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greatooglymooglyyy · 15 days

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It's Never Over (C. S.)

contains: 2nd person pov, angst, somewhat toxic relationship, verbal argument, relationship issues, kissing, smut (softdom!chris), overstimulation, angry/make up sex, unprotected sex, 3.4k words

a/n: hi friends. this is apart of the triple threat event sooo don't forget to go see my babies @luv4kozume and @rootbeerworshiper for two more fics for your smutty needs. j will be posting in one hour and sienna is an hour after that.

masterlist

Maybe we’re too young.

The thought bounces around your head uncontrollably as you watch Chris move silently through the kitchen from your perch on the counter. You haven’t been home long- maybe 10 minutes- but after the day you’ve had, the silence feels like a jab.

“So,” you start, raising your eyebrow as he pulls out a drink and leans against the counter across from you. “How do you think the pictures will turn out?”

He gives you a tired look, seemingly trying to gauge whether your question is a trap. “I actually really fucked with it. It’s a new look for us.”

You two had spent the entire day on the set of a photo and promo shoot for Fresh Love’s new line of products. He was right about it being a new look and he’d gone all out for the launch; the shoot had been completely 90s-themed to match the vibe of the products and he’d recruited some influencers to model.

Not that you were keeping track or anything, but the original idea had been yours and you’d put countless hours in helping him execute it. That isn’t to say you minded at all... at least not until today.

“I’m glad it’s exactly how you envisioned it.” You say, testing the waters unsure if you wanted to raise the issue again.

But Chris takes the bait and groans. “Don’t start.”

“I didn’t even say anything, Chris. But I just don’t understand why my input stops being taken seriously as soon as other people are around.”

“Did you ever stop and consider that maybe my photoshoot wasn’t the place for you to start a random ass argument?”

“I wasn’t trying to start one. And my bad, I didn’t realize you stopped being my boyfriend when you walked on a set.” Your eyes narrow as you stare him down, irritation at the situation resurfacing.

He sighs heavily, running a hand over his face. “I don’t but it’d be cool if my girlfriend supported me on days like this instead of adding more stress.”

Your eyes grow wide and you look around dramatically. “I’m sorry? Is that not all I do? Planning with you. Pitching ideas. Running around finding any little thing I can do to help? You wouldn’t even have the new product ideas without me.”

He throws his hands up in surrender, pushing off the counter and stepping closer. “And I’m grateful, baby. You know I am. I’m not saying you’re not important to me. I’m saying it can’t always be about you.”

“Can it sometimes be about me?” You question, feeling like you’re losing your mind. “I would never have an entire photoshoot full of influencers and not even ask you to join. Do you know how embarrassing that was?”

“Oh my-” He laughs out harshly, turning away for a second and then turning back. “I knew that’s what this was about. The team wanted people with over a million, not me-”

“And who owns Fresh Love, Chris? Don’t act like you have no control.”

“I own it, but it’s not just me who runs it. How stupid would I be if I hired a marketing team and didn't fucking listen to them?” His voice raises slightly and he shakes his head, attempting to regain composure.

“Probably as stupid as I looked pulling up to the set and looking for hair and makeup. You should have told me.” With that you slide off of the counter, intending to let the argument die there and go to bed but he follows behind you.

“How are you mad at me because you assumed you were modeling? I never said that. I invited you to the set like I do every time because You. Are. My. Girlfriend.” He claps to emphasize his points and you spin to glare at him.

“I’m not just your girlfriend, Chris. I work hard on my content just like you.” You say defensively. The decision to even begin posting was his idea so you can’t believe how unsupported you feel.

“And I'm so proud of you. You know I am.” He says with sincerity, bringing a hand to his chest. “But you aren’t..." His sentence trails off and he gives you an uncomfortable look.

“What?” You challenge, knowing exactly where this is going. “Say it. Tell me how little I matter since I haven’t hit the right numbers yet.”

He rolls his eyes and looks up at the ceiling. “It’s business. And they asked for people with reach. What did you want me to do?”

“Fight for me, Chris. That’s what I expected you to do.” You turn and head over to your dresser, snatching out your favorite oversized t-shirt and changing quickly.

Chris leans against the door frame with his arms crossed, watching you intensely until you finally face him with a scowl. “Stop following me.”

“I just can’t believe this is how you want to end this night. Why can’t you celebrate this win with me?” He asks, annoyance coating his tone.

“Go celebrate with Brooke. You two looked comfy today.” You suggest as you pass him to head into the bathroom.

Behind you, he barks out a laugh of disbelief before whispering something under his breath. You don’t even bother asking him to speak up, grabbing your makeup remover instead.

“So what’s that supposed to mean, huh? You're gonna start throwing accusations at me now?” He sounds absolutely over the conversation but won’t walk away to cool off. It’s a flaw you have in common.

“Just saying Addison has twice the followers as her but somehow you put her centerstage. I mean, I thought this was a numbers game.” You say, refusing to look over at him as you lather your face wash.

If you’re being completely honest, it’s not like you actually believe Chris would ever cheat on you. One thing Chris has always been is loyal to a fault. But right now you're itching for a reaction. No matter how you have to get it.

“You have to be fucking kidding.” He says, reacting exactly like you expected him to. “When the fuck would I be cheating on you?”

“How am I supposed to know? People make time for what’s important to them.” You say, letting your voice take on a nonchalant tone as you pat your face dry.

“That’s so fucking stupid and you know it. Look, I’m sorry you’re not where you want to be in your career but don’t take it out on me.” He grinds out, his voice thick with distaste.

You spin to face him, your eyebrows high. There it is. At least he finally said it. “Wow, Chris. Tell me how you really feel.”

“Y/N.” He says, rubbing his eyes roughly. “You know I didn’t mean it like that.”

“Do you think I could buy a shoutout, Mr. Six Mill? Only if you have time, of course.” You drawl, pressing your hands together into a begging gesture.

“Tell me what you want to hear, baby. Tell me what I need to say to end this conversation.” He says, stepping toward you but you take a step back instead, leaning against the sink.

“How about an apology? How about recognizing that I worked hard on this launch too and deserved to be a part of it? Anything except this condescending bullshit.”

He drops to his knees dramatically, looking up at you with a faux pleading look on his face. “I’m so sorry, ma’am. Please forgive me.”

You shake your head and curl your lip up in disgust. “Yeah. ‘Cause everything’s a joke, right?”

Chris blows out a huff of irritation and stands up, reaching out to wrap his arms around you and spinning you around to face the mirror. He presses himself into your back and meets your eye in the reflection as he runs his hands up and down your body. “Aren’t you tired of arguing yet?”

Your gaze drops to his hands, watching as he slowly and methodically slides up your oversized t-shirt and rubs teasingly at your inner thighs.

"You know I love you." He whispers, his grip tightening as he trails higher, grazing your heat before dipping his hands back down.

“Do you?” You question childishly, heat flooding your body as his hands travel your skin. He leans in close, the cool breath of his words sending a shiver down your spine. “Let me prove how much.”

Part of you wants to snatch away from him and refuse to reward his arrogance. But there is something so erotic about the way his eyes stay locked on yours as he moves in closer to where you need him most. Without your permission your body melts into his, the muscle memory from every other time he’s made you feel this way activating naturally.

You turn your head to look at him full-on instead of the reflection, the slight flush on his face from the arguing turning you on even more. “Nah. Prove how much you need me.”

If Chris is at all surprised by your demand, he doesn’t show it. He just walks you closer to the sink and spins you around by the waist to face him. His blue eyes are so coated with lust and frustration they seem almost brown under the harsh bathroom lighting.

He lifts you onto the counter, pausing only for the barest of seconds before crashing his lips against yours. The sudden movement pushes the back of your head into the mirror but you barely feel it over the heat and pressure of his kiss.

His hand travels under your shirt, his fingertips grazing your nipple with a frustratingly delicate touch that has you groaning into his mouth. You pull away, drawing a shudder out of him when you lightly nip his bottom lip as you do.

“Stop wasting my time.” You demand, your hands fiddling with the bottom of his shirt in a hint for him to take it off.

He does with a roll of his eyes before he comes back, placing a firm hand on the back of your neck and bringing you closer. “You can drop the attitude now. You know you want this just as much as I do.”

Pain flashes through you again briefly as you consider the possibility that this is the only thing you two will ever agree on wanting but you push it down and lean in to run a tongue over his collarbone. “Shut up and prove it like you said you would.”

A smirk grows across his face before he nods and kneels down slowly, pushing open your legs and roughly snatching off your thin underwear. Pushing your legs open wider, he buries his face in your inner thighs and peppers lingering kisses on them as he trails closer to your heat.

When he finally reaches it, it’s clear he’s not done taking his time as he runs his tongue through your folds purposefully avoiding where you want him most. You push at his shoulders in annoyance and he chuckles darkly, only making your wetness grow despite yourself.

The first kiss he places on your clit is slow and shallow before he leans back to find your eyes. “I always forget how fucking pretty you are.” He says as he smooths a thumb over you before diving back in with a new urgency.

There’s reverence in the way his tongue circles your clit, the movements somehow both precise and desperate. Before you even realize what you’re doing, you find yourself grinding your hips up to chase your pleasure, pathetic whimpers falling from your lips.

You don’t need to glance down to feel his eyes on you, baby blue and laser-focused as he peers up to gauge your reaction, alternating expertly between sucking and flicking his tongue. But instead of giving him the reaction he wants, you press your fist into your mouth and work to keep your face a mask. You’re determined to grant him as little praise as possible, leftover anger spurring on your pettiness.

Smiling against your core at the challenge, he readjusts his hold on you, slinging one of your legs lazily onto his shoulder before locking his arms around your thighs to keep you still. He pulls fully away and you finally snap your eyes to his, a protest on the tip of your tongue.

“I can do this all night and still make sure you never come. Stop playing with me.” His voice is like velvet as he warns you, not even pausing for your response before he buries himself back in. He taps your leg, signaling for you to hold it before he readjusts to add his fingers, swirling them around teasingly before pumping them inside to stretch you out.

All of your pride flies out the window as he fucks into you with his fingers, finding your g spot easily and caressing it. Flinging your head from side to side and calling his name wildly, you feel a familiar pressure building inside of you. “Please, Chris.” You beg as you tangle your hands into his hair.

His pace only increases when he realizes you are close, his moans against your clit sending vibrations through your body and driving you even crazier. You tug his hair lightly as your body tightens and grind your hips against his fingers to ride out your orgasm.

Chris pauses and removes his fingers slowly before placing one last kiss on your throbbing heat. He comes up with his breathing unsteady and a look of pure triumph on his face as he sucks his fingers into his mouth.

Your legs are still trembling slightly as you slide off of the counter and pull his face down to yours. This kiss feels different, like coming home, and you can tell he feels the same. He kisses you back like he loves you like the taste of you is air and he’s suffocating.

It’s been a while since you two were desperate enough to leave marks on each other’s skin but he does tonight. And you let him without a single thought to the effort of covering them up, too focused on his tongue working over the sweet spots of your neck.

You reach down fumbling with his belt impatiently as your breathing goes ragged, and free his hardened length, stroking it slowly.

His lips freeze on your throat as he thrusts into your hand before he yanks away and spins you back around, pressing his palm into your back and kicking your feet apart to give him access.

You feel his tip nudge against your entrance, slipping down further to tease your clit briefly, your only warning before he slides inside of you. A cry tears out of you as he rolls his hips into yours, bottoming out.

You’re still soaked from your orgasm but as he stretches you out around him, you feel yourself coat him even more and he groans. “My pretty girl. Best fucking feeling in the world.” He pushes your shirt further up your back, his fingertips trailing your spine lightly as he continues to thrust into you.

Squirming with a need for him to go faster, you push your hips up to meet his, forcing him deeper and making you both curse. He takes the hint, wrapping his hand tightly around your shirt for leverage before setting a brutal rough pace.

Your vision starts to blur so you close them as you try to hold on to the counter for stability. With your eyes squeezed tightly closed, it’s almost easy to pretend the tears swelling up are from the intensity of the moment and not from everything that came before.

Because it’s nothing if not intense, your stomach pressing into the sink as he slams inside of you roughly. His free hand grips the counter so hard his knuckles turn white and he keeps up his insane pace. His name slips from your mouth as a moan, seeming to spur him on as he increases his tempo even more.

“That’s right, baby. What’s my name?” The sound of his voice barely breaks through your fucked out trance and you lift your head to see him through the mirror.

The sight of him almost pushes you right over the edge immediately and you watch him in a sort of fascination. The way his muscles strain with his movement, his slightly open mouth before he bites down on his bottom lip. But it’s the wink he throws you when he notices you watching that has you contracting around him for the second time tonight.

This orgasm tears through you like a wave and you lose all control as Chris fucks you through it, never missing a stroke. If you had it in you to be embarrassed right now, you would be mortified at the things you say at this moment. Making promises, calling him names you never thought you’d utter, telling him exactly who you belong to.

When you come down, Chris’ pace slows and he pulls you up to face him. He watches you tenderly before he lifts the shirt from over your head and kisses you deeply.

He leads you to your bedroom and lays you down at the center of the bed, climbing on top of you slowly.

He enters you again with a gasp and you bring your mouth up to his to swallow it, his hand traveling up to lightly circle your neck. You moan in contentment and he makes a sound of approval from the back of his throat as he begins to thrust.

His strokes are slow and as deep as he can make them, his hands roaming your body as his tongue explores your mouth. There’s emotion laced in every snap of his hip and you know him well enough to understand every message. I love you. I didn’t mean it. I’m sorry.

Pleasure coils around you as his thumb finds your clit and circles it, coaxing you closer to the finish line as he drops his head near your ear. His hips stuttering tell you he’s close and you bring your mouth up to his ear to whisper. “Come for me.”

He groans loudly in response, fighting not to lose control yet. “You first.”

“I already did!”

“I don’t care. Give me one more.”

At his words, he pulls himself up and angles himself deeper, finding your g spot and plowing into it mercilessly. You drag your nails down his back, yours arching up off the bed. “Chris, I can’t.”

He shushes you softly, his lips claiming yours again as he continues to push into you. Ultimately it’s his muffled moan of “fuck” against your mouth that sends you over the edge, your face screwed up from an erotic mix of ecstasy and exhaustion.

You know you can’t take much more but Chris follows right behind you, dropping his head on your shoulder and moaning your name into it.

You lay there breathing heavily, skin to skin, for a while before you tap his back and he slides out of you. Awkwardness settles between you, so thick you’re not sure what to do with it so you stand wordlessly and head for a shower.

Your thoughts race as you scrub the remnants of him off your skin. The words you threw back and forth play on repeat in your brain as you wonder how to fix what’s between you before it’s too late.

The bathroom door opens and you watch through the streamy glass as Chris settles on the counter. The same counter he had you bent over not long ago.

You step out of the shower and grab your robe, all the while avoiding his eye contact. This is the part you hate the most. The part that never ends. Because neither of you knows how to force it to end.

He clears his throat, gesturing for you to come to him when you finally meet his eyes. Once you are standing between his legs, he pushes your wet hair out of your face gently as he studies your face. “You know how much you mean to me, don’t you?”

The nod you give is reluctant and slow. It’s never been a question of if Chris loves you. Just a question of whether he appreciates you.

But he continues this time, his eyes holding a fierce sort of intensity. “I’d give this all up for us if I had to. My whole platform if it means I can wake up next to you.”

Your breath hitches at this and you feel the tears threatening to fall so you bury your face in his shoulder, letting him pull your body into his.

And you hope. Hope that his words are more than just words. Hope that you’re not too young to keep each other from slipping between your fingers.

A/N: thanks so much for reading my loves. don't forget to head over to my girl @luv4kozume's page in exactly one hour for her new matt smut. 🗣️

🏷️/ @sttzee @tillies33ssss @miloisdone1 @sstvrnioloo @junnniiieee07 @sturnioloslurps @mrsmiagreer @asturniolos @teapartyprincess4two @whicked-hazlatwhore @sukiipjs @fratbrochrisgf @sturniolosmind @imfromthediningtable @st4rswrld @thvvluvr @sturnssmuts @littlenerdybee @sturniolossss @iloveneilperry @eclipzw @chrissloverrrrrrr16 @sstvrnioloo @clemlament @maryx2xx @fwskullz

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rise-my-angel · 2 years

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Confused Warmth

Pairing: Joel Miller x Female Reader

Length: 12.3k

Warnings: angst/hurt comfort with happy ending, smut, p in v, oral (f receiving), romantically inexperienced reader, mutual pining

Note: it took me a few days to summom the courage to post this here, but i really hope you enjoy it! Prequel to Distracted Mistakes and Past Retribution

Softness and warmth surrounded you, and yet your mind felt anything but calm and comfortable. The blanket draped over you should be enough to lull you into a comfortable sleep, but the warmth emanating from the body next to you is a constant reminder of what you’ve done. The quiet breathing along with every rise and fall of their chest yells at you for not just doing what they’re doing and fall asleep.

But you can’t. You replay in your mind what actions directly led you to right now, and even worse, how this will affect your relationship entirely. You never expected this in your life. Not in general, and especially not with the person sound asleep next to you. Afterall, you were told when you first arrived in Jackson that Joel Miller is a difficult man to know.

Though, really thinking about it, you were given pretty conflicting opinions on the man right up until tonight. Once you had met Joel, everyone felt the need to tell you how to deal with him or how to handle him. It was nothing but confusing for you, and not just because you had only met him.

Before arriving at Jackson, you were alone, and had been for a long time. You knew how to hide from danger, how to forage, and how to lay traps for hunting food. That was enough. You had to travel, nowhere for a long stretch of road was anything resembling civilization. You could find places to stay with no Clickers, but it was the depraved hostility of other survivors you didn’t want to stay and find. So you kept going.

Eventually, you heard rumours of Wyoming. A real community, good people paying their dues to make it all work. While you didn’t hold that flicker of hope in your heart, you planned a path regardless. It took a while, but you found it. An awkward and slightly scary initial confrontation with a few men aside, it was obvious you were alone and simply looking for a place to breathe. So they brought you in, and showed you around.

It was that first day, rain lightly misting in the evening air, that you met him. One of the men, learning earlier was named Tommy, led you into a building that you thought was originally some kind of restaurant, and introduced you to his wife Maria. It was there, talking to them about the time you spent alone and how you found this place, when he walked in.

The door flew open, sprays of rain droplets flying around the entrance followed by a broad man with an angry disposition barreled in, paying no mind how his loudness disrupted the quiet conversation taking place.

“Tommy, if this damn thing snaps one more time, I’m heading out to find a new one and I’m fixing it myself.” With a bang, he turns to drop what appeared to be some kind of metal piping onto the counter you sat at. The noise causing you to jump in your seat, hand letting go of the glass Maria had handed you, the bottom of it hitting the counter with a noticeable clank.

“Well maybe if you give the man more than 5 minutes to fix it, you wouldn't keep having this problem,” Tommy began giving what sounded somewhat like a lecture, only it was toned in an amused familiarity, like this was a regular kind of occurrence. But the newcomer's gaze wasn’t on him.

It was on you, a glare turned your way at your startled jump, later you’d learn it wasn’t really a glare. Joel’s resting face just looked like that naturally. Only a glare wasn’t enough to make you look away. In fact, you only just watched him back in return. Instinct told you to brace yourself for a fight, too used to the road with aggressive men looking to steal whatever you had that they didn’t. But he didn’t move, he just looked at you as Tommy said something about pipes behind you.

“That work for you, Joel?” Tommy’s affirming tone pulling his attention away from you. His face turning just slightly to look up at him, his eyes clearly going from whatever apprehension towards your presence fading back to the annoyance he held when walking in.

“Just tell him it’s his last chance.” The voice is harsh and gruff, but in a way that suggests he isn’t angry, he just has this angry demeanour. Joel’s arms slid over to the metal works he placed on the counter, with a brief moment of his gaze following suit to once again look at you. It almost looked like he had a question to ask, but his eyes narrowed back to it’s usual look as he draped the material over his arm. “It’s my house he’s fixing, not some cheap hotel that pays him no matter the shit job.”

And with that he hitches the thing in his arm higher and swings the door back open, his body fading into the mist of the rainfall until the door closes over the scene.

It was then, when you first heard your first warning about him. Tommy chuckled to himself, before moving from his place at the counter to walk past you, a hand playfully grasping your shoulder as he goes by. “I know I said we have a bunch of different kinds of people, but I was hoping you’d have a nicer introduction to them than my brother.”

Your eyebrows shoot up in question as you put it together. The similarly structured faces and both holding a clear southern accent that didn’t belong to the area matched each other but not the relatively calm presence Tommy gave you versus the fiery urgency his brother radiated.

Maria laughed lowly to herself, before getting up from her own seat and coming to stand next to you. “Joel can come off as an asshole at first, but he’s less grumpy and more caring when he gets to know you, don’t let it bother you.”

Tommy didn’t add anything about his brother, simply gestured for you to get up, and walked the two of you outside with him, going on about available places to live.

From that point on, it felt as if you saw Joel everywhere. Jackson wasn’t big, sure, but more than one person on many occasions said that you likely wouldn’t encounter him often. That he works hard, but doesn't often interact with people a lot outside of Tommy, Maria, and the young teenager who lives with him who seems to be his daughter of sorts.

Yet, you constantly saw Joel everywhere. At first anytime you ran into him, it was quiet but cordial. An answer to where a certain building is, pointing out that you were doing some small meaningless task wrong, he was gruff and intimidating but was never rude. Just pointing towards whatever you were doing with a, “You need to hold it this way, you’re just gonna hurt yourself doing it like that.” Sometimes just grabbing whatever you are holding and turning your hands to hold it properly, himself. It was always quite flustering, but by the time you would turn to look at him with a quiet ‘thank you’, Joel was always either back to minding his own business or has walked away totally.

One evening, you were outside of your home, a small rundown place tucked away from the other houses for peace and quiet. Tommy had warned you it was in rough shape, and pretty ugly, but that it never had many people around, which after years of travelling all alone, is what you were most comfortable with. You were busy working away at sawing slabs of wood into specific lengths, so focused on making sure the measurements were right, that you didn’t notice your approaching visitor.

“You planning on dragging all that around, yourself?” Looking up to see the source of the voice, Joel stood mere feet away, arms crossed over his chest as he looked down at your hunched form. The only response you gave was a raise of an eyebrow.

Joel nodded his head to indicate at yourself, “No offence but you’re not exactly in prime shape to carry around lumber.” While he was right, it was also embarrassing and you didn’t like that he just said it out loud.

You shrugged, looking back at the wood and eyes downcast to the side. Your plan was to just drag each piece to its destination and you’d figure it out from there. Without knowing what to say you merely muttered, “I’d manage.”

There was a moment of silence, but before you could determine if it was awkward or not Joel spoke again. “What’re you even doing?”

Looking up to him he seemed to be genuinely curious. Tommy was right, Joel’s face was always just a degree of grumpy no matter what it seemed. Standing up to face him properly, you gestured to your windows. “The back of my house faces the edge of town. Maybe I'm just paranoid, but I don’t like how easily the windows open from the outside.”

Joel still cross-armed, nodded, a thoughtful look in his face. “Life on the road does that to you. Makes you feel like you can’t trust anything too comfortable.” You knew from word of mouth that Joel hasn’t been here for that long. He and his daughter Ellie had only arrived less than a year before two men on patrol stumbled upon you.

You don’t know why you felt the need to say anything, you assumed he was just curious and would walk away again, but you still spoke. “I still don’t really know anyone here.”

Joel was just confused looking, but waited for you to finish your thought.

“I didn’t know if I should ask anyone for help, since, uh, no one really knows me. So I just decided I’d do it myself.” You turned back to start just moving things anyway. “Nice seeing you, Joel.”

You simply started to lift some of the larger slabs since you may as well get those over with first, when it suddenly lifted from your arms. Your hands hovered from where they held it, when you looked at Joel holding it up over his shoulder like the heavyweight meant nothing to him. “Gonna take you until midnight doing this alone.” As he began walking towards your backyard he just hollered, “Bring over those smaller ones, would you?”

He worked with you to nail the slabs around your loose windows all evening. You didn’t share much conversation that night, but you two worked together pretty seamlessly. By the time the job was done, it was finally getting dark.

Joel had one forearm resting against the wall, deep brown eyes looking at you, something clearly stirring around in his head behind them. You don’t know if intimidated is the right word for how you felt in that moment, but it’s the only one that came to mind. His large, broad frame standing over you, ever watchful of your moments, it made you squirm.

You hated that feeling. Years on the road, surviving and defending yourself, it wasn’t natural for you to feel flustered. Like his gaze made you warm, and you didn’t understand the feeling at all. So you gave yourself an out.

Picking up the tools left on the ground, you looked at Joel hoping it was a grateful expression not a hesitant one. “Thanks for the help, Joel. Least now I can hopefully sleep a little better.”

Joel’s mouth opened to respond but you were faster. “I should let you go, you’ve taken enough of your time helping me. I’ll let you head back home.”

His head tilted as he clearly was trying to process your quick dismissal. “Anytime, really. Just gotta ask, alright?”

You nodded, lips pursing slightly as you tried not to look at him. “Goodnight, Joel.”

Right before you went inside, Joel yelled out your name, just loud enough to get your attention. “Seriously. Just ask next time you need help, okay?”

Again, you nodded, not sure what to say. He didn’t leave the moment open for long, Joel simply said, “Alright. You know where I live.” Turned, and left the way he came. Leaving you standing at your front door, looking into the darkness of the evening. Wondering why you always feel so strange around this man.

The time in which he spends around you seems to increase with every encounter. It’s probably not enough time to consider the two of you friends, usually you either pull away busying yourself to escape this growing unknown feeling, or Joel is pulled away either by whatever job he had taken up, or usually, by Ellie.

You’ve actually spoken to the girl enough times to feel fond of her. She's smart, but boy does she have a quick mouth on her. She gives you more sass than you’ve ever seen from one person, and anytime you see her with Joel it’s a constant back and forth. Bickering as if they can’t stand each other, but it’s filled to the brim with playfulness and affection. You don’t know what they’ve been through, but it’s clear that whatever it is it’s left the two of them with an inseparable bond.

The group of people you’ve found yourself spending a consistent amount of time with have tried to mention it around you. Speculating on what the mouthy teenager and brooding father have been through before arriving in Jackson, but you never listen. It feels wrong.

You don’t know why they would care to talk about it in such a way. If they wanted to know just ask, but you didn’t want to know. Every single person here has a story, one that hurts them to remember and no one deserves to have it brought out into the open without their permission. The most you’ve ever heard before leaving the conversation was enough to learn that Ellie isn’t Joel’s biological daughter.

Though you don’t know why that’s even interesting. The two look nothing alike, not in skin tone or facial structure, but they clearly see each other as father and daughter, so you don’t care until the duo themselves feel the need to say otherwise.

You do, however, pay attention to when one of the group members mentions that Joel seems to hover around you. Your head turns from watching your finger tracing the lid of your glass to whip around to face her. Brows furrowed and eyes screaming confusion, they laugh and say, “What like you’ve never noticed? He is always suddenly around when you’re around and when he is he watches you like a hawk.”

That strange warm yet juggling feeling in your gut returns. You hate it. You don’t understand it. “He doesn’t.” It’s all you can say in your defence, before downing the remainder of your drink before getting up to pour yourself another.

This time another person in the group speaks up, “No he definitely does. I don’t see Joel hovering around anyone else, and he definitely talks to you just as much as he does Tommy or Ellie.” That makes your stomach lurch even more.

You don’t make a habit of watching Joel. Watching people’s movements comes naturally to you, being alone on the road, tracking people’s movements on a day to day basis becomes a necessity for survival, knowing how to avoid anything treading on too dangerous to handle alone. You have no reason to watch Joel, so you make a conscious effort not to, even though you don’t feel compelled to watch others like you do him. Not that you’d admit that.

“He’s just nice to me, is all.” You drink maybe half of your new glass, trying very hard not to chug it down.

“Sweetheart, Joel ain’t just nice like that to everyone.” You ignore the light laughter from the group. Your whole body feels warm and taut with tension, and you hate it. All you can do is roll your eyes and wait for the conversation to change topics.

Against your best effort, you start to take note. Joel in fact, pops up where or around where you are whenever constantly. He approaches you just to chat some of these days. It’s never super chatty like other people. Joel isn’t a big talker, and neither are you. But the silence between the words is comfortable all the same. Just standing, backs slightly leaned against the wall, both your arms crossed as you talk. Small laughs or smiles gracing your faces the longer the conversation.

You never associated the strange happenings in and around your place with him at all. But they bothered you.

It was Tommy who spilled the beans about what Joel’s been doing behind your back. You walked into the bar one afternoon, complaining that someone was messing around your house. He looked very surprised, and when you mention how things on your property seemed to be fixed by themselves, or firewood suddenly is precut for you on your outdoor pile, he has the audacity to laugh.

“Those ain’t bad things, you know that right?” You didn’t let it slide, though, wishing he was taking it more seriously.

“Tommy, someones on my property, touching my things, and I don’t like it. I get that this is a safe place, but I don’t feel safe when I come home and someone’s clearly been there without my permission. If I can’t feel safe here I may as well be back out there.” Your voice with each sentence raising in pitch and hysterics, Tommy realising that you didn’t like your privacy being invaded, and to you, your home itself was your privacy.

He says your name low but gently, grabbing your attention. “Listen, sweetheart,,” He sighs as he contemplates how to say what he needs to say. “My brother’s not the best at letting people know he cares. I mean hell, he's closest to me and Ellie and he’s had more arguments and fights with the both of us then anyone else combined.”

“I don’t,” you shook your head in denial, “I don’t get what you’re saying.”

Tommy leans in closer to you, his voice quiet, “He’s not good at saying he cares about you, he’s better at just doing things you need. He’s not going to just tell you what he’s doing, he just notices things you need fixing or more supplies of, and he just does it for you.”

That warm feeling has become the thing you dread the most. You’d rather be shoved into a room with Clickers than keep having this unknown feeling arise anytime Joel came up.

“I never brought those up though,” Tommy shakes his head, hand raised to interrupt you.

“You don’t need to, he pays attention to you.” Your head lowers, lost in thought, when he speaks again. “If it really makes you uncomfortable, I’ll tell him that. But he’d rather just do things to help you out, especially since he knows how little you try and rely on anyone else.”

Your fingers light start tapping against the wood of the bar, “I, I guess you’re right. Not like it’s bad things he’s doing.” You move to grab the bag that you had unceremoniously dropped when storming in, “You’re right, he’s just being nice, not a big deal.”

Tommy had more to say, but clearly you didn’t, you just looked him in the eye, “Please uh, don’t- don’t tell him I said anything. Don’t want him mad that I complained about it.”

Hands raised in the air, he swears, “Not a word.” as you leave the building.

The next day, Joel shows up at your door, walking in like he was previously invited and makes his way into your kitchen. “I’m sick of walking by here at night, and seeing every light working and then just candles lighting your kitchen.”

You genuinely can't tell if Tommy said anything to him, and Joel doesn't elaborate.

He does, though, fix your kitchen lights that day, just needing a quick job that you didn’t know how to do. After it’s done, he stays for a while afterwards when you offer him a drink. The two of you just in your kitchen talking until it gets late enough that you joke, “You know if you don’t get home before the street lights turn on Ellie’s gonna be worried.”

Instead of thanking you for the drink, Joel just asks you, “You wanna join us?” Him having to elaborate further at your widened eyes, “For dinner, it’s Ellie’s night to cook, and I know you ain’t got a huge stock of stuff here.”

Both of your hands now holding the glass, grip tightening on it matching the tightening feeling in your gut, you answer anyways. “I’d like that.”

Joel’s house is far nicer than yours, it feels lived in, full, no doubt a large part being Ellie’s young and more energetic influence at work there. You do spot a guitar as you make your way into the kitchen. It had been so long since you heard proper music, the old music player you carried with you for years had broken just a month before arriving at Jackson. You had missed it greatly. Was it his or Ellie’s, and why did a part of you so badly want to see Joel play it?

Your attention didn’t linger for long, Ellie acosts you as soon as you walk into the threshold of the kitchen. “Finally, I’ve been telling him to invite you forever.”

“Ellie,” Joel’s tone is final in the abruptness which is comes out, making Ellie look drastically between the two of you.

“What? It’s true, he never shuts up about you during dinner anywa-”

Joel turns away from you completely to point at the stovetop, “Ellie, watch the damn burner.” His back to you hiding his wide eyed unimpressed look, though it did little to hide it in his tone.

Turning back to you, his body tense in an uncomfortable awkwardness, his hands placed on his hips. “So uh,” his hesitation lingering in the air as he thinks, “Sit down, I’ll get you a drink.”

Things do settle, Joel complimenting Ellie for getting better at cooking, and her trying to play it off like it’s no big deal. It’s heartwarming watching the two of them together. Their banter compliments each other, but their closeness doesn’t disclude you. Joel throws things your way all the time, trying to get you to speak up.

It doesn’t come naturally to you, making casual conversation, but you get the sense that Joel knows that. It’s not like either of you are a chatterbox to anyone. It helps getting you through dinner, though. The night is cozy, you have a good time just being around them as they go about their evening.

It also though, leaves you feeling confused and somewhat stupid. This sensation you get around Joel was so strong the entire night, you at some points worried you were going to be sick. It torments you the next few days, unable to stop thinking about how much you liked being so close to him, spending time with him. And you don’t know why.

Honestly you are not used to sharing how you feel with people. You spent so much time watching how people sharing their feelings with each other ended up tearing the group apart, leaving you to go find a new group to travel with, until it became too much to bother with. There’s something foreign about this feeling though that makes you wonder if there’s something wrong.

It’s Maria who gets it out of you. On more than one occasion you find yourself sitting at the bar counter, picking at whatever you brought out for lunch, staring at it like it’s the cause of your problems. Maria approaches you, “You wanna tell me what’s bothering you so much, or do you want me to leave it for the sandwich?”

You’re not sure what it is about her, but she feels safe, like she’s not going to just use it against you. You dish it all out, how Joel makes you feel, the feeling in your stomach, how confused you feel about what people have said when it doesn’t make sense. By the end of explaining it all to her, it may be the most you’ve ever said in one go.

Maria has to take a moment to take it all in, to think about why you’re feeling so bad about this when it dawns on her. She says your name quite calmly, “Have you never had a crush before?”

No, no that’s what’s happening right? It couldn’t be, you didn’t even think of that. “I, no, never. Uh, it just, never, no one has ever,” You start stammering, eyes looking around as if worrying someone else would hear you. “I mean before all this happened, like, I was still pretty young, it just never happened beforehand and then afterwards everything was just about surviving that it didn’t matter anymore.”

Maria knew you were younger then Joel clearly, but you held yourself up in a quiet but put together way. You spent years out there alone, hardening your spirit, that it made her forget that you must have been younger then they were when the outbreak happened. She figured you may not have even been around anyone that would have given you a crush for a while anyways, having to go through a life in all this didn’t give most people the best understanding of these kinds of feelings.

“It’s okay, it’s not a big deal. Actually, it makes sense really. You’re both a lot alike from what I can tell.” She watches you fidget in your seat, and all you can do is accept that she’s right.

“What do I do? Fuck no, nevermind there’s nothing to do about it. It doesn’t matter.” You jump up from your seat and grab your bag to run out the door when Maria calls your name.

“Listen, don’t shut it out okay? Don’t just push that all down, you never know-” You cut her off right then and there.

“It’s okay Maria, I know who it is we’re talking about. Just uh, don’t, don’t say anything, please?” You look at her desperate, wishing that just by not talking about it will make it stop.

“Don’t worry, I won’t.” She’s not entirely sure that’s true though, she’s probably going to talk about this with Tommy, but you didn’t need to know that right now.

For a while, you could pretend like life was normal. You and Joel spent increasing amounts of time together, but none of it changed. He’s still grumpy, and brooding, he still is a degree of rough in how he speaks to you, but he speaks to everyone that way, so you don’t think anything of it. Joel is just a rough around the edges kind of guy.

Joel still just does things for you without you bringing it up or even asking, he becomes increasingly protective over you, and you just assume he’s always like this. Part of you wonders about it, but you rationalise it. You tell yourself that reading into how he protects you is just going to drag you back into that hole.

It all comes to a boiling point one day, when you are preparing to make a trip out. You know that Jackson provides you with as much food as you need, but a part of you will always feel the need to ensure you can still fend for yourself. Trapping is the one you rely on more often. It allows you to practise patience and a degree of stealth to track animals movements.

Tommy already knows you’re headed out today, asking if you wanted one of them to come with you, but you declined. Going out alone is what you’re used to.

What you didn’t count on, was before and just after you left. Joel had come up to talk to Tommy, when he notices you. “Hey, where do you think you’re going?”

You were kneeling down on the ground, checking to make sure your pack had everything necessary when you heard the deep voice approaching you. Looking up to see Joel just in front of Tommy, you quickly closed your pack and moved to stand up. Joel reached out to give your arm a pull when he could see you stumble as you tried to stand and slip the bag onto your back at the same time. “Just going out to check my traps before it gets dark.”

Joel’s eyes squinted and his brow furrowed as he moved his gaze from you to up in the sky, and back to you. “ Getting pretty dark, isn’t it? You should wait until tomorrow.”

Shrugging you let the suggestion slip by, “I’d rather do it now, it’s been a little too long and I want to check them all before something else gets to whatever got caught.”

“It’s still late, I’ll go with you.” Whatever Joel came over to talk with Tommy about, clearly involved other plans because Tommy immediately looked surprised if not a little put out at his brothers words.

“No, no it’s fine. I prefer doing it by myself. Go uh, ahead with whatever you guys were gonna do.” As you started to secure the bags straps across your chest, Joel took another step forward into your personal space.

“You shouldn’t go out there by yourself.”

“I’ll be fine, Joel. Seriously.”

“I’m going with you.”

“Joel, I can do it on my own.”

Both of you were starting to get annoyed, and Tommy took a step forward as Joel’s tone raised.

“You’re not going out there when it looks like it could storm at any time.”

Now you were looking him right in the eye, very frustrated. “I don’t need you to babysit me Joel, I know what I’m doing.”

Another step forward towards the pair of you from Tommy as Joel almost growls your name in warning.

Looking back on it, you know your frustration was your fault. You were struggling with realising you have feelings for him, and the subsequent problems that came with trying to ignore it. All mixed with Joel spending more time with you and the people around you commenting on how unusual they thought it was. Today's last straw was simply. Hating feeling like Joel was treating you like a child contrasted badly with having this crush on him. Tommy was fine with you going out now. Why couldn’t Joel just do the same?

Joel makes a move to grab your arm when Tommy finally steps in between the two of you. A hand on his shoulder, Tommy pulled his brother back out of your face, “Let’s take it down, now.”

You didn’t want to hear it. You wanted time alone, to check your traps, go home to use one of them for a quiet dinner, and this was getting in the way of that. “I’m heading out, I’ll see you later Tommy.”

Just as you turned away, Joel calls out to you, calmer than he was just seconds before. You didn’t say anything, but you just looked at him apprehensively. The anger had faded into something softer that you couldn’t identify. Brown eyes shining wide, with a concern behind them, a concern for an unknown reason.

“You come back if you get into trouble, alright? One of us’ll go out with you in the morning.” Tommy had let go of his brother at this point and watched him with a thought filled expression.

All you did was nod. The annoyance drained from your face and body, you just accepted his offer before turning and leaving. You didn’t look back to see Joel again, you didn’t want to. You just wanted things to be normal between you two, you wanted this stupid crush to go away forever. It was getting in the way of how you talked to him.

Not 5 minutes into your journey, you felt a drop of water splash onto your cheek. Thinking nothing of it at first you kept going. Water gets trapped in the tree leaves and any breeze can send it down towards you, and it feels just like rain.

Just as you were approaching your first trap, the water droplets picked up and turned into steady rainfall. Seconds later, it poured down. Heavy rain drenched you beyond compare instantly. The sun setting down below the view of the horizon, and the heavy rain made it hard to see more than a few feet in front of you.

You didn’t really mind. It felt nice after almost getting into a fight with Joel. You some days used to travel the most during the rain, Clickers were less likely to find a home out in the open when it rained hard, and other survivors typically took shelter until it was done, so you could cover more ground without anyone or anything getting in your way.

Besides, whatever had been caught in this trap got snatched up by something else. The remains of something was apparent, but not enough to tell you what you missed out on. That was fine, you had 3 other traps to check anyways.

You reset it, and got up, continuing on to the next one. By the time you made your rounds and were headed back in the direction of Jackson, you had scored 2 squirrels, and a rabbit. Not great, but better than 4 empty traps. Wandering into town, you were debating your meal. After dealing with the squirrels, you thought the rabbit would do for tonight. Rabbit meat was too lean to be worth keeping in storage so you may as well use it well, now.

Well, at least that was your plan until you passed by a certain grumpy southerner’s house. You heard him before you saw him, Joel’s loud and angry call of your name. This time his voice was angry without a doubt. More angry than he was before. Looking at you from his front door he yelled your name again, angrily beckoning you over with his hand.

You didn’t even get within 6 feet of him before the yelling continued. “What the hell did you think you were doing?”

What was he so mad about? “I’m fine, what are you talking about?”

Joel pulled you out of the rain, just under his front door when you got within reach. Well, yanked was more like it. Pulled was too gentle of a term. “It’s been storming for a good hour and a half and you just hung out there this whole damn time?”

You could sense another fight brewing and desperately tried to swallow it down. “This is nothing, what are you talking about?”

Just as you said it, a flash of lighting hit the sky. You hadn’t even realized. Once it got too dark you pulled your flashlight out anyways, you must have missed it. “There's barely any, it doesn’t matter.”

“You’re out there alone in a thunderstorm and you think it’s no big deal? It started pouring just after you left you should have just come back, I’d have gone with you in the morning.”

“Joel, I told you it was fine, I don’t care about getting wet!”

Something flashed in Joel’s eyes, something dark that set your nerves alight, something you didn’t understand. “You don’t care until you wake up tomorrow, sick from being soaked for so long.” His voice was low, akin to the growl he sounded like earlier. His head leaning down right into your personal space.

“Who cares?” Your voice was raised now, and that did not help.

“I care, so why the fuck don’t you?”

You had nothing to say, you just wanted to get your stuff and have a quiet night but every step of the way today Joel had been right there trying to get in the way of that. You sighed deeply, a hand coming to press against your forehead. You just pressed harder hoping somehow that would make this headache go away.

“Can you yell at me tomorrow, I just,” You sighed deeply again, “I just want to go home.” You didn’t want to yell, or to fight with him. You were so exhausted with this growing tension between you and him.

Joel looked you up and down, something brewing within him. He took a step towards you, saying your name with a gentle hum, as your eyes met his, he nodded to the side where his front door remained open. “Come on in, let me at least get you something dry.”

When you hesitated, Joel's posture almost seemed to slouch. As if trying to make himself less threatening. "No more yelling. I promise."

Exhausted and drenched like a rat, you muttered a tiny, “Okay.” before following him inside. His house was just as cozy and warm feeling as ever, after a night in the rain.

In the corner of your eye, you see Ellie on the couch, something in her hands that she quickly goes back to when she notices you spotted her stare. Curiously she stayed completely silent. No doubt she heard you two at the door, but says nothing.

You and Joel go down the hallway, following him to a room closed shut at the end. Joel opens the door and gently waves for you to follow him in. It was for a brief moment, you hesitated.

It hit you out of nowhere that you’ve never been inside a man's room before, let alone while being alone with him. It makes you freeze and you don’t quite know why, but you suck it up and follow inside.

Joel was rummaging through a drawer of his, he pulls out a few pieces and walks over to hand them to you. “I’ll let you change, and we’ll get on drying those for you.” With that he leaves the room, pulling the door closed behind him.

Joel’s room was warm. A cozy orange light that wasn’t too bright, curtains pulled halfway closed to let the patter of the rain splash the visible window, a heavy blanket draped across his bed, and near the wall, his guitar gently sat against a bookcase. You look at the clothes in your hand, a T Shirt of his and what appeared to be sweatpants with a drawstring to adjust the waist.

It felt like a daunting task, slowly peeling off your clothes in the middle of Joel’s room. Your eyes glancing to the side at the door as if it would fly open at any moment, but it doesn't. So all you do is quickly throw on the replacing clothing as soon as yours was off, like you shouldn’t spend too much time undressed in here.

Once you rejoin Joel in the living room, wet clothes folded awkwardly in your hands, he’s talking quietly with Ellie, too low for your ears to catch. Joel looks up, and just stares. Neither of you move, your eyes feel snapped to his face, which is staring at you so hard it’s almost right through you. Breaking the silence, Joel leans down to his companion.

“Ellie takes her clothes to dry them out, would you?” The teen nods, and takes the clothes from you and leaves into another room.

Joel nods his head to some unheard thought of his, before shaking it off and moving to the table. Pulling out a chair he waves you over, “May as well feed you if I’m gonna spend all day arguing with you.”

Taking a seat, you finally smell cooking in the air. “What about my tra-”

“Ellie’s handling it, she needs the practice anyways.” Joel comes around with two plates, and places yours down as he takes his own seat at the small table. “Not so warm anymore, but it’s better than freezing.”

You’re not sure how much you want to admit it, but you’re so cold that he could have told you the food was blazing hot and in comparison, you’d probably just believe it. Everything feels so precarious being alone with Joel right now. You don’t quite understand why he got so mad, but you don’t want to bring it up in case it makes him mad again.

You’re not scared of him, but you are worried of ruining whatever peace you two seem to have found since you stepped into his house. Joel sits in the other chair, not having touched his own food yet, but holding his drink glass tightly. So tightly that you can see the tension in his knuckles, like as long as the glass doesn’t break he won’t either. So you just eat, and lose yourself in the silence.

Turns out he couldn’t hold the silence for very long. Before he’s even moved to have a bite, Joel says your name. “Why didn’t you just come back? I told you I’d even go with you in the morning.” He’s calmer than before, but still tense.

The fork in your hand taps the plate lightly as you try to figure out how to say it. “I’m just used to doing things during storms. No one else typically wants to travel during them, so I just got used to taking advantage of it.”

“Yeah, except yo-”

You cut Joel off almost right away, “I also maybe needed some time alone, and when you showed up, I just knew you were going to offer to come. But I needed time to myself, without you.”

If the way you phrased that hurt him, Joel doesn’t show it in his face, but you back track regardless. “I don’t mean I didn’t want to be around you, at least, not in that way.” You take a long breath, chest visibly rising and lowering with it. “Being around you is confusing sometimes. A lot of times.”

He doesn’t speak, but he shifts his body to face you more directly. His head moving to catch your downward gaze, dark eyes watching yours, narrowing just slightly to figure you out. So you continue. “One day we get along great, and then the next it’s like I’m walking a fine line around you trying to, trying to like, keep you from hating me.”

It’s out, and now you can’t stop. “I can never figure out what I’m doing around you. Like tonight, I was out in a storm for what? Not even 2 hours, and I come back and you’re yelling at me like you think I’m a goddamn child who doesn’t know any better.” Finally you’re looking him in the eye, and like before, something flashes in his expression that you can’t quite figure out.

“I know you're not a child.” Joel almost shakes his head in exasperation. “Trust me. I know.”

“Then what? You know I’m an adult but you just wish you could order me around like a kid? That it? Because you're kind of protectiveness lately always feels like you’re just lecturing a dumb kid who doesn’t know any better. I don’t know if you’ve noticed Joel, but I can take care of myself. I have for a very long time.” The eye contact is seething right now, you’re mad, but Joel is..something else.

Moving his body to lean into your personal space, his voice comes out in a husky whisper. “Let’s get one thing clear, I’m not and have never tried or wanted to treat you like a child. Far from. If I saw you as a kid, I’d just treat you like I do when Ellie acts out, and teach you to know better.” He breathes in through his nose deeply before he speaks again, “There are other ways to get to listen.”

Lips parted slightly, your lungs suddenly feel shallow, and that warmth flows through your veins like fire. It’s not the same feeling like before, no this was a sensation you know you can put a name too. Like the combination of his words, the deep quiet tone of his voice you’ve come to adore, and his eyes boring into yours as if the answers to everything he wants are there.

It’s a rush you feel fly through your whole body, leaving a shiver in its place as it passes, and finds a home directly between your legs.

Joel though, means more to you then is worth jumping to conclusions. You have no real idea what he wants or meant, but that doesn’t stop your mouth from speaking before you could even hear yourself do so. “This is nothing. You want a brat?I could show you a brat.”

What did you just say? What is wrong with you? What are you trying to do here? You take a long sip of the water before you, a desperate reprieve from the thick air surrounding you. It's a fruitless effort, because Joel's eyes are right there watching you once you look back.

“There’s a line here sweetheart, and I’m damn close to just pulling you over it myself.” The flash in his eyes isn’t just a flash now, it’s a continuous bombardment towards you, and maybe it’s just a little too overwhelming.

Not knowing if his slight shift towards your body had any intention other than to speak, you shoot up from your seat, turning away to face the main room and miss the instant shift of concern in his eyes as he follows suit. You force the words out without the stammer, but it’s draped in an uncertainty that you wish you could hide.

“I should get my stuff and go, I’ll just wear my wet clothes home. No reason to ruin your stuff you know? Not like I live too far away, anyways,” Quick and desperate voice trailing off into nothing as you see Joel approaching you, an arm outstretched towards you palms up, as if you’re a horse he’s afraid of spooking.

“Hey, take a breath for me.” You nod as you do so, in and out, willing your nerves to settle. Joel finds himself right in front of you, looking down at you, his arms raise slowly, a firm hold on your arms as his head leans in to speak quietly. “Listen, I’m not here to push something you don’t want. If you want to head home, that’s okay, but-”

“I don’t. I just…I’m not sure if you..” The words are in your head but not your mouth. Joel seems to know what they are nonetheless.

He trails his hands down your arms, one coming to his side gesturing to his room, and the other moving to find a gentle home on your back. “I think we should have a talk, sweetheart. In private.”

His voice turns strangely commanding right as he stops speaking, but you follow his now distracted eyeline just in time to see a head of long hair disappear around a corner. It’s enough to make you smirk, Joel looks at you, and it’s enough for him too.

Back in his bedroom, he nudges you in before him, so he can close the door behind him. You stand motionless in the middle of his room, eyes wide as you watch him bypass you and take a seat on the edge of his bed.

Your name comes out firmly, “Before I say anything else, I need you to know that there’s things going on here that you don’t know about, but I want you to just stay here and listen.”

You nod, arms crossed over your torso protectively.

“Tommy’s not one to just give away other people’s secrets. Neither is Maria, but they’re involved enough to pester me about certain things I’m not good at doing myself. So when he comes around spilling your secrets it’s not because he wanted to embarrass you.”

Your eyes could pop out of your face at the realisation you were having. He knew. He fucking knew. “How did Tommy-”

“Maria probably told him the same day you told her.” You almost got out asking why, before he shifts to lean a bit more over his thighs, hands splayed out on them in a way you suspect is as much a protective move as your arms wrapped around your torso. “They knew how I feel about you, and figured telling me may finally get my ass in gear to do something about it.”

The look in your eyes soften, but remain wide open, and lips part in a disbelieving quiet gasp. “How you..feel?”

“If you’re going to feel that way about me, I’m either the best or the worst option. I’m not exactly an expert at talking about how the people around me make me feel,” His hand pointing lazily at who you both knew was somewhere outside his door. “So I get how you feel, but it also means it takes months of my brother and his wife nagging to get me to do something.”

You had so many thoughts, but only one you needed an answer to. “Why get so angry with me sometimes? If you are saying what I think you’re saying, why be so mad at me?"

A voice suddenly shouts through the door, “He doesn’t know how to show affection otherwise!” Joel stands up and opens the door at record speed.

You don’t hear what he tells her, but you see a variety of arm gestures being made just beyond your view of the door. Followed by what sounds like a very smug Ellie saying something about leaving him alone before what you presume is her bedroom door shutting.

When closing the door again and turning to you, Joel finds you with a hand over your mouth. Doing a very poor job at hiding your laughter, Joel smiles slightly and his hands find a home on his hips. “I can’t say that she's wrong, actually. She would know that best.”

A giggle threatens to spill over you, the tension finally coming to a simmer from its blazing heat. You shrug one shoulder, eyeing him with a playful but challenging smirk “Well if you just don’t know any better, maybe I should let you yell at me more often.”

His voice hits you almost late, like you see him reach you in such a small amount of strides, his gruff tone hits you almost when he’s already right in front of you. “You want me to show you better?”

He’s close now. So close you have to look up to meet his eyes. Whatever he searches for in your eyes, he seems to find it, and you suspect it’s a lot like what you keep seeing in his. A hand wraps its grip on your hip, while the other tilts your chin with a hold he controls. “Say no to me at any time. Okay? This isn’t just about me.”

And your relationship takes a turn it can never return from. You feel Joel pull on your chin, while his own head leans in and finds your lips.

Whatever you imagined kissing was like, kissing Joel kicked those thoughts out and found a new home in your heart. His kiss was soft, such an utterly soft feeling as his lips move against you, but also incredibly demanding. He moved you how he wanted to move you, deepening how hard he kissed you, and teased you just on the edge opening you up.

His grip on your hip tightens as he pulls your body against his, the hand on your chin drifting all across your jaw to hold your neck. Hands so big they encompass the side of your face as well. The gasp you let out gives him his opening. His tongue finding yours, still teasing, as if he can’t decide between kissing you rougher and exploring your own tongue. So he switches between both.

The scruff on his jaw and moustache burns against your skin. You’d never feel the same after feeling it against your smooth skin.

You’re hands out of pure reaction, held lightly at his thick sides, but just as he moves from your hip to pull the other side of your face in a rough kiss, his nose pressed tightly against the side of yours, your own hands move. Refusing to even leave him, your hands move up against his chest and find a home grasping the back of his neck like it’s a lifeline.

Your addicted to the feeling of his lips moulding against yours but you’re light headed. So lightheaded. Pulling back with a loud gasp of breath, Joel’s need rumbles against his chest, “Fuck.” He yanks you right back into him so harshly your teeth bash together. He doesn’t even seem to notice, he just turns you in the room.

You couldn’t say where you were at all or where he was directing you, but right as both his hands leave you to grasp onto your hips, they just as soon push you into the plush bed.

Joel’s hand rubs down his face before curling against his mouth, watching your chest heave to catch your breath. You lean up on your hands splayed behind you to whisper his name. The second it takes for him to join you feels like an eternity. Climbing up a knee at a time, finding its place on each side of your closed legs.

At the same instant, you both lean into the other, Joel’s hands resting on your waist, you laying one hand in the middle of his collarbone, the other wrapping to grasp the back of his neck and pull his lips back onto yours. His teeth scrapes against your lips, biting down on them, only to follow with a smirk at the breathy whine you cry out.

Joel moves his hand from your neck downwards, to feel the softness of your skin, pushing, grasping, and pulling at the plushness. Rougher and rougher with every shift of his hands, his patience serms to find a limit. He pulls from your lips just enough to coax your eyes to look at his. “You still want this? Cus I can’t promise you I’ll remember to be gentle if this goes any further.”

Your eyes drift back to his mouth, so pouty and slightly flushed from the force. You can barely pull away from the sight long enough to look up and answer. “So don’t be, Joel.”

For a moment, Joel just leans his forehead against yours, your arms all holding still against each other. He kisses you with a force that pushes your body back, and he pulls away just as quick to lift your shirt up and off you. The uninteresting sports bra beneath it does little for Joel's patience just getting in the way of his need to feel your soft bare skin. Before you can even think about moving your arms back around him, Joel yanks the sports bra up and over your head, chucking it to whatever direction his arm manages to find.

He doesn’t ogle. His patience has no time for that right now. He pushes your body the rest of the way down into his bed, as he holds the hair at the back of your head in a tight grasp, with the other coming between your bodies to grasp your tits just as tightly. Each gasp and whine you give him, just allows his tongue to find yours again.

It took nothing but simply being exposed to harden your nipples, but Joel isn’t satisfied with just that. His thumbs caress over them for mere moments before finding a hold and pulling them. The sting so shockingly good feeling, you cry out a moan that sounds awfully like a very high pitched “Oh God,”

His other hand leaves your hair to grip and pull at your other breast, each nipple feeling a tight pull over and over. Joel leaves your mouth and trails itself down your neck and joins his hands. His facial hair scraping against your skin with the same addictive burn.

A man possessed, Joel wastes no time in replacing the fingers pulling your nipples with his mouth. Your chest betrays you and lifts up to meet him even closer, It’s a sweet suck of lips and mouth, only to bite down. He bites and he bites while the other hand caresses your other breast, reaching up to tease your unattended to nipple in much the same fashion.

His legs encompass yours, but your thighs desperate to feel more try and open up for him. Your outer thighs brushing against the inside of his, he lifts up from your entirely to take one leg and shoving it outside of his hold. He doesn’t return to you, he just looks at your heaving body, one hand holding your upper thigh when it moved you, the other dragged itself down to the very top of your pants, gripping the very top seams in its own desperate question.

The second he spots your own hands moving to get them off yourself, Joel gathers a hold and yanks them off of you. Just one small fabric keeping you from showing him what he desires the most, he lets your legs move to find a home against his sides and hips, finding your mouth with a hold on your jaw, the other gripping the sides of your underwear like it offends him.

The sound of your kiss is only interrupted by a growling breath and whining need as he pulls them tight up between your legs from the stretch only to threaten to come off from the push and pull. He’s had enough. He’s tearing them down your legs and leaving your legs out and spreading to bare all of you to him. Before the insecurity can have a hold on you for even a second, he rubs against your thighs soothingly. “Don’t even think about it, sweetheart. Don’t you hide any of this gorgeous fucking sight from me.”

Joel moves in, only for your body to shoot up with a hand on his chest. You gaze at each other for a moment as he feels you go for the buttons. Before unfastening the first one just at the bit of chest he always seems to show, you hesitate. Looking up at him with a sweet, “Please?”

Joel leans in to capture your lips in a much more sensual kiss before nodding. “Go ahead, sweet girl.” He just watches you undo each button. Your eyes glued to the sight of his torso with each little exposed skin until you reach the bottom button. Undoing it your hands push the fabric aside to hold the exposed stomach at your reach when Joel holds your chin in his hand gently once more.

Fingers sliding along as he moves and stands up on the floor before you. Not a word is spoken as he watches you, his brown eyes barely blinking as he stares at your body as if he’d forget what it looks like if he looked away. Joel pulls the rest of his shirt open and lets it fall to the ground, his hands finding his belt.

There it was, what he was looking for. As Joel pulls his belt open, and unzips himself, he sees you clench. Legs still wide open, Joel watches your pussy clench around nothing like it's desperate to fit him.

In mere moments Joel is just as naked as you are, and you were not ready. His body broad and thick, strong muscles give way to a softer stomach that sits deliciously and unapologetically without flexing abs to show off. But it’s beneath that, that you cannot look away from. His cock sits hard and thick between his legs, a length that makes your mouth ache just looking at, and a thick girth that has your fingers holding the sheets below you tightly.

Joel doesn’t return to you just yet, his eyes impossibly dark, nostrils flared in an audible breathing, Joel fists the base of his cock tightly for a moment before he’s suddenly right over your legs, face level with your stomach.

His cock pressed up against the sheets, one hand reaching to grasp your ass and pull your hips to him, with the other pushing a thigh out to make room for his broad size. Joel pulls your hips up closer as he presses his nose up against your mound, taking in your scent when he calls you, “Look at me, sweet girl. You gonna let me taste you? The way I’ve always fucking wanted?”

A thought passes through your head, but it gets pushed down right away. It’s not the time for that line of thinking. You’ll deal with it later, all that matters right now is the furious nodding of your head, “Anything,” You try to open up more for him, “Fuck Joel anything you want.”

Anything? He takes the anything he wants. Joel licks you up to your clit in one slide of his tongue, taking your clit into his mouth to suck and tongue at. The feeling is like fire, its burning white hot and your arms give you, your back flat against the bed.

Joel licks and drinks at every slick drop you have for him, and finally he devours your cunt just the way he wants. He’s everywhere, his tongue is inside you too much yet not far enough, and you need his mouth on you more but it’s so much that you writhe desperately. He works you over with his mouth for a while, building you up for an unknown amount of time.

It could have been minutes or hours, you lost all senses that aren’t him. One hand above your head grips the pillow it finds, while the other hand tries to simulate his push and pull of your tits. The pull of your nipple both isn’t enough without him and yet it seems to even match every tug of your clit his mouth gives you.

Joel doesn’t let his mouth leave any part of your cunt out of his actions, it’s so overwhelming you don’t realise what’s built up until it’s at your door. Suddenly it’s there, this burning tension alights right where Joel devours you, it warms and tightens so fast your cry out is almost followed by tears.

His hands hold your hips firm right up against his mouth, “Fuck, come on, give me it,” You can’t hear him well, but you feel him speak against you. He takes and takes and doesn’t stop until he knows you can’t give him anymore.

He doesn’t wipe his mouth, doesn’t clean you off, Joel just drapes his body over you and forces you to taste yourself from his own mouth. You hold his shoulders and neck like you can’t afford to let go, and he uses the chance to slide his fingers down.

You only realise his intentions when they brush against your sensitive clit. They don’t linger though, your pussy is soaking wet from your own doing and his mouth, giving his fingers a home without issue.

Two of Joel's thick fingers pump in and out of your soaking hot center, letting you cry into his mouth as he kisses you just as demanding as his fingers fuck you. They shift slightly as he rubs his nose against yours muttering, “There you are,” And suddenly his two fingers brush against a part of you that makes your cunt weep for him. He doesn’t let up either, he’s found your sweet spot and his fingers fuck up against it with little mercy.

You moan and gasp against his mouth, his name the only word he can even make out. Joel separates from your lips and nudges his nose against your cheek, “One more, sweetheart. I need one more, then I’ll let you have me, come on, I need you to cum one more time before I make it cum around my cock.” Joel just keeps talking and talking and you can’t stop him. “Give me one more, and I’ll fuck you so full of me, give you every fucking inch and you’re going to take it, aren't you?”

You’re almost there, your orgasm rushing into you faster then you could ever imagine, “Yes, yes please. Please Joel, I’ll take it.”

The palm of his hands rub right up against your clit to push you over, “Gonna cum for me, sweet girl?”

You can’t even answer him, you just hold any part of his body you can find as your head takes refuge in his chest. Riding your orgasm struggling to catch your breath. Slowly Joel slips his fingers out of you, soaked and sticky with you, lips brushing yours with small kisses, “Good girl.”

Joel wraps his soaked hand around his cock, spreading it all over him, stroking up and down with rough strokes. He gives you one more bruising kiss, before he kneels up, wrapping your legs properly at his hips, stroking his cock right up until it’s pressed against your entrance.

If Joel sees any hesitation in your eyes, he doesn’t let it take over you. One hand holds his cock right up against you, the other grabs your hand. Bringing it up to his mouth, he gives it a gentle kiss before holding it against his heart. “I’ve got you, sweetheart. I’ve got you.”

He places your hand down to join the other one of yours around holding his sides, and with a push of his hips, it’s all over for you.

Every inch of his cock pushes into you like there’s only just enough room to fit him, but you feel it hitting every single part of you in a hot overwhelming pleasure. Only halfway in, Joel grapes your hips ready to move them, “You gonna take all of me, sweetheart? Gonna let my cock feel every part of this,” Joel teeth grit together with a hiss, “this sweet cunt?”

You can only beg him, and that’s all he needs. Joel holds your hips up at his, and thrusts the rest of his cock into you. It’s a brutal pounding pace that's set. Joel slams his cock into you while pulling you hips back onto him like he can’t settle for just one thing.

He groans and gives such deep low moans to match your high pitched crying ones. The only other sound being the harsh slap of his skin against yours with each rough thrust. It’s not fast but it’s certainly not slow, each pull of his cock gives you only enough time to gasp in a breath before it’s forced back out when he shoves his cock back into you.

“I’m, Joel- fuck,” There’s no comprehensible thoughts, it’s him, it’s his cock hitting every right part of your cunt, it’s the obscene slapping skin as he slams into you, and the mixing moans from both of you, and nothing else.

Suddenly Joel yanks your hips to follow hips, your legs wrap around his body, finding a home around him, one at his waist, the other wrapped around his leg that you can reach like you’ll fly away without it. His hands push at your thighs, opening them wide, stinging in pain to give him the most he can offer.

Part of him wants to watch your tits bounce with every slam of his cock, he can fuck you so much faster like this, but he cant help but constantly watch how well your take him. Giving neither of you any reprieve from the overwhelming burning pleasure. You grasp the sides of his face, leaning up just enough to feel his forehead against yours, and a brush of your lips against his.

He’s gritted and tight in his jaw, eyes shutting from the feeling, brow furrowed in intense sensations, but he opens his eyes when he feels your cunt clench tightly against his cock, just as they did his fingers. “That's it,”

Joel loses his steady pace as his hips simply start pounding in a desperate search for your end. He captures your lips again and spits out your name in need, “You can do it, sweet girl, you can give me one last one.”

Your nails dig into his skin as you feel yourself coiling, knowing it’ll break you when it releases. “You- you need, I want your,” Whines and cries stops your sentence but Joel knows.

Joel wraps his hand around to grasp your ass in a painful hold, the other gripping the back of your head, tight and commanding, “You first, cum one more time for me, then I’ll give it all to you.” His cock pounds into you without any purpose but fast and urgent need.

It's so blinding when your final orgasm hits you, it’s too much, he’s too much and you can’t hold on anymore. You choke out Joel’s name as you hold onto his neck as he hits his own peak.

Joel pulls his cock from your tight cunt just as he moans out your own name, face burying itself in your neck with panting breath. His cum shoots out just as he slips from you, and paints your cunt and stomach as he strokes every last bit of it out.

You both stay there for a while, how long you can’t be sure. But when Joel comes up from his home in your neck, his hands gently find your waist and cheek with his hands, gentle caressing as he pulls you into another kiss. This one much calmer than the rest, this one soft but full of a matching emotion you both pour into the other.

Joel warns you before he moves from your hold, a kiss to your forehead, “Stay right here, I’ll be right back.”

Your arm reaches out before he leaves your touch totally, and he leans back in, “Hey, I’m just gonna clean you up, I’ve got you, I told you.” You nod, eyes not fully open, exhausted your fingers graze his entire arm as he gets up.

Joel returns just as fast with a soft touch of cloth to your skin, damp with warm water he is careful not to press too much on the sensitive skin between your legs as he cleans you of his cum.

For a moment, your body leans up on your elbows as you look at him, walking back to you, before stopping just before the bed and grabbing his shirt he pulled off of your body. You freeze in your spot. Does he want you to leave now? Is this it?

He doesn't let it linger for long, he sits on the bed facing you, “Come here, sweetheart.” You realise he only has the t-shirt to put on you. He helps it over your exhausted head and down back to cover you up a bit. He moves your legs to slip underneath the blanket before slipping on the soft pants he had previous given you.

Turning the only light off, Joel slips into the bed right beside you. Whatever moonlight that peaks through the storm clouds gives just enough light to see the other. You turn your own body to touch at his chest and his cheek, your thumb stroking back and forth against the scruff.

His hand finds your own face in return, bringing his face down to kiss you once more, and maneuvering you into laying right up into his chest, both of you facing the other, held tenderly in eachothers arms.

You slip into sleep before him, you think maybe you heard him say your name, saying something soft into your hair, but at the feeling of lips against the top of your head you finally slip into a slumber.

You wake up briefly only a few hours later, a crack of thunder just loud enough to pull you awake. The blanket gives you a soft, heavy weight it should be enough to lull you back to sleep, but the warmth of Joel’s body wrapping you up in his sleeping arms keeps you awake longer then you should be.

The soreness between your legs brings back the thought you pushed away from your mind so quickly earlier. You think to yourself in that moment, wrapped up in Joel’s safe embrace. You should have told him.

He made sure more than once you were okay with him, and he made it clear his intentions to be rough. But he also didn’t know when he said that. It’s not that you’ve just never had a crush before. You don’t necessarily need feelings for the physical part.

You're not naive. You understand clearly how this all works, nothing came as a surprise when it got physical. You've explored your own body on safe quiet nights.

You’ve just never done any of it with another person. Not a kiss, never being touched like he did, never had sex. You know he wouldn’t have been so rough, so demanding, if he knew, but you treasured every second of it.

This isn’t how you imagined any relationship you would ever have to go. You didn’t know what it would be, but that day? That day you first arrived in Jackson, and this large brooding man with a demanding presence that barreled into the building wasn’t what you expected.

Joel wasn’t in your survival plans, a normal pursued relationship not being accounted for at any time in your planning. But he was here, and you were here. He was right, you know it. He has you now, but you also have him. And that’s all you decide matters right now.

One of his arms around you, moves to stoke at the top of your head and pull you closer into his warm chest. Voice so gruff and muffled with sleep you can only hear him because he is in your ear. He catches your name, “Stop thinking so loud, come here and just sleep, sweetheart.”

So you do. You snuggle in closer to Joel, and fall back asleep in the only place you’ve ever truly belonged.

#joel miller x reader #joel miller x you #joel miller x female reader #joel miller imagine #pedro pascal imagine #joel miller fanfiction #the last of us fanfic

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yelenasdog · 1 year

Text

vibrant, saccharine, his ☼ (fwb!mat barzal x fwb!fem reader)

genre: filthy smut, fluff, angst with happy ending

summary: pretending is getting harder, for both of them. and after a hard roadie, mat’s not sure if he wants to pretend anymore.

words: 8.7k (WOAH)

warnings: cursing, excessive use of parentheses, friends with benefits arrangement, smut, unprotected piv, oral (f and m receiving), fingering, blood (reader bit lip too hard oops!), pet names (baby, sweetheart, pretty boy), reader is described as having sisters and a dog, food mention, idiots to lovers, misunderstood situation, reader uses she/her pronouns, and i think that’s it.

a/n: when i started this, i originally was just writing a blurb and then it turned into a full ass fic with a plot?? and fwb??? idk man, im nervy to post this since ive never published for nhlers before but oh whale! and ty to @eminems-skittles for reading this for me and checking it over 🤍 love u

“You played so good, baby.” She breathed, welcoming him home with open arms.

“Not good enough, apparently.” He responded, letting her fingers card through his raven locks. Soft, freshly cut. She loved when he grew it out, but yet again it was him, so anything worked.

She sighed, letting her thumb fall to his cheekbone, knowing what he was referring to. It had been the last stop of the road trip, he’d had a hatty and despite making it to OT, it wasn’t enough in the shootout.

He’d had to wait an entire flight and car ride afterwards to see her, only giving her a brief text when he got off the ice (“We lost. Had a hatty. Fucking Toronto.”) (like she hadn’t stayed up to watch the game) and another when he landed.

And after so long of whatever the two of them had going on, she’d known better than to try to send him some long and winded attempt at a pick me up message. She settled for just responding “I’ll be here.” She didn’t need to say it though, he knew she’d be there.

She always was.

To anyone else it would’ve been sad, how she waited up for him, late nights spent lonely with just her and her dog, as he jetted around North America. In her mind, he was no doubt giving himself away to whatever random puck bunny threw herself his way.

Despite this, she was loyal, even though she had her suspicions about what he did when they were apart. And frankly, it wasn’t a part of the “deal” that they had to be exclusive, and it was none of her business. But truthfully, after so long, she couldn’t count on some washed up juniors player to give her even a fraction of the satisfaction he had.

So, she did this whole routine, whatever this was. She stayed up late watching his games, sitting on her couch in his sweatshirt he left. She wouldn’t admit it out loud, but whenever she wore it, she liked to pretend.

Pretend that she was an obedient girlfriend wearing her loving boyfriends sweater. That as she sat curled up waiting on the corner of the beat up black sofa, 3 coffees in at approximately 1:37 am, she would be rewarded for her efforts come morning time.

That her and said loving boyfriend would lounge around together in bed (after he woke her up in the best way he knew how, showing her how grateful he was. Like I said, she loved when his hair was long enough to tug on, and even though she endlessly made fun of his patchy stubble, she couldn’t deny how delicious it felt burning between her thighs. Especially after they’d spent so long apart.) Then they’d go and grab late brunch, holding hands under the table as they sipped mimosas, which were Mat’s guilty pleasure only her and the waiter knew about, before heading home.

Maybe then they’d FaceTime his mom back in Coquitlam, an early riser with the 3 hour time difference. Mat had felt bad interrupting her morning routine, but she’d never pass up an opportunity to talk to her boy and the girl who she hoped was her future daughter in law.

After they got off the phone, she’d tell him how much she loved his mom, how her cheeks hurt from smiling so much. He’d tuck a strand of hair behind her ear, watching as she leaned into his touch.

“Missed you, Mat.” She’d say, closing her eyes.

“I missed you more.” He’d respond, his voice nearly a whisper. Her eyes would flutter open, and he’d recognize the look in them immediately. He felt his blood rush, and suddenly their proximity, which he’d never get used to, was very obvious.

“Oh yeah?” She asked. “I doubt that.”

He swallowed, his tongue darting out to wet his bottom lip. Her eyes hungrily swept over them, wanting nothing more than to lean forward and capture them with her own.

But patience is a virtue, she supposed.

“Want me to prove it, pretty boy?”

Words failed him, and all he could do was nod. He relaxed into the sofa, watching as she dropped to her knees in front of him. Her hands were on either thigh as he fought the urge to lay his tired head back onto the beat up pleather behind him. It had been too long, he thought. And he’d be damned if he was going to miss out on seeing her do what he’d only imagined in the shower, or over the phone for the past 16 days.

She reached her hands up from the muscle of his thigh up to his tummy, her cold hands shocking him as she reached under his sweatshirt- the same one she’d been wearing before.

Her hands drifted, down, down, down, to the waistband of those damn Lululemon shorts she’d got him for Christmas. He held his breath, watching as they danced around where he needed her most and then-

The doorknob turns, and she’s brought back to reality. Sleep had almost claimed her, iced coffee left abandoned on the coffee table, a ring of condensation already drying on the glass. She attempts to smooth out her hair, hoping that her brief almost-nap hadn’t left her too disheveled.

Not that he’d care.

She stood to greet him as he opened the door, hockey bag, and garment bag, and duffle bag, and backpack, and- God, did he really need all that- and suitcase, dropped unceremoniously as he entered the threshold. He kicked the huge bag to the side, and it landed right under where her keys and her leash for her old mutt, Warrior, hung from the wall.

Above the leash hung a picture of her and her sisters, with her running shoes on the floor beneath it for easy access. They were nearly squished by the gear, and if it had been anyone else’s shit crushing her 160 dollar sneakers, she’d be angry. But the sight of his bag near her shoes was so weirdly domestic, she could’ve cried.

She, yet again, was snapped out of her fantasy by the closing of the heavy door, watching as the man in front of her shuffled forward, immediately allowing himself to be held by her. His head fell to her shoulder, and rather than the usual clash of teeth and shoving to get to her room, (they never went to never his place after a roadie. He needed to be away from the constant reminders of it all for awhile, just to be surrounded by her) she simply dropped a chaste kiss to his temple, letting her arm drop from his hair to his broad shoulders, squeezing once, twice, three times, on either one.

He stood up, and she led him to her room, though he knew the way well enough. Her hand in his felt nice, comforting, even, and he wasn’t going to complain. In the beginning of the arrangement the two of them had, touches like that had been normal. But as time went on, the barely there brushes and gentle caresses stopped all together.

He wanted to say something, wanted to ask her what was wrong, if it was something he did. But when he was off the ice, Mathew Barzal was not a man who liked to push his luck. So he didn’t. He let the touches slip away, and took what he could get from her.

Which right now, was toeing off his shoes, and crawling onto the plush comforter of her bed. It smelled like that sparkly ”fairy dust” shit from Lush he saw sitting on her bathroom counter once, cotton candy and bubblegum infiltrating his senses. That, and her favorite floral perfume he was all too familiar with on her pillow. A combination of scents he usually would find too much, sickly-sweet. But it was her, and that alone made it the most soothing aroma he’d ever known.

Initially when he’d gotten off the ice, the adrenaline had been pumping, and his anger had been rampant. All he’d wanted was to get home to her, have his way with her. To have an outcome he could control.

He’d kept himself relatively calm in the locker room, not having any outbursts towards Ilya, or anyone for that matter. If any of the guys had noticed he was uncharacteristically quiet, they didn’t say anything.

That is, until the bus ride to the airport.

He had been typing out his text to her, (Hatty, lost in OT, Toronto, you know the one), when he had felt a pair of peering eyes. Sitting in the back of the bus, he’d thought he’d done well to avoid such glances, but apparently not.

“Y’know, you shouldn’t be sulking so much.” A certain French-Canadian spoke, the brunette man’s tired eyes lingering over Mat’s hunched over form.

If there was one thing he didn’t need right now, it was more pep talks from Tito. He’d had more than his fill in the locker room. And though he loved the guy, he didn’t need to be told again how he “did everything right” and had a ”killer game”.

Because he knows, and that’s partly why he’s so mad.

Partly. As the other part is the fact that he wants more than anything to come back to NY to her arms. He was exhausted at this point, and rather than having his way with her, he now just wanted to be welcomed home into those ridiculously cozy sheets. He wanted her to light up all those overpriced candles she loved so much from Bath and Bodyworks, and for Warrior to snuggle up by him, stinky dog breath be damned. He wanted her to turn on ”Miracle” in the back as white noise, and laugh as she repeated all the lines from memory. (He may be Canadian, but he can appreciate a heart warming story told by Kurt Russell when he sees one.)

More than anything, though, he wanted her. And not just for an hour or two before he inevitably dragged himself out of those silky sheets that felt heavenly on his back, leaving her sleeping beside him. She looked peaceful in those moments, and he often wondered what she dreamt of. If she was dreaming of him as he did of her.

Bottom line was, Mathew was the victim of a series of unfortunate events. And the man to his left could recognize that it wasn’t just the hockey that was bothering him. (Though, that whole situation did suck pretty bad, he’d admit.)

So when Anthony told him he shouldn’t be sulking, he flashed him a tight lipped smile and a nod, before looking out the window at the Toronto sunset. The oranges and pinks were stunning, and more than anything their vibrancy reminded him of her. The smile she’d give him in her post-orgasm glow, or of the orange blossom on the bottle of perfume on her vanity. Beauvillier’s gaze never faltered, though, recognizing the deep train of thought his close friend was experiencing.

The screen of his phone had begun to darken, the draft of his message just barely visible. Tito’s eyes quickly shifted from the screen and back up to Barzy, opening his mouth and pausing momentarily.

“Who’re you texting?”

Mat quickly turned off the device, the “click” sounding out in the quiet bus cabin, most of the Islanders players catching some shut eye or watching that new Game of Thrones spin off.

Personally, Mat didn’t get the appeal.

“Nobody, just… a friend I’m visiting tonight when we get back.”

Anthony’s eyebrows went up, making a face of understanding as he slowly nodded three times.

“A friend, huh?”

Mathew nods, taking his bottom lip between his teeth and letting it go. “Yup.” He adds softly for good measure, popping the p.

“You visiting a friend after a game like that, this late, hm?” Another pause. ”Must be an important friend.”

“Yeah.” His voice is soft again, compassion coming across his features and he thinks of her again.

“Well“, Anthony starts, popping in his earbuds and opening his phone to his Music app. “I’d say whatever’s going on with this friend seems worth talking to her about.”

Mat‘s head snaps up, and he scoffs, shaking his head.

“I didn’t say that it was a she-“

“You didn’t have to, buddy.” Tito winks in the most annoyingly-Tito way, and chuckles to himself. He then lays his head back onto the navy material behind him. Mat “hmph”s to himself, doing the same. He turns his phone back on again, going to the chat between the two of them. The still blinking cursor seems like it’s mocking him as he runs a hand over his face, hitting send.

If there’s gonna be any deep, emotional shit, it can wait until he’s not 2500 miles away.

7 hours later when he finally crashes through her front door, he swears the relief he feels mixed with the sense of dread it all might be over in an hour, gives him whiplash. But nonetheless, she welcomes him in, and she feels like home.

Warrior watches from the couch, his tail lazily wagging as he observes his owner greeting the man who occasionally slips him bacon from his Starbucks sandwich. His old man (old dog?) body doesn’t find the arrival of the hockey player worthy of leaving his nest on the sofa, as to him that’s all Mathew Barzal is. The bringer of bacon.

To Warrior’s owner, though, he was so much more.

The trek to the bedroom felt like it took an eternity, and as he laid on her bed, he couldn’t help but wonder if it would be a bad idea to push his luck for once. Risk ending it all to gain everything.

She laid down next to him, and he shifted, going from laying with his arms crossed under his head, to one next to her head, the other keeping him stable from his position on top of her.

Her hand crept up to push an unruly lock out of his eyes, and she leaned forward, and he met her halfway. They paused briefly, taking each other in after so long, before finally closing to distance.

He tasted warm, like cinnamon and something she couldn’t place, and she wondered if at the airport he’d gotten one of those pretzels she knew he liked so much. To compliment his psychopath reminiscent black coffee, of course.

His hand went from where it had been cradling her face down to rest on her hip. The soft touch elicited a whimper, and at that he pulled away, resting his forehead against hers.

She recognized that something was off, swimming around in that pretty little head of his. A small frown etched its way onto her face, and she lifted his chin up so he had no choice but to look at her.

“What’s wrong, Mat?”

He took in a shaky breath, looking over to his left, where the TV was on some random wallpaper, a sunset, he realizes. He scoffs, looking back at her.

“Can you just- can we- can I- fuck.” He mutters, slowly falling down so his body weight is nearly on top of her.

“Can you just… hold me?”

She swears she’s never heard him sound so broken.

“Yeah, baby, ’course. C’mere.” She replies softly, allowing him to fully rest on her. It was a miracle that he didn’t fully break down right there, at the feeling of her fingertips dancing over his skin, under his pushed up shirt. His nose was cold against her neck as he dragged it up against her to come to her cheek, pressing a kiss there. His eyes never opened, afraid that if they did, it would all just be another elaborate fantasy he’d created to pass the time.

“Is this a good idea?” Came her voice, cutting through the silence.

He sniffles. “What do you mean?”

“This. Us.” She says, not able to meet his gaze where he’s lifted his head.

“We’re going to get hurt. More than we already have.”

Oh. Oh, fuck this was happening right now. Mat sat up, feeling like a scared teenage boy. Damn you and the way you read people, Beauvillier. Maybe this would’ve been easier from 2500 miles away.

“We don’t have to.”

“What other option do we have?” She said, sounding defeated, like she already knows her answer and she doesn’t like it. “I-I can’t keep doing this no strings attached shit. Not when you do this. Not when you come here all beat up like some sad puppy.”

“I’m sorry,” he said. And he was.

“Don’t be. I should’ve known this would happen.” Her voice was soft, her eyes distant.

“That what would happen?” He questioned. She looked at him like he had two heads.

“That you’d leave, Mat. That this whole pretending bullshit wouldn’t be enough for me.”

He leaned forward again, catching her off guard.

“I’m not leaving you. I’d never leave you.”

She looked away briefly, mentally cursing herself for being so emotional as tears began to well up in her eyes. He fell to her side, forcing her to meet his gaze.

“Do you really want this?” She asked, the tears rolling down her face illuminated a hue of pink from the salt lamp on the bedside table. Mathew reached out a hand, dragging his thumb over the droplet. He hated that she was crying, but fuck, she sure looked pretty while doing it.

His answer came without thought, he’d done enough of that on his way over.

“Yes. I want you in every way, if you’ll have me.”

A small smile came onto the corners of her face, and she nodded, shortly at first, but more exaggerated as they started laughing, a small “yeah?” escaping from Mathew. She responded with the same, and he took that as his sign to reach forward, closing the distance between them.

And like all the times before, they fell into their routine, her hands going down to his hips, lifting the gray material of his shirt over his head. He returned the favor, the two of them moving in sync as she lifted her hips and he gently slid off her shorts. He ran his palms along her bare thighs and she shivered at the feeling, a reaction that didn’t go unnoticed by Mathew.

“I missed you, y/n.” He admitted, running a hand through his, now, unruly hair.

Another vibrant smile came across her face, easing whatever nerves Mat had left over from his confession.

“I missed you more, Mathew.”

He shook his head, dipping down to leave sloppy kisses on her neck. Taken aback, she let a shaky breath escape. He pulled back, satisfied with the response he’d pulled from her.

“Not possible.”

In a moment of boldness (and a slight hope to allow a fantasy to come to life) she challenged him.

“Prove it, then.”

His eyes darkened, then, and he surged forward. Her remaining clothes, which was just his sweatshirt and a flimsy cami, were gone in an instant. She was left in just a pair of black undies, Mat nearly cumming on the spot at the sight, like he’s some horny teenager. His apparel soon joined the growing pile on the floor, as she made a remark about how it wasn’t fair he was still so covered.

She shamelessly raked over his naked form, save for the black boxers, with his firm muscles, sore from the roadie, prominent as ever. She might’ve been drooling, she wasn’t sure. He smirked, the effect he had on her not lost to him.

The two began to kiss again, and there was no other way to describe it other than that it just felt right.

Mathew wasted no time, allowing his hand to trail down and cup her clothed heat, his thumb passing over her clit and past her entrance with a feather light touch. She shivered, her hips lifting up to chase the brief sensation. He pulled her panties to the side, teasing her entrance with his middle finger.

It was immediately covered in her slick, as was the black fabric he’d moved aside. It made him groan just from the sensation alone, making her chuckle at his behavior. Her laugh soon was cut off as he sunk the finger in, giving her no time to adjust, not that she needed it with how ready she was for it, before adding another.

His palm just barely grazed her begging clit as he pumped in and out slowly. And as she continued to lift her hips trying to feel him deeper, push his hand closer to her clit, she fully expected him to push her down and put her in her place.

But this whole thing was about showing him how much he missed her, how much he appreciated her. To show her that he was staying. And him staying meant that he’d have plenty of chances in the future to be an insufferable tease, but right now wasn’t one of those times.

“Matty, please-“ it was more of a breathy whine, not intelligible to an untrained ear. But thankfully for her, that wasn’t Mat.

“You want more, baby?” He questioned, knowing the answer. She nodded, hair splayed around her like a halo on the pillow. She was still illuminated from the TV screen and the salt lamp, making her look like an angel of sorts, not of this world.

“Look at me then, sweetheart. Wanna see that I’m makin’ you feel good.”

Her eyes that met his were glazed over and doe like, and it melted Mat’s insides at just one look. He did his best to push down the mushy feeling that arose, before realizing he didn’t have to anymore. He could feel as sickeningly in love as he wanted, no consequences.

“You’re so beautiful, baby. So needy, fuckin’ perfect girl.” He remarked, adding in a third finger. She let out a borderline pornographic cry, and Mat picked up his pace. His gaze only faltered from her face, contorting in pleasure, back to where he was pumping in and out of her, unable to resist the urge to watch in amazement.

Though her legs were flailing, going from propped up to sliding down and spread, rustling the comforter, she somehow had enough mind to reach a hand down. She attempted to run tight circles around her clit, but not before her hand was pinned to her side by the center above her,

“No, baby. Lemme.”

His range of motion was wider and his thrusts harder as he curled his fingers to perfectly hit that spot inside her that made her see stars, fully trailing his hand over her sex. He repeated the action again, and again, and again- and fuck, she didn’t know how long she’d go on like this but she never wanted the feeling to stop.

He felt her tighten around him, and he picked up his pace, knowing she was almost there.

“Mat!” she managed to get out between strangled moans and panting breaths. He leaned down, kissing below her ear on the one spot he knew drives her crazy. She was halfway thinking, well, less than halfway with her state at the moment, that he would cruelly pull his hand away as she reached her peak. So she clamped her thighs together in an attempt to trap him, subconsciously more than not.

It didn’t stop him from grinding his palm against her like he had been, leaning down to capture her lips with his in a searing kiss.

Everything at once was just so much, the obscene sounds coming from both their mouths and her wet heat, the feeling of Mathew’s bare skin on top of her, the feeling of warmth radiating from his body, and oh my God, after so long it’s fucking finally happening-

He felt as her chest seized and she pulled away from the kiss, her head slamming back before falling to the side. She cried out, her orgasm hitting her like nothing had before.

He found her lips in the chaos beneath him, his hand parting her thighs as she went lax, lazily pumping in and out as she rode out her high. Her slick coated the inside of her thighs, and Mat pulled away momentarily and she whined, like the little brat she was allowing herself to be.

He only smirked, leaning down to kiss on her collarbone, letting his tongue sweep over the seemingly shimmering expanse of skin before him. He moved further down, savoring the taste of her, how it felt to be so close to her. No guards up, no shields, no screening involved.

She moved her ring clad hands to run fingers through his locks, that fucking smile coming across her face. He looked up from where his hands were holding either side of her waist, his fingers digging into the soft flesh just enough to not make it hurt, but to say “I’m here. I’m not leaving.” His chin rested above her bellybutton, and he felt suddenly seen, bashful almost. He continued his trail down in a half assed attempt to hide his face, her breath hitching when he made it to her mound.

Her breath barely returned to her as he skipped over where she thought he was headed, instead opting to take her right leg over his shoulder, moving down the expanse of it to her ankle. He brought his eyes to meet hers, and a tender hand ran up and down the distance of it. He kissed the inside of her ankle, making his way up to the skin where her thigh met her already aching sex.

He lightly nudged his nose against the area, before attaching his lips. He started sucking on the skin there, licking her clean. Satisfied, he moved to the other side, beginning his good work.

“Mat,” she broke her silence, her voice splintered and low, “don’t tease. Please.”

He raised his eyebrows, seemingly in jest.

“I think we’re a little far gone from teasing, eh?” He asked, and truthfully, one mind blowing orgasm later, they were.

She chuckled, rolling her eyes. “Yeah, yeah. Whatever hotshot.”

“New nickname?” He questioned. “I like it.” He huffed, returning to his place between her legs. “But I fucking love this pussy, baby.”

And with that, he dove in. He immediately groaned at what he had found. (Which, obviously, caused her to tug at that perfect head of hair, eliciting another groan.)

If possible, she had become even wetter with the mix of his spit and her nectarine juices. It dripped down his chin, and he wanted to stay there forever. He’d found solace there, he thought. No Maple Leafs, no Tito, no hatty that meant jackshit in the end.

Just her and her consummate being. Vibrant, saccharine. His.

He wasn’t sure how long he spent drawing her closer and closer to the edge, but somewhere between repeated chants of praises and whatnot, he’d slipped.

“Fucking love this cunt, fucking love you-“

He hadn’t realized what he said, and if he had, he didn’t seem to care. But his words alone were enough to rip an unassuming orgasm from her. She didn’t allow herself long enough to think about if he meant to say it or not, or even to ride out the aftershocks rolling through her nerves. She grabbed him by the shoulders, forcing him away from her glistening cunt and up to where she connected their lips.

A small sound of surprise, not reluctance, escaped from where they were joined. Her hands came to cradle either side of his face, and Mat thinks that he might’ve cried from the tender action. He wasn’t sure, but he wasn’t going to ask. Hey, it’d been a long day.

“You mean it?”

He realized what he had said, then, eyes wide and somehow his face even more flushed than before. He considered lying, like when Tito had asked who he was texting and he’d said a friend.

But where would that leave him, he wondered?

“Yeah.”

“Yeah, I did.” He added after a beat of silence.

And in those few moments nothing had seemed scarier.

Not when he was 18, getting skipped over by teams in the draft, and that voice in the back of his head had told him that, somehow, everyone had collectively decided to skip Mathew Barzal. Not when he was 19 playing in his first game for the Isles, having to follow up Auston Matthews first NHL game where he had four goals. Four. Fuck.

No, all that was topped by this. By the same fear he’d had earlier when he’d been on the bus, or when he’d arrived at her apartment.

But all of that fear was dissolved in a second after her laugh sounded out in the small bedroom, her eyes crinkling at the edges. She pulled him down towards her, and the sound of her laughter pulled a radiant smile from the hockey player that he felt like hadn’t seen the light of day in a long time.

She rolled over on top of his chest, leaning forward and throwing her arms around his neck. His chain was glinting, now, in the light she had previously been bathed in, and it caught her eye as it rested against his milky complexion.

“You looooove me.” She regarded in a sing-song voice, and Mat rolled his eyes despite the smile growing on his face. She leaned down, and Mathew’s grip on her bare hips tightened, all too aware of the wet spot left on his stomach from her leaking sex.

She mirrored his previous movements down his chiseled body, a regular Adonis in his own right. She left open mouthed kisses, the wet patches from them adding to the thin sheen that covered his body. She made her way down to his boxers, the obvious tent making her stifle a laugh. He caught it though, of course, and rolled his eyes for what seemed like the millionth time.

“Laugh it up, babe. Laugh at my misery.” He commented, to which she only shook her head.

“Patience is a virtue, Mathew.”

“You’re one to talk.”

Well, he had a point there.

So rather than talk, she decided she’d put her mouth to good use. She pulled down his boxers at a painstakingly slow rate, watching as his cock slapped up against his stomach. Her mouth watered at the sight, the tip red and weeping, begging to be attended to. He kicked off the boxers, paying no mind to how they slipped onto the floor, forgotten. She didn’t either, as she was sure he had to have some extra in one of his gazillion bags sitting in her entry way.

Her nails scratched down his stomach, angry red lines puffing up and decorating around the expanse of his skin. They were accompanied by freckles and marks and scars that she could have mapped together with her eyes closed. She knew Mathew like the back of her hand. And with that, came knowing how to make him come undone in her hands.

She started leaving small kisses at the base of his shaft, before swiping the bead of precum from his head down to the rest of him. She pumped her hand a few times, and Mathew let out a strangled moan. She thought he couldn’t get any louder, feeling bad for her neighbors at whatever hour in the night it was, but she was quickly proven wrong.

She licked a long stripe from the bottom to his tip, before taking as much of him into her mouth as she could. She bobbed her head a few times, jacking off whatever she couldn’t fit with her hands. She hollowed her cheeks, and the rise and fall of Mathew’s chest quickened. The sound he let out was animalistic, and it sent another wave of arousal through her body. She moaned involuntarily, and the feeling caused Mathew to buck his hips.

“You’re doing so good, baby. ‘M not gonna last with you going at me- shit- like that.”

He brought a large hand down to the side of her face, lightly stroking her cheek. It was a moment of wholesomeness that reminded them what they were now, what he had said.

Mat could tell she was tired, her pace decreasing. The look in her eyes never changed, though. And as he went to speak to tell her it was okay, and she didn’t have to (and because since it had been so long, he was scared he’d bust his load if she wasn’t careful), she pulled off.

A string of saliva followed, and the sight looked like a thumbnail of a shitty porno. Her eyes were droopy and glazed over, and Mat’s hypothesis was proven correct.

“It’s okay, sweetheart. You don’t have to finish. Let me take care of you.” He repeated his sentiment from earlier. She only shook her head, continuing to jack him off with her hand. Oh. He thought. That’s not what I was expecting.

“S’okay, Matty. Wanna make you feel good.”

She ran her thumb over his tip again, her glassy and swollen bottom lip hanging ajar as she concentrated. The moans he was letting slip free could only be described as pathetic, the 190 pound hockey player putty in her hands.

“I’m gonna cum if you don’t, God, baby, shit! I-If you don’t stop.”

And then she pulled her hand off, and he let out a quick breath at the momentary relief, if that was even the right word. But it was short lived, and she managed to hoist herself up, dragging her folds along his cock, before stabilizing herself with hands on his chest. He slid inside of her, and the sounds they both let out echoed off her walls.

She started moving, and then it was “You’re fuckin’ amazing, you know that? So fuckin’ amazing. My girl, my perfect girl.” He rambled, the events of just that day alone scrambling his mind trying to keep up. Similarly to how she felt earlier, everything was just too much for the poor man. She felt like Heaven around him, and he watched in awe from below her as she moved, enamored by the woman he loves.

As she became more and more tired, her movement slowed, reduced to her grinding herself down on his cock. Mat was barely hanging on, trying to make it last as long as possible. He could tell she was close too, as she squeezed him like a vice, and put her energy into picking up her pace.

“Fuck, Matty. Feels s’good. Love you- shit! I love you so much, baby.” She told him, her eyes closed and her face screwed up as she chased her high. But something snapped in Mathew at her confession, and with a quick “fuck” under his breath, he flipped the two of them without ever leaving her.

He was relentless.

He slammed in and out, and at the sudden change in position and pace, she was blindsided. She thrashed around him, her hands everywhere at once. Her hair, his hair, grasping at his shoulders, scratching down his back. She settled for his biceps, as his hands were planted. One on the right side of her head, the other gripping her hip bone so hard, she was sure it’d bruise.

“It’s only ever been you, baby. I promise you.”

“Shit, Mat!” She cried, tears forming in the corners of her eyes. She loosely draped her legs around his middle, allowing him to reach new depths within her. He was fucking her senseless, and they fucking loved it.

“It’ll only ever be you. I love you. Fuck, I love you so much, Y/n.” His hair hung in his eyes as he fought to keep them open. He shook it out of his eyes, wanting to see her as she came in all her glory.

“Love you, Mat. So much, baby. You have no idea.”

His pelvis snapped harder against her, just barely reaching up and grazing her clit in the most exquisite way. The rope in her stomach began to tighten for the third time that night, so close to breaking she could almost taste it.

Actually, she could taste it, she realized. She had been biting down so hard on her bottom lip she could taste the metallic tang on her tongue, and fuck, it was all the more delectable.

“Mat!” It was another exclamation, followed by more babbles. “‘S too much, Matty, can’t do it.” Her voice was small, and despite the nature of the statement, Mat felt his heart flutter.

He shook his head. “Yes, you can, baby. I know you’re tired, but you can do it, Y/n. You’ve got another one in you sweetheart, pull through for me. I’ve got you.”

And never one to disappoint, especially not her Mathew, she did.

She came, and she came hard. But it wasn’t dramatic the way you’d think it’d be, at least not outwardly. Her breathing stopped, her toes curled, and her nails dug into the skin on Barzy’s arms. It wasn’t accompanied by a loud scream, or a drawn out, high pitched moan. It was a breath of relief that left her when she came, her head falling to the side and her eyes closing. A quiet moan of Mat’s name, and she was clamping down on him.

The sweet way his name fell off her tongue, mixed with how she was so damn tight around him as she came, and he was done for. It triggered his own orgasm, and he felt the same feeling of peace wash over him that she had as he spilled into her. He fucked her through it, soft thrusts calming whatever aftershocks they both were experiencing. She had gone limp under him, her eyes opening as she gave him the sweetest smile he’d ever seen.

He stayed in her, lowering himself onto his side, then maneuvering them so she was laying on him. They were a cliché and they knew it, but they couldn’t seem to care. A few moments passed in comfortable silence, before it was broken by Mathew’s scratchy post-sex voice. Swoon.

“So,” he started. She raised a brow, wondering where he was going with this.

“You looooove me, too, then?” He mimicked her tone from earlier, and they broke out in a fit of laughter as she slapped his arm and rolled her eyes.

“Yeah, yeah. I guess you’re alright.” She feigned annoyance, propping herself up on her right arm as she faced the man she loved. Mat scoffed, blowing a strand of hair from his forehead. “Just alright? You’re crazy, lady.”

“But you love me.”

Not a beat passed before “I do.”

She smiled softly, lifting up a hand to run a finger along his jaw. He caught it with his own, never breaking eye contact as he kissed her palm. Again, swoon.

“I know.” She responded, wanting to stay in that moment forever. But, she knew that if she stayed where she was too long, she’d more than likely fall asleep in record time. So, she pressed a chaste kiss to the corner of his mouth, which he turned to catch before she could go, pulling her back for a “real” kiss at his protest.

A petulant child, that’s what he is.

She pressed one more to his lips for good measure, before pulling himself off of him. They both let out disgruntled sounds at the sudden losses, and it took all her energy to sit up on the edge of her bed. She felt a strong jaw on her shoulder, and she leaned into it.

“Where you goin’? Leaving me all alone isn’t very nice.” She could hear the frown in his voice, and even though she knew he was joking, it tugged on her heartstrings that little bit.

“Gotta pee.” She said, standing up and walking towards the connecting bathroom. “Sorry baby, no UTIs for me.”

The frown stayed cemented on his face.

“You should be grateful,” she threw over her shoulder, shutting the door. “No UTIs, more fucking, yeah?”

He chuckled at her bluntness, deciding to go and get her some water and maybe a snack. Shit, he didn’t know. What was he supposed to do? Usually when they fucked before, her or Mat would be out the door as soon as possible, still trying to ward off those pesky feelings. But now, he was allowed to feel said pesky feelings, and he’d be damned if he fucked it up.

So, snack. And water? Yeah, water, for sure. He was hungry and thirsty, why wouldn’t she be. He had no idea the way around her kitchen, nor how to, er, actually make anything, so this would be rough. But, first, a pit stop.

He would have walked butt-ass naked into her kitchen, really, but then he remembered Warrior was out there and he didn’t have a need to traumatize that dog any further than he already was.

(It was one time, okay? He didn’t know she had a dog, he’d been asleep on his bed by the TV when they’d gotten to her place. And at the time, Mat was too preoccupied to notice.)

He looked around on the floor for the offending clothing item, slightly grossed out when he did finally find them. It was only for a minute, tops, is what he told himself, as he pulled on the boxers from earlier in the night.

He tiptoed, for literally no apparent reason, through the dark apartment until he found the bag he was looking for. He grabbed what he needed from it, struggling with the zipper while trying to close it, before giving up. On his way back to her room, he gave Warrior a nod and smile, and he swore the mutt gave one back. Okay, actually, on second thought, he remembered the clock on her microwave saying it was 3:18 AM, so, maybe he didn’t.

It was late and he just had the best sex of his life with the woman he loves. Give him a break. So what if he’s delusional and thinks he can communicate with dogs? At least he’s pretty.

When he gets to her room, he pulls on the newer, clean, pair of boxers, setting the other pair he grabbed from his bag on the bed for her when she got out of the bathroom, along with an Islanders shirt that he’d secretly always wanted to see her in. Too soon? Maybe. But after so long yearning for everything domestic and wholesome and good that he was convinced he didn’t deserve with her, he was indulging a little bit. So sue him.

His next stop, snacks. And water, can’t forget the water.

The water was easy enough, he got lucky. He grabbed her “emotional support cup” as she’d called it before when she thought he wasn’t listening, and went over to the fridge. He got a few ice cubes and put them in, and then went over to her Brita. He stood there, pressing down on the little lever, watching the steady stream of water into the cup. It was almost laughable, how he stood there in the dead silence, concentrating so hard. He was determined not to somehow do something wrong, even though it was just pouring a cup of water. Cute.

He checked the pantry once the cup was full, with the lid safely screwed on top. The rustling about caught the attention of Warrior, who hopped down from where he’d been on the couch, moseying on over.

Mat, who still was slightly wary of Warrior, despite the fact the dog would cause him no harm, shook his head at the mutt.

“Sorry, buddy. I don’t have anything for you.”

He turned his head and gave him puppy dog eyes, pulling out all the stops. Mat sighed, looking back to the pantry. He saw a box of Milkbones, and looked back to Warrior, who was egging him on. (They’re telepathically connected, remember?)

He reached in the box, pulling one out, and tossing it down. Warrior gratefully accepted, taking his treat and waltzing off to his bed to chow down. Mat looked in the pantry, going to close the box, when he sees it, his saving grace.

White bread, hallelujah.

He can do toast. Mathew Barzal is a totally capable 25 year old man who can make toast. So, he takes the bag, going over to the toaster. And-

One look at all those fancy buttons, and he’s tapped out.

Okay, it’s okay, he can remember seeing a vending machine on his way into her apartment. Yeah, he remembers her telling him about having to sign off on some HOA form for it, even though she was just renting. Apparently, her landlord hadn’t signed, which made it her job. Whatever, that’s irrelevant.

He figured that there wouldn’t be anybody out in her hallway at 3:23 AM, so he grabbed his coat with his wallet, shrugging it on over his bare back. His slides were somewhere in his hockey bag and the last thing he wanted to do was stink up her whole place by opening that Pandora’s box. So, barefoot it is.

He does his best to sneak out the apartment, leaving the door ajar as he makes the short walk to the vending machine, grateful his search was over. He let out a long sigh as he stood, wondering what to get her.

For himself he decided on a bag of cool ranch Doritos, and a bag of those tiny cookies. For her, he racked every corner of his brain for potential options, before realizing how long he’s taking, and how long he’d been gone. So, not wanting to waste any more time, he elected for one of everything.

He punched in the numbers and paid, attempting to grab them from the machine. Trying to pick up the few that had fallen, he leaned down. His attention was called elsewhere by the ”click!” of a door a few units down. His head snapped to the source of the sound.

“You’ve got to be shitting me.” He muttered under his breath upon what he saw.

A man probably not much older than himself, suitcase and backpack in tow, donned in, you guessed it, a New York Islanders hoodie a lá number 13.

The man had yet to notice the star player down the hall from him, and Mat was considering just making a run for Y/n’s place. But either way, he would have to go past the man, or the man would have to go past Mat to get to the elevator. Maybe he’d take the stairs? He hoped. Shit, who was he kidding, he’s not taking the stairs.

Starting his walk over, the unnamed Islanders fan lifted his head, stopping in his tracks. His jaw dropped, and if it wasn’t purely because of being in the presence of Mat Barzal, he had a hunch what it was.

Said hunch, was that it was due to the fact Mat Barzal was standing in front of him, in an apartment complex definitely not boujee enough for him to be living in, at 3:25 in the morning, naked, except for boxers and some fancy trench coat, holding several bags of snacks.

Mat would’ve laughed at the guys face, but he thought he wasn’t quite in the position to do so.

“Hey, man. How’s it going?” And a stupid bro nod, was all Mathew could manage.

While he was facing that debacle, Y/n was having one of her own.

After she’d gone to the bathroom, she decided to try to do her nighttime routine, too. She put on her robe from where it had been hanging in her bathroom, beginning her little routine.

When she emerged 10 minutes later, Mat was nowhere to be seen.

His bags were still by the door, albeit one of them hastily thrown open. Was he leaving and had gotten some clothes and an Uber? Did he have last minute regrets? The door to her place was left open, and an overwhelming sadness began to take over her system. As the tears began to well up, she looked over to Warrior, only to notice him chewing on… a milkbone? How the hell did he get a milkbone?

She sniffled, wiping her sleeve under her nose. She sat down on her couch, looking at where her iced coffee from earlier was still sitting, ¾ of the way empty. The tears started to flow freely again after that, and she stood up, deciding that she should at least shut the door. She didn’t need to deal with a robbery, too.

As she stood and turned, she was met with a very discombobulated and very underdressed Mat trying to shove his way through the door.

“Have a good flight, man. Enjoy Miami!” Mat called over his shoulder to what sounded like her neighbor Gian, based off of the “Thanks bro, good luck this season!” she heard back.

She slapped a hand over her mouth, trying to not bust out laughing at the sight in front of her. Hearing her snickering, he looked up gesturing to the bags in his arms.

“Hungry?” He asked, the smile on his face falling when he saw the red around her eyes. He dropped all the snacks on the couch to his right, making his way over to where she stood.

“Hey, hey, why’re you crying? What’s wrong sweetheart?” He questioned, and his sincerity made her smile widely.

“Nah, I’m all good, don’t worry about it. Just thought you’d left, that’s all…” A pause. “But I see now that you just had a case of munchies, apparently.”

He wrapped his arms around her shoulders pulling her towards his chest. His chin rested on her head, and she closed her eyes, inhaling his scent.

“No, baby. God, no, I’m not leaving. I just wanted to do this whole thing right, and I thought you might be hungry, and I tried to make toast- your toaster is really complex by the way,”

She pulled away from him as he rambled, her smile reaching her eyes.

“And I filled your water and set out clothes for you and I really did try, baby. I didn’t mean to fuck anything up, really.”

She giggled again, taking hold of the shoulders of his jacket, shrugging it off. She folded it over the back of a barstool, then turned back towards Mat.

“And Gian?”

“Oh yeah, he’s cool. Ran into him in the hallway and introduced myself. Going to visit some family in Miami.”

She raised an eyebrow, nodding her head in understanding. She stepped closer, wrapping her arms around his middle.

“So, am I gonna have to compete with him for your attention now whenever you come over?”

He reciprocated the action, one hand coming up to rest on her chin.

“I mean, he’s gonna be gone for two weeks, but after that…” he shrugged, trailing off. She hummed, and he smiled at her, leaning forward. He searched her eyes for any remaining upset, unable to find any, before he pressed his lips to hers. It was sweet and gentle, with not a hint of rush or fervor.

When they pulled apart, she was smiling again. Her hands found their way back to his neck.

“And baby, you’re amazing. You didn’t fuck up anything at all, I promise.”

“Promise?”

“Promise.” She whispered, leaning in again to connect their lips. She let her tongue sweep over his bottom lip, biting down just barely before pulling away. She pushed down the sleeves of her robe just a bit, exposing her shoulders. Y/n took his hand, and started walking backwards, letting it slowly slip out of hers as she did.

“Come on, hotshot. Come to bed. Snacks will still be there in the morning.”

She smiled again briefly, before walking towards her room, the robe slipping down as she went. Mat stood watching her in total awe, glued in place, until he was knocked out of his trance.

“Hurry up! And lock the door, too, please!”

He had never obliged to anything quicker in his life.

(And as for the snacks, they were not still there in the morning, thanks to a certain mutt who managed to rip open all the packets on the couch. The next morning was spent at the vet, who had told them Warrior would be fine, just fat. The vet had only said this, though, after Mat had consoled a crying Y/n, who was under the impression he was going to be poisoned.

The rest of the day after that? Making up for lost time.)

FIN.

YO idk if that was good or not i kind of feel like i imagined writing the entire thing and it was a fever dream. but. anyway! if you liked it, be sure to reblog <3 thank u i love u! go eat some protein and drink some water.

xx, hj

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dazais-guardian-angel · 1 year

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Dazai truly has become Oda in every way imaginable now. :’ ) the final words he gives to Sigma are the exact same words Oda gives to Dazai in the original scene Asagiri wrote for the end of the Dark Era stage play, 後は頼んだよ, “I will leave the rest to you.”

And I really love the progression of the way his eyes look in this chapter, and how Sigma is allowed to have this moment of questioning and rebelling against all the faith Dazai had naturally been leading him to place in him up to this point, which is what I hoped would happen. He’s been confused ever since Dazai first chose him, and everything he’s ever known about how everyone sees/treats him turned upside down by Dazai’s words and actions, and just when he’s finally started to feel like he’s found some hope and lowered his guard, Dazai pulls him back underwater, instantly reinforcing all of Sigma’s trust issues and reinforcing that he should never believe in anyone, because (he thinks) everyone lives to manipulate other people. Dazai’s dark eyes here reinforce that, too, and the other panels around this point where they look white and hollow and demonic, all like Fyodor’s. He appears like an evil, looming force pulling him back under, trying to kill him, when Sigma is so close to the freedom of the air he desperately wants (aka free from pain, which is what he’s been seeking his whole life).

But then Dazai makes this face, and the first one I posted above, and Sigma understands, even without words, that Dazai doesn’t have evil intent: on the contrary, he actually is bound and determined to save his life -- and the light in his eyes comes out through this determination and kindness, arguably the most light we’ve ever seen his eyes have in the entire manga (in the “I leave the rest to you” panel too). The “No” could be Dazai wordlessly telling him to not leave the water, but my first assumption was that it was Sigma telling himself no, stopping his own train of thought about Dazai being the same as Fyodor and someone he shouldn’t have trusted -- he soon realizes why Dazai stopped him, and that he’s still going to try to save him, that he wasn’t wrong about him, and it’s all because Dazai’s earnest expressions get through to him.

And it’s just so heartwarming to see how far Dazai has come. :’ ) He tried so hard to save Sigma (doing the most physical action we’ve ever seen him do, really), did his best to be reassuring and comforting to him afterwards, and then reaffirmed his promise to ensure he escaped Meursault alive, his final words to Sigma echoing Oda’s and his last action being to save an orphan, just like Oda did in his last moments. Obviously Dazai isn’t actually going to die, he’ll be saved somehow, but I do think as of right now he really does think this is the end for him, and that he didn’t foresee the elevator dropping -- he was examining the wires a few chapters ago because he thought he might need to know how to open the doors in case Fyodor pulled an uno reverse, hence why he looks more annoyed than shocked when the water starts, but here, when the drop collision sequence is initiated, he looks genuinely shook in comparison. There’d be no reason for him to give the thumbs up if he knew more danger was on the way, either; that’d just be cruel. No, I don’t think he saw this coming, and it’s important that that turns out to be the case: it’s important that he spent what he believes to have been his last moments saving someone like Oda wanted for him, and doing what Oda would have done in the same situation. That doesn’t mean that it’s okay that Dazai throws his life away so easily, and cares so little for his own safety; he still has a long way to go in that regard. But it’s still so beautiful to see how much he’s changed, and how much he’s truly begun to embody Oda and his legacy; the fact that he messed up and miscalculated, because Dazai isn’t infallible, but in turn didn’t hesitate to use his last moments to save Sigma. Oda would be so proud for everything he did here. :’ ) 💖

There are a lot of options for how Dazai will be saved, and by who, but personally I hope (and I kind of expect) that Sigma chooses to not give up on him and ultimately plays a role in saving his life, to return the favor and repay him for his kindness. Not only would it be a beautiful way to initiate Sigma’s ADA entrance exam as people have said, but it would bring the Dazai > Atsushi > Sigma chain full circle: Dazai saved Atsushi at the start of the series, allowing him to (spiritually) save Sigma at sky casino thanks to the growth fostered in him by Dazai, and now finally, Sigma could potentially save Dazai thanks to Atsushi kickstarting his own growth (and Dazai continuing it). Fyodor is overly cocky right now and so tunnel-visioned on killing Dazai, it’s possible that he has no idea that Sigma managed to escape the elevator and is now a wild card; even if Sigma doesn’t go as far as killing Fyodor himself (which I don’t want, tbh; that’s endgame stuff arcs down the line and imo Nikolai and Dazai should be the ones involved with that), he could throw a wrench in the jailbreak duel, and help Dazai and Chuuya get out alive. It would be poetic, and only fitting, for Fyodor to underestimate and be outdone by the kind of person Dazai told him is the strongest in chapter 77 -- a self-proclaimed “ordinary man” -- who could only have the strength to take such action thanks to the chain of kindness that Oda originally started. 💖

#bungou stray dogs #bsd 106.5 #meta #this chapter was literally everything i could have wanted i am SO EMOTIONAL #I WILL NEVER BE OVER IT #ASAGIRI GIVING ME LITERALLY EVERYTHING I EVER COULD HAVE WANTED #DAZAI HAS GROWN SOOOO MUCH HE'S BECOME SO MUCH LIKE ODA I COULDN'T BE MORE PROUD 😭😭😭💖💖💖#as soon as i saw that big panel of his face i was like........ he looks like oda......... ASAGIRI I SEE YOUUUUUU #AND THE FINAL WORDS #I SEE YOUUUUUUUUUU #ISTG IF DAZAI THINKS ABOUT ODA WHEN HE THINKS HE'S GONNA DIE BEFORE HE GETS SAVED I WILL SPONTANEOUSLY COMBUST #ASAGIRI PLEASE THIS IS THE PERFECT OPPORTUNITY I WILL CRYYYYYYY 😭🥺🥹💖#Dazai was so much like Oda here and Sigma looked just like Atsushi in that one panel DONT TOUCH MEEEE #THIS WHOLE CHAPTER WAS SO PERFECT #I NEED SIGMA TO SAVE HIM NOW #the longest chapter we've gotten in AGES and it was a banger god bless #tbh i really needed this after season 4 lmao i needed a reminder of why i love this series so much :''''') something to soothe my rage #asagiri saw my bitterness at anime sigma and was like 'here u go babe i got your sigma and dazai and oda feast'#probably means next month will be short again and a pov change lmao 🥲💔#gonna enjoy this while it lasts #anyway i was really happy to see that moment of Sigma getting mad even if it didn't last long (and for a beautiful reason)#because he Deserved that #(because that's what i wrote in my fic and i feel vindicated now even if that wasn't the main focus of this chapter looool oops-)

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artiststarme · 1 year

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...You Make Lemonade

A little snippet based on a comment made by @straight4joekeery in my "When Life Gives You Lemons..." post. "Women are like lemons, I love lemons!" I loved it so much, I had no choice but to write an entire fic about it!

~*~*~*~

Everyone knew that Eddie Munson was a weird kid. He had long hair, listened to music that was more screaming than singing, and never bent to fit any mold. So why would he conform to society’s boring sayings when he could make his own? Ever since he was a kid, he’s had a habit of constructing his own phrases and idioms.

Sometimes it would be something close enough to the original idiom that no one would call him out on it. The phrase, “I’ll burn that bridge when I get to it” has become a common one amongst the boys of Hellfire. He used to say “he’d kill for less” but that seemed a little too brash in light of what occurred over Spring Break what with his murder accusation and innocent teens dying.

Nevertheless, some of Eddie’s more outlandish sayings had worked their way into everyday speech for the Party. It wasn’t uncommon to hear one of the kids talking about the “devil kicking their kidneys” during physical exertion or mentioning how “neutral, and not even chaotically” people were when they bored them (a reference to Eddie’s least favorite moral alignment in D&D). However, the sayings always seemed stranger coming out of Lucas’ or even Dustin’s mouths than they did Eddie’s.

The point is, everyone that has ever met Eddie knows that he can say some pretty off-the-wall things. However, Steve had never been privy to the sayings with Eddie’s odd twists until a random weekday afternoon spent getting high in his trailer. It all started because the weather was getting warmer. Eddie was supplying the weed so Steve brought refreshments for the both of them to enjoy.

“Do you want some lemonade?” He asked him, his hands already passing him a bottle.

Eddie nodded. “Well, you know what I always say. Men are like lemonade and I like lemonade.”

Then he took the bottle and a long gulp.

Steve paused for a moment and just stared at Eddie. Was this a big coming out like it had been with Robin in the movie theater bathroom? What had Robin told him to say in this situation?

“Um, thank you for telling me. I’m honored that you trusted me enough to divulge that information about yourself and I accept you.”

Eddie turned to him with barely concealed panic in his eyes but that quickly turned to mirth upon hearing Steve’s reply. “That was the most rehearsed and scripted response I’ve ever heard. How’d you learn that, did you see it in a PSA?”

“No! Ro- my friend told me that’s what sh-they wished someone had said to he-them,” Steve stumbled. Holy shit, he almost outed Robin. That’s like the worst thing you can do to a friend!

Eddie looked at him fondly. “That’s adorable, Stevie. Also, I know about Robin.”

“What?! How do you know about Robin?”

“Birds of a feather, Steve. They flock together,” he commented wisely and took another drag of their shared joint.

“Oh, that makes sense. That’s probably why I’m friends with you guys. You know, because I’m bi.”

Immediately, Eddie’s eyes went wide and he took a sharp inhale which caused him to cough uncontrollably. Once his breathing started to return to normal, he choked, “bi?”

Steve nodded sagely, “yeah, bi. As in bisexual. That’s what you call it when you like both guys and girls.”

“I got that,” Eddie said, rolling his eyes dramatically. “Just you? You’re the straightest person I’ve ever met.”

“Hey, don’t insult me! Just because I still like girls doesn’t minimize my attraction to guys. I’m going to tell Robin that you-”

“No, no, no! I’m not judging you, I’m just surprised. But uh, thank you for telling me.” Eddie leaned over the space between them and gave Steve’s shoulder an awkward pat.

“Okay, what the hell was that?” Steve asked him in the bitchiest tone he could muster. “Give me a hug like a normal person.”

Eddie gave a long-suffering sigh but the grin on his face showed his jest. “If you wanted to get your hands on me, you should’ve just said so.”

When Wayne walked in on his nephew and Steve Harrington making out on his couch just a few hours later, he couldn’t even say he was surprised. Scarred forever and washing his eyes out with soap? Yes. But not surprised.

Permanent tag list:@doubleb11 @nburkhardt @zerokrox-blog @newtstabber @i-less-than-three-you @carlyv @pyrohonk @straight4joekeery @trippypancakes @conversesweetheart @estrellami-1 @suddenlyinlove @yikes-a-bee @swimmingbirdrunningrock @perseus-notjackson @anaibis @merricatty @maya-custodios-dionach @grtwdsmwhr @manda-panda-monium @lumoschild

#it takes months for Steve to be able to look Wayne in the eye #The kids are embarrassed that the weird comments Eddie's been saying for months got them together #Robin gives Eddie a shovel talk so brutal that he almost flees the state just to escape her threats #but Steve's puppy eyes make him stay #stranger things #steddie #fanfic #steve harrington #eddie munson #robin buckley #uncle wayne

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cult-of-the-eye · 1 month

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inspired by @archivus' statements, i decided to give it a try myself

tw for depersonalisation, body image issues, body horror, slight gore

Out of Body Experience

Statement of Rebekah Fitch, regarding something that wasn’t her body. Original statement given 5th March 2018. Recording by [REDACTED], Head Archivist of the Magnus Institute, Manchester. Committed to tape 26th March 2024.

Statement begins.

I never thought I would end up like this. I just-

I guess I should start from the start.

Throughout my life, I’ve had a complicated relationship with my body. Not to get too, um, personal or anything, but let’s just say it's tough being the child of an immigrant mother, especially, well, my mother. She would make comments about my body, small ones, I’ll admit, but ones that certainly built up to…recent events. On top of all that, I spent a lot of my teen years dissociating. Tricking my brain into believing that I wasn’t real. That nothing was. It’s a bit difficult to solidify an image of your body when half of you is ashamed of it and the other half doesn’t even consider your ownership of one. Ownership. I guess that’s sort of where it all began.

It was sometime in January when it all started to go wrong. I don’t exactly have a habit of staring at myself in the mirror, in fact, the only mirror I own in my cramped little flat is the bathroom one. It’s somehow always stained, a fact which I hesitate to admit helped me live with my…issues. The point is, the majority of the time, I didn’t know how I looked.

And then one day, I watched myself wake up.

I remember exactly how it felt. You know how people sometimes slice oranges in half and then take the peel, dig their fingers into the sides and push, letting each segment split from the other, hungrily leaning up towards you? That’s how I felt. Inverted. Wrong. I saw myself in a way that I had never, ever seen before. Each and every part of me that bulged where it shouldn’t have, thinned and yellowed at the edges like a fruit in its off-season. Whatever was happening to my eyes didn’t hurt, exactly, but I could feel every single part of my body as if it had suddenly awoken from a deep unconsciousness. It disgusted me. The life of it all. I panicked, of course, I thought I was having a really, really bad dream and that all I needed to do was wake up. But, no matter how many times I attempted to shield myself from the view, no matter how many times I willed every single synapse in my brain to connect and let my goddamn eyes close, nothing happened.

That nothing was the most excruciating nothing that I had ever experienced in my life. I was forced open, boneless and writhing. The me on the bed that I was watching slept soundly.

I don’t remember when I snapped out of it. I don’t remember how long it had been. I sat up, drenched in sweat, determined to be rid of the one mirror I had left. Putting it in the bin didn’t feel as triumphant as I believed it would. I guess part of me knew that this was no one-off.

Ok, I know what you’re thinking. It could just be a hallucination. I could be traumatised or mentally ill or on drugs. Well, I’m actually all of those things, which means that I have the unique ability to prove you wrong. I know what a hallucination feels like, I know what drug side effects feel like, and I know what my episodes feel like. And this? This was entirely separate. I don’t have to tell you that it happened again. I don’t have to tell you that I went from GP to GP, therapist to therapist to find out what was happening to me. But I will end this with proof.

Statement Ends.

Post-statement records include a medical report of one Rebekah Fitch. It outlines a series of scars of unidentified means on the underside of her eyelids, spelling out the phrase “I know that I exist.” Any attempts to follow up have led to dead ends. However, I’m afraid that I may be able to guess how this one ends.

#tma #the magnus archives #tma statements #tma fanfic #how else should i tag this

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drabbles-mc · 1 year

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Catching the Red-Eye

Juice Ortiz x F!Reader

Request by Anon: I just saw a funny post that gave me a fic idea: Friend says “Our flight is at 3am so we could go drinking and then straight to the airport.” Y/N: “Sound like a great idea!” Narrator: “It was not a great idea.” Can I request a Juice x reader where she & her gf (maybe Tara or someone?) are coming back from a girls trip and Juice(&Jax or whoever) have to deal w/ whatever state they find their girls in? 😂😂

Warnings: language, alcohol

Word Count: 1.9k

A/N: I started a draft for this months ago when you first sent it in and then my computer deleted it. But I got back to it tonight because apparently my muse is only awake between 11pm and 1am these days 😂 I did tweak a couple little things from the original request but the idea of writing reader an Tara as friends just made my heart way too happy. I love them so much and I hope they have many adventures together going forward. I've missed writing slice of life stuff like this. 🥰 (Also I can't lie this made me want to write more fic for Jax and Tara. It's such a small glimpse of them here but god I mourn the missed opportunities of them just having normal relationship moments man idkidk)

A/N 2: My requests are closed this is an old one that's been sitting in my inbox for literal months. Unedited and unbetad as always lmao

SOA Taglist: @espieviolet99 @littlekittymeow @chibsytelford @juicyortiz @meadowofsinfulthoughts @i-just-read-stuff @bport76 @withmyteeth @buckybarneshairpullingkink @paintballkid711 @jitterbugs927 @fanfic-n-tabulous @mijagif @frattsparty @winchestershiresauce @beardburnsupersoldiers @choochoo284 @artemiseamoon @yourwinchesterbros @nessamc @garbinge @narcolini (If you want to be added to any of my taglists, please let me know!)

It was the first time that you’d ever actually been drunk on a plane. For all the times you heard people talk about airport bars, and all the times that flight attendants had offered you cocktails, you had never really thought much about it. You were always on the go through the airport, always had a book or something to keep you company on the flights. You had never even been buzzed near a plane, let alone drunk and on one.

Apparently the missing ingredient had been traveling with Tara. You had no idea what you had been missing out on until you had it. All because of a trip for a hospital conference. The two of you had spent the better part of your week sitting through lectures and seminars. Sure, the information was interesting, and sure, you were both thankful for the opportunity. But after an entire week in a swanky resort it felt like the two of you had nothing to show for it.

Then to top it all off, your flight got delayed. So you and Tara were stuck at the airport with a few extra hours to kill. It wasn’t long enough to justify leaving just to have to go back through security, but it was too long to just sit there doing nothing. You had no interest in the book in your backpack, and the way that Tara was looking around the airport had you thinking she was in the same predicament.

Then she turned and looked at you, eyebrows raised and a little bit of a glint in her eyes. “You know,” she leaned on the armrest between your two chairs at the terminal, “since our flight isn’t until three now, we could just…” she shrugged casually, “hit one of the bars here and head straight to our flight afterwards.”

You chuckled, trying to gage just how serious she was. “R-really?”

She shrugged, “Why not? The plane has a designated driver. Plus,” she stood up from her seat, “I think we deserve something besides pamphlets and lecture notes for the week we’ve had.” She held her hand out for you to take. “Come on. Closest bar is just a few gates down.”

Despite knowing that it was most likely going to end in a hangover on a plane, you slapped your hand into hers and let her pull you up from your seat and down the hallway. The amount of laughter erupting from the two of you were the sure sign of an impending good time.

It was such a good time, in fact, that it was a just before midnight when your phone started buzzing in your pocket. You pulled it out to see who was calling at such a late hour. You half-stifled a giggle as you showed Tara the name flashing across your screen.

“I forgot to tell him the flight got delayed.”

Her eyes widened as she laughed, taking a sip of her drink before saying, “Oh. When you tell him, make sure he tells Jax.” She let out another laugh. “I forgot to tell him, too.”

You were laughing as you answered the phone. “Hey, baby.”

“Hey,” Juice had been confused the second he dialed your number, but the drunken lilt to your voice only made him more confused. “Are you good? We're at the airport and—”

“Promise me you won’t get mad?” you asked, still giggling.

“He better not!” Tara chimed in with a laugh before ordering the two of you another round of drinks.

Juice couldn’t help but to laugh at the fact that Tara was also drunk. After getting it together, he said, “I promise I won’t get mad. What’s up?”

“Our flight got delayed.” You laughed. “Until 3AM. We aren’t,” you took a sip of the drink that Tara handed you, “we aren’t gonna be home until morning.”

Juice sighed but he wasn’t mad. All the shit that you went through because of him being in the club, all the changed and canceled plans for a myriad of reasons, you more than earned this one. Tara too.

“You’re mad,” you said.

He laughed. “I’m not mad. Just, you know, don’t get carried away and miss your flight.”

You smiled even though he couldn’t see it. “We won’t.”

“Text me later with an ETA?”

“As soon as we board the plane.”

“Alright. I love you.”

You were beaming. “I love you too.” He was halfway through saying goodbye when you remembered, “Oh! Shit. Make sure you tell Jax! Tara forgot too.”

Juice laughed. “Yea, I think he might have figured it out by now.”

You heard Jax's muffled hello on the other end of the line, laughing before finally getting around to saying one more I love you to Juice and saying goodbye.

The rest of the night into the tiny hours of the morning flew by in a bit of a blur. There was a lot of laughing, a lot of drinks. If your memory served right there were a decent number of them that you and Tara didn’t have to pay for yourselves which always seemed to make a drink taste better. It was a great time, and despite the amount of alcohol in your systems you still made it to your flight on time. You even remembered to update Juice.

The two of you managed to get your laughter somewhat under control for the sake of the other passengers on the plane. You didn’t want to keep them up with fits of giggles so you dialed it down. It didn’t take long for Tara to drift off to sleep, but you knew that wasn’t going to be happening for you until you home and in your own bed. And, with any luck, curled up with Juice.

Not sleeping had the unique upside of allowing you to nurse another drink or two on the flight. Just enough to keep you buzzed, to stop you from getting slammed with a brutal hangover. You kept yourself perfectly amused on the relatively short flight home. A few hours on a plane seemed to go by faster than in the car. Being able to watch the sun come up while still having a buzz certainly didn’t hurt.

Tara woke with a groan when you nudged her shoulder after the plane landed. She shook her head at you, not opening her eyes all the way as she felt around on the floor for her purse. “This is why I don’t drink,” she grumbled.

You laughed as you stood up, slipping your backpack on your shoulders. “No, you don’t drink because we always have to be grownups.”

“If we’re both grownups, why am I the only one who’s dying?” she asked as she reached over and snatched your sunglasses off the top of your head and put them on.

“I stayed up,” you laughed as you walked through the airport towards baggage claim, “and I stayed drunk.”

She had to laugh at that. “Smart. I’ll have to remember that next time.”

“Next time?” you said with a grin as you pulled your suitcase and then hers from the carousel. “Hell yea.”

When the two of you stepped outside, Tara immediately let out another groan at the bright morning sunlight. You couldn’t help your laughter as you continued walking, looking for either your car or Tara's. She followed along behind you, trusting you to do the real scouting on her behalf.

It wasn’t long until you saw both Jax and Juice standing on the sidewalk, leaning back against the side your car. You waved to get their attention, picking up your pace, not caring about the suitcase rolling and bouncing along behind you. The second you were close enough, you let go of the suitcase and ditched it on the sidewalk in favor of running up and hugging Juice. You hopped up, wrapping both your arms and legs around him as you buried your face into the crook of his neck.

He laughed, the impact of your jump making him stumble a step but he still caught and held onto you. He hooked his arms underneath you, holding you as your legs wrapped around his waist. He hooked his chin over your shoulder, holding you tight for a moment before you let your feet hit the ground again. Pulling back, you kissed him hard on the lips, leaving the both of you breathless and somehow still laughing.

“I missed you too,” he said with a chuckle. He leaned into it as you cupped his face in your hands. “The trip was good, then?”

“It was great!” you beamed. “Missed you, though.”

“Looks like you two did just fine without us.” He paused, looking over at Tara who was leaning into Jax as he chuckled at her hungover state. “Well, one of you did just fine.”

Jax kissed the side of Tara's head. “Rough trip, babe?”

She shook her head. “The trip was great. I’m still dying, though.” She hugged him and kissed him on the lips. “Take me home so I can die in peace.”

He laughed. “Is this how I am when I’m hungover?”

“You’re worse,” all three of you replied in unison, laughing when you realized.

Jax rolled his eyes but he was laughing too as he picked up both your suitcase and Tara's to toss them into the trunk of your car. “Let’s get you party animals home.”

You immediately ran towards the front of the car. “I call shotgun!”

You were comfortably slouched in your seat with your feet on the dash before Jax and Tara finished settling themselves in the back seat. Jax had his arm draped around her shoulders, keeping her tucked snug against his side as she got ready to lightly doze for the duration of the ride home.

Juice reached over, resting his hand on your thigh as he drove. You interlocked your fingers with his, watching the scenery through the windshield and the passenger window.

Juice squeezed your hand. “How the hell are you not, you know, super fucking hungover?”

You were too busy laughing to answer the question, so Tara piped up from the back seat for you. “Hair of the dog,” she mumbled.

You laughed as you nodded. “Something like that. I just didn’t let myself sober up all the way.” You saw the way Juice peeled his eyes off the road to look at you for a moment and shrugged. “What? The flight attendant offered! Who was I to say no? Don’t worry,” you patted his hand, “when I wake up from my nap in a few hours I will be plenty hungover. By then Tara will be doing better than I’m doing now.”

Juice dropped the two of them off at Jax's. You said a lazy goodbye from the passenger seat, the exhaustion of the week and the all-nighter finally catching up to you. You were starting to close your eyes when Juice got back into the driver's seat. He looked over at you before he put the car back in drive, unable to stop smiling at the sight of you.

You didn’t have to open your eyes to know that he was looking at you. “Yea?”

He laughed quietly. “Nothing. I love you.” He leaned over the center console so he could kiss the side of your head. “I’m glad you two had fun. I’m even more glad that you’re home.”

You opened your eyes and looked at him with a smile. “You’re a sap, Juan Carlos.”

He chuckled as he backed out of their driveway. “You love me, though.”

You couldn’t deny that. “I do. But remember that you love me in a few hours when I’m cranky and hungover.”

“When you’re trying to bury yourself in all of our pillows and blankets?”

“And trap you there with me.”

“And all of your crankiness.”

You laughed, resting your hand on top of his on the console between you. “Exactly.”

#soa #sons of anarchy #soa imagine #sons of anarchy fanfiction #juice ortiz #juice ortiz fanfiction #juice ortiz imagine #juice ortiz x you #juice ortiz x reader

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inevitableinfinity · 7 months

Text

mini kageyama character study | oikage | 500 words | originally posted here

it wasn’t that Tobio didn’t know what precious meant or that he’d never had anything that fit the descriptor. It was that (apart from volleyball, of course) he never knew something was precious until it was already gone.

He thinks back to childhood. Those days playing volleyball with Miwa, the time spent learning from Kazuyo, the years with the three of them, together—they are all precious in retrospect, but at the time, they were just part of life. He misses them with the ache of nostalgia and longing for simpler times.

When he lost his friendship with Kunimi and Kindaichi in his final year of junior high and the trust of the entire team, he realized how important they were to him. He won’t let his failure stop him from moving forward, but it does follow him, clanking shackles on the marble of an empty throne room.

What Tobio doesn’t know is how to rectify this idea of precious, how to know to treasure something while he still has it. Part of him resists it because surely if it’s important, it will end. People have proven that they will leave. Volleyball is the only constant and he finds comfort in that.

The moment he realizes his time with Oikawa is precious, Tobio freezes. They’re on a date and he makes Oikawa laugh so hard he has to crouch down. Tobio takes out his phone because I want to remember this, and the thought shakes him so badly that the picture comes out blurry. Oh no.

Oikawa glances up and aims his own phone at Tobio. “You look stupid,” he says, still laughing. Tobio can’t manage a retort back.

Tobio waits for the inevitable end, trying his best to both enjoy the time they have left together and read the signs. He’s never been good at reading signs, but it feels like everything is going okay, which will make the end that much more painful.

He can’t bring himself to say “don’t leave me too”, so he lingers for a few extra moments in Oikawa’s presence. Squeezes his hand before letting go. Clings just a little too tight.

“Why do you keep looking at me like that?” Oikawa asks one day. “I’m not going to disappear.”

Tobio shrugs but thinks he knows better.

It’s not until Oikawa is holding out a ring, wearing a smile that is both soft and self-satisfied at Tobio’s shock that he believes that it might be true.

“Um, do you mean you want to stay? With me? For the rest of your life?”

“That’s usually what getting married implies, yes.”

“Ah.” He doesn’t think he actually gives a proper response but after he stops kissing Oikawa, there’s a ring on his finger.

Tobio has only ever been sure of one thing in his life. But as he lies in bed, wrapped in his fiancé’s arms and listening to the soft snore in his ear, he’s glad he can add another to the list.

#i'm so normal about them #haikyuu #oikage #kageyama tobio #oikawa tooru #my writing #originally posted on twitter

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via-the-ghoul · 6 months

Text

A Hanging Dying dream forever repeating

AKA: the Via-Verse’s version of Alagadda’s origin.

After working off and on on this for months and debating whether or not I should post it, it’s finally, finally here! This takes some elements from other tales, but I made it my own lol.

Anyways, TW: mind-altering, body horror, death by childbirth, heavy usage of blood, emotional child abuse, plague (which has descriptions of killing people), religious themes, child abandonment, mild gore, medical themes, suicide by hanging, slit throats, and someone snaps their own neck at one point, a knife’s briefly mentioned, cosmic horror, chains, brief mentions of drinking, someone plays with another person’s trauma in an attempt to manipulate them.

Sorry about the long list of TWs, but it’s just text, no pictures.

Anyways, here we go! (The document this is saved on is 12 pages long what is wrong with me lol)

Have you ever heard of Alagadda? Probably not, most haven’t these days. It was a kingdom long ago, before it became something else at the cost of memory. Do you wish to know what happened? …Good.

It all started as most stories do: before anything noteworthily weird happened. There was a king, there was a queen, she was pregnant, they loved each other very much, and the kingdom loved them. Nothing that made it seem too different from most kingdoms.

Except, of course, for one thing. The king had a certain secret, one that would hand the ink and pen to the hands of fate for Alagadda.

He had a love for forbidden magics. His nights spent at the Wanderer’s Library, writing the names of Gods and various sights across the sea of universes. Eventually, the Way he used just closed up, but that didn’t matter. He already had what he needed to grant his greatest wish.

Dyo’s surroundings felt like a dream to him. A faint memory of a dream from centuries back, that was what this was. He knew he wasn’t in Alagadda anymore, and he felt off. Was this fear, or bewilderment? And what were these colors? And why wasn’t this entirely unfamiliar?

He could hear birds chirping somewhere on his left. Why was the sound’s location so clear? And what kind of birds were these, with a song so beautiful and clear, something he could sing along to if he possessed vocal chords?

What was this strange, new, beautiful world? The sky above him, it was blue? Was that the word for it? Why did he know the word?

Gosh, if only he still had his body. Then he could investigate this strange new world he was thrown into. See the birds. Maybe sing.

The king wished that him, his queen, and his future child would live forever. The kingdom loved them, and he loved his queen, so there was no problem he could think of. Plus he had a common trait to most mortals: thantophobia. He was a strange man driven by fear. Not very strange, actually, when comparing him to others.

He whispered into the abyss, and three brothers answered. The youngest draped in darkness, his pale face standing out with a sliver grin. The middle a strange mismash of armor and arms, dust and clutter. The eldest of pale colors, faced in pure shadows and towering over the night sky. Three ways to die. A deal was made, a game of cards for immortality.

He fought for this immortality, he really did. He was able to top the two younger. But the eldest defeated him, far, far too easily, crushing the built up hope. And then they returned to the shadows without a word, leaving him alone.

The queen gave birth three days later. The child survived, but she faded away. The child didn’t cry, covered in their mother’s blood. The king didn’t understand why, and did not hold the child. So they remained, wrapped in dark clothes by the midwife, for someone else to take care of.

Time seemed to return to a familiar melding for Dyo. He couldn’t tell how many hours it took before the sun began to set. He knew that soon, a familiar night would appear. He felt strangely sad, he rather liked this new day. But he couldn’t really hear the birds anymore, and he was rather tired of being stuck in one place. Perhaps something familiar would help this horrid wait for some poor soul to come across him.

However, a new sound came from his right. Faint, but approaching. He had heard variations of this sound back home, and it sometimes appeared in this new daytime, but never was the crushing of leaves back home, and never was it approaching him here.

Footsteps. The stepper was probably wearing boots, from the sound of it. He honestly couldn’t wait, he really wanted to move around this new world. See the birds. He wondered what new colors they would be.

The footsteps got closer and closer, until finally a shadow covered Dyo. He could feel himself smiling. He never smiled back home. He could get used to this new world. He felt a gloved hand grab him, and hold it up to the mysterious face of the new being. The face…

It was probably the most horrific face Dyo had ever seen.

The plague came after that. Sores spotted the people of the kingdom, blood and bile coming from screeching mouths. The screams of the people echoing in the streets for years. The inescapable smell of death. But the king never heard them, never smelled rot or tasted bile.

The king had hidden deep in his castle, sobbing, mourning his queen, and only his queen for all those years. Unaware of the state of his people. He had put the lords in charge of it all, the kingdom and his child. His child…

His child grew strange. They were quiet, and rarely smiled, but weren't mean. They did try to help the people, as much as a child could. Sometimes, when there was no hope that someone would survive, they would sit by their side until they fell, no matter how the doctors warned against it. Strangely, the child never grew ill themself. Despite most people accepting the child, there were… rumors about the kid. Whispers of being the devil’s child and witchcraft, which the child somewhat heard. They didn’t believe it, but… it explained why their father never played with them like other fathers did.

10 years after it all, the king finally listened, having returned from his sorrows. He heard the screams. He saw the blood, and he saw the corpses. But he didn’t blame himself, no.

He blamed the child. He accused them of not being his child, of having been a spirit possessing them sent by the brothers to torment him, bringing the plague with them wherever they went. A monster that must have killed the real child.

The child didn’t understand. They had never met their father before this, but they heard they weren’t supposed to do this. They were supposed to love their children. That was what they saw with the fathers in the street. Was this why he never showed himself? Were they really a monster? A fake? Were those whispers right?

The king ordered the child to be locked away in their room, and never let out. Proclaimed them to be a contamination spreading monster. Some believed and some didn’t, but the ones that didn’t didn’t do anything to stop it.

Perhaps they were supposed to be locked away, perhaps there was something wrong with them. That was what they wondered, anyway. Their father hid away from them for so long, after all. Perhaps this was the reason. Perhaps they were born of dust and shadows, their mother unable to bear the beast she created. Perhaps everyone was right, perhaps they doomed the townsfolk they loved by existing.

The child began to cry.

There was something completely off about the figure’s face. It had the same mask-face as the people back home, but there was something off about its construction. The mask felt too organic, the yellow eyes uncovered, sunken deep in its head. Too expressive, too wrong, that was the eyes. It’s eyes, something changed in Dyo upon seeing the creature’s eyes.

Memories began to appear in his head, of long before, of a state of wakefulness, of trees and blue birds, and colors! So many forgotten colors, bright orange paints like the sky when the sun rose, the green grass and trees he could get lost in, a blue sky, a blue sky! And purple, purple was his closest friend’s favorite.

His childhood friend. The king’s child. By the stars, the king had a child! Why couldn’t he remember more about this lost child?! What happened to them?

Dyo didn’t see the strangely beautiful abomination for long, as it wordlessly put it in a dark brown bag. Brown, he could remember the color of tree trunks and dying leaves and the child’s eyes. The child…

Though now he was in darkness, he could tell the entity would let him out sooner or later, it had too. Perhaps there were more wonderful joys he had forgotten that the entity would show him. Though, why weren’t all these joys back home? Why were they hidden away? And what happened to his friend…

The king tried again the next morning. He knew he may not be able to resurrect his wife, or his child, but he was willing to try to give himself immortality again. Not with the brothers, of course. He simply called into the void, hoping someone, anyone would answer.

Something did come out, draped in dark robes and with a hidden face behind bandages, if it even had a face. They called themself an ambassador of a faceless being. They promised the king much more than immortality. They said they could make the king a God. A God… a God could bring back his wife and child. A God would never die. He could have it all, as long as he did what the thing said. The king smiled for the first time in ten years.

Meanwhile, our child looked out their window. A small wave to a boy their age they got along with, but the boy didn’t see. Perhaps the boy would forget about them. And they’d be up here forever. If they weren't such a clever child, perhaps they would try to jump out the open window. Alas, the child didn’t wish to die. Maybe not wanting to sacrifice themselves for the kingdom was part of being a monster. Not wanting to kill the twisted, sick devil that cursed the town-

It was at that time a crow landed at the window. The child liked crows, even though their father didn’t, as they were always nearby when they went to visit their mother’s grave, back before the tower. It was strangely comforting to them. So the child then took a piece of lavender from their shelf. It died when they plucked it, and it was rotting, being here for years, but the child didn’t care. They placed the lavender in front of the crow, and it picked it up. It almost seemed to smile before flying off. The child felt better. Maybe they were not a monster. Crows seemed more trustworthy than the king anyway.

Time was melding again in the bag. Or perhaps it was Dyo not liking the dark. It felt like he was floating in the darkest void, where no one could hear him scream, even if he had the vocal cords necessary. Gosh, perhaps the entity would give Dyo a body so he could actually talk!

A sudden blast of light and another gloved hand later, he was out of the bag. Apparently the entity lived in some sort of cave. He could make out some sort of cloth in the background. He didn’t know why, but Dyo figured it was called a blanket. People… slept on blankets. They never slept back in Allagadda.

He saw a table with another cloth on it, this one not a blanket for sleep. It was soaked in red blood. Medical cloth. This was a doctor of some sort. The entity placed him on said table, laying on the cave’s wall. The blood was dry, but the blanket was somewhat wet. Attempts of cleaning blood that never really worked. The doctor stared at him, before staying one sentence, in a dark, echoey voice.

“I know you are alive.”

Three years passed, and the kingdom grew strange. The king started to paint over anything that wasn’t black, white, yellow, or red. His favorite colors. More people started to wear masks, masquerade masks, forever. No one seemed to question any of this, and just went along.

The child meanwhile, disappeared. They had attempted escape twice before, and the lack of fighting back once they were caught again made them think escape wouldn’t be much of an issue. As the plague had been fading out, the king simply assumed they returned to the darkness they came from. This is not what happened, they merely escaped, without anyone noticing this time. Though some suspicion was casted on the new young court jester, theories they let out the kid, nothing ever came of it.

The child had grabbed a mask and ran off with it. No one was to see their face, no one was to know who they were. They cut their hair and changed their name. They ran to the town doctor, and claimed to be an orphan child seeking apprenticeship. The doctor took pity on the kid, and took them in. No one realized who they really were. No one claimed them a child of the devil, or a witch.

Dyo wished he could respond to this, he really could. He really wished that he and the entity could have spoken this whole time, about the sky, and the birds, and all these questions that were in his metaphorical brain. But he had no host, and he couldn’t look into this thing’s mind. Maybe he was still getting used to this dimension? He simply frowned. The entity tilted his head a bit.

“Huh, I thought you could still speak in this state. I must have overestimated you, my apologies. Hold on.” The entity picked him up again, and flipped Dyo around. Now they could only see the cave wall. The entity better have a good explanation for this when he actually gets a body.

He could still hear, however. He could hear the bag opening, tools being taken out, as well as something soft. Sewing, wet tearing sounds, soft fleshy noises? How did he not feel any of those in the bag!? And why did the entity think he wouldn’t want to see this over a boring old cave wall?

After what seemed like hours, he was flipped back around to see the entity’s crude creation. Flesh draped over bones, a tear in the “face” to simulate a mouth, bulging eyes and no hair. A small mannikin of flesh.

“I could have done better, but you will just destroy it anyway. No use wasting more spare parts than necessary.” The entity sighed before placing Dyo over its face.

Finally, he was getting pretty bored.

The years went on. No one mentioned the king’s child anymore. It was getting harder to see any colors that weren’t the king’s favorite, even in the yellowing sky.

The people began to change as well. They seemed to be losing themselves, more and more thinking merely of parties and wine. It didn’t affect everyone, but most that weren’t inflicted ran to other kingdoms. Eventually, the only people not affected were the town doctor, and our child. Our child…

Our child wasn’t much of a child anymore, and despite having hid it so well, they never forgot their past. They could still be found laying the last bits of rotting lavender at the Queen’s grave. Sometimes, they’d talk to the crows, simple little greetings, but still.

You see, that one crow in the old prison, it would come back. The child would talk to it eventually, when they ran out of lavender. They were friends. Once, the crow even gave a piece of rotting lavender to the child. They never forgot that. They even took it with them when they escaped, though they had now lost that decaying flower. The child spoke better with crows than people since then.

Though one day, 20 years after the day the king first invoked the three brothers, it was time for the final step of the thing’s plan. No one could have guessed. No one but the king knew the thing. And the king was too entranced to question its word. No one could have guessed what it wanted.

“Thank you, you do not know how frustrating it is to need to talk but have no mouth! I am sincerely grateful-”

“Why are you here?”

“...Huh?”

“Why are you here and not… there?” The entity’s voice was cold and stern. Clearly not a fan of Alagadda.

“Oh, right, I was so ungratefully thrown out of my home for daring to be worried about my king, daring to question the ambassador, daring to care about my people!” Dyo was still, admitting, getting used to puppeting a body in this world, and this body didn’t have all the necessary parts to move, but he tried dramatically throwing his hand to his face and his other hand where his heart would be. The intent could probably be read however, judging by the entity’s reaction.

“Sounds about right. There is no care in that kingdom, no sense. The moment someone begins to fall out of line…”

“Not a fan huh?”

“Of course not! That kingdom is an artery in the body of the pestilence. It is filled with animal instincts, only chaos, consuming, destruction with no rhyme or reason, and that ambassador would not have it any other way.”

“...Have you been there before?” A potential way back. As much as he liked this new world, he did want to go back. He couldn’t get revenge without going back. The entity hesitated before giving their answer.

“Yes. I am waiting until I have made enough progress on my cure to retur-”

“How did you get there? Have some unfinished business I need to, well, finish.” The entity froze. Something about that question thawed away all that cold from the entity. In there, somewhere, was something afraid to lose him.

“You… Want to go back there? What could there be to justify entering that place again, when you have just begun to find yourself again?”

Dyo tilted the fleshy thing’s head, and paused.

They found the king in the middle of his court, hanging by a rope. But no one seemed to care. They simply threw him in the grave, not bothering to remove the rope or even bury him. He just laid there, as crows feasted on the body. Even the town doctor, so far unaffected by anything, found herself uncaring to the king. Her apprentice never really cared for the king at all anyway.

That night, however, they still couldn’t sleep. They still wondered what could have happened to prompt this, so they looked out the window. What if the king really did love them, and this was their fault? No, that couldn’t be the case. Perhaps they’d see a crow outside, something to ground them in reality.

However, they didn’t see that. Instead, they saw… something slowly moving, for walking or even stepping didn’t feel right, through the street, rope around their neck. They couldn’t make out a single other feature, but enough was enough, and they could read context clues, they were not sticking around any longer. The town was going mad, and the apprentice and the doctor could not do anything about it. They had to leave, they had to. They panicked, putting on their mask, before they ran downstairs in an attempt to get their superior out with them…

The doctor was dead. Simply lying there, throat slit. Knife next to her. Blood was everywhere around her. Far too much blood for this type of wound.

The apprentice was horrified, and ran outside. It didn’t matter how, they had to get out of here as quickly as possible, and never look back. They’d mourn later.

But as they ran, they heard something behind them. Something was chasing them, but that wasn’t what they heard. It must have been floating, as they could also hear faint sounds of wind. No, the apprentice heard the thing talk. The voice sounded like a wind chime, neutral and sing-song. The apprentice didn’t want to listen to what it was saying. It clearly had bad intentions.

“THIS IS MY KINGDOM NOW. ACCEPT YOUR DESTINY AND TURN AROUND.”

The apprentice just kept running, and running, and not turning back. This wasn’t a home anymore. They didn’t know anything about the thing, but they knew the thing didn’t have good intentions. They knew their kingdom wouldn’t be a good place to be. Especially with the blood they felt on the ground.

And they did it. They ran all the way out. Perhaps they were tired, perhaps they thought they were safe, but they looked back. They’d never been anywhere else before.

A chain wrapped around their torso. Knocking them down, pulling them back into the kingdom, back with that… thing.

“YOU FOOLISH, FOOLISH CREATURE. YOUR DYING BLOOD WILL FLOW TO THE HIDDEN ONE, AND YOU SOUL WILL ROT IN YOUR COT FOREVERMORE. NO ONE WILL REMEMBER YOU. IT IS YOUR PURPOSE.”

The apprentice was terrified, they really were, but they didn’t show it. They knew damn well that no matter where this was going, they would die. But they knew the thing wanted them to bleed as they died. So maybe, if they died bloodlessly, they’d be safe from the… thing. They didn’t know, but they didn’t want this thing to have their soul. If they were right, perhaps they’d be somewhere safe, far away from this thing. Perhaps their mom would be there. Their knowledge of anatomy left them with one real option now, even if they were scared to die. It was on their own terms, at least.

Before the apprentice could fully be dragged back into the town, they wrapped their shaking hands around their own neck, and turned it as hard as they could.

“...what do you mean by finding myself? I’ve always known myself!” Dyo smiled, trying to ignore how much he only remembered after waking up here. That didn’t mean he wasn’t the same old Dyo. The entity’s head tilted.

“Alagadda used to not be a dream-state pocket world. It was a kingdom here once, until the Ambassador appeared. He changed people into caricatures of themselves obsessed with the king. Take yourself, for instance.” Dyo wasn’t smiling anymore. He could remember it now, figments of what Alagadda was. Blue sky. Their friend, the king’s child, a child around his age at the time, who he was close with, but disappeared one day, and then everything was foggy.

“When I knew you, you loved theater so much. You were so happy, I remember your smile so well, even after all this time. You wanted to be an actor. You became the court jester instead, suddenly obsessed with the king. It took a toll on you. You were miserable the last time I saw you, and when we met again today, I assumed you were warped so much that you were just… gone.”

Dyo remembered a lot more as they said this. The theater. There was a theater, where no actors killed themselves at the end. Where dying in the play didn’t mean anything for you. He had wanted to be there, with the actors themselves. They seemed to be having so much fun, and he’d practice his silly little improvised monologues to his friend. His friend, his only friend at the time…

They still couldn’t remember who this entity was. Strange. Maybe if he played his cards right, he could get the entity to jog his memory…

“I missed you. I mourned you. I, I should stop. This is a lot to take in-”

“No, please continue. Who, who was I, to you?”

It didn’t matter, it didn’t matter, it didn’t have to matter! The king doubted this kid even existed, they didn’t have to be in the kingdom. It wouldn’t affect the plan at all. They were entirely optional, and had willingly thrown away a chance at eternity. Strange. They did not accept the purpose of being locked away forever. So they left the child to rot away, feasted on by bugs and crows.

The king was hanging at their throne again, twitching, faint breaths, but no words. The three lords and the court jester each also hanged in a different corner of the court, each noose done too tight, blood dripping from their necks. The Ambassador held up a golden cup, and blood, all of the blood throughout the entire kingdom, flowed into it. The Ambassador went to the twitching, shaking king, who began to slowly reach for the figure.

“WITH THESE, THEIR BLOOD, IT IS THE HANGED KING’S.”

They held up the cup for the king, who held it himself. He held the cup behind his veil, to his small, rotting lips. He began to sip from the cup.

And then he dropped it.

“...We were close, very close.” The entity said. Dyo simply waited for them to continue, but they didn’t.

“...And…”

“My apologies. I tend not to dwell on the past, considering how warped the kingdom has become, so I tend not to talk about it. No one has heard of the kingdom anyway.”

“Heh. Strange that I can’t remember you though. Can you turn into a bird or something?” the entity let out the smallest of laughs.

“No, no, I just was successful in leaving my old life behind.”

In all fairness, Dyo wasn’t entirely honest anymore. His disappeared friend and this mysterious person claiming to have been his friend… it couldn’t entirely be a coincidence. But something felt… off. Something else happened. This wasn’t just an Alagaddan who left, something changed about them. Sure, there was no influence from the Ambassador, but there was something else Dyo couldn’t put a metaphorical finger on. Maybe if they played their cards right, he could get the figure to reveal it. Reveal if they could be friends again.

“Well then, what’s your new life like? This boring old cave doesn’t really jog the imagination, you know?” Maybe they’d give away a God or two with the details.

“I seek to cure the pestilence.”

“For anyone in particular?”

“Humanity.”

“...Why, though?”

“I believe that curing such a horrible ailment is simply the right thing to do, and it is why I am still here.”

Ok this wasn’t going anywhere. Why they are still here, though…

“What do you mean, why you’re still here? What happened to you?”

The hanged king was dead, the hanged king was alive. The kingdom was dead, the kingdom was alive. No one was truly dead, and the only one truly alive was the Ambassador, the real one in control. Everything was on repeat. Everyone would go through the motions of partying, drinking, forever and ever. The kingdom didn’t exist and it did exist. It was somewhere else. No one back on Earth remembered it.

Everyone would go through their motions, like a play, of sorts. Everyone had their roles to play. The lords walked with the people, and the king wrigged and withered chained on his throne, but the Ambassador was the one in charge. It was like a dream for them. Everyone only remembered what they wanted them to remember, and that didn’t include that child.

That child… the Ambassador barely thought about them. They were dead. They were dead, and they’d never know what the kingdom became. That was that.

The Ambassador was intelligent. They knew everything that had gone done in the walls of the kingdom, the many that entered, the few who’d left. They had trapped another goddess, one of the moon, in a cycle of trying to destroy the king, being attacked and almost killed by them, before returning to the sky to rest, before coming down again once per year. They even had found a use for the prison meant to contain that child, keeping the bird who’d betrayed the queen in there before repeating the cycle. They knew a lot.

But they were not entirely correct about that child.

“Whatever do you mean by that, Dyo?”

“It sounds like something should’ve killed you, but didn’t. Whatever happened-”

“Enough about me. I am afraid I have come across much more selfish than I truly am, I do not wish to dwell any more on me, let alone my past.”

“No, no. Tell me what happened. Now.” Dyo was getting impatient. This being clearly was hiding something. Dyo didn’t like when things were hidden. He needed to know it all.

“No.”

“I don’t think you know what’s really happened to me, do you? I… I am royalty these days! You better explain exactly who you are now!” Dyo forced the body up, and stared down the being. They didn’t look like much, muscle-wise.

“No.”

“You have no one, do you? That’s why you’re all alone here. No one would miss you if I were to-”

The entity ripped the mask right off the body, cutting Dyo off.

“I really let myself hope…” it said. Its eyes were filled with fire. But now, Dyo felt a bit more… comfortable here. He could speak in the entity’s mind.

“How rude. I bet if your father cared about you he’d be very disappointed.”

Dyo couldn’t really see where the entity was taking him, but that remark seemed to make them go faster. Seemed to, as they were rather slow either way.

“Why are you gripping me so hard? I thought we were friends!”

“We were, yes. You have made it clear that we are not now.” They did loosen up a bit though. Nice to know Dyo had found a way under their skin.

“Didn’t you miss me?”

“Yes, and I still do. Here we are.”

They were back in that field. A couple of dark birds flew off as they arrived. Maybe they were the same ones from before, maybe not.

The entity left him on the ground, face down, before beginning to leave. Dyo could not believe this rudeness!

“Hey, don’t leave me like this! At least let me see the stars!”

The entity didn’t respond.

It all started unlike how most stories do, with a young human snapping their own neck in a final act of defiance towards a God. Said God had then returned to their kingdom, but the human had woken up somewhere else.

Said somewhere wasn’t too different from the place they left, but there were more trees, and there was no kingdom. Or was there? It was very dark, the person couldn’t tell. Was this what death was like? They slowly got up, putting a hand on a tree. No reason to stay here all alone, when they could explore this strange world. …Until he heard a coo behind him.

Turning around, they saw someone. A crow. The person let out a small smile.

“Hello,” Said the human. After everything that happened that night, it was nice to see something, anything familiar. They sat down in front of the crow.

And then it wasn’t a crow. It was a being wearing shadows like a robe over their pale body. Its gray eyes stared into the person, into all they ever were. Horrible and beautiful.

“Oh.” The human did not react with fear, or even shock. Strangely, the figure still brought them comfort. Perhaps the being had been there their whole life, under the appearance of the crow. Perhaps it was some sort of guardian angel. Or perhaps it was one strange coincidence. It didn’t matter anymore.

“GREETINGS.” A voice akin to if whispers in the darkness spoke loudly instead came from the thing.

The two simply sat there for a bit. Until they began to talk again. About the kingdom, and about the thing that warped it in its own image. About the thing that drove it. About the curse that was still in the human’s blood, even if they escaped the kingdom. Even if their mind was clean. This burning red malice, it still lingered in the kingdom. In humanity. And whether they liked it or not, the human was a part of this now.

A deal was struck there. The king was never correct about their child’s identity, they were never some spreader of disease sent by the brothers to torment the king. They were merely a child who wanted to help the people of Alagadda. But they were not a mere child anymore, and the people of Alagadda could not be helped anymore either. They were consumed by a plague of madness, one the human could never hope to stop with what they currently knew.

So, the human would perfect a cure to the madness of spilt blood, eradicate it, and then they would return to the darkness they were in now. Or die trying. This was to be the human’s purpose, to cleanse the red-stained madness, one they took without hesitation. Only once it was gone, or if the physical burden on their rotten form grew too much, should they return here. To be a savior, to free the people of Alagadda, and help this… thing, that the king was wrong to use as an insult, who was better family than the king. This was something that the human accepted.

…Oh, who am I kidding?

They were not human anymore.

Come on, where was it? They knew it was somewhere in this journal- aw, there it was, right at the beginning. A simple list of names. Not every name, just the ones they could remember. A collection of them, lined up neatly. So many still unaccounted for.

The people of Alagadda. All gone from life and from memory. They couldn’t hope to remember every single name, but they put the ones they could here, as a memorial. It was necessary, since they were the only one who could mourn Alagadda.

They had hesitated at first, reading his name again, but it was needed at this point. His name was one of the first ones written, as the memories of him were some of the fresher, even now. They were close once, very close. But he changed. Sure, the kingdom changed everyone, but once away from the kingdom, he was still much more cruel. They did not wish for any part of this man to be remembered anymore, but they couldn’t just erase it. They couldn’t erase that boy who saw he was having a bad day and created poetry on the spot just to make them feel better, playing in the flowers, laughing together…

The doctor crossed out Dyo’s name. Never again, not even in death. Never ever, ever again. That boy was gone.

…Though, they figured the old them was gone too. They were not a quiet child worried about a father who never looked at him with love. They couldn’t care less about the king anymore. They were helping people now. They were untraceable to the kingdom now, no one needed to know, no one, no one.

No matter. It still hurt, just how much the two had grown apart. Perhaps it was meant to be, the two being driven apart. Maybe they should’ve stopped being sentimental and smashed the damned mask to smithereens.

This was why they didn’t sleep that night. What if Dyo came back? What if somehow, he saw the light? Or what if he came back to attack them again, and they had another chance to crush him?

But all throughout the night, Dyo did not return. It was quiet. Under different circumstances, they believed it would have been calming. But they couldn’t relax, Dyo could show up again, or someone sick could show up at their door needing help.

But as the sun rose, no one showed up. A part of them was sad Dyo didn’t show up again, but they buried that part of themselves. Their time as a child, as an allagadan, ended centuries ago. They were a professional, a doctor, they couldn’t keep thinking about the past, there were people they needed to save.

#via #via rambles #scp #scp foundation #scp fandom #scp alagadda #scp 2264 #the hanged king #the ambassador #scp three brothers death #the three brothers #scp three brothers #scp 035 #scp 049

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daddyy333 · 2 years

Text

Touch Starved | Eddie Munson x y/n

if you’d like you can reblog my original work, but please don’t post it without credit. if you take inspiration from my ideas please tag me, I’d like to see how someone else would write it

Word count: 0.6k

tw: mentions of shitty boyfriends, teeny weeny tiny little mention of like implied abuse, obviously touch starved reader

summary: reader has never been cuddled before. Don’t worry, Eddies gonna fix that

sry this took so long, and isn’t really that great either, I wrote a 35k word miniseries and it was a lot so I took a break and spent the last like 2 or 3 weeks just relaxing and coming up with ideas but I think I’m gonna start writing about other characters and celebrities finally so there’s that. ty for reading :)

“Ed’s?!!” You said and slipped your shoes off. You two had only been dating a few months, and were just starting to really spend a lot of time at each other's places and with each other in general. You went home after work to grab some clothes and toiletries and then came straight to Eddie’s place to spend your weekend off at his trailer.

“I’m in the bedroom!” he said and you went there, finding him cuddled up with your pillow watching some crappy show as he waited for you to come home.

“Hi baby…how was your day?” He asked and you smiled. You set your overnight bag in the corner and he opened his arms for you to settle into. “It was good…what are you doing?” You asked and he furrowed his eyebrows.

He chuckled and said “wanna cuddle…I miss you” “oh…” you said and crawled into bed with him, not entirely sure what to do. “You okay?” He asked and you looked up at him nervously. You sat up and said “I don’t- I-I just…never really cuddled with anyone before”

“What? My god, babe you dated some real fucking assholes before me” he said and you looked down. He sighed and placed a hand on your thigh caressing it softly. You never had a relationship so bad you got hurt but your past boyfriends were just shitty in general, and didn’t treat you well. Eddie knew that, and tried to show you what a good boyfriend was to the best of his abilities.

“Come here, just lay down and I’ll show you how to do it” he said and chuckled, you did too. He wrapped his arms around you, pressing a kiss to your head. He grabbed your left hand and put it underneath the crook where his shoulder and neck meet so you didn’t crush it and stop the blood flow to it. He placed your other on his chest and told you to move it if you wanted to or leave it. You naturally moved your leg up to settle on top of his.

“There you go…is this okay?” He asked and you nodded. He smiled and caressed your cheek, kissing you softly. You giggled softly and he said “what?” “Just…I don’t know this is just really nice” you said and he smiled even more.

You buried your head into his chest scooting closer to him. You used the hand that wasn’t on his chest to play with his hair, smiling from ear to ear. “I love you so much” he said and you looked up slightly. You giggled and said “I love you too”

2 hours later

“It’s 9pm bub, we gotta figure out dinner” he said, trying to pull away. You groaned and said “nooo. Don’t go” “baby, we’ve been cuddling for 2 hours. I’m hungry, and you probably are too” he said and you held onto him tighter.

He chuckled and sat up, putting your legs around his hips and getting out of bed. You yelped, grabbing onto him even tighter. “It’s okay, y/n I got you” he said and placed his hands under your thighs, holding you up.

He walked to the kitchen and you got off of him, feeling rather clingy now. “Baaabe” he whined and you chuckled. You sat up on the counter and said “what’s wrong?” “Why’d you leave?” He groaned and you bit your lip, suppressing a laugh. You hugged him from behind and he smiled, cooking up some ramen for the two of you.

“Are you sure I’m not being clingy?” You asked and he scoffed. He squeezed one of your hands reassuringly and said “absolutely not. In fact, I want you to be clingy” “you’re the best freaking boyfriend ever” you said and he smiled.

He sighed softly and said “I know” to which you both laughed at. You bit your lip and squeezed his little nipples, making him yelp. “Babe!” He said and you giggled. “I had to! I’m sorry” you said and he shook his head “you’re lucky I love you” “damn right I am” you said softly.

Taglist: @readsalot73

Eventually I’ll be writing for

Eddie Munson

Joseph Quinn

Jamie Bower

Steve Harrington

Robin Buckley

Eddissy

Maya Hawke

So just comment the taglist you want to be added to and I’ll add you :)

#stranger things #eddie munson #eddie munson oneshot #eddie munson x reader #eddie munson x y/n #eddie munson fanfiction #eddie munson fanfic

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allinthemagicshop · 1 year

Text

We'll Fix This

I'm new to posting my writings so be gentle please.

FelixSKZxF!Reader

Angst, no warnings (I don't think, let me know if there should be for future reference)

This is a complete work of fiction originally written for a friend, I do not own rights to anything about Stray Kids. This is just a fun pastime for me.

Falling in love with someone is the easy part. The feeling of letting yourself slip into the comfort of someone’s presence and finding a new home within them takes little effort. Smiling at every interaction with someone is effortless. Recognizing their little mannerisms as endearing qualities is a breeze. Loving yourself more when they build you up is second nature. Smothering each other in love is like breathing. Realizing that the little things you fell in love with are now constantly irritating you is the hard part. It’s been 3 years since you and Felix started dating and loving him was the easiest thing you’ve ever done. Until it wasn’t.

Another comeback, another tour, and another period of repeating that “distance makes the heart grow fonder” to get through it. Only this time, you don’t have the belief behind those words. The last couple of days before a tour are always spent together, cuddling and promising that your love will keep this relationship going. Felix had his arms wrapped tightly around your waist while you threaded your fingers through his hair. Something was definitely different this time, he’s never held you this tight. Too nervous to say anything, you focus on the show you two had decided to finish together.

“Babe…can we talk?” Felix mumbled against your side, not taking his eyes off the screen. Your hands dropped to your side at his tone. He noticed immediately, yet instead of reassuring you like he has so many times before, he pulled away. “Something has changed,” he looked down at his hands, spinning the rings around his fingers. You couldn’t even form a sentence as you felt your heart harden against what was coming.

You weren’t stupid, you knew it was coming. The past two months have been filled with more fights than the entire last 3 years. Every time Felix wanted to be cuddly, you would stiffen and find excuses to busy yourself away from him and vice versa. He would lock himself in the office to play games with Jeongin and Seungmin rather than having the door open for you to lay on the office couch reading or mindlessly scrolling in his presence. Baking nights were nonexistent nowadays. If he wanted to bake, he’d go back to the dorms with the other guys and rarely brought any home back to you. You made elaborate dinners for date nights that would go cold long before he texted that he wouldn’t be home that night as practice had run later or he was going out with the guys.

Instead of working in tandem, it seemed as if you both were working around each other at opposite poles.

You had attempted to text Changbin what was going on, only for him to reply with short, uninterested responses saying he didn’t know what you meant. Similar responses came from Hyunjin and Chan. So you stopped asking. He pulled away first and you would return the sentiment. It took about two weeks before Felix started asking your friends if you were okay, only to be met with unanswered or indifferent texts in return. You began canceling date nights in favor of working more or going out with friends instead. Again, another week before he tried asking why you kept canceling.

The fight that followed landed you where you are now. Always one to resort to physical affection, Felix suggested a silent cuddle night to repair the hurtful words thrown at each other. It was about as expected, tense silence and too many unshared thoughts.

“Felix. Do we even need to talk anymore? You leave in two days again, that gives you a full day to set yourself back into who STAY expect.” He turned his head to you quickly, eyes widening in fear. “I’m not blind, I know something has changed. I tried to tell myself it was just the stress of a new album and tour, but that excuse only goes so far. When your own members start shutting me out with you, it’s a pretty clear sign,” you finished with a forced chuckle. “Although, I am a little disappointed you couldn’t just tell me that your love had faded weeks ago, rather than try to string me along until you could just leave and let it fully fizzle out with the tour as an excuse not to talk to me.”

Felix fell to the ground in front of you on the couch. “No, no, baby, no. No please you don’t understand, just give me a second to explain. I promise-”

“Promise what? That you didn’t mean to pull out of this relationship? That you didn’t notice the hundreds of texts you’ve left unanswered or the dozens of dates you’ve ditched on? Or how about that you didn’t have me in mind the past two months in any of this?” You swipe your hand under your eyes harshly as you watch his face fall and tears build up.

“Love, don’t do this to me. I had so many things going on since we started this comeback, I didn’t know how to function properly. The boys are just as stressed, please believe me,” he sniffled the last part out, tears falling onto your knees as he knelt over them. He tried to grab onto your hands, but you pulled them back.

“Felix I-” “No. No stop with the ‘Felix.’ You never call me that. Please, baby. Come back to me.” You just shook your head. “Felix,” you watched as his heart broke in his eyes, you were already gone, he was sure of it. “I can’t do this anymore. We’ve had plenty of comebacks and the last extended tour that we made it through. With communicating. Not by shutting each other out. I’m not going to sit and listen to excuses for you to rationalize why you have been treating me so badly recently. God, Felix, we used to be so good. Until you stopped trying. I don’t think I can listen to the excuses right now. I’m going to head to Yeji’s, please be gone when I get back.” You stood up and grabbed your keys and wallet, brushing past him to get to the door, not even looking back to see him stare after you as the door on your relationship closed with a soft click.

Felix sat there on your floor sobbing, staring after you for nearly 30 minutes before he realized you were right about one thing. He had one day to get himself ready for STAY, but also one day to figure out how this tour was going to fix him so that he could come back to you. Taking a minute to collect himself, he ran through your apartment and gathered all his things he kept at your place. He took off the hoodie he was wearing and buried it deep in your closet, hopeful that you’ll find it when needed, even more hopeful that these next three months on tour would selfishly not be enough time for you to move on. He put the spare key you had given him on the counter before he walked out of your life.

●●●

You walked into your apartment after spending nearly four hours crying into Yeji’s arms. You put up a good front for Felix, hoping that it would make it easier for him to move on if he thought you agreed with his recent feelings. The truth is that you felt like someone had punched into your chest and pulled your heart out. Complete numbness settled over your body as the ache in your chest kept blossoming further out, fogging your mind. You convinced yourself that the pleas from Felix were just for your benefit, not to truly save the relationship. If he had wanted that, he wouldn’t have pulled away months ago with no words or warnings.

The ache in your chest bloomed into full searing pain when you spotted the spare key on your counter. Running through the apartment, you noticed everything that tied Felix to you was gone. He truly had wanted this, no matter how loudly the little voice in your brain had tried to tell you it was another overreaction on your part. Holding your hand over your mouth, you looked around your bedroom, noticing even his plushies he’d bought you had gone with him. You didn’t even make it to your bed before your legs gave out and sobs tore through your body.

●●●

Felix stepped into the dorm, barely getting the door closed before he fell to the ground, head in his hands. He couldn’t even cry anymore, just shake and feel his heart rip to shreds. He had done this. He knew that you didn’t want this, he could always read you so well, but he wasn’t going to hurt you anymore if he couldn’t fix himself.

Lino poked his head out of the kitchen after he heard the front door click shut. One look at the younger member had him throwing the utensils onto the counter and running to the front entrance. He nearly slid across the floor to grab onto Felix as the younger boy shook. “Yongbok, what happened? Are you hurt? Did you call Chan? SEUNGMIN, GET CHAN HERE NOW. Shhhh, I’ve got you. Talk to me, Felix, you’re scaring me.” The younger boy could only shake his head as he buried himself deeper into the arms of his friend. The other younger members ran in after the shouts, Seungmin already with his phone dialing their leader. When they laid eyes on one of their best friends broken in the entrance, Jeongin began crying and walked over to the scene while Seungmin locked his jaw and told Chan to get to the dorm as soon as possible with the other members, hanging up without explanation.

It was only 20 minutes later that the other four boys burst in, the eldest looking around for the fire, only to be met with an even more heart shattering scene: Lino rocking Felix back and forth on the couch as Jeongin sat beside him rubbing his back with Seungmin gently murmuring to him from his position on the floor in front of the trio.

“What happened? Who’s hurt? Sick? Someone tell me what the hell is happening?” Chan rushed over to the group, kneeling next to Seungmin while the others looked on, wide eyed, starting to tear up at the sight.

“I- I lost her. I screwed up. I don’t know what I was think- thinking. It hurts so bad, Channie. I feel like I’m drowning,” Felix sobbed as he pulled out of the tight embrace he’d been held in. “You guys didn’t help. Why did none of you talk to her? Why did none of you tell me she was asking about me? Why didn’t you guys warn me? Why- why did I let this happen?” He broke down again as Chan shifted into Lino’s spot, pulling Felix into him.

“Hey, hey. Shhh, you have to tell us what’s going on. Is it y/n? Did you fight? What are we a part of? Felix, I need you to talk to me, yeah?” Chan was rubbing his younger friend’s back, looking at the rest, questions and tears in everyone’s eyes.

Felix pulled back before wiping his nose, Chan reaching up and rubbing the tear stains off his face, looking the younger one in the eyes. “I was so stressed about this comeback, this tour, continuing to be better for STAY. I lost myself, became obsessed with perfecting everything, perfecting our chemistry for STAY. She said she reached out to some of you, but was ignored by you guys too. We left her alone. Alone to think that I was done with her. Never even explained my obsession with this comeback. I lost myself, and I lost y/n in the process. I don’t know what is so different this time. I didn’t even get to tell her that JYPE was giving us the opportunity to go public. It slipped my mind. Another tack on my obsession with being perfect this time so that she would be protected. She’s been with me through so much already, and when it was finally time to take the next step, I took twenty backwards, away from her. I need to fix this. I don’t know how to fix this. I don’t have time to fix this. I love her so much, it hurts so bad. Who am I without her? Will I lose STAY next? She still only thought of me when she called it off, saying she was going to give me a day to get myself ready for STAY. She still looked out for me, thinking I had already given up on her. I couldn’t even get her to stop before she walked out. She walked out, trying to make it easier. It wasn’t easier. It’s my fault. Help me, please. Help me fix this. I want to make STAY proud, but I need her back. Help me.” Felix cut himself off, sobbing again. The others stared, open-mouthed and silent.

Hyunjin pulled his phone out to look through texts between him and y/n, noticing for the first time how he had come across in his own obsession with perfecting himself for the tour. He turned to Changbin, who was silently crying while already staring at his own phone.”We did this. We left her alone,” Changbin whispered, voice cracking. Hyunjin just shook his head, disbelief coursing through his veins.

“Lix, look at me. Please,” Chan gently pulled the younger one away from him, grabbing his chin to direct him to look in his eyes. “We have to focus on this tour and give our best. We owe it to ourselves and the hard work we’ve put in. We owe it to STAY. But we WILL fix this. I have a plan. The bag by the door, that’s your stuff from her place, yeah?” Felix nodded, tears still sliding down his cheeks. “Okay, good. We’ll need it. We will fix this, Lix. I promise you. You aren’t losing her, none of us are.” Chan looked around the group, noticing the tears in all their eyes at the thought of y/n no longer being a part of their lives after so long. He was going to fix this, not just for his brother, but for his dear friend he had found in y/n, for his members.

●●●

The tour began. Felix shaky behind the scenes, powerful on stage. They were leaving Seoul for the first leg of overseas concerts. A package arrived on your doorstep the day they left, pictures and one of the many plushies Felix had gifted you. A note sat on top. Y/n, I’m so beyond sorry for what happened. We got obsessed and none of us checked each other. You mean so much to all of us, to Felix. Please, I want to help you through this. I want to help Felix. This is where it starts. We’re all sorry. -Chan. You put the box in a corner of your closet, unable to look through the pictures.

The next flight was a couple days later. Along with it came another package. Hey, darling. I know we haven’t spoken in a while. That’s on me. I’ll be better, we’ll all be better. Take care, remember to eat and sleep well -Your favorite Cat Man. More pictures, another plush, and a bracelet the boys had gotten you for you first Christmas with them, the clasp fixed. You rolled your eyes, placing the new package with the other one.

A week later, another flight, another package. Sweet girl. I am so sorry. I let myself get caught up in the members and the practices and the new songs. That’s no excuse to have let you down in the process. He misses you so much. We all do. - Your muscle boy, Binnie. Again, another one of the plushies but this time a brand new necklace, obviously from Changbin, along with a new purse you had mentioned one of the last times you were with the boys. You felt your heart tug a little more as you hesitantly set the package on top of the other two. Closing the door, this time resting your head against the cool wood as you tried to steady your breathing.

Expecting it this time, you rushed into the apartment with the new package. This time you couldn’t help the small smile that grew on your face. A painting of a beautiful flower field greeted you, this time with three of the plushies. Lovely y/n. I miss you. I missed you before we left, but I didn’t act on it. I’m forever going to be sorry that I let you slip away when I got carried away. When we get back, we’re going on a painting date again. I miss our jokes and your laughter. I want to fix all of it. Yours, Hyunjinnie. A tear slid down your face. It’d been a month since you walked away from Felix. It hasn’t gotten any easier. You set the package on your coffee table, walking to your room to grab the other three. You sat staring at them, chewing your bottom lip as you debated what to do. Ultimately, you walked into your bedroom, leaving them on the table.

A couple weeks later, you were again greeted with a package. Opening it slower this time, you felt your heart rate pick up as all kinds of snacks from different countries greeted you, nearly drowning the two plushies at the bottom. My lovely honey girl! I suck. STAYs would say “predebut Han came out” and they wouldn’t be wrong. You mean so much to all of us. I did have to steal some of the snacks from Flour boy. I hope you enjoy them all, tell me your favorites when we get back. Hannie. You rubbed at your eyes, missing them all more than you can express. You pulled out the notes from all the packages so far. Heading into your bathroom, you stuck them all to your mirror. Gazing at yourself, finally noticing the dark circles under your eyes. You walked back to the living room, gathering all the plushies in your arms as you walked to your bedroom. You laid them all down on the bed before heading into your closet to find clothes to change into for a nap. While flipping through your sweatshirts, you finally noticed it. There in the back was the sweatshirt Felix had been wearing the last time you saw him. You grabbed it, feeling tears slip down your cheeks as you slipped it on. You slid on some random shorts you found and crawled into your bed, surrounded by the plushies of your relationship with Felix. You fell asleep with tears drying on your face, wrapped in the scent of the boy who meant the world to you, sleeping better than you have in weeks.

With only one month left until the end of the tour, you got nervous for the next package. If they were following the pattern, it would be Felix’s turn. You slowed your walk when you spotted it at your door. Taking a deep breath, you walked into your apartment with the box tucked under your arm. You opened the box to a new book you had mentioned to Seungmin months ago. Your jaw dropped, and a weird wave of relief went through you. You hugged onto yet another plushie as you read the note. Hahahaha sorry that I’m probably not who you’re expecting. SEUNGMIN IN THE BUILDING!!! I do want to apologize to you. Y/n you are such an important part of our lives, and we got too caught up in ourselves and being perfect for STAY that we neglected you. I promise, if you take us back, that it will never happen again. -Puppy boy.

The boys had been outstanding all tour. STAY were loving the shows, the boys were giving their all and then some. A cloud still hovered over all their hearts as none had received any word from you. Felix would go straight to bed after every show. It was a harder time each stop for Lino to keep him eating with the members instead of retreating to his room to scroll through all your photos together. Two more weeks remained until he would know if you truly had left him or not. The others were increasingly worried they weren’t going to get you back.

Another package arrived. New shoes and a new phone case accompanied the plush this time. Cutie cutie it’s me! I miss you. Felix isn’t the same without you, none of us are. I’m worried about him, but I’m worried about you too. I miss our conversations on who’s concert fashion is the best (me, by the way). I want to take you shopping when we get back, if you will go with me. Baby bread. You sighed, you couldn’t stop the ache in your chest from coming back as you let yourself fully recognize how much you missed them all. Only a week remained in the tour. You pulled out all the photos from the first package. It was you and all the boys. There were some candids you had never seen, clearly taken during your many hang outs at the dorms. Many of your favorites with Felix were in there as well. Your heart swelled. You were fairly certain what your decision was going to be.

A new package greeted you after a particularly hard day at work. Your heart sped up, knowing who it was. It was the last of the plushies Felix had gotten you over the course of your relationship, nothing more beyond the letter. I don’t even know where to start. One of our staff will have dropped this off only a day before we get back. Chan’s plan was so thorough. Each of the members have written an apology for how we all acted the last couple months before this tour. Accompanied by something of ours that I took back with me when I tried to give you as much space as possible by removing myself. It’s killing me, knowing that I hurt you so horribly. A sorry isn’t even enough, a thousand sorry’s won’t be enough. I royally screwed up. It’s no excuse that I let myself get too obsessed with being Stray Kids and getting everything perfect for this tour. I hope it goes well, as I’m writing this before we even leave. Everyone already has their extra gifts picked out except for Han, he wants to collect snacks from different places to send you. His package might be a little behind schedule, but Chan has it planned out to work anyway. I’m sure you noticed that I have nothing extra in here besides my words and the last of the plushies we’ve collected together. I do hope you’ve already found it and haven’t thrown it away or burned it. I wouldn’t blame you if you did. But I left my sweatshirt from that night in the back of your closet. It should still smell like me. I know how much trouble you have with sleeping, especially while I’m on tour. If you don’t hate my guts by now, maybe it will bring you some comfort. I love you, y/n. So much. Words don’t even come close to describing the way I truly feel about you. If you’ll have me, I want to be better for you. I know what I did, and I swear to you that I’ll be spending this entire tour working on myself so that I’m better for you. I’ll get strength from STAY. All the work I put in won’t be for nothing, especially if I lost you throughout this. It still won’t be worth losing you, but maybe I’ll drown myself in STAY’s love if I have to. I love you, endlessly, my beautiful star. - Yours always and forever, Lixie. Tears were streaming down your face as you put the letter down. You only gave yourself a few seconds before you throw yourself into action.

●●●

The boys walked off the plane, through the airport. The air crackled with excitement over how well the tour went. The cloud of anxiety still hung over them, but they were trying to block it out the best they could. As they walked towards the car to take them back to the dorms, they noticed one of their managers standing at an extra car. Trying to calm their heart rates down, Chan slowly walked over to the manager. “From y/n.” He gave Chan a gentle smile.

Chan could almost feel his knees give out in relief. He hung his head and blew out a breath he hadn’t realized he’d been holding. He turned to look at the rest of the boys. He couldn’t hide the wide smile that spread across his face, crinkling his eyes as he felt laughter bubble out. He ran over to Felix and shoved the small box into his hands. The rest of the members couldn’t hold back their tears of joy as Felix pulled the little ribbon off the top of the box. He looked at each of them, tears streaming down his face.

“No matter what, thank you all. What you did means the world to me, even if she doesn’t forgive me, forgive us, I love you all so much. Thank you.” Felix took a deep breath before he lifted the lid off. A tiny note was placed over something silver and shiny. He felt his knees give out as Changbin rushed forward to catch him. They all noticed the key at the same time and nearly sobbed in relief. Come back to me, I love you so much. “I- I’m going home. I’m going home!” Felix stumbled into the final car as the boys watched him head off to the love of his life, smiling until their cheeks hurt, tears slipping down all their cheeks as they realized they hadn’t lost two of their favorite people.

#stray kids #skz x reader #skz angst #skz felix #kpop angst #kpop imagines #kpop

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space-girlllll · 1 year

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So I was originally meant to post this on on another post with a bunch of AUs and headcanons but it got a bit long so I’ll post it earlier than I was meant to @salaapaoo:

Kim rok soo had always been kind of the older brother to the kids in the orphanage:

When krs first got to the orphanage he I'm not sure the canon age but my head always goes 8 or 13 yrs old so he wasn’t that big yet but still older than a lot of them.

I read a head-canon somewhere (I cannot for the life of me remember where, but this is where I got the idea is this technically theirs help) where he took care of the younger kids there.

Just bcs of the angst potential of this, every kid he takes care of or begins to care for leaves immediately, they get adopted quickly or they’re parents come back for them, some even ended up dead. So once the orphanage workers/helpers realized this strange system, they began to dump most of the children in his care. The workers/helpers who worked at the orphanage often stole or embezzled the funds they had. Kim rok soo had to look for food and get money by himself and taking care of the kids at the same time. There would be days in which where he would starve himself for the children, they were too young they shouldn’t have to suffer the way he did. There were even times he couldn’t find any food, he would clutch the children in a close hug as they cried from hunger and pain.

Fluff time! Maybe he would come to school for them in place of PTCs (Parent Teacher Conference) taught some of them to read and write, played games with them, help them when they get sick. When they have nightmares they often run to Kim rok soo, he was there safe place, he would maybe hug them and stroke their hair, sometimes even singing them to sleep (not me using this as an excuse for an i bet on losing dogs songfic).

After the workers left the children to him, he quickly learned how to organize food for the children, tie or even cut their hair, maybe he helps them with homework in-between his own working and they all have some set time for home work and school things, and as time flies by he soon is the oldest kid there and there is no one to help him out.

As he has to leave the orphanage eventually, he left them money, that he had worked hard for himself, that he’d spent hours tolling on work to give them, so they wouldn’t be left with nothing, so they'd remember he cared. Before he left he turned to the eldest of them, she was 15 and left in charge by Kim rok soo, the caretakers wouldn’t change even after he left and he trusted her, his little sister, after quickly going through his checklist on the things he’d left behind for them, to make sure they’d be safe and happy, even with him gone, he gives her a soft smile “Don’t forget you are still a child yourself, play around and cause trouble, children should be children.” before hugging her tightly and finishing his goodbyes not being able to hear her saying “What about you Oppa?”

Maybe he meets the girl again, during the apocalypse when she joins team 1 under Team leader Lee soo hyuk’s lead as a grade 1 ability swordsman. The two stay close, despite the time that had past Kim rok soo couldn’t help but still treat her the same way he did when she was a child he had been one too, taking care of her, making sure she was alright and not overworking, she even became close with Cjs and Lsh as Krs slowly befriended them. She teased krs often and complained along with cjs and lsh about his bad habits of sacrificing himself (like all younger siblings do such as myself).

They were all happy, they really were, till the massacre incident finally came and blew his entire world away, his brothers, his sister, his friends and family, the team that was his entire life, was gone and he was left with nothing but the broken pieces of his life, memories, and dreams of what could’ve been. Memories of playing with small giddy children, memories of older siblings being there for him and helping him, all disappearing as fast as the life was sucked out his family.

After the transmigration, there would be times when he looked at Lilly and saw her. The younger sister that he cared for and raised. He sees her in Lilly's brown hair, their shared sword style, and sometimes he would even slip up and call lily by her name. After a few times, Lilly finally asks "Oraeboni, who is (name)?" He freezes as the records of her death rewind in his mind. He can't stop it. Lilly resembles her too much, so he distances himself, hoping that it would lessen the pain. Lilly and (name) look like they could've been sisters... Almost like twins with how Lilly looks almost exactly like the little girl he raised. It hurts too much... He can't be there.

During the end of part 1 when GoD told Cale about Sui, he tells him a bit more than that. He tells him about someone else who reincarnated in the world-- in Roan. His little sister had been reincarnated as Lilly Henituse, the little sister of the original owner of this body. The God of Death then explains that he couldn't return her memories to her. Despite all of the things that Cale had changed and accomplished, GoD still couldn't return Lilly’s memories from her previous lifeto her.

When he sees her again, he's just devastated and pulls her close, holding her tightly as he slowly rubs the back of her head like how he always had in their previous lives. Meanwhile, the others are just confused because he usually has a sad look in his eyes whenever he would look at her before quickly averting his eyes. They're happy to see the two of them getting along though. LIlly is confused at first, but the hug felt so warm and strangely familiar. She's sure that she's felt it before, but the thought is quickly replaced with feelings of content from being hugged by her oraeboni

#lout of the count’s family #trash of the count's family #totcf #lotcf #lcf #tcf #kim rok soo #krs!cale #lilly henituse #lily henituse #tcf lily #god of death #GoD #angst #fan's ramblings!

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plainshobbit · 8 months

Text

First posted the original version of the this for the 2021 12 Days of Rexsoka event. Was never quite happy with the ending and I think I finally found the extra bits I needed.

Regrets and Second Chances

Rex had never wanted to part ways with Ahsoka. Given the choice he would be by her side at this very moment – and every moment after – until he took his final breath.

But she had made a compelling argument.

They were just too recognizable together.

Ahsoka Tano and Captain Rex of the 501st. They had a reputation that spanned the systems.

And the Empire would be looking for them.

Faking their deaths could only last so long.

He had told himself that by parting ways, they were keeping each other safe.

She had been weary of war – the fighting, the death. Ahsoka just wanted to leave it all behind – to slip into an entirely new life. She hadn't said it, but he could tell. He couldn't really blame her.

Rex convinced himself that he had no right to argue that they stay together.

If he did, it would only be for his own selfish reasons.

So he had let her go.

************

Rex hadn't been done fighting yet. A part of him had to believe that the Republic could still be saved.

All their lives he and his brothers had been told they were created to fight for and protect the Republic. Instead they had been used to destroy it and enslave its citizens. He had to find a way to make that right.

He would find and free his brothers. Together they would restore the Republic. They could still fight for the Republic and create a safe galaxy again for Ahsoka and those like her.

But Rex had ignored one of the most important lessons he had learned during the years of fighting the kriffing war.

Things were always better when he and Ahsoka stayed together.

Things always went osik'la when they were apart.

And things had.

So many brothers lost!

It still made him sick when he thought about it.

It had broken him.

He had retreated to Seelos with two of the brothers he still had left and they had spent their days slinging for Joopa.

Many a night he had slipped out onto the deck of their modified AT-TE home as his vode slept. Rex would stare up at Seelos' night sky and ponder all the "What if's" . . .

What if he had refused to leave her?

What if together they could have made the difference?

What if together they could have saved his brothers?

What if he'd had the gett'se to tell her how he truly felt about her?

And the years slipped away -- more swiftly for him than most.

************

When the VCX auxiliary starfighter touched down outside their AT-TE, Rex wasn’t sure what to think. Seelos was not a place where one expects visitors.

He definitely was not expecting a young Mandalorian woman (in the most colorful armor he had ever seen) and a Lasat. Even more surprising were a Jedi and his young apprentice.

When this extraordinary little group had revealed they had been sent by Ahsoka herself, it wakened hopes he hadn’t let himself acknowledge for a long time.

After so many lost years, Rex was finally going to see her again.

He walked into the passage – trying to look like a confident and experienced Captain and not the nervous Shiny he felt like.

It really did feel liked butterflies flapping around madly in his stomach. He'd never understood the expression until this moment.

Hopefully none of them are Sheyash Kyrham.

Then again – if I kriff this up perhaps a touch from “The Yellow Death” would be preferable.

All thoughts of deadly Mandalorian swallowtails were swept from his mind as the tall figure with blue-striped montrals and elegantly swaying lekku came into view.

There Ahsoka Tano stood.

She was magnificent.

And he was a di'kut.

"You got old?!"

THAT'S your opening line?

Yep, send in the Sheyash Kyrham.

But Ahsoka took it stride.

She launched herself into his arms and for a split second, Rex thought he might never let her go.

He released her, but he made himself a promise. This time would be different. He wouldn't hide his feelings and he would always be there to have her back.

He'd gotten a second chance, and he wasn't going to let it slip through his fingers.

*************

Prompts for Day 8: Alone/Regret and Day 9: Fix It/Second Chance.

Originally for the 2021 "12 Days of Rexsoka" event on Tumbler. Also now on Ao3.

Mando’a Reference

The Shyeyash Kyrham or Mandalorian Swallowtail is the invention of author independent_variables (currently known around here as @thesunlikehoney -- Please forgive me for using this in a Rexsoka ficlet, friend!) as featured in the amazing Bly story Butterfly as found on Ao3.

di’kut: fool, idiot, useless individual; context-dependent: can mean jerk, moron, etc.

gett’se: courage, nerve

osik’la: messed up, horrible (impolite)

vode: brother, sister, comrade

#clone captain rex #ahsoka tano #rexsoka #the clone wars #star wars rebels #ficlet #rerelease #with edits

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angstyaches · 1 year

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….. would you do 💋 first kiss for felix & elliott? or is that part of a plot thing?

This prompt is from a Valentine's Day prompt meme, and has been in my ask box for such an embarrassingly long time that I don't care to go looking for the original post.

Anon, thank you for this prompt, and I'm sorry it took so long!

___

You’ve heard of Early Days Felix, but now, get ready for...

VERY Early Days Felix (now with extra early!)

CW: cabin fever type symptoms, vampire transformation, mentions of blood ingestion, chronic nausea and loss of appetite, mentions of vomiting, food mention, pining, angst, low self esteem, kissing and romantic touching.

___

How would I know...

Felix spent a lot of time staring at the tiny speckles in the not-quite-yellow, not-quite-white wallpaper until they seemed to sluggishly shift about like tiny bugs picking their way through a pool of thick, goopy honey.

...If I was losing my mind?

There was a TV in the room that he could watch instead, but the possibility of seeing his own name, his own face, splashed across scrolling headlines stopped him from ever turning it on.

He rarely moved from the top of his bed during the day, unless it was to go to the bathroom to splash his face with water, or to heave up a failed attempt at a meal. He refused to avail himself of Elliott’s stash as much as he could, since it only seemed to exit him the same way it went in. He knew this wasn’t a sustainable way to go on, but he didn’t know what else to do but avoid the inevitable.

Human blood was far too precious for a fate such as being puked into a hotel toilet by history’s most pathetic excuse for a half-vampire.

Felix had once believed that if vampires existed, they would exude sexiness from their every pore. His first glimpse at Elliott had only seemed to compound that belief. But there was nothing sexy about what had been happening to him since his own transformation.

The bags beneath his eyes looked ready to drop off. His coppery-blonde hair had lost its luster and movement, and hung in dull, lanky clumps regardless of whether it was dry or wet, greasy or freshly shampooed. He’d found a worrying number of white strands in the past few weeks, where he’d had none before. His mother had once told him she’d started to turn grey at the age of sixteen, so maybe he should have been grateful for the additional eight years. But still, it seemed an excessive amount to find all at once.

And the hunger. The hunger.

Felix was unused to feeling hunger – true hunger – to begin with, but he'd never have imagined it could be this all-consuming. Even when he managed to keep food down, his body hovered around a baseline of jittery dissatisfaction. When he wasn’t staring at the wall and fancying that the specks were moving, he was preoccupied with the incessant growling and churning of his stomach. During the night, this expanded beyond being solely Felix’s problem; he was certain that he had heard Elliott groan and sigh and turn over in the other bed, pulling his pillow over his head for some peace and quiet.

Felix blinked, and the specks on the wall reset, sliding back into their original places.

He’d never thought he would miss his old bedroom and its the duck egg blue walls. He had wished, for so long, to leave everything behind, but now that his existence itself had been entirely re-written, Felix found himself longing for familiarity above anything else. What he wouldn’t have given to have a quick cup of tea with his mother. He’d even have welcomed an awkward chat with his father, if it meant reassuring him that he was, indeed, occupying the same earth he’d originally been brought into.

He was untethered. And it was nothing like he’d wanted or expected. There were moments where he could convince himself that he had died – he had bled out in that alley – and that this was his own personal purgatory.

But then...

But then, Elliott would walk past him, sparing him a glance of concern, and the world had light in it again.

Elliott.

Oh, Elliott. Felix’s beautiful, oftentimes bloodied, angel.

He fully believed that every exquisite bite of food, every musical masterpiece, every one of nature’s scenic beauties had been sculpted by the universe to honour Elliott.

A tad dramatic, perhaps, but who was Felix to deny the force of these feelings?

Elliott always arrived at the room a few hours after dark, too exhausted for conversation, with a bag of takeaway food in his hand and bloodstains on his clothes. Sometimes, Felix couldn’t eat a bite. Sometimes, he ate all of it and wished there was more. Days slipped by so quickly that it became impossible to track whether his appetite had a trend, or to tell if his poor stomach was at the mercy of his body’s transformation, or the weight of his feelings for his saviour.

The fever and the body aches were often accompanied by debilitating nausea, yes; but even on his good days, a half-smile from Elliott could send Felix’s belly flopping all over the place like a fish on the floor of a boat.

Elliott was feeding well during his work, based on the glittering fire of amber in his eyes. The thought terrified Felix – how many criminals had he killed? And how could there be so many deserving victims out there, to keep a vampire with such an appetite sated? Was it even safe for Elliott to be out there, hunting by himself? – but knowing that Elliott was keeping healthy was like a ray of sunshine in the grey, hazy day of Felix’s current existence.

Even when a half-vampire was getting enough blood, they still needed to eat a decent amount of solid food. Felix wouldn’t have considered this if he didn’t see Elliott sit down at the cramped hotel room desk every evening, book in hand, and shovel food into his mouth like he’d been away on a different planet and this was his first meal back on earth.

This was when Elliott usually looked the most vulnerable; even while he slept, his muscles seemed primed to pounce, his eyebrows clenched in a precursor to a frown. Eating was the only time Felix really saw him relax, and he often had to physically turn his body the other way to keep from staring.

Tonight, Elliott hadn’t bought any hot food. He’d clearly stopped at a corner shop, judging by the white plastic bag hanging from his hand. He silently dropped the bag on Felix’s bedside table on his way to his own bed.

Felix prodded the opening of the bag; inside was a pre-made wrapped sandwich and a bottle of water. He wondered why Elliott hadn’t brough home any food for himself, and he twisted around on his bed to ask him, but promptly shut his mouth.

The smell of blood clung more harshly to the air than most nights. Felix’s gums instantly started to throb like he’d developed two abscesses, one above each of his canines. He clamped his wrists to his face, pressing on the pained areas. He knew he should grab the sandwich and eat it to distract his body from its need, but the thirst pulled him up from the bed like a puppet on strings.

And those strings were, apparently, attached to Elliott.

Felix’s movements were so silent that Elliott either didn’t notice or didn’t care that Felix followed him. He sat down at the far side, facing the wall, as Felix stood at the other.

“Elliott?” Felix choked out. His voice sounded funny. The breath required for the single word dried out his throat. The effort of taking less than ten steps, and then continuing to remain upright, was making him dizzy in his weakened, blood-deprived state.

“Everything is fine,” was the curt response.

Felix wasn’t sure if it was the thirst, or the lusting in his heart that made him rock forward onto the bed. Maybe he was just relieved to give control over to whichever force was guiding him now. He was tired. He always tried his best to make the right decision, and he was always left feeling uncertain.

He needed a break.

Elliott’s blazing eyes met Felix’s as he looked over his shoulder. He had a startled look on his face, as though he’d just been interrupted in the middle of reading one of his books. He only ever seemed to get irritated whenever Felix did that.

His hands were empty, though.

“What are you doing?” he murmured, and Felix was entranced by his lips.

The blood of his latest victim still stained them bright crimson. To Felix, they looked like two drizzles of raspberry coulis over some tantalizing dessert that he had never tried and yet knew he would love to absolutely devour in a manner that would mortify his parents.

Elliott was visibly tense, muscles knotting beneath his skin. Every inch of his face was at odds with the inch that proceeded it, like a roadmap that Felix would gladly lose himself trying to navigate. The soft light from the bedside lamp hit his face at an angle and deepened the sliver of scar tissue that spanned the lower half of his left cheek. Felix wanted to caress it with his thumb, and before he could consider whether that was a good idea or not, he found himself doing it, fingers cupped against the stubble running up the side of Elliott’s jaw.

He realised he and Elliott hadn’t actually touched since that night, since Elliott had brought him to this room. Felix couldn’t even fully remember it. Had he been bridal carried? Fireman carried? It seemed unfair that his brain failed to deliver answers to these questions.

“Felix.” Even stained in blood, those lips still said his name as though it were a contract. “What are you doing?”

Felix’s mother had once ordered a truckload of food for a fancy brunch with her friends, including a tiered stand full of the most beautiful, colourful cupcakes six-year-old Felix had ever seen. He had stood in the kitchen for a full fifteen minutes, examining them, and even though he knew it would get him in a world of trouble, he’d ended up dipping his finger into the buttercream icing on every single one of them.

He knew the value of self-control, but it paled in comparison to the heavenly rush of indulgence.

He lowered his lips towards Elliott’s; no longer feeling the pull of any outside force, but with the steady pace of a painter adding the final tender strokes to what was already a flawless piece of artwork.

He heard Elliott exhale gently through his nose, as though Felix had prompted the air out of him.

The blood found his tongue before his tongue even knew where to look. The motion pried Elliott’s lips further apart. A flicker of guilt invaded Felix’s hazy thoughts as he deepened the kiss, drawing the victim’s blood from Elliott’s lips and fangs and into his own mouth.

This wasn’t how he should be kissing somebody he actually wanted to kiss. This was feeding.

Maybe he should stop.

But then Elliott’s hand was gripping his waist, and he was shifting his position, knocking Felix onto his back across the mattress. Felix’s belly and chest and throat lit up with a desperate desire, something separate from the thirst. The metallic tang was already gone from both their mouths, and yet they weren’t coming apart.

Felix looped his legs upwards, clutching Elliott’s waist with his thighs. Elliott’s hands still gripped the sides of Felix's stomach, thumbs almost meeting in the middle.

“Elliott,” Felix whimpered, and he’d intended to say more, to whisper out his feelings in between kisses, but the mention of his name seemed to jolt Elliott back to however he’d been feeling before all of this.

He pulled his lips back from Felix’s. He scrambled backwards, off the bed and onto his feet, hand clamped over his own mouth as though he’d just uttered something that he desperately wanted to shove back inside.

Dizzy and giddy with a cocktail of brain chemicals, and somewhat revived by the trace amounts of iron, Felix found himself stifling a giggle. He wasn’t sure Elliott had ever heard his giggle before. There hadn’t been a lot to giggle about recently.

“You...” He felt himself blushing as he sat forward. Elliott was still standing close enough that Felix’s knees almost brushed against his legs. “You had something on your mouth.”

“Felix, this isn’t wise.” Something – defeat? Desire? Oh, just for fun, let it be desire – took the wind out of Elliott’s voice. His eyes kept drifting down towards Felix’s mouth, which didn’t have any blood on it. It wasn’t blood he was after.

“What of it?” Felix asked hoarsely. The corners of his lips cracked as he smiled. He stretched out his arms, gently bringing his palms to rest on Elliott’s hips. “It was delightful.”

“Not – not the kiss.” Elliott’s gaze flicked to the side and broke away of Felix’s touch. He paced a few steps away. “Although, I am aware that perhaps the bloodlust is... confusing you.”

“I’m not confused,” Felix whispered. He was terrified, yes. Overwhelmed by events that had flipped the world on its side and still had his head reeling, yes. Insatiably thirsty, yes. But he was also feeling more honest than he ever had. The walls that had dominated his previous life hadn’t just crumbled; they’d been obliterated, their dusty remains blown by the wind to the four corners of the earth.

He didn’t know what kind of life he was going to live now, but he knew who he was as he stood at the centre of it.

Who knew that he’d have to come so close to death – to bump elbows with it, to feel its breath on the skin of his teeth, to taste it – in order to feel truly alive?

“And there is currently a power imbalance between us,” Elliott murmured. He was still pacing, though Felix predicted he was about to run out of pacing space really soon. “I do not want to you feel that you... owe me anything.”

“I don’t. I don’t feel that.”

The continued knotting between Elliott’s eyebrows suggested that he wasn’t convinced by Felix’s desperate, unembellished denial.

“I like you so much,” Felix blurted hoarsely, horror curling in his belly as he realised how close he’d come to substituting the word like for love. It wouldn’t have been a lie, either. But that was something for him to unpack another time. “The fact that you saved my life, and... and turned me...”

A shudder rocked Elliott’s shoulders. His pacing took him back to this side of his bed in time for Felix to see his lips disappear into a queasy line.

“Those things have nothing to do with my feelings,” Felix whispered. He wet his lips. “Nor does my thirst.”

“Ah. You haven’t learned yet. The thirst has everything to do with our emotions,” Elliott snapped, his voice a low snarl. He seemed to have had that response ready to go, as though it had been on the very tip of his tongue.

Felix recoiled just a little, shifting himself into a new position on his knees. It was difficult to let himself tear his gaze away from Elliott’s mouth, from that last smear of dried human blood that was calling out to the sting chiseling away in his veins and the hollow pang in his stomach. He couldn’t help feeling that he would feel so much warmer with blood in his mouth, dripping from his teeth, so much warmer with Elliott’s face in his hands and Elliott’s body beneath his hips and Elliott’s tongue –

Now it was his turn to shudder.

“Are you alright?” Elliott turned his body to look at him. The concern on his face made Felix’s heart wobble a little out of place. If Elliott had merely been handsome and tough, perhaps Felix could have written this off as a superficial crush, but it was his attentiveness that really pulled the rug out from under Felix’s feet.

“Yes,” he said.

“Please...” Elliott’s gaze fell to the floor. “Please get off my bed.”

Felix swallowed thickly, his face burning with shame as he shuffled to the edge of the mattress and crawled onto his own bed. What had he been hanging around there for? Had he really thought he would end up spending the night in Elliott’s bed, despite the fact that Elliott was clearly not even okay with the kisses they’d just shared.

Elliott now stood next to his own bed again, seemingly more relaxed and focused now that the bed was separating him from Felix.

“It... isn’t right,” he said hollowly, even though the very concept of ‘right’ had just blown up right in front of their eyes, redefining itself, screeching and pointing and waiting for the tension to break. “It would be just as reckless to pursue these feelings –”

Joy made tears spring to Felix’s eyes. Feelings, he’s feeling feelings for me.

“– as it would be to continue living as we have been.”

Something cold quickly dampened Felix’s mood. “Wh-what does that mean?”

“It means that I have given it a lot of thought...” Elliott was speaking steadily, as though he’d rehearsed it. “And I do not think I am qualified to take care of you during your transformation. I have certainly done a less-than-adequate job of it so far.”

“Elliott, you’ve –”

“These recent complications,” Elliott continued, “your body’s consistent rejection of blood...”

Felix slinked back a little further, arms curling around his waist as though forming a shield between him and the declaration of his failures. Was Elliott really blaming himself for Felix’s weak stomach?

“And now this... this lack of judgment and control on my behalf...” Elliott’s voice trembled, and he shook his head as though something had just brushed against the side of his face. “It is time to take you home to my clan. Our clan.”

#StW Felix #StW Elliott #vampire OC #vampire whump #vampire sickfic #vampire emeto #emeto #emetophilia #vampire kink #vampire fic #OC emeto

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