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#this was hard to colour but I did my best and that's got to count for something

peachypinkygloss · 7 months

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dior girl ✰ park jimin

Park Jimin is one of a kind. When he wants something, he gets it, no matter how hard it can be. He's not scared to get his hands dirty. If he had any morals, maybe he'd consider his obsession with you getting out of hands. But this man has absolutely no morals.

୨୧ pairing: designer!jimin x model/fem!reader

୨୧ genre: strangers to lovers, age gap (21 & 38), smut, slight angst

୨୧ word count: 8.1k

୨୧ warnings: unrealistic depiction of the fashion industry, alcohol consumption & mention of drugs use, manipulation & corruption, jimin isn't a good person (especially not to oc lol <3), violent sexual thoughts, jimin's a sadist (my fav headcannon :D), heavy dom/sub dynamics, hard dom!jimin, unprotected vaginal & anal sex, anal play (use of a buttplug), my new headcannon: jimin likes giving anal, dacryphilia, praising & degradation, oral sex (m), face fucking, aftercare ig because yes jimin's a sadist but he still has a heart.

a.n.: yup so idk if you guys were expecting that... but i did say none of the characters were ethical lmfao so 🤷🏻‍♀️ i really, really hope you like the first part, i've worked hard on it even though it's not super long. so please, reblog and tell me what you thought about it! <3 as always, don't like, don't read.

[dior girl moodboard] ["older" masterlist]

His studio is his sanctuary. It's the only place in the world he can spend hours in without even noticing the moon setting or the sun rising. In his studio it feels like the time doesn't exist or that it's just a futile detail that doesn't have much importance.

When he's creating a piece, nothing around him matters. The only things he's willing to give attention to are the placements of the needles on the fabric, the little lines that form the pattern of the clothing, and the way his scissors cut through the satin material of the dress he's designing.

He's thought about this design for so long and he finally got the opportunity to make it. He's thought about the colours of the dress and also of the seam, about the length of the hem and the sleeves, how deep the neckline should be and if lace would be suitable.

He doesn't even recall how many sketches he's made of the dress. At some point it was consuming his entire mind, this dress the only design he could draw and think of.

Now that he's finally creating it, he has the feeling that it's going to be the best piece he's ever made. He already sees everyone talking about it, saying how much of a genius Park Jimin is. It's going to be the design of the year — of the century.

He still misses something, though, and it might be the most important part of the design. He needs a model, the perfect body to wear his piece and present it to the fashion world.

It can't be anybody, it must be someone who's confident, who always has their head up and who radiates elegance and sports a unique beauty.

Jimin still hasn't found this person. He constantly searches for them, but never finds them or when he thinks that he has, he discovers flaws he cannot unseen.

All the Dior models are great, but not enough. They don't spark anything in Jimin when he watches them strode down the catwalk. He's checked upon the apprentices and the newer models the company has hired, but he saw no one extraordinary.

Until today.

He hears steps against the wooden floor of his studio, entering the place without knocking. "Ah, there he is!" A manly voice exclaims, Jimin immediately recognizes it as his friend's, Sungwoon. "I have someone to introduce you."

Jimin raises his gaze up from his working table and looks at Sungwoon who's accompanied by a beautiful, young woman. He's then suddenly interested, contrary to usual where he doesn't really care about the many girls Sungwoon brings, claiming each one as the new phenomenon of the fashion industry.

When Jimin turns around, he eyes you up and down, barely glimpsing in Sungwoon's way. It's all it takes, one simple glance and he knows you're the one he needs — the one he wants and has to ruin.

Sungwoon introduces you both and when your name is pronounced by the man, sounding so charming and delicate, he's certain you're the model he had been waiting for since a long time.

You seem shy, arms locked behind your back, but you stand up straight and have a polite smile drawn on your face.

"I thought maybe you'd like to get to know each other, right?" Sungwoon raises his eyebrows in Jimin's direction. "Everyone's fond of her," he smiles and pats your back, encouraging you to speak up.

"Thanks," you smile back at Sungwoon before glancing back at Jimin who still hasn't looked away from you. "I've been a big fan of your work since I was a little kid, Mr. Park. You've inspired me to become a model."

The way you say his name has his cock twitching in his pants, filthy thoughts of him spanking your butt while you cry his name invading his mind.

He can sense your vulnerability, your willingness to submit. Who would he be to deny you that? Him, who is so eager to dominate the ones he's attracted to, to break but also repair them.

He knows it when someone's fragile, hiding their weaknesses under fake confidence. He doesn't know you, but he recognizes the pattern almost instantly. What can be broken can also be repaired and you're asking him to break you.

"I'm glad to hear that," Jimin says politely, a slight smile tugging on his lips. He's not the type to smile — stretch the corner of his mouth upward to imitate the person in front of him, he finds it useless. But for you, he'll do it, just so you trust him because you're so desperate to give yourself to the opposite sex.

"Park, you were wondering who'd be part of the fall show this year," Sungwoon begins, looking at you like you're the most irradiant ruby in the world. "Well, you have her in front of you." You giggle softly at the man's words, nodding your head at him and then looking at Jimin as if waiting for some praises.

Jimin faintly smiles, seeing your eyes glimmering and he curses himself for not finding you first. You'd have been his by now, his to praise, to kiss, to fuck, to destroy. But he swears, if he happens to break you, he'll gratefully keep you safe close to him.

๑♡՞

T H E N

"Careful," Jimin softly says as he catches you up from falling on the floor. You let out a high pitched laugh, as if all of this is a big joke, and push him back with a hand on his chest.

"I'm fine," you answer, shrugging him off with a flip of your hand. You stagger from left to right, leaning against the wall when you almost fall a second time. You laugh it off again, halting your steps.

Jimin looks at you with a cringe expression, eyeing the people behind, sporting worried looks on their faces.

You all went out after the show; models, designers, directors, stylists... everyone. It wasn't your plan to get drunk, Jimin knows that because you're not supposed to drink alcohol since you're on a very strict diet. A glass from time to time isn't so bad, but your consumption clearly surpassed just one glass tonight.

It's not really your fault, though. Technically yes, since you're the one who swallowed all of the glasses of wine, but you had a little help.

A little help from Jimin himself.

When you weren't looking, he poured more alcohol in your glass and to his satisfaction you've noticed nothing and gulped everything. Sure, you got a bit suspicious, wondering how you had only drank so little when you remembered swallowing more than that.

But Jimin assured you it was only your first glass, so you drank, and drank, and drank... Until you were more than tipsy.

You've received nasty looks from your colleagues, especially the other models who weren't drinking a single drop of wine, and yet, still weren't awarded with the status of the 'face of Dior'. How ironic that the drunkest girl in the room was the face of Dior and the little protégée of Mr. Park.

Years and years of training, countless sleepless nights, meals that are as nutritious as birds seed... All of the efforts in the world to have your biggest dream stolen by a model who is in the industry for less than six months.

Their rage is understandable, but Jimin couldn't care less. In fact, everything is going as planned and he can't fuck things up now. No, because if he does, all of the things he has done until now will be completely irrelevant.

"I'll... I'll bring her to our room, you can go out without us," Jimin announces, watching you sit down on the floor in the middle of the corridor.

"Will she be okay?" A stylist asks.

"Of course. I'll take care of her."

He waits for everyone to be gone before he gets you up from the floor and leads you both to your hotel room. When you're in the room, he sits you down on the bed.

You don't say anything as he takes off his jacket and loosens his tie. He crouches down in front of you to remove your heels and he does the same with his shoes, leaving them at the entry.

When he comes back, he sees you quietly crying, the features of your face contorting into a sad expression. You've slightly sobered up, harshly coming back to reality, realizing how much you've embarrassed yourself tonight.

"What did I do?" You ask, looking up at him with teary eyes. "I fucked up, didn't I?"

Jimin sits down beside you, lifting your head up with his index under your chin and his thumb over it. "There's nothing that can't be repaired," he states in a soft voice, so low it sounds like a sweet whisper — a secret, a confession only you can hear. "Right?"

You sniff, wiping your tears away. You nod your head in agreement, slightly reassured, hoping Jimin will fix your mistakes. Your foolish mistakes, done by the carefree of a twenty-one year old.

"Shh, baby, shh," he softly murmurs, cradling your head in his hands and gently laying your face against his chest. You wrap your arms around his waist, hugging him tighter and tighter til suffocation.

He strokes your hair delicately, placing a sweet and warm kiss on the top of your head.

Someone as vulnerable as you contains a lot of emotions. He has to deal with them, which doesn't bother him at all. He wants you the way you are; sad and pitiful.

"Everything's going to be fine," he promises, but it's not entirely the truth. Not everything will be fine, though it'll be in the end, he thinks — he hopes.

You eventually pull away from his embrace, just enough to look at him. It seems like you're searching for something or maybe waiting for something, your eyes desperately staring at Jimin as if his simple presence will make all of your problems fly away.

You throw yourself at him and kiss him on the lips, fingers pulling on the hair at the nape of his neck. He reciprocates it, knowing you like your kisses sloppy and messy, wanting Jimin everywhere on you to remind you that he's always there.

You bring him closer, crumpling the material of his white shirt between your fists, moaning and whining as your teeth clash together at how roughly you kiss each other.

Jimin breaks your exchange first, both catching your breaths. His eyes observe you quietly as you look at him like you're still waiting for something.

"Did you do what I told you to?" He questions you, referring to your conversation of a few days when you came to his studio to try on his dress.

You were a bit stressed out, putting on the clothing like you were scared you'd rip it. He still remembers the way the satin was sliding up your body, hugging your waist and ass perfectly. He was baffled at how incredibly well it suited you as if he had made it exactly for you.

And maybe it was made for you, after all.

Because when he saw his creation on you, he knew you had to wear it for the runway. It has to be you, he'll accept no one else.

Jimin will make you walk the runway wearing his dress — the last time you'll ever step on the catwalk. After that, he'll keep you away from the rest of the world. He'll refuse anyone to see you because you're going to be his.

His forever.

"Yes," you nod your head, trapping your bottom lip between your teeth.

"Tell me what you did," Jimin softly demands, holding your chin in his hand, mouths inches away from each other.

You're too shy to say it out loud and that's why he wants you to tell him. Also to be sure you did everything correctly, but mainly because he wants to see you embarrassed.

"I prepared myself for you..." You begin, holding eye contact even though you feel your face heating up just thinking about all the things you've done per his request. "I... I used lube both on me and... the toy," you continue in a shy tone, so low Jimin wouldn't hear you if he wasn't so close.

"Where on you, sweetheart?" He interrupts, wanting each detail, each little thing you normally wouldn't have done if it wasn't for him. And all while thinking of him.

You swallow, "On my ass, Jimin," you answer in a whisper. "I stretched it out for you, using the toy like you told me," you finally admit.

"Good girl," Jimin purrs. "Let me see it then."

You proceed to strip off of your dress, now used to be nude in front of him, and slide your panties down your thighs, discarding them away on the floor.

You get back up on the mattress and position yourself on all fours close to the edge of the bed. Jimin stands up and goes behind you to have a closer look at your ass.

His veiny hands pull your cheeks apart, revealing your rim to his insatiable, sadistic eyes. You glance over your shoulder, curious of what he has in mind and what he has prepared for you.

You softly gasp when he spits and lets the globe of spit drip down between your asscheeks, rolling over your puckered hole. You clench around nothing, relieved to have his attention, to finally feel his hands on you instead of the usual touch of yours.

He sees that your ass is a bit looser than the last time he saw it, but it still clearly needs more preparation to welcome his girthy cock — though it's not like he cares that much if you're prepped enough or not.

He passes his thumb over your tight muscle, circling it and smearing his saliva over it. He wants to fuck it so bad, destroy it and do unbelievably violent things to you. Should he tonight? Should he show you his dark and evil side?

He's choked you before — smacked your ass hard til you felt your skin stings, overstimulated you to the point your orgasms were just spasms passing through your body, fucked your throat while you were drooling all over yourself, and tied your legs and wrists together to restrict your movements.

So fucking your ass can't be that bad, but the thing is Jimin wants it to be bad. He then wonders what would happen if the line is ever crossed. Would you endure it, would you defend yourself? Would you shut the fuck up and take it like you're asked to?

But you trust him so much — with all your pathetic being — and he thinks you'd let him cross any lines he desires to. He probably already has crossed multiple lines, and being the poor, sad girl that you are, you said nothing.

You truly are extraordinary.

He gives a slight slap to one of your asscheeks, groping both of them after, feeling how soft and tender your flesh is. "You did good, sweetheart," he comments in a honeyed voice that has you mewling, sounding so smooth and sweet. "How about we play with it a little?"

He lifts up a brow at you and you nod sheepishly, sinking your teeth into your bottom lip. "Yes..."

"Great," he says in a low tone, running his hands one last time over your ass before going to take something from his suitcase.

"What is it?" You question, your curious eyes landing on the small object he's holding.

Jimin brings the object to you, something made of metal, the end having the shape of a cone and a pink gem placed on the top. "A gift for my princess," he replies, opening the bottle of lube he brought as well.

He applies some lube around your tight hole and on the butt plug, and carefully pushes the head of the toy in your ass. You gasp softly, feeling it slowly stretch you out, sinking in gradually as Jimin holds your cheeks apart.

"Mmh, feels good, Sir," you moan, arching your back and pushing your butt closer to Jimin.

When the plug is all the way in, the pink gem peeking out between your two globes of flesh, he smacks your other cheek, making it jiggle from the harsh hit.

"Is that so, dirty girl?" He wonders, gripping your hips and colliding his hips with your butt, sensing his big bulge pulsing under his pants. "You like it when your little ass gets stretched out?"

"I like everything you do to me," you say with a content sigh, pussy clenching around nothing as your ass gets used to the small butt plug.

Jimin genuinely thinks he can't find better than you. You were so shy in the beginning, looking like a lost puppy wherever you went. You just needed someone bigger and older to show you the way — though you were too dumb, and still are, to realize he was leading you to the wrong path.

It's not like you seem to mind, anyway.

After all, you both got what you wanted; you, male attention, someone to rely on and be protected by, and him, a woman to break and keep with him forever.

He lets go of your hips to unbuckle his belt, pulling the leather material out of the gold loop with the luxury Dior logo on it. He lets the two ends of the belt hang off, not bothering to remove it completely, and tucks the fly of his pants down.

He finally frees his cock from the confines of his boxers, springing up and slapping against his stomach, the bit of pre-cum escaping from his tip dampening his shirt.

"You're so good to me, princess," he praises as he wraps a hand around the base of his engorged cock, aching and begging to be nestled in your cute little pussy.

His head pushes at your entrance, never fully entering, only teasing your hole and stimulating all of your sensitive nerves. He watches how his cock stretches your cunt, your walls expending to receive his bulbous tip and then closing down when he pulls out.

"Sir, please, want more," you beg him, pushing your ass on him to have his dick back in you. You let out a little whimper when Jimin holds your hips in place, stopping you from wiggling your butt side to side against his thick cock.

He hums and slaps your ass harshly, your skin stinging after. "Want my cock in your needy little pussy, baby? Is that what you're crying for?" He asks, teasing even more by swiping the head of his penis between your pussy lips, a string of your arousal sticking to his angry tip.

"Yes," you say back quickly and desperately, arching your back, literally presenting yourself to Jimin. "Been so good, don't I deserve it, Sir?" You softly murmur, still looking over your shoulder to see his gaze fixated on your quivering pussy, cock head sliding up and down over your sex.

"You do..." He responds distractedly, licking his plump lips, his fingers touching the pink gem peeking out from your ass. You're always so good and obedient for him, he even wonders if you ever did something that genuinely pissed him off before.

When he really sinks in, his head passing the barrier of your sweet pussy, he groans deeply, feeling your walls deliciously enveloping his hard cock tightly.

You moan in unison as he bottoms out in you, his balls touching your wet and warm pussy. He bends his back over yours, running his hand up your spine, feeling all the little bumps of it until he reaches your head and shoves it against the mattress.

You whine when he starts pounding into you, his girth stretching you out so well, leaving you panting and moaning loudly. His other hand holds your hip against his dick, fingers digging into your skin, leaving permanent marks on your body — as well as on your mind and your soul.

He already sets a hard and rapid pace — fucking is never soft or loving with Jimin, it's violent, long, and agonizing. It's a way to be himself, the real and dark version of himself he hides in public and releases when he gets intimate with you.

You surprisingly got accustomed to it, embracing it as if it was your destiny, the reason for your existence; to be his personal slut, the little toy he likes to play rough with. And you've accepted it, like you had no other choice but to be fucked into oblivion by Jimin whenever he feels like it.

"You like that, baby? Huh?" He growls, as if you're the disgusting one for liking the way he treats you, ravished and delighted to have his girthy cock sliding against your velvety walls. "You like it when I fuck you hard like this?" He repeats and grips your hair, pushing your head against the bed covers with more strength.

You babble out something, voice caught in your throat, too out of breath to formulate a simple sentence. You then only nod, your cheek squished against the mattress, Jimin's hand still pushing down on your head.

His mouth hangs open to let out heavy breaths and his eyes are focused on your face, watching the little translucent pearls fall on your face and on the covers. Your pussy swallows all of his girth, clenching so tightly it has him groaning and saying profanities under his breath.

It's sick how it makes his cock so fucking hard, leaking so much pre-cum in you and twitching avidly by seeing you struggle to breathe. You crumple the bed sheets between your little fists, doing everything in your power to keep your ass up for Jimin and not slump down on the bed from the hard thrusts he's inflicting on you.

He snaps his hips against your ass and the entirety of his length is covered in your wetness, a white ring made of your cream circling the base of his cock.

His hand holding your head descends to your neck, enclosing it with his fingers, the coldness of his silver rings contrasting with the hotness of your sweaty skin. He squeezes a little, just a bit so you know who's in control, so you never forget Jimin controls you — that he controls your life and thoughts.

With a grip on your hair, he brings your torso up, arched back against his chest. The material of his shirt sticks to your skin, coated in a thin layer of sweat. He continues to pound into you, his cock sliding in and out of your pussy rapidly, as he holds you by the throat, lewdly licking a long stripe along the side of your face.

You shudder in desire, hair standing up on your delicate arms. "You're my little whore, aren't you, baby?" His mouth is right beside your ear as he whispers dirty things to you, his lips touching your hair, damp at the nape of your neck. "So fucking compliant... You want to please me so bad like the slut that you are," he mouths the words against your hair, cock pulsing hard in your cunt.

His free hand that doesn't have a hold around your throat slides down your body, passing over your belly and reaching your puffy clit. The sharp zipper of his pants graces the flesh just under your ass, irritating your skin and making it itchy.

You clench around him when his digits find your sensitive bud, circling it sensually and slowly, the complete opposite of his hip thrusts.

"Yes, want to please you, Jimin," you gasp, bucking your hips at the feeling of his rough fingertips on your pussy. He grunts when you address him by his name, loving how it sounds on your tongue, so sweet and timid.

He remembers the first time you moaned his name; you were sprawled across his expensive leather couch, blindfolded and hands attached together with his black tie. Intense for your first time with him, but it was also the last time he's ever been that gentle with you.

It was when his cold fingertips graced the skin of your stomach that you let out a squeak followed by his name, said in the quietest moan. He had then stopped his movements and looked at your face, an expression of distress painted over your features.

He had realized how frail and weak you actually were, needing your most important sense to be at ease. That's why he had blindfolded you, to show you how dependent you are of him, how impossible it is for you to live without him to guide you.

He pushes your jaw to the side so your lips can meet his in a feverish kiss, wet tongues mingling together, drool dripping down from the corners of your mouth. He continues to ram his cock in your now soppy and messy pussy, the sound of skin against skin resonating in the hotel room.

He traps your bottom lip between his teeth, making you whimper and close your walls around his girth once again. Your little hands grip the material of his trousers, keeping him close and holding on to something because the hard cadence of his hip thrusts push you forward, breasts bouncing up on your chest.

"Fuck," he curses and he suddenly stops, steadying his hips against your butt. You let out a whiny moan as Jimin lets go of your face and hips.

You're sad to have your pleasure ripped away from you so hastily, but you don't have the time to complain, Jimin slipping out of your cunt and pushing you down violently on the mattress.

You turn around on your back to see him unbuttoning his dress shirt and throwing it on the floor, revealing to you his beautiful chest and defined abs. He gets rid of his pants and socks after, finally removing his boxers, the only things remaining on him being his rings and the watch crowning his right wrist.

His cock glistens in your juices, more pre-cum leaking from his swollen tip and twitching avidly against his stomach. Even though him fucking you while being all dressed and you completely bare is a way to humiliate and degrade you, he also likes to be naked sometimes.

He loves skin to skin contact, how your bodies stick together because of all the sweat coating you. It's addicting, it's rougher and it creates more friction — more pain.

He doesn't mind being naked too because he knows how to dominate you either way. He doesn't find it embarrassing, on the contrary, it makes him scarier and hungrier. While you shiver without your clothes on, curled up on yourself, Jimin is imposing, his cock thick and girthy enough to split you in half.

He crawls back to you, hovering over you like a predator had caught his prey, boring his eyes into yours. You look at him in awe, always waiting patiently. You feel his cock against your thigh, thick and veiny, your hole pathetically quivering — missing his size stretching out your pussy.

He sneaks a hand between your legs and reaches the little pink gem, ready to get it out. "Take a deep breath sweetheart," Jimin instructs and you inhale deeply.

He doesn't waste a second, pulling out the butt plug out of your ass. You scrunch your eyes shut at the pain, exhaling when it's done. He carefully sets it on the nightstand, coming back to you after.

He bends your legs over your stomach and looks at your ass, just begging him to fuck it, shining with lube and arousal that leaks from your pussy. His erect cock is just so close to it and Jimin could slide right in with one movement of his hips.

He lets go of one of your legs to grip his engorged erection, a little gasp escaping your lips when he presses the head of his cock at your tight hole, threatening to sink in.

"Sir," you sigh, not sure if you're ready for that. It always burns no matter how good you prepped before and he knows that. That's why he's so tempted, that he's staring so obsessively at your rim.

Will it hurt you? Will you grip his biceps in an attempt to dissuade him? He wants to see those tears falling from your eyes again, he wants to lick them and tastes your pain. He feels more blood rush to his penis at the mere thought of hurting you.

Give him all of your pain, he'll fucking take it whole and cherish it. He wants it — he needs it. Accuse him for having a sick and twisted mind, accuse him for everything you've ever been hurt by because he'll gladly take the blame.

"I know you can take it," he says in a low tone, glancing up at your face as he applies just a bit more pressure to your ass hole. "Can you, baby?" Jimin asks, waiting for you to admit how much you want it, how badly you want him to destroy you.

"Yes..." You whisper back, a long shiver running up your spine as his eyes pierce through you.

"Yes, what? Tell me, sweetheart," he demands, and it's as if he doesn't care about your response whatsoever because the next thing he does makes you yelp in pain.

His tip has entered you, the burning sensation forcing you to scrunch your eyes shut, your instinct thinking it'll protect you.

"Yes, I- I can..." you stutter and as expected, you dig your nails in the flesh of his biceps — only fair to hurt him in return. "I can take your cock in my ass..."

You take a sharp breath, eyes slowly opening, all watery and painful. Jimin groans at that, stuffing more of himself in your hole. "Good girl," he praises, voice raspy, ending with a deep grunt.

He stretches you out completely, his dick in no comparison to the toys you've used to prepare yourself. You open your mouth as he pushes himself in gradually, tears streaming down your face when you blink.

The tears roll down the side of your face and Jimin can't help but be turned on, leaning in to kiss your face and collect some of your tears, tasting the saltiness of them on his tongue.

"Jimin...!" You look at him with the saddest and most hurtful gaze, tears rolling down your face. "It burns," you add in a quiet voice, now scratching his back, leaving long red trails on his skin.

"I know, baby, I know," he softly murmurs in your ear, a husky moan leaving his mouth when he's completely nestled in you, balls touching your ass. "You're so tight, fuck," he sucks air through his teeth, not moving until he estimates he's waited long enough.

He gives warm and wet kisses to your neck, descending to your collarbones and groping your breasts, slowly starting to move his hips. You lock your legs behind his back, wanting him as close to you as possible despite the pain he's inflicting on you.

He loves knowing it hurts you because it makes it more pleasurable to him somehow. The pain will go away soon anyway, that's why he doesn't bother to stop or slow down. You have to get used to the feeling first.

He wouldn't go too far to hurt you. The choking, the hair pulling, the smacks... He keeps it for the bedroom, but he won't lie that there's a part of him that wants to ruin your life, ruin everything you've accomplished so far just so he can see those sad eyes of yours and hear you ask him for help out of desperation.

It's not even sexual, he just wants to break you, that's all he desires. Though your life is something he wants to destroy, it's more of a way to have you dependant on him after. If your career is no longer successful, your solution is Jimin because he's the only person in your life capable of taking care of you both emotionally and physically.

His teeth chew on the tender skin of your neck while his hand travels all over your body, many veins popping out along his strong arm. The cool sensation of his rings on your stomach makes you shiver, his finger gently circling your clit to make the pain more bearable.

His cock slides in your hole back and forth, your ass slowly but surely taking the size of girth. Many curses leave Jimin's mouth, your ass probably the best he's ever fucked. You feel so good around him, you're tight, but you loosen easily, making it so, so pleasurable for him.

His hand that was roaming over your body comes to close around your throat and he turns his head to your side, lips brushing over your temple. "Yeah, just like that, baby," he mutters under his breath, his nose pressing down on your hair as he murmurs the words to you. "Just like that..."

A choked moan is all you can respond, eyes rolling back in your skull as Jimin splits your ass open, fucking his thick cock into you. His hot breath hits the side of your face, his chest heaving rapidly while you claw at his back, white scratches appearing on his skin.

He sweetly kisses your temple as he pounds into you, not tightening his hand around your throat, just holding you in place — always letting you know that he is always in control.

Your tits slightly bounce up and down on your chest, little whines coming out of you each time Jimin bottoms out. It starts feeling good for you — really good — and you think that this pleasure is totally worth a bit of pain at the beginning.

You grip the hair at the nape of his neck and bring him in for a kiss. He accepts it, kissing you back as if he wants to possess your whole mouth, biting and licking your lips. You moan into his mouth, twisting his hair between your fist and sinking your nails into the flesh of his back.

He backs away from you a little, his plump lips glistening in both of your saliva, and places his two palms on your boobs. He feels your perky nipples under his hands, just loving how plushy your breasts are, fitting perfectly in his palms.

He keeps thrusting in you as he gropes your tits and you bring your hands over his, looking into each other's eyes. He lowly groans, holding eye-contact with you.

You feel his veins under your palms, your pussy clenching around nothing but air while you run your hands all over his arms. You enjoy the sensations of his pulsing veins under your small fingers as you sink your teeth into your bottom lip, staring into Jimin's dark eyes.

"Jimin..." You moan his name, throwing your head back and closing your eyes, just enjoying the feeling of his hard cock entering and exiting your tight hole. Jimin takes the opportunity to smooch your neck again as you expose it to him, his full lips delicately pressing down on your throat. "I love it," you sigh pleasantly.

He hums, the sound coming deep from his throat. He wants to hurt you, yes, but he likes it even more when you love the pain. He just knew you were exactly like him when he first saw you. He had the feeling that you needed someone like him, someone that'd push you to your limits and make you discover a new type of pleasure.

And he was right because there's not one time where you told him to stop.

"My dirty girl," he purrs in response, bringing his lips up to your jaw. He slowly rolls your nipples between his fingertips, pinching and pulling on them. "You're stupid, but so, so good for me, baby," he groans in your ear, gritting his teeth as he feels his balls tightening.

He slowly halts his hips movements, letting out heavy breaths as he eventually pulls out of you. You gasp when he does so, already missing his cock stretching out your ass.

You're both trying to catch your breaths, Jimin raising himself up from you and getting out of the bed. His erection stands tall against his stomach, bouncing up as he walks to the front of the bed.

You watch him getting away until he orders you to follow him. "Come here," he says softly and you don't make him wait. "On your knees," Jimin commands when you're facing him, sinking down to your knees after.

He places a hand behind your head and the other around the base of his dick, guiding the head of his cock toward your lips as he pushes down on your head.

"Here, baby," he instructs in a low voice. "Take it in your mouth." You part your lips to welcome Jimin's length, his bulbous tip shining in pre-cum and your juices under the light of the hotel room.

He immediately moans when he enters the warmth of your mouth, his heavy cock sliding on your wet tongue. He doesn't let you have much control, pushing his dick in your mouth until your nose touches his pubic hair.

You relax your jaw for Jimin, allowing him to stuff your mouth full of his cock. He looks down at you, watching the way your lips wrap around him tightly, your eyes starting to water. He still holds the back of your head with one hand, guiding you over his stiff erection and you moan obscenely around Jimin, drool dripping down on your chin.

He begins to fuck your mouth, forcing you to take the whole thing each time he bottoms out. He moves his hips back and forth, obsessed with the way his girth appears and reappears between your lips as he uses your mouth as he pleases.

"Shit," he hisses when you hollow your cheeks, making it more pleasurable for him. "You're a fucking cockslut, aren't you, baby?" He says breathily, his eyes not once leaving his cock penetrating your mouth over and over again.

You whine around him, surely agreeing with what he said. It sends deliciously vibrations through his entire body, the sounds of your moans and hearing you gag around him is so arousing to him. He wants to hear more so he literally uses your mouth like a toy, snapping his hips against you, his balls slapping your chin.

He lets out a deep moan, your cheeks now damp and eyelashes all wet because of your tears, eyes stinging as Jimin fucks your throat like a mad man.

"Stroke your clit," he manages to say between two heavy breaths. "You can get off by yourself, right? I know you're soaking wet just by letting me use that pretty mouth of yours," he mocks you, but he knows he's right. Whatever he does, your cunt is always dripping wet.

You whimper again, doing what he told you to and sneaking a hand between your thighs to play with your pussy. You part your legs wider as you circle your clit with your finger, Jimin's hooded eyes lazily watching you playing with yourself.

Your right hand is laying on his thigh while the other is operating between your legs, pleasuring yourself to the sounds of Jimin's moans and the feeling of his stiff cock weighing down on your tongue.

You do your best to breathe through your nose, swallowing around his length and flattening your tongue underneath him. Your juices drip down your inner thighs, your finger flickering over your sensitive bud smoothly because of your arousal.

The whole room is smelling like sex, an odour that Jimin can't ignore, loving it so much. Your lips glide so easily over his hard cock, completely covered in your spit and still some of your wetness, tasting yourself on him.

"Ah, fuck," he curses, his head rolling back on his shoulders, eyes still strained down on you. He feels the familiar burning sensation at the pit of his stomach, indicating he's really close to his orgasm. He stops thrusting in you. "Go on the bed, baby."

You're taken aback, but you follow his order, pulling him out of your mouth and laying your back down on the mattress close to the edge. You beautifully moan when Jimin penetrates your pussy a second time, bending your legs over your stomach.

"Oh, god," you cry softly, being pounded onto the bed by him right away, tits moving up and down on your chest.

His hands are positioned on each side of your shoulders, snapping his hips against yours so harshly you feel your skin stinging. You keep doing circle motions on your clit, now faster and impatient to reach your high.

You let out a high-pitched moan when Jimin suddenly steadies his hips over yours, dropping down to his elbows as he hides his face in the crook of your neck. "Holy fuck," he grunts, gripping the bed sheets tightly in fists beside your head as his cock twitches in your pussy.

"Yes, yes," you quietly exclaim, your clitoral orgasm passing through you, making you arch your back and buck your hips.

Your hole clenches repeatedly around him and he finally comes undone into you, shooting long, thick ropes of cum deep into you. He empties himself in your wet cunt, cumming just after you.

When he slips out of you, more spurts out of his tip, landing on your pussy, covering it in his creamy cum. You moan at the warm sensation, always loving how it feels both in and on you. Some of his seeds dribble out of you, dripping down to your ass.

He stays above you for some time, catching his breath and looking at the mess he made on you. He stares up at your face, seeing how fucked up you look, hair in a nest and eyes reddened.

Later, Jimin is in the shower, washing his hair and his body, passing a soft cloth soaked in soap over his chest. He lets the water fall over his head, wetting his black locks. He stays maybe a bit longer than normally, staring at the tiled wall.

He thinks about you, about all the things he's planned. He revised everything in his head, imagining you walk on the podium wearing his design, people looking at his piece with admiration in their eyes.

He thinks about all of that that will go down for you after the show, getting fired, losing your career and your fans. Many articles talking about your excessive use of alcohol and drugs, saying how tired and sad you look beside Jimin.

You won't last long, you're too weak anyway. A downfall like this is unconquerable, nobody recovers from that, and surely not a model who will be thrown out of the industry as soon as you turn twenty-five.

Jimin knows the industry, he's been in it for years now. He's aware of how cruel it is, how difficult and harsh it can be on fragile little girls like you.

But that's why he's here, to take care of you once nobody will want you anymore. That's the goal, after all; you to be finally his — solely and completely his.

"Jimin?"

Your voice reaches him, turning his head in your direction, seeing you hesitantly entering the shower with him. He opens his arms, inviting you to come closer and you do, hugging him and laying your head down on his wet chest.

"I love you, sweetheart," he softly murmurs against your hair. "I'll never leave you, you know that, right?"

You nod your head, looking up at him and meeting his gaze. "I love you, too."

๑♡՞

A F T E R

The runway went incredibly well. Celebrities and journalists were all gathered for the fall show, totally amazed by every design and the models that were wearing them.

But there was one specific piece that everyone was willing to say was the best.

Jimin was satisfied to see that his name stood out among everyone else's, being called more times than Dior itself. He predicted it; it was the creation that every guest remembered, the dress that the fans were only talking about.

He'd take all the credit, he was the one who imagined it and then sewed it after all, but he has to admit that you had contributed to the fame a lot.

Being the beloved face of Dior only made people talk more about it and that was what Jimin needed.

But everything has an end, doesn't it?

When Jimin comes back to his apartment, the place is silent except for the TV playing, as he thought it would be. You're looking through the window, watching the city living at night while it's raining. You're sitting on the sofa, not even acknowledging his presence as he enters, getting rid of his shoes.

You're not much of a talker since you've been fired from Dior a few days ago just after the fall show. He understands your wish of remaining silent, needing a bit of space to process everything that has happened the past weeks in your small head.

It was going to happen soon enough anyway. You've been to your photoshoots completely drunk, sometimes just going in with a hangover, but of course it didn't help your case at all.

Jimin was guilty for letting you drink alcohol so soon in the morning. No need to deny it, he was even the one for dropping you off at work like that. Well, he had to do it if he wanted people to notice how far you've fallen.

He doesn't feel bad, though. Your career wasn't going to last with Jimin's sabotage or not. He did you a favour, you should be thankful.

You can't handle being a model. If you could, none of that would have happened. You wouldn't have gained weight, you would have been suspicious of the amount of calories Jimin was feeding you. The bottle of wine wouldn't have been so tempting and smoking weed wouldn't have ever occurred to you as a good idea.

Some people can, others can't and you're one of them. You shouldn't be ashamed of it, sometimes things just don't work out like we would have wanted them to.

"Did you see the article they wrote about me?" You ask, already knowing he's walking up to you without looking. "You surely did, I bet that's all they're talking about..."

He sits down beside you and you eventually turn around, facing him. You care so much about what others think of you. It must be so tiring having such a low self-esteem. He can only imagine it; seeing you look through the window like a sad puppy, your life finally making sense when Jimin comes home.

"I did, but nothing of that matters to me," he answers, the most honest he's ever been. And even if he had to lie, it's not like you wouldn't have believed him. You always trust whatever he says.

You don't reply, your head still filled with many thoughts.

"Hey, come here," he softly tells you, patting his thigh. You straddle his lap, setting your hands on his shoulders. He cups your chin, forcing you to look at him as you keep avoiding his gaze. "Whatever they say, whatever their name is, nothing will ever be more important than you."

Because who is he if he lets some article affect the way he sees you? He's known you since the beginning of your career and he stayed til the end of it.

He knows you better than everyone else. He was with you during your highs and lows and he'll still be there for the next ones. There's nothing in the world that could make him leave you. After everything he's done to have you, there's no way he'll go away.

How cowardly of him if he does. He can't leave when he's promised he'd heal you — close all of your past wounds and create other ones.

He may be selfish, but there's one thing that he isn't and it's a fucking liar. He sticks to his words, and when he says he'll never leave you, that means he'll never, never abandon you — he'll never leave your side, not even once. He can't risk it.

๑♡՞

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writingsbychlo · 1 year

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WHAT HAPPENS IN VELARIS | azriel

summary; what happens in vegas? what happens in velaris. or, what happens the morning after two blind-in-love best friends get married while black-out drunk at a starfall party?

word count; 6733

notes; okay, I know starfall week is technically over, but the end of my week got real busy unexpectedly, so there are another few fics to come which we'll technically count. shhh.

You awoke with a startle, the familiar feeling of a shadow stroking over your cheek, but unfamiliar for the morning. Your eyes snapped open, sunlight pouring in and burning your eyes at the brightness, a hoarse groan leaving you. As you dragged yourself up in bed, darkness exploded around you, a dizzying kaleidoscope of shadows whipping around the room in a flurry that made your stomach twist.

“Az, make it stop.” You groaned, and he stirred a little, groaning himself. At your words, though, whether you or him, the shadows began to calm, gracefully blocking out the light coming from the window and setting the room back into peaceful semi-darkness. Propping yourself up a little further, the man snoozing at your side huffed, wings tucking in a little tighter as he began to rise.

“Why are you in my bed?” He groaned, twisting to grab a pillow and slam it over his face, and you rubbed at your eyes, before turning to face him properly.

“You’re in my bed.” Scanning your eyes greedily along his bare arms, a thing you could later blame on this raging hangover if you were caught, your breath stuttered when you properly took him in. Not just bare arms, but bare chest. Rippling muscles peeking out from here the covers had slid down to his waist, swirling tattoos and dark chest hair. Your gaze roamed a little further, a squeak leaving your lips before your hand slammed over your eyes. Bare legs, one hanging out from the edge of the covers now, draped over the side of the bed like his wings. “You’re in my bed naked! Why are you in my bed naked?”

“I’m what?” That caught his attention, the man sitting up almost ramrod straight, back stiff and crumpled, lazy wings flaring a little too late to catch himself in the sudden movement. His hand flew out, both of you taking a loud gasp when that hand, sliding under the covers to grasp at anything, connecting with your thigh, gripping tightly for balance. A look of sickness crossed over his face as his head presumably spun, much like yours, in an equally awful hangover. “That’s your thigh. Naked thigh. Bare skin. Please tell me you have clothes on?”

His voice rose higher and higher in pitch, eyes fixed determinedly forwards as you glanced down at yourself, lifting the covers to check. “Yes…” His shoulders sagged a little, head daring to turn to you. “Sort of?”

“Sort of, what-” His jaw dropped, eyes visibly widening a little as he stared at your chest, and you smacked his shoulder. His cheeks reddened, but he didn’t look away. His voice was much raspier when he spoke next; “Cute bra.”

“Azriel!” You yanked the covers up, covering yourself from the neck down, and that blush spread to his ears as he finally met your gaze. He only shrugged. Reaching a hand under the covers himself towards his crotch, you were ready to chew his head off, before he was letting out a relieved sigh.

“I have my boxers on still.”

“Oh, okay. So, we didn’t…” You waggled a finger between your bodies, and that blush that had started to fade gained colour on his cheeks again. You were sure your own face was just as warm.

“No, I mean, surely we’d remember if we did… that.”

“It’d be pretty hard to forget,” You mumbled, hangover clouding your brain enough that you didn’t quite realise your eyes were roaming down his chest again until he cleared his throat, the muscles of his chest flexing a little as he did. You’d pretend until your dying breath that the sight didn’t make your mouth dry a little.

It didn’t change the fact, however, that you could get used to waking up like this. Sure, you’d seen Azriel shirtless before, many times. Just like he’d seen you in bikinis in Summer, or scandalous dresses that arguably revealed more than this when you visited Hewn City, but that didn’t make it any less domestic. This wasn’t causal beachwear, or training, or a mission. This was home, this was comfy mornings when he should be smiling and kissing your forehead and asking what you want for breakfast. It all made your throat pinch a little.

Azriel’s lips were moving, he’d been saying something and you’d trailed off into daydreams. Snapping away the small smile from your lips, your attention moved to him. “What?”

“I said, maybe we should get dressed, and I can try to sneak out before anyone notices us in the halls.” Normally, this wouldn't be such a challenge, because you only had Nesta and Cassian to deal with, and they’d likely sleep in late today. The problem, was that following last night’s Starfall party, Rhys and Feyre were here with Nyx, Mor and Emerie, Elain and Lucien, Amren and Varian, and probably a couple of party-goers just now rousing themselves enough to leave. So many people to hide from, and your head pounded at the mere thought.

“Good idea.” You rubbed at your temples, even the sound of the sheets rustling around him was grating on your eardrums. But, you couldn't pass up the opportunity for just one more look at him, before he was gone, and would doubtless avoid you for days to come as the awkwardness settled. As he stood, he flexed his arms up and over his head, wings fluttering in a loose stretch, and your eyes widened. The garbled sound, something between a gasp and laugh, that fell from your lips was beyond your control. “Your wings!”

“What? What about them?” From the tone of your voice, he tried to look over his shoulder, unable to see what you were seeing. You discarded the blanket, crawling on your hands and knees over the mattress until you could kneel up behind him, one hand cupped over your mouth. The shock had effectively eliminated any remaining headache or sensitivity, his wide eyes finding yours. “What?”

“Flare them all the way out.” He did as told, the white paint smeared across the leathery membrane was clear words to you now, and you let out a shaky breath, tracing one letter with the pads of your fingers.

“Please don’t do that unless you want me to embarrass myself further.” His words came on a groan as you touched the flesh, and you snatched your hand back, cheeks burning hot now as you realised what you’d done. Squeaking out an apology, you stood, guiding him over to the large mirror in your bedroom and turning him around so he could see what was written there.

Painted in thick capitals across his wings in white paste, were the stark words ‘just married’. A little chipped, somewhat faded as you were sure you’d find paint in your bed for weeks now, but there was no mistaking it. “Oh my God, Az…”

He looked down at his left hand, finding a beautiful silver band there, adorning his finger and catching in the rays of sun that occasionally flickered in from between his shadows at the window. As he glanced at you, the thought lingered in the back of your mind that you were still in only your underwear, as was he, and perhaps you should care about that, but the fact he was married was pinging around the inside of your head like a pebble.

“Who the hell did you marry?” You forced a laugh out, like everything in your body hadn't gone numb at the idea.

He only cleared his throat, picking up your left hand, and lifting it up to show off the matching silver band there. “You, apparently.”

You took a moment to admire the ring on your hand, the worry inside of you at having gotten married quashed momentarily by both relief and the sheer beauty of the gem on your finger. It was a blue colour, the same as his siphons, ridiculously cheesy but somehow perfect, and exactly what you’d have picked while drunk. Dotted around it were bands of silver leaves from metal, making it look like a flower nestled amongst nature, wrapped delicately around your finger.

The silence dragged on between you both, each of you taking a second to come to terms with what had happened.

“Okay, I mean, this is fine. It's fine, right?” His focus snapped back to you, lowering his hand, and furrowed brows raised a little. “This is totally casual. Let’s just act normal and get some breakfast. I bet nobody knows.”

“Okay, good call…” He cleared his throat, shoulders rolling back the way he did when calculating his next move in a sparring match against Cassian, or a battle of wits with Nesta. “We eat, get rid of these hangovers, and figure out a plan later.”

“Yes!” Your voice was a little too loud, both of you wincing. “Yes. Good.”

Darting around the room, you left him there, gathering some clothes from your drawers and tugging on a pair of simple leggings and a hoodie, feet shoved into a pair of comfortable slippers, the most causal outfit you could think of for the day after a Starfall rager. He only stood, idling in the room and alternating between staring at the ring on his finger, the words in the mirror, and you.

“What?”

“I… only have that. It’s a little walk-of-shame-y, don’t you think?” He pointed to his suit, still lying in a crumpled heap on the floor near your dress, and your cheeks flooded with heat once again.

“Right… you should go get some clothes. Do your little shadow-hop thingy.” Your hands settled on your hips, waiting.

“I can’t Rhys hasn’t removed the protection wards from the party yet.” He shifted, face that of pure concentration, and the shadows in the room pulled just slightly towards him, but quickly sputtered back to their own devices. Stupid protection wards against snooping guests. “You’ll have to go get some.”

“You want me to sneak across the palace, into your bedroom, and rifle through your draws to find your clothes?” His scowl formed.

“Yes, I want you to go across the hall, into my bedroom, a place you’ve been before, and go into my first dresser, top two drawers, and bring me some fresh clothes.”

“Snarky.” You muttered, making your way across the room. He stuck his tongue out at you childishly, before turning his attention back to the mirror. On the other side of your bedroom door, as it clicked shut behind you, the air was colder. Refreshing, clearing your head. The smell of food was already wafting through the halls, chatter in every direction but none too close, if you were quick.

Sneaking along, around two corners and one small set of stairs - across the hall, snarky bastard - you found his room. The door was mercifully unlocked for you, and you were quick to close it behind you. It was calmer than your own, the curtains open and golden light spilling in far softer than your own as his bedroom faced away from the rising sun. It smelled like him, that perfect mix that you always found so enticing, and the pathetic hope that it lingered in your sheets for a while made your eyes roll to only yourself.

First dresser, top two drawers. Pulling out the first, rows and rows of neatly folded sweatpants were presented to you, and you tugged out a pair of muted green ones, unsure you’d be able to handle seeing him swagger around in those sinful grey ones today. The second drawer was t-shirts, a black one to match, and you tucked them under one arm, before backing away.

The journey back to your room was just as quick and stressful, barely taking a breath until you were sealed inside of your just-married bubble with Azriel once again.

“See? You survived the big scary trip and my big scary room. I’m so proud.” You only scoffed, launching the clothes at him.

“You know, it’s adorable that you colour-organise your sweatpants.” His laughter stopped abruptly, scowl shot in your direction. As you gained the upper-hand once again, you took a look at him. He had a sponge in one hand, still standing by the mirror and trying to reach around himself. Water was dotted along the carpet, some of the paste smeared into grey on his back now, but he could barely reach it. You softened upon looking at him, holding out your hand. “C’mere. Come sit on the bed.”

He did as told, after tugging on his sweatpants, and yesterday’s socks with a grimace, settling on the edge of the bed. Kneeling behind him once again, he flexed out his wings, bowing his head forwards for you to start work. Carefully, you wiped down his wings, giving extra caution to the paces that made him shiver or his breath catch, until the words were gone entirely.

You weren’t sure what possessed you, when you leaned forwards, pressing a kiss to the back of his head. “All done.”

He only turned, his face close to yours as he looked over his shoulder, and he bumped his forehead against yours once. “Thank you.” His whisper was as low as your own, and your smile only grew. Letting yourself bask for only a second longer, you peeled away, headed to the bathroom to discard of the sponge and at least give your face a cursory wash, a splash of cold water to wake you up.

When you returned, Azriel was just buttoning his shirt up behind himself, both of you looking far fresher and feeling much more composed than you had twenty minutes ago.

“Ready to go deal with this?”

“Ready as I’ll ever be, husband.” He grinned a little, opening the door and peering out into the corridor. Nobody was present to see him slipping out of your room, and so he turned back to you.

“Now or never, wife.”

“I’d prefer never, to be honest.” Your stomach rumbled in disagreement as you stepped up beside him, both of you leaving your room behind, and his shadows darted along behind, swirling around you both like a cloak as you began your walk toward the voices you could already hear and the tempting smell of food.

Nerves were eating you alive, Azriel’s presence beside you doing little to calm the erratic racing of your heart or the beading of sweat along your spine, and so you found yourself twisting anxiously at the ring on your finger, spinning it around and around and around-

It went utterly silent as the two of you stepped into the doorway, all eyes moving to you both, scanning every footstep and breath as you moved across the room to take the only two seats still available. Pulling out the chair beside Mor, Azriel motioned for you to sit down, and you offered the best smile you could muster in response as you sank into the seat. He took the one next to you, Lucien on his other side buttering a piece of toast, and the only sound in the room was the loud crunch it made as he bit into it.

Nobody spoke, until Cassian did; “So, how’s life as a married couple going so far?”

“So you all know?”

“Well, you invited us all to watch,” Rhys smirked, a loud groan left you, your head falling down to burying your hands, and as laughter broke out around the table, you wanted to curl up into a ball. Better yet, you wanted to disappear entirely. Jokes quickly followed the laughter, only spurring on everyone’s amusement, and the burning of your blush was so high you were sure you were going to catch fire at any moment. You couldn't bare to even look up.

That was, until a finger was tapping under your chin lightly. The rough feel of a scarred- fingertip telling you exactly who it was, who was guiding your face back up from the sanctity of your palms. Before you, was a plate of all your favourites that he’d gathered, and he placed a tall glass of orange juice down to match it, giving a sweet smile when your stare shifted thankfully to him.

He nodded in acknowledgement, his smile lingering as he began to gather his food, but the moment was ruined by Feyre’s cooing as she elbowed her mate. “Oh, look, such a good husband you make, Az.”

“Yeah, yeah. Get it all out.” He sighed, fixing his usual terrifying stare around the guests at the table. “This is your chance to make jokes, while I’m distracted with food and a hangover.”

“Fuck that, I want to know the story,” Cassian spoke right over the top of any jokes that were coming, ignoring Feyre’s stare for his curse in front of her son, various sounds of shock and agreement sounding out. Once again it was quiet, all attention still hanging on your both, expectantly.

“What story?” You raised your brows, shovelling some of the food into your mouth, hoping it would quell the rising nausea within you at the spotlight that had been thrust onto you now.

“The story. How in the name of the Mother did you two end up getting married last night? That story.” The warrior clarified, and your jaw tightened as you tried to think. All that came up was a blur, half the night was clear and half of it was gone, right up until this morning. Unfortunately, the half you needed was the blurry part.

Azriel, though, stiffened beside you, pausing with food halfway to his mouth. It was only a minute stutter, picking up action again hardly a second later, but you weren’t the only one to notice. Rhysand’s smile widened. “Az, looks like you might remember something. Care to share?”

He looked like he absolutely didn’t want to share, not even a speck of it, until his eyes moved to you. You wanted to know, and you were sure your face conveyed that, because he slumped a little in defeat.

“I had plans to tell you something last night.” He paused, leaving everyone at the table, including yourself, in suspense, as he poked at some of the food on his plate, and ate a little more. “I was nervous.”

“You, nervous? Must have been something important.” The look on Nesta’s face was like that of a predator hunting its prey, she was delighting in this, and Cassian chuckled by her side. You shot them both a glare, but Az never looked away from you. He looked nervous now as your attention moved back to him, the look on his face sparking something in your memory, and it was like a part of that blur uncocked just a little bit to release a memory.

“Well, don’t you just look dashing tonight, shadowsinger?” You smirked a little, raising your glass to tip towards his as he chuckled, smoothing one hand down the front of his suit. He’d really gone all out tonight, a dark grey button-up shirt under a smart black waistcoat, tight suit pants and his best pair of boots, all shined up and ready for the party. He looked practically edible, with his hair styled for once, a single curl flicked down across his forehead. He was all but glowing under the lights, like glitter was painting along his skin, a glow in those golden eyes.

“Well, I had to make sure I’d look alright standing next to you.” He was bold, this line you’d been dancing along in these last few months was still exhilarating, new enough that your breath rushed from your lungs in a sudden burst when he raked his gaze along you, purposefully slowly. “You look… there are no words for how you look tonight. I could list a few; stunning, beautiful, breathtaking, but I don’t think any of them do you justice.”

Your blush was so warm you wanted to press your glass against your skin just to cool it down, a smile stretching your lips as you stared up at him, even in heels. You stepped a fraction closer, his hand coming out gently, to find your one, fingers brushing your free palm lightly enough that you shuddered. Then, his smile was gone, he was nervous, a look you rarely ever saw in him.

“I wanted to talk to you tonight. I have to tell you something.”

“Well, you have my full attention.” You hoped your tone was soft enough to melt away that panic, linking your fingers with his firmly, and his gaze dropped for a second to your joined hands. A smile flickered on his lips, his thumb smoothing over your knuckles.

A new song played on the drums, the live band filled the room with music, and so many loud voices cheered and sang along, faelights flashing in all different colours to mimic the fall of the stars outside that would start soon. You could all but feel it like a temperature drop in the room when Azriel’s fear got the best of him. He locked up, body going rigid, eyes hard and smile turning sour.

“Maybe some liquid courage, first, hm?”

He let out a relieved breath, nodding his head, body loosening once again as he took the lead, guiding you away towards the bar.

“I remember that. You were nervous, you said we had something to talk about. I suggested we get some liquid courage.”

Azriel’s eyes glazed over a little, as though he was remembering too, reliving the moment the way you had. His jaw dropped a little, a puffed-out laugh leaving it on a breath. “Yeah… well, I think we might’ve had enough liquid courage for an entire army the night before battle.”

Your laugh was the first one this morning that felt truly genuine, a light sparking in Azriel’s eyes at the sound. He stared, watching you giggle over the entire situation, and you’d feel self-conscious about it in front of everyone, if it didn’t make you feel so adored. That was the thing about Azriel, one of the many things that had made you fall for him so hard all those years ago, only getting worse since.

The way he gave you his attention, the way he could make you feel like the only person in the room with a single look, the way he could make you feel special. It warmed your heart like nothing else ever had. His attention, his devotion, it was something you dreamed about, and longed for at night when you lay in bed alone, knowing he was only a few doors away.

“So, you drank, a lot.” Feyre interrupted, Nyx giggling loudly at the way his mother had cupped her hands over his ears, as though he understood any of it. “Then what happened?”

“Another?” The bartend offered, you and Azriel already a giggling mess. You were leaning against one another, a row of sticky shot glasses lined up in front of yourselves, surrounded by bitten lime slices and split salt. The feel of his hand on your waist was like a brand through your dress, one you loved enough to place a hand over his, squeezing to keep it there.

He didn’t, only sliding it further around your waist to yank you into his body, and your laughter stopped for a second in shock, staring up at him as he stared down, awaiting your reaction. You both melted into laughter once again.

You could feel each deep breath he took, the brush of his chest against yours, and that laughter slowly fizzled out the closer he leaned. The bartend was long gone, the atmosphere around you both melting away into nothing more than a haze. His nose was bumping your own, dragging over your cheek, kisses without ever kissing as you shared space, shared breath.

“We should- we should go sit down. Before I fall over in these heels.” You mumbled, and he hummed in acknowledgement.

“I’d catch you.”

That only brought more giggles. “I think we both know, that’s not possible anymore. We’d both more likely end up sprawled out on the floor.”

He laughed too, head raising again and arm tightening at your waist. “Fine, sitting it is, but only because the floor is so dirty. Where’s our table again?”

You were mortified, fingers tracing over the tip of your nose in a feather-light touch, nothing like the way it had felt to be so close to him, to be touched by him, and the new wash of colour on his face suggested he was thinking the same thing.

“We had some drinks, and then we came over to the table with you all.”

“Some drinks? You two drank the rest of us under the table.” Nesta scoffed, everyone laughing in agreement. Your body was already regretting everything after that first shot. “It was impressive!”

“But, also kinda’ nice.” Elain chipped in, the first thing she’d said this whole time, and she was now tucked happily under Lucien’s arm, grinning at the pair of you. “Seeing Az let go, loosen up like that. It was funny, but also sweet. I mean, I’d never seen him like that before, you bring out that side of him.”

You ducked from her stare, poking at the remnants of your food on your plate. “Pretty sure that was the tequila.”

“No, it was you,” Azriel muttered, shocking you enough that your head snapped towards him, but he was just staring at his plate, a soft upwards-twist of his lips showing his feelings.

“You challenged me to an arm wrestling competition.” Cassian cut in, a smirk on his face as you turned to look at him.

“Did I win?”

He almost instantly regretted that question, because his smirk dropped, shifting to Nesta’s face instead as she sipped her tea. “Yeah, you did. Made all us Valkyries real proud, you can boast about it at the next training session.”

“You only won because Azriel cheated and helped you.” The General grumbled, crossing his arms and slumping in his chair. The male beside you shrugged, leaning back in his own with a cocky expression, and the two began bickering.

A phantom feeling raced along your back as you tried to remember it. Flashes of the night, your hand clasped in Cassian’s, pushing with everything you had, another hand sitting over your own. Heat at your back as Azriel pressed himself up behind you, one arm around your waist, the other hand wrapped with yours as you both pushed at Cassian’s. His hand slammed into the table, the two of you celebrating as Cass took his loss like a sore loser.

“You also did a lot of dancing,” Mor chipped in next to your ear, practically a whisper as the men all now fought over what constituted cheating in ‘arm wrestling’. Images behind your eyes again, you and Azriel twirling across the dance floor, chest to chest again, so close you could practically taste him, laughing and giggling your way all around the room in laps for what felt like hours, until your legs were shaking and feet aching, both of you panting. “And then, the two of you were sneaking off between the pillars, laughing so much. It was adorable, you were never apart.”

Hands on your waist, pulling you away from the dance floor, like you wouldn't have followed him just about anywhere. If Azriel had asked you to, you’d have walked straight into one of the lakes in Oorid, just to see that smile on his face. He dragged you away, your back pressing against the cold stone of one of the pillars. It was a relief, your whole body hot and flushed, the cold stone cooling you a little.

It was quieter here, darker, and so much more peaceful as you were hidden away from the rest of the party. He leaned in, enough that his forehead was sat on your own, eyes closed as you both giggled hysterically.

“Wait- what were we laughing at?” Your mind had emptied as he invaded your space, the smell of him emptying your thoughts out like scattered sand.

“I don’t know.” More laughter took over, his body all but falling against your own as he sagged, shadows leaping in happy twirls and jumps like they were laughing too, pretty shapes around you that your eyes followed. “You know what would be funny, though? If someone spilt red wine on Eris’ suit. Who wears all white to a party?”

Azriel’s words draw loud laughter from you, bounding off of the walls between gasping breaths as you pictured it.

“Or, if someone pranked Cassian like last year.”

You could barely breathe, arms wrapped around Azriel, clinging to him just to stay stood, and he twisted around, arms looped at your waist until it was his back pressed to the column, wings drooping either side, and you were slumped against his chest. “No, wait, I have the best one.” You pushed yourself up, one hand on his chest so you could meet his eye. “It would be so funny if Helion actually managed to convince Feyre and Rhys into that threesome.”

“What about when Mor found out, and that Helion was just moving his way through the family?”

“If they did fuck, would Lucien have to start calling Rhys ‘daddy’? Or is that only if they got married?” That seemed to be it, the two o you laughing so hard you slid down to the pillar, collapsing into a heap on the floor. You were half strewn across Azriel’s lap, face buried into his neck, his head tipped back to let the sounds of amusement flow free.

His hair was messy now, yours the same, his cheeks pink and lips shining and he’d never looked better than he did at that moment. He lifted a hand, smoothing it across your cheek, one thumb running over your smile gently, “You know what would be the funniest, though…”

Your hand slapped over your mouth, darting to Azriel who dropped his fork, mouth dropping in shock and cheeks going the darkest shade of red yet.

“Then, suddenly, the two of you are inviting us all down to one of the temples, and telling us you’re getting married!” Mor had no idea the moment she’d chosen to speak on, the key memory flashing through your mind of what had led to it all. “Poor Gwyn’s face, when you bombarded her with questions, asking her if priestesses held a high enough status to marry someone, and whether she’d do it right there, right now!”

“Gwyn married us?” Was all Azriel was finally able to choke out, still steadfastly ignoring your burning stare, and refusing to even let his eyes move sideways in your direction.

“Yep.”

“Would you like to see your spectacular wedding?” Rhys offered, and it was enough to finally pull your focus from Az, moving to watch the High Lord tap at his temple in offer. He wasn’t looking at you, though, his eyes shifting to the middle distance, a look Azriel had too, upon closer inspection, and they were obviously talking. A conversation the rest of you weren’t a part of. Rhys’ brows rose, a silent question, and Azriel sighed.

His face moved from shock, to embarrassment, to resignation, shrugging a little as his eyes came back into focus. Finally, he turned to look at you. He was nervous again.

Taking his hand from the table, you squeezed it in both of yours, and he squeezed back, letting you settle your joint hands in your lap, never breaking eye contact. “S’okay, Rhys. Might as well get everything out in the open at once. I can’t get any more embarrassed, anyway.”

You squeezed his hand again.

There was a tapping at your mental shields, polite as ever, Rhysand made his presence known, first, A request, never a demand. You were proud of yourself for even still having them up, actually, dropping them for him to enter your mind. He grabbed onto your consciousness, dragging you into his head, to show you the scene playing through his eyes.

The giggles you’d been encased in had long since stopped, but that didn’t make the two of you any less clingy. Instead of holding hands, Rhys watched his friends cling to one another, foreheads pressed together and smiles on their faces. They looked a mess, wind ruffled from the flight here, as they all did, and eyes bright. Gwyn, slightly tipsy and utterly elated, was chanting her way through a text passage from the tome in her hands.

Nyx was bored, tugging on his lapels as Feyre tickled at his stomach, trying to keep him quiet as they watched from the front row of the pews. He couldn't tear his eyes away, couldn't bear to leave, not when he was finally watching his brother smile like that. Not when he was finally watching his best friend get the girl he was always meant to have. Centuries of sadness and pain and suffering, and finally, they’d all get to be truly happy.��

“Azriel, uh, I don’t suppose you have any vows?” Gwyn offered, the book making a mighty slam as it snapped closed, a cloud of dust leaving it and she gripped it to her chest, teal eyes bouncing happily between the two at the altar.

“Sure, yeah. I have… something.” The speech, Rhys felt excitement bubble within himself at the speech he’d heard Azriel practising for days to tell her. “I have been trying to tell you this all night. All month. For years, actually, so, I’m glad I can finally say it.”

Chuckles sounded around him, and Cassian hooted in encouragement somewhere to his left. “Get her, Az!”

“I’m in love with you. Plain and simple. I’m so fucking in love with you, that I can’t think straight. I can’t act right. I can barely breathe when you smile at me, and when you look at me, it makes me feel worth it. Like everything I had to endure to get to this point was nothing, because you make it all right. Everything, from the scars on my heart to the ones on my hands, you make it all feel okay. You’re beautiful, you’re special, and I hope you feel even a tiny bit of what I feel for you, because if you’ll let me, I’ll spend the rest of my life loving you with everything that I have to give. And when we die one day, my soul will forever be bound to yours, following you across the winds, to wherever you want to go. Life or death, sickness or health, happiness or sadness, I’m yours.”

It was so much more than the speech they’d had planned, something truly poured from his heart, and he rubbed a hand over his chest as he watched. He watched you cry, watched tears stream slowly down your face as you gaped, and watched Azriel wipe them away patiently.

You were overwhelmed, clearly so, and yet you reached up, cupping Azriel’s cheeks in both of your hands.

“Some spymaster you are, huh? How did you not know I love you too? So much, Az, for years. There are so many things about you, everything about you, I just-” You cut yourself off with a sniff, lip wobbling as you stared at him, and with your confession too, Azriel was grinning.

“It’s okay, don’t cry, my love.”

“When I stop crying, I’ll give you a real good speech too, I promise.” That drew laughter from them all, and he could feel Feyre practically buzzing with excitement against his side, could feel the overwhelm of both Cassian and Azriel’s emotions from their bond.

“Are you sure you want to-”

He didn’t get a chance to finish that tickle of doubt, before you were pulling his face down, body flush to his as you leaned into the kiss. Your lips melded together, Azriel wasted no time in responding, and Rhysand let out his own loud cheer of approval to join everyone else’s as the deal was all but sealed.

“Well, kiss your bride… I guess?” Gwyn teased, stepping down from the altar as the two remained locked in their tear-filled, happy embrace. With a wink of magic, Rhys was holding out his hand, a set of pretty bands sat in the centre. With another flick, the pair was sitting snugly around each finger, and at the sudden coldness, the pair snapped apart.

Glancing down at your hands, you were busy admiring yours while Azriel’s head turned to Rhys, mouthing his thanks, before taking your hand and throwing them up in the air.

“I got the girl! I got the girl, Cass!”

“Yeah, you did, buddy!” His friend hollered, all of them making their way up to the altar now in a stream to offer their congratulations.

The memory fizzled out, you felt yourself being slowly deposited back into your own body, until you were blinking your eyes and taking a gasping breath. The room was silent, waiting for any kind of response, and Azriel was pushing the last of his foot around his plate aimlessly, an anxious frown sitting on his lips. Your hands squeezed, coming up empty, and finding his hand was now sitting on his lap, clenched into a tight fist so hard his knuckles were white.

“I had imagined something better for our first kiss. Preferably, something I’d consciously remember.” He still wasn’t looking at you, even as he spoke. Out of everything about this situation that made it crazy, somehow, marrying Azriel, it all seemed to make sense. Nothing about it felt wrong, or crazy, and you only wished you’d remember the beautiful moment through your own eyes instead of someone else. It was your turn to direct his attention now.

“Yeah?” Your hand settled behind his head, sitting on the nape of his neck and rubbing lightly, until he looked up at you. Hope. Hope shone in those pretty eyes. “Something more like this?”

The moment your lips met his, gasps sounded and cutlery dropped to hit plates sharply. But, you didn’t care. Moving slowly, Azriel barely paused, before letting out a quiet moan against your lips, relief and love mixed into the sound, as he kissed back. One hand found your cheek, the other spreading along the back of your chair until his arm wrapped around you to tug you in closer. His lips were shy against your own, growing in confidence with every drag, your noses bumping, promises and affection and need shining through.

He pulled back, for a quick breath, your lungs burning in a heady way that made you dizzy, before he was stealing more, prolonging the kiss. Vaguely, you could hear Cassian cheering, Feyre aww-ing, and Lucien chuckling. Nyx was clapping his little hands excitedly, obviously picking up on the joy in the atmosphere. Azriel’s thumb swiped over your cheek as he pulled back, a final kiss left on your still-puckered lips.

His pupils were blown wide as he licked over his own. You smiled, hoping to maintain at least a little of your dignity and all of your innocence, before you jumped your new husband right at the table now that all of the confusion was cleared. His nose was still bumping your own lightly, lips barely brushing, and he placed another chaste kiss on your lips, need burning hot between you both. “Yeah, just like that.”

Finally, he pulled away, sparing you both any embarrassment if he’d stayed longer and you’d lost all your self-control. He was grinning stupidly as everyone stared at you both, his arm still spread along the back of your chair, fingers brushing your shoulder in aimless patterns.

“So, what are you going to do now?” Lucien raised a good question, you hadn't really thought that far. And yet, still, as you glanced from your wedding band to your husband, you felt nothing but bliss.

“Well, I think Azriel should take his wife on their first date, for starters.”

Azriel only nodded, turning to look at you and you swore hearts were visible in his eyes as he did. He leaned in, lips brushing your own again, a tease of a kiss that had you leaning forwards for more, and before he gave in, he simply whispered, “I’ll pick you up at six, my love.”

#azriel x reader #azriel/reader #azriel x you #azriel/you #acotar x reader #acotar/reader #acotar x you #acotar/you #azriel shadowsinger #azriel #a court of thorns and roses #acotar

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froggibus · 1 year

Text

The Mark of Greed - Mammon

Pairing: Mammon x reader

Genre: angst -> fluff, hurt/comfort

Word Count: 2.4K

Summary: mammon can’t help but notice that you refuse to talk about his pact mark, and he’s determined to find out why

CW: hurt/comfort, angst, violence (reader gets attacked by demons), mutual pining, self deprecating thoughts, arguing/yelling, angsty! Mammon, love confessions, misunderstandings

i definitely did not write all of this at 3am. nope. idk i had this image in my head of soft! Mammon tracing your pact mark and telling you he loves you so here it is lol. i got super carried away and ended up making this super long too oops

————

The best kept secret in the Devildom, aside from Satan’s pet cat, was your pact mark. Not just any pact mark—no, it was the shimmering gold one that marked Greed. Right from the day you got it, you knew you should keep it hidden.

Always wearing clothes to strategically cover it, lying, deflecting and giving different answers every time someone would ask. Mammon watched all this, and said nothing. Sure, it was a little funny, but it also made him wonder.

Did you hate him? Was the mark of greed as awful as he always thought it was? Was his touch so ugly and toxic that you didn’t want anyone to know about it?

Maybe his brothers were right. Maybe there was something wrong with him. You were so open about your pacts with his brothers, gladly showing them the swirling coloured patterns that marked your body. You showed them off unashamedly, proudly displaying the marks as part of yourself.

It made him jealous, really. You were his human. You were his first. His pact was your first—so why did you hate it so much? He always pegged envy as Leviathan’s emotion, but the more he watched, the more he realized his turmoil was enough to rival the otaku himself.

You first notice Mammon withdrawing after you show a demon in class your pact mark with Beel. An orange sigil just above your belly button that you displayed proudly with crop tops and bathing suits. You could feel Mammon’s eyes on you the whole time, watching you as you explained the beauty behind the mark.

“It’s not just cause he’s the Avatar of Gluttony,” you explain, fingers tracing the orange outline. “But it also relies on emotions. In this case, the comfort he brings me is like having a full stomach. It sits right at my core because he’s my support.”

You swear you see blue eyes roll to your left, but you shrug it off. He’s probably just upset because Lucifer confiscated Goldie again. Still, you can’t help but think he’s jealous of the way you’re talking about Beel.

When you walk home later that day, Mammon is short with you. He barely acknowledges you or responds to anything you say, instead he slumps his shoulders and shrugs you off.

“Mammon, is everything okay? You seem…upset,” you note.

“The Great Mammon? Upset?” He tsks, “maybe your time in the Devildom has made you dumber, y/n.”

“I was just checking on you…”

You don’t wait for him to say anything else and instead throw open the front door and stomp to your room in silence. If he wants to be a jerk, you’ll let him be a jerk.

You practically throw your backpack across the room and slump on your bed. One of your pact marks aches and the thought makes you cringe. Of course it’s that one.

Ever since you got it, you’ve tried so hard to keep it hidden. Not even telling Mammon himself where it is. I mean, if he knew, what would he even say? You could almost hear his voice in your head telling you that you’re delusional to think you could ever be with him, dismissing your feelings and breaking your heart.

You get up and sit in front of the mirror, pulling off your shirt so that you can examine your skin. There, sitting above your heart, is the golden mark of Greed. You trace it lightly. It’s always been your favorite, the colour and the design by far the prettiest. You just wish it wasn’t where it was.

When you first got the mark, when you felt it sear itself into your skin, you knew what it meant. It was a visual representation of the butterflies in your stomach and the clenching in your heart every time you saw the Avatar of Greed.

Still, you found yourself flipping through the pages of Satan’s personal collection. You honestly hoped it was just random, a weird coincidence or a mistake—but the books said otherwise. They confirmed your fear.

When the others started to make pacts with you, you worried the same thing would happen. That they would show up in the same place or worse. You can still remember the immense relief you felt when you made your pact with Levi and have the mark show up on your thigh.

Levi was so excited to ask about his mark and when you let him touch it? He almost exploded. That was the first time Mammon asked you about his mark, and it was the first time you lied to him.

You groan in frustration and pull your shirt back on, trying to blink away the image of his branding. A part of you always wanted to tell him, to show him and have him touch it. But the other part couldn’t get it out of your head that you’re just a burden to him. You’re his responsibility and that’s the only reason he hangs around you.

You only wish things could be simpler.

—

Mammon slams the door to his room and sinks down against it. He tugs on his white hair so hard it hurts, but the pain isn’t enough to wash away the frustration bubbling in his chest.

Why did he have to be so mean to you?

Maybe if he was nicer you wouldn’t hate him or his pact mark. Maybe if he was nicer to you he might actually have a chance of being with you.

The sound of his voice rings in his ears, echoing off his skull. He hates it. He hates how mean he was to you, and the guilt eats him up.

Finally, it becomes too much and he forces himself to his feet. He should apologize to you. Because Lucifer would kill him if he knew how mean he was being…not for any other reason.

You open the door to see him standing in front of you, fidgeting with his hands. “What’s up?”

“I—Lucifer would be mad at me if I didn’t apologize to you,” he says, eyes focused on his shoes. “‘N I don’t wanna be strung up tonight so I’m sorry human.”

“It’s fine. Just—why were you so upset earlier, anyways?”

He shrugs his shoulders, still avoiding eye contact with you. How can he tell you that he’s jealous and angry that you don’t want to show off your pact mark? It’ll make him sound like a little kid.

“Mammon, come on. It’s just me.”

He sighs, “not that I care but I don’t get why you hate my pact so much.”

You freeze, your blood like ice in your veins. All this time you’d been withdrawing from him, you knew he noticed but because he never said anything, it was easy to ignore. Not anymore.

“I-I don’t hate it.”

“Then why do you never show anyone?”

“It’s just,” you shrug, “in a weird spot. I don’t know—I don’t hate it. I just don’t want to show it off.”

“Because it’s ugly, right?”

“Mammon—“

“Why would anyone want to be marked by Greed?”

“Mammon—!”

“Imma dirty scumbag anyway. Making a pact with you was the most selfish thing I ever did. Tying you to me for life, why would you ever want that?”

“Mammon, Jesus. Just listen to me!”

The demon stops his self deprecating rant, staring at you expectantly. He doesn’t know what you’re about to say, but all he can hope is for you to tell him that’s it’s not true. That it’s not ugly, that you want to be tied to him.

Your words fail you. You interrupt his rant and suddenly your mouth goes dry under the gaze of his blue eyes and your words all fall away. Your heart beats a mile a minute, drawing more of your focus to the pact mark that connects the two of you.

You stare at each other for a minute, and then Mammon turns on his heel and storms out of the room.

It takes you a minute to process what just happened, and another minute for you to follow him. By the time you make it to the staircase, he’s already slamming the front door shut behind him.

Everything is moving so fast. The illusion that you were protecting yourself from Mammon hating you has shattered—replaced by the realization that you’ve been hurting him this whole time. You can’t think of anything except for how to make this right.

Without thinking about it, you follow him out of the door and into the streets of the Devildom. It’s dark out and you have to squint to see the familiar white hair receding into the distance. You pick up the pace, wanting to catch him before he disappears.

You’ve never been outside alone before. It’s too dangerous, they always said. But that’s the furthest thing from your mind right now. All you want is to make things with him better.

“Mammon!” You call, heading up the hill behind him.

When you get to the top, the demon is no longer in sight. You spin around to see if he doubled back to the house, only to realize it’s no longer in sight either. The horrible realization that you’re lost starts to set in and you find yourself reaching into your pocket for your DDD—only to remember you left it in your backpack.

There’s a hissing noise nearby and you’re suddenly acutely aware of how vulnerable you are here. Without thinking, you start to run back the way you think you came. You hear two pairs of footsteps behind you, they’re gaining on you. Whatever is chasing you, it’s going to catch you.

A clawed hand takes your back and hot pain erupts within you. You fall to your knees and scream, warm blood trickling down your back.

You try to get back up but you’re shaking so badly that your knees refuse to cooperate. There’s two demons behind you, only vaguely humanoid with glowing eyes and flickering tongues. They’re speaking, but not in any language you understand.

They circle around you, taking some sort of sick amusement in watching their prey cower. One of them lashes out at your chest, three claws slicing the front of your shirt and causing blood to pool down your chest and stomach.

You reach up to clutch the wounds, your fingertips brushing against the golden pact mark. I’ll never get to tell him how I feel, you realize.

“I’m sorry, Mammon,” you murmur, tracing your pact mark one last time.

A jolt of energy rushes through you followed by intense golden light in front of you. You squeeze your eyes shut, waiting until it dims to open them again. When they’re open, you see Mammon in demon form, standing between you and your attackers.

All it takes is a flick of his hand before they erupt into dust. You knew he was powerful, but seeing him in action only confirmed the fact.

“Mammon..?”

He drops to his knees in front of you, his hands frantic as they search you for injury. His fingertips fall on your open shirt and clawed chest. “You’re hurt…”

“I’m sorry, Mammon,” you mumble.

“I know.” He says, “let’s just get you home, okay?”

He scoops you up in his arms effortlessly, holding you close to him. You’re sure your blood is dripping all over him and wrecking his new shoes, but you’re too disoriented to care.

Mammon sets you down on the counter in the bathroom, “move your hand, alright? I gotta make sure you’re not gonna die.”

Without thinking about it, you move your blood coated hand off of the pact mark. Mammon slowly peels off your shredded shirt, his eyes going wide when he sees what your hand was covering.

Somewhat hidden by the blood and fabric yet unmistakable, is a golden mark. Not just any golden mark—his golden mark. His pact mark and its above your heart?

His hands shake as they brush the outline of it. “My—my pact mark is on your heart?”

You bite your lip and nod slowly, looking anywhere but at him.

Mammon is in complete disbelief. This whole time he thought his feelings were one sided, that you hated him and hated his pact even more. But to find out that it’s on your heart of all places—right as he almost lost you? He’s almost entirely overwhelmed by his feelings.

His hands shake the whole time he bandages and disinfects you, his mind only set on the branding above your chest. When he’s done fixing you up, he can’t stop staring at it.

“You got lucky that the Great Mammon was here to protect you today,” he tries to play it off.

“I-it was only cause I summoned you with the pact.”

The mention of the pact makes his head spin again. His mouth is suddenly dry and his hands sweaty.

“Mammon,” you mumble, still unable to look at him, “please say something.”

His voice is low. “Do you know what it means when a pact mark forms over your heart?”

You shake your head, butterflies erupting in your stomach.

He reaches out to trace the swirling lines of the mark, his touch featherlight. “It means I’ll always be there for you, y/n.”

His tone is serious, unlike anything you’ve heard from him before. You don’t dare move or interrupt him, wanting to hear what the demon has to say.

“It means that I’ll never let anyone hurt you,” he mumbles. “That I’ll take care of you no matter what. It means that you own me. It means that I—“ he swallows hard, looking at the floor. “I love you, y/n. Now and forever.”

You flinch at his words. They’re all you wanted to hear and yet hearing them has awakened something inside of you.

Your eyes finally meet his. “You—you really mean it?”

“I love you,” he gently kisses the centre of his mark on your body. “I love you.”

“Mammon,” you say, “I love you.”

Mammon might burst at your words. He reaches up to cup your face, planting a needy kiss on your lips. His touch is desperate, needy, way overdue. You melt into him, his taste so familiar and comforting that you don’t need to think twice about it.

Mammon smiles against you. If you had asked him a week ago, he would say that his pact with you was the most selfish thing he’s ever done. Looking at you now, though, he sees it as a sigil of his love for you, and what could be more selfless than that?

#obey me x reader #obey me oneshot #obey me x you #obey me fic #mammon #mammon x you #mammon x reader #mammon fluff #mammon avatar of greed #mammon angst #obey me headcanons #obey me #house of lamentation #obey me devildom

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rileyslibrary · 1 year

Text

The hot seat.

Synopsis: You decide to attend a speed dating event in the city where you're deployed. Simon “Ghost” Riley, your lieutenant, is also there.

Relationship: Simon “Ghost” Riley x F!Reader

Word Count: 1,595

Notes:

I got this idea after a friend told me she matched with one of her colleagues on Tinder.

Fluff.

Want more?

———————————————————————

“Why don’t you just give it a try?” One of your friends suggested, “It’s not like you’ll be committing to anything.”

And when you told them there are other ways to meet new people, such as dating apps, they laughed so hard that you felt offended. “You don’t trust your own shadow,” one of them said, “how could you possibly trust a couple of pictures and a few messages before meeting a stranger?”

They were right; not only had it been months since your last date, but your trust issues weren’t helping. So you listened to your friends and decided to give it a shot. This could be your opportunity to get “back on the horse.”

They wanted to come to your house a few hours before to advise you on what to wear—it seems like it wasn’t just you who had trust issues. “You have a thing with self-sabotage,” one of them admitted, “and we don’t want you to portray yourself as less than who you really are.” A bolt claim from Jessica, the master of self-sabotage, who kept bailing her partner out of jail because he was constantly breaking into people’s houses.

You politely declined, promising to do your best. You chose a little black dress, opaque tights, and black heels. You let your hair down for once, since the army wouldn’t let you, and applied some make-up—but not too much—to enhance your features.

The speed dating event is held in a trendy downtown bar. The room is crammed with small tables, each with two chairs facing each other. You take a deep breath and walk over to the registration desk. You sign up, fill out a form with your information, and they hand you a name tag.

“This Is What You Came For” plays over the speakers, and you can’t help but wonder what made the DJ choose that song. What did I come here for, Rihanna? You think to yourself. To tell a stranger in three minutes about my food preferences and favourite colour? Is that what will ensure compatibility?

Your nerves start to kick in, so you rush to the bar. Your options are limited to beer or wine, according to the bartender. When you ask why, he starts narrating the horrors he’s seen of people attempting to calm their nerves with shots before the speed date. You choose wine and turn to face the people you’re about to meet in three-minute rounds. A few catch your eye; some look intimidated, while others appear overconfident and exuberant. “Peacocks”, as you call them.

The event organiser announces the beginning of the event, and you make your way to your assigned table. Dread grips you. What if you don’t meet anyone interesting? What if everyone you talk to is dull or uninteresting? You take a seat and wait for the event to start.

The first guy who sits down is a health freak, to put it mildly. He gets up at 4 a.m., lifts “hard” for two hours, goes to work, and waits until his next workout at around 6 p.m. He says he likes chicken because of its high protein content and asks what your favourite food is, to which you respond, “Haribos,” to piss him off.

The next one is a cryptocurrency investor. Enough said.

The third guy is a motivational speaker. You’re unsure about the “motivational” part, but he’s undeniably a “speaker.” He doesn’t. Stop. Talking. He only asks for your name, which you don’t have to say because it’s written on your tag. He then starts mumbling about books he’s read and the importance of a proper and consistent morning routine. He and Mr Health Freak could have easily become soul mates, you think to yourself.

Three minutes pass like hours, and you lower your head to the table. This was a mistake. Coming here was, as you suspected, a bad idea.

“I see you’ve already given up.” The man in front of you comments with a smile.

You look up and meet his gaze. He is tall and well-built, with short blonde hair and dark brown eyes. But it’s his sleeve tattoo that draws your attention.

It’s familiar to you. You’ve seen it before, peeking through a military uniform and tactical gloves.

Simon “Ghost” Riley.

You’d never seen him without his mask, but his build, voice, and tattoos are distinct. Your heart is racing as you struggle to remain calm. He, too, appears surprised. Did he not recognise you at first because of your make-up and hair?

Well, it seems like he recognises you now. But you’re not supposed to acknowledge his true identity; doing so might destroy everything he’s worked so hard to keep hidden all these years. It may also jeopardise your professional relationship.

But, my God, he’s hot. He’s exactly as you imagined him, if not better. It’d be best to act as cool as possible. Ignorant, stupid, call it whatever you want—just don’t reveal his identity. There are tens of thousands of people named Simon, and you are not supposed to give your surname to the other person here. So all you know about him is his name. He could be any of the other “Simons” out there.

You immediately put on a happy-go-lucky face and smile, trying to muster the courage to date your lieutenant for three minutes.

“Hi, I’m Y/N,” you reply, trying to play it cool.

He fidgets in his seat, still feeling uneasy. You need to act quickly.

“Yes, I’m about to give up,” you moan and pout, “so please, for the love of God, be a decent one.”

He lets out an awkward chuckle. “I’m not sure about that,” he says.

“Oh, really?” You exclaim, raising your eyebrows, “Unless you speak nonchalantly about yourself, chuck twelve egg yolks in the morning, or boast about imaginary coins, you’re good.”

“Ah,” he says hesitantly, “no, I prefer my eggs cooked.”

“Boiled, scrambled, or sunny side up?”

“I don’t mind as long as they’re cooked properly.” He responds, and you raise your fist to your mouth.

“I assume no runny egg whites?” You ask, making a disgusted face.

“Christ, no.” He smiles and shakes his head.

He appears more at ease now, thinking you haven’t identified him.

But then another problem arises. When dating, one of the first questions you usually ask is about the other person’s occupation.

“So, Simon,” you say, “what do you do for a living?”

“I, um, work as an operator,” he replies. “And you?”

That was a wise move on his part. He knows you’ll relate if he discloses his primary occupation, and you’ll start speculating. So he decided to reveal his side job. Although he is not completely honest with you, which could be interpreted as a red flag, there is a serious reason behind his answer.

“I’m a sergeant in the military,” you admit.

He nods and smirks but doesn’t ask a follow-up question.

“I’m sorry,” he says, “I’m not very good at this.”

“Neither am I,” you chuckle, “but I can help you.”

“Thank you,” he says.

“Do you prefer cats or dogs, Simon?”

“I like both,” he says, “I can’t have a preference for animals; they aren’t eggs.”

“Phew!” You exclaim, theatrically placing the back of your hand on your forehead, “most of the men I met today hate cats!”

“Yeah,” Simon agrees. “I believe it’s because they don’t have control over them like dogs.”

“I feel bad for most of the women in here,” you say, looking around, “for settling for such controlling personalities.”

“How do you know I’m not controlling?” He asks, his brow furrowed.

“Men whose job is to order soldiers around, tend to live a more chilled lifestyle.” You elaborate.

“Order soldiers?” He asks, and you immediately stiffen up. “How do you know I order soldiers at my work?”

“I, um, assume you do because of your profession.” You stutter and look down at your lap.

“I said I’m an operator,” he smirks, leaning back in his chair with his arms crossed, “but I never said what kind of operator I am.”

Your chair has turned into a hot seat all of a sudden.

“From what you know, I could be a heavy machinery operator.” He adds, his smile widening.

You blush and turn to look at the clock; time’s almost up.

He leans forward to the table. “Why such eagerness to end our date, sergeant?” he whispers, “I thought we were doing so well.”

You raise your head to look at him. “I’m sorry, Lt.,” you admit, “I just didn’t want to make you feel uncomfortable.”

“I appreciate that,” he says, “but knowing that you know who I am is already uncomfortable, don’t you think?”

You look down again, and he continues.

“Perhaps it would have been better to acknowledge the elephant in the room from the beginning.” He explains.

You let out a sigh. “You’re right,” you say, “I should have been more honest.”

He nods, and the bell rings for your next date. Simon gets up from his chair and smiles at you.

“Normally, I’d end this with a nice to meet you,” he says, “but in this case, it’s more of a nice getting to know you better,” he adds, extending his hand for a handshake.

You stand up and take his hand in yours. “Likewise, Lt.,” you say, smiling.

“See you tomorrow,” he says.

“For another date?” You joke, “You move too fast, Simon.”

“For the best military drill of your life,” he corrects you with a smirk, “for thinking you could fool me so easily.”

———————————————————————

Part 2 ->

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benedictscanvas · 2 months

Text

coat stays on - remus lupin x reader

pairing: remus lupin x fem!reader

word count: 1.3k

warnings: it’s just sickly sickly fluff my loves

a/n: @burnthoneydrops encouraged me to post this weeks ago and honestly i totally forgot about it but she’s wonderful and i can’t deny her!! i hope you enjoy, it’s the first i’ve written for remus so i’m a little conscious of it! i’ve also just opened up requests and you can see the characters i’ll write for here, please send in all the fluffiest fluff your hearts can think of <3

- - -

If your hand was starting to feel a little clammy in the crook of Remus’ arm, you weren’t saying anything. The streets were lined with market stalls and lots and lots of people, more importantly, and you were pretty sure if you let go of him right now you might never see him again.

“Doing alright sweetheart?” he asked, leaning his head down to your ear so you’d hear him properly because the man refused to raise his voice even a little, “Still with me?”

You squeeze him tighter to you and rest your head on his arm briefly rather than answering. The two of you had long since lost the others in the crowd, likely because you weren’t clinging to them as you did Remus. It would make you feel silly if it didn’t make you feel ten times better.

It had been Lily’s idea to venture out into the Sunday markets in town, but she clearly hadn’t thought about the timing. Just days before Valentine’s Day and it was packed, almost shoulder to shoulder as you traversed the street. But the 5pm February darkness had enveloped the cobblestones and most of the stalls had decided to illuminate their wares with pretty fairy lights on strings, wrapped around the poles. All kinds of colours. There was a helter skelter a little ways down that was lit up in warm gold.

Despite struggling with the sheer volume of people, Lily had been right that it would be something you’d enjoy.

Remus steers you towards a stall with a blue and white striped roof, filled with fudge of every flavour you can think of. He’s quiet as he stares at them all in turn, but when his eyes land on your favourite, you watch him smile and point it out to one of the sellers.

“That’s not fair,” you murmur, nudging him with a sharp elbow, but either he doesn’t hear you or he ignores you. To get your own back, you signal to the other seller and ask for Remus’ favourite in return.

“Here we are,” he says, handing you the paper bag once you’re a little away from the stall. You’re smug as you hand him one right back. He looks inside before he pouts at you and its adorable. He’s adorable.

“Thank you,” you grin and he rolls his eyes but still thanks you back. Then he points over your shoulder, where the buskers are playing, to the little tables for resting shoppers. There’s an empty one. The two of you share a brief look before you scurry over to claim it. When you sit across from him, you have to let go of his arm and it feels all wrong.

Until, of course, he shuffles his chair around the table so you’re sitting next to each other instead, facing the band.

You’re both content to nibble on your respective fudge for a while, listening to the music, but Remus breaks the comfortable quiet.

“I’m sorry we lost the others,” he says, face close to yours in a way that makes your chest ache, “I know you and Lily were looking forward to this together.”

He’s right in one way, because you were. But it was also inevitable that you’d only get half of Lily’s evening and that James would get the other, something you were thrilled about, honestly, if it meant that during that other half you got Remus.

You couldn’t quite tell him that, yet, so you settled for the next best thing.

“Sirius was in one of his moods,” you shrug, “I think we’ve come out of this one on top.”

Remus doesn’t laugh. You find it quite hard to make him laugh and you used to be conscious of it. You’ve since found that the little smile he does towards his lap is even more gratifying, like he’s holding in a belting laugh out of something that looks like fondness.

He’s doing it now, bottom lip caught by his teeth.

“Right as always,” he muses, looking back up at you, soft as ever. You struggle to keep the awe from your face.

“I am often right,” you whisper back, breaking off another chunk of fudge and popping it into your mouth, “It’s really pretty here at night. Shame about the people.”

“They’re awful, aren’t they?” Remus says, only joking a little, “Although, I’d rather you didn’t come here at night when no one’s around, hm?”

You nudge him again just because you can. He catches your elbow as if punishing you but all he does is run his hand down from your forearm to your hand to see if you’re cold.

“Mr Protective, you are. As if I’d want to come here on my own, idiot.”

“You’re cold,” he says instead, mutters it like he’s talking to himself as he squeezes both your hands in his own. You wonder if he even heard you call him an idiot like he was your favourite person on the planet.

“It’s an evening in February, lovely, of course I’m cold.”

You watch his pink-tinged cheeks to see if the blush deepens at your best name for him, but you can’t tell if it’s just from the chill in the air. He starts unbuttoning his coat, leaning forward in the chair to take it off.

“Woah, slow down there Rem,” you insist, holding your hands out to him to stop him, “I am fine. Since when do you worry about me so much?”

He doesn’t answer straight away but he does put his arm back into his coat. He’s thinking about what to say, something you’ll always let him do, but it means he’s going to answer seriously. It’s worrying when you’d just been teasing him.

“I always worry about you, I think. Absentmindedly. Wondering if you feel alright, if you’re comfortable. You haven’t looked very comfortable this evening.”

He doesn’t lie to you, ever, but you’re pretty sure that’s the most honest Remus has ever been with you. He can’t even look at you either, just staring at the floor and scuffing his shoe against the chair leg.

“Remus…”

“I don’t like you cold. And I don’t like to think of you alone. Sorry. I know you don’t need looking after like that.”

And he sounds heartbroken enough to break your heart.

“No, I don’t need looking after,” you confirm softly, because it’s true. He’s always said you’re the most independent person he knows. But you still wind your arm through his and tug him into your side, “I’d quite like it if it’s you, though, I think. If you’ll let me return the favour.”

It’s always the returning that he’s not so adept with. Your affection and your time and your energy are all things he struggles to see he deserves. It’s mostly why you worry about him too.

“Don’t take your coat off for me though,” you warn, putting your head on his shoulder, “You idiot.”

This time he definitely hears you and he must hear how utterly smitten that word is. He’s your idiot. He has to know it by now.

“Okay. Coat stays on,” he murmurs, turning to press a kiss to your crown and then place his chin there, gentle as ever, “Also, I lied. I’m very glad we lost the others, by the way. Not sorry at all.”

So maybe he did lie to you sometimes. It was a lie you didn’t mind, even if you’d pretend to.

“Yeah? Why’s that now?”

He slowly nods his head until his nose is nuzzling you instead of his chin, and you feel another feather light kiss, this one near your ear.

“Like you lots. Even more than them,” he breathes, and you try not to melt into him then and there.

“Oh lovely,” you whisper, “Like you lots too.”

#remus lupin x reader #remus lupin fluff #remus lupin #remus x reader #remus lupin fanfiction

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eliluvschan · 1 month

Text

Shadow Selfies

pairing: bang chan x reader

word count: 971

warnings: few curse words & cutie Channie

genre: fluff

a/n: am i writing instead of finishing an essay for my deadline on thursday? no im not👀

i was walking my to my best friend Chan’s house. he’s got i don’t know what hair colour cause the man dyes his hair every two weeks now? i kinda lost count.

we’ve known each other for the past five years, but the thing is i’ve always liked him more than a friend.

i like him. a lot.

i rang the bell and Jessica, Chan’s mother, appeared in the doorway.

“hey dear, Chan’s in his room upstairs.”

“thanks, Mama Bahng.” i always call Jessica Mama Bahng, it’s a habit i picked up from hanging out a lot at Chan’s house.

she smiled as we both walk trough the hallway. “are you hungry?” she asked me.

“a little.”

“come on. i just bought these.” she said, putting a batch of brownies in front of me.

“alright then, but just one.” i smile.

“sure.” she turned away.

i took a piece and ate it.

“oh, this is amazing.”

“i know right? it’s a new bakery called Felix’s Goodies, maybe you and Chan can pick some up for the others?” she suggested.

“sure thing!”

“eomma, is Y/n here already?” i heard Chan calling from upstairs.

“maybe later.” i smiled and got up from where i was sitting, and made my way down the hall and upstairs. i knocked on the second door on the left.

“if it’s Hannah, go away. if it’s Y/n, come in please!” he called from inside.

“ugh, rude!” Hannah called as she got out of her room to go downstairs.

i laughed at her comment as i opened the door to the usual shirt strewn floor and messy bed.

“hey, where are you?” i called.

“oh, hey there cutie.” he said emerging from the side and pulling on a black hoodie. he stopped in front of me. “what’s up?”

“nothing much. you ready?”

“ready for what?”

“science!”

“oh yeah. come on.”

so we sat down on the bed and flicked through our books and opened chapter seven of biology. disease’s & microbes.

“i don’t understand this shit.” he said after five minutes of poring over the same page. he scanned the green page and then looked at me.

“what is that hard about learning the freaking definition of a compost?” i asked after explaining the compost again.

“it bounces off of my head. how did you do it?”

“don’t ask.”

he laughed. omg his laugh.

“okay. one more time?” i asked.

“okay. and then we do something else.”

i rolled my eyes. “sure.”

he smiled and sat a little straighter.

“when rotten plants, are piled onto a heap, the bacteria of microbes act on it, and produce an enzyme that turns into any sort of liquid and then they feed on it. this stupid and disgusting process is called a compost. got it?” i asked.

“the crappy heap of plant shit is called compost?” he joked.

i laughed. “yeah. now Bio degradable’s?”

“we’re doing something else.” he told me.

“you’re going to fail the test!”

“no, i’m not.” he said.

“yeah, you are. you’re not paying attention!”

“look, i’ve done as much as i can. and just one def. of bio- whatever’s left. it won’t hurt to leave one thing. and besides, you need a break too.

i thought for a moment. true, i do need a break.

“why are you trying so hard to make me study?” he asked.

“cause friends watch out for each other, and remember Mr. Lee said he’s gonna change out seats so we can’t pass noted or talk at all.” i reminded him.

“aw, you’re doing this so we can talk? sweet!” he smiled.

“shit up.” i said, returning to the book.

“hey, look at the shadows!” he said.

i looked and saw our shadows on the wall, very clear and sharp.

click!

Chan took out his phone and took a picture. soon, we were posing madly and taking pictures in the mirror. then Chan held up his index finger. i put mine across it and made an x. i took the picture.

he held his palm in the air. i calmed mine against it, forming a weird, but beautiful shadow of two hands joined in mid-air.

both of us took the picture. then he curved his hand into a half-heart shape. i curved mine, completing the heart. we took the picture.

i looked up at him, he looked down, not smiling. his eyes full of passion. he stared at my lips, then he leaned in and the next thing i knew his lips were moving against mine and his arms were no longer suspended in the air but gripping my waist.

a soft sigh and a click!

a camera snapping a picture, and we jumped and broke apart. Chan looked around. his mother was standing in the doorway. she quickly turned around and walked away.

“i, uh, i should get going.” i blushed and turned away.

“no, don’t go.” he whispered, holding me back.

“goodbye, Chris.” i moved away. but i felt a tug at my fingers. i looked back. our fingers were still locked. Chan smiled at them, but i hastened to pull them away.

i made my way home, still thinking about the kiss.

i got a text from Chan as soon as i was inside.

Channie😩❤️‍🩹: i made mom delete the picture.

me: ok, thanks.

Channie😩❤️‍🩹: but i still have it ;)

me: what? why?

Channie😩❤️‍🩹: our first kiss.

me: can u send it to me too?

Channie😩❤️‍🩹: [1 attachment]

me: well…

Channie😩❤️‍🩹: it’s uhh, nice.

me: yeah.

Channie😩❤️‍🩹: will you be my girlfriend Y/n? i mean i’ve liked you forever and i know you kissed me back and we are friends- i’ll take you out this weekend if that suits you?

me: uhh…

Channie😩❤️‍🩹: what?

me: nothing

Channie😩❤️‍🩹: then?

me: yes! :D

Channie😩❤️‍🩹: i had fun.

me: excuse me?

Channie😩❤️‍🩹: excused, girlfriend ;) i was talking about the shadow selfies and science of course.

me: oh yeah. me too >_<

Channie😩❤️‍🩹: so tomorrow night?

me: sure. goodnight boyfriend 🤍

Channie😩❤️‍🩹: goodnight girlfriend :)

#skz fluff #skz imagines #skz scenarios #skz x reader #stray kids #bang chan #bang chan x reader #bang chan x y/n #stray kids fanfic #bang chan fluff #bang chan texts #bang chan fanfic #bang chan scenarios #christopher bang

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phantomspiderr · 1 year

Text

Relax My Love

Pairing: Wanda Maximoff x afab!reader (lil mentions of Natasha Romanoff x reader)

Word Count: 1.9k

Summary: Wanda just wants to help you relax in the best way possible

Warnings/Tags: SMUT, so much smut, so it’s 18+, fake p in v, little overstimulation, rough and gentle Wanda, reader’s a whiny lil baby, one use of good girl, it's a bit soft to begin with

a/n: half of this has just sat in my drafts for months and I randomly looked at it the other day and this happened. It was originally going to be a bit softer and caring but obviously, the horny little goblin that lives in my brain got out. Oh and this was beta’d by my favourite person @natashasvixen 🥰

･☆: *.☽ .* :☆

You let out a sigh as you sink into the hot water, your sore muscles relaxing as you fully submerge yourself in the bath. Thoughts of the day slip from your mind and your eyes fall closed, head resting against the edge of the tub.

"Oh moya lyubov' (my love)," your eyes blink open and you take in a deep breath. Unsure of how much time has passed, your mind comes back to full consciousness as your girlfriend comes into view, "did Natasha work you too hard today?"

A small whine escapes you as you nod your head, Wanda sinks to her knees next to the bath, her hand combing through your hair softly. Her gaze is fixed on your face like she's studying you.

"Let me help you relax detka (baby)," her other hand gently holds your face, her thumb stroking along your cheek and your eyes close at the contact. Wanda places a soft kiss on the tip of your nose, your eyes blink open and a lazy smile plays on your lips. Your girlfriend stands and slowly starts undressing. You can't help but giggle as she starts exaggerating her movements, flinging clothes across the bathroom. Finally, she stands fully naked in front of you and you smile up at her, pulling your arm out of the bubbly water and reaching out toward her. She steps forward letting your wet hand graze up the outside of her thigh.

"Scoot forward my love," immediately you pull yourself forward, the water swishing around slightly and Wanda gingerly steps into the bath behind you. Once she is sat down, her legs on either side of you, her hands sink under the water to the base of your spine, slowly she drags them up against your skin until they come to a stop at your shoulders. Wanda starts digging her thumbs into your muscles, trying to rid you of the knots that hide under your skin. A groan falls past your lips as your head drops forward and you feel her place a kiss on the back of your neck.

Wanda starts humming a tune you don't recognise but the sound helps you relax further, her hands realising all the tension you have built up. Her hands start moving down your back, her thumbs still pressing into your skin as they move and she starts kissing along your shoulders. She starts at the top of your spine moving all the way to the edge of one shoulder before doubling back and going along the other.

"Nat really left her mark on you didn't she?" her breath on the back of your neck causes you to shiver. Wanda is reminded of the smutty picture of you Natasha had painted for her this morning right before they went into training as one of her fingers draws wet circles against the brightly coloured bruises littering your neck. You can only whine in response and she giggles, her hands continuing to move along your back as she starts kissing your neck.

"I love you so much," her hands slip around your stomach and she gently pulls you back to lay against her. Wanda holds you there while she presses soft kisses to the side of your head. Her fingertips lightly brush over your skin, slowly moving up the centre of your chest before she goes back down, this time grazing her knuckles against your nipples. You let out a quiet moan as she continues doing the same thing a few more times while she whispers praise into your ear.

Your eyes shut tight as she continues with her ministrations, your head rolling against her shoulder as she goes agonisingly slower. When you whine Wanda stops her movements, one hand resting splayed against your stomach and the other turning your head until she can capture your lips with hers.

She's slow and attentive with her mouth, taking her time to ensure she has you keening. Her tongue gently swiping along your lips makes your mouth fall open, letting her deepen the kiss without much effort. Her hand firmly holds your jaw, keeping you in place. There's a strain in your neck at the awkward angle but you continue to lazily delve your tongue into Wanda's mouth.

"Why don't we get you to bed dorogoy(sweetheart)?" Wanda moves to kiss your forehead, a quiet whine escaping you and it makes Wanda chuckle. She kisses you once more, your lips still touching as she speaks again, "I can help you relax more there."

That's all it takes, you're both climbing out of the bath dripping water everywhere as Wanda can't wait. Her lips immediately attached to yours, moving their way down your neck and you're whimpering for her. She only pulls herself away to grab hold of a nearby towel, slowly using it to dry you off. Her eyes stay trained on yours as she steadily sinks to her knees in front of you, your breath hitches at the sight and you have to remind yourself to breathe. Wanda's delicate hands move down each leg with the towel and she's placing kisses up your thighs and onto your hips. You can't tell if you're dizzy from the heat of the bath or from Wanda's sweet but sensual movements. You don't even realise that you whine out her name until Wanda speaks again.

"Oh, my sweet baby." You're almost hyperventilating at this point, your chest heaving as you watch her tilt her head to the side, her tone so sickly sweet and you don't break eye contact as she rises back to her feet. "What do you need baby?" You only whine more, how this woman doing so little can make your mind into actual mush you'll never understand. "Tell me what you want angel," she's slightly more authoritative this time. Her hand holding your chin, using that leverage to pull your lips closer, "need to hear you."

"Need you. Need you to touch me. Please, I just-I just need you." You're desperate now, the words just tumbling out before you can even process them fully. Wanda's smirking before you even finish, she loves it when she's able to get you in this state. She loves it when you're pliant and so willing for her.

"You're so good for me detka (baby)," she pauses to kiss you again, "go make yourself all nice and comfy on the bed okay?" You're nodding like an obedient little puppy and it only makes Wanda chuckle as she turns you in the direction of the door. A slight smack on your ass propels you forward as you follow your instructions and go to leave.

The groan followed by foreign mumbling pulls your eyes to hers, you'd been laying out on the bed patiently waiting alone for much longer than you'd expected. Your compliant clouded brain only focused on the thought of what was to come.

"So beautiful."

Wanda sounds more like she's talking to herself as she saunters over to you. Your head falls back against the plush bedding once your eyes clock the shimmery cherry red strap adorning her hips. This woman will be the end of you.

"Going to make you feel so good," Wanda crawls over the top of you, your body immediately welcoming her. She leans on one elbow so her other hand can caress your thigh, gently pulling it up to rest on her hip. The new position opens you up even more to her, Wanda's surprisingly hefty strap now prodding at your entrance and you can't stay still now. Your hips are uncontrollably bucking into her, the tip of her strap now hitting your clit making you whine out a moan. "Going to make you forget all about Nat, you'll be all mine. You want to be all mine don't you baby?"

You're over-exaggeratingly nodding, at this point, you'd probably agree to anything she said as long as she made good on her promise to make you feel good. Her possessiveness paired with her now rocking hips enough to have you teetering on the edge already.

"Want you to take it all," you're panting with quiet moans littered between breaths, "you'd do that for me wouldn't you dorogoy (sweetheart)?"

Your hands are practically clawing at her now, you're so wound up and in need of release, her words only winding you even closer to collapsing over the edge.

"Need you to talk to me," Wanda's nose nudges your jaw, moving your head to allow her to start placing open-mouthed kisses on your neck and along your collarbone.

"I-I need-I need you-fuck-Wands-I-please, please, please!" Words are not your strong suit so you just resort to begging at this point, anything to just get a little more from her. You're still mumbling out pleases when Wanda maneuvers to thrust into you, a sharp squeal coming from deep within you. Her gentleness subsides for a brief second as she sinks fully into you, your legs lock around Wanda’s hips pulling her even closer. A cocky smile graces her face when she stills, making you whine and squirm. Her hand cups your face and she gives you one quick kiss.

“I love you,” you feel as if your heart skipped a beat then when you looked into her eyes. The look of pure love on her face distracts you momentarily, enough that you’re caught off guard when Wanda’s hips start moving at a brutal pace. Your jaw falls open, profanities loudly echoing in the room. She’s not even been going at it for a minute before she changes up the position. Wanda somehow expertly gets on her knees and tugs your body down the bed a little, your bottom half now propped up on her thighs. She doesn’t even give you a second to comprehend the change before she’s driving back into you at a fast pace. Wanda’s hands pull your hips forcefully into hers, your whole body bouncing against hers. Your hands grip the bedsheets until your knuckles turn white and when you finally manage to pry your eyes open you see how Wanda looks almost like a feral animal. Her gaze is transfixed on where the two of you meet, one of her hands moving to rest on your pelvis, her thumb immediately circling your clit and intensifying your pleasure. You almost scream at the added stimulation, your vision instantly starting to stipple.

“That’s it, there’s my good girl. Taking me so well baby, god, you’re so perfect, angel.”

Just like that your eyes roll into the back of your head, you can hear your heartbeat raging in your ears and it’s almost as if your body is levitating. Wanda doesn’t stop either, she keeps pounding into you with her thumb still working you into overstimulation and you can feel your hips moving erratically to get away even as you keep moaning. Before you can even come down from your first orgasm she’s pulled another from you, this time you’re sure you’re screaming, the intense pleasure overpowering you so much you feel like you could blackout.

“What a mess you’ve made angel,” Wanda’s sickly sweet voice returns, she’s slowed her hips completely and removed her hand to instead rub both of your thighs. Your head is still spinning, you’re not even sure what planet you’re on at this point and your eyes blink open to see your girlfriend lovingly looking down at you. “I think we’re going to need another bath now.”

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sissyisawitch · 3 months

Text

Rainbow in the Sky

Relationship: Ominis Gaunt x f!MC

Summary: What happens when blind Ominis learns that his best friend MC is a synesthete who associates certain traits of personality to all the colours he can't see? Synaesthesia = Perceptual phenomenon in which stimulation of one sensory pathway leads to involuntary experiences in a second sensory pathway.

Word Count: ~6.1k

Author's Note: Hi! It's been a while since I last posted, but college exams took up all my time. Anyways, I'm back with my first Ominis one shot, so I hope I did good enough for all the Gauntlets out there🤞 This one is for all my fellow synesthetes💕Enjoy!🌈

"Wake up, sleepyhead. Class is over."

"Mmh?"

MC's eyelids fluttered open as a hand gently nudged her awake. Still a bit groggy, she slowly realised that she had unintentionally dozed off during History of Magic. But most importantly, she noticed that she had inadvertently fell asleep on Ominis. A tidal wave of embarrassment washed over her, making her brusquely straighten up.

"Oh, Ominis, I'm so sorry, I didn't realise–"

The blond boy put his hand up to stop her, and smiled softly, "Don’t apologise. It's fine. That's what Professor Binns does to people."

MC tried to forget how much of a fool she had made of herself by gathering her belongings. Ominis did the same, then followed her out of the classroom.

As they began to walk together through the corridors teeming with students, the palpable awkwardness remained between them. The silence was thick, and neither knew quite how to break it. However, Ominis was rapidly becoming frustrated by the tension, and decided to inject some humour into the situation.

"You...uh, sleep really peacefully… like a serene Puffskein." He attempted to lighten the mood with a compliment, albeit clumsily. "Pardon me, I'm not trying to compare you to an animal... I just wanted to say that you were cute– Not that you’re not always cute, of course!"

Instead of easing the tension, his words hung in the air, unintentionally adding another layer of discomfort to their stroll through the corridors. MC mustered a polite smile, forgetting that he was unable to see it, as she was too busy worrying about whether the wand in his hand, with its tip pulsing with red light, could relay the fact that her heart had soared after hearing that he thought she was cute.

Screaming with joy on the inside, but trying hard to remain calm of the outside, MC desperately wished for a change in conversation, "Sebastian must've spent his free period at the library, like the bookworm he is. How about we go fetch him and head to lunch?"

MC thought Ominis would be happy to put an end to this moment of embarrassing torture, but against all expectations, his face contorted into an expression she had never seen on him before. He replied with one short, quick word, "Sure."

Without adding another word, they arrived at Central Hall a few minutes later, right when their mutual friend was coming out of the library and already taking long strides in their direction.

"Synaesthesia!" He shouted out of the blue as soon as he got in front of them.

"Bless you." Ominis joked, although his bitter tone was still present.

"Ugh, no!" Sebastian rolled his eyes at him before turning to his other friend. "MC, remember when you told me that you saw numbers as a certain colour, or that you gave personalities to colours?"

"You can do that?" Ominis questioned, quirking an eyebrow dubiously.

MC remained oddly silent, and turned as white as a sheet. It was Sebastian who answered for her, "Yes, she does. She never told you?"

"No…"

"Oh well, now you know." The brown-haired boy shrugged. " Anyway, I did some research at the library because I was curious and wanted to know why you had that. It took me hours to find a book about it, but I finally did. A Muggle did some research on it not long ago. He couldn't explain where it came from, but he did give it a name – synaesthesia – which is when someone perceives a sensation in addition to the one normally perceived.... So MC, you're a synesthete! It's exceptional!"

Sebastian's enthusiasm, conveyed in his loud tone, attracted the attention of curious ears around them. But as incredible as Sebastian considered this discovery to be, it was not the same for everyone else. It was just one more singularity, one more abnormality in the girl, making her once again the black sheep of Hogwarts.

"Synesthete? Wasn't being the Hero of Hogwarts enough for her? She just had to find something else to prove she was better than everyone else, didn’t she?" Leander Prewett scathed, thinking he was being quiet when in fact he was as discreet as a bull in a china shop. He scoffed. "What a stupid cow."

Next to him, Cressida Blume – Hogwarts's biggest faultfinder – nodded eagerly, “She’s such an attention-seeker.”

MC knew she should not allow herself to be affected by such stupid and immature words, but it was extremely complicated to do so when the people she was closest to could also hear these negative remarks, which could possibly have a bad influence on the way they viewed her. She looked away and bit the inside of her cheek, trying to think of something else.

Sebastian, notoriously impulsive by nature, recognised her expression immediately, which made his blood boil. He approached Leander at a slow but terrifyingly determined pace, until he towered over him, which made Cressida, who had a yellow streak, take several steps backwards

"The whole school already knows you've only got two brain cells left, Prewett, and yet you still open your mouth to prove you're still as daft as ever."

The redhead frowned as he looked up at him, "You tryin' to pick a fight with me, Sallow?"

"’Course I do! It's good that you still manage to notice the obvious. Even if it takes you a lot longer than what's considered normal. Perhaps you've lost another brain cell?" Sebastian smirked derisively.

Quickly tiring of being taken for a fool, the Gryffindor reached into his robe pocket to pull out his wand... but Sebastian saw right through him.

Seeing red at the idea of Leander having the ridiculous audacity to think that he would be able to defeat the best duellist of Hogwarts, the Slytherin drew faster than Leander, right before the redhead could complete his incantation.

Sebastian cast spell after spell with such an astonishing speed that his opponent was unable to evade the incoming magical onslaught. His wand danced through the air, sending various spells that formed a whole colour palette. He began with a simple Levioso to neutralise him, followed by a Flipendo to humiliate him in front of the spectators who had clumped together to watch the spectacle, and finally a Depulso to finish him off in style.

A powerful impact propelled Leander backward, and with a resounding thud, he collided face first with the solid stone wall, before falling limply back to the equally hard ground.

Preventing Sebastian from savouring his victory, Professor Weasley's horrified gasp resounded, "Mr. Sallow! What on earth possessed you to attack another student for no reason? Such savagery will not be tolerated! One hour of detention with me. Right now."

"But he insulted-" Sebastian tried to defend himself.

However, Professor Weasley cut him off sharply, "Two hours."

"But he started it! Why should I be the one to waste my time in detention?"

"You've wasted your time attacking a fellow student. Surely you can waste your precious time in detention too, can't you? Now, will it be three hours, or will you follow me in silence?"

Sebastian let out an irritated exhale through his nose before turning his gaze to MC. Without saying a word, the intensity in his pupils was enough to convey his message. 'If that's what it takes to defend you, I'd do it again.' Still, MC sent him a rueful yet thankful smile, and watched him follow Professor Weasley.

"Oh, Miss Blume." The Deputy Headmistress stopped momentarily in her tracks and turned around. "Take Mr. Prewett to the hospital wing, please."

Cressida rushed at Leander's side and helped him to his feet. His black and blue face was now displayed for everyone to see. He held on tightly to his housemate as he seemed on the verge of blacking out. But before they could disappear to the Hospital Wing, Ominis approached them, guided by his sentient wand.

"Prewett." Ominis spat his name as if it was an insult. When he no longer heard footsteps, he knew he had his attention. "If I hear or even get wind of you speaking ill of MC one more time, I won't hesitate to ask Black to have you expelled. You know how good friends he is with my father."

Ominis could not see his reaction, but his silence and the heavy tension growing between them was a satisfying enough response.

"That goes for you too, Blume." The Slytherin added, just to make sure he had made himself clear.

Ominis only heard Cressida make a short 'humph' of displeasure before the sound of their footsteps against the stone faded away. He subsequently turned back to his friend.

"MC?"

No response. He could not even sense her with his wand anymore.

"MC!" Ominis called out again, just in case she was still in the vicinity, but just far enough away to be imperceptible to his wand.

Still no response. She had run away.

"Fuck."

Obviously, she had not gone to the Great Hall to get lunch without him (Ominis knew her too well to think about that even for a fraction of second). No, he knew that she would want to hide after being the centre of unwanted attention, and he could only think of one place where she could have taken refuge... The Undercroft was his destination.

Trusting his instincts, he navigated the familiar twists and turns of the castle. He approached the secluded clock in the Dark Arts Tower, and opened the secret passageway with a simple flick of his wand. Once the gate to the Undercroft was raised, Ominis entered, the echo of his footsteps reverberating against the walls, making the boy doubt whether his friend was truly here. Nevertheless, the secret room did not remain silent for long, for MC made her presence known on her own.

"Here to make fun of me, aren't you? Another one of your snarky comments?" She asked, her voice coated with bitter sarcasm.

The jest failed to elicit a laugh from Ominis, who replied most solemnly, "I would never dare. Not with you."

"Good. Because you should know that if you did, I'd hex your arse until you joined Prewett in the hospital wing."

"I am perfectly aware of that." He smiled tenderly, approaching the direction from which her voice came.

"Good." She repeated. Once he had stopped in front of her, she pulled him by the wrist to sit on the floor next to her, their backs against the wall. Once he was settled, she released his hand.

Displeased at the loss of contact, Ominis felt the need to make himself interesting again, "Speaking of Prewett, I want you to know that I wanted to do something before Sebastian, but... you know how brash he is."

"I know."

"However... I talked to Prewett – well, more like threatened him actually – but point is, he'll never bother you again."

"Thank you, Ominis." She replied, and he could hear the genuine gratitude in her voice.

But something was not quite right because, if usually the way she pronounced his name with such warmth and how it rolled perfectly off her tongue did wonders to make him feel better... at this moment it was not enough.

“...You could have talked about your synaesthesia with me as well, you know? I could have been just as good of a listener as Sebastian.” He declared without thinking, hurt taking over his facial features.

“I know, you would. Even better than him, without a doubt.”

“Then why didn’t you tell me?”

There was a moment of silence before he heard admit, “I was scared you’d think I’m stark raving mad, and–”

“I find it fascinating." He swiftly cut her off, not wanting to give her the time to depreciate herself any further. "How you give personalities to things that people don't even look at twice, I've never seen that level of creativity before. It just shows how deeply caring and thoughtful you are. You have a heart of gold, and the most kind and beautiful soul I have ever come across."

MC had tears in her eyes just from hearing him speak. Never before had such beautiful words been spoken to her, "Do you really mean that?"

"Every single word." Ominis insisted. "You have a unique talent. Do not let people's jealousy drag you down."

“It’s not a very useful talent though…” She mumbled.

“Allow me to disagree.” His falling intonation made it clear that his sentence was finished. Yet MC knew him well enough to recognise his expression when he had something to add, but did not dare.

“Go on.” She encouraged him.

MC’s soft words were the spur the young man needed to reveal what he had in the back of his mind, "Well, I always hear people talk about colours, or read about them in books, but I can't see what they look like, so...” He paused for a moment, either shy about his request, or afraid of refusal. “Perhaps you could help me understand what they feel like?"

“Oh, Ominis…” She cooed upon seeing the pastel shade creeping up his high cheekbones. She instinctively put a hand on his shoulder in an attempt to make him at ease again. “Of course, I’ll try my best. What colour do you want to know about first?”

“Let’s start with your favourite colour. Pink.” He declared without even having to think about it.

MC felt her own cheeks becoming beet red in turn. It was the way he remembered that insignificant detail they had rarely talked about. But it was also the way he had uttered the name of her favourite colour with confidence, without the slightest ounce of hesitation. He was always so attentive, and it made her feel all giddy. In fact, he always made her feel that way with the slightest show of affection, so it was nothing new, and yet it still remained exhilarating.

Unfortunately, as thrilled as he made her feel, he made her just as nervous, and she often ended up stammering (which she was sure ruined any chance she had of ever being able to charm him), “Uhm well… P-Pink is really sweet and kind, even if she’s quite naive. She's someone who looks at life through... well, rose-tinted glasses. She sees the good in everything and everyone, and is often lost in a daydream. Dreams mostly of love, while her cheeks turn pink to match her name.”

MC waited patiently for Ominis to respond in whatever kind of way, rather than remain agonisingly silent, with his eyes piercing right through her soul even though they could not see. She needed to know what he thought of her. If he understood her, or if he judged her. If he thought she was weird, or even worse, terrifying for thinking that way. She just desperately needed him to say the slightest word.

What she did not know, however, was that Ominis was remaining obediently silent because he was waiting for MC to continue with her explanations, which he found captivating.

“Am I detailing things enough? Does it help you?" MC decided to ask in a small voice to end the nerve-wracking silence.

Ominis offered her a soothing smile, "It does. You're doing a brilliant job."

"Brilliant...” She repeated awkwardly. “What colour do you want to hear about next?"

"Sebastian once told me the colour of the Slytherin house was green. What does it represent to you?"

“Pure joy. As soon as you see Green arrive, you're instantly relieved, because you know happiness is back. A bit like when grass reappears after a long winter when snow covered all nature and deprived it of its colours. But don’t get me wrong, Green isn't at all extroverted and attention-seeking. No, Green’s the kind of quiet, everlasting delight that makes for true happiness.”

Ominis took his time to process MC's explanation, before frowning, "Don’t people usually say that yellow is the colour of happiness?"

“Mhm, you’re right. They do. Usually because it’s the colour of the sun and a lot of flowers. But I think it's a hypocritical colour. She's always glowing, so brightly that all you can see is her, as if she wants to show off her happiness to everyone. But it's impossible to be that happy all the time! People like that are always hiding something.” The further MC went into her description, the more her calm tone disappeared and became louder.

Ominis listened intently to her, nodding along words, “Duly noted. I'll be wary of Yellow.”

“As you should.”

Even while being blind, Ominis knew by the tone of her voice that she was adorably pouting with her arms crossed in front of her chest. Witnessing how riled up she could get over colours, it made him inevitably chuckle, "All these colours, they really are like true people to you, aren't they?"

“They are. My brain has created all these characters for as long as I can remember. I’ve lived my whole life with them, so I can’t help but take this at heart…” She confessed, somewhat insecurely. “Is it weird?”

“Not at all. To be entirely truthful… I think it’s endearing, and makes me want to know how that beautiful mind of yours works even more. I only wish I could know you down to the smallest detail.”

MC could not understand how Ominis managed to say such sincere words out loud without the slightest difficulty. He admitted them to her as easily as if he were reciting the recipe for a potion, even when they were face to face. She wished she had even a quarter of his charisma... perhaps then she would have the courage to confess how she really felt.

She looked down, nervously tucking a lock of hair behind her ear, "So, uhm... let's continue, shall we? How about red?"

"I'm listening." He replied softly, smiling as if to give her confidence.

MC cleared her throat, “Red is really powerful, and so everything they feel is powerful. It’s always something like anger, or passion. They’re hot-blooded, but that’s why they feel warm and pleasant. But! You should be careful, because they can burn you if you come too close to them.”

"Sounds like a dangerous colour then." Ominis remarked.

"They can be. But if they like you, then you can trust them with your life. It's a really loyal colour, just like Blue. Blue is–"

“Oh, I know that one!” Ominis exclaimed proudly, now sitting more upright. “Blue is the colour that represents sadness. That’s why people say they’re blue when they’re sad, isn’t it?”

“Yes, you’re right…” MC paused hesitantly. He seemed so happy to finally know something about colours, that it broke her heart to have to tell him that she had a different kind of perception. “But… just like for Yellow, I don’t see things the same way as everyone else.”

Ominis's face fell a little. He had tried to impress MC by showing her that he was not completely ignorant, but he had failed miserably. Nevertheless, he forced himself to keep a slight smile on his lips to mask his disappointment, “How do you see it then?”

“Well, in my mind, Blue is the very definition of serenity and comfort. He's always perfectly calm and peaceful. He always knows just the right words to say. You'll never find anyone more trustworthy than him. You look up to him as you would look up to the sky.”

"Blue sounds majestic, I like him. I think it’s my favourite colour so far.” Ominis declared, making MC grin as she was delighted to be able to convey some emotions to him through her explanations. “Do you have any colour associated to sadness, then?"

“Purple. She’s always sad, because she looks like Blue and Red died and melted together to make her, so she can only mourn them. I wish there was a way to cheer her up, but it’s impossible. That’s how things are, unfortunately. She’s the representation of perpetual heartbreak.”

"And wouldn’t another colour be able to help her? Like Orange maybe?" Ominis suggested, now fully immersed in his friend's imaginary world.

MC could not hold back her scoff, "Oh, Merlin, no. Orange is so arrogant and big-headed! He thinks very highly of himself. He believes he's better than everyone else, because he's not a colour you often see in nature. So when he's around, he stands out so much from the crowd, that he's the only thing you can see.”

“So by that logic, someone who wears orange is a person who wants to draw attention to themselves?” He questioned, tilting his head slightly to the side out of curiosity.

“I guess you can say that.”

After concluding, MC recited the rainbow in her head, to make sure she had not forgotten any of the colours. Realising that she had presented them all to Ominis, she smiled in satisfaction.

"Well, I think that's it. We've talked about all the colours!" She announced cheerfully and clapped her hands together, just about to stand up.

"Wait!" Ominis held out his hand to stop her from leaving.

He put his hand where he thought her shoulder was, but his aim was too low. His fingertips brushed against her, running up her arm, and even through the layers of her uniform, it sent electric sparks all over her skin, resulting in her heart skipping a beat.

Blissfully oblivious to what he was making MC feel, Ominis continued, “I also read about brown. What does it feel like?”

“Oh, I’m sorry, I forgot about that one.” She hurried to answer, lest he think that she wanted to wrap up their conversation quickly. “Technically, brown's not a colour that's part of the rainbow. But anyway, it's a really basic colour that you cand find anywhere around you. Sure, he’s common, but he never disappoints you. He’s in harmony with everything. I reckon he’s the type of person that seems calm on the outside, but who has so many exciting – even chaotic – things going on in his mind. I associate brown to Sebastian a lot.”

Ominis jerked his hand away from MC's shoulder and recoiled from her, as if he'd received an electric shock. His jaw tightened and his eyebrows furrowed, creating a shadow over his misty opal eyes. They had always been full of light, giving them the ability to soothe MC, but seeing them at that exact moment, the girl could do nothing but wonder what she had said or done wrong to render them so dark.

(Un)Fortunately, Ominis was quick to give her some guidance on the subject with his next line, "So Sebastian gets a colour? What about me? Am I not good enough to have one?"

Piqued by the poison that was intoxicating his intonation, MC did not let it faze her, "Quite the opposite, actually. You're too important to only have one."

"Whatever does that mean?"

“It means that whenever I think about you, I feel red... like…" She flirted with the edge of the precipice, but her voice cracked and failed her before she could fully launch herself.

Even though he could hear the distress in her voice, MC was infinitely grateful at this moment that he could not see her cheeks as red as a poppy, as well as her eyes which were starting to fill with tears because her nerves were starting to fray.

Sensing that she was struggling, Ominis immediately abandoned his cold, distant attitude. Instead, he decided to reach out to her again, but this time he rested his hand on her knee, "It's okay. Take your time."

This simple gesture was enough to give MC the strength to continue what she wanted to tell him. She took a deep breath before crossing the point of no return, this time with determination, and seized the golden opportunity to reveal her true colours.

“I feel red like my ardent feelings for you and the way they overpower me whenever I'm around you. Or like my jealousy when I see you close to other girls. I also feel orange, because I’m pretentious enough to believe that I'm the right person for you, that we belong together. Yellow is hypocrite, just like I am when I pretend to be content with us simply being friends. I'm overcome with green every time I see you coming towards me with your beautiful smile. I see blue when I look into your eyes. They’re the most magnificent and reassuring place on Earth. They remind me that you’re the most trustworthy person I’ll ever meet. I trust you with my life, because I know you’d never do anything to hurt me. I feel purple when I remind myself that you might never return all the love I have for you. And lastly... I feel terribly pink right now, because I'm naive enough to think that my confession won’t ruin our friendship, and make you run away from me."

Ominis never really found himself at a loss for words, it happened once in a blue moon. He had always had a knack for finding the right comment at the right time. MC had said so herself earlier. But now, after hearing his best friend make the most beautiful and honest of declarations of love – and rest assured he had heard a good handful of them in his life with all the pureblood girls trying to charm him in the hope of joining the overrated Gaunt family – Ominis was simply rendered speechless. And a few seconds later, he also found himself breathless when he heard MC's melodious giggle echoing between the stone walls.

The girl was laughing for a whole list of reasons. Firstly, because the situation seemed so surreal. When she woke up this morning, she never thought she would end up pouring her heart out to Ominis. It was such a thrilling yet white-knuckle experience.

The second reason was how lighter she felt now that everything was off her chest, and out in the open. She could no longer understand why she had decided to carry such a heavy weight in secret for so long.

Lastly, it was impossible for MC to remain impassive in front of Ominis's hilariously adorable expression of frustration. With his defined arched eyebrows raised, and his remarkable eyes as wide as they could possibly be. Then there was the red tinge that had taken hold of his pale skin and even his ears. Not to mention his mouth agape, ready to utter the words that were stuck in his throat, while his bottom lip quivered, only making MC want to suck on it and graze it between her teeth.

"You're the rainbow in the sky of my life, Ominis!" She added with a radiant joy in her voice that was as obvious as the sincerity and beauty of her words. The warmth of her intonation was such that it could warm the cold, dark room that was the Undercroft. It was a sound that made Ominis's heart beat faster, and yet made all the tension in his muscles vanish. Never in his life had he heard anything or anyone as soothing and angelic as MC.

He took a moment to think about what he was going to say next, searching for the right words to express what he was feeling, and when he found them, he expressed them without the slightest tremor in his voice, “You’re right. You’re truly naive, because this is going to inevitably devastate our friendship.”

MC gasped out of fright but Ominis did not let her get a word in edgeways before he was finished.

“However, you were wrong about the second part. It did nothing to make me want to run away from you. Quite the opposite, in fact. It gave me the courage to finally act on my innermost desires, and get closer to you, like I've always wanted.”

Now that he said it, MC realised how he had scooted closer to her unnoticed, until their sides were leaning against each other, making their knees brush, and their hands touch. Using his little finger to caress the back of MC's hand and test the waters, Ominis fully grasped his beloved's hand and intertwined their fingers together when he realised that she was not reluctant to his touch.

Thrilled by his gesture, MC looked up at his beautiful face that she now could see up close thanks to their intimate proximity. She could not help but be mesmerized by the intricate details of his features, starting with the numerous beauty spots that adorned his pale skin and caught the light in such a way that it was impossible for her not to trace their contours with her eyes. She was fascinated by the realisation that, over the many years of their friendship, she had memorised the location of each of these moles, like familiar landmarks on a map she treasured. One small cluster as black as coal was just below his cheekbone, as well as on his jaw, highlighting its sharpness.

As she continued her silent inspection, MC's fingers began to twitch with the urge to gently trace the paths between those beauty spots, resulting in her squeezing Ominis's hand instead. She wanted to map them with her touch in the same way she had done with her eyes. Especially the isolated one next to his left eye. It stood out from the rest and added a touch of charm to his gaze, drawing attention to his unique and expressive eyes, with their irises that were a mixture of azure and creamy rays, giving them a welcoming depth in which MC wanted to drown. His eyes could not see her, and yet they looked at her with such warmth and admiration, echoing the emotions he concealed so well. Every nuance of his expression spoke volumes, revealing a vulnerability that only exacerbated her own feelings. MC could feel her heart beating faster, a gentle reminder of the unspoken connection they shared.

Still sensing the way she was admiring him as if he were the incarnation of Apollo himself, Ominis brought their entwined hands to his lips, and placed a tender, lingering kiss on her knuckles, “I've loved you since fifth year, and I've fallen for you more and more with each passing day, but..."

"But what?" She breathed, her voice barely louder than a murmur. She feared that her curiosity would put an end to their moment of complicity.

"...But I always thought you fancied Sebastian.”

“Sebastian is dear to me. But like a brother. He has been the confidant of all my admiration for you.”

With that revelation, Ominis's face drew nearer, until she could feel the warmth of his breath, a tantalizing whisper against her skin. The air seemed to thicken with anticipation, making MC close her eyes in an attempt to calm her rapid heartbeat. She soon realised it was all in vain, for the scent of the boy she cherished immediately overcame her senses and excited her even more.

Ominis's perfume wafted through the air, enveloping MC in its amalgam of cedar and bergamot aromas, a blend of sophistication and warmth. She allowed herself to briefly savour the fragrance, before opening her eyes again.

But, in the blink of an eye (literally), the moment shifted. Ominis, perhaps aware of the charged atmosphere, had leant in even closer. MC's gaze flickered to his lips, and for a moment, time seemed to stand still. The unspoken tension lingering between them reached its zenith, and the uncharted territory of what could be hung in the air. A fleeting thought suddenly crossed MC's mind – was this the red-letter day where he would bridge the gap between friendship and something more?

And sure enough...

“Can I kiss you?” He asked in a soft, sensual voice. He was only a couple of inches from her now.

MC was tickled pink, “You don’t need to ask. I’m all yours.”

Ominis raised his hand to where he thought MC's head was and, sensing his hesitation, the girl guided him to her cheek. This small gesture gave him the final green light to do whatever he wanted with her. Once his palm made contact with her skin, he searched for her lips with his thumb, and when he found them, he traced their contours with as much delicacy as if he were touching the petals of a fragile flower, reflecting all the esteem and care he had for her.

Ominis smiled at the softness of her lips before deciding, at last, to feel them with his own. He kissed her in a slow and tender dance. He took his time to appreciate all the sensations that were new to him, appreciate his first kiss with the witch of his dreams. Each lick and suck were a deliberate exploration as if he aimed to imprint every subtlety and nuances about her into his brain – from her sugary taste of remnants of Chocolate Frogs, to the shape of her full and plump lips, by way of her hypnotic floral fragrance.

When she had explained all these colours to him, he had managed to imagine them, but now... Now, he understood them.

Red for the intensity of his passion for her. Orange because he wanted her to only have eyes for him. Yellow for his hypocrisy when he played the act of the gentleman who wanted nothing more than a chaste kiss. Green for... well, how could he be anything but unmeasurably happy in this instant? Blue because, just like it was his favourite colour, she was his favourite person. He always wanted to be with her, just to feel like he was somewhere he belonged. Purple when he thought of the possibility of this magical moment being nothing more than a dream, a wicked trick of his imagination. And yet pink, because he hoped he was living a dream come true, and would get to keep her by his side forever.

When he felt himself starting to lose control over his actions, when his urges threatened to take over his chivalry, he immediately pulled away. This was one of the rare occasions where Ominis was grateful to be blind. Because if he was able to see her tantalising lips, he just knew that he would be doomed. He would never be able to spend even a second of his life without kissing them.

His hand which was still cupping her cheek, started caressing her smooth skin, "Not only do you make me feel all these colours, MC, but you're also the first person to make me experience them as well."

Sure, Ominis's confession was lovely and went straight to her heart... but MC could not take her mind off the primal urge to kiss devour Ominis that coursed through her veins. And so, instead of responding with words, she chose to convey her love with a different language, a more physical one.

She threw herself at him, wrapping her arms around his neck, causing him to topple backwards, resulting in MC lying on top of him on the floor. Without waiting, she smashed her lips back on his – which, let's face it, was far more meaningful and accurate than any words she could have come up with.

She clutched his wrists to place them on her waist and hips, like an enthusiastic invitation to explore the new curves of her body, which Ominis accepted gladly, starting to trace her contours and memorise them. Whereupon, one of her own hands wandered up and down his chest, trying to feel as much of her lover as she could through the textile barrier that was his white shirt. Meanwhile, her other hand snaked around his neck until it reached the top of his nape. She tangled her fingers in his golden hair, pulling it lightly by the roots, earning a needy whimper from Ominis that was muffled by their fiery kiss.

Time seemed to suspend as they entirely immersed themselves in the experience, as if etching every fibre of the other into their memory. The way they pulled each other closer, the way they wanted desired and desperately needed each other...

They were so engrossed in each other's electric touch that they did not hear the rattle of the wrought-iron gate being opened. They only snapped out of their own little bubble when they heard Sebastian's whistling as he caught them red-handed, followed by his quippy voice exclaiming, “Took you guys long enough!”

#hogwarts legacy #ominis gaunt #ominis x mc #ominis gaunt x mc #ominis gaunt x reader #ominis gaunt fanfiction #ominis gaunt fluff #sebastian sallow #hogwarts legacy fanfic #fanfic

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openpandorabox · 1 year

Text

end of the beginning - part 2

neteyam x omaticaya! reader part one here!

requested! *this was requested, i just accidentally deleted the request from my submission box!*

summary: it's been months since you last saw the sully's, but in a time of need, you somehow find your way back to each other and back to neteyam, possibly finding your forever in the process.

warnings: violence, mentions of guns, injury, a character almost dying

notes: fluff, angst, hurt boy neteyam

word count: 4.1k (holy damn)

!reader is the same age as neteyam!

*:･ﾟ✧*:･ﾟ✧ *:･ﾟ✧*:･ﾟ✧

The days blurred into months.

Following the departure of the Sully’s, everything just seemed empty. You felt like you had been running on auto-pilot, pretending that there wasn’t a chunk of you missing since they left without even the utterance of a goodbye.

You felt betrayed, how could you not? The family who had taken you in had left you so easily, just based off one persons request. Someone should have fought for you, the same way you always did for them.

Above everything though, you just missed them.

You missed Tuk’s excessive nagging at you to play with her, you missed being dragged around by Lo’ak for whatever trouble he was up to, you missed Kiri’s advice and her hugs, and you missed Net-

It hurt to even think about him. Every time his name popped into your head, you’d push it out with all your might. If you sat and let it linger, you knew you’d fall into a bottomless pit of grief.

So, you did whatever you could to distract yourself. You invested more time into hunting. You had become the best hunter of your age group. You explored your creative side. You made neckpieces, arm bracelets and ionar’s for other Omaticaya people. You even made one of Mo’at’s Tsahìk statement pieces. But every night, you would go home to your lonely hut, and you’d reminisce and desperately ask Eywa why they had left you.

Eventually, you realised being in the place that reminded you of everything you lost was detrimental to your mental health. You couldn’t heal if you were surrounded by the memories of what your life once was.

So, one day, you readied your ikran, and you left with what little personal items you had to seek a new home, somewhere that wasn’t like the forest. Where the trees couldn’t remind you of Lo’ak climbing them to scare people as they walked past. Where the long grass couldn’t remind you of Kiri hibernating in it, atokirina swarming her body. Where the dirt and mud couldn’t remind you of making mud pies with Tuk. Where the empty Sully hut couldn’t remind you of your fight with Neteyam, where he confessed his love for you and flew off into the sun only an hour later.

You found yourself with the Metkayina clan and your new home became the Ta’unui village. Unbeknownst to you, you were so close to the Sully’s.

You were trained as a Metkayina, and you were a natural with the ocean. You could already hold your breath for long periods of time underwater, and you were a strong swimmer despite your skinny arms and tail. You fit right in, and you were at peace with where you were.

Then one day, the sky people arrived, they looked like Na’vi, but they wore soldier uniforms, had guns and knives strapped to their waist. They burnt your marui’s and pushed your Tsahìk’s face into the sand, all in search of Jake Sully.

You were out at the time. Every now and then you��d take your ikran for a fly around the reef because honestly, you missed it. Thank God you were gone, you weren’t sure what could’ve happened to the people if you were there and Spider saw you.

That’s when you realised how close to them you were. But you wouldn’t look for them, refused to. If they could let you go so easily, you would too.

More time passed, it got to the point where you could go a whole day without thinking about the two families you had lost.

You loved exploring the ocean, almost as much as you loved flying.

The smile on your face was hard to miss as you rode your ilu through the water, eyes catching onto every colourful piece of coral, every sign of life, the bioluminescence that shined so brightly, even under water.

All of a sudden, the water vibrated. It was minimal. Barely noticeable, you almost missed it. But you definitely felt it. You travelled the waters long enough to know it wasn’t normal. You bring yourself to the surface, curiously looking around at your surroundings, and then you see it. In the far distance, flames and smoke.

Your heart sinks. Is that another village being torched? You look back in the direction of your home, pondering whether you should just turn around and go back like you saw nothing, but you knew the guilt would eat you alive.

“Damnit.” You whisper, clicking your tongue at your ilu until it dives back into the water, taking you in the direction of the fire.

Once you got closer to the scene, you realised it wasn’t a village on fire. It was a ship inhabited by sky people. You knew what it was for. The Metkayina had told you stories about these demon ships.

You look around at the sinking ship from a distance. You can barely make out the colonel that torched your village on an ikran, shooting at something in the water. You see another ikran, but you can’t make out the rider.

You ride as close as you can, enough that you can’t be seen, but enough where you don’t have to swim for twenty minutes to get to the ship. You dismount your ilu under the water and it swims away. Slowly and carefully, you rise to the surface, covering your mouth in shock. It’s an all out war. Na’vi fighting sky people. You see demon boats, exo suits, guns and arrows. And so much fire.

You swim underwater (which was a bit of a struggle since you had your bow) to the ship and you sneak on.

You immediately have to take out a solider who spotted you, shooting an arrow straight through his chest and watching his lifeless body drop to the ground. It has been a long time since you killed somebody.

You stay crouched, navigating your way through the sinking ship, steering clear of other soldiers. All of a sudden, you hear a voice. A very familiar voice. You duck behind a pole, regaining your breath before you poke your head out, and the sight pulls a sob from deep within your body.

Lo’ak and Neteyam.

“They’ve got spider. We’ve gotta get him. Come on!” You hear Lo’ak say to his brother, who begins to shake his head. “Come on, bro. We can’t leave him!”

Neteyam lets out a frustrated growl, but then he chases after his brother, right in your direction. You quickly squat down, staying close against the pole as they pass you and head further down into the ship without seeing you.

You sit with your back against the pole, feeling months worth of suppressed emotions coming up. Your face scrunches up as you cry, head dropping into your hands.

You’re only allowed to feel for a few seconds, because the sound of footsteps heading towards you becomes more apparent, so you push yourself onto your knees, readying your bow.

When you see another sky person, you don’t hesitate to shoot them before crawling over to their body to retrieve your arrow. You look in the direction Neteyam and Lo’ak went in. You knew they could be in trouble, but was it your place to rescue them?

With a growl, you rip your arrow from the lifeless body and follow them. Sometimes you were too loyal.

You struggle to navigate your way through the sinking ships many aisles, so instead, you rely on your hearing. Your ears twitch as you listen in for any slight sounds, but you jump out of your body when gunshots come from nearby. You immediately fear for their lives and jump into action, running to the source of the sound to see Lo’ak and Spider jumping into a pool of water, barely missing multiple gun shots. You angle your body closer to the rail of the deck, spotting Neteyam hiding behind a wall, gun in his hand as he ponders the best moment to flee. You hiss quietly. He was always the brother to stay back to protect Lo’ak.

You take a deep breath in, drawing your bow at your side, waiting for any danger to cover him from.

He pokes his gun from behind the wall and shoots at nothing in particular before sprinting towards the water, narrowly missing gunshots.

Everything slows down. You see a solider stand, gun aimed straight at Neteyam’s back. You breathe out, firing your arrow at the solider. It lands in his chest just as he shoots his gun, which distorts the soldiers angle of fire. The bullet hits Neteyam‘s shoulder, and he jumps into the pool of water with a grunt.

You gasp, ears turning down instantly at the sound of his body hitting the water. “Please be okay.” You whisper to yourself, hand over your heart as you attempt to regain your breath. The sound of Neteyam hitting the water replays over and over in your head, and in a fit of rage, you rise to your feet, bow drawn, and you kill the remaining three soldiers in the area.

Once you clear the area, you jump into the same pool of water Neteyam had jumped into minutes before, swimming in search of him or Lo’ak or Spider. You click your tongue, waiting only moments for your ilu to appear next to you, stroking your head with its own.

In a hurry, you pull yourself onto the saddle, sitting up straight and looking around you. So much fire, so many machines, and so much death. But you manage to spot the familiar blue bodies a little further out on some rocks.

“Under,” you speak aloud to your ilu, and it obediently listens, diving into the water and swimming at a speed you didn’t think was possible, but it just showed this creature could feel your bond with Neteyam through you.

Once you’re at the rocks, you disconnect from your ilu, climbing the rocks without anyone noticing because they’re all arguing.

“Lo’ak, you put your brothers life at risk again! If that bullet hit a few more inches over, he’d be dead!” Jake yells at his youngest son, who simply drops his head in guilt. Neytiri is on her knees, presumably beside Neteyam but you can’t see him because Jake and Lo’ak are in the way.

“Dad, we had to save spider. We could not leave him there.” Neteyam speaks up, and you wince at the sound of pain in his voice.

Lo’ak is the first to see you. His eyes widen, having forgotten his lecture from his father, but he doesn’t move.

“Y/N?” He questions, cheeks stained with tears, yet a hopeful look in his eyes.

You didn’t blame his questioning stare. You had changed a lot while leaving with the Metkayina. Your hair that was usually just in tight braids was now only braided at the roots, falling into curls at your ribs. Your skin had turned slightly aqua from the sun and water exposure, and you were wearing a traditional Metkayina loin cloth and neckpiece, decorated by sea shells.

Suddenly, all of the Sully’s were looking at you, plus a Metkayina na’vi, but you don’t have time to say anything, because you’re almost knocked over by Lo’ak who tackles you in a hug, shortly joined by Spider.

“Neteyam… Is he okay?” You whisper, your voice slightly broken, and Lo’ak steps out of the way just as Jake moves aside, and there he was, staring right at you.

From his spot on the ground, he lifts his fingers to his head, the gesture of ‘i see you’ and you approach him with shaky knees before dropping to them next to him.

“You’re okay? You’re going to be okay?” You question him, eyes scanning over his body, looking for any other wounds. He’s scratched and grazed, but that’s nothing compared to his shoulder. Neytiri is applying pressure to the wound, but blood is still sleeping through her fingers.

“He’s gonna be okay. Bullet went through his shoulder. But we need to get him help, or he could bleed out.” Jake finally speaks, and Neytiri nods with him:

“I can take him to my vi-“

Jake cuts you off when he suddenly lifts his head, ears back in alert as he listens to his earpiece.

“He has Tuk and Kiri. Neytiri, he has our daughters.” Jake immediately stands, beginning to ask Spider for directions. Neytiri grabs your hand, placing it on Neteyam’s shoulder. She caresses Neteyam’s cheek for a moment, before mounting her ikran, heading back in the direction of the ship.

“I need you to take Neteyam back to the village to get him help. Please.” He looks at you with pleading eyes, and of course, you can’t say no. Neteyam needed you right now.

“Dad, I want to go with you.” Lo’ak steps towards him, eyes like an endless pool of sadness, and Jake barely spares him a glance before he’s turning around.

“You’ve done enough.” He mumbles, following Spider to the edge of the rocks and leaving you all behind.

“No, Dad.” Lo’ak whispers sadly, but he’s already gone. You frown, wishing you could comfort him, but Neteyam needed help right now.

Neteyam who is on the ground, grunting in pain as his body makes involuntary movements, and your heart aches to take all of his hurt away, shelter him so he never had to feel an ounce of it again.

“Okay, we’re going to get you on an ilu. Are you ready?” You ask Neteyam, but you don’t really wait for him to answer. Instead you look to the water, tongue clicking for your ilu.

“It hurts, so-so much.” Neteyam grunts, and your attention is immediately back on him. “I need to tell you. I’m sorry for what I di-“

“Shh,” you shake your head, tears pooling in your eyes as your free hand meets his cheek, stopping him from finishing his sentence. “Come on, we can talk about this later. We need to get you back.”

He looks up at you, the fear in his eyes almost knocking you over. Gone was the fierce warrior. The warrior who always protected his people, who showed no fear. Left in his place was just a scared, little boy whose eyes were welling up with tears, staring up at you as if you could fix the hole in him. “What if I don’t ma-make it back?”

A tear falls from your eye, but you swat it away. “Hey,” you say to him, lightly tapping his cheek. “You are going to make it. You are strong, Neteyam — Lo’ak! Help me with your brother, quickly!” You yell behind you, and Lo’ak and the Metkayina girl appear right behind you, already helping Neteyam up.

You keep your grasp on his shoulder, now using both your hands to put pressure on the entry and exit wound as Lo’ak and Tsireya guide him over to your ilu. They sit him at the front, and you sit behind him, guiding Neteyam’s hand to hold onto the saddle, while guiding his other hand to press on his entry wound. You keep one of your hands on the back of his shoulder, the other wrapping around his waist, before you connect to your ilu.

“Tsireya, go back with them. I need to help.” Lo’ak turns to Tsireya and cups her cheek, ignoring our pleas for him to stop and he’s gone only seconds later.

The girl, Tsireya, sighs, and you shoot her a sad smile. “Boys, huh?” You squeeze Neteyam’s waist the tiniest bit, and you knew if he wasn’t in so much pain, he’d be teasing you back.

You wait for Tsireya to mount her on ilu, and then the both of you are racing towards the village, with you constantly checking in on Neteyam to make sure he's still with you.

“Mother!” Tsireya calls once you land on the sand, and you struggle, but you manage to get Neteyam off the ilu and onto the sand, his body was weakening due to the loss of blood.

“Come on Neteyam,” you grunt, pulling him along with you, but his body begins to fall limp. “Neteyam!” You yell as he drops to the ground, lifeless.

You immediately drop next to him, grabbing his face in your hands and trying to shake him awake. “Neteyam!” You cry, lightly slapping his face, as if that would make a difference. His body remains unresponsive, unmoving, and you were too panicked to even check his breathing.

It’s all a blur, but the Tsahìk appears and two other men pick him up and rush him into a shack that you are not allowed to enter, all while you sit frozen in the sand, thinking you’d just lost the love of your life before you could even love him properly.

*:･ﾟ✧*:･ﾟ✧ *:･ﾟ✧*:･ﾟ✧

An hour went by, maybe two, while you just sat in the sand, waiting for any word from Ronal. Not only were you anxiously anticipating news about Neteyam, but the other Sully’s were yet to be seen.

They all showed up after some time, all with their own grazes and cuts. Neytiri’s bow was broken, but the bond between Jake and Lo’ak had seemed to mend, at least a little.

Tuk and Kiri just pulled you into a hug, and you all cried together. You had all been in danger that day, everybody was scared, tired, and anxious at the absence of Neteyam. Spider and Lo’ak joined you soon after, the five of you sitting in the sand, staring out at the ocean.

“We wanted to say goodbye, you know.” Lo’ak speaks up, his gaze turning towards you. Tuk was between the two of you, nestled under your arm. “Dad wouldn’t let us. Said it’d hurt you too much.”

You breathe out, glancing at him for a second before looking back at the water. “Yeah, he was probably right.” You smile sadly, remembering the words Neteyam said to you that day.

“He is going to be okay, my friend.” Kiri loops her arm around your shoulder, nuzzling her head into yours.

You do your best to distract yourself from the anxiety you were feeling, and instead caught up with the Sully siblings, how their life had been since they left, how yours had been, and how this war even came to be.

“-and Payakan landed right on the sky pe-“ Lo’ak’s animated story is cut short by Jake’s voice behind you.

“Neteyam’s awake. He’s okay. He’s asking for you.” Jake’s gaze levels on you, a small smile on his face.

The relief that floods your system is unexplainable. Like all was okay again, there was nothing that could ever hurt you because Neteyam was alive and well.

You stand up, brushing the sand from your legs, and you make your way towards the shack, letting Jake pull you into a dad-hug on the way there.

You push the curtain aside, eyes automatically finding Neteyam who was lying on a blanket on the floor, head elevated by a makeshift pillow.

Neteyam smiles when he sees you, as best as he can through the weakness of losing so much blood, bags under his eyes. “Hi,” his voice is gruff and crackly, like he’d been in a coma for days.

“Hello.” You answer back, wrapping your arms around yourself for comfort, rocking back and forth on your heels as you struggle to decide what to do next.

Neteyam decides for you when he sits up just enough to reach your hand, and he pulls you over towards him, making you sit with him. You help him readjust his position so he can sit as well, back against the wall and injured arm wrapped in a sling. You sit next to him, back against the wall as well, heads tilted back as you search for the words to say.

“I thought I lost you for the second time today,” Your voice is shaky, like you were on the verge of admitting your feelings for him, just as he had vulnerably done so many months before. “When you fell to the ground, I was sure you were dead.”

He sighs, wrapping his good arm around your shoulders to pull you into him, your face nuzzling into his neck.

It felt so strange to be this close to him. After pretty much hating each other and being as separated as possible, to being joined at the hip gave you whiplash, but in a really cheesy way, it still felt so right. Like Neteyam was literally put on this planet to be your soulmate.

“I cannot die yet. I haven’t tortured you enough with my presence.” Neteyam attempts at a joke, and for a moment, you smile, but it quickly diminishes when he grunts in pain.

The two of you let the silence take over for some time, just wrapped in each other's arms, listening to the slightly unsteady sound of his heartbeat.

“You know, you broke my heart.” You speak after some time, voice hoarse as you look up at him, seeing a wave of emotion pass over him. Guilt, shame, regret.

“I know. I had to.” He whispers, looking straight back at you, teary eyes glistening in the light.

You feel your own eyes well up, but you pull your gaze away from him, looking down at your hands in your lap. “Why?” You ask, voice shaky as you try to hold back the sobs.

He pulls away from you and you feel your heart beat faster, thinking you had said something wrong. But then he’s cupping your cheek with the hand he could actually use and lifting your head until you’re looking at him again. “Because, it was the only way to stop you from coming after us. I had to break you to keep you safe.”

A sob leaves your body, you feel the tears running down your cheeks, gathering at Neteyam’s fingertips. Your eyes flicker between his. “Well, I still found you.”

Neteyam smiles, eyes full of adoration. “Yes, you did. You never listened to me, anyway.”

You laugh sadly, leaning your face into his hand, eyes closing as more tears fall from them. You’re close enough to feel his breath on your lips, and suddenly, you’re nervous to open your eyes again. You’d never been in such an intimate moment with someone before. Despite your best efforts, your eyes flicker open, immediately dropping to his lips, watching as they widen into a smirk.

“Neteyam…” You trail off, eyes roaming over his face, greedily taking him all in. “I see you.” You whisper, voice only breaking the tiniest bit as you place your hand over his one on your cheek, tangling your fingers together. You move your other hand to his chest, fingers splaying across his blue skin.

He doesn’t hesitate, just touches his forehead against yours, eyes fluttering shut. “I see you, my love.” Your eyes shut in relief at his words, and he takes the moment to press your lips together, conveying every word he ever wanted to say to you with his mouth as it moves against yours.

“She’s been in here for ages, bro — Oh.” You immediately tear away from each other, stuck like deers in headlights as every Sully offspring enters the room, all wearing similar expressions of shock.

Lo’ak raises his eyebrows, awkwardly clearing his throat. “Oh.” He finishes, chewing his lip to stop himself from laughing.

Kiri is the first to burst out into laughter, immediately joined by Lo’ak, and shortly followed by Tuk, who probably doesn’t even understand what she’s laughing about, but she does anyway.

You can’t help it, you smile the biggest you have in months, covering your face with your hands as you lean your back into Neteyam’s chest, knowing full well he was smiling and blushing too.

“You skxawng’s!” Neteyam yells through a fit of laughter.

Jake and Neytiri decide to join at this moment, and you wish the floor would swallow you whole.

“Who’s a skxawng and why?” Jake asks, looking around at you all, trying to find the answer.

Neytiri has a knowing look on her face. Just smirks as she makes her way over to you, taking the spot on the other side of you and pulling you into a hug, resting her chin on the top of your head.

The rest of the Sully’s follow, surrounding you and Neteyam, all connecting to you in some way, whether it was holding hands, heads on shoulders or legs touching, you were all connected, and finally, you felt whole again.

Sully’s stick together.

*:･ﾟ✧*:･ﾟ✧ *:･ﾟ✧*:･ﾟ✧

tags: @sopiasleeps @navs-bhat @cedeni-beanie

if you would like to be tagged in future posts, please let me know and i will make a tag list!

#neteyam x reader #neteyam x y/n #neteyam imagine #avatar twow #neteyam x omaticayan #jake sully #avatar imagine #avatar 2 #tsireya #lo'ak #neteyam

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writemekpop · 10 months

Text

Needy | Lee Donghyuck (Haechan)

Summary: Haechan surprises you on your birthday with something completely unexpected...

Genre: Established relationship AU, cheeky and clingy Hyuck

Word Count: 0.7k

“Happy Birthday!” Haechan sang as you walked into your flat, hugging you so hard he lifted you up and spun you around. “Wanna open your present?”

You blushed up to your ears. “I said you didn’t have to get me anything.”

“And I didn’t listen,” Haechan said, kissing you on the neck, and making your face burn hotter.

It was a lie – you had been hoping Haechan would get you a present. A new watch, to be precise. You’d been complaining - loudly - about your broken watch for the past three months, hoping he’d get the hint.

Haechan brought out a small, watch-sized paper bag. He was grinning, his handsome brown face beaming.

You felt a flutter of excitement.

Reaching inside the bag, you pulled out… an orange sock. Just one. It was dirty, and had a hole where the big toe should be.

You frowned. “Um… thanks?” you said, expecting Haechan to say that he’d accidentally given you his laundry, not your present.

But all Haechan said was, “Isn’t it perfect?” He was almost bouncing in excitement.

“Um – yeah,” you mumbled, fighting the sinking feeling of disappointment. All you wanted was a watch, was that too much to ask? Or did your boyfriend not really care?

Haechan crossed his arms. “The orange sock! Don’t you remember?” He looked down. “Because, if you don’t remember, I’d really start to think you don’t love me at all…”

“Of course I remember!” you said, too loudly. “I was just – surprised! That’s all!” You kissed Haechan on the lips. “It’s perfect.”

Haechan narrowed his eyes. “Hmm… if you really do remember, then… what colour is the other sock?”

Your heart began to race. For Haechan, ‘dramatic’ was an understatement. If he realised you’d forgotten this ‘sock story’, he would sulk for the rest of the week.

Well, the other sock probably wasn’t orange…

“Blue?” you guessed.

Haechan stared at you for a long moment, then snatched the sock from you and cradled it to his chest. “You don’t deserve the sock.” He turned to storm into the bedroom, sniffing. “Traitor.”

True to what you’d expected, Haechan began one of the biggest sulks you’d ever seen. “I’m going for a walk!” he declared, going to the door.

“But it’s raining!” you said. “And it’s dark out!”

Haechan sniffed. “I don’t care,” and slammed the door behind him.

You wandered round and round the apartment, wracking your brain for this ‘sock story’. What could Haechan possibly care about this much?”

Finally… you remembered.

You rushed out of the door, too eager to even bother with an umbrella. Would you be able to catch Haechan before he got too far away?

You found Haechan striding down the street outside your apartment block. Rain was pouring, sliding down Haechan’s shoulders and making his clothes cling to his lean frame.

“I remember!” you called.

Haechan huffed, not turning. “Stop lying!”

You shook your head. “The other sock is green.”

Haechan stopped walking, the muscles in his back tensed.

You continued, “It just after we had sex for the first time. We were so excited, and dazed, and loved up out of our minds, that we put on one of each other’s socks,” you said, laughing a little.

You held Haechan’s hand. “Thank you for giving me my sock back. It’s the best present ever.”

Haechan turned. His brown eyes were wide and nervous. “Are you sure you wouldn’t rather have… a watch? I was gonna get you one, I know you were dropping hints. It’s just – I already had this planned.” He grabbed his head. “I should’ve got the watch.”

You stepped forwards, wrapping your arms around Haechan’s waist and hugging him. You could feel his skin, hot against the cool rainwater. “I’m sorry I forgot, Haechan. I would rather have this sock than a million watches.”

Haechan placed, wet, sad kisses down your jaw. “Really? he whispered.

“Really,” you said. Your boyfriend was crazy, and sentimental – and perfect. “Now… why don’t I take you home and love you so good you forget which sock is which?”

Haechan grinned.

—

MAIN MASTERLIST

Let us know what you thought in the comments or on anon! 💋

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bradshawssugarbaby · 4 months

Text

Cowboy Casanova - Jake Seresin x Reader

A/N: It's been a hot minute since I wrote anything spicy but since Glen had to go and make that comment while reading thirst tweets yesterday, here we are. It's not my best, and it's literally plotless smut, but c'est la vie.

pairing: Lt. Jake Seresin x fem!reader

warnings/content: minors dni below the cut / fingering, praise kink, swearing, daddy kink, breeding kink if you squint, unprotected p in v (wrap it before you tap it, y'all).

word count: 1.1k

“Come on then, cowboy. Show me what you’ve got,” you challenged, hands resting firmly on your hips as you eyed your tall, blonde-haired boyfriend up, trying to resist the urge to bite your lip as your gaze fell on his sharply toned body, his white long-sleeved henley hugging his muscular physique tightly, accentuating every curve of his arms in a way that was almost hypnotizing.

“Cowboy?” Jake retorted, laughing dryly as he raised the amber coloured glass bottle in his hand to his lips, taking a sip of the cold, frothy liquid inside, shaking his head in mock disbelief at your bold attitude, trying hard to deny any semblance of feeling towards you over it.

“You heard me. You sure as shit talk like one.”

“You makin’ fun of my accent, darlin’? I thought most women go wild for a good Southern boy.”

“Most women might. It takes more than an accent to win me over, gorgeous.”

He leaned in towards you, his tall frame towering in as he ducked his head down beside your ear. His voice was a low, seductive whisper as he spoke - he knew what he was doing, you were terrible at bluffing, and honestly, so was he, but that was part of what made this whole exchange so appealing.

“Oh believe me, I’m up for the challenge,” He purred as he stroked your cheek with the back of his hand, his fingers brushing against your skin lightly, yet in a way that made your skin feel hot to the touch.

He pressed his lips to the sensitive patch of skin directly in front of your ear, his warm breath taunting your nerves as you felt it brush over you. The smell of beer mixed with his intoxicating cologne, and you felt your head begin to spin as his lips made their way down the curve of your cheekbone, trailing their way to your neck before resting on the sweet spot where your neck and shoulder met. You felt your back press flat against the wall as Jake put his hands on your waist, gripping your body tightly as he held you in place, his knee resting in between your legs, keeping them spaced just far enough apart for him for his hand to find its way between your thighs, reaching up the short skirt you’d decided to wear that day. You felt Jake’s lips curl up into a smirk against your skin as he ran his fingertips along your slit, a cocksure chuckle escaping his lips as his fingers brushed your clit.

“So wet for me already, babygirl,” He hummed against your neck before nipping at your sensitive skin with his teeth, continuing to grin against you as he left soft bite marks on your skin.

“Only for you, daddy,” You murmured, knowing that calling Jake that was a surefire way to have him practically ripping your clothes off in seconds. It drove him wild whenever he heard it fall from your lips like a prayer, he could barely contain himself whenever you did, and you loved taking advantage of that fact.

Jake plunged two of his long, thick digits into your core as soon as the words came out of your mouth, barely giving you time to react to his touch. You threw your head to the side, letting out a loud whine as he pressed his fingers into you, pumping them at a taunting pace as you let out a series of lewd noises.

“Look at my pretty girl, all dripping wet for me,” Jake teased, his tone low and deep as he grinned at you, unable to stop himself from getting cocky about the effect he had on you.

He pulled his fingers out quickly, leaving you a whimpering mess at the loss of contact as he stuck them into his mouth, his wide tongue licking them clean before he undid his belt with his free hand. As he pulled his fingers out of his mouth, he quickly dropped his jeans to the ground, kicking his boxers off his legs with them. Jake pressed you against the wall once again, his hardened cock pushing into your thigh as he lifted you up to hold your legs around his waist, using the wall as leverage to balance you where he wanted. He used one hand to guide his tip along your soaking core, leaving you a babbling mess at just the touch of him. Without warning, he pushed himself into you, an obscene sounding grunt coming out of his mouth as he felt your body clench around him.

“That’s it, pretty girl. Taking Daddy’s cock so good for me, aren’t you? Want Daddy to fill you up, hmm?”

You attempted to respond, but your words could barely make their way into a coherent sentence as Jake continued to thrust into you, his movements becoming sharp and quick as he found his rhythm, thrusting as deep and hard into you as your bodies would allow. You managed to nod your head quickly in reply, but even getting your mind and body on the same page long enough for a simple head nod was next to impossible at this point. Jake prided himself in never half-assing anything, and that extended into his sex life. Not once in your relationship had he left you unsatisfied, or without craving, wanting, needing more.

“I’m so close,” You finally managed to sputter out, the only words that could come to you when Jake had you like this.

“Let it go, honey,” His words were more of a command than a phrase of encouragement as he said them, but it wasn’t like you had much of a choice over it at this stage. You felt Jake beginning to lose control as your wet cunt clenched around him tightly, As Jake’s thrusts became sloppier, you felt him reach his climax, filling you with hot spurts of cum as he threw his head back, making his shouts of your name sound obscene as he was overrun with pleasure.

Panting heavily as he leaned against the wall, pinning you in place after helping you put your feet back on the floor, Jake’s sea-green eyes met yours with a lustful, yet loving gaze. He smirked as he gently pushed a strand of hair that fell from your ponytail behind your ear, leaning in to kiss you passionately, the heat of your bodies radiating between you, sweat dampening your brow.

“How ‘bout you and I take this to the bedroom so I can fuck you properly?” Jake smirked, raising one of his dark blonde eyebrows at you.

“You’re on, Cowboy, you’re on.”

355 notes · View notes

starstruckmoony · 1 year

Text

style.

masterlist

pairing - sirius black x fem!reader

summary - you and sirius start dating after accidentally running into each other at a concert but confirm nothing, just to watch everyone lose their shit online.

trope/tags - band/celeb!au, instagram/social media!au, modern!au, fluff, terrible humour

word count - 1k

warnings - language

part 1 / part 2 / part 3

yourusername

❤ liked by starmanblack, cissy_blck, r.a.black and 804,337 others

yourusername mirror's dirty but i felt pretty

7,164 comments

starmanblack damn smash

yourusername thirsty mf

starmanblack you're not wrong

cissy_blck i promise i'm cooler than your boyfriend

luciusssy i love you too bae

cissy_blck 🥰

bartyyy can you sign my house?

yourusername i'll see what i can do

lily_evans UMMMMMM MOTHER?

mmmckinnon mommy.

prongsyboy mama?

starmanblack PRONGS

user128836 i don't know the colour of anything

user702655 YOU HAVE A BOYFRIEND????

user358991 sirius said smash and i agree

user073823 the only man we trust

user662627 i'm gonna clown so hard but why did half of sirius family like this post?

user491175 i almost sent a thirst tweet

starmanblack

❤ liked by yourusername, ev.rosier, marymacdonald and 799,853 others

starmanblack boyfriend vibes 😩

6,897 comments

yourusername very real

starmanblack i'm flattered

yourusername you better be

yourusername you still smell like horse tho

starmanblack go away

prongsyboy did you tell him i said hi?

starmanblack i got you his autograph

mmmckinnon you didn't even tag the photographer smh

starmanblack why are you offended in the name of the photographer?

mmmckinnon i'm just defending my wifey

casmeadowes i wasn't there???

user075764 DATE ME

user246766 you single?

user113388 he's dating y/n l/n

user300722 i volunteer to take your bf photos 🤚

user943534 CONFIRM THE RUMOURS I'M BEGGING

user855465 y/n has a boyfriend and you just put boyfriend in the caption so i'll live in delusion from now on

user464646 i wanna be a horse

prongsyboy added to their story

yourusername

❤ liked by starmanblack, pandorasbox, rjlupin and 844,008 others

yourusername london, i'm speechless. i had the most amazing time with all of you last night and i can't wait to perform for you again 💞 hearing you guys sing your hearts out with me was truly magical, thank you sooo much and i love love love every single one of you 💕 also! a special thanks that friend group from the first row who gave me a bunch of plushies, my heart is extra happy 😚

tagged ev.rosier

8,677 comments

starmanblack i was there, i can confirm

yourusername I COULDN'T SEE YOU IN THE CROWD AT FIRST AND I GOT SO SAD

starmanblack lol i love you sm

starmanblack my guitar fits your aesthetic nicely

yourusername i know right?!? me and her were meant to be

marymacdonald when i say best concert of my life i mean it

yourusername i don't deserve you

bartyyy first row seats hmghnhm 😩

yourusername perks of dating the photographer

ev.rosier you're welcome bartemius

user201010 i cried ugly tears

user927161 i formally apologise to the people who were near me 💀

user472738 ARE Y'ALL SEEING THIS??? THEY'RE DEFO DATING

user928312 YOU PLAYED MY FAVOURITE SONG AND I WASN'T THERE 😭😭😭

user446286 one of those plushies was from meeeee

user018381 lost my voice but it feels so right

starmanblack

❤ liked by yourusername, marymacdonald, lily_evans and 810,777 others

starmanblack ok.

7,995 comments

yourusername he loves you

starmanblack he bit my converse

yourusername it was an act of love

starmanblack AND HE STOLE ONE OF MY DOCS

yourusername IT. WAS. AN. ACT. OF. LOVE.

yourusername bet you deserved that

starmanblack you were just saying he loves me?

yourusername was i though?

vance_emm what in the gaslighting hell is going on above me?

r.a.black wdym? i'm loving it

user242539 i've yet to see a normal picture of this little guy

user301453 THE BICKERING LMAOOO

user463646 HELP HE'S VIOLATING YOU

user857433 he's in his reputation era

user302770 THIS DOG PLS

yourusername added to their story

celeb_gossip

♡ 37,022 likes

celeb_gossip a scandal is on its way! 👀 there's been word on the street that sirius black and y/n l/n have had a little something going on since the beginning of the year, and we are almost certain that this isn't just another case of senseless rumours. 🙈 other than constantly interacting with one another on social media, the two have been pictured entering l/n's apartment after what seemed like a romantic night out. 😌 several sources can prove that the couple has been caught in ways that scream everything BUT platonic, and we deem them quite credible. 😉 but in the light of all of this, the two singers haven't said anything. what do you think? 🤔 are they secretly together? 🤭 or are they secretly laughing at all of us? 😶 leave your opinion in the comments! 😘

12,558 comments

user438185 oH

user019570 EVERYBODY STAY CALM

user837999 i hope they sue you lol

user262626 they're defo laughing at us

user823715 THE POWER THESE TWO WOULD HOLD AS A COUPLE

user192072 LMAO THEY'D BREAK THE INTERNET IF THEY CONFIRMED IT

user137753 get a life wtf

user020191 pretty sure they're together

user647275 this is out of line

user244411 nah cause paps should be illegal

user302906 I NEED THEM TO SAY SOMETHING I'M LITERALLY FREAKING OUT

user522727 dunno but i want whatever they have going on

yourusername

❤ liked by bellatrixieb, cissy_blck, r.a.black and 855,006 others

yourusername tea pages are saying that i'm dating this weirdo 🤪

tagged starmanblack

10,675 comments

starmanblack people just love being funny

yourusername making me shed tears

starmanblack you could have found a better picture at least 🙄

yourusername fym? this is top tier stuff

starmanblack you're not getting your shades back

yourusername funny 🤣 i'll steal them back today 😐

vance_emm yeah and i'm a hamster

marymacdonald you kind of look like one though 🥺

mmmckinnon LMAOOOOO

starmanblack not you talking

mmmckinnon lmaoing ≠ talking

user283800 guess this confirms it ☹

user916373 WHY DO REG AND SIRIUS' COUSINS KEEP LIKING ALL YOUR POSTS THIS MAKES ME CONFUSEDDDD

user758234 does this mean you're free to date me?

user424116 YOU'RE TROLLING US

user021725 double meaning? (pls say sike i'm desperate)

user024477 calling sirius up rn

user555641 GUYS THERE'S STILL HOPE MAYBE THEY'RE JOKING AROUND

user828295 okay but does it actually matter 💀

starmanblack

❤ liked by lily_evans, pandorasbox, casmeadowes and 873,253 others

starmanblack feeding the paps

11,994 comments

yourusername bet they're still starving

starmanblack we should make out and post it

yourusername twitter will go CRAZYYY

yourusername we look dead tho

starmanblack i reckon it's the cheap wine

yourusername you calling me poor?

starmanblack 😇

prongsyboy i still don't get how or why you had my glasses

starmanblack aesthetic purposes

xeno_lovegood that's cute 🤩

starmanblack facts ong fr fr

cissy_blck reggie's sil

bellatrixieb i'm so jealous

user472721 I WANT

user882923 I CAN'T DECIDE WHO THE LUCKY ONE IS

user382541 NAUR STOP MESSING WITH US

user773724 WHATTGEDHQUXJQDJJQSJJW

user482972 OH MY GOD?????????

user362613 narcissa's comments making me all hopeful

user924474 I'M SO STRESSED

starmanblack added to their story

512 notes · View notes

chocosvt · 2 years

Text

best friend’s brother

⚬ pairing: joshua x fem!reader ⚬ word count: 37k ⚬ warnings: alcohol, mentions of unsafe sex/unplanned pregnancy ⚬ genres: timestep, romance, angsty angst, major feels abt having a crush, lots of flirting, smut, drama, happy tears.

✧✎ synopsis: joshua happens to be your best friend's older brother. he's pretty, and he's got a lot of cool details about him that you pay a concerning amount of attention to, but he’s just a friend (if you could even call it that). still, what does he think of you, anyway? that is—if he thinks of you.

✧✎ a/n: this is a rewrite of an old fic that i uploaded in 2016. keep in mind the original version was only 13k! i've made so many changes to this story and i really hope those who read it enjoy it! thank you sm!

⇢ here is this fic’s inspo playlist ⇢ smut section is marked! ⇢ taglist included in final author’s note

13.

You flipped to the next page of the plastic binder and squiggled a small ‘seven’ inside the margin. Then, your eyes wandered back to the math textbook sitting in between you and your best friend. It was difficult to study on Jennie’s bed, but she liked it that way, and there definitely wasn’t enough room at her desk.

“Okay, this part shouldn’t be too hard,” she said, using the tip of her pencil to trace the question, “we just have to graph this line, and we already know the y-intercept is going to be negative three.”

“This would be so much easier if the teacher handed out graph paper. Look at this grid I just drew, it’s so ugly.”

Jennie leaned over her left shoulder to look at your binder and started laughing. It was probably the saddest grid in history.

“I have a ruler somewhere,” the girl offered, pushing up onto her knees and patting around the bed, “at least, I think I do… or—maybe he took it. Yeah, of course, he definitely has it, stupid idiot.”

“Who? Joshua?” You asked.

She huffed again, sliding back onto her stomach.

“Mmhm, told me he needed it for his physics homework,” she uttered the word in a fancy-established way, as though she were making fun of it, “he never gives back any of my stuff.”

The only thing you could do was swallow and nod your head, meanwhile this awkward smile was slapped onto your mouth. You loved Jennie, you really did, but the only reason you agreed to homework and supper at her house was because of a very specific reason—this was the one night her older brother didn’t have any guitar or baseball lessons, or some outing planned with his friends. And, well, you hadn’t seen him at all since you’d gotten here, but he’d inevitably have to come down for dinner. Joshua, that was his name.

He was about two years older than you, and despite never having a conversation with him before, there was a lot you already knew about him. For example, Joshua always wore the same beat-up pair of white converse sitting in the front foyer. He liked collecting these weird, colourful band t-shirts and he routinely made Jennie bring him a piece of Double Bubble whenever he didn’t have any. It was pretty unimportant information, actually, but not to you.

“Shoot, it’s almost time for to eat,” Jennie announced, looking back at the alarm clock on her bedside table, “my parents will probably call us down any minute. Guess no more homework.” She flipped the textbook shut and cleared all her notes away. “Also, what do you want to do after dinner? My mom said we can walk to the river. We might be able to catch some frogs.”

“Oh, okay. Yeah, we should do that.”

“Totes,” Jennie smiled, “okay, I’m gonna see if they need any help setting the table. Hey, do you wanna grab Josh from his room? Tell him to come down?”

Almost immediately, you shot up onto your knees.

“Me?” You reiterated, aiming a finger at yourself.

Jennie threw on a small wool cardigan from the spine of her desk chair, tilting her head at you in amusement.

“Mmhm. Yeah, you. Who else is in here? Just grab him, ‘kay? And make sure you knock kinda loud ‘cause sometimes he’s got his earbuds in, so he can’t hear.”

Before you could even hope to oppose, she was already out the door and skipping downstairs, and you listened to the sound of her socks sliding against their hardwood floors until everything was silent. Okay, yes, you’d wanted to see Joshua and maybe find an excuse to say even a word to him, but as your docile, thirteen-year old self, asking him to join you for dinner was like…like asking you to take the sun out of the sky—very much impossible. But you were also too worried to not do anything, so you settled for a nervous walk down the hall, where Joshua’s door was covered with posters.

You knocked, though not that loudly.

When there was no answer, your face exploded into heat and you already questioned just leaving him to his devices.

But you tried knocking again, harsher this time, only to be met with the same poster of a woman wearing red, star-shaped glasses. You pressed your ear to the door. It sounded a little too quiet. And for some god awful, stupid reason that you could not compute, you decided to open Joshua’s bedroom door and just waltz right in like it was second nature. Except, there was no one. His room was empty, the shades fully drawn so everything was tinted dark, and surprisingly, it was quite neat for a fifteen-year-old boy. You saw his guitar propped in the corner, and some shiny medals dangling above his bed from baseball competitions.

He had a lava lamp sitting on his desk, purplish and hot yellow, which left a very impressionable dent on you, because you’d always wanted a lava lamp and this cute boy just happened to own one. You even saw Jennie’s ruler sitting next to a massive textbook on his desk, beside a tiny glass and acrylic cube of the solar system.

His room seemed like the most fascinating place on Earth.

“Uh, did Jennie tell you to come in here?”

Shoot!

It was horribly audible, that embarrassing suckle of breath you heaved in through your teeth, and when you turned around to meet the boy who was looking at you so concerningly, you realized he wasn’t mad (which was wonderful, since you already felt on the verge of tears and having this boy snap would definitely be the hand to push you over the edge). He reached out to flick on a light.

“Dinner’s ready,” you told him, your voice shaking a little.

“Okay,” Joshua answered, “are you… looking for something?”

“No, sorry, I’ll leave now. I’m really sorry.”

You didn’t know what you were saying as you stumbled past the boy blindly, but he’d moved to let you shuffle by, even tapped the door open a bit wider for you. By the time you were downstairs, you grabbed a large glass of water and chugged it, knowing that was the first time you’d ever felt this winded—the fact it had made the air simultaneously thicker and harder to breathe. Joshua came down about a minute later to grab a soda can from the fridge, meanwhile Jennie and her parents were adjusting the table.

“Do you like cream soda?” He asked you.

“My mom says they’re not hea—um, never mind.”

Yeah, say that, you thought, and he’ll think you’re a big loser.

“I’ll leave one in the fridge,” Joshua responded with a shrug.

When he popped open the tab to his drink, it started foaming and spilling orange soda onto the rim, which he slurped up quickly over the sink. You just stood there idly, watching him, thinking he was the most attractive thing in the universe, and you didn’t begin to question these feelings until you were standing alone in the kitchen.

What did it even mean to be attracted to someone? And should you really be this giddy about your best friend’s brother?

14.

You were standing outside, balancing on the edge of the curb, trying not to sway backwards due to the immense weight from your backpack—stuffed with two textbooks, a gigantic binder, and the big thermos that had held your lunch. Jennie was crouched down beside you, twiddling her thumbs as she stared at her phone. Exams were starting in the middle of June, so you two decided to get a leg up and take the study sessions to her house. Joshua was supposed to come around front and pick you up, but he was pretty damn late.

“Bet he’s fooling around in the parking lot w’Hansol,” Jennie grumbled, clicking off her phone and shielding her eyes from the bright summer sun, “I’m gonna melt. It’s so freaking hot out.”

“Do you want to go back inside and use the fountain?”

“No, ‘cause that’s when he’ll show up. He left me here once, y’know? All because I went back inside to get my gym shoes.”

“That doesn’t seem like him,” you said, smiling.

Jennie reached out her hand and you pulled her up.

“Mmhm, he just pretends to be all cute and Mr. Polite when my friends are around,” the girl rolled her eyes, “but he’s so mean.”

Mean? You couldn’t imagine Joshua being mean. You suppose he did order Jennie around sometimes, nagging her to do his chores or grab him another can of soda, but that just seemed like normal sibling behaviour. Besides, there were times when Joshua was plenty sweet, like when he’d come into the basement to bring you and Jennie ice cream (though you might’ve heard his mom urging him to do it, because there’s a ‘guest’ over). With a voice like his, you couldn’t even imagine him yelling.

“Oh! There! Finally!” Jennie flung out her arm to point at the silver-bullet car approaching the curb. “Gosh, took him forever.”

The passenger seat window rolled down, and you recognized Joshua’s best friend, Hansol, who wiggled his fingers to wave.

“You’re late,” Jennie barked through the window.

Joshua turned down his radio ever so slightly, only to shake his head and gesture for her to hurry up and climb inside. When you wriggled into the back, there was hardly enough room between your knees and Joshua’s reclined seat, forcing you to sit the uncomfortable backpack on your lap. Jennie leaned forward before she clicked on her seatbelt, giving her older brother a whack on the head.

“Pull up your chair, dummy. Give the girl some room.”

“Oh—shit, sorry.” He mumbled, and it seemed like Joshua hadn’t even realized you’d climbed into the car until his eyes glanced into the rear mirror, and suddenly, the seat was yanked forward.

Hansol turned around, “are you guys thirsty? I’m trying to convince Josh to stop at Joe’s Corner Store for some alcoholic beverages.”

“Why did you whisper it?” Jennie asked.

“Because it’s illegal.”

“Yeah, no duh. We’re all underage.” She folded her arms.

“Pretend I meant sodas,” Hansol smiled wide and gummy, revealing his rows of brace-covered teeth, “so what’chya thinking?”

“Yeah,” Jennie obliged, “I guess I’m thirsty. Let’s do it.”

Joshua was already at the stop sign, shaking his head.

“No, alright? Mom wants us home by two-forty-five. If we stop at Joe’s then we’re gonna push it, and I just got back car key privileges. Can’t you drink something when we get home?”

You were fully inclined to stay out of their sibling disputes, so you settled for looking out the window instead, watching a sprinkler shower a garden. That is until you felt a nudge against your elbow and Jennie was gesturing at you with her head to say something.

“He won’t say no to you,” she whispered between her teeth.

“U-Um,” you piped up, feeling hotter than the blacktop, “I’m, uh, really… I’m really thirsty too. Can we stop at Joe’s?”

Jennie pinched the back of your hand, murmuring, “y’have to add in ‘please, Joshua’, and sell it too.”

You were blinking at her awkwardly the entire time.

“Um… please… Joshua.”

Even though both directions were clear, her older brother still hadn’t turned yet, and from the way Jennie was clasping her hands together expectantly, you were hoping that pathetic ask was enough. When you glanced toward the rear-view mirror, Joshua was already looking at you. Honestly, you didn’t think you had the power to sway him even relatively, but then he flicked his signal to the right.

“Yes!” Hansol shouted from the front, “I’m gonna mix the cherry slush with the blue raspberry, and no one can stop me!”

“No one wants to,” Jennie remarked.

She then sent you a wink, which seemed unnecessary and kind of confusing because it felt like she was saying, ‘see, I told you.’

At your age, it was easy to take Joshua’s compliance as a gesture much bigger than it actually was, and for some reason, you already knew that. He was just being nice, is all, sweet, like he had to.

You were his little sister’s best friend.

“A large? Your brain can’t handle a large, Hansol.”

Jennie was standing behind Hansol at the slushie machine, watching him with a judgemental expression as he bent down the little handle and a bunch of icy, cherry red slush fell into his cup. You didn’t really know a lot about Hansol, minus the best friend to Joshua part and the fact his shaggy brown hair desperately needed a trim, but you did pick up that Jennie was always bickering with the boy and trying to get his attention. Most times, you ignored them.

Despite bending to your friend’s plea and asking Joshua to stop for drinks, you didn’t have any extra change lying around, even in the crevices of your backpack. Jennie was using money she earned from her allowance, and Hansol had just gotten payed the other day due to his first job at the bowling alley. You were staring at the glass display of bottles and cans across the store when Joshua came around the corner, holding onto his usual—an orange cream soda.

Pretending not to notice him seemed like a definite way to erase his presence, but you surely weren’t that dumb at fourteen.

“Are you almost ready to go?”

“Yeah, I am.”

Joshua reached into his pocket and checked his phone.

“Five minutes to get home,” he sighed, “it’ll be close—hey, didn’t you say you were thirsty or something? Changed your mind?”

You shrugged, “I realized I don’t have any money.”

“Oh,” Joshua responded, and the silence that hung in the tacky, air-conditioned sweat lodge that was Joe’s Corner Store was suddenly palpable, “I, um, I don’t have any extra on me, sorry.”

The only thing you could do was smile at him, and it must’ve creeped him out or something, because Joshua decided to turn around and go find Hansol who was inquiring about lottery tickets at the front counter. You waited outside while everyone paid, sat down in the shade provided by the cute, kitschy overhang painted with soft green and spring flowers. Joshua came outside first, which you noted from the pair of white converse that had just stepped beside you in the stones. And then, a can of cream soda was lowered to your face.

“Do you want this?” Joshua offered.

You glanced up at him, but only for an instant.

“Are you sure?”

He nodded.

When everyone shuffled back into the car, Hansol was already jabbering at Joshua to crank up the air while he rolled the slushie against his cheek. Jennie was just about to poke a straw into her cold tea when she noticed the bright orange can in your lap, which you’d wanted to hide from her. It was just that, one time she begged Joshua for about half an hour that he give her the last can of cream soda in the fridge, yet he wouldn’t relent no matter what.

But today he let you have one, no problem.

The rest of the day went pretty accordingly. You weren’t allowed in the basement because Joshua and Hansol were apparently watching ‘scary movies’ that weren’t suited to anyone younger than sixteen, even though Jennie assured you she’d already seen them and they were mild at best. You finished the can of cream soda, and you nearly had a heart attack when Jennie went to throw it in the trash.

“N-No! I, um, I’d like to keep it, actually.”

“Really?” Jennie sounded too surprised. “It’s just a can.”

“I’m—” quick, think up a reasonable lie that won’t mislead her into suspecting you only want the can because of her brother, “I’m collecting cans, like Elsie Bolger. She gets money back from them.”

“Oh, okay then,” Jennie shrugged, “it’s all yours.”

Because of that dumb lie you told Jennie, you were stuck with a hobby you didn’t even want over the summer, and a gigantic plastic bag lumped in the garage half-filled with tin. Your mom proposed that you start going on ‘neighbourhood walks’ to pick up any extra cans people might’ve throw into ditches or left at the parks, which was how Joshua drove past you at seven in the morning, on his way to baseball practice, catching a glimpse of you wandering through a slippery trench that you’d quite literally fallen into.

Great, you were now probably the biggest loser he knew.

The neighbourhood walks didn’t last too long though, as you came to realize there were a lot of disgusting, unsterile things that got thrown into ditches, besides coffee cups and soda cans.

Your safest bet was to ask the neighbours on your block, and by the end of July, you’d gotten a few people to start saving their cans for you. Additionally, Jennie offered to pitch in, and thus every Saturday you rode your bicycle to her house hoping that she’d remembered to save at least one can so your journey wasn’t futile.

Last week, you’d stopped by on a Sunday.

And not much could’ve really prepared you for that.

That morning, it wasn’t Jennie who answered the door, still dressed in her pyjamas with the little flamingos on them because she would sleep into lunch if she could—nope, it was Joshua. Shirtless Joshua. Shirtless, only dressed in sweatpants, with damp and mussed back hair Joshua. You couldn’t even whimper out one word. It was so obvious that you were trying not to let your curious, adolescent eyes roam that tanned torso of his like he was a dessert pamphlet. Your bike was resting against the garage—you could make a run for it.

“Jennie isn’t here,” Joshua said, “doctor’s appointment.”

“Oh,” you still weren’t looking at him, but at this pebble on their doormat, which was clearly very interesting, “I was supposed to come yesterday, but, uhm… never mind. I’ll just grab my—”

“You’re doing the can thing, right? Like, you’re collecting them to exchange at the corner store? I know about it.”

For some reason, your mind immediately lurched to that rainy morning about two weeks ago, when you were caked with mud and humidity from slipping around in that stupid ditch, rather than the far more logical answer of Jennie simply telling him you were collecting cans because they were siblings and lived together.

Joshua opened the door wider, “she has them in a bag somewhere. I can go look for it—uh, come in, if you want.”

Of course, sweet Joshua would never let you stand outside where it was slightly too windy and slightly too sunny and slightly too fragrant because of the lilac pots beside the front door. You definitely weren’t overthinking that gesture at all, and your mind was definitely working exactly as it should. So, you slipped off your sneakers and took a seat on the couch, waiting in complete, stifling silence as Joshua disappeared into the house. You got so nervous and fidgety that you rearranged the coasters on the coffee table and used the shiny edge of the fake fruit bowl to check your reflection.

Not long after that, Joshua came back to the living room.

“Hey, I’m sorry but I can’t find where she keeps that bag. I checked the garage and everything. You should phone her.”

“No, that’s alright. I’ll just come back next week.”

Honestly, you didn’t want this to be it. Gosh, you’d daydreamed so many different scenarios in which you were alone with Joshua, exactly what you’d say to him, how you’d laugh, and, oh—maybe you’d playfully bump his shoulder, or accidentally brush his hand, and the touch would create this insatiable, romantic spark between you and—all of those things seemed impossible.

As you bent down to re-tie your shoes, Joshua stopped you.

He then walked over to their fridge and pulled out a can.

“Cream soda,” the boy shrugged, “I mean, once you drink it, it’ll be empty and you’ll have a can for your… can thing.”

He tossed the soda to you, which you almost didn’t catch because it immediately slipped between your fingers, but somewhere along the struggle it managed safely into your hand.

“It’s cold,” you said, a very dumb observation to point out.

Joshua opened the front door. And then he smiled at you—just, a dazzling smile, so soft but kind of teasing and seraphic at the edges and made one-hundred percent worse by his lack of shirt.

“It was in the fridge, and fridges’ make things cold.”

The moment felt like it was too much. You were burning up, hardly even breathing as you slipped past him to hop outside and grab your bike off the garage door. That smile, those eyes, his voice, it was all you thought about during the ride home, feeling the sun kiss the back of your neck and imagining the warmth as Joshua.

You didn’t even use the can for your exchange.

Instead, you kept it beside the last one he’d given you.

15.

Unironically so, the day had just started and it was already shaping up to be one of the worst yet, even worse than the time you got stuck in that child’s swing at the park and lost your shorts trying to wriggle out of it. At least you could partially hide the water-lined eyes and trembling lip by stepping as far into your locker as possible, but that wasn’t going to save you from the bell.

That first physics test had kicked your ass.

Sure, you wasted last Saturday cleaning out and redesigning your entire room, and maybe you could have stayed home Monday night instead of going to the Laser Tag Center with Jennie, but you still studied. And you still got a whopping fifty-four percent. To make matters worse, this tumultuous feeling had been sitting in your abdomen since breakfast, a twisty type sensation, like someone was squeezing your insides using their fist. It made you sweaty hot, and then colder than ice, and at one point you swore something fucking trickled out of your body when you sneezed on the bus.

Great, just great.

Bad grades, possibly poisoned, holding back a meltdown—it would have been the complete trifecta of misfortune and general misery.

But it became more of a “quad-fecta” when you glanced down the hall.

Joshua was poised at his locker, talking to Hansol, with his arm lounged comfortably around Elsie Boulger’s waist, the autumn-haired sweetheart of his grade whom everyone only had wonderful things to say about. They were laughing, and Joshua suddenly nudged Elsie in closer against his side to pop a kiss on her cheek. You didn’t want to be jealous, because jealously felt awful, like something icky and slimy crawling around in your gut that you wanted to throw up. Jennie said that Elsie was cool, and inspirational (whatever that meant), and that she smelled of a juicy, clean citrus.

Maybe Jennie was in love with her too.

It seemed like the whole world was in love with her.

Or maybe it just felt like that because Joshua had been making an increasingly bigger impression on you as a person.

He sort of became your world.

When the bell to second period started clanging, you made a snap decision to skip and escape into the music room, which was always open and empty at that time anyways. You melted into the first chair you saw. The lights were off, and everything was pleasantly dark in a way that made you feel invisible. No one could hear you snivelling or see those thick blobs of tears on your cheeks, and it occurred to you that this room was a lot more enjoyable when there were no freshman screaming through their trombones.

But then you spotted a silhouette outside the door. Your first thought was that someone had squealed on you, and now a teacher had sought to find the juvenile foolish enough to skip Careers of all courses and send them straight to detention. God, what a shitty day.

Except… oh no, Joshua.

There was nothing you could do to hide. Was he better or worse than a teacher? You didn’t know. Neither had seen you cry, and like he’d even want to console you when you’d just shoved a tissue up your nose and tears were dribbling off your chin.

“…Uh, are you oka—”

“I’m fine,” you cut him off to save the awkward space.

Joshua tilted his head, clearly not believing you because the evidence was sitting right in front of him, pretty damning.

“Well, not to be rude, but I think that’s a lie. And—” he let the backpack slide off his shoulder, “you’re sitting in the dark. I suppose if I turned this light on, you’d want to rip my face off.”

Dabbing the crumpled tissue under your nose, you laughed half-heartedly. You were surprised he was even tolerating you.

“Something like that.”

“Can I sit next to you?”

A pulse of energy shot straight into your chest.

“Why? Don’t you have class?”

He snickered, “don’t you? This is my spare, and the only acoustic guitar in the whole school is sitting in here.”

“… I excused myself,” you tucked your knees close together, and tipped your head to the chair on your right, “you can sit there.”

This was abnormal. This was electric. This was… almost too good to be true. Why should Joshua want anything to do with the girl who probably annoyed him each time she was over at his house, taking up the couch and always giggling at the top of her lungs and drinking all his cream soda? You weren’t really friends, but it could be considered more than acquaintances—enough for Joshua to drop into the seat beside you and then proceed to edge closer.

Rubbing a palm underneath your eye, you heaved in a big breath and sighed out, “I failed my first physics test. I failed it.”

Joshua pulled one foot onto the edge of his chair to tie his shoe, and you watched him shove the loose ends down his ankle.

“Almost everyone fails that test,” he said, “no one really takes it seriously, no one studies, and about four people drop. Guaranteed.”

You swallowed. There was that obnoxious rush of heat again.

“If it makes you feel any better, I got a sixty.”

“Joshua—” your voice wobbled, another tear wetting your cheek, “I got a fifty-four. And you were probably way smarter than me!”

Despite his innocent intentions, that comment did nothing but take any ashes of, ‘it’s not so bad’ and blow them into a wispy scattered dust. Leaning over into your hands, an emotional torrent gushed through you, unlike anything you’d experienced before. It wasn’t doing you any good to keep sitting here. Maybe outside would be better. Some fresh air to get your endorphins buzzing.

Once you got up, so did Joshua.

“Fuck, I’m sorry,” he stumbled, “I wasn’t trying to be a jerk.”

“I know, I know. I’m just having a crappy day. I mean, obviously. Everything is all over the place and I would so rather be at home crying than here.”

Joshua nodded, his eyes seeming glittery and sympathetic.

“I’m sorry I couldn’t make you feel better. I thought having a little sister would make me good at that stuff, but Jennie is like a honey badger when she’s upset. No one can get near her.”

You laughed, and it cleared the weight in your throat. But, laughing also triggered that same trickling sensation you experienced earlier while sitting on the bus. And it wasn’t a little trickle, it felt like it was flowing and—what the hell, this? Of all fucking days, of all moments, your body decided now was the perfect time to get its first period. No wonder you were a mess with icy fingers and toes but a shiny sweat down your back. No wonder you couldn’t handle even the tiniest bit of pressure or stress without feeling like a being made from porcelain glass.

And why the hell did you decide to wear light blue jeans. They were in the laundry hamper and you still pulled them out because the black ones didn’t suit your top the way you wanted.

That moon-eyed look on your face was as good an indication as any something had happened, if the firmness that had planted itself into your body wasn’t already noticeable. Joshua chuckled a little, most likely confused by your comportment.

“What’s happening? Do you need me to—”

“This is…” you heaved through your teeth, “the worst…”

He tilted his head and pursed his bottom lip.

“Seriously, if you need to go home, or— if you need a ride or anything like that, I’m okay with it. Like I said, I’ve got a spare, so…”

Your gaze wandered back to his face, prompting Joshua to shift his weight from right foot to left as you stared almost through him, like he was a piece of plastic. Even if it was tempting, you couldn’t just whip out the door with that blood staining your pants, because the way your luck was going, someone would step right behind you and how could they not notice a gigantic red patch—Oh my god! There’s something wrong with this girl’s pants!—which would undoubtedly cue everyone rushing out to see you humiliatingly crumble.

You swallowed, fumbled with your fingers, only for Joshua to bite his lip.

“Did something else happen today?”

“Yeah,” you answered, sucking in sharply, “but, I’m not sure if I can… I just don’t want to—Joshua, I—I think I just got my period…”

He was quiet at first, and that small gap between his mouth pressed shut. You were even more rigid than before, almost quivering, and it was quickly dawning on you that maybe he didn’t want to hear about your body and how it was literally leaking blood.

“Oh, that’s it?” Joshua exhaled, almost seeming… relieved?

Were you hearing things correctly?

“I thought you were gonna like, confess to a crime or something,” the boy then rubbed his neck, laughing, “jeez, you were scaring me a bit—but, uh, okay, you’ve got your period, unexpectedly I’m guessing. Have you got any pads or tampons? Or spare cloths?”

“N-No, I—” your unstable emotions, they were spilling all over again and closing up your throat and thickening your voice, “I don’t have those. I-I don’t know what to do. It’s bleeding through.”

He flitted you a careful smile, passing his hand up and down your arm for a moment, “hey, it’s alright. Just relax. Why don’t you stay here, and I’ll grab Jennie from class? She always keeps stuff like that in her locker. Here—” Joshua then wriggled off the black windbreaker he was wearing, “tie this around your waist.”

You sniffled, biting the inside of your cheek before you accepted the jacket, still feeling uncertain despite his hospitality.

“Are you sure I can use this?”

Joshua was already picking up his knapsack from the floor, slinging it over his shoulder while he nodded his compliance.

“Yeah, I can get it back later. I won’t be long, okay?”

“Okay.”

He flashed you another smile, and then slipped out the heavy door which closed with a metal squeal, narrowing the ray of light that had split across the tiles. You breathed out shakily, nose still somewhat runny and your eyes bleary, as you tied the windbreaker tight around your waist. That day was officially awful, you were certain of it, though Joshua had managed to make things a little less messy, and while it could have just been the influx of hormones twisting in your abdomen that influenced your thoughts, you were starting to really, really like him. More than what it was before.

This spark you had—it was growing.

It was turning into something much bigger than attraction.

You hauled the smooth blanket up to your chin, making no move to help as Jennie crouched by the system box underneath the television. She was trying to figure out something technical, which involved pushing random buttons and clicking her remote every time the screen flickered. It wasn’t like you knew the television any better than she did, so you settled back against the couch, throwing cheeze-it’s into the air and poking out your tongue to catch them.

“This is all Josh’s fault,” she grumbled, wiping her hands along her pants, “he always screws up the settings to play video games, and never bothers to switch anything back.”

“I thought your mom made him draw up an instruction card thingy on how to fix all that,” you answered, flicking another cheeze-it into the air, “don’t tell me you lost it already?”

“He was the one who lost it.”

“Okay, so let’s just ask him what to—”

Jennie held out the remote after tampering with the system box for the umpteenth time, and the television blipped, revealing the proper screen with the little sparkling logo. She nearly sent the remote flying from her hand when she hopped up triumphantly.

“Or, I’ll fix it,” Jennie smiled, jabbing a thumb at herself, “I’m clearly not the most tech-savvy person—and that’s probably why I kept hitting the applause sound affect during the funeral scene at our school’s last play—but I do know my way around some things… even if it took me…”

You checked your phone, “fifteen minutes?”

Tossing the remote onto the couch, Jennie laughed, and remembered to grab her bowl of party-mix off the floor (with everything but the baby breadsticks included because she always said they were most useless part of the snack). You were supposed to watch this movie for your English class, though you couldn’t even remember the name, something about a vendetta. However, before the introduction scene could even play, the door squeaked at the top of the stairs and Jennie immediately pressed pause, groaning.

Joshua bounced off the last step, rubbing his hair.

“Don’t give me that look,” he nagged, “I’m not down here to bother you, I’m just looking for our soccer ball.”

“Well, chop chop. We need to watch this movie ASAP.” Jennie said, craning her neck around to glare at Joshua as he rifled through some storage bins shoved near the basement corner.

“Yeah,” you agreed (not really, but only to back up Jennie), and stuck out your tongue, “you’re making a lotta noise, too.”

“I can’t be any quieter than this,” Joshua responded, taking off another storage lid to sort through the contents, “I still have all my notes from that movie, y’know? Not that I’d give them to you.”

“That’s why I didn’t bother asking,” Jennie retorted through a mouthful of party mix, “I jusfftt knew you’d be a dick about it.”

Finally, Joshua dug out his soccer ball.

“Does mom know you swear like that?” He smirked.

“Does mom know you lied about staying over at Hansol’s last Friday so you could actually meet Elsie at some stupid party?”

The boy stiffened, meanwhile Jennie gave him a falsely sweet grin, dropping another handful of snacks into her mouth.

“I literally payed you to keep quiet about that.”

“Oh, pfft—five bucks! Thanks Mr. Charity.”

You weren’t entirely sure if you were supposed to be hearing this conversation, though neither Jennie or Joshua seemed concerned about your presence. It’s not like you would tell, anyways, and you already knew Jennie had quite the fair share of secrets up her sleeve that she’d convinced Joshua to keep.

“This conversation is over,” Joshua stated with a smile, snapping the lid back onto the storage bin, “oh, and—” he then pointed his finger at you, “I know you won’t say anything, but pretend you didn’t hear about the party. Seriously. I’d be screwed.”

“Okay,” you gave him a reassuring nod, “I promise.”

Joshua positioned the soccer ball under his arm and ran upstairs, to which you heard him softly click the door shut. The moment he was gone, Jennie’s head slumped back into the couch.

“I sense that he’s got a dangerous influence on you.”

“He doesn’t,” you giggled, whacking Jennie harmlessly on her shoulder, “now, just start the movie before I fall asleep.”

“Fine,” the girl huffed, sticking out the remote and clicking resume, though you didn’t miss how her eyes remained on you for that extra breadth of a second, like she had questioned your answer.

You lied, of course. Joshua did have an influence on you.

But you didn’t think it was dangerous.

A few weeks later.

“Ow!”

Pulling the wooden spoon out from the pot, you shot a scornful look over your shoulder, realizing that it was Joshua who’d just bumped the top of your head with the ladle in his hand. You couldn’t help the harsh expression flickering into a wide smile.

“How’s the sauce? Is it almost done?” He asked impatiently, coming to stand beside you at the burner while breathing in the flavourful smells, wafting up and sizzling from the pot.

You sighed, shaking your head.

“It’s getting there, alright? I’m just stirring it for as long as Jennie told me to. She’s the one who knows this recipe.”

However, it seemed like Joshua wasn’t absorbing a word you’d said, rather he dipped his ladle into the sauce and stole a small amount to drink. You screeched at him, switching the spoon to your latter hand while the other just grazed his shoulder. He’d escaped to behind the kitchen island, continuing to blow at the thick sauce.

“No tasting until it’s done!” You laughed, wanting to sound as serious as possible, but utterly failing because it was Joshua.

“Too late,” the boy replied, licking at his index finger where he made a bit of a spill, “I already tasted it. Sucks to suck.”

Reaching out to the dial, you turned the heat down a little more until the sauce frothed a quiet, bubbling simmer. There was a towel next to the stove that you grabbed, using it to wipe a pretend smudge off your hands, though you lashed it across the island to nip Joshua on the chest, which had been your intent from the start.

“Well,” your arms folded, “since you betrayed my trust and tasted the sauce anyways, what do you think? Missing anything?”

Joshua leaned to the right, tossing the ladle into the sink.

“Don’t think so, but I’m also too hungry to care ‘n—hey, is anyone gonna start making the pasta?” He came to your side of the counter and poked at the rolling machine used to thin the sheets.

You leaned a palm into your cheek, “Jennie said she was gonna start, but then one of our friends rang her up, saying they desperately needed her notes for our English essay. She’s been upstairs for like, almost half an hour. D’you know how?”

He straightened his back, “how to make pasta? Uh…” he flicked the handle on the machine, watching it spin, “I haven’t done it in a while, but I don’t think it’s hard. We just need—” Joshua suddenly spun around, opening the fridge and then delving into another drawer, “eggs, some flour, salt, and, olive oil, I think.”

“Oh, so you’re going to make it?”

Joshua smiled as he organized the ingredients on the island and cuffed up his sleeves, “it’s not that I didn’t want to help. Jennie told me to stay out of the kitchen. But, she’s not here right now.”

Chuckling, your eyes danced after Joshua as he moved over to the sink, switching on the water and cleaning his hands.

“Why’s that? Are you secretly a fire hazard?”

“No, she said I’m a distraction,” he scoffed, using quoted fingers and heightening the sound of his voice to mimic his sister.

“Really? A distraction?”

You twisted your body to follow Joshua’s every movement, watching as he opened the door to a small broom closet in order to grab an apron hanging off a hook. He nodded his head.

“I find that hard to believe. Jennie’s pretty good at blocking you out, and, well, she’s had lots of practice at it.”

Joshua pursed his lips, blowing at some loose, black hairs that had shifted over his forehead. As he was tying the strings behind him, the boy glanced up, catching your gaze for a very brief, peculiar second before he was back at the island, measuring out the flour.

“Um, yeah…” he exhaled, “she said I’d be distracting you.”

At that, you froze. Even the dreamy smile that was constantly stretching wider and wider from one corner of your lip to the other had flattened, meanwhile Joshua was already concentrated on patting the flour into a bowl shape that would support the eggs. As if directly on cue, the sauce left to simmer in the pot changed from pleasant herbs and garlic to something a bit too crispy and… burnt.

“Shit,” you coughed under your breath, quickly removing the pot off the stove and giving the sauce a thorough stir.

“I think you’re the fire hazard,” Joshua softly laughed from behind, pushing and kneading the sticky clump in his hands.

As much as you hated admitting it, Jennie had been right.

You needed to get these feelings more under control.

Later in the evening, it was almost supper time. The ribs had just finished brazing in the oven, and the pasta that Joshua went through immense effort to make (as detailed by the speckles of flour on his cheeks and the hairband he borrowed from Jennie to keep his hair pushed back) had been strained and deliciously buttered up.

Joshua whizzed by you in the corridor, still dressed in the apron as though he were orchestrating his own restaurant.

“There’s a little something on your face!” You called out to him, each word clearly sung by a much too happy smile.

“I realize that!” He shouted from inside the washroom, and you heard the sound of water gushing into the sink.

“Oh—” their mom caught you in the hallway, one hand occupied by the sauce pot and the other with a bread plate, “I’m sure I just heard a knock at the door. Do you mind getting it, dear? This sauce is superbly warm and kind of burning me right now.”

“Yeah, sure thing. Please don’t drop it!” You giggled while rushing toward the main entrance, “I worked so hard on it!”

Jennie popped up from the basement, heaving hard and dragging an extra chair as she sighed, “y’mean, you stirred it.”

“Close enough.”

Honestly, you’d never been more excited to eat. When you first began staying the night at Jennie’s house, family dinners terrified you, and no one could get you to speak more than a few words (which basically consisted of saying yes or no to seconds or dessert). But Jennie had been your best friend for a long time now, and her family seemed to adore you like a daughter. Yet, the second you’d pulled open the front door, all that energy and luminance drained from your body so quickly it was almost disorienting.

You were standing face to face with Elsie Bolger. She practically beamed upon greeting you, and presented a glass bowl that was sealed with a plastic film. Inside, you were sure there was strawberries and sliced-up bits of yellow cake.

“Elsie?!” Jennie poked her head around the corner, “oh my gosh! I totally forgot you were coming! I’m such an idiot. I’ll get another chair!”

“Oh, it’s no worry at all,” Elsie assured, “I brought something for you guys, it’s a dessert my mom makes.”

At this point, everyone except for Joshua had filed into the main living area. Jennie’s father took her jacket while their mother accepted the bowl. For some reason, Jennie handed Elsie a fork.

“That’s the special fork,” she said, “the last prong sticks out weird. I think it’s finally your time to use our most sacred utensil.”

God, that stupid fork—you briefly recalled the memory of Jennie almost squashing Joshua down onto the floor a few years ago, simply because he’d managed to swipe it before her.

“You used it last time!”

“That didn’t count!”

“What do y’mean it didn’t count?!”

“Just give me the fork, Jennifer!”

“Ow! Mooommmm! Joshua just punched me in the boob!”

“No I didn’t—my hand—you—you’re such a liar! Mom, she’s lying!”

Jennie actually had lied, though she believed it was a justified lie considering her brother had just called her Jennifer, which was a bridge no one should cross. You were glad that era was over and done with.

“Uh, thanks, Jennie,” Elsie smiled, ruffling the girl’s hair, “and, as I was saying about the dessert—it’s like a strawberry shortcake thing. It has strawberries of course,” she paused to laugh nervously, “angel food cake, and this homemade custard.”

“It looks so freakin’ good,” Jennie salivated.

Her mother lit up in an appreciative smile, “that’s wonderful, thank you so much. Joshua’s just cleaning up—he’ll be out soon!”

“Oh, perfect,” Elsie stuttered a sigh of relief, “I’m ready to eat.”

In that moment, you weren’t sure what you despised more—the half of yourself that wished Elsie had never showed up, or the crushing amount of internal guilt that felt like it was going to destroy you for being so… jealous. Elsie was clearly nervous, and sweeter than sugar, and there was no plausible reason to treat her coldly.

“Is this your first dinner?” You asked her on everyone’s way to the dining room.

“My second,” she said thickly, “I’m not very good at this stuff.”

“It’s okay. Jennie and I will try to steal all the questions, so you can just relax and eat. It’s gonna be really tasty, I promise.”

She looked at you gratefully, “that would be amazing.”

It wasn’t long until Joshua entered the dining room before everyone settled down to pass out plates. You didn’t want to stare, but at the same time, you were itching to watch as Joshua rested his arm around Elsie’s waist and pulled her in for a light kiss as well as a whisper, probably something to ease her nerves. He hadn’t taken off Jennie’s hairband yet, to which Elsie pinched his cheek.

“I like this on you,” she cooed, “it lets us see that forehead.”

“Ah, it’s blinding!” Jennie teased, using her placemat to cover her eyes, “dear god, it’s been ages since it’s seen the daylight.”

However, Joshua pulled it out, giving his head a shake.

“I only wore it when I was making the pasta.”

Elsie raised a brow, her smile tiny but clearly impressed, “oh, you made something? Now I’m even more excited to eat.”

Joshua flushed, and suddenly, he was pointing at you.

“She made the sauce—”

“Ahem,” Jennie coughed into her fist, “she stirred the sauce.”

“Which has to be the most important part,” Joshua added, pulling out Elsie’s seat before taking his own, “critical, in fact.”

“Sorry,” you then whispered to Jennie, who gave your hand a gentle slap under the table as she shook her head lightheartedly.

Dinner went by in a flash—mostly because you hunkered down into the plate and gobbled everything like some neanderthal who’d been introduced to food for the first time. The sooner you finished, the sooner you could escape the table, as well as all the little laughs and sentimental gazes passed between Joshua and Elsie. Her dessert was delicious, but you ate that quickly too, crunching your hand fiercely around the napkin on your lap when Elsie grabbed Joshua’s face to swipe some custard off his lips. Clearing your plate before everyone else was somewhat awkward, though it gave you an excuse to wash up alone in the kitchen.

Afterward, you and Jennie went into her room. The girl collapsed onto her bed with a gigantic huff, groaning in delight about how stuffed she was as she stretched into a starfish. You took a seat at her desk chair, fiddling with some coloured pencils, trying to ignore the laugh you just heard echo from Joshua’s room, followed by a yelp that seemed to be abruptly silenced in the middle. Jennie shoved herself up.

“We can go the basement if y’want,” she offered, “that way we don’t have to hear their dumb playfighting. We can watch a movie. Or if you don’t want to do that, we can take out my paint set and do those Mandala rocks. My mom said she really wants more for the back porch.”

You didn’t respond right away, instead rolling a sky-blue pencil under your palm until it slipped out onto the floor.

“How serious do you think they are?”

Jennie scrunched her nose, “what?”

“I mean your brother, and Elsie,” you winced, sensing how dramatically your stomach had bloated when you bent down to pick up the pencil, “does it seem like they’re super serious?”

“Serious how? Like, I-love-you serious? That’s the only serious I know. Unless you’re asking if they… if they like—if they’re—y’know, doing the thing. Because I have no idea and I really don’t want to know—”

“Never mind—stupid question. Forget I asked.”

Bringing a palm up to your chin, your eyes fluttered to Jennie’s windowsill, decorated with an assortment of different rocks she’d been collecting from her trips to the science museum—pink, sparkly granites that looked like hardened sugar and the tiniest angelite stones, which were an ashy sort of blue. Joshua once told you they were candy and tried to get you to bite one (which you might have done if Jennie didn’t burst in). Then, the watercolour paintings she’d taped over the glass. Your favourite was the butterfly with holographic glitter wings. It stained her floor in an opal tint whenever the sun shone through. Joshua always hated it, because he said he found sparkles all over the house for weeks after she’d finished, even in his backpack and on his pillow.

Jennie rubbed her neck, her face soft and sleepy.

“Can you be honest? I have to ask something.”

Swivelling in the chair, your toes curled, and you nodded.

“Do you like J—”

At random, Joshua threw open the door and came into the bedroom.

“Jesus Chr-crickets! Gosh, can you knock?!” Jennie shouted, shuffling up hurriedly on the forest colours of her bedsheets.

“I did.”

“No, you didn’t!”

“Not my fault you didn’t hear it.”

Jennie lopped her head back and groaned.

“You’re so—you’re just so—,” she crumpled her hands together as though she were imagining her brother’s head as a squishy grape, “—bleck! I don’t even have the words. What do you want, anyways?”

Twisting in the chair, you noticed Joshua holding onto a cream soda and a squishy packet of blue raspberry juice that he tossed to his sister. You couldn’t tell if it was obvious or if you’d been intentionally searching for anything odd, but his hair seemed messier, with strands flicked out all over his head, and you were certain Joshua was hiding something when he pulled at the collar of his shirt.

“Mom just wanted me to bring you guys drinks.”

Jennie jammed the straw into her juice.

“Was this the last blue raspberry?”

“I think so—don’t even think about taking the cherry.”

“Woah, I’m not!” Jennie lifted her hand defensively. “Slow your roll, idiot. The cherry tastes like medicine, anyways. You can have it.”

He merely furrowed his brow at the girl before turning to you, sticking out the can of cream soda. Jennie sunk into her pillow with her head propped up, sipping loudly at her juice and narrowing her eyes.

“How come she gets your stupid cream soda? Where’s my cream soda privileges? I’m your blood. I bet you don’t even let Elsie have any.”

Joshua looked like he might snap, “can you shut—”

“It’s okay,” you interrupted, “I’m not thirsty.”

If you were anyone else, it wouldn’t have been a big, dramatic deal to decline wanting a soda, but you knew it would definitely seem questionable and possibly hostile and cultivate the weirdest tension because you always accepted it whenever Joshua offered. Even Jennie was shocked, lifting herself off the pillow to stare at you in confusion, meanwhile Joshua had actually flinched, his head leaning to the side limply as though you’d just uttered some alien dialect.

You gave him a tight-lipped smile.

“Elsie still collects for the recyclable can drive, right? You should give it to her. I can always come down later and get a water.”

Joshua breathed out sharply through his nose.

“I’ll just put it back in the fridge,” he said, almost stuttering in his movement when he turned around, trying to compute the situation.

As soon as the door closed, Jennie cackled.

“Did you break him or something?”

16.

You whacked the tip of your shoe into a pebble, struggling to track its explosive path down the sidewalk until you decided it was lost for good. But now you wanted something else to kick. Chiefly because you were frustrated. And moody. And hating the supposedly celebratory milestone that was turning sixteen. You didn’t exactly know where you stood in all the changes. Everyone around you seemed to be morphing akin to tree leaves in the midst of autumn, though you felt somewhat like a crinkled, dry leaf—one that always got stepped on just to hear the crack.

And maybe that was normal.

Maybe everyone was experiencing the same sentiments beneath all their new personalities. Except, you didn’t know who to approach or how to express this. Jennie had made friends with these two girls from her health class, and it wasn’t like she’d forgot about you, but there was something to note about how she was suddenly into white-gel tips and miniskirts and drinking an almost obsessive amount of caffeine when she used to express how much she hated all of those things combined.

If you were to be completely candour, you missed how she was before. Jennie loved critiquing movies and painting in watercolour and could never keep a polished manicure because she loved turning up rocks or bark to catch beetles and frogs. You missed that girl so much.

But, had you changed too? Without being conscience of it?

Folding your arms tightly, you were on the cusp of punting another rock into the sun itself when a silver car pulled in close to the curb, maintaining a barely-there pace to keep in tune with your walking.

The passenger window rolled down.

“Hey!” He called from inside, stretching his neck over while flittering his focus between you and the road, “want a ride home?”

Even worse—you still hadn’t gotten over Joshua. He was eighteen now, less gawky, more piercings, a voice that was smoother than butter, but the same pair of eyes that were deep and calm and undeniably heart aching. His relationship with Elsie was rather intact. You saw them kiss every morning before slipping into your calculus class, and it was only yesterday that you’d been seated behind them during the school’s monthly assembly, a bitter taste in your mouth whenever she leaned into his side to whisper or giggle. He even slipped her an earbud so they could listen to his music instead of the principal’s boring, monotone speech.

When you didn’t respond to him, Joshua cleared his throat.

“Just—I know you don’t always take the bus, and Jennie went home with Marina, and—” his eyes shot back to the road, narrowly avoiding a pothole before he straightened the car again, “um, as I was saying, I can drop you off at home. I don’t have guitar today.”

You kept nibbling a sore patch on your bottom lip, trying inconceivably hard to pretend he wasn’t there. It was for his own good, honestly. One slip-up and your anger would pull you under.

He continued steering the wheel with one hand, the other resting almost irritably against the top of his backward baseball cap. He sighed.

“Okay, I can understand ignoring Jennie, but what did I do?”

Still, nothing.

“You’re making me look like an idiot.”

That one almost got you to smile.

“Or some weirdo who’s trying to seduce you into his car. Please, I’ve gotten the silent treatment before, and it fucking sucks. Especially when I don’t know what I did. If you don’t want a ride then—”

You finally slapped your fingers onto the handle and pulled the door open with a gigantic huff, to which Joshua stopped the car. He watched you collapse into the passenger seat, maneuvering your bag to your lap while you pressed your shoes to his dashboard. Neither of you uttered a word as he steered away from the curb. While Joshua allowed the wheel glide under his palm, he shot you a speculative glance through the rear-view mirror, teeth sunk into his lip like he was contemplating.

But then a minute or so passed, with the boy drumming his hands restlessly at the stop light, and you knew he’d ask regardless.

“Did you have a bad day?”

The silence stretched itself thinner.

“Look, that’s understandable. I can get not wanting to talk as well. I’m only being annoying ‘cause I care, actually.”

Your head tilted in the direction of the window.

“I know I’m not the first person you’d run to with all your problems, so I won’t ask you to spill them. But I’m not completely useless when it comes to advice n’ all that. I’ve gotten way better at it.”

He eased his foot over the gas pedal as the light changed. And you heard him chuckle before heaving a sigh of disbelief.

“I guess I’m not gonna get one word out—”

“You know what I don’t get?” Slipping your shoes off the dashboard, you shuffled up in the chair and rolled the window further down, feeling a gentle breeze massage the edges of your face, “I don’t get why everyone is being so fucking insufferable. Like, everyone. Even my teachers. I’m on the verge of failing calculus right now, just because Mrs. Panek is so awful at teaching. She boasts about her low class averages like it’s something to be proud of. She only pays attention to the geniuses, thinks everyone else isn’t trying hard enough.

Oh, and it makes me so mad whenever Jennie blows me off to hang out with Marina. Like, it was literally just a few months ago when she told me she loves laser tag, but suddenly it’s not her anymore, and now she’d rather fucking blaze with Marina in the washroom before class and talk about how hot her art teacher is. I mean, she used to like slasher films and stupid crystals and weird, nerdy science-y stuff which makes me think Marina’s brainwashed her. And if I have to see that one couple shove their tongues down each other’s throats on the stairway right outside the library one more time—I’m gonna fucking lose it! You didn’t just get your hormones yesterday! I’m so sick of—of everyone!

But then I’m confused too. About myself. It’s been fifty-one days since my last period. I was so scared, I bought a pregnancy test, even though I’ve never even had a boyfriend. Can you believe that? And I can’t even change comfortably in the locker room now since some girl made fun of the fact that my bra is like—it basically looks like a middle-aged woman’s bra, but I just wear them because of comfortability, y’know? But the funny thing was, that got to me, so I bought a new bra, and it’s so stupidly itchy. I’m wearing it right now and my chest feels like it’s gonna burn to bits if I scratch it again—”

You slipped a hand up the back of your shirt, undoing the clasp to the undergarment, which you squirmed off and threw out the window.

Sucking in a long, quivering breath, you felt the heat tingle across your face and melt your cheeks. With an elbow digging into the car, you rubbed two fingers against your temple, which was now pounding terribly as though someone had clocked it using their fist. A salty taste hit your tongue, and you realized that a few tears had trickled down to your jaw during the rant—that Joshua had pulled his car into the empty lot just beside the lake, overlooking the stillness of the water.

And that’s when you tightened every bone in your body, twisting your head around painfully slow to gauge his expression.

But he didn’t appear anything other than relaxed.

“W-What’s wrong w’you?” Came your very slurred, clogged-with-emotion question. “You should be telling me to get out.”

Joshua huffed, furrowing his brow.

“You’re asking me to punish you for feeling like a teenager?” He pulled up his knee, extending his elbow across it. “Why the hell would I do that? You clearly had some stuff building up.”

“I basically cursed out your sister. And I just threw my own bra out the window—there’s no way you should be calm about this. ”

He rolled his shoulders in a shrug.

“She’s not exempt from criticism. Just because she’s your best friend and my sister, doesn’t mean we have to like her all the time. And, yeah, can’t say I was expecting that. But now you’re not itchy and uncomfortable and shit, right? I’d probably do the same.”

Turning back to the window, you sought for the breeze and sunshine, closing your eyes wetly and inhaling deep. Joshua was right, you were merely human, and sometimes things irritated you. And like anybody else, you let them accumulate and fester and take up space in your chest where you were supposed to feel weightless.

“Well…” you exhaled, flicking the zipper on your backpack, “at least I’m not pregnant. I really thought, maybe I was… I dunno.”

Joshua groaned as he stretched an elbow behind his head.

“It’s probably stress. You should talk to your doctor.”

“I really just feel like falling into a hole, if I’m honest.”

He smiled at you, “want to do something?”

“Like what?” You responded tentatively.

Without bothering to elaborate, Joshua kicked open his door and whipped it shut before proceeding to your side of the car. He folded his arms on the open window, causing you to move back ever so slightly because he didn’t seem to care about how closely he leaned forward—you just knew there was a dangerous spike in your heartbeat when his gaze ensnared your own, almost pulling you into his warmth like a riptide.

“Get out,” he said, smirking, “and I’ll show you.”

And that’s when you remembered: Joshua was oddly exceptional at skipping stones. You followed him down to the rocky shoreline, in which he politely extended his hand for you to grab when you nearly face-planted your way to the water instead. He instructed you to start collecting stones that were tiny, flat, and smooth, which you organized into a pile beside your shoe. At first, you let Joshua demonstrate, closely monitoring his stance whenever his wrist sharply flicked and the stone would practically bounce its way across the calm sheets of water, leaving the neatest ripples to disrupt the surface, almost hypnotic.

“I’m not going to be good at this,” you told him.

He shook his head.

“Not about being good or bad. It’s just, a mindless task, something to relax you. Or, think of the rocks as your… problems, or—yeah, think of them as all these little irritations you just expressed to me, and each time you throw a rock, you’re getting rid of some stress.”

You breathed out hopelessly, wearing a flustered smile.

“Fine. Who knew you were so full of wisdom?”

“Wisdom is one of my many attributes,” Joshua grinned, sending another rock to dance across the water, “as you’re just understanding.”

Picking up a round, purplish stone, you flipped it between your fingers, getting a feel for its weight and texture.

“Well, doesn’t that also mean you’re getting older?”

“Nah, I think I’ll stay forever young. Isn’t that a super power?”

“No, that’s like flight and stuff. Invisibility. Heat vision—”

“Oh!” He snapped his fingers at you, “heat vision—I want that.”

“Why?”

“Because you can like, burn stuff with your eyeballs. It’s in the name. I’m guessing you didn’t watch a lot of cartoons.”

“No, I did,” you laughed, “it’s just that, heat vision isn’t usually what people would pick. Like, it’s not the first thing in their minds, y’know?”

“Okay. So then tell me what you’d want.”

“Um... flighhh—no! Actually, telekinesis.”

“Oh, so mind-reading?”

“Why’d you say it like that?”

“Like what?”

“You said it so disappointedly.”

“No, I didn—you’re just wasting time so you don’t have to skip that rock in your hand. It’s easy once you get the hang of it. Try it, at least.”

Of course, you weren’t expecting much from your first throw. It vanished straight through the surface in a depressing plonk. You weren’t sure if he was mocking you, but Joshua tossed his rock next, accomplishing three perfect skips before it bubbled under the water. He retreated a few steps back, rolling up his sleeves and scanning the shore for another suitable rock. Your eyes drifted after the boy like they were attached by a lure. Everything he did felt necessary and gentle.

“What if I can’t get it to skip even once?” You complained.

The next attempt didn’t fare any better, and served to prove your point. That’s when Joshua decided to hand you his next rock.

“I can show you again,” he offered.

You broke into laughter, “I’m standing exactly like you stood!”

“No, I’ll guide you, is what I mean.”

At first, you were still a little hazy on what he intended to do, but then you immediately understood the very second Joshua moved behind you, and every single nerve in your body had positively lit up like the flashing lights on a pinball machine. For some embarrassing reason, you couldn’t calm down no matter how slowly you breathed, and this visible shudder wracked down your spine as Joshua pressed himself against you and slid his fingers to your wrist. His touch was like silk. His voice beside your ear was warm and delicate and you were burning ash. You didn’t process a word he’d softly spoken. You breathed in mint and aftershave.

In fact, when he helped to guide the angle of your wrist and the stone made one very prominent hop across the river, you hardly noticed.

Because then Joshua had squeezed your waist with both his hands, giving you an excited, innocent shake. For you, your world nearly went black. It was merely a teaspoon of what it could be like to have a relationship with him, and it was intoxicating you dauntingly fast.

“—told you it wasn’t that hard!”

He was away from your backside, already picking some more stones into his palm when you caught the end of his exclamation.

“W-Well, you helped…”

Dammit—you sounded so stupidly breathless—

“Just do as I showed you, n’ you’ll be stress free in no time.”

But little did he know, you’d already forgotten all about that wild rant in the car. Now, your mind couldn’t conjure up any sort of thought other than what it would be like to know Joshua the way Elsie did—to whisper in his ear and kiss the edges of his kitten mouth and nuzzle your head into his shoulder while you listened to his music. To constantly breathe in his scent and feel his hands anywhere you desired. He mumbled something else to you, though you didn’t quite catch it.

You were floating far too high.

Rather than home, Joshua drove you back to his house. He’d told you his parents were going to be out late for a business dinner and you already knew Jennie was staying the night at Marina’s—not that one single part of you cared. Spending time with him was better than heating up some artificial, frozen dinner in the microwave while you waited in tears for your mom to return from her placement in the city.

Joshua toasted a sandwich for you, and you observed him with adoring eyes as he busied himself about the kitchen, washing and slicing the ingredients. He set the plate down in front of you, then filled up a glass with some juice.

“No cream soda today,” he frowned, reading the large bottle of juice, “Ocean Spray’s the special…. uh, Very Berry or something like that, with no artificial flavours or colours.”

“You’re such a restauranteur,” you laughed, forcibly stopping your feet from swinging under the island like a giddy child waiting for their ice cream sundae. He excited you in ways that should be magic.

He flipped the dish towel over his shoulder and winked.

“I want all these compliments going into my tip, ma’am.”

Joshua settled with leftovers from the fridge. Neither of you really spoke while eating, but there was no pressure in the air that suggested you might need to—it was cool and quiet. The boy flicked through a few texts on his phone meanwhile you slumped back into the chair with a satisfied puff, one hand rubbing along your shoulder blade.

“Are you also a massage therapist by any chance?” You whined. “I have a knot like, right around here, and I can’t get it at all.”

He slurped some noodles into his mouth that had been hanging from his chopsticks, and swallowed with a peculiar smirk.

“Pushing your luck just a bit, aren’t you?”

You felt an invisible jab against your stomach.

“I am?”

But the boy just huffed, shaking his head.

And you that’s when you realized the jab against your stomach had actually been fear. Joshua had a girlfriend. Joshua was in a happy relationship, and just because he’d kindly comforted you didn’t mean it was deemed suitable to edge the situation beyond that. In that moment, you’d shrunk in shame. It had just been so… reassuring, and validating, to pretend this boy could be more than just the brother of your best friend who only looked out for you because it felt like an obligation.

You were about to apologize when Joshua beat you to speaking.

“D’you wanna go my room?” He asked.

Hardly able to breathe, you uttered out a very quiet okay.

Joshua didn’t close his door all the way, instead leaving it about a quarter open. You took a seat at his desk chair, hands folded in your lap.

His room hadn’t changed much over the years—the walls were still the same dark grey, there were more medals hanging above his bedframe and he’d taped up a few new posters, but he’d kept the lava lamp and his acrylic cube of the solar system. Teeth rubbed over your bottom lip as you watched Joshua pick his acoustic guitar off its stand in the corner. He returned to his bed, propping one leg on the edge.

“This is my favourite one to play,” Joshua said, plucking a few strings, the sound which resulted softly tuned and as pleasant as birdsong, “the wood’s Nordic cherry. It’s such a deep and rich colour, don’t y’think? I had the lacquer redone a few days ago.”

“It’s really pretty,” you agreed, keeping your feet on the floor.

He was tying together a song, swaying his body back and forth to match the gentle nature of each chord. There had been a number of school assemblies where they asked Joshua to play the guitar, mostly to accompany the choir or the band. You always thought he was the best part, even if you had to watch him from between heads and shoulders.

You were lucky enough to sit at the front one time. He’d frequently whisper to the percussion player whenever the principal was speaking (usually Hansol, who was either awkwardly holding his symbols or maracas or whatever instrument the conductor trusted him with), leaning over his guitar with his earbuds dangling out from under his collar. It had intrigued you to know what they were saying. And then there was the way he’d chuckle quietly to himself afterward, licking his lips and proceeding to put on a bored face as his eyes swept into the crowd. You assumed he must have been looking for Elsie.

“What d’you think of the melody?” Joshua asked.

Clearing your throat, you stated simply, “calm.”

“Right? I thought it would be nice to play something like this.”

You didn’t say anything more, but glanced down into your lap with a smile that was imploring to burst at the seams. It brought you to wonder why Joshua did the things he did for you—give you rides home when it would’ve been easier to breeze right by, submit his favourite drink again and again because there was something about the way you glowed when you had a cream soda in your hand. Lend you nothing but normalcy at times where you or your body felt nothing but normal, listening to all your quarrels about the confusion of growing up, feeding you dinner and reminding you of all the ways there was still tenderness and compassion waiting to smooth the soul of its roughness.

Tapping your ankles together, you mumbled his name.

Joshua lifted his hand from the guitar.

“I can’t hear you if you’re gonna whisper,” he said before slapping the spot beside him, “come here, right next to me. It’s fine.”

And so you rose up cautiously from the chair and took your place on his bed, sitting atop your hands to stop their apparent fidgeting. He strummed his guitar once, almost like a prelude to your demure smile.

“I just wanted to say thank you.”

Joshua looked at you, raising his brow.

You shifted again, sucking in a breath, “like, for tolerating me today, even when I was being kind of an asshole. I guess I just needed someone to talk to but I didn’t know who. It’s just—I feel like I can talk to you, I guess. Even though I probably overshared and said a lot of things I shouldn’t’ve said, especially about myself…” you chewed into your cheek, angling an embarrassed glance toward the floor, “so, I’m sorry about that, but I’m glad you listened to me anyways. Really, thank you.”

He watched you for a moment with his delicate eyes, until he decided to remove the guitar from his lap, leaning it against the bed. His thigh pressed slightly into yours and you tried not to squeak.

“You can come to me, y’know?” he said softly, folding his arms low across his chest, “you’re not some stranger. And I’m also not a judgemental jerk, so if you have to be a bit dramatic, I don’t care.”

A small huff of laughter left your chest, and you nodded to show how much you appreciated the sentiment, because words just wouldn’t perform the right justice. Closing your knees together, your brow stiffened, and you thought it was a good time to ask the question.

“D’you think that I… that I’m different? From when you first remember me? Or that I’ve changed a lot?”

“Of course you have,” Joshua answered so obviously that you cocked your head back and nearly bulged your eyes out at him, “when I first met you, you wouldn’t even look at me, or speak, really.”

“Can you blame me for that?”

“No,” Joshua chuckled, “I know you were shy. Most of Jennie’s friends were like that. But if you’re worried on whether or not you’re seeming fake, or coming across as an asshole for thinking Jennie switched up on you—whatever it is that you’re wondering—it’s okay. It’s fine. You’re not doing anything wrong. You’ll probably meet different people and someone will say you changed, too. It’s not a bad thing. In fact, just about everyone’s thinking the same things.”

You swallowed, heavy and bitter.

“What if—what if Jennie like, forgets about me?”

Joshua shrugged, “I can tell you confidently that won’t happen. She’s stubborn. Just give her time. She probably feels pressure to make it seem like she’s maturing by doing what feels grown to her. I promise she won’t forget about you,” he smiled, “you’re not someone people forget.”

And your whole body seized up with laughter.

“Please forget that I threw my bra out your car window.”

He grinned at you, splaying his arms behind him and nudging his knee against yours. A surge of heat throbbed throughout your face.

“I said I don’t judge. We can always go back and get it.”

“Nope, no way,” you sighed, “I’ll stick to my middle-aged woman undergarments. But it is an unfortunate fifty bucks down the drain.”

“Seems like you’ve got it all figured out,” Joshua said.

“Oh, and—is there a chance you cannot mention any of this to Jennie? Like, even the fact I was here? Is that okay?”

The boy nodded his agreement, “yeah, ‘course.”

It’s not that you wanted to start keeping secrets. But today had been important, and special, and sometimes it felt necessary to keep such moments between you and whoever else was concerned. A day geared to end horribly had turned into a memory so perfect you wanted to encase it in amber, take it into your dreams even, and preserve it until the end of infinity. Maybe you meant more to Joshua than you initially thought.

You stood at your locker, wriggling in the textbook that you’d nearly forgotten in the geology classroom. The lunch bell was going to ring any moment now, though your teacher had wrapped up the lesson early and dismissed everyone with very little homework (which you were most likely going to procrastinate because the newest drama you’d picked up definitely wasn’t going to watch itself). Just as you were about to close the door, you noticed Jennie walking down the hall, thumbs tapping a flurry on her phone while she chewed something that was undeniably a stick of Double Bubble. You panicked, and nearly sank into the locker.

But she strutted right past you, not even glancing up once or forcing a greeting under her breath, and you truthfully couldn’t decipher if she hadn’t noticed you or was clinging to her phone as a scapegoat.

Not that you wanted it to be either of those things—your relationship was already wearing thinner by the day, and you always wondered which interaction between you two might end up as the last.

Jennie stopped at her locker down the hall, seemingly typing out a few more texts before she finally tore her gaze from her phone and nudged the door wide open with her foot (she always forgot her combinations), beginning to rifle around inside. And for a moment, you weighed the options of approaching her. She looked especially gorgeous today, with her long midnight hair in loose curls, almost falling to the belt that wrapped around her white-buckle skirt—you were still adjusting to her in such attire. For the five years you’d known her, she was always wearing knee-length shorts and Joshua’s plethora of old soccer jerseys.

It felt unnecessary, practically performing deep breathing exercises at your locker just to ruminate a conversation with the girl who was supposedly your best friend. You decided to give it a shot.

No harm, no foul, right?

“Hey Jennie,” you said, clutching your hands awkwardly.

She tossed an orange folder to the top shelf of her locker, her eyes remaining forward as she replied, “I don’t know where Joshua is.”

Visibly, your entire body stuttered, like a printer trying to force out its last bits of ink. Without hardly any breath, you stood there stiffly.

“I’m not, uh, I wasn’t looking for him,” it came out sounding like a question, “I thought I’d ask you about our geology homework.”

“Oh. What about it?”

She’d pulled out a small tube of lip gloss, quickly running the applicator across her mouth before stuffing it back into her bag. You struggled to comprise a response, watching the girl readjust her hair in the magnetized mirror, hardly paying you a lick of attention. It felt like a slap in the face. You couldn’t help touching your own burnt cheek.

“Well, I—”

The lunch bell rang, and almost instantly, the halls gushed with students, the static of everyone talking at once remarkably loud. Before you could inch out another word, Jennie had slammed her locker door shut, swinging a black lunchbox over her shoulder.

“Text me about it,” Jennie said, already beginning to walk away and disappear into the crowd, “I’m going to see Marina right now.”

No—it wasn’t just a slap, it was a brutal, fist-flat punch.

You didn’t really know what to do, frozen in place until the tenth grader with the locker right beside Jennie’s came trudging up and barely muttered an ‘excuse me’ before grabbing at their lock.

During lunch, it was usually less hectic on the second floor, so you grabbed your plastic-wrapped sandwich and headed upstairs, trying inconceivably hard to ignore the trademark couple who were too busy devouring each other’s tongues and groping. You went back to the geology classroom. Thankfully, it was empty, and so you took a seat at first counter on the left while bracing through the overbearing amount of mayonnaise your mother had slathered across the bread.

When the door creaked, there was an electric burst in your chest, thinking it could be Jennie who’d finally come to decide that hanging out with the purple-haired, face-studded Marina wasn’t as interesting as you (even though you assumed it was probably better—she had a pet tarantula for god’s sake, and her own car). But you definitely weren’t disappointed to realize Joshua had entered the geology room instead, shouting a goodbye to Hansol before the door heaved shut.

You didn’t want to smile so eagerly, fearing that it might weird him out, though you were helpless to stop the automatic stretch which always appeared at the sight of him.

Turning around on the stool, your eyes fluttered.

“What’re you doing in here?”

He paused, scanning the classroom almost frantically.

“I forgot my pencil,” Joshua answered, approaching a desk and picking one up that clearly wasn’t his, about as short as his pinky.

“Yeah, right.”

“I have my physics in here, first period.”

You folded your legs and smirked, “but you don’t even sit there.”

“How would you know that?”

Tilting your shoulder to the right, you directed Joshua to the black surface of the workbench, where his name was poorly etched.

“Okay—I didn’t do that,” he laughed, “it was Hansol, with a pair of scissors, and I literally begged him not too. He didn’t care, obviously.”

You squirmed back around on the stool.

“Right, and that’s not a random pencil someone just forgot?”

“No, not at all… that, and I might’ve seen you slip in here before I walked Elsie to her Envirothon meeting. But make no mistake. I didn’t come back here for you.” He was acting fidgety as he said it, and though the room was dark, you wanted to believe he’d blushed.

Nonetheless, Joshua slid onto the stool beside you, his fingers attempting to untangle the wire earbuds he’d just pulled from under his collar. You watched dotingly while he struggled, only to surprise the boy as you pulled your seat closer and batted his hands away.

“Let me, since you’re lacking the dexterity for this.”

He huffed, leaning his head to the side, his fawn eyes bouncing to every corner of the room as though looking directly at you was a sin. But once you’d loosened all the knots, Joshua seemed to relax.

“So,” you edged back on the stool, “are you excited?”

Joshua scratched his ear. “Excited for what?”

“You graduate this year, dummy. Are you not excited?”

“Oh, yeah. I guess I am. I made some applications a few weeks ago, and I already heard back from one. It’s not my ideal choice, though.”

Leaning your elbows onto the table and squishing your cheeks between each palm, you exhaled a big breath.

“You’ve got good grades and all that. I wouldn’t worry.”

“Mm.”

“What about Elsie? Didn’t she want to go far away?”

Joshua’s adam’s apple pointed sharp against his throat.

“Um, she’s not sure yet. We haven’t discussed it much. She said, like, if I moved really far, she’d figure it out and come with me.”

Your eyes popped wide, and you tried to dim your surprise.

“Oh, wow. She must really like you—I mean, that’s obvious. You guys are dating after all. For a while now, I guess. Over a year.”

“Yeah.”

As Joshua thrummed his knuckles a few times on the table, you sensed he wasn’t exactly keening to examine the subject, not to mention the way his voice had thickened and the rustling of his knee was a bold spelling he was uncomfortable. It was nothing to take personal, yet that didn’t stop the little fissure which struck somewhere deep in your heart and made the air harder to breathe. Joshua had said you could come to him—you merely wanted him to know that he could trust you, too.

Sitting in closer against the table, you smiled at him.

“I may be a bit younger, but I can still give advice.”

Joshua furrowed his brow playfully.

“What d’you mean by that?”

It was surprisingly difficult to push the words past your teeth, almost like your body was issuing a mechanism to stop yourself from saying anything you might regret, anything that might scare him, or nudge him to develop the inkling you were beyond interested in him.

“I want you to trust me like I trust you.”

Each his pupils dilated further than they already had in the shadily lit room, and it was so apparent that you had to clench your fist, dig in your own nails until it stung to ensure you weren’t dreaming.

His answer was simple.

“Alright.”

You rubbed nervous, excited circles against the indents on your hand.

“There’s a prom party at the end of the month,” Joshua said, pulling out his phone as it vibrated, “You should come. I know Jennie’s going.”

“Uh, that sounds fun. I think.”

Slipping off his seat, Joshua grinned.

“Come find me if you decide to go—anyways, Hansol wants to get a burger and apparently I’m the only one he knows with a car. See ya.”

There were so many butterflies in your stomach, you tried not to cough one out as Joshua made his way toward the door—forgetting that stupid pencil of course. He liked writing all his notes and homework with pen, and you hated knowing such a specific, trivial fact.

“Yeah, talk to you later.”

It didn’t take much contemplation for you to agree to the prom party, even if you had yet to configure a ride or the location or how you’d get your hands on some alcohol (because you definitely weren’t going to enjoy one of those things sober), hence your decision to entreat Joshua for his phone number.

It was only to ask about the details.

You learned the party was going to be hosted at Jeonghan’s house, probably the most popular senior in the entire school, and that there was a very strict designated driver policy. Well, at least you could scratch one bullet off your list, leaving just the ride and the alcohol. There was no way you were going to ask Joshua to be your escort—like he’d want to have his little sister’s friend stuffed in the backseat, it would be a total mood kill.

Jennie was apparently going too. You’d try to avoid her if you could help it, even if it meant locking yourself in some washroom that reeked of liquor and smoke and impulsive decisions laced with vomit.

By the time the party rolled around, you were having a severe case of thought seconds, unable to sit still and constantly checking your phone and wondering how many times you could possibly change from the black skirt back into your shorts before you decided something. Chan, a boy from your English class, was kind enough to offer a ride—even some alcohol that his older brother had swiped for him. He texted that he’d be outside your house around nine o’clock, though it wasn’t until half an hour later that his car crunched into the driveway.

“Sorry,” he apologized the instant you opened the door, “I got busted—my mom found the beer in my backpack and got all mad. She thinks I’m still in my bedroom. I had to sneak out the window.”

Clicking on your seatbelt, you threw the boy a perplexed look.

“Uh, are you sure that was a good idea? I can probably just try to mooch off people. I don’t want you to get in serious trouble.”

Shrugging, Chan ignited the engine and set his navigation system to the party’s address, seeming disproportionately unconcerned.

“No, but I wasn’t going to bail. My brother said he’d take most of the heat, anyways. Oh—I really like your skirt by the way.”

“Thanks,” you replied, inching closer to the window.

Because you didn’t know him all that well, the car ride was a little awkward, your ankle twisting in these back and forth circles conveying just how nervous you were. Only the placid voice of the navigation system broke the silences, until Chan cleared his throat and lowered its volume.

“Did you hear the big drama that’s going around?”

Your ankle paused, and you looked across the glove box.

“I don’t think so.”

“Oh, well I have the scoop. So, basically—wait, you know Elsie Bolger, right? The Envirothon girl? And Joshua Hong. I mean, I think everyone knows them ‘cause they get around and stuff. And you’re friends with Jennie so you probably know Joshua.”

“Yeah, I know both of them.”

Chan only kept one hand on the wheel, his other motioning around like he was giving some sort of speech, “okay, so they broke up, right? On Wednesday. Apparently, it was after school, and Elsie was like, sobbing, asking why and what went wrong, ‘cause it was him who broke the ice about it. I heard Joshua was saying that he saw her more like a friend, but Elsie kept adding pressure that there was another girl. Not that he was cheating or anything, but I don’t think he loved her, so I kinda agree with Elsie. There has to be someone else he likes—or, shit, maybe even loves. I think it’s that choir girl with the long arms. ”

He threw you a curious glance, as though he were anticipating your angle on the situation, though you couldn’t express much apart from an unhinged jaw and a stutter that fell to hot breath in your chest. When your tongue tapped the roof of your mouth, it was dry, and Chan must’ve thought you looked nauseous because he offered to roll a window down.

“I had no idea,” you admitted, smoothing your hand over a crinkle in your skirt, “I really hadn’t heard anything about it, so…”

“Really? That’s surprising. Who’s side, though?”

“What?”

Chan opened his window an extra inch and smiled.

“I mean like, who do you think was right? Joshua or Elsie?”

Honestly, at that moment, the idea of yanking the door open and bailing onto the dirt road seemed extremely tempting. How could he expect you to answer a question like that? When you were younger, you used to daydream about this: Joshua at long last detaching from his girlfriend, in which you could somehow swoop in to take her place and dust out his memories of her like you were cleaning a closet. But now that opportunity had actually presented itself. And you felt miserable.

Why would Joshua even decide that a party was what he needed right now? Why wasn’t he at home, heartbroken and grieving?

Chan snapped his fingers.

“Well, who’s side?”

“I-I don’t know,” you stuttered, “and I don’t want to choose.”

“Student cards, please.”

At the end of Jeonghan’s long driveway, a booth had been set up by the student council. You didn’t know the girl who’d asked you to present that pointless card you never thought would be useful, but once you flashed it to her, she grabbed your wrist and pressed a stamp to the back of your hand. It seemed that the night was really starting to take shape around ten o’clock—indecorous music echoed from the house and smoke was curling up into the blackness, courtesy of an impressive fire that crackled in the backyard. You weren’t sure what to do without Chan, who was already halfway along the driveway when you caught him.

“Please don’t wander off on me,” you sighed, taking a skittish look around the property filled with strangers, “I mean, I’m not gonna tether you to my side the whole time, but you are my ride.”

Chan pulled open the double doors to Jeonghan’s home, and a burst of heat welcomed you, steadily fanning your face. He obviously wanted to be inside, though you would have preferred to stay outdoors where it was cooler and a bit quieter and the likelihood of a guile senior cornering you against some table or couch was far lower.

The boy glanced around, stretching his neck to peer into the different rooms, “I won’t wander. I’m just looking for someone…” he mumbled, paying you next to no attention as he pardoned his way into the adjoining kitchen. Not wanting to be abandoned, you followed him.

“Oh—look, there’s Seungkwan!” Chan exclaimed, pointing his finger into the room past the kitchen.

Again, you hurried after him, squishing between two seniors who were nonetheless unenthusiastic at hearing your apology, and you were half-expecting to get a solo cup thrown at the back of your head. The friend Chan had met, Seungkwan, was gathered with a few others at this little counter in the living room, each whom you recognized from your grade. Seungkwan wasn’t one to drink, so when he asked if you wanted his cup of hard lemonade, you took it almost immediately and used it as an excuse to not fully join their conversation. Instead, you meandered more around the outside of their circle, surveilling the room and trying to catch any familiar face that presented itself. Well, not just any face.

You were specifically hoping to see Joshua.

Since Chan had told you about his breakup with Elsie, your whole demeanour shifted, and a fog had creeped its way into your brain. You couldn’t think about anything but him. Even standing next to the speaker responsible for blasting a salacious song about messy sex and drugs wasn’t doing much to distract you. Jeonghan’s house was considerably large, therefore Joshua could be anywhere. And you had yet to understand it. Was he intentionally glossing over his own misery by forcing himself to enjoy a party? Or was he happy to escape a relationship that he might’ve never truly wanted in the first place? That didn’t seem like him. He definitely loved Elsie. You needed him to be okay.

“Can you not just stand there? You’re blocking the way.”

You had no idea who they were, but this girl who was vastly taller than you appeared, holding onto the hand of a guy you assumed to be her boyfriend—either that or a quick, meaningless hook-up.

Without uttering a word, you stepped aside and let them pass.

And then you looked back at Chan, staying true to his vow and steering clear of drinking. Hovering beside him the entire night like a shy puppy wasn’t going to make you feel any better, nor would engaging in synthetic conversations with people you barely talked to at school, so you decided to break your own promise and wander. Your guesswork of the house led you out a random door, into the backyard where the bonfire was sparking and jouncing as students threw in more wood. Sipping at your hard lemonade, you examined everyone as best you could, though it was practically impossible to decipher all the blurry faces.

The very second you stepped off the deck onto the grass, someone’s arm was sliding around your shoulders, and as you were being tugged against this body you realized that Joshua had found you first.

“Aww, so glad y’could make it!” He slightly fumbled the pronunciation of his words, dragging them with a laziness that could only indicate he was inebriated, or teetering on the heated edge of it.

It took you a moment to regain your footing.

“Almost forgot y’were coming—” he paused to laugh, rubbing one hand beneath his nose, leaning on you heavily, “but I saw you n’ I remembered! M’so happy to see you, soso happy.” Joshua’s arm then tightened around your shoulders, like you were his support crutch.

“I’m, uh, happy to see you too,” you answered.

If it weren’t for the deep breaths you were subtly taking, you might as well have fainted. Joshua had never treated you like this in all your years of knowing him—even the moments when he’d come home late at night, tipsy and wobbly and Jennie would have to cover for him come morning. The fact was that there had always been an unspoken boundary between you, an invisible line, which now seemed completely erased as the boy pressed at your shoulder blades and urged you forward, something about meeting his friends, his face glowing with the surge of alcohol and his eyes completely clouded. This confused you further.

Because even though he was drunk, this was so unlike his character. You suspected that breaking up with Elsie must have shattered him. All his pieces hit the floor and he just left them there, broken.

“Are you doing alright? I, uh… I’m just wondering…”

Joshua stopped, unwinding his arm from your shoulder to fix his hat, combing back the thick hair underneath with his fingers.

“Oh, yeah. I’m fine. Fan-fucking-tastic,” he replied, seeming unconscious of the words leaving his own mouth.

“Well, that’s… I mean, that’s good. I’m glad to hear that, really glad, because I just—I heard some stuff and—” you nervously wet your throat with another sip from the solo cup, feeling your body shake, “it’s not my business or anything! Like, not at all, and I don’t want it to sound like I’m prying, or that I don’t believe you, but I—”

“Jeonghan’s just over there,” Joshua interrupted after fixing his backwards cap on, “we have a couch outside. Come sit w’us.”

He slid an arm around you again, pulling you forward.

And you stepped alongside him, shrinking yourself as much as possible to avoid colliding with another intoxicated body, smelling the fresh charred wood and smoke that desiccated the night air. Your little heart was beating so fast that you had to talk with a second pulse.

“You do? T-That’s cool. But, like I was saying, I guess I just want you to know that I’m sorry about what happened with Elsie. And I really hope that you’re okay and everything. I’m here for you, so—”

It happened in the blink of an eye. One minute you were occupied with speaking, and the next, Joshua’s warm, soft lips had pushed to yours, effectively shriveling your next thought as he held your shoulder. The kiss was transient. Before it could even click, Joshua had already pulled away like it was nothing at all but a hair to the wind.

“I said I’m fine, ‘kay?” Joshua slurred, and you looked into his eyes with enough intensity to burn a hole, “I’m g’nna take you to the couch. We can sit down and stuff. Jeonghan’s there.”

“Okay.” You agreed quietly.

However, as you made your way to the couch propped close by the bonfire, desperately scanning the crowds and ensuring no one had seen that unpredictable moment, you caught glimpse of a face that was so familiar it made you weak. The hard lemonade nearly dropped from your hand and soiled in the grass. Because Jennie was practically glaring at you from the trees, her arms folded and her mouth uncordially slanted.

You didn’t know what to feel any more.

It was definitely an old couch, one that Jeonghan’s parents were probably on cusp of throwing out, especially with all its patches and prickly seats and burnt spots from cigarette butts. You were wedged against the arm while Joshua drank beside you, spreading out his legs and pretty much exiling you to as little space as possible—not that you really blamed him considering his lack of awareness right now. Jeonghan was decent, though you knew he would never even be talking to you if not for your connection with Joshua. So, the senior seemed to deal.

He chucked another log onto the fire, and a big swoop of sparks and ashes puffed upward like a volcanic breath. Once Jeonghan dusted off his hands, he sat himself down on an old table and cracked open another beer. Your lemonade was one sip away from being completely empty. It still felt a little strange to be drinking something that wasn’t cream soda.

“Pass me that,” Joshua asked, slumping forward and gesturing to the beer his friend had just drank from, “or pour some into my cup.”

Jeonghan chuckled, guiding him back by the shoulder.

“I think you’ve had enough, Shua,” he answered, “you had some fun. Now it’s time to mellow out a little. You’ll thank me when you aren’t stuck in the bathroom throwing up your guts an hour from now.”

“You suck so fucking much,” Joshua complained, crumpling up his solo cup and then proceeding to toss it over his shoulder.

“I suck, yeah, yeah,” Jeonghan clearly didn’t take the comment to heart, instead knocking his fist atop Joshua’s head, “I’m gonna take a lap around the house—” he suddenly pointed at you, “make sure he drinks a glass of water or something. Or at least keep an eye on him until Hansol comes back. And don’t let him mooch. You got all that?”

With a stiff, tiny smile, you nodded.

“Sorry to dump the man on you. I’ll be back soon.”

Even though you hadn’t been getting along spectacularly well with the senior, you still wished he could have stayed. You felt unprepared to console Joshua, and that it wasn’t exactly your place to start controlling his alcohol when he was evidently going through something. But, then again, your concern outweighed the uncertainty, and you found yourself grabbing the boy’s shoulder, gluing him back to the couch when a girl had shuffled by with a bottle wrapped in a brown bag. He threw his head back, sunk lower into the cushions with a groan.

“I’m sorry,” you squeaked, “I’m just doing what Jeonghan said.”

“What do y’have left n’here…” he asked vacantly, pulling at your arm and looking into the solo cup, “what is this? Can I have it?”

“There’s hardly any left. And—”

“Mm, you’re gonna say no, right?” He didn’t give you the chance to respond before he was already pushing his weighted body off the couch, stumbling slightly. “Get some myself then… w-whoa—”

“How about you just sit down? Please Joshua?”

You stood up too, planting your hand on his lower back to stabilize his toppling movement. It didn’t help that one of his friends walked by, her and Joshua exchanging a quick dap before she giggled something unintelligible. She let Joshua have a swig of her drink, and you almost fumed at her in a blind rage, because how could she not care enough about him to see that alcohol was far from what he needed? In less than a second, you’d ripped the drink away and thrust it back.

“Okay, relax,” the older girl tutted condescendingly, “this is a party, y’know? Why don’t you have a sip yourself and calm down?”

“I’m just—”

“Yeah, yeah. I’m leaving. Later, Josh.”

Like some sort of animal guarding its territory, you watched her until she disappeared into the crowds, and it was only then that you exhaled long and slow, realizing Joshua had already collapsed back onto the couch. You sat down as well, though at the very edge.

“Where’s Hansol?” You asked.

Joshua folded an arm behind his head, “dunno.”

“Well, once he comes back, I’m going inside.”

The boy’s head fell in your direction, the fire flooding his eyes with sunset orange as he questioned, “why are you waiting for him?”

“Because I don’t want to leave you alone.”

“Why?”

You shot him an anxious but stern look, “why d’you think?”

“I’m seriously fine.”

“Uh, you’re seriously not.”

Joshua laughed, a hiccup caught in his throat. His gaze traveled away from your face and back toward the fire, extremely dilated.

“It’s not even your business, so I don’t get it...”

“I know that—” for some reason, you felt yourself getting emotional, and your knees started tapping together as the nerves expanded, “but you saying that doesn’t make me not worried. I know if it were me, you’d be acting the same way. Wouldn’t you?”

Joshua was silent for a moment, but then he tensely swallowed and pushed his way back up the couch. He looked at you with the most clarity you had witnessed from those eyes all night, and suddenly, his hand had come to rest on your bare knee, squeezing it gently. He wanted to say something. It was loaded on his tongue like a bullet, but then—

“Uff—I’m back!” Hansol plopped down on the couch, sprawling out all his limbs and placing a water bottle behind Joshua’s head.

His hand was already off your knee.

And you were already making your way inside.

Honestly, you never envisioned yourself as the type to hide away in a washroom at a high school party, sat on the floor with your arms folded like some woeful delinquent who thought they were too unique for the world. Too unique? Not exactly. A woeful delinquent? Yeah, pretty much. You hadn’t bothered asking Chan to leave. The last you saw of the boy he was enjoying his time examining Jeonghan’s record wall.

Almost three hours had passed. One in the morning was just around the corner, and somehow the party was still twirling with energy.

Just Dance, that was the song, the only Lady Gaga hit on the entire playlist that somehow made the walls shake whenever it played. The heat was thick enough for you to force open the bathroom window where breeze was faint, but you leaned into it regardless. Not many people were concentrated to this side of the house—mostly because there wasn’t anything out there aside from a generator and some trees. You would hear voices occasionally, though you could never deduce what they were saying. Jennie and Marina had walked underneath the window at one point. You had pulled back so quickly that your head spun.

This had all been a mistake. Almost as if the universe willed to prove your point, an obnoxious knocking berated the door, prompting you to uncomfortably swallow and call out a hoarse, “occupied!”

But the doorknob continued to jiggle, and then there was more pounding that jerked you hastily and fearfully to your feet.

“I said occupied!” You shouted, pacing a few steps forward and wondering what was the best possible item in this washroom to defend yourself—most likely the can of hairspray (you made a mental note).

After you still refused to unlock the door, the stranger left, and you assumed they were either left partially deaf due to the music or were off their rocker on whatever drugs and alcohol had managed to circle around the house. Brought back to sitting on the floor, you checked your phone again, groaning at the red sliver of battery you were prolonging.

Hungry, tired, sweaty, and slightly sick, you contemplated lying flat across the rug in an attempt to fall asleep. It wasn’t a good idea, but you didn’t care. The thought of closing your eyes was heavenly, and before you could pick a verdict they were already fluttering shut, the music beneath you sounding incredibly distant, turned to a soft echo that seemed like it was pushing through layers of concrete.

Someone else came to the door.

When they knocked, you were convinced it was the stranger from earlier. Now, you were angry, angry enough to unveil whoever this person was (and pray the first thing they didn’t do was projectile vomit all their nights liquor onto your shirt). Yet, when you saw Joshua’s face through the mirage of dark, crimson colours mottling the corridor, you wished it could have been that stranger holding down their stomach. He looked a little more focused, though his hair was mussed up in spikes and his cheeks were visibly blotched pink in the mugginess. One of his hands braced against the doorframe. Joshua wasn’t sober, just steadier.

“Can I come in?” He asked, keeping his head angled to the floor, rubbing the tip of his nose with a knuckle.

“Were you looking for me?”

“Jeonghan said he last saw you going into the washroom.”

With a reluctant sigh, you grabbed Joshua’s arm and pulled him inside, kicking the door shut with your foot. Whoever was in charge of the music had opted to play the song even louder, and you heard the living room crowd belting along to every lyric, even from upstairs.

He sat on the edge of the bathtub. You joined him.

Joshua then leaned forward, elbows on his knees. For a moment, you questioned if it was right to ask him about the kiss—you were burning to know his intentions, drunk or not. The boy proceeded to grin.

“What?” You were intrigued—tempted to laugh, even.

“Nothing,” he chuckled, shaking his head, “I just—I feel numb, or something. Like, I feel everything: how hot it is, sweat on the back of my neck, the chills in my fingers, but at the same time, I don’t really feel it.”

You sniffled, twisting your ankle in nervous circles. Joshua leaned back a little less, though he dragged a hand through the thick strands of his hair, and you now understood why it was so messy.

“Where’s your hat?”

“Lost it,” he smiled.

“We should switch places.”

“Why?”

“So you can be closer to the window. There’s a nice breeze.”

Once Joshua had slid over, you two sat in silence, listening to each rhythmic thump. He pulled one of his banged-up converse onto the edge of the tub, propping an arm across his knee while he stared into the moonlight. You wanted desperately to know each thought in his head.

Then, he was suddenly looking square into your eyes.

“Did I kiss you?”

With a careful nod, your fingers clenched.

“Fuck, that was just a stupid, stupid accident. I’m sorry. I thought I dreamt that for a second—I keep fucking up.”

An accident? A stupid, stupid accident?

No, that makes sense. Of course it’s an accident.

But it hurts. God, it really hurts.

He was drunk. That’s why. You already knew that!

Why is it so much harder to breathe?

Your eyes are stinging. Pull yourself together, holy shit.

He really doesn’t see you like that. It’s obvious, always has been.

Don’t you dare cry. Pull it together. Pull it together.

Pull it together!

“Hey,” Joshua tapped your arm, “I’m really sorry.”

“No, I—” you pushed off the edge of the tub, leaning against the clam-shaped sink instead, taking a second to blink and force back the wetness at your tear ducts, “it’s fine. I get it. I’ve just been sitting on the floor for like, the past three hours. I need to stand a bit. But— I’m just thinking, maybe you should go home. It’s been an intense week.”

The older boy agreed, nodding his head as a lopsided smile touched at those perfect lips. You nibbled your inner cheek.

“I don’t know why I came, I just—” Joshua threw his hands up defeatedly, “Elsie and I, we wanted different things. She was amazing, and I have only good things to say about her, but I…”

You weren’t sure if you could handle this. It didn’t help that your mind was still whirling from his earlier apology, thoughts and emotions spinning and spinning like a spool of slippery ribbon coming undone. But at the same time, you wanted to be there for Joshua. He must be unraveling about this heartbreak because he trusted you, though, as he stumbled and continued correcting himself and paused every minute or so to look deeply at the moonlight, you began believing that Joshua had forged his relationship with Elsie as some sort of distraction.

And this sparked a flicker in your dark eyes.

Was it easier to be with Elsie than it was to be with you?

But you didn’t say anything. Instead, you stood there silently, letting Joshua reminisce, gulp back his tears, pick up those shattered pieces he’d dropped that bitter Wednesday afternoon—as he should be doing, rather than stuffing his heart into an ice bucket and letting it numb. His smile reflected as less broken by the time he’d finished.

“Well, I sorta unloaded. I hope it wasn’t too much.”

“No, you needed to do that. I’m glad you did.”

Joshua finally stretched his leg off the edge of the tub, meanwhile he raked through his hair again, flopping it all over the place.

“I’m glad I did, too,” he admitted, steadying his gaze on you.

Your lower back pressed further against the sink.

“I mean, you’ve listened to me complain about pretty much everything under the sun. Even your sister. You’re just caching in.”

“Should I be caching in more often?”

“Wow—perfect Joshua Hong has more stuff to get off his chest?”

He huffed, “since when have I been perfect? Like, ever?”

Whoops, that had been a revealing slip of the tongue. You crinkled your nose and swung your smitten head toward the window.

“I didn’t say perfect.”

“But you did, though.”

“You’re hearing things.”

Joshua rolled his shoulders, capitulating to you easily.

“Whatever,” he said, finally rising from his seat with a smirk that felt familiar, “I’ll take the compliment, even if it supposedly didn’t exist.”

At that moment, you thought he was going to leave the washroom, and once again you would be left to sit on the floor until Chan overwhelmed your phone with texts, asking where you were. There was no way he could still be admiring the record wall. He’d probably moved onto something else obscure yet alluring. Jeonghan’s house was just as pretentious as the senior himself. But Joshua didn’t disappear.

He grabbed your shoulder, and you froze.

“Thank you, I should say before I forget.”

The mould around you crumbled away.

“Oh yeah, for sure, um—no big deal,” you mumbled awkwardly while pulling him into a hug, losing your words in a mere instant.

His arms curled around your waist, firm on each side, and there was a soft squeeze to your body that left you breathless. Your right hand landed at the back of his neck, fingers moving almost instinctually toward his black hair, feeling each lock slip through, a bit tangled and damp with sweat. Shit—your heart had never raced like this before. He could probably sense it against his own chest. Joshua had started pulling away, and so you replied with a slow, obviously unwanted retreat from his body. For some reason, Joshua left a hand on the hip of your skirt, which he seemed to be looking down at for a notable time.

You should kiss him.

Kiss him, kiss him, kiss him. Don’t let him go. Pull him against you. Lick into his mouth and move his hand back to your hip. Show him he doesn’t need to distract himself anymore because you’re right here.

Except—you did none of that.

Joshua said thank you once more. And he slipped back into the misted, red lights that glowed outside in the corridor.

You had never gotten into a fight before, though you’d been a witness to one or more at school. The first fight—which your principal incessantly referred to as an ‘altercation’—was three years ago on the green, when two senior footballers had gotten into a shoving match that resulted in the meeker having his cheek rubbed against the dirt for a solid five minutes. The second fight was a year later, between two girls who were opting to practically pull the other’s hair out in the locker room.

But you, yourself, had never gotten into an actual fight.

Maybe sixteen was the year you’d throw your first punch.

You just never anticipated that the girl on the potentially-receiving end would be Jennie Hong, a former best friend since the age of twelve, now converted to a thorny stranger who’d gotten the tiniest sip of popularity and clung to it with stunning avarice. Ever since your falling-out, you always assumed this day would pull itself out from the leaves—essentially a disinterring of what had killed the friendship—though you hadn’t expected it here or now. It had only been a weekend since the party. Jennie couldn’t even keep her burning remarks until two-thirty.

Instead it was lunch, at the base of the staircase outside the library, just without its centrepiece couple to clog the path. Nobody was really filtering through at that moment, but you could already imagine how the tight space would bubble with a crowd once someone caught wind of the shouting. How the hell do you throw a punch, anyways?

“You know what—I don’t have to answer to you. It’s not like you’re my boss or anything.” Right, and when was the last time Jennie actually responded to a text message? She let the friendship fizzle.

“No, I’m not letting this slide, because what you did was one of the shallowest things I’ve seen—like, ever.”

“Ever?” You gawked, feeling an instant sharpness in your gut.

Jennie exaggeratedly rolled her doll eyes, and for some reason, you contemplated how it might feel to grab a stinging handful of her stupid, silky, coconut-smelling hair and rip it flat out.

“Yeah, ever! My brother just went through a huge break-up with the love of his life! And, you see this little window, so you come in and take it. I legit saw you kiss him. It made me think how selfish you are.”

“What is wrong with you, Jennie? That’s not how—”

“That’s basically what our friendship turned into. You’re fucking obsessed with my brother. You were supposed to be my one friend that wasn’t, but guess I was wrong. Joshua doesn’t want you, at all.”

For a quiet, hollow moment, you were speechless, meanwhile Jennie had this tart yet overtly prideful countenance, like she had so tactfully shone a beam on how horrible you were—an announcement to let the entire world know her ex best friend was the textbook definition of fake. You had noticed a few faces peeking through the doorway up the stairs, and this heat began stifling over you like smoke from a fire. She wasn’t going to listen or even reason with anything you could say.

“I-I don’t care what you think you saw. I’m not shallow, or selfish, and the fact that you have to like—even convince yourself I did something wrong is showing that you—you’re—you’re basically—”

“You can’t even say it!” Jennie threw a ridiculing finger out at you and cackled. “I’m right. I’m so fucking right about you.”

“No, you’re not!”

“Kitty got claws?”

“Shut up, Jennie!”

“No, I won’t. I have every right to feel hurt ‘cause of you! The truth is, you just like Josh ‘cause he’s the only boy that’s ever paid you any attention, so you obsess over him, thinking he’s gonna what? You’ll finally lose your v-card or something? I never wanted to think y’were just using me to know him, but that’s exactly what happened!”

You couldn’t stand listening to her, and tried to drown out the cacophony of her voice instead, rubbing harshly at your ears while you blurted, “just shut up! Shut up, shut up!” like it would make her vanish.

“Then do something to make me stop!”

And that’s when you felt the crackle skip down your wrist and bumble at the tips of your fingers. Could you really punch Jennie? The girl whom you’d once laughed with and cried with and spent a memorable chunk of your earlier adolescence figuring out the world with? God, you had never hit anything in your life, unless you counted the time you accidentally struck your mother in the jaw when she’d been trying to blow raspberries on your tummy. But that wasn’t intentional. And Jennie used to be a real outdoorsy kid, digging up snails and shaking beetles off bark. She wasn’t afraid to get her nails dirty.

You took a few steps toward her, and Jennie’s eyes widened. The slight lagging of her expression indicated that she genuinely hadn’t expected the slightest action from you, though, you’d lost the urge to strike her as quickly as it festered up. Besides, someone must have relayed the argument to the staff, because you heard the blips from the on-duty teacher’s walkie-talkie at the top of the stairway. An entire crowd of students had bunched behind them, watching a little too excitedly.

“There a problem here, girls?”

Surprisingly, Jennie was the first to cough.

“No.”

The teacher then glanced at you, folding his stout arms across his chest and pushing up the glasses on his red nose.

“No…” you repeated dully, your eyes trailing off to the side.

You took back everything you said about bad days.

This was officially the worst.

Monday.

[ don’t answer | 3:28 pm ]: hey.

[ don’t answer | 3:28 pm ]: something happen at school today?

[ don’t answer | 3:28 pm ]: jennie wouldn’t talk to me in the car.

[ don’t answer | 3:28 pm ]: thought you might know what happened.

...

[ don’t answer | 4:30 pm ]: are you taking a nap?

[ don’t answer | 4:30 pm ]: or is it physics? i can help.

Tuesday.

[ don’t answer | 3:20 pm ]: am i an idiot or were you avoiding me?

[ don’t answer | 3:25 pm ]: did i do something?

Thursday.

[ don’t answer | 5:50 pm ]: i’m trying to give you space rn.

[ don’t answer | 5:50 pm ]: just thinking about you.

[ don’t answer | 5:50 pm ]: hope everything’s okay.

Sunday

[ ______ | 2:30 am ]: im sorry. messages were being weird.

[ ______ | 2:30 am ]: i don’t think we should talk any more.

[ don’t answer | 2:34 am ]: why?

[ ______ | 2:34 am ]: it looks weird.

[ don’t answer | 2:34 am ]: i don’t want to make you uncomfortable.

[ don’t answer | 2:34 am ]: i’m not sure what happened bu

[ don’t answer | 2:34 am ]: *but if i did something please tell me.

[ ______ | 2:34 am ]: it has nothing to do with you.

[ ______ | 2:34 am ]: im just trying to respect jennie.

[ don’t answer | 2:34 am ]: are you talking about that fight? call me

don’t answer is calling…

call declined at 2:34 am.

[ don’t answer | 2:35 am ]: why not? idc what jennie thinks.

[ ______ | 2:35 am ]: well i do.

don’t answer is calling…

call declined at 2:35 am.

[ ______ | 2:35 am ]: joshua don’t i won’t pick up.

[ don’t answer | 2:35 am ]: this is easier if we talk.

[ ______ | 2:35 am ]: i don’t want to do that right now.

[ don’t answer | 2:36 am ]: find me tomorrow at school, ok?

[ ______ | 2:36 am ]: where?

[ don’t answer | 2:36 am ]: physics, at lunch.

[ don’t answer | 2:36 am ]: my grad partys coming up soon.

[ ______ | 2:36 am ]: excited?

[ don’t answer | 2:36 am ]: yeah.

[ don’t answer | 2:36 am ]: one sec. sending a picture.

[ don’t answer | 2:37 am ]: IMG.124_313

[ ______ | 2:37 am ]: new amp?????

[ don’t answer | 2:37 am ]: early gift from vernons mom lol.

[ ______ | 2:37 am ]: no way she fucking bought u that!!

[ don’t answer | 2:37 am ]: she loves me more than him.

[ ______ | 2:37 am ]: im not getting you anything like that, sorry

[ don’t answer | 2:37 am ]: nah nah your presence is enough.

[ ______ | 2:37 am ]: u want me there??

[ don’t answer | 2:37 am ]: obviously wtf.

[ don’t answer | 2:38 am ]: are you gonna skip bc of my sister?

[ don’t answer | 2:43 am ]: did you fall asleep? or are you avoiding the q?

[ ______ | 2:43 am ]: sorry, phone died.

[ ______ | 2:43 am ]: i don’t want stuff w jennie to ruin your day.

[ don’t answer | 2:43 am ]: you’re not gonna ruin anything.

[ don’t answer | 2:43 am ]: what if i told you

[ ______ | 2:44 am ]: told me what?

[ don’t answer | 2:44 am ]: that i want you there more than anyone else.

[ don’t answer | 2:46 am ]: why do you keep disappearing?

[ ______ | 2:46 am ]: you’re such a liar lol.

[ don’t answer | 2:46 am ]: you’re coming, ok?

[ don’t answer | 2:46 am ]: i’ll make you promise me tomorrow.

[ ______ | 2:46 am ]: you can’t make me do that.

[ don’t answer | 2:46 am ]: we’ll see.

[ ______ | 2:46 am ]: yeah we will.

[ don’t answer | 2:46 am ]: ngl i’m tired. but find me on monday.

[ ______ | 2:46 am ]: i know. goodnight.

[ don’t answer | 2:47 am ]: goodnight.

1 month later.

[ ______ | 6:50 pm ]: hey, answer me asap.

[ ______ | 6:50 pm ]: need extra thoughts on what i should wear.

[ joshua h. | 6:53 pm ]: wear whatever you want.

[ ______ | 6:53 pm ]: but how formal is it?

[ ______ | 6:53 pm ]: could i get away with like……

[ ______ | 6:53 pm ]: a really nice camisole and jeans??

[ joshua h. | 6:53 pm ]: yeah.

[ ______ | 6:53 pm ]: what are u wearing?

[ joshua h. | 6:54 pm ]: dress shirt and slacks.

[ ______ | 6:54 pm ]: that’s at least noticeably formal!!

[ ______ | 6:54 pm ]: i’m going to wear my skirt.

[ joshua h. | 6:54 pm ]: okay lol. see u there.

[ ______ | 6:54 pm ]: this frjdsy, right?

[ ______ | 6:54 pm ]: whoops **friday

[ joshua h. | 6:55 pm ]: yeah. come at like 8-ish.

[ ______ | 6:55 pm ]: will do.

How were you supposed to feel about Joshua leaving? Honestly, you tried not to ruminate on it. Your relationship had definitely evolved more than it ever had these past few months, and now that you were finally shaking off the thick chrysalis of being his “little sister’s best friend”, Joshua would be coasting away to university. New people, new experiences, new environment—how were you going to ensure you were the thing that stuck? That, when he was in the midst of some homecoming party with a girl sliding her fingers down his arm, in the back of his mind he was thinking of you to an annoying degree.

You didn’t know how to do that.

It felt awkward to even muse about such a thing as you stood in the Hong family living room, occasionally scraping a few pieces of crackers and cheese off the platters organized on the island while everyone buzzed and mingled around you. Jennie was somewhere. You didn’t know where, but at that point you didn’t care any longer. The fight had wedged you two apart for good. Thankfully its details hadn’t circulated much, and if Joshua had any indication the precise details of the fight, he was very polished at hiding it. His mother had swung by a few times to talk with you, and you always saw Joshua’s seraphic eyes in hers.

“Every time I walk past, you’re glued to this spot,” she smiled genuinely and gesticulated with a wave of her wine glass.

“Oh, just enjoying the crackers,” you replied, “and, um, the cheese. But it’s okay. I don’t mind people-watching.”

“Need anything to drink?”

“I’m good. Thanks, though.”

She squinched her face for a moment, “I might offer the wine, but you are by far underage. Of course, I’m saying this like you haven’t already drank before. Most teenagers find a way. Jennie uses Joshua who uses his older friend, Seungcheol. I’m not condoning it, obviously.”

“Obviously,” you grinned, flitting a wink at her.

“Oh, I miss you,” she half-exhaled, half-laughed, grabbing onto your shoulder with a touch of comfort you’d almost forgotten. “I’m still trying to figure out how to handle Jennie’s new friends.”

With a distant hum, you agreed, “that makes two of us.”

Someone suddenly called her over from the next room, and she politely dismissed herself, fitting in a graceful comment about your outfit before she strode away. And that was when you started feeling… disheartened, a bit empty, dreary about the future and how you were supposed to wake up relatively excited for school knowing that Joshua’s kind, sweet, stupidly pretty face wasn’t going to be there. It felt like a kick in the teeth, and it hadn’t even happened yet. Did he care that he was going to be leaving you here to sink further into your loneliness?

As you picked at another cracker, Hansol came up from the basement with Jennie following suit. They were holding extra paper plates and cups, and you watched from your peripheral as Hansol kept the door open for her with his foot. He was graduating too, though his family hadn’t glamorized it as much as Joshua’s, to which you figured the boy was dually enjoying the praises he got in the mix. Jennie and Hansol walked off together into another room, talking animatedly and constantly brushing shoulders and smiling a little too gleefully for two people who just got sent to the basement for some cardboard and plastic.

Where the hell is Joshua?

You got here at eight, and hadn’t seen him once.

Well, if he didn’t want to be found, then you’d just follow the very obvious trail that lead to his bedroom, the door cracked open and the aging, peeling poster of that lady with the star-shaped sunglasses still staring at you just as placidly as always. When you thought about it, she was the only one to ever see you stop and stare at his door over the many years, watching your wonder of him turn into a crush, and then whatever you called it nowadays. Using your foot, you tapped the door open slightly, exchanging a nervous glance with the star-shaped glasses lady.

Joshua hadn’t even noticed that you’d entered. He was squatted in the corner, wires snaking around his feet, some plugged into a few outlets on his amp. Of course, this is what concerned him right now.

“So, you’ve been up here, playing around with a bunch of wires, instead of like, enjoying the graduation party you forced me to come to.”

He flinched, at first jarred by your presence, but you noted Joshua’s relaxed smile as he rose up while sweeping some dust off his hands. You stood in one place, like roots were sprouting from your socked feet into the floor, hands fiddling behind your back.

Standing near his desk, Joshua gestured to the lava lamp.

“Do you want that?” He asked as a bright, yellowish gob of liquid floated gradually upward, merging into the purple.

“Why would I want it?”

“You said something to me once about always wanting a lava lamp. I don’t really need it anymore.”

Rolling back your shoulders, you chuckled. “I said that like, two years ago. And I think it’s a staple of your room. You should keep it here.”

“Good point,” he answered, reaching for a soda can on his desk.

Cream soda, obviously. Some things never change.

You sighed, though it ended up whisking out your mouth in a much sadder tone than you intended, and for a second your heart skipped a beat because you didn’t want Joshua thinking his graduation party was insipid or boring. If anything, you were reminiscing, and it just wasn’t in your nature right now to be especially pert when you knew he was leaving. Not to mention, you hated him in a crisp white dress shirt that he’d clearly been fiddling with because the sleeves were too long and the fabric was too stuffy. He’d cuffed the material up to his elbows and undid a few buttons that unveiled a deep amount of his skin.

Were collarbones intended to be that attractive?

“Everything okay?” Joshua questioned, tilting his head.

You leaned against the desk with him, the room hardly aglow in the dull heat from his lava lamp. Honestly, you did kind of want it.

“Well, you’re going off to university…”

“I am.”

“So, you won’t be here. Like, at all.”

“Are you forgetting the entire summer before I leave? And reading week? And Christmas? And whatever else? I’m not ‘gone’,” he quoted with his fingers, “you have my number, anyways.”

You scoffed, smiling at him to lighten the tension. “Pfft, yeah, like you’re even going to be hitting me back. You know you won’t, right?”

Joshua merely shook his head in disagreement, folding his arms.

“Never mind any of that stuff. I don’t mean to make it about myself—” Jennie’s face scorched across the canvas of your mind like a lightning strike, that comment about you being selfish, “how are you feeling? I mean, shit has been… a little different for you this year.”

The boy bit his lip softly as he agreed, and his eyes almost glazed over for a particular second, as though he were flicking through heavy pages of old memories. Was he thinking about Elsie? You really hadn’t spoken to her since their breakup, apart from an excruciatingly awkward encounter in the girl’s washroom where you basically expressed your empathies to a brick wall. She had been scrubbing every cell of her hands with soap, smiling and nodding and probably wishing you’d just dissipate. Since then, you hadn’t seen the autumn haired girl much.

“Yeah,” Joshua hummed, tilting his head in your direction, “I guess it has been different. But… good different…” his eyes stilled on you like they were focusing a picture, and you swore his gaze drifted up from your legs, your hips, ever so briefly along your chest and to the sort of frozen expression painted stiffly and crookedly to your face.

What the fuck does that mean?

“So… you’re ready to leave?” Experimentally, you adjusted your hand on the desk, having your fingers slightly overlap with his.

“Pretty much.”

He stared at you again, and this sitting, small frog in your chest charged into a hop as Joshua’s ring finger slid overtop your pinky, hooking the two digits together. Nervous was an understatement—you felt downright nauseous, the dry-mouthed, heart-hammering, sweat-slicked kind where fainting seemed like a possibility if you didn’t go into cardiac arrest first. Despite the guileless brushing of your fingers, Joshua’s face hadn’t budged that much. He was about as easy to read as a stone tablet, only if someone used scissors instead of a chisel.

But was it right to doubt yourself? This could be the perfect moment served on a silver platter. Maybe you didn’t know what you were doing, or how to kiss someone, or how to look at this boy’s sweetly plump lips without feeling tingly and dehydrated, but if you didn’t just make that fucking move you’ve been waiting on like a birthday wish then—

“Oh, yeah! Totally forgot to mention this but—”

“Wait, Joshua—”

He had taken a step away from the desk, and without thought, you latched onto his shoulder in an attempt to reel him back.

The boy turned around almost automatically, unable to purse another word past his lips as he realized the seriousness that had desaturated your aura, feeling the shaky hands that pulled down the smooth front of his dress shirt, arms now curling their way around his neck. You had pressed him in close against you, not a flicker of space between, and Joshua still hadn’t said a word as you touched your lips to his in a light contact. Unsure if you should continue, you almost stepped away, surprised to consequently feel two firm hands on your hips which guided you back in, his lips now eagerly pushing against yours.

But it quickly dawned on Joshua that he needed to go slower for you, and there was an almost grateful, relieved breath into his mouth when he extended each kiss into a gradual pace. Working softly, letting you pause to take in as much air as you needed, occasionally smiling against your mouth whenever he added something like an experienced touch of the tongue that you clearly enjoyed and responded to. Almost blinded by the desire you felt, you were immediately desperate for more, having Joshua sit down in his desk chair while you climbed onto him.

“Wait—” he huffed between your kisses, accepting each one and nipping back too, almost like he couldn’t stop himself, “wait just a sec.”

His calloused hands landed on your bare thighs. You couldn’t help but twitch the instant it happened, losing another fleck of sanity, chills dancing up your spine when his fingers inched further to play with the short, black hem of your skirt. To your displeasure, Joshua suddenly abandoned that idea all together. Almost like he’d contacted something burning hot, the boy chose to grasp your waist instead.

“What?” You mumbled breathlessly against his neck, exploring the skin with licks and bites.

This was something you had never done before, something you didn’t even know you were capable of, but the desire was flowing out and you didn’t know how to stop it. His addicting scent fluttered around you, making it beyond difficult to concentrate. Joshua’s fingers then grazed your cheek, pulling your face back toward him where he slotted your mouths together once more, wanting to kiss you harder but knowing he needed to stop. You sensed it too—he was confused and apprehensive.

Swallowing the lump in your throat, you leaned back on his lap and frowned. “Is there something wrong? You don’t want us to?”

Joshua reached for your face again, moving you back in.

“Listen,” he said, using that satin-dipped voice of his which could only indicate he was about to let you down gently, “it’s not that… I just—you’re beautiful, and thoughtful, and as much as I want to—” he sucked in a breath that seemed deeply regretful, moving his thumb across the crest of your cheek with such fragility as he admitted, “I can’t, and I feel like I shouldn’t. I’m so, so sorry. I really am.”

“So… what does that mean? You don’t like me?”

It was akin to pinpricking a balloon—just the slightest puncture had instantly deflated you, and there was a horrible, useless feeling that soaked into your bones as this boy caressed your face so tenderly.

“No, I like you. Fuck, of course I do,” Joshua whispered, sitting up further in the chair, black tresses slipping into his eyes, “but—”

“I’m just your little sister’s best friend, right?” Damn it, tears had glistened up as you said it. “Well, not even best friend. She fucking hates me, thinks I’m pathetic or whatever. And, is she even wrong? I mean, I’m literally sitting on her brother’s lap thinking he—you’d actually want me.”

“Slow down—” Joshua reached for your wrist as you squirmed off his lap, but you flinched away from it and wiped your cheeks instead.

“Please, you don’t have to leave. I mean, I’m not gonna hold you here, and— okay, I didn’t mean to make you cry. Fuck, I’m so sorry—“

He pushed out of the desk chair, reaching toward your face.

But you stepped back at the same time, maintaining the equidistance.

“What did you mean to do, then?!”

“I-I don’t know, honest. I really don’t know. Just—not this.”

Everything was fucking sweltering and stinging and you had never hated yourself more for thinking Joshua saw you as anything else but that dorky sidekick to his sister. And, you didn’t want to hear him elaborate or try to sugar coat his truth because that would only shove the knife further into your back. You wanted to leave, chiefly because you knew he wouldn’t follow, though nothing had ever hurt more in your life than when you slammed his door shut for the very last time. As you hurried down the stairs and anxiously buckled your shoes back on at their front door, Jennie had wandered into the corridor holding onto a plastic cup, at first extremely confused to the tears caked over your face.

“Um… should I get you a tiss—”

“Actually, you were right.”

Jennie perched an eyebrow, then scratched at the bracelets on her wrist. She was too stunned by the situation to bother responding.

“Your brother doesn’t want me, at all.”

And just like that, you were out of their house in an instant.

This could be a good thing, exactly what you needed, even.

Age thirteen was the first time you had seen Joshua, and for some unshakeable reason, your brain decided that he was the only boy worth fixating over—coursing enough serotonin and dopamine through your receptors like a drug that seemed harmless enough to keep injecting until one day, it just wasn’t. Joshua wasn’t even that great. What did he do anyways, apart from having eyes as captivating as the fine details of an oil painting, and a voice that sounded what a daydream felt like, and this seemingly genuine attentiveness to your life that made you forget the blizzard that often whipped around it?

Right, Joshua was not all that.

There must be other people out there who could elicit that rush, and maybe you would have met one or two of them if you hadn’t been so tethered to the older brother character who’d pinned you as this one-dynamical permanent friend. And that’s why you had come to the conviction that he needed to be cut from your existence, not just in physicality, but in thought. The second you got home from the party—letting your bicycle crash against the asphalt driveway because it was a fossil anyway—you took every single can that you had kept over the years, shovelling them into your knapsack while trying not to blubber.

Flinging the bag over your shoulder, you saddled onto the bike and pedalled off toward the quarry near the edge of the town. There was a huge, earthy hole dug into the middle, and most people had decided to start treating the pit as a trash site. It was nearly pitch black by time you arrived, so you had to balance a tactical flashlight on a rock, your enlarged shadow cast along the big, graffitied construction boxes sitting opposite to the hole. You grabbed a soda can out from your bag and twisted it into the dirt, pausing for no less than a second as his pretty face eclipsed your thoughts, perhaps one last opportunity to weigh the scale.

No—follow through, don’t be doubtful.

Crush the can. Crush the crush.

Using your heel, you stomped the soda can, hearing the metal contort and crack like you had squeezed out its breath. Then, with a gust of the leg, you sent the flattened semblance of a disk sailing through the air into the pit, which seemed as deep and infinitely dark as the sky. You did it again. And again. Crush and kick. Crush and kick. Until there was nothing left inside your bag, emptied down to its dust and crumbs.

It would have been an incredibly victorious, fulfilling moment.

If only you had not been crying so hard the entire time.

[ joshua h. | 11:45 pm ]: this is my fault, and i’m sorry.

[ joshua h. | 11:45 pm ]: i shouldn’t have kissed you back and messed with your expectations. but it’s not that i don’t like you or think about you.

[ joshua h. | 11:45 pm ]: bc i do. i just don’t know what’s right.

[ joshua h. | 11:46 pm ]: can we talk again? please.

[ joshua h. | 12:58 am ]: i’m sorry. i hurt you. i’m so fucking sorry.

[ joshua h. | 12:58 pm ]: i’m still gonna be here for you if you need me.

[ joshua h. | 12:59 am ]: goodnight.

Are you sure you want to block Joshua H? You will not receive any of this user’s messages.

…

Yes.

17.

Being seventeen was relatively new. Jennie Hong was no longer in your life. She was past a point of dislike and stuck on indifference. You heard from your mother that it was worse to be meaningless to someone than to be hated, and… you agreed. Chan, the boy responsible for driving you to Jeonghan’s party, was your boyfriend, and you two had started dating at the beginning of September. He had an oddly thrilling personality, a small group of friends, wasn’t too clingy or detached, and, well, he certainly tried at your relationship. Chan was the perfect amount of normal—balance, could be a better word, someone you looked at and sensed their life was exactly where they needed it to be.

Contrarily, your life had never felt like that, though that could have been due to Jos—him. Just, him, because you firmly decided that he was to remain a blank, faceless cut-out in the branching cloth of your memories. Right now you were with Chan, and he was lovely.

“What if—for the spaceship scene—you have her ride in on one of those harness thingies? And just get her to hold a cardboard painted ship. We have the budget for a harness-pulley system, right? All it takes is some rope and muscle, really.”

“We’re not doing that, Chan. I appreciate that you want to lessen the burden of my stage coordinator B.S, but after the Peter Pan incident last year, harnesses were fucking stripped from any future production.”

“Oh! That’s right. Wasn’t that what’s-her-face’s fault?”

Seungkwan rolled his eyes, “basically, yeah.”

Theatre wasn’t exactly your school’s forte. It was proven year after year, beginning with the tragically iconic incident of the mattress pile toppling in the Princess and the Pea. The most recent incident—referred to ominously as the “harness” incident from last year’s Peter Pan production—nearly sent the theatre’s jewel, Lee Seokmin, straight to the hospital, though he was kept content with a hot fudge sundae and a coupon book. How that worked was beyond your understanding.

You had known Seungkwan since middle school, and it had always been his dream to be appointed stage coordinator. While it was bestowed to him under hapless circumstances, he was taking the school’s original production, Lost on Planet Smeckle, to an almost concerning degree of seriousness, constantly walking around with a pen spinning between his fingers and an “inspiration” notebook tucked at the elbow which you assumed was rather void. In truth, it was a particularly hard job to get suspended from. Jennie used to operate the sound panel for the plays. You swore she almost never hit the right button or was either incredibly delayed at doing it, and she was never admonished once.

“Are you going to contribute any ideas or not?” Seungkwan quipped, leaning back in his chair with an ankle propped on his knee.

Squishing up the sloppy remainder of your sandwich into its plastic wrap, you chucked it at him, knocking the pen out his hand.

“Like I know how to spice up Lost on Planet Smoogle—”

“Smeckle!”

“Smeckle—whatever it is. You’re asking the wrong girl.”

After sliding his pen back with his foot, Seungkwan seemed to agree that you were impracticable, therefore illuminating Chan as the rubber to bounce any incoming ideas off. Lunch was nearly over anyways. You decided to let the boys hash out whatever they could.

“I’m going to the library.”

Chan reached for your hand, fluttering his eyes sweetly.

“I’ll come find you after chemistry, okay?”

“Sure thing,” you smiled, leaning down to give him a peck.

Speaking of the library, it had finally dawned on you that the couple who routinely opted to swap spit on the staircase were gone and graduated. While you had never been fond of them, they probably had the strongest relationship in the entire school. Chan occasionally joked about taking their place—it always earned him a thwap to the forehead.

Honestly, you weren’t sure why you escaped to the library, because hanging out with Seungkwan and Chan felt… right. They offered the company you always longed for in high school—a small, concrete group that was free of toxicity, the type of friends to groan with you about how unpalatable the cafeteria food was, stand with you outside your classes when the teacher was notably late and giggle about that stupid rhetoric of skipping after fifteen minutes. They were normal and familiar and that was all you could ask for. Seventeen was boring. Good boring.

A few minutes had gone by as you picked through the spines.

You kept sliding out and re-shelving the books without any actual intention of having them stamped. But then you pulled out a thick history novel that was at eye level. It revealed a perfect gap into the next aisle—exactly where Jennie and her friend Marina were standing. It surprised you so abruptly that you had flinched, cramming the book back into place as though you were restoring a bewitched, sacred artifact you definitely shouldn’t’ve touched. You should have left too. Except you didn’t, instead hovering close to the shelf where you deeply inhaled the scent of dusty paper, eavesdropping their conversation.

“Is that the one about the Galapagos finches?”

“Nope, dunno what it is—oh, there, barn owls. Not quite.”

“Maybe I should switch my topic. I fuckin’ hate biology. You think if I paid you ten bucks and half a joint, you’d write my project?”

“Yeah, no way. I’ll help you, though.”

“C’mon! You’re the only one I know who’s getting a ninety-five in bio. The teacher fucking loved your poster on those weird frog things.”

“The poison dart frog? Those are cool. I always went to their exhibit at the nature museum with my brother. You can get them as wooden toys with a stick. They sound like the actual frog.”

“Pfft, the nature museum. You’re such a loser, Jen. Ah—since you mentioned him, how is that dude, anyways? Mr. Beautiful.”

“Joshua?”

“Mmhm.”

Okay, this has to be your exit. Even just hearing his name feels like a tiny scalpel running the length of your heart. It’s been months and that chapter has closed. You’ve sutured your own cuts and moved on.

“He’s doing pretty good.”

Wait, pretty good? You paused. Pretty good, how?

“Uh, classes are fun. He really likes his roommate. Remember Jeonghan? He’s got an apartment with him. Life’s good for that idiot.”

No—what the hell are you doing? You don’t care!

“Okay, nice. Has he gone to any like, crazy parties? Everyone says the parties at uni are unmissable and you’re guaranteed to eat an edible without even knowing it. I’m not sure if that’s good, though.”

“Uh, yeah. He’s been to a few.”

Is it just you or did someone slick this part of the floor with glue?

“Got a girlfriend yet? I wouldn’t be surprised with those daydreamy eyes of his and the deceivingly angelic voice.”

Your breath stilled, lungs contracting, nerves simmering. Jennie hadn’t answered yet. It felt like time was viscous and nearly unmoving. At first, she chuckled, sliding a book back onto the shelf until it clicked.

“A girlfriend? Don’t think so. And never say those things again.”

In one gigantic exhale, the air gushed out your nose. If not for the bell startling you into reality, you might have slid down against the shelf due to anxiety, melted into a puddle even for the janitor to scrub away.

Something inside you had embarrassingly given.

It could not happen again.

Your fork sliced into the edge of orange, mashed sweet potato until it clinked against the plate, stainless steel scraping porcelain as you dragged it up and set the prongs onto your tongue. Chan was cutting rosemary asparagus in half to your left, keeping his eyes fixed on the stalks that were glimmery in butter and sauce. Picking up her wine glass, your mother took a slow, savoury sip. She watched the both of you.

Dinner was always so fucking awkward. Your mother had insisted she throw something together despite the fact she’d come straight home from work, still confined to her button-tight blouse and knee-length pencil skirt she hated, stalking around the kitchen in her clicky heels. She had met Chan once or twice before, though he never stayed for dinner. It was her opportunity to finally pin him in place, and it was going horribly.

Maybe it was weird to think, but some people just weren’t good with mothers—not purposefully or accidentally or by unimaginative curse, but in a way that was rather ignorant. Everyone’s house was their house, and unfortunately, that was Chan. If you had known this was her plan, you would have dragged him upstairs, pushed him down in your swivel-back chair, flipped around the for-emphasis chalkboard and instructed him on exactly what not to do. Yet, there hadn’t been the opportunity for that.

“So, any ideas for college or university? A gap year maybe to secure some money? I know that you’re very interested in performance and theatre.”

“Oh, yeah,” Chan agreed, bits of green flashing in his teeth as he spoke with a full mouth, “I want to be like, a really amazing dance teacher, but work my way up to it doing tons of gigs—,” he paused to chug a gulp of water, “and um, I don’t know. I want to be like Usher or something.”

“Really?” Your mother remarked, her wine glass settling onto the coaster with a light thud. “Usher? I guess he’s more your generation.”

“Yeah, probably,” Chan answered, also placing his cup back on the table, completely missing the coaster, “there’s this one song I really love, it goes like—”

Oh no. You braced a palm against your forehead, hardly watching from the edge of your vision as Chan sat up straight and pitched his hand.

“Shorty got down and said “come and get me”, yeah, yeah, I got so caught up, I forgot she told me, yeah, yeah, her and my girl, used to be the best of homies, next thing I knew, she was all up on me scream—”

You grabbed onto his arm, disguising it as a sincere, thoughtful touch despite your nails teething down on his skin.

“That was really great. Thank you, babe.”

“Well, I just—I hadn’t got to the rest of it yet.”

“No, I know,” your nails clawed a little deeper, “that’s fine.”

It was best to stop him before he entered a whole performance number in your dining room, to which you could picture him tripping over his own feet and tearing a photo frame off the wall, or elbowing the fine china teapot that had been a gift from your grandmother. He didn’t have the best spatial awareness, or awareness of anything, really. Your mother was sitting back, smiling, one leg folded over the other with her head in a slight tilt that seemed deceivingly warm and intrigued. She wasn’t going to say it, but she didn’t have to. Chan was below your standards.

“You know, that’s good.” She pointed a finger at him. “I’d love to see the full routine one day. You’ve got that…” she swirled her hands around as though she were clearing a crystal ball, “that star factor. Very cool.”

“Thank you.” Chan grinned, setting his elbows onto the table where he then hiccupped quietly into his hands (it was more of a belch, but you were admittedly trying to water down how insensible he was in even your own mind).

If wizards were real, you were dying for one to zap you with the end of their wand, preferably into a pile of sparkly ashes.

Somehow, dinner came to an end. While Chan excused himself for a bathroom break, you stood at the sink with your mother, dutifully polishing the forks she’d set into the dry rack. It was silent for a minute or two. At least her heels were finally off, though bits of hair from that slicked updo were beginning to tickle her face while she scrubbed away at the plate. You really didn’t want to discuss what happened anyway. But after you organized the cutlery into the drawer, your mother gave you a look that felt loaded as she let the soapy water drain.

Well, here we go.

“You know, I don’t dislike him as much as you think I do. There’s definitely character. He’s just… far below you, in my opinion. And I wish I could say I understand why you’re dating him, but I don’t.”

Opting to stay silent, you wiped down the puddles around the sink.

“I won’t throw up all my inklings onto you now, especially when I know the kid’s down the hall, doing God knows what—and I can tell by this little shoulders-buckled, lip-tight thing you’re doing that you don’t wanna talk about it. Gosh… at least we’ve got leftovers for tomorrow.”

“Mmhm.” You hummed, just to acknowledge you’d heard her.

“Oh, you know who I liked? That brother, the brother of that girl you used to be best friends with. Jennie and… J-something. They both had names with J’s. Their mother is in such better shape than me. Help me out here. I know damn well that counter’s dry by now.”

Crossing your arms, you rolled the very corner of the dish towel between your thumb and pointer finger, feeling his name rise along the back of your throat like it was being summoned out, against your will.

“Joshua.”

“Yes! Him! I adored that one. I always thought he liked you, too.”

“Mom! I don’t think we should be talking about this.”

“It’s true! I mean, he drove you home from school all the time. He always bought you things. And he had these eyes that were just… he looked at you different, so deeply, like he truly cared about you. I just—I know he’s older, two years or something, but I felt safe whenever you said you were with him. I kept waiting for him to come here for dinner.”

“I said we shouldn’t be talking about this and you’re talking about it!”

“Okay well I—”

The bathroom door squeaked open from down the corridor.

Both of you sealed your mouths shut.

It was 10pm, and Chan was asleep at your side, the two of you miraculously cramped onto the twin size bed shoved against the wall with the sheets pulled a generous amount onto his half. Not that you cared. It was warm in your bedroom, and the heat from your hard backs pressed together was making you slightly sweaty. To feel uncomfortable in your own home was one thing—but in your own bedroom? The place you had perfectly cultivated over the years to always feel comfortable? Part of you wanted to crawl out from your own skin like that was something humans did. Chan was a great friend. Maybe it should have stayed like that.

Or, maybe it was just late, and you were too warm to think with clarity.

Wedging out your phone from beneath the quilt, you took a cautious peak over your shoulder, only to see the dark, dim outline of Chan’s shoulder bone digging into yours. Then, you turned back to your phone.

Instagram. That was usually what you did when you couldn’t sleep. A filtered and superficial glance into the very uninteresting lives of people who thought they were interesting was certain to make you tired.

A picture of Seungkwan with his empty script book.

Oh, there’s Seokmin eating ice cream with his girlfriend.

Marina? Since when did you follow her? Apparently, you did. Probably when you thought it was still possible to mesh yourself into her friendship with Jennie and become the triplet friend group everyone was envious of. Except you strongly disliked Marina. And Jennie hated you.

You two still followed each other.

@jennie.hg commented on @marinascapilatti’s photo: “HOT. SMOULDERING. FUCKING SEXY AS FUCK.”

@marinascapilatti replied to @jennie.hg: “LMAO. love you sm babe!!”

For some reason, you clicked on Jennie’s profile. Thumbing to the bottom, you realized she hadn’t removed the old pictures of you two together, even if they were from two or more years ago. Jennie had never been one to constantly delete pictures and reshape her account as she got older. She liked the memories. The beauty of an archive. Letting people know exactly who she had been because that was never a concern to her.

You opened a picture she had posted on your birthday three years ago.

@jennie.hg: a lot of u ppl know this girl. she’s my best friend or something. since sixth grade. it’s her birthday. so if you don’t wish her a happy birthday then you’re dead to me and you suck! xo.

That day, people you had never spoke to more than once or twice said happy birthday to you in the halls, or in the lunch line, on the way into your next class, even in the washroom. You decided to look at more comments on the picture, pausing on one in particular.

@joshua_hong_1230: it’s your birthday? happy birthday!:)

Fuck. Were you really about to do this? With your boyfriend asleep beside you, so close that he was crushing you into the wall?

A deep, deep sigh.

Yes.

First, you had to unblock him, convincing yourself it would only be for a moment or two as you quickly gleaned his account (out of curiosity and definitely not the emotion tugging your heart in a very sensitive direction). Pressing onto the most recent picture, you bit your lip.

404 likes. 51 comments. @joshua_hong_1230: clink.

Him and his university friends crowded around a restaurant table, half-emptied glasses of alcohol and dinner plates everywhere. You only recognized Jeonghan who was right beside Joshua in the photo. On his other side, a girl you had never seen before. She was leaning into him closely, her hair tousled in pretty, effortless manner that somehow reminded you of Elsie. Continuing down the rabbit hole, you opened her profile. Her name was Daphne. She was in biomed. Cute sundresses that hugged her shape in all the right places glowing from her feed.

As much as you wanted to believe you were genuinely interested in this Daphne girl’s life, you weren’t. What you really wanted to know was obvious. In fact, it slapped you in the face, filled you with shame and embarrassment and now you were stuffing your phone beneath the cold side of the pillow hoping it would disappear.

Stop thinking about him.

Stop comparing yourself to everyone in his life.

Valentine’s Day seemed to come out of nowhere. One minute you were scalding your tongue with the taste of disgustingly hot cocoa, attempting to stick together a gingerbread house using prayers and pastry icing, and peeking between your blinds at the carollers who were singing the loudest version of Silent Night that you’d ever heard. But then you had blinked, and suddenly everything was pink. Roses were being sold in the front foyer (you specifically told Chan not to purchase one because you knew that under your care, it would wilt in a week) and the number of cinnamon hearts you’d smelled on people’s breath was almost concerning. Not to mention the Stupid Cupid Dance was tonight.

At first, you didn’t want to go. Most memories you recalled of the dance were actually quite pleasant, though Jennie had still been your best friend then, and jumping around manically with her while student council showered the crowd with candy grams eased the sting of not being with him. However, Chan was oddly passionate about going. He didn’t swoon to your idea of staying home with a movie and some cheap sugar cookies. In fact, he even offered to accompany you with your dress shopping, though you both got insanely bored halfway through the process and decided to play games at the arcade instead. The best outfit you could muster was a long, oversized dress shirt with a stylish belt to wrap around the waist, alongside some thigh-high pink socks.

It was… definitely something.

The dance was roughly two hours away. You were lounging across your bed, twirling a cherry-flavoured sucker against the inside of your cheek. Chan was sitting on the floor, still trying to fix his tie.

“Do you want me to look up a tutorial or something?” You asked in a bored tone, temple feeling sore from leaning against your fist.

With his tongue curling against his lip, Chan declined. “No, no, think I’ve almost got it… just gotta slip it up and under and… there!”

You could hardly choke out a lukewarm congratulations as you completely spread out across the bed sheets, blinking up the ceiling with the sticky taste of cherry on your lips. Chan edged off the floor and sat beside you, prompting you to raise your head onto his lap.

“Dunno if it’s a good thing to bring up, but your mood is a little… it’s not doing too great, babe. Is there anything I can do?”

Obviously, you wanted to skip the dance. It’s not that you believed it would be unenjoyable with Chan—he did have the tendency to wander and was easily absorbed into conversations with friends, almost exiling you to stand there stiltedly the entire time—but other than that, he was a fantastic dancer and you loved watching him (you had never once danced with him at a party because you felt more like a hindrance to his spotlight). Besides, the gym was only so big, and since Jeonghan had graduated there was no one else at the school to host blow-out parties.

“What if we just didn’t go?” You mumbled around the sucker.

“Uh—no! We have to! Seungkwan’s gonna meet us there.”

“I know, I know. But we can do something fun that’s not the Stupid Cupid Dance! Like, um—we could—there’s always—how about we go the river? It’ll be a little chilly but we can bring our jackets. I think fresh air is what I need. You could teach me to skip rocks.”

Chan’s hand fell into your hair. It felt sympathetic.

“Skip rocks? What makes you think I can do that?”

Pushing yourself up, you groaned, “I don’t know, Chan. I just don’t want to go. Can we make a compromise at least?”

Your boyfriend paused for a moment, slumping against the wall and pursing his lips like he was tediously wracking his brain.

“We can stay for two hours. Then we can go to the river and throw rocks, or whatever it was—the thing you just said.”

“Yes, thank you, thank you!”

He seemed surprised at how ecstatic you behaved, his hands rather delayed as they climbed up to your hips, responding to the hug you had draped him in. You pressed a kiss against his cheek, then a swift one to his mouth, knowing he could taste the cherry and how sweet it was.

“The song—the song, they’re changing the song!”

“Yeah, I know, I can hear it—”

“Can you hold this? And this? And my phone—last time it flung out of my pocket and I got big crack in my screen protector.”

“No, Chan—can you wait? It’s almost time to go—”

“I promised that I would do this dance with Seungkwan!”

“So you’re leaving me alone?”

“No, no, no—just—it will be fun! And I’m really good at the dance for this song. Watch me and you’ll see. Thanks, babe! You’re the best!”

“The promise you made to Seungkwan,” you sagged, attempting to hold his suit jacket, drink, and phone all in one severely cramping hand, “what about the promise you made to me?” Walking over to the bench in the gym corner, you set all his possessions down one at a time, gritting your teeth. “I love how much I matter to you, babe.”

You squinted at the exit across the room and attempted to maneuver your way toward it, twisting and wriggling and tiptoeing around everyone until this girl had stepped backward into your way. She flicked a straight curtain of hair over her shoulder and you smelled tart perfume—almost nauseating—as she talked with her friend.

“I feel like these parties were so much better when they weren’t school-sanctioned! No one in student council is stepping up. Why do all the seniors suck this year? Where is everyone with surgeon parents?”

“I know. People were moving the tiles in the girl’s washroom at lunch so they could put Vodka bottles up there. It was so funny.”

“Someone will snitch and they’ll make us do the breathalyser thing—no way they’re doing that to me! It’s like, my right or something.”

“Hey guys, pardon me, I’m going that way.”

“You’re going where?”

“That way, to the exit.”

“You’re trying to leave? Are you going to the washroom? They make you write down your name, y’know, on this clipboard, and they time you. Isn’t that fucking stupid? Like, if you take an extra minute to piss or open a tampon, they’re going to call your parents.”

“Um, that’s—”

“Like, ouuu, I’m so scared. Hey, are you rich by any chance? Not even rich—just like, you’re moderately above average and it’s likely that you have an inground pool? Or, you know someone who is rich?”

“I don’t, sorry…”

“Fuck—it’s whatever.”

“Can you move now? I’m leaving.”

“Oh, yeah—sorry. But you heard the thing I said right, about the washrooms and the clipboard? I hope you’re not going piss!”

Her and her friend were now too far behind you for a response to be meaningful. Your head was throbbing, almost like there was gun powder sitting in your skull instead of a brain, awaiting the flare to thunderously ignite. You tried to slink past the vending machines on your way out, hoping to be inconspicuous and unimportant.

“Uh—excuse me, young lady. I can’t let you walk out. It’s a little loud but I know you hear me.” The teacher started waggling her finger.

“Sorry.”

“Where are you going? Washroom? You’ll need to write your name down on this clipboard as well as the time. I know students have been complaining about this, but it’s a rule and no one is exempt.”

“No, I don’t need the washroom. My head hurts.”

“At least four other girls have told me that, then I saw them all together with this big bottle, stumbling around the track field when I was supervising. Just hold on a moment, I’ll radio a teacher to go with you outside. That way you can get some fresh air, and we know you’re not up to anything that’s against the rules. Can I have your name?”

“Is it for the clipboard?”

“Yes… I have a pencil—here.”

“Well… I don’t need someone to go with me outside.”

“It’s the rule. We need to keep track of all students.”

“I don’t have any alcohol. Or cigarettes.”

“I understand that, but—hey! Hey! You are not allowed to go anywhere unless—young lady, this is not okay!”

You heard the blip on her walkie-talkie as she attempted to alert some other teacher. She’d been following you to the doorway at the front of the school, though she stopped the second you were outside, picking up your pace until you were almost sprinting away from her. It was hardly rebellious—in your eyes, you saw it as less than pathetic. You had decided to turn cheek and flee from her like you had been sent to your room.

Chan wasn’t anywhere close to the boyfriend you had been convincing yourself he was. You didn’t even take his phone or dump his things on the floor or break up with him in the middle of the dance floor as some sort of hedonistic, petty revenge that wouldn’t bare any significance a year from now. Everything had felt so colourless and dull lately. You couldn’t tell if it was your own fault or not.

Balancing your feet at the very edge of the curb, you wondered why February had to be such an awful month. Nothing good had happened since it started. And now it was chilly and wet and dark outside, with big lumps of grey, dirt-speckled snow spilling hideously all over the place. You had left your jacket inside. The thinness of your long dress-shirt let the cold prick you like little razors, and you were beyond tired at pulling up those thigh-high socks which kept shrinking down your legs. February felt like it was asking to be punched in the face.

It seemed like just yesterday you were standing in this exact spot, beside Jennie, squinching through the brightness of a summer sky. You remembered waiting for her brother to appear around the corner in his silver car, his stereo vibrating with different songs each time, the interior smelling like mint gum and foam cleaner. Hansol was always in the front seat, sticking his hand out the window, singing confidently into the oncoming breeze with the boxiest grin on his face. You remembered the intense nervousness you felt accidentally catching Joshua’s eye in the rear-view mirror—how your fingers curled from the anxiety.

The air was too cold for you to stand still. Once a shudder wracked along your arms, you decided to keep walking, kicking a pebble that had melted out from another mushy pile of snow. Upon reaching the end of the sidewalk, extremely bright lights flooded behind you and the pebble was somehow swallowed up. An engine was guzzling heavy at your side and you contemplated crossing the street despite the pixelated red hand glaring at you. Then, you heard a window roll down.

“Are you the type of girl I can p—”

“I’m seventeen,” you interrupted, refusing to acknowledge the man who was eyeing you a little too excitedly from inside his vehicle.

“Well, I have a nice warm truck right here, in case you want to hop inside if you need a ride anywhere. I can unlock the door for ‘ya.”

“I said I’m seventeen.”

“I’ve seen lots of women like you when I wa—”

“I’m not a woman, I’m a teenager.”

You looked at him once through the inky shadows and saw that merely the outline of his face was visible, with slight glints hollowing what you suspected were his eyes. Something in your chest wobbled. The second the walking-man appeared, you hurried across the street with your thumbs tucked deeply into your fists. Too afraid to continue home alone, you swung into the corner store with the spring-painted overhang you had loved so much in your past, pretending to need something. You paused at the slushie machine—the greatest contributor to all your after-school brain freezes and headaches. An ‘out of order’ sign was taped to the glass. From the peeled, slightly stained edges of the paper, you assumed no one had bothered stopping by to repair it in months.

There wasn’t anything you could buy anyways. Joshua had always bought you a drink or a bag of mostly-air packaged chips when you stopped here—either that or he would give you something he bought for himself. At times you would sit beneath the overhang together, bracing through salt and vinegar flavoured chips that stung the soft, cushioned inside of your mouths, drinking soda, throwing the little stones at your feet. For the first time in a long while, you admitted it.

You missed him.

When the clerk disappeared underneath the counter to dislodge another magazine he had most likely read for the hundredth time, you slipped out the door delicately. You then removed your phone from its very convenient spot (tucked between your bra, obviously). For a moment, you studied the number that you had once blocked in the dusk of summer—certain it would never be touched again no matter how much you could be hurting, crying, or grieving the pieces of love you had somehow lost along the way. And you stayed true to that certainty. You didn’t unblock Joshua’s number, rather you just tempted yourself with the idea of it, like smelling a piece of cake but never taking a bite.

Of course, it was unsatisfying. But you pretended it wasn’t.

The river had to be nearby, the sort of thing you could always tell was getting closer and closer because the water sounded like busy wind in tree leaves. It started appearing over a distant crest, which you eventually came to pause at, staring down unto the bank and its large slabs of rock that were now frosted with snow. This was the place you were supposed to be with Chan—if he hadn’t completely ignored your compromise. The fact he wasn’t texting you, worried sick or even an inch concerned, engendered you to think you weren’t really anything to him at all. He didn’t want to be tethered by a girlfriend, that was obvious.

You stared for a little longer, growing colder and stiffer, tracing the places you stood when Joshua had been showing you how to skip stones. But then you started hearing footsteps crunch in the snow, and as you squinted down the bank, you sucked in a dry, freezing breath.

“Jennie!” Your voice cracked. “What the hell are you doing?!”

The girl stopped abruptly, and her shoes sunk awkwardly into the snow, her face visibly flushed in the street lights shining down on the shore. She seemed almost embarrassed to be caught by you, though it should have been the other way around, considering your last words to her were about her older brother rejecting you whilst sat on his lap.

“I’m walking to the corner store!” Jennie shouted back, burying herself deeper into the brown coat draped over her shoulders.

“Why?!”

“Why does it matter?!”

“… Uh, I dunno!”

“If you keep yelling, you’ll start an avalanche somewhere!”

“You’re yelling too!”

Somehow, you successfully managed your way down the riverbank without slipping on a hidden piece of ice. Jennie huffed as you approached her, shaking snow clumps off her sneaker.

“Why don’t you just take the sidewalk?” You asked.

It felt inconceivably strange to look at her face this directly after the fight—to gauge the slow unfurling of maturity in her cheekbones and jawline—to realize how tall she suddenly was—even her impressively long hair which surrounded her like a rippling, black sea. She took a moment before answering, leading you to believe she had studied your face as well. The thought made you uncomfortable yet pleased.

“Why are you dressed like a Dollar Store hooker?”

You couldn’t help but guffaw at that—her humour hadn’t evolved much.

“I went to the Stupid Cupid Dance.”

“Oh—that.”

“Why didn’t you go?”

“Uh… I don’t know,” Jennie shrugged, her eyes drifting along the dark expanses behind you, “I didn’t have anyone to go with.”

“You don’t need a date—”

“No—like, I know that. I don’t have any… friends, I mean.”

“That’s not true. I see you with people all the time. You’re popular as shit. What about Marina? Is she sick?”

“No. We haven’t been talking lately. I don’t think I missed out on anything, anyways. You already left, and by the looks of it, the dance was so bad you didn’t even want to stay to get your jacket. I don’t know how you’re not freezing your tits off. I’m cold, and I have a coat.”

“Yeah, I am cold, but I didn’t wanna go straight home ‘cause this weirdo pulled up beside me at the crosswalk. I was actually supposed to come here with Chan—he clearly had other things that mattered more.”

“Your boyfriend’s kinda lame.”

“Okay—yes, you’re right. Ouch, though.”

“I mean, you tend to like lame guys—my brother, for example.”

The nausea in your stomach dropped. It was a very sickly swirling of butterflies and the slight urge to vomit onto the snow, though you tacked a smile upon your face that definitely wasn’t as soft as you thought. Jennie then blew a strand of hair from her eyes, beginning to shake her head at you. It seemed that she wasn’t bitter, just confused.

“Well, he rejected me,” you stated simply.

She huffed in a gloomy breath, “I know.”

It was quiet again.

“I don’t like him anymo—”

“Oh—just stop, okay?” Jennie exhaled deeply through her teeth, and her gaze burned into yours like a flaming arrow. “I always suspected you had a crush on him. I don’t care anymore. I just wanted reasons to be mad at you since we were growing apart, and there wasn’t even a good explanation for it. I thought if I made up a reason to just—I don’t know—hate you, then it would make me feel better about us. We aren’t friends anymore and that’s fine. That’s what happens. That’s life.”

You struggled to swallow. It felt like the cold air had somehow frozen your throat, and now you could only stare at Jennie, speechless.

“He was so angry at me,” the girl continued, brushing something wet and shiny from her pink-stained cheek, “when I finally cracked and told him about our fight. I mean, he’s been like, ‘mad’ before, but never angry. Until then. Almost yelling at me—just, a bunch of emotion all over his face and stuff. I knew he was in love with you. He never wanted to say it, but he didn’t have to—like I said, he’s lame.”

For some reason, you couldn’t help chuckling.

“Oh yeah, he loves me—like a friend.”

“He just didn’t want to pressure you.”

“Jennie, I was in your brother’s fucking lap, kissing him. He didn’t pressure me at all. And he said something like, ‘I can’t do this, I shouldn’t do this’, and he didn’t even try to stop me from leaving. How could I have made it any clearer I wanted him?”

“Okay—well! My brother is an idiot, then! I don’t know what else to tell you—he got cold feet, he was worried about a long-distance relationship, it all felt too soon, he wasn’t sure how I’d react—I don’t know what he was thinking. I just know he had feelings for you, and if I somehow interfered and ruined it for you two, I’m sorry. But at this point, I don’t care what happens. I honestly never did. Just don’t pretend that you’re not still in love with him ‘cause you think I’ll be mad about it.”

After a tired, musing sigh, you broke off from her eyes and stared across the river, rubbing at your cheeks that were numb and stiff. It was then you realized how fucking insufferably cold you were, to which Jennie unzipped her long brown coat, gesturing for you to huddle beside her underneath it. You didn’t hesitate—not even for a second.

“It’s atrocious out here,” she breathed unsteadily into the lashing wind, “my house is closer than yours. You can warm up there.”

“Didn’t you need to go to the convenience store?”

You heard the smile she fought to supress as she huffed, “I lied. I was just taking a walk. I don’t know why I lied about that.”

“When it’s this cold?”

“Shut up! You have no room to talk right now.”

“I know, I know. But, really—you could have just stayed home.”

With a secure grip on her far shoulder, you both made baby steps up the riverbank, back toward the street. Jennie clutched your waist.

“I’m tired of being at home. I don’t have anything to do there.”

You giggled, “why not watch a movie? Or play a video game?”

“It’s not fun by yourself.”

“Well, we should do that—watch a movie or something. I wanted to stay home, anyways. And we can make big mugs of hot chocolate.”

“I think we have marshmallows,” Jennie said while smiling.

For some reason, you thought you could cry. There seemed to be a distant, swelling sting pressing at the back of your eyes, enough for you to sniffle and thickly swallow, though the tears never actually fell. It was just… nice… to talk with Jennie again. She was the one part of your life that you believed would always stick, and having her slip so rapidly from between your fingers had been a tough knife in your back. You weren’t positive if after tonight things would still be this cordial. Maybe you two would wake up again, knowing there was nothing left but dust in all the cracks and crevices of your friendship. It was impossible to say.

Right now, however, she was the person you needed most.

You sensed it was the same for her.

Joshua came home at the beginning of June.

A little less than a year had passed since you last saw him at his graduation party—the day responsible for birthing your abruptly decided choice to weed him from your life. It was easier to commit to such an extremity knowing he was hundreds of kilometers away. Yet, that didn’t mean it was easy exiling him. How were you supposed to forgot about someone who spent the last five years comfortably burrowing in your head and heart? And—right when you thought it was possible to finally cut the remaining wire, he pulled back into the Hong driveway in that silver bullet car like he’d never left. As easy as a cool breeze.

You were walking to the corner store that day, knowing they had a help wanted sign currently hanging in their window. It seemed like a simple gig, it’s just that you wouldn’t be allowed to ring up cigarettes, lottery tickets or beer. Passing Joshua and Jennie’s house was almost inevitable, though you had officially accepted the portrait of their driveway without that silvery, shiny car. So, when you casually flicked your head left to glimpse their house across the street, you were stunned and even horrified to see the vehicle once erased from your thoughts.

It was reversed into the driveway. The trunk was popped open, and judging by their open garage, someone was lugging suitcases into the house. You didn’t move for a solid minute. Instead, you watched the trunk, as you swore that someone was digging through it. And then you saw a hand touch the top edge, running along its chrome embellishment before beginning to slam it down. You knew it was Joshua before you even saw the person’s face—he had very particular ways of doing things. At first, he didn’t notice you while adjusting the duffle bag strapped over his shoulder and the backpack hanging off his other arm. The lanyard to his car keys was cutely dangling from his mouth.

His eyes impetuously scanned the street, whisking over you like the dull detail nobody was moved enough to highlight—until something about him jerked and suddenly he was squinting directly at you. He slowly took the car keys from his mouth, continuing to observe you from across the street, most likely attempting to fill in the differences of your face and figure—decide if it was even you, he was squinching at.

Immediately, you felt sick to your stomach.

Every single emotion, thought, and feeling came stampeding back through your bones and your skin and your blood. It was almost suffocating—like witnessing a tidal wave of your own secrets looming so far above that you needed to crane your neck to find where it stopped. In your next breath, you were walking away, refusing to look back.

The worst part was feeling Joshua watch you.

The worst, worst part was knowing you weren’t any less in love with him than before he left.

[ jenn-E | 2:14 pm ]: if ur heading to the house now I prob won’t be home for another half hour. stupid dentist appointment!! >:(

[ _____ | 2:14 pm ]: do you not have a drill in ur mouth rn?

[ _____ | 2:14 pm ]: you’re being such an irresponsible patient!!

[ jenn-E | 2:14 pm ]: she left the room. and I like the drill.

[ _____ | 2:14 pm ]: weirdo alert

[ jenn-E | 2:14 pm ]: RUDE!!!

[ jenn-E | 2:14 pm ]: see u soon <3 garage door should be open

[ _____ | 2:15 pm ]: okay! byebye <3

You slid the phone back into your shorts pocket, continuing down the sidewalk with one eye pierced shut. The sun was beaming on you so intensely that you felt the warm sting along your arms and legs, and there was probably a sweaty shine brighter than the north star reflecting off your forehead. Sometimes summer was insufferable. It felt like there was nothing you could do to cool down. There better be ice cream in the fridge, you thought, or a whole package of popsicles. As you drew nearer to the house, you saw that the garage door was indeed open. Then you started walking hurriedly into their driveway.

It was too goddamn hot out.

“Yeah, I’ll try that next… Mmhm… I thought it went the other way?... No—the other, other way… Dude? Are you fucking stupid?... I didn’t mean that, I didn’t mean it… Never mind Jeonghan, I meant it.”

Oh no. Joshua wasn’t supposed to be at home today. His car wasn’t in the driveway, so you hadn’t anticipated marching straight into this astonishingly awkward predicament. You forgot about the old couch they kept in their garage. Jennie used to quip and demand for Joshua to play his guitar there since she couldn’t stand the noise of him railing on the chords. He was speaking to someone on the phone—Jeonghan, his roommate—though he was wearing his earbuds so Joshua hadn’t heard you come in. For a snap-instant, you contemplated turning the other way and making a very understandable sprint back home.

“Okay, just send me the chord progression you’re thinking of then… Oh? Wait, I have my guitar, listen to this… Good, right?... If there’s tweaks then—yeah, yeah, exactly… Just send me it and I’ll—”

Well, it was too late for that, anyway. Joshua had finally noticed you standing like some ghostly apparition who definitely thought they were invisible by the garage threshold. His eyes widened in shock, and you couldn’t help but crack a tiny smile as he attempted to push his roommate off the phone. You sighed, walking toward him slowly.

“I have to go—‘cause, I do!... No I would never do that, I really need to go, though… Send-me-the-chord-progression-okay-bye!” He chucked the last sentence together so quickly it sounded like one word and proceeded to pull out his earbuds.

You had no idea what to do, what to say, or how to piece together an expression on your face that wasn’t strained. He cleared off the coffee table of its old magazines and thick newspapers, to which you sat down across from him with clammy hands clutching your shorts and the largest lump in your throat. God—you hadn’t seen his face in nearly a year, and what a beautiful face he had. His hair was the slightest bit copperier, like it had been sun-kissed, and his skin seemed to have tanned as well. Even his cheeks had maturely sharpened out. You had trouble staring at him, especially his eyes, because you knew exactly how they made you feel—it was a drink of something warm and sweet and glimmery.

“So…” Joshua started to lean back, plucking a few soft strings on his guitar, “I’m still blocked, y’know? Just in case you forgot.”

“I haven’t,” you reminded him in an instant, trying inconceivably hard not to let the dopiest fucking smirk take over your face.

“You hate me?”

“No.”

“Do you want to hate me?”

“What’s the point of this?” Discretely rubbing off your palms, you managed to lock eyes with him, though only for a second.

Joshua shrugged, quirking his head at you.

“I’m trying to figure out why I’m still blocked.”

“Because I needed to get you… out.”

“Out of what?” He chuckled. “Your life?”

His question, you didn’t answer. These weren’t exactly things you wanted to admit aloud, let alone to the face of the person who was the subject. It seemed embarrassing, and maybe it shouldn’t be—maybe you should just own how you felt during those moments because you deserved the chance to finally just breathe. Stop holding things so tight until they popped into an explosion like the fight with Jennie.

“Yes,” you sighed after the brief silence, “I was hurt, and I was angry, and I didn’t want to sit in those feelings. That’s it.”

Joshua nodded, “because of what I said to you that day.”

“Essentially, yeah.”

You weren’t sure if he was going to apologize again. It hadn’t done him any good the last time, so you assumed he wouldn’t bother. For a moment, you contemplated asking him about what Jennie had told you that night at the river, when she revealed that he supposedly loved you.

Nothing ever left your mouth. The timing wasn’t right.

“So, do I get unblocked or not?” Joshua huffed.

Your feet crossed shyly. “Um, I’ll think about it… how’s school?”

“Uh, it has its ups and downs, highs and lows. I’m guessing you didn’t come here to ask about that. Jennie’s not home until later.”

“I know. She’s at the dentist.”

Joshua smiled, sitting up straighter and setting his guitar aside.

“Well, I’m glad you two patched it up. That doesn’t always happen. Not that there’s anything wrong with drifting away. I wasn’t sure if Hansol and I would keep talking. He’s in South Korea right now.”

“I heard, from Jennie.”

“Yeah,” the boy sighed, “they text and stuff.”

“Are you bothered by that?”

“No…?” Joshua replied ambiguously, scratching his head. “I haven’t decided yet. Hansol is cool, anyways. I’m not worried. But what about you? How’s your life been since I hit the city?”

At that, you leaned back against the coffee table and laughed, covering your mouth with a nervous hand. Upon first glance, it had been a boring yet deleterious mess—convincing yourself that you were happier and better off despite the very conspicuous hole suckling like a whirlpool in your chest. But if you looked a little deeper, it had been a journey of acknowledging said mess. You didn’t know how to explain it to Joshua.

“It was interesting.”

“Really? That’s all I get? I think you’re skirting the question.”

“Obviously,” you giggled again, “it’s a long story and not one you’d want to hear right now. I’ll tell you some other time.”

“Fine,” he succumbed, shoving his hands in his pockets, “did you get a boyfriend? Is that why you don’t wanna say anything?”

The heat engulfed you instantly, almost as though you were back outside and suffering under the density of those sun rays. The relationship with Chan had ended after the dance. He was utterly confused about the reasons why, prompting you to feel a bit of pity as you broke up him with him on his porch the next morning. Joshua tilted his head curiously, something a little playful and glinting in his eyes.

“I had a boyfriend,” you answered simply, almost whispered.

He started grinning, moving into an engaged position with his elbows on his knees. You quivered subtly at the closeness.

“Of course. Who?”

“Just, someone from my grade,” you prevaricated.

The boy’s gaze had fixed on you indefinitely.

“Who?”

“Someone.”

He gripped your shoulders—“Who?!”

You were burning up, and pushed him back—“Someone!”

Joshua collapsed against the couch, beginning to cross his arms while making a tsking sound with his teeth. The urge to excitably laugh hadn’t left the back of your throat, and you couldn’t stop mumbling around it as Joshua furrowed his brow at you. Having him touch you so suddenly struck a match. Your feelings hadn’t subsided in the slightest.

“I don’t think it’s important who. And, besides, you don’t deserve to know right now. We broke up back in February.”

“So, I don’t get to just know things about you now?” He asked, melting further down the couch. “I have to earn it?”

“Mmhm.”

He smirked, “fair enough… why’d you break up with him?”

“I didn’t say that I broke up with him.”

“Okay,” Joshua shrugged, losing his transient half-smile, “but we all know you did. Why? He didn’t treat you well enough, yeah?”

Your hands clenched together, pressing uncomfortably.

“We can talk about it later… what about you? Girlfriend?”

“No.”

You raised your brow and decided to poke at him, “wow—even with those eyes? Or does your sweetheart act not cut it anymore? Have you resorted to drugs, Joshua? It’s okay, you can tell me.”

“Oh, you’re so fucking funny,” he pretended to laugh while pushing his sneaker gently against your knee, “I just didn’t want one.”

Suddenly, your phone buzzed. Taking it out from your pocket, you saw that Jennie had sent a text about how she was heading home now. You swallowed tautly, glancing up at Joshua who seemed to realize what the vibration was. He looked rather disappointed, and you felt it deep in your gut too. There was so much more to talk about and joke about and this little sliver of time in the cool, shady garage had whipped past in a mere blink. But at least there was more transparency. Jennie knew and there was no reason to play coy. The whole summer and all its vibrance was still at your feet. You didn’t have to rush anything.

“It was nice catching up with you,” Joshua said, pulling the guitar back onto his lap, “shoot me a text whenever you decide to unblock me.”

“You won’t ignore me? Even with your big fancy university lifestyle now? Greasy takeout and bags of coins for the laundromat?”

“Never,” he smiled, winking casually, “by the way—”

Turning around in the doorway, you tilted your head at him.

“You look really pretty.”

18.

Joshua’s October reading week was nearly over—he’d be packing his suitcases tomorrow morning and escorted back into the city alongside some help from his father. You’d been invited over to their house for sushi night, to which you were currently fighting Jennie off with your chopsticks for the last yam tempura roll. She decided to let you have it, muttering something along the lines of, only because you’re the guest.

It had been roughly three years since your last dinner at their house, and while it was a bit nerve-wracking, you relaxed continuously throughout the night (which could be also attributed to the saké that Mrs. Hong let you pour a decent-sized cup of). Jennie slipped back into the dining room once she grabbed a soda can from the fridge, leaving you alone in the kitchen to decide between the last fried wonton or vegetable spring roll. You sighed, pinching your chopsticks in thought.

“Save room for dessert, y’know? They gave us ice cream.”

Joshua approached the sink, rinsing off his plate and emptied glass under the water. He’d drank more from that saké bottle than you, indicated by the peach-pink glow traversing his cheeks.

“I know, but I’m greedy. I haven’t eaten sushi in forever.”

He came beside you (who still couldn’t decide) and opened one of the drawers to remove some spoons for the ice cream. Joshua then proceeded to pick up the last golden-fried wonton with your chopsticks and dropped it onto your plate. You gaped at him as he nudged a quick kiss against your temple, watching the boy now pull open the freezer.

“I hadn’t made up my mind yet!”

Joshua shrugged, “now you don’t have to. The wonton is good, anyway. It’s got this slightly sweet cream cheese filling.”

“Blah, blah.”

Mrs. Hong entered the kitchen, exchanging a few words between you and Joshua while she cleaned her dishes. She said that her and her husband would be going upstairs to their bedroom for a movie.

“You and Jennie are welcome to do anything. Joshua—I’m guessing you’ll be in the garage? Or will you start packing tonight, dear?”

“Uh, I’ll start tonight. Makes it easier.”

“Okay, perfect. Here—I’ll help you take out the ice cream.” She took two of the bowls, but stopped in the doorway, “are you coming?”

“Yeah, I will,” Joshua replied, “in a sec.”

Once she left upstairs, you felt Joshua’s body push against your spine, his hand tapping your chin and lightly guiding your head to tilt back onto his shoulder. His parents didn’t know of the relationship and neither did yours. Only Jennie was aware. She had been easy to tell.

“I want to do something with you tonight,” Joshua whispered into your ear, his breath warm and ticklish, “after hours, of course.”

“Like what?” You asked in a soft, hushed tone, smiling against your bitten lip. The depth of his eye contact was so exhilarating that you wanted to pounce on him right then and there, refraining by a mere hair.

His hands drifted down to your hips, squeezing them.

“Nothing too special. I’ll surprise you.”

“Okay,” you lilted, “I like surprises. Sometimes.”

Immediately pushing up to meet his lips, you kissed him, lifting a hand behind you to run your fingers slowly through his hair. Put simply, the relationship had ignited just before Joshua left for his second year of university. He came to walk you home from a night shift at the corner store, the both of you kicking pebbles down the sidewalk and dancing around the topic that was so evidently dying to burst. That’s when you decided to ask him about what Jennie had said.

“Was she right? Were you in love with me?”

“Honestly, at the time, I don’t think I could have given you a straight answer. I knew that I felt something, but I wasn’t sure if it was right. You were always in the back of my mind. I thought about you more than I’d care to admit. But when I look at you now, I can definitively say I loved you... I love you, still. ”

Since the fading aurora of that late summer night, you two started dating. It was a fairly covert operation, yet that made it all the more alive and electrifying. The topic of the graduation party had consequently resurfaced—Joshua said he was just overwhelmed by his feelings for you, and that he crumbled in the moment. You didn’t care about the incident though. He was kissing and holding you now.

“Okay, let’s meet Jennie back in the dining room,” you giggled, pushing him away from licking and teething a mark to your neck, “and I’ll let you know what I think of this very crispy looking wonton.”

This year you and Jennie would be graduating. She had offered to do your nails and make-up, which were skills she had picked up from hanging out so frequently with her old girly-girl crowd. You had met some of them—the actually genuine ones who you could imagine holding back your hair during a wicked hangover or offering their most treasured life advice through a bathroom stall at a party. Jennie had maintained some of her interests from them, though she still liked the things you had originally known her for. It was a wholesome change.

“What style of nails do you want? Personally, I like the really pointy stiletto ones because it’s so easy to scratch people.”

“Of course that’s why you like them,” Joshua rolled his eyes, spooning some mango ice cream into his mouth.

“Maybe you could practice a bit on Joshua,” you laughed.

“Yes!” Jennie exclaimed, reaching over to ruffle her older brother’s pretty, mussed hair, “that’s so perfect, isn’t it, Joshy Woshy?”

He swatted her hand away, “I told you to stop calling me that. I don’t call you Jennifer anymore.” A gradual smirk crossed his lips.

That was the cardinal sin. Never call her Jennifer. You opted to stay quiet and finish your deep-fried wonton while they bickered and sniped at each other. At least it wasn’t about the fork with the oddly-dented prong this time. That always tended toward a wrestling match.

nsfw warning.

skip to next divider if wanted!

“Shit, right there!”

Your hand flung into the darkness, bumping against the glass of the backseat window, its condensation wiped off in a messy, uncoordinated smudge. It felt too fucking good—his tongue, pressing up your most sensitive area, indulging slowly in each swirl and kiss and flick as if he would never get the opportunity to taste you here again. It was sometime past one in the morning, his car stalled in the empty lot overlooking the river bank, one single lamp post scattering the windows with a distant, glowing tint. You breathed in deep, closing your eyes.

“You like it that much?” Joshua laughed huskily, readjusting the leg cast down his shoulder. “You’ve got tears all over your face, baby.”

“Just give me more,” you whined in impatience, thrusting your hips toward his mouth with frustration, sensing his hovering breath.

He smirked, placing his thumb just above your clit and pulling back against the skin to expose it more clearly. Everything between your thighs had been generously drenched with your arousal and his spit.

“Are you sure? Think you can take cumming again? I won’t give you a break this time.” There was a teasing nature about his voice.

“Fuck, Joshua, I don’t care! Just keep licking me, please!”

“You’re so fucking whiney,” he murmured, suddenly jerking your body further down the upholstery, “I’ll let you drown me, then.”

In the next instant, his face was stuffed back into your heat, the touches of his tongue and the relentless slurping shooting every nerve in your body to starlight. You couldn’t help but thread your fingers into his wavy, sweat-dampened hair, holding him there as he practically drank you, feeling the pleasure tick higher and higher and higher. Even your hips adapted a mind of their own, attempting to grind against his face so that you could engulf him as much as possible. He caught onto your clit again, sliding his tongue directly into its most sensitive golden spot.

“Fuckfuckfuck,” you moaned into the thick air, “like that, like that—hh-holy shit! M’g’nna cum, Joshua! Please, keep going!”

At that point, you didn’t even know what to articulate. A sheen of sweat had soaked through the thin t-shirt you wore to dinner, your skirt left in a pile in the passenger seat as it had been ripped off earlier. Joshua focused relentlessly on that one perfect spot until you tipped over the edge. The scream broke down in your throat before it could even hit the mugginess around you, not that anyone would have been able to hear you given the time. Contortions twitched through your face while your hips spasmed. And Joshua took it. He took everything. He was most definitely smirking as he slurped your pussy like ice cream—even pinned down your wrist when you began to weakly push and nudge at his head.

“Holy fuck, yy-you’re crazy, Jos—nngh!” Your voice wilted at the sensation of his tongue curling inside of you, wriggling just to ruin you a little further. Half your consciousness was floating in an intangible dimension behind your eyelids. “M’gonna be so fucking sore.”

Once he was satisfied with licking clean the mess between your thighs, Joshua ripped apart the buttons on your pale shirt, kissing up your stomach, your chest, pushing his slick lips onto yours and digging his warm tongue into your mouth. You grabbed his pants, helping tug them off while tasting every bit of yourself.

“I need t’fuck you so bad,” he whispered into your ear, his honeyed voice becoming coarser with desire, “while I still have your taste on my tongue—” your leg was then stretched over his shoulder again, “I need to be inside you more than anything—” he guided himself in with a single thrust, your gasps flushing together, “all these things I wanna do to you, all these things I wanna make you feel—” your nails carved into his back, dragging in scores across the muscle, “I want you t’keep crying for me—” his hand pressed into the slippery car window, leaving an imprint in the fog as he fluidly moved his hips against you, staring down at your wet, breathless face, “I want you to know how much I’m in love with you when I fuck your pretty body like this.”

Your lips trembled into a reverie-like smile. Gripping gently at the back of his neck, you sunk him down for a slow, thorough kiss.

“Love you too…” you whimpered, “ss-so much…”

The desperation and strength of your lust had just been too surmounting in the moment. Joshua hadn’t pulled out onto your stomach like he usually did, opting to keep himself nested inside as he shuddered and let his body release. When you came around him, there was next to nothing you remembered apart from the stars that twinkled through the open sky-light of the car and the intense convulsion you experienced while gazing at them. Joshua laid against you while he caught his breath. You couldn’t stop staring at the world above that resembled a beautiful black beach. There was something so spectacular about it—something so comfortable about quirking Joshua’s head toward the roof in order for him to see what you were seeing.

He nudged your temple with his nose.

“I didn’t plan for the stars to be out. I got lucky.” He answered in between warm breaths.

You turned to look at him with a faint simper. The tingles and throbs of pleasure were still pricking you, fading ever so gradually.

“I like to think they popped out just for us.”

He chuckled, “to see us have sex in the backseat of my car?”

You mushed a hand into his face, “don’t ruin the moment!”

“Sorry, sorry,” Joshua apologized, to which you stopped squishing your palm awkwardly into his cheek, “you’re right, they’re shining for us. Um, and, you’ve got your morning after, right? You said it was in your bag or something.”

“Yeah, I’ve got it. We probably shouldn’t be that careless.” You laughed.

“Probably. But you feel so good.”

“I know,” you poked out your tongue playfully, “let’s just not make a habit of it.”

“Fair enough.”

“It’s getting pretty late, though. Don’t you want to be home at least a little early? Catch more sleep before leaving?”

He shook his head nonchalantly, then notched you closer against his bare skin by the hip. The motion prompted you to shiver at the sensitive feeling of him still deep inside you, a soft breath exhaled from between your lips. Joshua decided to sweep his fingers delicately up and down your face to relax you, knowing your nerves were rather burnt out.

“It’s alright. I have time with you now. That’s what I care about.”

Present.

It wasn’t the most ideal day to be moving cardboard boxes of your appliances, pictures, and whatever else miscellaneous belongings into the building— especially considering the three staircases you had to climb. Unfortunately, you couldn’t control the weather, and that seemed to be proved almost spitefully as a fat, cold raindrop spat directly onto your forehead. With two boxes balanced against your chest, you let it dribble down toward your eye, until you spotted Jennie hopping out the front door to the complex and whined for her to wipe the droplet away.

“At least all the super heavy stuff was moved up yesterday,” she tried to include something positive, flipping up the hood of her plasticky-green raincoat, “this is just the knickknacks. I hope.”

“Mostly—hey, can you grab that box with the lamp? It’s sitting behind the passenger seat. Oh, thank you—you’re a gem.”

“I know,” Jennie chirped, poking out her tongue.

By the time most cardboard boxes were moved into the apartment, you had experienced one downpour and another ditzy, sweet-smelling rain shower about half an hour later. The bottoms of your feet were aching. You kicked off your wet shoes onto the welcome mat and proceeded straight to the fridge, pulling out the first drink you saw—an orange cream soda. Officially toasting to your first apartment with some fancy alcohol would come later, when you weren’t damp and hungry and ready to chew someone’s head off like a dog with a meaty bone.

Joshua then pushed open the door, carrying what you assumed was the last box. He walked over to the living area, pausing for a brief moment as he decided where amongst the brown sea of cardboard it should be placed. You watched him balance it atop another big box.

“Please tell me there’s no more,” you pouted, leaning all your weight against the island countertop, “I’m about to disassemble.”

“Disassemble?” Joshua laughed, toeing off his shoes beside yours on the mat, “are you a Polly Pocket or something?”

“Yes, I am. You’re in a relationship with a piece of plastic.”

“Hm, I can’t believe I’m just figuring this out now.”

He opened the fridge, peering around inside. There wasn’t much to look at apart from some bagged vegetables, cheese, a single carton of coffee creamer, and the orange soda cans. You had opted for takeout tonight, but Joshua insisted that he should cook something special—a little market area was just down the street, anyway. He ended up grabbing a soda can, cracking it open over the sink with a satisfying hiss.

“Well, we live here now,” Joshua said, rubbing his hand down the back of your jacket, “was it a pain in the ass? Yeah. But we have a home.”

You straightened out, peeling yourself off the counter. The terrace was most definitely going to be your favourite part come summertime. Joshua liked the floor-length windows for the sunlight.

“Do you think you can buy garlic bread? Or—no—focaccia? The rosemary kind like we had at that restaurant in the fall? Don’t you remember how good that was? We couldn’t even eat our dinner.”

Joshua grinned, his hand lingering at your lower back as he brought the soda can to his lips, “I remember that place. I’m pretty sure I could make the focaccia too. Probably not too hard… anything else?”

After taking a sip from your own drink, you raised a brow.

“What do you mean?”

“Is there anything else you want for dinner?”

You smiled at him, leaning back against his chest.

“I’ll have to think about it.”

Suddenly, Jennie had poked her head through the door, waving you over with a hand. You exchanged a quick kiss with Joshua and approached her, to which you were abruptly dragged outside into the corridor, yelping. Jennie reached into her pocket for a moment.

“What’s this all about?” You grumbled.

The girl then shoved a tiny pink and white box into your chest.

“Oh my god—Jennie, I’ve told you! I’m not pregnant!”

“Like you actually know!” She rebutted, folding her arms and moving her soaked feet about nervously. “From what you’ve been telling me, it seems at least likely. You need to try it. And tell me!”

Taking a few seconds to glance over the box, you could only upend a gigantic sigh. Sure, you had told Jennie that your period was running late (but that wasn’t particularly rare for you), and you also complained about urinating more than usual. Besides, you and Joshua were fairly careful. You couldn’t remember a time when you hadn’t swallowed a plan b pill the following morning. Massaging at your sore temple, you decided to just capitulate and shove the box in your pocket.

“I can’t believe you’re making me do this.”

“All you gotta do is pee on a stick, babe.”

“I know what I have to do—” you gesticulated with a wildly flailing hand, puffing out an exhale, “I just think these changes or irregularities or whatever you want to call them are a coincidence.”

“Blah, blah, blah. Just take the test.”

“Obviously, I will.”

“Thank you,” Jennie said, patting your shoulder, “I just don’t want this to sneak up on you—in case it’s true! Note I said in case!”

“Yes, I did note that,” a smile managed to plant on your exhausted face, “I’ll try it, okay? Are you staying for dinner?”

“Nah,” the girl waved her hand dismissively, “I’ll let you two enjoy the first night here, alone. But I will be returning, and I will be expecting Joshua to cook me an entire meal like he’s doing for you.”

“Aw, Hansol still hasn’t found his way around a grill, huh?” You giggled, recalling the last time you visited them for supper and the boy had somehow charred everyone’s burgers into measly black pucks.

“His mind wanders,” Jennie sighed hopefully, “he’ll get there.”

“I believe that too.” You agreed while taking a step forward, wrapping your best friend and her crinkly raincoat into a hug. She returned the embrace. Both of you were practically leaning on the other for stability, clearly beaten from those heavy, clunky boxes and the number of steps you’d taken since lunch. You stayed like that for a minute, until there was a mutual choice to lug your weight off each other.

“Sleep in tomorrow!” Jennie sang as she continued waving goodbye from down the corridor. “Get him to make you breakfast, too!”

“Obviously!” You called back, smiling and admittedly a bit teary.

When you returned inside the apartment, Joshua had already pulled out some things from the boxes. All the paintings were leaned up against the wall while a few of the kitchen appliances had been organized onto the counter. Looking outside, you saw it was starting to brighten up between the clouds, the still drops on the windows glistering.

Joshua then collapsed onto the couch he’d cleared off.

“So, what was that all for? Gossiping about me?”

You huffed innocuously and plopped down beside him.

“Imagine a world where we have nothing better to do than gossip about you? Can you imagine it? No? Me either, sweetie.”

He pulled your hand away from shaking his jaw.

“You’re annoying—what was it?”

Digging a hand into your pocket, you touched the edge of the pregnancy test, though you hesitated before revealing it. The more you thought into the possibility, the more your heart started pounding with the idea that it could be true—maybe you really were pregnant. No, you had to swat the anxiously bubbling feelings away. Cross the bridge when you get there. Heaving a big breath, you flicked the test onto his lap.

Joshua merely stared at it, until he picked up the box and began reading the label. His mouth fell open in a stutter, but then it closed and he quirked an eyebrow at you because his words just weren’t conjuring.

“Um, yeah. Jennie thinks I might be pregnant. So… that’s something fun I can try tonight. Dinner and a pregnancy test.”

“Are you actua—I mean, d-do you think you are?”

Pressing your head back into the couch, your eyes drifted along the ceiling in search of some concrete answer that just wasn’t there.

“I… don’t know…” you finally said, looking to your boyfriend who was glancing at the test again, “I told you about my period being late, but that’s happened before. And I’m having to pee a lot more than usual—I get headaches now and then. I just—maybe I am!” You slid further down the couch, biting your lip. “How would you feel if it was positive?”

“How would I feel?” He echoed, leaning forward to set the test on the coffee table, his hands clasping and rubbing together. “Obviously I’d be fucking ecstatic, sweetheart. But, I mean, this is your body, and—”

“Really?” That caught you by surprise.

You sat up and pulled your knees to your chest, angling your body to face him properly. “This is something you want? Like, I know we’ve glossed the topic before and we both agree that, yes, this is in our future. But… you’re okay if it… happens now?”

Joshua scooted closer to you, fitting his palm perfectly against your cheek. His gaze poured so intimately into yours, and it felt like an invisible thread was connecting your stream of thoughts and emotions.

“If it happens now then I’ll be even more excited,” his dampened hair brushed your forehead as you softly pushed your lips together, fingers skimming through his hair, “we’ll start with dinner, and we’ll see what happens afterward, okay?”

He kissed you again, pulling your body closer and firmer into his chest. “I love you.”

You nodded appreciatively, whispering, “I love you, too.”

Of course, you had no idea what was going to happen with the pregnancy test, and even if you could somehow see into the future, what was the point of spoiling things for yourself? What was the point of knowing the punches if you were better off getting hit, anyway? You just needed to be patient. You needed to take each second, minute, and half-hour at a time, because the universe always seemed to have a place for you, even when it felt like you were floating alone at the farthest perimeters of its arms. Joshua got up from the couch, grabbing his wallet off the coffee table and slipping back into his shoes. He was going to the market. At least the sun was starting to make its golden blips down onto the earth after all the rain, so he wouldn’t be walking underneath darkness.

Right, dinner first.

That was how this whole thing started, anyway.

✧✎ TAGLIST: @02psh / @ally-127 / @astersg4rden / @aunty-tiger-potato / @boowanie / @celestialpearls / @dokyeomblr / @gventaken / @hesbambi / @honglynights / @hyuckworld / @j4d / @joshuahongsfuturewife / @joshuas / @junhuilov3r / @kellyooo13 / @koishua / @lovelywoo / @quicksilverster / @rae-blogging / @sseastar-main / @ucantstopthefunk / @woozes / @wonwoonlight

Could not be tagged: @lovelacejun / @manamiyx / @notscoupy / @soonchanshua

✧✎ a/n: OKAY. I’M SO HAPPY THIS IS DONE. this fic wouldn’t have taken me so long if 2021/2022 hadn’t been as busy as they were!! again, i just want to fork out a massive apology for my inactivity! i hate producing so little writing but knowing ME and my undying urge to write questionably long fics, i somehow created a very counterproductive system LOL.

anywho, i honestly loved every opportunity i had to work on this fic since it follows the reader as they grow up, and, coincidentally, i also grew a lot during the literal fucking year it took me to finish this. there are so many new scenes compared to the og version and i personally adored writing the side-arc between reader & jennie:_) and i tried to add some humourous stuff too since it got a little angsty at times!! i hope anyone who finishes this fic develops even the slightest bit of joy that i felt while writing it. THX SO MUCH! LUV U.

#joshua scenarios #seventeen scenarios #joshua fanfic #svt fanfic #seventeen smut #seventeen fluff #joshua smut #joshua fluff #seventeen angst #joshua angst #joshua hong #seventeen x reader #joshua x reader

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frailstateofhealy · 23 days

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babe, you look so cool - matty x reader

a/n: hi, this is my first fic!! i've never really written something and put it out into the world so i hope you guys enjoy! so sorry if this is hard to follow but hopefully my writing improves! i'm going to label this as 18+ just because it's angsty and has mature themes! also let me know if you want a part 2! xx

warnings: angst, cursing, depiction of anger issues, toxic love and brief mention of blood

summary: you're in a toxic relationship with the lead singer of an up-and-coming band in your small town. he's damaged and so are you but two negatives make a positive right?

word count: 2.4k !!

wilmslow. a small town in england where your family had decided to relocate to a few weeks ago from london to get away from the chaos of the city.

you were eighteen years old and this would be your final year of school. you were nervous about moving to a town where you wouldn't know anyone until you met a guy called adam who was nice enough to invite you into his friend group and introduce you to them.

you would never fit in with the popular girls because you weren't a cute preppy blonde that everyone liked. you had brown curly hair and your favourite colour wasn't pink like the other girls. it was black and that was the colour you wore every day.

one day during lunch adam invited you to the table where he sat with his friends every single day. as you approached the table you saw a tall guy with blonde hair and another with short brown hair who seemed a bit shy. then finally, you saw the one who was laughing obnoxiously at something the taller blonde one had said to him. the obnoxious guy's smile faded from when he saw you standing there in front of him like he was almost in a trance at the sight of you.

adam stood up from his seat and walked over to you. "hey boys, this is y/n. she's new here and i wanted to welcome her into our group." you smiled and looked at each one of the three boys sitting in front of you but your eyes traveled back to the loud one. he was so visually appealing to you and there was something enticing about him.

adam started "this is george, he's massive. this is ro-" adam was abruptly cut off when the obnoxious one stood up in front of you. "fuck off ross! i'm matty." he said with a smile while letting his eyes linger on you for a few moments before he forced himself to look away.

you looked at matty, he was beautiful. people would often argue that men couldn't be beautiful which you always believed to be true until you met matty.

george's deep raspy voice knocked you out of your trance "shit, matty just fell in love at first sight." george joked that day but he was right and he usually was right when it came to things like that. george and matty seemed to be the closest of the four, they told each other everything. they hardly ever had secrets between them and george knew exactly when his best friend fancied someone, especially from the way matty looked at you. he looked at you as if you were the most beautiful piece of art hanging in a museum, one that he couldn't take his eyes off of.

you began to ask adam some questions about his friend matty during the class you two had together. you knew you had to get to know him and you wouldn't rest until you did. something about him really intrigued you.

matthew healy. nineteen years old. he had spent one extra year in school because he got held back from not paying attention in class or skipping. when he was asked why he didn't show up to class he told the teachers that school "got in the way of his visionary genius" he had long curly brown hair that just barely touched his neck. he sometimes wore his hair up in a bun which matty preferred you called a "man bun." his normal attire was black, ripped skinny jeans, and any shirt he could find in his closet. adam really didn't go into much detail but apparently matty had a rough home life. his parents were always working and had to babysit his little brother often. matty had beautiful brown eyes, the kind you could easily get lost in without even trying. he was shorter than adam, ross, and george and they often teased him about this which he got quite defensive over. all four of them were in a band they called themselves 'big sleep' because matty chose the name after something he enjoyed doing.

they invited you to their band practices in matty's basement every time they had one because they could use constructive criticism which is what adam said. but, you knew it was just because matty wanted to look at you. george played the drums, and ross and adam both played guitar. matty was the lead singer which wasn't surprising for his flamboyant and loud personality. you knew they would be famous one day especially matty. he was the perfect frontman for a rock band, you could just tell.

you and matty had a thing. you wouldn't know what to call it although labels weren't always important. you two would catch each other staring a little more than it should be between two friends. the other guys always knew there was something more between you and matty but they didn't seem to mind. they just seemed to be happy that matty was excited about and that you motivated him to keep showing up to school. ross told you he hadn't seen matty this happy in awhile.

you sat there with your legs crossed and watched the guys in front of you tuning their instruments and getting ready for today's band rehearsal. they were in the initial stages of their band so up to this point they only really sang covers of their favourite alternative songs, most of which matty chose.

"so, we wrote this song the other night when you had that thing come up with your dad." matty spoke into the microphone and he seemed quite nervous by way his voice was shaky. the mere mention of your father felt like a punch in the stomach.

matty looked over nervously to his left where adam stood with the guitar pick in his hand. adam gave him a slight nod to calm matty's nerves a bit as if saying it was okay. matty put his head down for a moment "let's do this boys." your eyes traveled to adam as he played the first few chords of their first original song. it was a slower song, it started with just four simple chords and it remained pretty consistent throughout the song. matty started to sing effortlessly while staring at you.

"she had a face straight out of a magazine"

you looked at adam, ross, and george who all seemed to get lost in the music surrounding them. you nodded your head to the beat of the music while also paying close attention to the lyrics that matty sang. you were impressed, you knew they were good but not to this degree. you could tell by the covers that they would sing that they had something special but this just further proved it to be true. the music started to build as the guys started playing faster and with more passion. you loved seeing all four of them get lost in the music that they played. you noticed that adam gave matty another nod as if telling him to do something.

"but if you just take off your mask, you'd find out everything's gone wrong"

matty sang out as he started walking towards you. he grabbed your hand and pulled you hard off the piece of furniture you were sitting on.

"what are you doing?" you asked but you didn't get an answer, well at least not the one you thought you'd get. matty took a break from singing with the pause of the instruments behind him.

"i fucking love you." he muttered as he grabbed you roughly by the back of the neck and pulled you closer to him before you even had a chance to respond. before you knew it, matty crashed his lips against yours in what was a passionate kiss. you felt chills run through your body as he let his lips linger on yours for a few moments before pulling away. when he pulled away from the kiss he reached his hand out for yours as if he didn't want to pull away but he knew he had to. you glanced up at saw george and ross smirking at each other.

they finished the rest of the song and you just stood there dumbfounded. you had no idea what just happened, you weren't upset but you were just surprised. matty nervously looked at the guys and george gave him a reassuring pat on the shoulder when all the guys stepped away from their instruments and went into the other room to give you two privacy.

matty finally approached you once again and you immediately spoke "the song was absolutely amazing but why did you kiss me?" matty stared into your eyes as he started to softly twirl the hair that was hanging in his face. you knew him enough to know that he only twisted his curls when he was nervous about something.

"fucking hell!" he finally said as he started pacing in front of you. "matty, what's wrong?" you asked in a concerned voice. you could tell by his body language that something was bothering him.

"i can't stop looking at you. i can't stop thinking about you and it's bloody frustrating. i'm not supposed to be in love with you but i can't help it." he walks back and forth in front of you at a faster pace as his voice grows louder.

"i can't even fucking go to sleep without thinking about how i feel about you. even when i do sleep, you show up in my dreams. it's just-" he pauses for a moment while you just stand there staring at him.

"it's fucking impossible. i need to be your boyfriend. i'll fucking do anything." he trails off while noticing that you're just standing there looking at him. he probably thought you were judging him but you just didn't want to interrupt him.

"shit! are you even listening to me right now?"

you could tell that he was starting to get pissed off. you knew it wasn't with you but it seemed he was very frustrated with himself. he got closer to you, so much so that you could feel his warm breath on your face.

"i need you to be mine. i need you to be my girlfriend and i need you to fucking fall in love with me or something. fuck!" at this point he was raising his voice in frustration. he bit his lip and walked over to the wall and punched his fist right through it. he fell to his knees on the ground, not from the pain of punching the wall but from the pain he was feeling in his chest. at this point, his breathing was fast and he had his head in his hands while he kneeled there on the ground.

without hesitation, you rushed over to him and got onto your knees. you instantly took his now bloody hand into your hands.

"look at me matty, breathe, okay?" you said in a calm tone while staring into his brown eyes which seemed to be darker than usual at this moment.

"i just, i can't..." he paused to gasp for air.

"i can't get you off my mind is all." he said with tears forming in his eyes. he wasn't upset from sadness though. you knew it was from the overwhelming feeling of passion he was experiencing at this moment. when matty had his mind set on something, it was nearly impossible to change his mind or get him to think of something else.

"matty, what makes you think i don't want the same thing? what makes you think i'm not in love with you because i am." you saw his face turn from a pained expression into an almost bright one. his breathing instantly slowed down now that you spoke. "really?" he asked. you looked down as you noticed a bruise starting to form as well as blood trickling it's way down his hand.

you started to cry, you couldn't bear the sight of him in pain. he cupped your face with his hurt hand, letting out a hitched breath while wincing in pain. he extended his fingers to wipe the mascara filled tears that fell down your cheeks.

"i love you so fucking much, darling." he said almost as he felt relief despite all the pain he must have been in. he wasn't in much pain though, at least not right now when he was looking into the eyes of the girl he loved.

he pressed his lips against yours. only this time it was a gentle kiss that sent shivers through your body. you had dreamt of this moment since you first laid your eyes on him when adam introduced you to him.

you felt helpless right now, you knew he wouldn't have punched the wall if you just spoke up when he was talking. what if him being in pain right now was your fault?

"george!!" you yelled out which was the first name that came to your mind besides Matty's. he was only in the other room so he came rushing in based solely on of the distress in your voice.

"what hap-" he stopped when he saw his friend on the floor next to you. george immediately crouched down onto the floor next to the both of you.

"shit, not again mate." george said he helped his best friend by grabbing a nearby towel and wrapping it around his injured hand.

"he told me he was in love with me but he got frustrated and then that happened." you gestured towards the hole in the wall.

"he does this a lot. he'll be okay." george reassured while grabbing the ice from ross that he had brought in as if each of them already knew what to do.

"what did you say?" george asked as if matty wasn't sitting there right in front of him.

matty looked up at george with a genuine smile. matty didn't smile much unless he was telling a lame joke and even then it faded pretty fast. this one though was already lasting longer than any joke that he thought was hilarious.

"she said you she feels the same mate! she actually feels the same. can you fucking believe that?" matty spoke with a smile.

"i fucking told you you she would. hurt your hand for nothing you wanker!" george teased as he playfully ran his hand through matty's messy brunette curls.

"i got the girl." the curly-haired rocker said with a growing smile.

george smirked and kneeled off of the ground. "yeah, let's see if you can keep this one."

you looked at them both with a raised eyebrow and repeated what george said in your head.

this one? what the fuck does that mean?

#matty healy fanfic #matty healy x reader #matty x you #matty healy angst #matty healy fanfiction #matty healy #matty

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