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lidiasloca · 1 year

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Can you pls write a fic of the folk of the air in the bomb or roach pov, just one of them third wheeling Jude and Cardan.

I have to tell her that I love her (jurdan fic)

During TWK

⠂⠄⠄⠂⠁⠁⠂⠄⠄⠂⠁⠁⠂⠄⠄⠂⠁⠁⠂⠄⠄⠂⠁⠁⠂⠄☆

“Liliver?” I hear someone call as they knock hard on the door. I leave the plants on the table and I hear another impatient knock.

“I’m amidst the making of a potion for the Queen.” I shout to the voice outside.

When I hear no response, I walk to the door and open it. In front of me, I see a young-looking knight I recognize from the High King’s guard. I frown, asking with my eyes. “It’s the King.” He says.

I sigh, knowing all too well what he wants from me. Nothing less than immediately curing the High Queen, who had fallen yesterday, almost from the sky, after I shot her, having had quite a deadly fight that had left her very much wounded not long before. Yes, he wants me to do that as soon as possible.

“Where is he?” I ask, clearly irritated, which makes the knight's gaze narrow in accusation to my arrogance for calling him in such a discourteous way. I care not.

“The High King of Elfhame is in the throne room with the Living Council.” I nod with nothing more to say, and start walking.

On my way there I can’t help thinking about him, Cardan, and how he’s been acting lately. I know he’s worried and stressed and sad and all that, but he must understand that even with his royalness, there is no amount of power that’ll make Jude wake up earlier or healthier, but whenever I try to make him understand so, he denies the thought.

I really miss when the Queen was in charge.

Finally, I get to my destination. I open the doors and among all the Council, I see Cardan having a private conversation with who I think is Randalin.

I’m fairly close to them when the King notices me and waves the man away in a rude way that makes me smirk slightly. Randalin seems offended when he snorts, but he parts anyway.

“Liliver.” It is more of a question the way he says it, so I answer with, “You called for me?”

I can’t help but linger my eyes on his face, not for other reason rather than his considerable bad state. Beautiful or not, everyone can see how tired he is, even sick-looking some would say.

His hesitant voice wakes me up from distant thoughts, “I did. I wanted to talk about something."

He takes a few steps to me. His eyes going for a second behind me, probably checking the Living Council members, who are all too busy talking with each other.

“I wanted to talk with you about something, something that could help my wife.” His wife. As if I didn’t know Jude myself. "Vivienne, her sister, mentioned something about human healers.” I didn’t think he’d go delusional. Not so quick.

“Don’t look at me like that.” He says, mustering a royal tone that doesn't match his desperate eyes.

I stay silent for a moment. I don’t want to hurt him into reality, but I think he’ll be better if he assumes his hand before he has to play. “Cardan, you have to stop this, it’s not good for you. You have to believe she’ll be fine and not force it.”

I’d say he's angry, but then his face turns sorrowful. It surprises me, and I fear the King crying in front of his intimate Council will only shatter the hope that’s been put on the crown to show strength facing the war.

“But will she?” He asks, and as I think about what to say, I take his arm and lead him to the secret room behind the dais to give us some privacy. He smiles sadly as we enter the room, and I’m confused enough to ask.

“It’s not the best choice for a room to put me in, not if you wanted to soothe me.” He answers, making me more confused, his gaze, though, is asking for a change of subject, so I contently obey.

“Cardan, you clearly have a lot going on, we all do, so do yourself a favor and talk to me. I can help you, you know? I could give you advice, put you in place, kill who you ask me to, but you need to talk to someone, and I’m a good option,” I say pretty fast, almost in a breath.

He opens his mouth to talk. He says nothing, though, so he closes it again.

Silent seconds pass, and then he says very low, “It could work. They are more familiar with human sickness.”

It takes me a moment to realize that he’s talking about the human healers he mentioned, and that he has totally ignored my previous speech.

I sigh and walk to the couch to sit. I gesture him to join me. “Oh, no. I can’t. Not on that couch.”

I frown and ask, "What do you mean, you can’t?" And then, the High King of Elfhame blushes in front of me. He blushes and I understand nothing. I’m about to ask, but then he shakes his head. End of subject, I guess.

After some seconds, he walks a bit closer to me and says, “Yes,” He says, “I do need someone to talk to.” I smile amicably, feeling triumphant that I might have convinced him.

“So, you’re finally willing to tell me what’s going on with Jude.” His eyebrows go up as if shocked. I’ll think him not too bright if he can’t really believe I know there is something between them two.

“You mean, what’s going on with Jude being severely injured? The High Queen of Elfhame being severely injured?” He asks flatly, believing me not to be too bright.

“No, I mean, what’s going on with you being this sorrowful because of Jude being injured, as if she hadn’t been injured every hour of every day since we know her.”

He looks taken aback, like if he didn't know that already. “I don't think you understand. The Queen, a great model for Elfhame, is severely injured, just now, that we are at war, and that makes our land very vulnerable. That is what’s going on.” He explains, like talking to a kid.

I’m beginning to get mad, but then... I know him enough to know he’s just trying to avoid the real talk by being his rudest self.

I put the heels of my hands covering my eyes, my elbows resting in exhaustion on my knees. I can’t believe how, in the middle of a war, my biggest problem still is the feelings of the High King. “Cardan, you can’t really think I don’t know, can’t you? Just don’t act stupid in front of me, please.”

He keeps himself silent too long, so I look up at him and continue, “You and Jude! Oh, please. Don’t make that face. There is something between you two.” I’m almost shouting, and I wonder where the limits of our friendship lie, because, friendly or not, he’s still the King.

I think he finally surrenders when he says faintly, “How can you know?” I laugh.

“How? Cardan, the way you look at her. The way you keep asking news about her. The way the land had turned dull when you exiled her. The way you are in constant pain because she is in pain. It’s everywhere and it’s obvious.”

For a moment, I can’t help but think of Van, him, who I wish I could say all of this.

But, then, I don’t know what exactly is that Cardan feels. “Tell me, do you-” I immediately stop when I pay attention to him, whose about to cry eyes warn me.

“I do.” He finishes for me, his tone as vulnerable as serious. “I do love her.”

I’m stupidly surprised, since I knew that he did love her, but I didn’t expect he’d admit it.

I stand up and come closer to him, feeling the need to reassure him, because I do know what he’s going through, and I think I need this myself. I put my hand on his wrist, making him look down at me.

Before I can say nothing, he states, “But I can’t tell her that now, and that’s my fault.” I close my eyes at the guilt in his words

I try my best with my choice of words when I tell him, “Cardan, she’ll wake when she will. There is no forcing her body to cure itself faster.”

He stares at me, his expression blank. I expect him to discard the thought, to end the conversation or to stay silent, but then he just nods. Sadness in the way he does so, sadness in his eyes as if with acceptance.

I force myself to continue, “But you know she’ll be fine, right? Because she will.” He looks up at me and gives me a smile that’s not too honest.

“She better be, because I have to tell her," he says eventually. “I have to tell her that I love her.”

-Characters by Holly Black

I'm planning to do one in the Roach's POV when both Jude and Cardan are present, (which was probably more like what the request was about), but I just had this headcanon where Cardan (who has befriended the court of shadows), talks to his friend, the Bomb, after Jude's fall, and yk, he just opens up a bit.

#jurdan #jude and cardan #jurdan headcanon #the folk of the air #thefolkoftheair #jurdan canon #jude duarte #cardan greenbriar #jude and cardan headcanon #i miss jude and cardan #the wicked king #the queen of nothing #cardan x jude #jurdan fic #jude and cardan fic #jurdan fanfic #the cruel prince #jude x cardan

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lailyn · 11 months

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All The Plans We Didn't Make, Chapter 2

The next evening, Loki found himself wandering the streets of New Asgard, and before long, he was walking into the common dining hall, drawn by the sounds of a familiar laugh.

Most of the dinner crowd had dispersed but as expected, Thor was still seated at the high table, without doubt sharing stories of Old Asgard and reminiscing about the good old golden days.

Seeing Loki approach, the crowd around the king scattered. It was a silent intolerance that he had endured for centuries, one that had endured Ragnarok. Tonight, it was a blessing.

Thor looked him up and down.

"You look terrible," said Thor critically.

"And a very good evening to you too, brother."

"Your mood has not improved." Thor dipped his head, to ask his question in a conspiratorial whisper. "Did your plans with Sergeant Barnes not go as well as planned?"

"Why are you whispering?"

"It's what people do when they wish to partake in a private conversation, or share something sensitive."

"I have nothing I wish to share," Loki muttered. "Least of all with you."

"Oh, but I think you do. I have never known you to appear at supper unannounced. They've run out of ham, but here, have some of my smok'd herring - "

"No, thank you," Loki said, recoiling in disgust. "I am more than capable of feeding myself."

Thor poured his brother a drink and slid it across the table. "Come. Unburden yourself. I will lend you my ear. My shoulder too, but it's a bit achy from sword practice."

Loki's reflection stared back at him from the murky black ale, morose and dour.

How did it come to this? That Loki should find himself in such a predicament with no one alive to confide in but his brother?

Thor should know, a voice said.

Loki had spent the most of yesterday tossing and turning in his bed, thinking of how best to break the news to the only family he had left.

Thor is King. Thor must know.

"I have some news," Loki said hesitantly. "I am just not sure how I feel about it."

'I think I'm with child', the long hours of overthinking intended him to say.

What came out instead was much more verbose. "I have been invited to Sam Wilson's seafood boil, and I would like for you to come with me."

"Allow me two questions. Who are you and what have you done with my brother?" Thor asked. "You've kept the good sergeant from me for more than a year now with nary an introduction, and now I am being invited to a…what is a seafood boil anyway?"

"That's three questions you just asked me," Loki said, mentally kicking himself for passing on the chance for a delightful pregnancy announcement, but congratulating himself at the same time for missing it. "And I kept no one from you. I am nobody's keeper."

Thor tsk-tsked. "Three questions and you managed to answer none."

Loki rolled his eyes.

"A seafood boil is when Midgardians get together and gorge themselves on boiled seafood because they don't know how else to prepare it. Alcohol is usually an afterthought," he muttered, "It used to annoy Njǫrd so much."

"Ah, yes, I remember now," Thor said with a nostalgic smile. "Trust Njǫrd to be discerning with how the bounties of the seas are to be enjoyed. I personally think sea creatures are to be admired, rather than consumed."

Loki hummed, neither agreeing nor disagreeing. Clearly Thor did not consider his smoked herring as seafood, seeing how he was scoffing it with relish.

"I'm not great with people," Loki finally admitted with reluctance.

"What are you talking about? I've seen you at parties," Thor mumbled through a mouthful of fish, "Two drinks in and you're singing and dancing on the table."

"It won't just be the two of us. There is Sam Wilson, and his sister, and I suspect, her children as well. Apparently, she's the brain behind the Wilson family's seafood business."

"How very entrepreneurial of the Captain and his family. It can be difficult to make a living these days, even for superheroes like us," Thor said.

"Poor you," Loki said with absolute zero sympathy.

"You look troubled," Thor observed. "Did something happen between the two of you? Lady Jane and I used to have disagreements from time to time, very loud ones too on occasions. It is nothing to be ashamed of. It is all part of a normal, healthy relationship."

Was theirs either of those things? Loki wondered. It certainly was not normal in the traditional sense, through no fault of his nor Bucky's. One was born a Jotun, the other a human whose altered life span may just rival Loki's own.

And Loki did not have the first inkling as to what a healthy relationship should look like. They were both still alive from not having killed each other, so…that should count for something, yet?

"No, no," Loki said. "We're…quite healthy, thank you very much."

"Good, good," Thor said. "I am glad to hear it."

Loki cleared his throat. "So will you not come? You can finally and properly be introduced to James, if that is your wish."

Thor's grin widened. "It is every older brother's wish to chaperone their only sibling on a date. When and where is this party?"

"It's in Louisiana, and they are expecting us at…" Loki calculated the time difference in his head, "Now, actually."

"What?" Thor sputtered. "Now?"

"You've had supper," Loki grinned. "How about some lunch?"

***********************

If New York City was cloudy on the day he left Bucky's apartment, the sun sought vengeance over Delacroix that day, and Loki regretted not having dressed in something other than his black suit.

In contrast, Thor looked effortlessly bohemian as always in his baggy khaki pants and paisley shirt.

Catching sight of Captain America at the dock post, Thor exclaimed, "You did not tell me we were going on a boat!" and hurried down the pier with such enthusiasm Loki felt like throttling him with his tie.

"Welcome aboard Paul & Darlene," Sam said proudly. "The jewel of the Wilson family. It's not new, but it's got zero shake, instant throttle response and the highest horsepower to weight ratio in all of the bay."

"It is a beauty," Thor said sincerely, admiring the newly painted boat. "I have commandeered a vessel or two in the past, and I have to say, when the wind is blowing in your hair and the goats bray in symphony while you watch the space dolphins mate in the sky, it is a feeling like no other."

"Brother," Loki admonished, "Here on Midgard, we don't outshine the host."

Sam laughed. "Now I get why they say you're the life of the party."

"Did you hear that, Brother?" Thor clapped Loki on the back. "I'm the life of the party."

Loki only gave a derisive snort.

"Come on up, guys. Bucky's already inside, setting the table." Sam turned, and was about to lead his guests up the plank when he stopped. "Aaand now he's not."

"Hey." Bucky did a double take at the sight of Thor. "Your Majesty. I wasn't expecting you."

"Oh, look who's here, Loki!" Thor said, feigning surprise that convinced absolutely nobody. "It's Sergeant Barnes!"

"I'm a civilian now," Bucky said, shaking his head. "I'm just Bucky."

"Just Thor, then," Thor smiled, and grabbed Bucky's hand to shake it. "And it's very nice to finally make your acquaintance."

"You two act like you've never saved the world together before," Sam teased. "People might think we made the whole story up."

"Yeah, we've met, once or twice," Bucky said.

"Not in this capacity, we haven't," Thor said mischievously. "I'm Loki's plus one, because he's terrified of children and I was told there were going to be some."

Sam raised his eyebrows. "Oh, the kids aren't actually here, my sister's taken them out to take care of something."

Bucky's sharp eye caught the sudden blanching of Loki's face. "Hey, you okay?"

"Yeah," Loki mumbled. "It's just a bit hot out here."

"What are we standing around like a bunch of idiots for? Come on up, let's get out of this heat!" Sam shooed them up. "Jeez."

*************************

"The first time I met him, I made fun of his suit," Sam said. "I mean, dude looked like a cat! The only thing missing was a tail."

Thor guffawed. "And what did he say to that?"

"He was very cool about it." Sam's smile turned wistful. "Launched into a speech about how the Black Panther was a mantle passed down from generation to generation."

"I envy him," Thor admitted, fiddling with his empty beer can as his gaze took on a thousand-yard stare. "He has left a legacy that will keep on protecting his beloved Wakanda, even after he's gone."

"You're not so bad yourself. New Asgard is thriving, from what I hear."

"Yes, but I do worry sometimes," Thor confessed. "One day you're here, gone the next. Man or God."

"As long as you have family, you're never truly gone. You live on in them," Sam asked. "You…don't have children? A prince or princess you've kept hidden somewhere?"

"Is this place bugged?" Thor made a show of looking around the small dining space, before breaking into a hearty laughter. "Don't believe everything you read in the books, Captain. The stories are very often embellished accounts of the truth."

A giant arm snaked out and grabbed Loki around the shoulders. "I have my whole family right here."

Loki blushed, his paltry effort at removing said arm backfiring when Thor tightened his bear hug. "Thor, how many drinks have you had?"

"Not near enough!" Sam stood and opened a new can of beer, "Whoops!"

Thor caught the spilling froth with his bowl of clams, eliciting more laughter from the table.

That was when Bucky noticed Loki's silence, as well as his untouched plate.

"You're barely eating," Bucky whispered. "What's wrong? You don't like the food?"

"The food's delicious," Loki said with an apologetic smile. "I just don't have much of an appetite."

"Did I do something wrong?" Bucky asked under his breath the question he had been dying to ask since Loki's abrupt departure the day before.

"Hmm?"

"Did I hurt your feelings or something?" Bucky pressed. "If I did, I want to know, so I can make it right."

"Oh, James." Loki reached under the table for Bucky's hand and squeezed it gently. "No, you did nothing wrong."

Far from feeling any relief, Bucky could sense his anxiety level skyrocket. "I tried calling you but you never answered. I wasn't sure if you were going to turn up, or if you were okay."

"Were you worried about me?" Loki teased, but his attempt at his usual playfulness fell wide of the mark, when Bucky's fingers tightened around his.

"You know I was," Bucky answered quietly.

He sneaked a look at the head of the table a few feet away where Thor was busy helping Sam crack open a batch of lobster claws, a task that proved too delicate for Thor's clumsy gigantic hands.

"You didn't have any side effects or anything, did you?"

"Side effects?" Loki queried. "From what?"

"I know nothing about magic, but what you did the other night, was it dangerous or something? Shifting form like that?" he asked helplessly. It was the only thing Bucky could think of that had been…new.

"No," Loki exhaled shakily. "No, it wasn't."

Bucky's confusion finally gave way to exasperation. "Then why are you acting so weird?"

Loki licked his suddenly dry lips. It was a mistake coming here today. Thor was a passable distraction to take the attention away from him, but the smell of the bay, the food, the beer, the exhaust fumes, they had all added to the pandemonium in his head.

To make things worse, the boat was starting to move; Thor must have persuaded Sam to let him have a go at the helm.

"I'm in need of some fresh air."

Loki pulled his hand out of Bucky's grasp, and to his credit, Bucky let it slip. As Loki rose from his table, Bucky called his name instead, quiet and beseeching. "Loki."

"Five minutes," Loki implored. "Just give me five minutes, okay? I am not going anywhere."

"Can I get you anything?"

At the look of intense desperation in Bucky's brown eyes, Loki relented. "A glass of soda water, if you have it?"

Without wanting for an answer, Loki lurched toward the back of the boat. A blast of hot, fishy air hit him in the face but he gulped it in hungrily, causing his stomach to roil.

Loki grappled blindly for the handrail, fighting the urge to be ill, painfully aware of curious onlookers from the other boats moored at the dock. As the boat chugged along at a leisurely pace, he prayed that Sam would steer the boat faster out of the bay into open water.

Are you there? Loki asked the silent waters before him, the rumble of the engine mere white noise amid the cacophony of his thoughts.

My legacy…is down there, Thor.

Loki keeled, almost bent double over the guardrail at the stern.

My Jor.

Saying that name was the final straw. Loki's world blackened, and he pitched forward, plunging headfirst into the black, black water.

#winterfrost #mpreg #loki x bucky #mth 2022 #fic

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carbo-ships · 8 months

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Post Hoc - Chapter X

Start: Chapter I Previous: Chapter IX

Terzo and Ardis arrived at the dining room early so that they could sit together. Swiss was the next to arrive. He was a bit unsettled by the sight of them together, but put on a brave face for her. "Good morning, angel," he greeted her softly, taking a seat next to her. He knew she trusted him. "It's good to see you. Are you doing alright?"

Ardis gave a little nod and a slight smile. Her voice was quiet when she spoke. "Terzo let me stay with him last night so I could get some space from..."

Swiss glanced at the man beside her. Terzo had a smirk on his face. He was clearly proud of himself, but not enough to suggest anything particularly scandalous had happened. "I know," Swiss said, returning her attempt at a smile. "We were looking all over for you until I spotted him leading you through the yard. I told Papa to call off the search – I figured you weren't in the mood to be disturbed."

Before she could thank him, Aether and Papa appeared in the doorway. Ardis fell silent. Her face flushed, and she looked down at her plate. Papa chose to be the one to disturb the unsettling quiet. "Good morning, my dear," he said as he and Aether took their seats.

"Good morning," she responded, timidly looking up at them.

"I'm sorry," Aether blurted out as he joined them at the table. "About yesterday. I got carried away and I shouldn't have acted that way."

"Our guest got a bit overwhelmed, that's all," Terzo answered, pouring her a glass of juice from a pitcher on the table as more ghouls began to arrive. "She'll be staying with me for a while to cool off, if no one objects." No one dared to defy him, and Terzo knew it. There was no sense in lingering on it any longer. Further discussion would just make Ardis uncomfortable. "I like the new setlist, Copia. Dusting off one of Nihil's songs, eh? I'm sure Sister Imperator had some opinions about that."

The morning conversation stayed away from the events of the previous night, but the ghouls' minds were racing. Terzo and Ardis had been alone together for hours. What happened? What had they talked about? Swiss could tell just how heavily she smelled of Terzo. They must have slept in the same bed, although he likely hadn't gotten further than that. Still, that was significant. She clearly trusted Terzo and found a false sense of safety with him. She was in danger, and there was very little they could do.

Terzo leaned toward Ardis and spoke quietly in her ear. "I have a private study you're welcome to use, if you'd like. I might even have a copy of the Bible in there somewhere. Yours, I mean. Not ours."

Ardis smiled at him. "I'd like that. Thank you."

"I'll take you there when you're done eating," he said, smiling back. He gave her leg a gentle pat under the table.

Aether hated the way she looked at Terzo – stars in her eyes that had once been reserved for him alone. He could tell she was falling for the former anti-pope just as quickly as she'd fallen for him. He had no idea how to stop it.

When Ardis finished breakfast, she followed Terzo back down the dusty, abandoned hallway. They stopped a few doors down from his bedroom and Terzo opened the door so they could step inside. When he turned on the lights, she looked around the study. It had roughly the same layout as Terzo's room – arched ceiling, large windows in the back wall. Tall wooden bookshelves lined the other three walls, all filled with dusty tomes. To the left was a large wooden desk with an antique leather office chair. On the right were two more chairs, slightly less ornate than the first, and a long mahogany coffee table. Ardis wondered if he used to take meetings here when he was in charge.

"Not quite as extravagant as the main library," Terzo said, "and certainly dustier, but it's yours to use if you'd like to." He walked her around the room, explaining how his collection was organized – fiction, history, biographies, memoires, political science. "And this whole wall is religion. It must be around here somewhere. I tend to organize them alphabetically by the author's surname, which made finding a space for this one a bit difficult."

"Oh, I think I've spotted it," Ardis said, pointing toward his collection of anthologies at the beginning of the top row. A copy of the King James Version was nestled in the middle of the bunch. She raised herself onto her tiptoes to take it from the shelf, but she couldn't reach.

Terzo chuckled. "Here." He reached over her head and easily plucked it from its place, quickly dusting off the cover with his gloved hand before handing it to her. "I'm not used to being the tall one around here," he teased.

She smiled at him bashfully. "Thank you, T– I mean, Vincenzo."

"Don't thank me yet," he said with a grin, taking her shoulders in his hands. "Meet me by the back gate at noon, okay? There's something I'd like to show you."

"Show me?" she repeated.

"It's a surprise." He silenced her with a kiss to her forehead, which made her cheeks feel warm. He laughed again. "You're precious. You can leave any books you pull on my desk when you're finished with them – I'll reshelve them later. I'll see you in a few hours, angel.” Before she could interrogate him further, he winked at her and stepped out of the room. She hugged the Bible to her chest, flustered.

Ardis wondered what Terzo wanted to show her. The back gate led to that imposing forest. She remembered Aether's warning to stay out of the forest after dark. However, it was a bright, sunny morning outside and she figured Terzo likely knew what he was doing. There was nothing to worry about. She chose one of the chairs on the right side of the room and nestled into it before flipping to the chapter she was looking for.

Next: Chapter XI

#carbo writes

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elftwink · 3 years

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no thoughts only taakitz superhero/villain coffeeshop au. taako’s power is shapeshifting but he has a cool gun from lup. kravitz’s power is Big Fuckin Scythe With Unspecified Abilities. also there was no time to get into it but fantasy starbucks isn’t a real starbucks it’s a borderline illegal unaffiliated bootleg starbucks that taako and lup own. like dumb starbucks was.

By all rights, it should have been a fairly routine night for the Reaper. Go out, stop some crimes, arrive just in time to prevent whatever scheme the Mongoose had cooked up this week, exchange some one liners, make some threats that essentially amounted to ‘same time next week?’, the works. A regular Tuesday as a superhero in Neverwinter.

But Kravitz is tired, and more than a little distracted, so he’s not doing so hot on the one liners, and the Mongoose’s attacks are a little closer than they would normally be. He doesn’t even have a good excuse, it’s not like he’s injured, or that he has anything pressing to think of.

It was just— this morning his barista (who he may or may not have been harbouring a small crush on) had mentioned offhand that he thought the Reaper was ‘probably hot under the stupid all-black getup’, and Kravitz didn’t really know what the protocol was for someone complimenting your alter-ego was.

“I think if you were gonna go for the strong silent type, you had to start doing it months ago. Now it’s just acting like an asshole. Are you mad at me?” the Mongoose cuts into his thoughts, firing off another few missiles from his stupid umbrella gun (Umbrastaff, he called it, although it was a gun and not a staff so Kravitz had no idea why he insisted on calling it that).

“We are literally fighting as we speak,” says Kravitz, playing up the cockney accent, spinning his scythe to deflect the missiles off the blade, sending them ricocheting around the room. He’d said something like ‘how can you tell’ to Taako— the barista (well, they’d been on a first name basis for a few weeks, so, Taako), and he’d said ‘I can just tell’ which was not at all helpful in getting Kravitz through the conversation without saying or doing something to give himself away.

He’d almost given Taako his number, but how was he going to justify that? Hey, it’s me under the all black getup. Do you want to go out sometime? As if.

“You can have fights without being fuckin’ rude,” says the Mongoose, firing off another few rounds, which Kravitz deflects again, advancing on him.

“You’re right, sorry. I’m a bit scattered. Not exactly my A game.” As if to prove his point, the Mongoose easily dodges his next couple swings with the scythe, not even bothering to leave his range.

“Clearly. I mean, normally you’re at least close enough that I can feel the breeze from your sword.”

“It’s not a sword, and you know that.” Kravitz brings down the scythe in the space where the Mongoose was only seconds before, having already backflipped out of the way and landed a few metres back. Show off. Not that Kravitz had room to complain about that. The Mongoose spins to face him again, at least this time seemingly aware of what a close call that was. He’s tense, and his hair, which Kravitz supposes has thus far been hidden underneath his costume, has come somewhat unravelled, black braid falling to the middle of his back.

It seems... familiar?

He doesn’t have time for that right now. Kravitz draws back the scythe, feeling the hum of energy under his fingers, swinging again, and—

“Wait! Time out!” the Mongoose puts up a hand and Kravitz, for who knows what reason, stops his scythe mid-swing. The familiarity sticks, so it’s not just a trick of the light. It takes him a second to place, but the hairstyle... it looks a lot like a certain barista he’d been spending all night thinking about.

He shakes his head, trying to clear it. It’s because he has Taako on the brain, is all. Besides, he has other things to worry about besides seeing his crush in his enemy. Namely the fight currently happening with said enemy. “What? You can’t call a time out.”

“I just did,” says the Mongoose, fishing through his pockets and pulling out several bobby pins, sticking them in his mouth so he can use both hands to fix his hair. Kravitz blinks, still trying to shake off the sense of deja vu, but it won’t quit nagging him. “It’s a whole safety issue to leave long hair down.”

“It’s still in a braid,” retorts Kravitz.

“Somebody never took Foodsafe.” the Mongoose gives him a lopsided grin that Kravitz fucking knows he’s seen before, and suddenly it’s more than just passing familiarity, and how could he possibly have not noticed before, and— the Mongoose finishes putting up his hair, raising an eyebrow at Kravitz and his private crisis. “Alright. Ready—”

“You work at Fantasy Starbucks,” blurts Kravitz, without even thinking about it. The Mongoose stops dead in his tracks, and Kravitz can see his eyes widen even behind the mask. He splutters for a moment, and then seems to find his footing, already ready with a snarky remark.

“Yeah, well— your accent is fake.”

Shit. He’d forgotten. At the only time so far that having it would have been useful too. Still, he pushes it out of his mind; the Mongoose hadn’t denied it. And, well, he’s already solidly derailed this fight, so he might as well get some real confirmation out of it.

“...Taako? It is you, isn’t it?”

“Just who the fuck are y—” The Mongoose— Taako— levels the Umbrastaff at him, and then stops again. “...Kravitz?”

Well. Shit. Again. Kravitz doesn’t bother to affirm that; his silence is more than enough confirmation. One of them has to say or do something, but the seconds stretch on.

“You’re telling me I said all that shit to your face this morning?” says Taako.

“That’s what you’re worried about right now?”

“Uh, yeah—” Taako is backing up now, and they’ve fought enough times that Kravitz knows when the Mongoose is looking for an escape route; Kravitz’s feet still feel glued to the floor, even when Taako reaches the window, fingers already turning to talons around the Umbrastaff. Taako breaks the glass (because of course he does, even though the windows aren’t even fucking locked), breaking eye contact with Kravitz in order to swing his legs through the window before his form changes too much. “Look, this is like, a lot right now, and I— I’m getting the fuck out of here,” he says, and then drops. Whatever had been keeping Kravitz in place, slack jawed, ends as soon as Taako leaves his sight, and he’s moving before he has time to think about it.

“Wait—!” Kravitz runs for the window, but by the time he gets there, the bird clutching the Umbrastaff is nearly out of sight.

Well. That could have gone better.

***

Kravitz doesn’t go for his coffee the next day. Or the next day, either, although the day after that he’s sick of making his own coffee. And frankly, he misses chatting with Taako. Even if the guy was trying to kill him like once a week. He couldn’t just avoid this forever.

Still, the fact that Taako is working cash when he comes in makes him want to turn tail and run back home. He conjures up the memory of yesterday’s shitty coffee and pushes onward. The shop is mostly empty still, so there’s no line.

“The usual?” says Taako, like nothing abnormal has happened.

“Please,” says Kravitz, and then, before he can chicken out entirely, adds, “Uhm, do you have a few minutes?”

“My shift isn’t over until—”

“I’ll cover you,” comes Lup’s voice from the back room; she pokes her head out and gives Taako a look that is clearly significant, but that Kravitz can’t quite puzzle out. “Take five minutes after you’re done making his coffee.”

Taako scowls at her, and she smiles brightly before heading to the back again.

“Okay. I guess I have five minutes. Talk to you after I make your coffee.”

Kravitz nods, and goes to hover around the pickup counter, pretending to be interested in things on his phone. Taako makes his coffee in a ceramic mug, which at least means he doesn’t want Kravitz to get the fuck out as soon as possible, so that’s... something.

Taako slides the finished coffee across the counter, circling around to join Kravitz on the customer side as Kravitz grabs the mug.

“Lup!” he hollers, and then starts walking towards one of the corner booths without checking to see if his sister is headed to cash or if Kravitz is following. Kravitz does, though, sliding himself into the seat opposite Taako, hands wrapped tightly around the mug.

Taako speaks first. “To be honest, I kinda thought you would rat me out.”

“That would be shitty of me, to just sic authorities on your place of work without so much as a warning.”

“So is this the warning?”

“No,” says Kravitz, taking a sip of his coffee, “I... can’t really make coffee without burning it. And this is the only place for miles with tolerable muffins.”

Taako cracks a grin, like Kravitz knew he would. “Flattery will get you nowhere.” His smile falls, and he crosses his arms and leans back. “So. Reaper. Why didn’t you rat me out?”

Why indeed. Kravitz takes another sip of his coffee and thinks for a second, not even sure himself what his explanation will be once he starts talking.

“It didn’t seem... fair. You’re less of a villain and more of a pain in my ass—” Kravitz ignores Taako’s indignant noise and keeps talking, “—and while we always have cause to fight when on the clock, you’re not doing anything that I feel needs to leave the bounds of those... work hours, I guess.”

Taako is trying to pick him apart with his gaze; it’s something he’s been subjected to several times, although normally in costume, and in retrospect it’s difficult to imagine how he spent so long not noticing the Mongoose in Taako.

Whatever Taako is looking for, he must find it, because he relaxes a bit, and shoots him a lazy grin. “Plus, Mongoose related insurance just got rolling and it would be fuckin’ rude to take me out of commission before anyone got to use theirs.”

Kravitz laughs. “Sure.” He’s silent for a second, before adding, “You aren’t planning on revealing my secret identity, are you? Awfully rude of you to double cross me like that.”

“Wha— You didn’t even give me a chance to respond! Maybe I wasn’t!”

“Were you?”

“I was,” admits Taako, not even pretending to look sheepish. Kravitz raises his eyebrows, and Taako shrugs. “Oh, like you didn’t think about revealing my secret identity? And could you imagine the hype if I unmasked the Reaper? I was tempted.” He sighs. “But I figured then you’d have no reason to keep my identity a secret. No way am I risking a backfire like that.”

It sounds callous, but Kravitz has been talking to Taako almost daily for months; at this point, he can pretty reliably pick up on when Taako isn’t being entirely truthful about something.

“Hmm. Then I suppose it’d be in my best interest not to tell you that I wouldn’t reveal your identity even if you revealed mine?”

Taako narrows his eyes. “Why not?”

Kravitz makes a face. “It’s just in poor taste. I just think we all go through all the trouble to hide who we are and use these powers for good— or whatever it is you do— that it’s always going to be such a low blow to reveal who we are. There might be times where it’s necessary, but petty revenge is not one of them.”

Taako’s expression hasn’t changed; if anything, he’s narrowed his eyes more. “God, you are like— fuckin’ irritatingly nice. Fine. I wasn’t going to reveal your identity. That would be fuckin’ annoying to deal with. Plus I’m having fun.”

“Fun?”

“Oh don’t— don’t fucking lie to me. I know you’re having fun out there too. With your stupid accent and one liners and shit.”

“Alright, alright,” says Kravitz, rolling his eyes. “But I’m not supposed to be having fun, so keep it quiet.”

“See, that’s why I market myself as a villain. No dumb rules.” He puts an elbow on the table and leans on his hand. “Why do you have a fake accent anyway?”

Heat rises to Kravitz’s face, and he’s hoping he looks less embarrassed than he feels. “It’s my— I do it so people don’t recognize my voice.”

Taako laughs. “Well, it doesn’t really do that if you immediately stop using it when you realize you might know someone.”

“I was caught off guard!” defends Kravitz. “It’s not every day you find out your nemesis is your barista.”

“Nemesis, huh?” Taako grins. “Didn’t realize it was that serious to you. You know I have other heroes to fight.”

Kravitz rolls his eyes again. “I don’t see how you have the time, considering how often you’re causing trouble for me.”

Taako laughs, and it’s so contagious and the whole conversation is so surreal Kravitz can’t help but laugh too, before they both lapse into a comfortable, if drawn out, silence.

“So, uh,” says Taako eventually, “what now?”

“Well,” says Kravitz, “I want to keep coming in for coffee in the mornings. And I assume the Mongoose will continue with... whatever chaos it is you currently have planned.”

“It’s not chaos,” insists Taako, “I have plans. But yeah. And I assume the Reaper is gonna show up and throw a wrench in those plans?”

“Yes, probably. So we’ll just be enemies by night...” Kravitz trails off, not entirely sure how to refer to their by day relationship. Friends? Potential love interests? Acquaintances? There’s a few seconds of awkward silence before Kravitz gives up entirely.

Taako pulls and pen and a napkin out of his pocket, jotting something down and pushing it towards Kravitz.

“Here’s, uh, here’s my number. If you give me a heads up five minutes before you get here, we can have your coffee ready by the time you walk in. If you’re nice to me out there.”

“I don’t take bribes,” says Kravitz, grabbing the napkin and pulling out his phone to type in the number.

“That wasn’t a bribe, it was a threat. You don’t even wanna know what I’ll do to your coffee if you fuck me up.”

Kravitz doesn’t bother to point out that neither of them have ever caused any extreme bodily harm to one another and instead says, “So you’re asking me to go easy on you? I thought you were having fun.” He sends Taako a ‘hey it’s kravitz’ text before he has time to second guess himself.

“Could you stop poking holes in my threats? You’re harshing my fuckin’ vibe, Krav.” He sounds irritated, but Kravitz can see the smile tugging at his lips as he texts Kravitz a couple of skull emojis. “I should get back to work before my sister kicks my ass,” he says, standing back up. “I’ll see you tonight, nemesis.” Then he turns on his heels and heads back to the counter, saying something to Lup as he walks by. Kravitz watches him disappear into the back room.

Tonight.

Kravitz had better make sure he had hung his cloak up to dry.

#this is like. 2k words of unpolished nonsense that desperately needs an edit BUT i had a lot of fun with it #i dont know how the powers work or where they are or why they're fighting or who theyre affiliated with ok just roll w/#*roll w/me on this one. just go with it #taako's name was selected by virtue of being the only thing on his wiki page that sounded even remotely like a good supervillain name #taakitz #taz balance #mine

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tiedyemillenialbullshit · 3 years

Text

Nightmare

Pairing: Bucky Barnes x Female!Avenger Reader Word Count: 3,431 Summary: Your best friend finally comes to visit the compound after you join the Avengers. What starts out as a fun night out, quickly turns dire for you and Bucky. Warnings: Angst, Fluff, Feelings, Mentions of Alcohol and Drugs, PTSD/Nightmares, swearing

“AHHHH Y/N!!” You hear her before you see your best friend running towards you, not a care in the world that your entire team has also turned around to watch you two galavant towards each other like long lost sisters.

You catch Sarah in your arms and spin her around.

“Oh my god, I can’t believe you’re FINALLY HERE! And you’re early! Holy shit like I can’t believe you’re finally here in New York!! Let me introduce you to the team!” You grab her arm after she starts to show hesitance in meeting the Avengers all at once.

“Are you sure they have time? I don’t want to be a bother,” she says sheepishly.

“Oh my god Sarah, I talk about you all the time! They’re just as excited to meet you, come on.” You both walk towards the team still staring at you both near the entrance to the compound doing a quick debrief of a not-so-successful mission the day before.

“Guys, this is Sarah. Sarah this is-“ she cuts you off. “I know who you guys all are. It’s so nice to meet you! I’ll stay out of the way, I promise.” Everyone grins and introduces themselves to your best friend.

Nat smiles at you both, “On the contrary, you’re coming out with us tonight! No if’s, and’s or but’s”

Sarah seems to suddenly catch a second wind from her long flight and lets out a squeal of excitement.

You’re the newest to the “official” team, even though Steve and Fury had been trying to recruit you for years. You didn’t like the idea of the world knowing about your skill set and preferred to live a quiet life back in California. Ever since moving here, you’ve felt like maybe you weren’t home yet. Everyone was so nice and welcoming, but you missed your little house hidden in the outskirts of the National Parks in California. You missed the sun, the familiar smell of your patch of paradise and the general sense of room back home. Most importantly, you missed Sarah.

You were reluctant to invite her out to New York at first, but now that things seemed to be going smoothly, you sent for her via a car and private jet thanks to one Mr. Tony Stark. He was more than happy to help you out given your fresh and maybe sometimes bumpy arrival to the Avengers.

As everyone filed inside to break away before the evening festivities, Bucky caught your arm.

After holding you back for a second he said, “Hey, I can totally hang back tonight if you’d rather just be with Sarah and the team.”

You realize what he’s getting at. He also has some lack of feeling settled at the compound. It was something you bonded over when you first arrived. You both had similar pasts, even though they were at the same time lightyears apart.

“Buck, no. I think we’re all going out to Bleaker’s tonight! What’s a better way to get to know the team than bowling, beer, smoking inside, beer, old arcade games, more beer and maybe dancing?!”

Bucky gives you a quick glare out the corner of his eye before wrapping his metal arm around your shoulders to lead you inside after everyone.

“Fiiiiiiine, but I can’t promise I’ll behave.” You giggle, but suddenly feel a couple sets of eyes on you.

“And what do we have here?,” Tony asks with a smirk across his mouth. Sarah seems to be in the middle of an engaging conversation with Steve, so you don’t seem to have an easy out of this encounter. Bucky quickly drops his arm and steps a foot away from you.

“Uh, nothing. Y/N just seemed like maybe she wasn’t feeling well.”

“But I’m fine so here we are - have you seen Sam? Nat? Wanda? I told them we should be ready in a few hours and I jus-“

“Oh for Christ’s sake guys, your secret is safe with me,” Tony winks at you knowingly. You decide to take that as the end of the conversation and rush over to join Sarah.

“So! You have muscles.” Sarah says clearly at a loss of words looking at Steve in a tight shirt.

You and Bucky share a giggle, but pull Sarah away and save her from further embarrassment.

“What the fuck did I just say?” Sarah is about as red as a tomato as you drag her upstairs away from the awkward encounter. Steve looked a little flustered as well, which you file away in the back of your brain.

“Who cares! Let’s catch up and get ready for tonight.” Sarah is your best friend for a reason. Even though it had been 6 months since you last saw each other, it was like it was yesterday. You two spend the next few hours catching up, gossiping about each other’s families, friends, ex-boyfriends, etc.

“So! How are we doing in the boi department?” You turn around and face Sarah at the inquisitive tone in her question.

“What’s that supposed to mean? I’m good, I’m… I’m doing great, I mean yeah I’m good. WHY?” You’re stuttering and you don’t even care it’s obvious you’re blushing.

“Oh, you know. I mean, I’ve only recently met a few super soldiers, but I do think I can tell the there’s a spark between one and someone else.” Sarah so wants you to spill the tea but you promised Bucky you’d keep it quiet.

“Let’s just say things are developing and whatever you’d like to take from that you may.” You both launch into a giggle fit of her guessing and you denying certain aspects of Bucky Barnes.

When Wanda wanders into your room a few hours later, she starts laughing at what she sees. “You know you two are wearing like the same thing, right?” Exchanging confused looks at each other, you reply with a “AND?!”

Sam follows in with a smirk of his own. You’re bracing for his jokes but instead says “damn, OKAY! Everyone’s looking sharp tonight. Y/N, have you seen our bionic man around? Is he coming? He better come out tonight or I swear to…”

After Sam leaves to go find Bucky, the three of you wander down to find Nat and start the evening off with a shot or two. You aren’t much of a drinker, so one is enough for you. You much rather enjoy the company of your friend Mary Jane.

The team is getting silly with each other in the kitchen and quickly the room is filled with people yelling at each other to pregame harder, laughing when Nat’s little sister challenges Sam to a chugging contest and wins.

You feel a large hand at the small of your back. You can smell his cologne and know who it is immediately.

“Well don’t you look dashing tonight Sargent Barnes.” You lean in on impulse but stop yourself just as the girls turn around to see who you’re talking to.

“I was just going to say the same thing to you, sweets.” He mumbles in your ear before removing his hand and walking over to Sam.

The alcohol decides to hit you then, leaving you feeling empty that he’s not standing next to you anymore. Neither of you had wanted to have the “conversation” but you knew you were head over heels for him.

“CABS ARE HERE” screams Sam.

“Sam. For the love of God, stop watching Jersey Shore.” Natasha jokes to him.

At the same time Steve screams, “I understood that reference!” Eye rolls are exchanged as you all make your way outside.

The atmosphere is buzzing and you’re so excited to not just be out with your team, but to also have the only bit of family you had with you as well. You finally felt at home, at peace, and were ready for a fun night out.

Bleaker’s is one of those hole-in-the-wall dive bars that from the outside seems like a hard pass, but once you’re in, there’s no other place you’d rather spend a Saturday night. It’s true it started as a bowling alley in the 60’s. That still remains. What’s newer is the arcade in the back, where the old salon used to be. Jimmy bought the space next door, blew out the wall and filled it with arcade games that sometimes work and sometimes eat your money.

After years of being regular patrons, he knows your team well. The minute you walk in, he starts up all your favorite drinks.

“Ah! My best customers! I had a feeling I’d be seeing Earth’s mightiest heroes tonight.” You line up at the bar for whatever Jimmy decides you’re drinking tonight.

“Ah yes, two vodka on the rocks for my little Russian assassins. Sam here’s your vodka red bull which I don’t think you need, but here we are. Steve! Your drink of choice: an Old Style. Wanda, a cosmo for my favorite witch. And who do we have here, Y/N?”

You’re already both in hysterics at the old man behind the bar giving everybody a hard time. “Jimmy, this is my best friend Sarah. She’s visiting from California for a few days.”

“And whatever the lady wants can be put on my tab…” Steve butts in. Sarah immediately turns red but says “well in that case I’ll have vodka soda with lime please!”

Bucky has come up behind you and now you’re both laughing and watching the two of them stare at each other like no one else is in the room.

“Oh no, what did you do Y/N?”

“Let it play out, he’s not completely tripping over his words yet, maybe he’ll finally land a good girl.” You hush to Bucky.

Jimmy stares as well in amusement. “And you two? Your usual?”

“Yes’sir!” You shout over the growing music. Jimmy hands you each a jack and Diet Coke. You tell yourself it’s okay because it’s diet, but you know that’s a bunch of bullshit.

The other great thing about Bleaker’s? The dance floor downstairs. You always joke around that it seems like a nightclub that never closes in Amsterdam or something, but you’re serious. It could be 3 pm and sunny and you’d never know. It’s in the basement, it's always dark and the music is almost always too loud.

Usually that would gross you all out, but the energy tonight is pushing you all downstairs.

You reach back and grab Bucky’s hand not really caring who sees. It’s been months of sneaking around and either everyone knows and is playing it off like they don't or you’re really good at hiding it. Regardless, you’re over hiding. Maybe showing a little PDA tonight will get him out of his shell.

Sarah and Steve are no where in sight, assuming they’re ahead of you, you follow the team downstairs.

Minutes turn into hours. Everyone is dancing, laughing, sweating, screaming the lyrics to every song, and for a little while you can forget you’re a group of superheroes, and can just be normal 30-something year-olds.

You mostly dance with Bucky and quickly realize he’s a better dancer than you thought he would be. Those moves from the 1940’s must still be relevant in some way today, because the way he's grinding up on you and not caring if anyone sees just does something to you.

You work the room, finding Sarah, Wanda, Nat, even Steve for a song before you realize you don't see Bucky. You give it a few minutes thinking maybe he is in the bathroom. After 15 minutes though, you grab Steve’s attention and motion for him to check the bathroom while you check outside.

You race to the alley where you find Jimmy on a smoke break. “Hey Jimmy, have you seen Bucky? I can’t find him.”

“Oh yeah, doll, he took off in a cab about a half hour ago. Looked real flustered, but I didn’t want to press.”

Fuck. Fuck. Fuck. You thought you felt his mood shift about an hour ago, he was becoming stiff and quiet. You thought maybe he was just drinking a lot but now you’re realizing the loud music, strobe lights and base must have been triggering him.

“Ugh I’m such a bitch,” you huff as you send Steve a S.O.S text.

You: Hey, Jimmy said he just left. I'm sure he's heading home. I'm going to go find him.

Sire Captain Rogers: Go ahead. I think Sarah and I can find something to do while you find Buck. ;)

You: Yeah I’m sure you can.

You: BEHAVE. She’s my best friend.

Sire Captain Rogers: I know Y/N, don’t worry about us. Let me know when you find him.

You lock your phone and hop in a cab back to the compound.

No one is up or around when you enter through the front. The kitchen has been cleaned up, the dishes done. Probably thanks to THURSDAY, Tony’s beta bot for “cleaning up after you assholes trash the place.”

You smirk and head for the elevators. Heading straight to Bucky’s room, you can tell his light is on but something seems off. You don’t like to use your powers on friends or in the compound, but you close your eyes and reach out with your mind to find his aura. Your eyes snap open. You don’t sense him, you just see red.

Taking this as a good excuse to break into a friend’s room, you burst into the room to find it in disarray. Everything is toppled over, broken glass is on the floor, the bathroom light is on, but all you can see is his blood on the door and the floor. You’re panicked, trying to piece together what happened.

Again, you close your eyes and reach out for the familiar energy of Bucky. You find him in your room on the floor.

“What the fuck?,” you mumble and sprint up the stairs to your apartment. You shoot Steve a text on your way up.

You: Found him, looks like a bad one. I’ll let you know if I need you.

Sir Captain Rogers: Thanks Y/N. I’m just a call away, let me know if you need anything. Night.

Upon entering, you sense he’s in distress. His heart rate is elevated, he’s incredibly sweaty and is panting like a dog.

“Bucky? Buck, it’s me, it’s Y/N.”

Bucky stirs and jumps into a defensive standing position quicker than you can blink. You flip the lights on with a “BABE. Baaabe, it’s me. It’s okay, you’re safe. We’re in the compound. You had a nightmare.”

Bucky’s eyes are wide and alarmed, but you can tell the moment he recognizes you.

Rushing over to you, he takes you into a big hug. “Oh my god. What happened? Are you okay, did I hurt you?”

“No Bucky, no I just found you a minute ago. You had another bad one, what do you need me to do right now for you?”

Bucky stands back and rubs his swollen eyes. “I need to shower, can you help me?”

Typically, this is where it gets exciting, but you knew what he means. Water grounds him. He doesn’t feel like he’s falling in water. It helps him visualize the stress washing off of him.

You help him strip and get in the shower, but before you can even take his jeans off, he jumps in and pulls you in with him. You realize how desperate he is for whatever he’s feeling to pass and your heart sinks.

You’re both standing there, almost fully clothed holding each other. This is the worst you’ve seen him in a long time.

“I’m so sorry if I ruined your night, Y/N. The base sounded like the train, the lights looked like the machine they used on me, what the fuck.”

You aren’t sure what to do so you decide to sit on the ground and pull him down with you. You position yourself behind him so his back is in your chest. Even though he’s so much larger than you, he sinks down enough for you to reach over his shoulders and hold him.

“It’s okay Barnes, just breathe with me. You’re safe. You’re with me, and we’re home. Nobody is going to touch you. I’ve got you, you won’t fall.”

You take in deep breaths so he can match your breathing.

After about 45 minutes, the hot water is out in the tank. Bucky sits forward and turns towards you. You want him to lead right now, so you don’t say anything. Neither does he, but the look in his eyes are telling you something about tonight is different.

With a soft smile on your lips, you cup his cheek until he is really looking at you. “Hun, let’s go lay down, ya? Let me help get you dried off.” Bucky hates when you fuss over him, so when he doesn’t argue, you know to be extra gentle with him.

After getting him up and out of the shower, you think skin-to-skin contact doesn’t seem sexual right now, it feels intimate in a grounding sense, and you know that’s exactly what he needs right now. Bucky seems dazed, almost like he got hit too hard in the head. You yourself are of course a tad over-served, and are quickly realizing the adrenaline of this entire situation is rubbing off.

You get Bucky into bed and turn to make sure his phone is plugged in and that he has a glass of water, but he grabs your wrist before you can move away. “Just leave it, it’s fine.”

“Buck, just let me-“ he grabs your wrist harder.

“Y/N. Please just stay here. Please.”

The entire time you’ve been together, he’s done a lot of things but begging you for anything is not one of them. Suddenly the phone and whatever hell else you were doing doesn’t seem important anymore.

You climb into your usual spot next to him and decide maybe you’ll try to get him to open up. The moment the back of your head hits the pillow, Bucky is facing you. His pleading eyes seem like they want to tell you everything that’s going on in his head, but you know pushing him to talk will just make the nightmares come flooding back too soon.

Instead, you decide to lay on your back and pull him to lay on your chest.

“Just listen to my heart beat, Bucky.” You hear him take a deep breath and settle into your chest.

You start and stop yourself from trying to say something comforting. You’re terrified to say the wrong thing at such a crucial moment. Typically these bad episodes are reserved for a Steve house call. You realize as he’s settling into a comfortable position that he hasn’t asked you to call Steve yet. Bucky trusts you in a way you didn’t realize until now.

You don’t know when, but you start humming the first calming song that comes in your head.

I’ll be seeing you In all the old familiar places That this heart of mine embraces All day through

Bucky picks his head up to look at you. Oh fuck.

“Where did you hear that song?,” he says to you with shiny eyes.

“You sing it all the time when you’re concentrating. I looked it up and added it to my ‘bath time/relax’ playlist. I didn't know Billie Holliday was a favorite of yours."

Bucky was looking at you like maybe this was the first time he saw you, like really saw you. “My mom used to sing that around the house when she was missing my dad.”

“Oh I’m so sorry, I didn’t know. I can hum a diff-“ you’re cut off with the most searing kiss Bucky has ever given you. He’s crying when he pulls back to look at you again. “Will you keep singing it?”

In that small cafe The park across the way The children's carousel That chestnut tree, the wishing well

By the time you finish the second verse, he has physically relaxed in your arms. You continue rubbing your hand up and down his back and shoulder, stopping to play with his long hair every once in a while.

I'll be seeing you In every lovely summer's day In every thing that's light and gay I'll always think of you that way

“I forgot how much I love hearing this song sung around me.” Bucky whispers so quietly you almost miss it.

I'll find you in the morning sun And when the night is new I'll be looking at the moon But I'll be seeing you…

You stop your caressing when you feel him sit up on one arm.

He leans down to kiss you but stops short to whisper “I love you Y/N.” You kiss him back and wrap your arms around his shoulders, and when you say “I love you too, Bucky,” you’ve never been more sure of something in your life.

#bucky x reader #bucky barnes fanfiction #bucky barnes x reader #marvel fanfiction #bucky fluff #steve rogers

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melliflovs · 3 years

Text

Chapter Three - Yuji x Reader

Word Count: 1,519

Warnings: Just kinda cute, kinda angsty

Summary: Breakfast with Itadori and potentially new feelings begin to blossom.

Series Masterlist is pinned!

Sitting across from your classmate you sipped your water. It was admittedly very awkward. While you understood the overall idea of today's 'training' it was going to take a bit for the two of you to warm up to each other. Befriending people wasn't exactly your strong suit even if it was over two large plates of eggs and bacon.

"How long have you known about curses?" He asked, taking a bite of the buttered toast in front of him.

"My whole life. I was adopted by the Zenin clan when I was four so Megumi and I grew up together. Maki was practically my big sister when I was younger."

"Maki?"

"Oh, right you haven't met her. She's a few years older than us. You'll probably meet her soon."

He nodded in response, "How many people go to our school?"

"Honestly, not many. The campus was designed for a full student body but there are only a handful of students. Each year the classes get smaller too." It's because people keep dying, but hell you didn't want to scare the kid. You guys needed all the help you could get in the war against curses. Even if the strongest of them all resided inside him.

"Why do you want to be a sorcerer?"

Suddenly the food on your plate no longer looked appetizing, your stomach doing a nervous flip as you looked over at him. "It's always been the plan." You said, pushing the scrambled eggs on your plate around.

Yuji's eyebrows drew together, "That's not what I asked."

"Why do you want to be a sorcerer, Itadori." You responded, a bit harsher than intended. Then again he'd struck somewhat of a nerve. Your sudden change of tone didn't go unnoticed by him, realizing that he might've crossed a line. "Because I made a promise."

"What?"

"I made a promise to my Grandfather to help people, so I'm going to do that. Sukuna and I are going to do that." The curse mocked him in his head, calling him a fool. Maybe he was a fool, and he'd definitely end up dead by the end of all of this but based off what he'd learned it would probably be for the best.

"I made a promise too," You mumbled, struggling to swallow a small bite of your toast. Your mouth felt so dry, the topic of conversation making you increasingly uncomfortable. But this was what Nanami wanted right? To get to know each other?

Yuji seemed to perk up at your words, finally finding a common ground. "Really?"

"Yeah," You nodded, clearing your throat and deciding to indulge him. "I made a promise to my parents before they died."

"What was it?"

"Well-" You began, the vibration of Yuji's phone on the table quickly cutting you off. All desire to spill your secrets fading with every buzz. Fuck getting to know each other.

"Sorry." He said, checking his notifications. "Gojo wants to know how I did yesterday. I must've watched five movies." He seemed so apologetic like he didn't want to leave you alone here.

"Well," You said, giving him a soft smile. "You don't want to keep him waiting."

"Are you sure?" He questioned. He wanted you to say no, to ask him to stay and tell him all your secrets. For some reason when Yuji looked at you he didn't want to leave, he wanted to stay by your side. Something about leaving you here alone didn't feel right, but when you looked at him from across the table with a small smile he felt his stomach flip.

"Go ahead." You said, reassuring him. "I'm a big girl, I can handle myself."

Nodding he slipped out of the booth and put enough money to cover the bill on the table. Part of you wanted to insist you could pay for yourself but decided to accept the nice gesture. It was friendly.

Friendly. You have plenty of friends so why did that make you frown?

He grinned at you before turning and walking out the doors, looking back at you one last time before leaving the cafe. Letting out a sigh you stared out the window next to you.

Of course, you didn't want to be a sorcerer. No one really wanted to be, at least not that you know of. Everyone around the school seemed so forced - full of fake emotion and light. You've seen the sparkle leave Gojo's eyes when he thought no one was looking.

Shit, he probably wore the blindfold so he didn't have to pretend all the time. You'd heard rumors he used to be happy, rumors that he had a friend and that something went wrong. Just like Nanami had a friend and something went wrong. Something always goes wrong eventually.

You didn't have a choice, even if you did try to quit and abandon the promise you'd made so many years ago. Sure, you could try and rationalize that you were just a child. So naive that you didn't know what you were getting into. But once you get into it you can't leave - at least that's what your mentor had told you.

You knew Nanami was right. It'll always call you back.

For now, you'd sit here for a while, overthinking every event and decision until you were exhausted and couldn't think any longer. Until your head hurt and your eyes began to tear up.

It wouldn't take long for Yuji to regret his promise, to regret swallowing that finger. When that day comes you hope to be far far away from him. Away from the destruction that you'll inevitably cause him.

The feeling of your phone buzzing in your pocket snapped you out of your thoughts. A single text read:

Gym, 8 am tomorrow.

Hopefully, you wouldn't see Yuji until then.

----

Thankfully you didn't.

When you arrived at the gym you were far more prepared after waking up in your own bed (as comfy as Megumi's was) and had even set a timer to wake you up in time. Something had compelled you to put on a bit more makeup that morning. Nothing major, just some mascara and a bit of blush. Ultimately it would probably be ruined during training today since you had to exorcise a curse but at least you felt beautiful as you took off your shoes and stepped on the mats.

Nanami quirked his eyebrow at you, clearly noticing the supposedly subtle difference. "Why are you wearing-" He was cut off by the door opening, the two of you turning to watch the pink-haired boy enter.

It was as if a lightbulb had gone off in his mind, the realization dawning over him as he watched Yuji move to stand next to you. This was bad. Gojo's words echoed in his head as he watched you shyly eye your classmate, he's going to be executed.

But you didn't seem to know that.

This was very bad indeed.

Clearing his throat he got back to the task at hand, "Like I said yesterday we're going to exorcise a grade two curse. It should be fairly easy for the two of you so just remember that this is supposed to work on your teamwork skills."

Maybe this was his fault for forcing the two of you to work together. He'd tried his best to keep you away from the pain that he'd experienced when in reality he might've only pushed you closer to it. Nanami found himself getting lost in thought, overthinking, and forgetting what he was saying. "Um."

You looked at him perplexed. It was so unlike your mentor to act like this. "Right!" You said, clapping your hands once, "We should get going then."

Nanami just nodded in response, his eyebrows furrowed as he wordlessly turned and walked out of the gym.

"Is he okay?" Yuji asked, scratching the back of his neck awkwardly. Even the student he'd only known for two days had caught onto your teacher's odd behavior.

"Yeah, he probably just didn't get enough sleep last night." You said trying to rationalize it. the two of you looked at each other with small smiles, shrugging at each other stimulatingly. With a giggle you started to follow after your sensei, grabbing your shoes by the door and disappearing through the exit.

Yuji watched as you walked away, smiling to himself. You had a cute laugh. "She looks nice today," The voice inside his head pointed out.

"That's the first nice thing you've ever said."

Sukuna scoffed, "Don't get used to it."

"She does look nice today, you're right." With that Yuji took off in a jog, the spirit muttering to itself as he swiftly grabbed his sneakers.

"Then tell her, or I will." He could practically hear the smirk in Sukuna's voice. Itadori was sure that if the curse got a chance to say it himself it wouldn't be as nice as the confession in private. "Then maybe I will."

With that Yuji left the gym, tuning Sukuna out for the time being and running towards your retreating figure.

Maybe he will

#jjk x reader #jjk #jujutsu kaisen #jujutsu kaisen imagines #jujutsu kaisen yuji #yuji itadori #itadori x reader #yuji x y/n #sukuna #kento nanami #yuji itadori x reader #yuji itadori x y/n

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nugnthopkns · 3 years

Text

i’ll tell you i was wrong if you dance with me

word count: 3.3k

warnings: explicit fem!reader, slightly unhealthy relationship moment (lack of communication), mention of infidelity, cursing, alcohol consumption, a fair bit of angst

recommended listening: fred astaire | adam brock

a/n: communicate with your partners!!! also yeah this is the song from lady bird. it’s a banger

This seriously isn’t happening.

You never fight with Travis. Communication comes easy between the two of you, but you also make it a priority to talk about your feelings. It keeps things from boiling over; both of you are known to unleash wicked tempers on occasion and have found being direct stops issues from occuring. Arguments still occasionally happen, but they’re typically over trivial things like what movie to watch or where you’re spending the holidays. Travis apparently forgot about the fact you talk to each other about things.

He’d been upset when he came home from practice, but you were pretty sure he was fine after he woke up from his pre-game nap. Knowing he’s a superstitious person and has a lot of pressure on him to put up points, you had made the choice not to ask about what was bothering him. Throwing off his routine could have detrimental consequences. Tonight's game is tighter than it should have been, but the Flyers come out on top. Travis spends a bit more time in the penalty box than you would have liked, but everyone was getting chippy by the start of the third period. Claude tries to talk to him on the bench but he gets shut down. Whatever Travis was upset about before is still clearly bothering him, and it’s affecting his game.

You’re following Travis home from the game, and can tell he’s uptight from the way he’s gripping the steering wheel. As you wind through downtown Philadelphia you try and prepare yourself for any bomb that could drop. Chances are that when you reach your apartment things will explode. Maybe it’s nothing; Travis is fine and just wants to be a responsible driver for once. You pull into the free spot beside his car and see him walking towards the elevator, suit jacket balled up and tucked under his arm. This won’t be good. Trying to buy yourself some time, you take the stairs. Seven flights later you arrive outside your door; he left it unlocked, which gives you a sliver of hope things will be fine.

“Do you want to talk about what’s bothering you?” you call into the darkness of the apartment. Your sneakers are left at the door and to retreat towards the bedroom, looking for a sign of life. You find one in the bathroom: the light is on. A gentle push on the door reveals your boyfriend is in the shower and ignoring you.

“Trav?”

“Yeah,” he huffs, words muffled by him tossing his head back to rinse the shampoo of his hair. Apparently the shower isn’t as relaxing as he had hoped.

You don’t bother to tread lightly, upset that he’s acting like a child. “You’re being an asshole. I get that you had a bad day, but you can’t take it out on me. I just want to help.”

Travis turns the water off suddenly. “Can’t help if you’re the problem,” he scoffs.

His statement doesn’t make sense. You’ve done nothing out of the ordinary the past couple of days; nothing that would warrant the behaviour you’re receiving. “What do you mean?”

Shouldering passed you to exit the room, Travis doesn’t bother to respond. You’re beyond frustrated: partners in healthy relationships communicate, not show emotions like grade schoolers. “You’re not giving me the fucking silent treatment Travis. You gotta talk to me.” The bedroom is dark when you enter and you flick the overhead light on to see better.

“You really don’t know?”

“Of course I don’t know,” you seethe. “If I did know we wouldn’t be in this predicament because we’d be solving the issue.”

The glare you receive is sharp enough to cut stone. He pulls on a t-shirt, anger clear in the aggression he does it with. “Why did I have to find out from Carter that you’ve been getting coffee with your TA?”

You’re shocked. In no way is it what he thinks it is. “You’ve got to be fucking kidding me,” you sigh, upset that Travis would take someone else’s words at face value and not talk to you about it.

“I’m dead fucking serious Y/N. You preach communication, but it looks as though you’re the one who hasn’t been doing enough talking.”

The room around you starts to spin. You can’t comprehend what he’s insinuating. “Wait, you think I’m cheating on you?” you ask. There has been a gross miscommunication error somewhere; never in a million years would you think of having an affair.

“I didn’t say that.”

“Well what the fuck did you say?”

Travis tugs at the roots of his hair in frustration. He doesn’t answer immediately, pacing the length of the bed a few times. “I just–” he struggles to articulate his words. “I just said that you’re being a bit hypocritical, don’t you think? You’re standing here yelling at me because I didn’t voice my concerns, but you haven’t been talking to me about what’s going on in your life.” Travis’ tone is sharp, and it stings.

It’s your turn to show how upset you are. Your hands curl into fists at your side, and you squeeze your nails into your palms before releasing them. “I do tell you what goes on in my life Travis,” your breathing ragged as you try to not lose your cool. “I ran into my TA at the coffee shop yesterday, and he paid for my drink because my card wouldn’t work. Didn’t think it was breaking news, sorry I don’t send you every single fucking life update that happens. What’s gotten into you?”

“You could have been cheating!”

“But I wasn’t!” you scream, no longing caring about keeping up appearances. You can’t believe Travis would think that. It hurts. “And I never would! You know this”

He turns his back to you, like it pains him to look at you, but you don’t understand why. You're not the one suggesting infidelity. “That’s it? That’s all you’ve got to say?” he seethes.

“That’s all there is to say! There’s nothing to explain, no secret to uncover. I’m not in the wrong here.”

“And you think I am?”

You look at Travis like he has three heads. “Are you serious? You’re the one who’s so fucking upset over a situation that could have happened to literally anyone.” Your tone suggests that you’re exhausted with the conversation, and Travis gets the hint.

He slinks towards the door, still visibly angry. “I’ll take the couch tonight,” he grits out before tightly gripping the doorknob and shutting the door with more force than needed.

The bed doesn’t look appealing, full of much happier memories, but fighting with Travis has knocked any and all energy out of you. You gingerly pull back the covers and slip underneath. Tears trickle down your cheek as you toss and turn, trying to fall into some sort of slumber. However, your mind has other ideas, replaying the blowout. You can’t begin to understand why Travis is so bothered by the instance, and more importantly why it caused him to disregard a fundamental part of your relationship. There’s little movement from beyond the door, but you can hear the faint noise of a Johnny Cash record playing from the speakers in the living room. After hours of staring at the ceiling your eyes close and a fitful sleep follows.

You might have gotten nine hours of sleep, but you wake up feeling exhausted. Fighting with anyone drains you, but fighting with Travis is especially terrible because it rarely happens. There doesn’t seem to be any movement from the other side of the door; maybe he’s still asleep. You refrain from heading into the kitchen, unsure of what will happen if you see him. After nearly twenty minutes you can’t wait any longer to start your day and pad into the main living space. It’s empty: no sign that Travis has been there for many hours. Guess you don’t have to immediately deal with the fallout of last night.

A post-it note is tacked onto the fridge handle and your heart skips a beat. In Travis’ chicken scratch it reads I’ll see you at the gala tonight. We’ve got media all day and I won’t be back in time for us to go together. There’s no mention of the fight, and you can’t judge from a two sentence note whether or not he’s still pissed off.

“Fuck,” you groan. “The gala.” Tonight’s the annual Flyers Give Back gala, and you’re expected to be in attendance. It’s not even a charity event; the organization is offering a chance for business men to chat up the players in hopes they continue to donate. You find things like these unbearable and tedious, but Travis does his best to make them enjoyable. Not knowing what page you’re on with him is going to be terrible. There’s a pretty good chance he’ll ignore you if he’s still upset.

As if someone is reading your mind, the better halves group chat starts to explode. Everyone is chattering excitedly about tonight, and under normal circumstances you’d be excited to see them in such a relaxed setting. It’s been a while you’ve all hung out, but you can’t find yourself to contribute to the conversation. You mute the notifications and do your best to move on with your day. The rest of the morning is spent working on your thesis; mind numbing work that almost makes you forget about everything that happened in the past twenty-four hours. Once you’ve hit an acceptable word count for the day you shutdown your computer and make lunch.

The grilled cheese sandwich you eat while watching a John Mulaney comedy special fulfills your appetite but doesn’t curb your dread. You decide to call your sister, hoping she can be a welcome distraction. Dialling her number you sink further into the couch cushions, wrapping yourself tightly with a blanket so that only your head is poking out. “What’s up?” she asks, and you hear her shuffle in the background, presumably to move somewhere more private. It isn’t normal for you to call her unannounced.

You hold it together for approximately two seconds. The tears start and they don’t stop. Every emotion you’ve felt since getting home last night comes to the surface, and before you know it you’re sobbing into the receiver.

“Woah, slow down,” she says. “Y/N, take some deep breaths.” When your breathing returns to a somewhat regular level she continues speaking. “What happened?”

It takes you nearly twenty minutes to tell the whole story because you’re so distraught. No detail is spared, and you go back much farther than is probably needed. You recount what happened after yesterday’s practice, pretty much the entire game, and the fight that followed. “I just don’t know what brought this on,” you sniffle. “We don’t fight, we talk about things. I’m not sure if I’m more upset at what he insinuated or at the fact he broke a cardinal rule.”

Your sister sighs, and you hear her breath fan in slight annoyance. You’re worked up about something kinda stupid, you know, but you can’t let it slide. “It’s probably a bit of both. So, what are you going to do?”

“What can I do? I know that we need to talk about what happened, but a public event is not the best place to do that. I also can’t not show up or ask Trav to ditch in order to figure this out. We have to be there.”

“Sounds like you’ve got it figured out then.”

You really don’t. “What happens if he ignores me the entire night?”

She laughs and tells you to not to anything stupid, and to take your mind off of things tells you a story about your nephew eating dirt. It does the trick; you’re momentarily distracted and forget about Travis. You talk for a while longer before she has to go. “Miles is crying, will you be okay if I let you go?”

It’s your turn to laugh. “I’ll be fine,” you insist. A glance at the clock tells you it’s time to start getting ready. “I’ve gotta shower and start the process. Beauty is time consuming you know.”

Against your better judgement you open your text messages to see if there’s anything from Travis. His text thread is the same as it was yesterday and you’re disappointed. You had hoped that maybe he’d get bored between interviews and check in. With no new notifications you exit out of the application and pull up a playlist you hope will brighten your mood. The steam from the shower relaxes your tense muscles and warms you up. It’s comforting in the way a cocoon is; you practically have to drag yourself out of the bathtub.

Your bedroom is cold and doesn’t offer the same respite as the bathroom. The music continues to float in from the hallway, and you allow yourself to get lost in it. It’s been a while since you danced around your room; it worked to cure sadness when you were a teenager. Hopefully the magic hasn’t worn off. You flail your arms, not caring how silly you look since no one is here to see you anyways, and scream along at the top of your lungs. After a few songs you feel better and return to the task at hand. The dress code is labelled as ‘black tie’ on the invitation, but that isn’t what you’re worried about. You own a million dresses for situations like this after being with Travis for so long. You don’t know what he packed to wear, and there’s a decent chance you’ll be pushed together for photos. Clashing colours will look terrible.

A quick glance through his side of the closest leaves you no clues, so you decide to be as literal as possible. Black is a flattering colour and works well with every colour combination. There’s a jumpsuit hanging in the back that catches your eye and you think it’s the perfect choice. After pulling it on you move back into the bathroom to do your hair and makeup. Everything is natural and relaxed; once again for the sake of potential photos. The clock strikes on the hour and you realize it’s time to leave. A pair of heels are slipped on and you order an Uber before locking the apartment and heading to the lobby. You had thought about driving yourself, but on the occasion that things don’t end well with Travis you’ll probably have more than a couple of drinks.

The entire way to the venue your leg bounces up and down. It’s been years since you’ve been this nervous about being around the team. You’ve been with Travis for a few seasons now, and the organization has become a second family to you. No one is going to know about the fight and you worry they’re going to talk about your solo arrival. The outside of the convention centre is sharply decorated, and your driver lets out a low whistle at the extravagance of it all. “Thank you so much,” you gush, and exit the car. Thankfully no photographers are set up outside, and you dart inside without being seen.

Once in the main event space, you scan for the bar. There’s no sign of Travis, which should make you more relaxed but doesn’t. What if there was an accident on the way to the venue? You have no idea where he was all or who he came with. Overthinking distracts you from your original goal, leaving you standing aimlessly in the middle of the room.

“You look like you might need one of these,” Ryanne chuckles, handing you a champagne flute. You gladly accept and down it in two gulps. “Holy shit.”

“Yeah,” you sigh, eyes scanning to see if your boyfriend has made an appearance.

She sees right through your facade of calm and wraps you in a tight hug. “What’s going on?”

For a second time today you explain what happened last night. There’s no judgement from Ryanne as there might have been from your sister because she understands. Dating a professional athlete isn’t easy; things like this happen much more frequently than you’d expect. Perhaps it’s all the time spent apart that makes the occasional lapse in communication so apparent. She listens quietly, full attention on you. To your credit you don’t cry this time, slightly more numb to the situation to due more time passing. It still hurts a tremendous amount.

“He’ll come around,” Ryanne insists. “TK is a little moronic sometimes, but he’d never jeopardize his relationship with you. You’re quite literally the most important thing in his life.”

“I know. I’m just upset because the whole thing could have been avoided.”

She offers you a sympathetic smile. “I know.” Ryanne links her arm through yours. “Let’s go find something to snack on.”

You spend most of the night with Ryanne, and occasionally Claude when he can get away from the hot-shot businessmen. Travis eventually came in, flanked by Nolan, but was immediately pulled into the politics of the night. The two of you occasionally sneak glances at each other and you tell he’s uncomfortable. You can only hope it isn’t because of your presence. It’s nearing eleven; the party has become a much more relaxed affair, and the DJ is playing sappy love songs in an attempt to get the media team some good photo ops. An intern asks the Giroux’s if they’ll dance for an instagram story and they both look hesitant. “Go on guys, I’ll be fine,” you reassure. It’s the subtle push they need to enjoy a quiet moment together.

As if he can sense you’re lonely and feel out of place, Travis approaches you. It’s tentative, like he’s petrified you’ll turn him away, but he comes regardless. Drinks are in each of his hands and he extends one to you. When you don’t take it he sets it on the table behind you. “Hi,” he says sheepishly, fiddling with something in his pocket.

“Hi Travis.” You’re determined not to let his presence crack your resolve; last night illuminated a big issue and it needed to be dealt with. It’s proving to be difficult because he bumps a shoulder against yours and all you can think of is kissing him senseless.

The song changes to a Bruce Springsteen ballad, and you recognize it instantly. It played at the coffee shop on your first date with Travis all those years ago. One look at him tells you this isn’t an accident, that he had requested it specifically for the two of you. “Dance with me?”

You sigh deeply, looking him in the eyes. “Trav, this isn’t going to magically fix things.”

“I know, baby, I know,” he pleads. “I fucked up so bad last night because I was being an idiot. I wrote down everything I would do differently if I had a time machine, look.” A hand reaches into his jacket pocket and pulls out a piece of paper filled with his nearly illegible print. “Just one dance, and then we can go home and talk about it like I should have suggested in the first place. Let me know we’re still okay.”

If you hadn’t been in public you’re sure Travis would have been in tears. It’s not necessarily a good look to cry in front of hundreds of sponsors. He has a reputation as the goofy boy who takes no shit to uphold. “You have a lot of talking ahead of you,” you say, and let him drag you onto the dance floor. Swaying in his arms you realize things are going to be just fine. Travis loves you and you love him; there’s nothing the two of you can’t work through.

☼ ☼ ☼ ☼

taglist: @jamiedrysdales @kiedhara @tortito if you want to be added shoot me an ask :)

#travis konecny imagine #travis konecny x reader #travis konecny fic #philadelphia flyers imagine #hockey imagine #hockey fic #nhl imagine #nhl fic #cwrites

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legaciezzz · 3 years

Text

Hello Sister

Part 1

Hope & Cain

Genre: Chapter fic

Synopsis: It was always believed that Hope was Klaus’s only heir and the tribrid, but things change when Cain strolls into town and claims his title as a Mikaelson. But just how much of a Mikaelson is he?

A/N: Here it is Finally! the first chapter! I know it took forever but I really hope you guys are not disappointed with this series!

Cain came to Mystic Falls to look for Hope, but instead found himself in a cell guarded by some guy named MG according to the bearded man. Not that he was upset about it, he seemed to be in the right place, judging from the way they reacted earlier they knew Hope Mikaelson.

Cain leaned himself against the metal bars and watched MG, a smug grin on his face.

MG looked anxiously back at him for the sixth time now, it was obvious that the staring was making him uncomfortable. Then Cain's attention shifted as heard voices nearing.

"I don't understand. If he's not another monster then who is he?" he heard a girl say through the walls.

"I don't know, he won't say anything other than he's looking for you." the man he met earlier replied.

"Dr. Saltzman, thank god," MG said as the bearded man walked in with three girls: two brunettes and a blonde. "He's really starting to creep me out."

"Thanks, MG. We can take it from here." the bearded man, Dr. Saltzman, told him and with that he didn't waste any time getting out of there.

Cain straightened up. "So which one's Hope?" he asked, looking at the girls.

The brunette with the blue eyes stepped out from the middle, arms crossed.

He looked her up and down, a slight arch to his brow. "Hm. Thought you would be taller."

"Who the hell are you and what do you want?" Hope said, unamused.

That question made him smile, which combined with the look in his eye was a little eerie. "The name's Cain. Mikaelson."

"Mikaelson?" the other brunette echoed softly. "I thought you didn't have any other family."

"I don't." Hope responded.

"Actually," Cain began, dangling his arms through the bars. "You do. Hello, Sister."

. . .

"That's impossible. I can't have a brother." Hope said aloud, pacing around.

They were now in Alaric's office, discussing what was just discovered in private. Being Hope's sibling was such a bold claim, plus there was something about Cain that seemed off and they were wary of whether or not they should trust him.

"Are you sure none of your family has mentioned anything about this?" Alaric asked from his desk.

"Yes."

"Maybe Klaus got somebody else pregnant." Josie suggested.

"I highly doubt it."

"Hope, relax, okay? We can just do the lineage spell and then we'll know if he's telling the truth or not." Alaric said.

"Do we really need another tribrid?" Lizzie pointed out, she had been rolling her eyes and checking her nails during the whole conversation. "One Hope is already enough."

"Thanks." Hope said, unconvincingly.

All of a sudden, MG came barging in which grabbed everyone's attention. "Uh, Dr. Saltzman, we got a situation out here."

They all rushed and followed him outside where a bunch of students crowded around a corpse of a now former student, head severed and a small pool of blood. Shocked gasps, murmurs and a little fainting crying fueled the tension in the atmosphere.

"Guess we can check off vampire." Josie said softly, it was no coincidence that as soon as Cain arrived at the school someone ended up dead.

Then they saw Kaleb appear, "Mystery Dude's not there."

"Thank you." Alaric said to the two boys before turning back to everyone else. "Alright, everyone head inside," and as the students started to do as told, he started to look around. "Where's Dorian?"

And on cue, Dorian emerged from the herd of teenagers frantically making their way inside. "Ric, what's going on?"

"We need to find Cain." Alaric told him before deciding to correct himself when he saw the confusion on Dorian's face. "Long story, just make sure everyone's situated inside."

Dorian then noticed the body. "Is that--"

"Yeah, do you mind taking care of that too?"

"So what do we do now?" Josie asked.

"We," gesturing to him and Hope, "are going to look for Cain before someone else gets hurt. You and your sister stay here."

Alaric and Hope quickly set out to look for Cain god knows what he was up to. Even though they just met him and barely knew anything about him, a dead body was hard not to see as a red flag.

"Where do you think he went?" Alaric asked, walking alongside Hope.

"How am I supposed to know?" Hope replied, a bit bitter. All the sudden she apparently has a brother and she's automatically supposed to know all about him.

A minute passed and they didn't seem to find any sign of Cain, until he popped up out of nowhere. "There you are," he said walking towards them with a smile, blood dripping from his lips.

Hope looked like she was about to attack him with a spell, but Alaric lowered her hand. "What the hell?!" she said.

There was a moment of confusion on his face before realizing that they were probably talking about the body. "Right, yeah. Uh, you left. I got bored... And hungry, I guess-- it wasn't that hard to get out." Cain rolled his eyes when neither of them responded. "It could've been worse. Trust me, one person won't be missed."

"We don't feed off of people here." Alaric said.

"My bad. It won't happen again."

"Why were you looking for us?" Hope said.

"Well you walked out in the middle of our conversation. That was pretty rude."

"Well why don't we get back inside and we can finish that conversation." Alaric said which caused Hope's head to snap towards him.

"Are you serious? He just killed someone and you want to let him back in the school?"

"You think just letting him go is a better idea? We need to know more about him."

"You know I can hear you, right?"

Hope huffed. "Fine."

The three made it back inside to Alaric's office. Alaric and Cain sat at opposite sides of his desk, while Hope leaned against it, not bothering to hide her annoyance.

"So, headmaster, huh?" Cain said, casually looking around the room, trying open with a little small talk.

"What are you doing here?" Hope asked, cutting straight to the chase.

"What? Small family reunion is not a good enough answer for you?"

"Yeah, actually."

"Is it really that hard to believe you may have a brother?" he asked, that smug look appearing on his face again.

"Why don't you just cut the bullshit and tell us why you're actually here."

Cain opened his mouth but Alaric stood up to intervene. "You know, maybe tomorrow's a better day to discuss this." he said, looking at Hope. It was obvious her hostile tone wasn't helping get answers. "Hope, why don't you take him back down."

Hope sighed before reluctantly walking Cain out. With each step he took, it got quieter, aside from a few whispers. He glanced around at everyone's face. They all seemed to be scared or angry, either way he didn't care. If this was after one body, just wait until they saw what he really was capable of.

They reached the cell and once he stepped foot in there, he heard the door close, lock and hope speak some Latin-- which made his head turn.

"Boundary spell." she said.

He nodded. "Hm."

She turned to leave without saying anything.

"What? No goodnight?" He asked playfully.

Hope flashed him an obviously fake smile, "goodnight," then rolled her eyes before officially leaving.

Once the silence settled in, Cain walked around in circles. Eventually he got bored and decided to lie down on the bed, staring at the ceiling before falling asleep.

The next morning Cain woke up. He sat up, back resting against the wall, and waited patiently. By the way the sun shone through the little opening. It was probably around mid morning, but it wasn't like he was awake for long either.

Soon enough, Hope entered the room and with a wave of her hand brought down the barrier. "Get up," she said, the blatant indifference in her tone.

The smugness returned to Cain as he walked to the bars. "What? Is there a morning drill or something?"

"Tests," she corrected. "All the new students have to go through them. So if you want to stay you're going to have to pass all of them. If you really are who you say, that shouldn't be a problem." That was a lie. Technically he only had to pass one, but she couldn't let him know that. "Give me your hand."

Cain put hand through the bars, slightly confused, before Hope grabbed it, taking a knife out from behind her back and running the blade across his palm. "The hell?"

She watched the wound close almost immediately. "Well test number one is complete."

"And what test was that?"

"Healing factor."

"I thought yesterday would have hinted at my abilities."

"Can't be too sure." she said with a passive aggressive smile that only lasted for a second. Keeping the knife in her hand, she opened the cell. "Let's go."

They exited the chambers and made their way to the school yard, passing by Alaric whom she gave the bloody knife.

The tests went into noon and Cain passed everyone of them with flying colours, adding the flair of cockiness which Hope rolled her eyes at. The rest of the student body steered clear of the testing field, especially when he hurled a log across campus.

"Was that really necessary?" she asked, turning back to him.

"Are we done now?"

"Not yet." She noticed he had redirected his attention to the twins who were walking in the distance and smiled at them. "Hey. Eyes over here."

"You really don't like me, do you?"

"Is it that obvious?"

"You know. I actually always wanted a sibling. I don't know about a twin but anything's better than being alone. I just think you're having trouble accepting that you're not that special anymore." He clearly took pleasure in telling her that last segment. He then turned to walk away.

She put a hand out. "Where do you think you are going?"

"I'm hungry."

Hope walked to a cooler that Alaric traded her for the knife, and took out a blood bag. "Here." she said, tossing him it.

Cain examined the rich red fluid before actually drinking. He decided to take a seat on the cooler as he took his lunch break.

He handed her the bag to offer it to her, which she turned her nose up at. "I'm good."

He looked at her with a slight squint to his eyes, wrapping his lips around the straw like tube once again.

A moment later Landon appeared with a brown paper bag in his hand. "Hey. This is for you." He said, giving her a peck on her temple as she accepted the bag with a smile.

"Who's this?" Cain asked, almost immediately making her return to her previous demeanor.

"He's no--"

"Boyfriend." Landon said, puffing his chest in a way that failed to be subtle or intimating.

Cain grinned. "And what are you? I mean you have to be special to get into this place, right?."

"Phoenix." the boy said proudly.

"Okay, lunch is over. Go jump in the lake." Hope cut in, she obviously didn't want Cain getting close to anyone she cared about, especially since his motives were unclear.

Cain scoffed. "Really?"

"Yes." she said, quickly dismissing him with her hand.

He playfully rolled his eyes as he directed himself towards the lake, stripping down to his underwear when neared closer to the water.

Hope sent Landon off to get towels while she ate her bagged lunch and waited. Once Cain was finishing swimming and drying off, Hope noticed something on his shoulder blade, glistening from the remnants of the water. A birthmark.

As he finished drying off, Landon came back around. "The spell is done."

"Spell?" Cain echoed, putting his shirt back on. "What spell?"

Hope sighed before following Landon inside, Cain walking with her. "Lineage spell."

Cain paused for a second. "So if all you needed was a lineage spell then why all the other trouble?"

"We agreed that it was better to keep an eye on you by making you do all the tests since clearly just keeping locked up didn't go that well."

"Hm, smart. Actually, No, it was kind of obvious. You know, I easily could have slipped away."

“So why didn’t you?”

“I wanted to get to know my sister.” he said with a smile that made her eyes roll. "Hey, Boyfriend, is she always like this?" he asked Landon.

Landon turned to Cain then glanced at Hope who gave him an intense look. He hesitated, but when he opened his mouth he stammered until Cain chuckled.

They went back to Alaric's office where he, Dorian and Emma were. Dorian seemed the most guarded, he had his eyes locked on Cain and his jaw clenched.

"So what is it?" Hope said, sitting down with Cain.

"Well it was a little hard with the amount of blood, but we managed. He's telling the truth, he's your brother." Alaric said.

"That's what the knife was for? If you needed my blood, all you had to do was ask."

"Well excuse us for not trusting you," Dorian spat.

"But now that we know you're telling the truth," Alaric said, giving Dorian a stern glance, "hopefully we can establish some."

"You're just going to let him stay here just like that?" Hope asked, completely shocked by his decision.

"There are conditions though."

"Of course there is." Cain said, handling a book from Alaric's desk until he took it back.

"You're not to leave school grounds without permission, you'll attend class as scheduled, you'll be under close watch-- especially by Hope who will be in charge of you and you'll stay in the cell until we're sure you're no longer a danger to the student body. And if any-- and I mean if any-- harm is to come to any students, I deal with you myself. Am I clear?"

"Crystal," he said with a cheeky smile. "Who's she?" he then pointed to Emma.

"This is Emma. She's the school counselor."

"Thanks, but I'm already well adjusted."

"I meet with all the students." Emma stated.

"Well then I'd like to consider myself a guest."

"Dr. Saltzman, can we talk for a minute?" Hope said.

. . .

Cain was now in the library, Dorian watching him like a hawk, while Hope talked to Alaric about what the hell he was thinking. Cain was contently browsing through a book, legs up on the table. His focus, however, drifted as his ears picked up a conversation MG and the twins were having as they huddled near the library doors.

"Do you think Dad is gonna let him stay?" Josie said. "I mean they must have decided something."

"Hope hasn't told you guys anything?" MG asked.

"No, and by the looks of it she isn't too happy about this." Lizzie commented.

"They can't actually let him stay, right? I mean he killed one of the students."

"Like no one here has killed anyone." Cain interjected with head still down in the book, causing the three to go quiet. He then set the book down and got up to walk over to them. "I mean this place is filled with werewolves and vampires, I think it's highly hypocritical of you to judge me as though I'm the only one that has taken a life."

Despite his smile, there was a certain intensity to his eyes that made MG swallow hard.

"Were you eavesdropping?" Lizzie said boldly.

"It's kind of hard to ignore when people are talking about you." Cain turned to her, there was something about her attitude that stood out to him. "I'm Cain, but you know that already."

"Lizzie." she said, unimpressed.

"And the shy one?" he asked, looking at Josie who seemed to be avoiding eye contact.

"Josie." she said meekly.

"And it's MG, right?"

MG nervously nodded.

Hope walked into the library, obviously looking displeased, and they all looked at her.

"And I'm guessing that's my cue." Cain said. "It was nice meeting you."

As he followed Hope back to Alaric's office yet again, she flashed him a look. It was clear that she didn't trust him, especially around her friends.

"So, do I finally get to talk now? Or are you two going to keep having side conversations?" Cain smugly asked as he rested against the back of a chair.

"Why are you here?" Alaric bluntly asked.

"Well I won't bore you with the details, but basically I was raised by a cult that I thought was family, then found out that was a lie along with my entire life and that I have a sister."

"And how exactly did you know where to find Hope?"

"I asked around. I had no idea our family was so popular."

"What do you want with me?" Hope asked.

"I already told you. Is wanting to know your family seriously that much of a crime?" he said, laughing with confusion.

"Forgive us, we've haven't been getting a lot of friendly visitors lately."

Cain sighed and stood up, dropping the smug expression. "Look, I know I didn't make the best impression yesterday, but I've spent my whole life thinking I was alone and now I'm not. Wouldn't you feel the same way?" He stared at her earnestly, waiting for a response.

She looked into his eyes and the longer she did, it got harder to say no without seeming completely heartless. She glanced over to Alaric before sighing and softening her tone. "Fine."

"Great," he said, smiling wide as he pulled his sister for a tight side hug. "I promise you we are going to have so much fun together." he whispered into her ear, sending chills down her spine.

. . .

The next day, it was time to tour the school and mingle with the factions. Hope was unenthused to say the least and only gave a brief explanation to all the rooms they came across while Cain took a deep interest in everything. As they came to the end of the tour, they crossed paths with Emma who was letting a student out of her office.

"Hope," she smiled, pleased to see her face. "I see you're giving tours now."

"Actually, we're just finishing it."

"And I'm glad we ran into you when we did," Cain jumped in, "because I've been thinking about what I said to you and I've changed my mind. I'd love to talk to you."

"I'm delighted to hear that. I don't have anything right now, if you'd like to come in." Cain nodded and walked inside, Hope followed him but was stopped at the door.

"I know Dr. Saltzman told you to stay with him, but you know the rules. Plus it seems to me like you could use a break from him...Don't worry, I can handle him."

Hope relaxed her shoulders. "okay," she breathed out, forcing a small smile.

"And don't forget, you and I are scheduled for Thursday." Emma closed the door behind her and went to seat herself across from the newcomer. "So, Cain, what would you like to talk about?"

"You said that you meet with all the students. Do you keep files on them?"

She immediately tensed at the question, so caught off guard. "Those are strictly confidential."

He leaned forward and smiled, looking intensely into the depths of her eyes. "Surely you can make an exception for family."

Compelled, Emma rose up and walked out to her filing cabinet.

"And while you're at it, get her friends' too. I should know what kind of company my sister keeps."

She put a small pile of files on the table in the seating area and Cain kicked his feet up as he started to browse them. He took time reading the files, almost analyzing them like characters in a book. After he was done, he tossed the last file back onto the pile.

"My sister has some interesting friends, doesn't she?" he said, sitting back up straight. "Oh-- and I guess I should probably give you something to write about me in return. But, you know, I think I'm pretty well adjusted so there's nothing really to talk about. I mean I was a true prodigy, I was amazing at everything I was taught, I was worshipped. It wasn't like I had a bad childhood, it's just that it was all a lie…" He started to drift off and zone out when it came to that last part but then quickly snapped out of it. "Anyway, do with that what you will. This was a nice chat. I know this was only our first time sitting down with each other but I've learned so much from you."

They rose up together. "No problem," she said, putting on a smile to hide the underlying uneasiness.

Right before walking to the door, Cain smiled back and placed a hand on her shoulder. "Oh and just to be sure, no one needs to know about this. You know, confidentiality and all." he said, using his compulsion again.

He was let out and wandered the halls until saw Hope again in the student lounge with Landon and Rafael.

"There you are, and I see you're with Boyfriend and Friend." he said, walking over to them.

She looked over her shoulder and rolled her eyes.

"It's Landon, actually." Landon said.

"Good to know," he said before turning his attention to Hope, "So what else is on the agenda for today?"

"Meeting with the factions. And since you're here, Raf, I guess we should start with the wolves."

"Sure."

The two said their byes to Landon, Hope giving him a kiss on the cheek before leaving.

"So when he said he was a phoenix did mean it as in the bird or is that some code word I don't know about?"

"I'm not talking about my boyfriend with you."

They spent the next few minutes in silence until they reached the gym where the pack were playing a small game of kickball.

"And here's the pack.” Rafael said, as the pack suddenly stopped the game and went to huddle around them. “Guys, this is Cain."

Jed, with his chest puffed out, took a step in. “Isn’t he the dude who killed Tristan Gorecki?”

“That was an accident.” Rafael said to which Cain in the background had his own reaction to the comment that made Hope shoot him a dirty look. ”And Dr. Saltzman said we have to give him a chance to fit in.”

“How are we sure he’s not gonna hurt someone again?”

“Jed, do we really have to remind you of how many fights you’ve been in?”

Hope said, “he won’t hurt anyone. I’ll make sure of it.”

Cain looked around at each of the werewolves. “So, who’s the alpha?”

“I am.” Jed and Rafael said in unison then looked at each other.

“I mean I did fight you to become Alpha.” Rafael said.

“Then you were a wolf for the summer and someone had to take over.” Jed rebutted.

“But I’m back now.”

The other tribrid huffed a faint laugh and smiled. “This is great. A pack who doesn’t even know who their Alpha is. If you guys are so unsure, I’m more than happy to step to the plate.”

Jed stepped up to him and growled. “You think this is funny? You come in here, kill one of us and--"

"Okay, that's enough," Hope said, stepping in and pulling her brother away. "I think we found out how well you get along with the werewolves. Cain, let's go."

Then while walking in silence, led by Hope of course, they ran into MG, Kaleb and a couple of vampires who were standoffish to him. The new kid that single head managed to create tension between them and the rest of the factions.

But then MG, being the diplomat, decided to be the first to engage Cain in conversation even though just his presence made him nervous. They sat and chatted-- which felt more like an interrogation on Cain's end, talking about the ups and downs of being a vampire.

"You think we can trust him?" Kaleb asked Hope as they both stood by and watched the other two.

"Hell no." Hope said bluntly. "But Dr. Saltzman says until we find out he has a M.O. besides yesterday he hasn't really given us a reason not to trust him."

"What if he really doesn't have a game and just wants to be your brother?"

"Trust me, I know my family."

MG and Cain talking until MG's discomfort finally reached its peak.

"I do have another question," Cain began, leaning forward with his eyes even more on MG than they were. "Do you get any rippers here? I mean with how many vampires that are here, there has bound at least one loose canon."

MG immediately tensed up but tried to hide under a nervous smile.

"Have you met with the witches, yet? You can probably catch them at the mill, they hang out there all the time." he said, quickly changing the subject.

And with that cue Hope got up from the wall. "MG's right. The sooner we're done mingling the sooner I can get you back downstairs and do some studying."

And again She dragged her brother off to somewhere else. The witches were at the mill as they socialized amongst themselves, then all heads turned as soon as the two Mikaelsons stood at one of the entrances.

They walked in some more and just as Hope assumed there was going to be tension like the other two factions, the witches started to gather around them. Although some witches kept their distance, the others seemed to want to meet the newcomer.

"So you're Hope's brother?" Alyssa Chang said, being the first to speak.

"Lost and found." Cain replied.

"Well, let's just hope being a buzzkill isn't hereditary.”

His lip twitched with amusement. "I can assure you I'm lots of fun." he said, his eyes glancing over at Lizzie.

"Does this mean you're also a tribrid?" another witch asked.

"Yep. I'm the whole package."

The witches brought him over to sit down as they continued to ask him more things, fascinated by him as if he was an exotic animal or something. And Cain very much seemed to be enjoying the attention. Hope looked a little confused as they pulled him away.

"They're acting like they've never met a tribrid before." she said to herself. But on the plus side she knew she didn't have to watch him as closely anymore.

After a while, Cain managed to slip away from the witches and found his way to Lizzie who was on the staircase.

"So you're a witch." he said, pleased.

"How'd you figure that out?" she said, oozing with sarcasm.

"I was just wondering why you were with the others."

"I already met a tribrid. Wasn't impressed by the first one, not gonna be by the second one."

"I think I can come up with a few other ways to impress you."

She looked over at him. "Never gonna happen."

They sat in silence for a moment until Cain glanced over to his sister and Josie.

"I can't believe you and my sister are friends."

Lizzie looked at him confused.

"I mean from what I've… heard you two had quite the rivalry. But I can relate, my parents did spend way more time with her than me too."

"My dad actually knows I exist. It's different."

"Is it really?"

The blonde clenched her jaw right before walking off. "Your new brother is annoying."

"Tell me about it," Hope said.

That led to a rant about how this whole situation and Cain showing up out of nowhere felt like an inconvenience to her. While Cain went back to the witches.

After, Hope realized how much time had passed and decided it was time for Cain to get back to the cell.

"Alright, time to go."

Cain looked up at her from the couch. "Come on, I just started making friends."

"And I have to study for a class tomorrow." That and she'd been around him enough for the day.

Cain let out a little sigh before getting up. Although he was a little disappointed it was time to leave, he figured if he wanted to get in his sister's good graces going against her wasn't the way to go.

They walked together in silence again because the last thing that Hope would want to do with some sketchy stranger is have a friendly conversation or share her whole life story.

"I like the witches," he said, "especially your friend, Lizzie."

Hope couldn't help the snort. "Good luck with that."

"You take after Mom, don't you?" he said, catching her way off guard. "Based on the things I've heard people say about her. I also came across a picture this one time. You look like her too." This made her pause for a second. She knew that they were family but somehow actually talking about their family-- key alone their parents-- seemed to be the last thing she'd expected. "Do I look like either of them to you?"

After that, the moment she looked into his eyes, a bunch of images of Klaus raced through her mind.

"You have his nose," she said softly before quickly turning away and going back to walking.

#oc imagine #cain mikaelson imagine #hope mikaelson imagine #hope x cain #legacies #chapter fic #the dark twin series

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youngerdrgrey · 3 years

Text

relax (this is private, too) // a Mary/Ryan oneshot

about: In a post-2x13 world, Mary welcomes Sophie to the Bat Team, and Sophie derails the conversation with an observation.

“It’s a tale as old as time. ‘Straight’ girl meets somebody that she just has to know, wants to spend all her time with her, starts wearing her clothes….” Sophie and Mary both look down at the color-block jacket that Mary’s wearing — Ryan’s color-block jacket. But Mary couldn’t possibly have a crush on Ryan… could she? + read on ao3

notes: Surprise! Truly, none probably more surprised than me. One moment I'm saying that I probably won't write for a bit, and the next I'm writing this because we really didn't talk enough about Mary saying, "Okay, that's kind of sexy" over the hot shot moment. (As a note, yes, platonic, intimate friendships between women are important. At this moment, though, let's run the tape back with Mary who is very confused.)

🦇

“Sit, sit, sit.” Mary leads Sophie through the loft to the living room. “You must have questions.”

Sophie does sit — on the chair this time, which leaves the couch open for Mary. It’s a slightly different seating arrangement than they had yesterday. There’s definitely a lot less attitude and tension here, but then again, it is only Mary and Sophie right now. Unless Ryan’s patrol goes poorly, but it probably won’t. Besides, Mary had texted Ryan about wanting some one-on-one time to suss Sophie out. Sophie’s a great person, but she might need to come around to Ryan wearing the suit.

Mary uncorks the wine bottle on the coffee table and gives a generous pour into the two stemless glasses. It’s a rosè, which is the perfect drink for a casual conversation. It’s light, airy, and has absolutely no chance of worms or poison in the bottom.

Sophie eyes her glass a moment before picking it up anyway. “Honestly?” She chuckles. “I have less questions now.”

“Really?” Mary settles back into the couch. “Because I won’t judge you if you do. It’s a lot to take in.” Mary’d wanted to rip the suit right off of Ryan the first time that she saw Ryan in it. Granted, at the time, they’d still been trying to find Kate, and a stranger was wearing Mary’s sister’s secret vigilante costume.

Sophie swirls her glass. “Don’t get me wrong, I’m still processing the Ryan Wilder of it all, but… well, it all makes sense now.” She leans forward, her elbows finding the tops of her knees as she pitches towards Mary. “Before last week, I couldn’t understand why Ryan was suddenly everywhere. Sure, she worked at the bar, but then you were roommates out of nowhere. You went from zero to….” Sophie snorts into her wine glass.

Mary laughs too, but she doesn’t quite get why. It’s like they’re playing Never Have I Ever all over again. “Zero to what? I want in on the joke.”

Sophie shakes her head though. Her eyebrows pull together like she’s still puzzling something. Then she gives in, and her voice still has a hint of that humor as she finishes, “Zero to U-haul.” Mary chokes on the air in her lungs. Sophie raises her glass in a silent toast. “So, the Batwoman thing — makes a lot more sense than you suddenly having a girlfriend.”

Mary’s cheeks flush. Leave it to the lesbian to assume Mary’s hiding her sexuality. “A secret girlfriend is much more your speed.” Wait, is that rude? “Uh, no offense.”

Sophie takes a swig of wine. “None taken. You’re right. So, tell me more about working with Ryan.”

Mary smiles. This, she can do. She could talk about Ryan for hours. “She’s amazing. I mean, you know, you’ve seen her. She totally fills out the suit. Like it suits her and not the other way around. You’d think that it wouldn’t, but she really makes it her own.”

“Right, with the wig.”

“With everything!” Mary drinks some more. “She really gets this city, you know? Everything we’re doing with the Center is all Ryan’s idea. She came up with the plan, and she has these rules that we follow as the Bat Team! No killing, no working with Crows — again, no offense. Er, well,” Mary tilts her head to the side, “some offense. You guys have an awful track record at this point.”

Sophie takes another drink. “So you tell me.”

“But we also do team building exercises. It’s mostly us playing Taboo, and Luke getting really tired of us. Ryan’s so great. It’s like we don’t even have to say anything to know what the other is thinking. And even though she’s the boss, and she’s the leader, it’s like we’re really working side by side to make Gotham the place we always wanted it to be. The Center’s only the start. She has ideas about upgraded transitional shelters for people experiencing homelessness, and expanding the clinic if we get enough resources. She listened to my whole pitch about what we would need to do it, and asked questions, and— what?”

Sophie’s staring at Mary. Staring hard, but soft at the same time.

Mary swipes a hand across her cheek. “Is something on my face?”

Sophie shakes her head. “No, it’s nothing.” She drinks again, but her brows stay furrowed.

“Sophie, come on. Whatever it is, you can tell me.” Maybe hearing about all the good that Ryan wants is too much for Sophie right now. Mary can wait. It’s not like she’ll run out of good stuff to say.

“It’s the way you talk about her,” Sophie says finally. That softness is there again. A gentle touch in her voice. “Between that and your ‘kinda sexy’ comment yesterday… I don’t know, Mary, it just sounds like you have a crush.”

“A crush?” Mary repeats. “On Ryan?” She scoffs. “Hate to break it to you, Sophie, but I am straight. Like so straight. Like—”

Sophie puts her hands up in a silent casual defense. She drops them a moment later. “You don’t have to convince me. I believe you.”

“Thank you!” Mary flops back into the couch. Her head bounces just a bit on the top of it. Her curls smush, and she sinks down so that the thought can hopefully follow it out of her head.

She knows what sexy is. She can identify that something could be attractive without actually being attracted to said thing. There are all the different types of attraction. She ran a course on gender and sexuality for the doctors and volunteers at her clinic to make sure that everyone was on the same page in how to properly treat people that the medical field did not always regard with respect. She would know if she had a crush on Ryan.

Wouldn’t she?

Sophie sets her wine onto the coffee table. “It’s a tale as old as time. ‘Straight’ girl meets somebody that she just has to know, wants to spend all her time with her, starts wearing her clothes….” Sophie and Mary both look down at the color-block jacket that Mary’s wearing — Ryan’s color-block jacket.

“Okay, but we live together,” Mary reasons. Roommates borrow each other’s clothes. It’s not like she’s taking her crush’s jacket so that she has an excuse to see Ryan again. She can see Ryan whenever she wants. She does see Ryan whenever she wants. She can’t even count the number of times she’s come back from an awful shift, walked into Ryan’s room, and flopped down onto the bed beside her.

Her bed’s not softer than Mary’s. Mary obviously cared a lot more about her rest than Kate did, so Mary’s mattress is a dream. But Ryan’s room smells like a dialed down greenhouse. It smells alive and hopeful and earthy in a way that instantly calms Mary down. And when Mary’s having a really rough day, Ryan will put a pillow in her lap and run her hands through Mary’s hair until she stops seeing whatever gruesome wounds that she’s spent the last few hours dealing with. That’s not a crush. That’s… comfort. Intimacy. A deep, deep starvation for physical touch after a lifetime of parental neglect.

Friends can be affectionate. Friends can want to be close to each other.

She wants to be close to Luke. And to Sophie! She would love to curl up next to Sophie right now. Though, the more that Mary thinks about curling up with Sophie, the more she recognizes that it wouldn’t be the same as cozying up to Ryan. Ryan’s basically her same size. She’s got this warmth that radiates from her cheeks and her chest, and she hums songs and asks Mary to guess which song it is. Mary’s awful at this game, by the way. She usually ends up giving up, or drifting off to sleep while Ryan’s clearly picking songs that Mary — as someone who did not grow up in a Black household — did not grow up with.

(The one time Mary used that as a defense, Ryan had pointed out that Ryan didn’t grow up in a Black household either. Ryan grew up in a mismatch of cultures and identities in group homes before Mama Cora found her in high school. They’d made up for lost time with plenty of Miss Anita Baker and all the classics that Ryan had missed out on. The rest of Ryan’s cultural education came from other Black students and friends who’d either clowned her for not knowing a reference, or rushed to show her what their parents told them. It hadn’t been as simple as a natural osmosis for Ryan to feel at home with some of the cultural references around her.)

(Mary had whispered that it wasn’t easy for her either. Not with her mom working all the time and the rest of her Korean-American family out of reach. “There weren’t many Korean people in Gotham.” An understatement, but Ryan had leaned down and pressed a kiss to the crown of Mary’s head to comfort her. Sadness Mary hadn’t even known was still there had welled up. Liquified into tears that slipped onto Ryan’s pillow.)

(“It was—” Her breath had caught in her throat. The tears smeared her vision, which was fine, since all she could see from this angle were Ryan’s plants by the window anyway. “It was so lonely sometimes. And my dad…. With Kate… And Alice….” She couldn’t finish a single sentence. All the tears turned to sobs, and the sobs turned into this soul-clenching pressure in her chest.)

(Ryan had curled around Mary then. An arm found its way under Mary’s knees and softly tugged her into a tighter ball in Ryan’s lap. Ryan rocked them, whispered again and again, “It’s okay. Let it out. I got you. I’m here, Mary. I’m here.”)

Mary gulps now. “Ryan is….” She’s Mary’s roommate. Mary’s best friend. She’s the one who got Mary through losing Kate and who welcomed Mary onto the Bat Team. She’s the first person Mary calls whenever anything happens and literally the only person Mary could entrust The Hold Up to. She’s Batwoman, and…. And Mary has no idea what she would do without Ryan at this point. But it’s not like Mary wants to kiss Ryan. Just look at Ryan.

Look at Ryan in those ridiculous flannel shirts. She has twelve. Not including jackets. And she’s a woman, which is not Mary’s type. Mary hasn’t been super successful with her previous type, but they definitely have certain characteristics that Ryan does not. They don’t walk around in fluffy robes that they bought to spite their ex-girlfriends, or wake up super early after a late shift to use the workout bike that Mary still has never actually tried riding. They don’t make Mary sweet potato pancakes and encourage her to try out cooking on her off nights for stress relief. They don’t make her feel like home. They don’t…. Shit.

The lowest groan that Mary has ever done in her life grumbles out of her.

Sophie pops her lips. “There it is.”

Mary squeezes her eyes shut. “You’re not right. I don’t — I can’t — it’s Ryan.” She can’t fall for her best friend! She doesn’t have a backup bestie. “Besides!” Mary pops up to tell Sophie, “I have never once wanted to kiss her.”

Sophie raises an eyebrow in the smoothest, most silent way to ask, Are you sure?

(Mary got them breakfast the next morning. She couldn’t do the sweet potato pancakes, but she knew the right cafe to get Ryan’s favorite vegan chorizo burrito. She got back just as Ryan was finishing up a shower and called out, “Breakfast!”)

(Steam followed Ryan out of her bedroom. The tips of her hair dripped softly onto her shirt, just above her chest, and Mary couldn’t stop glancing down at it. Normally, she would’ve been able to, but that morning…. Ryan snatched up her burrito and flopped down onto the couch. On the first bite, Ryan let out a soft moan that somehow carried straight over to Mary. Maybe Mary made the wrong food choice? If the burrito was that good, and Mary could feel it, then she needed some of what Ryan was having.)

(“You’re brilliant,” Ryan said. Then she locked eyes with Mary and gestured with her burrito. “Anyone who would ever leave you behind is a dumbass. Full offense to the entire Hamilton-Kane family.” Ryan dug in for another bite, and Mary’s heart swelled in her chest. She couldn’t even smile with how full she felt. How warm and safe and loved. God, she loved Ryan. She really, really could spend the rest of her life like this.)

(Ryan’s face scrunched up. “Stop looking at me like that. I don’t care how hungry you look. I’m not sharing.”)

(Mary faked an outraged gasp. She wasn’t even hungry. Not anymore, not really. Still, she threw herself onto the couch beside Ryan. “I paid for it! Give me a bite!” Ryan squirmed away, and Mary had to cling to the curve of Ryan’s back to try and reach for the good. “Come on! Ryan!”)

(If Ryan was a guy, this is when Mary would’ve kissed him. Would’ve peppered his head and his cheeks and his nose with kisses until he turned just enough for her to kiss his full lips and suck his tongue into her mouth. To lose every bit of resistance in the soft brush of her hands, and the gentle curls of Ryan’s hair beneath her fingers. Ryan’s teeth nipping at her bottom lip, then her neck, then—)

“Shit. Shit, shit, shit, shit, SHIT!” Mary sinks even deeper into the couch. Then shoots up at the reminder of the memory of wanting to kiss Ryan on this exact freaking couch. She turns her wide eyes to Sophie. “What am I going to do?”

Sophie clicks her tongue. “Nope, I want nothing to do with that. Whatever happens there is between you and Ryan.”

“But what if….” Mary loses her words in a squeak. What if she doesn’t know what she wants to happen? What if she doesn’t want anything to happen? What if she’ll be totally fine, going about her business, continuing her life where she gets to occasionally cuddle up with her best friend in their apartment? Maybe she doesn’t need anything more than that. She’s made it this far, and she didn’t even know she had any sort of feelings, or attraction. She can keep on going now. She can be normal.

Not normal meaning straight, just normal meaning Mary’s normal state. Which was straight. Is straight?

Mary groans. “I hate my life.”

Sophie reaches for the wine bottle and fills Mary’s glass up to the brim. “Look on the bright side — at least you know who she is. No secret identities, or clandestine rendezvous. Unless you’re into that sort of thing.”

“I am apparently into a lot of things I didn’t know,” Mary mumbles.

Sophie sighs. “It’s not that different, and for you, maybe it’s not different at all. Maybe….” Sophie glances around the loft. Mary follows her eyes as they bounce from the wine to the hallway to the silly bat wall decals that Ryan got from Party City and put near the TV. Sophie nods her head, as she finds her words. “Ryan loves Halloween.”

“What?”

“Stick with me.” Sophie points to the bats, then the tiny plastic pumpkins from the checkout section of Target. “Ryan loves Halloween. She decorates the whole house around it because she loves it so much. But me, I grew up in a strict Christian household where Halloween was not what we did. We did Christmas. And you….”

Mary follows again. “We did a mix. Christmas and Hanukkah.”

Sophie winces. “Okay, a mix of holidays. You’re not strictly a one holiday kind of girl. And that’s fine.”

Mary glances back to the Halloween decorations. “So, in this metaphor—”

“It might be time to celebrate Halloween. Maybe you’ll love it. Maybe you’ll hate it. But it’s October now, so, get a costume, grab a pumpkin, and tell her how you feel.”

Okay. Mary can do that. Mary can totally do that. If she can handle Alice imploding her entire life in front of the whole world, then she can tell her roommate that she has a crush on her.

Maybe.

Someday.

When she’s ready.

“Can we, uh, work our way up to Halloween? I feel like I’m still hearing fireworks.”

Sophie grins at her. “Of course. We’ll go at your speed. And if you have any questions?”

Mary picks back up her wine glass and knocks back nearly half of it. “I’ll ask you. Or Parker. She’s incredibly knowledgeable for a teenager.” She probably wouldn’t use such convoluted metaphors either. It’s a win-win really. Great, last time Mary saw Parker, they were watching the lesbian drama; now Mary will be a part of it. Ugh. "I'm never living this down, am I?"

"Oh, absolutely not. Hey, Mary?" Sophie waits until Mary's turned her steadily narrowing gaze to her. "Never have I ever had a crush on Batwoman."

Mary flips Sophie off.

🦇

#mary hamilton #ryan wilder #mary x ryan #hamilbat #maryan #batwoman fic #mine #batwoman: s2 #batwoman: 213 #sophie moore #this was fun and then sad and then fun again. good times.#and they were roommates #and good night!

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carmichealroyals · 3 years

Photo

Transcript under the cut (click pics for HQ!)

Beginning || Previous || Next

Green Drawing Room, Winterven Palace. Early Winter.

[Peggy] Lottie! Peter! You’re home! [Maria Theresa] Oh, thank goodness -- with that storm on its way I was worried you’d be delayed. How was the trip? No trouble, I presume?

[Charlotte] No, Mama. I made sure to see the other girls off, and we even dropped Eleanor off at the airport so she didn’t miss her plane. [Peter] There was trouble, though. [Charlotte] ...no, there wasn’t. What are you talking about, exactly?

[Peter] You practically held court with the other girls yesterday morning. [Charlotte] So what if I did? They’re my friends. Friends talk. You wouldn’t know that. [Peter] No, but I distinctly remember the conversation you five had. About me. [Charlotte] You’re really bringing this up now? Honestly, Peter--

[William] Not so fast. I’m suddenly invested. [Maria Theresa] What happened Peter? You can tell us.

[Charlotte] You wouldn’t. You weren’t even supposed to hear that! [Peter] You and I both know I would. And if you didn’t want me to hear, then you and your ladies-in-waiting shouldn’t have gossiped in the den!

[Peter] What happened to Little Miss Honesty? One drop of hot water and you’re suddenly scared of me telling Mama and Dad that you called me, and I quote-- [Charlotte] You eavesdropped! On a private conversation! [Peter] --a “petty child on a power trip?”

[Charlotte] So what if I did? You wouldn’t be so hurt by that if I was wrong! [Peter] You have no right! You compared me to Gideon, of all people! [Charlotte] And clearly I was wrong to -- because if you were like him, you wouldn’t be making a public scene! You’ve said things just as bad to me!

[Charlotte] How about when you blackmailed me into letting you come so you wouldn’t tell Dad about me wanting Tobias to come? Or, I know, when you said you should be the heir instead of me? That’s practically treason! [Peter] Not if I’m right. You’re immature, selfish and only care about your reputation!

[Charlotte] I’M the immature one? You’d rather revert back to a sexist law than see your own flesh adn blood make history because of what, a petty grievance? [Peter] Because you take everything for granted! Everything just gets tossed at your feet while the rest of us have to fight for a scrap of praise!

*Charlotte and Peter arguing in the background* [Peggy] Mama, can I go... do something else? Please? [Maria Theresa] No, love. You need to see what consequences look like. [Peggy] Mama... *sighs* fine...

[Maria Theresa] ENOUGH!

[Maria Theresa] One would think that you were raised in a barn and not in a palace! Do you realize the immense amount of privilege you were born with? To sit here listening to you squabble over the order of your birth not only disrespects your father and I, but the whole country which you, Charlotte Carmicheal, stand to inherit rule of.

[Maria Theresa] If I had it my way, I would disinherit you both and make Margaret heir. At least she would have come decorum and common sense! [Peggy] Please, don’t. [Maria Theresa] Your behaviour is childish. My children are smarter than that, surely.

[Maria Theresa] The two of you are officially grounded for the rest of winter break, and confined to the palace grounds unless supervised by myself or your father. [Charlotte] But Mama-- [Maria Theresa] No buts! You may one day be Queen, but I am still your mother. If I ever catch you using that tone again, you’ll wish you were never born. Understood?

[Charlotte and Peter] Yes, ma’am. [William] Good. Take your things upstairs. We’ll talk about this later. *Charlotte and Peter leave*

[Peggy] ...they really don’t like each other, do they? [Maria Theresa] No, sweetheart, they don’t. I blame your father’s side of the family. [William] But Auntie Belle and I were never that bad.

[Peggy] I don’t get why. Lottie is the oldest. She deserves to be first in line. [Maria Theresa] Our rules were different a long time ago. They’re that way in Krasnoyarsk, remember? It’s why your cousin Masha is so... intense.

[Maria Theresa] Promise me, Margaret, that you’ll do your best to get along with your brother and sister. Family is hard sometimes, but-- [Peggy] --it’s worth it in the end. I know, Mama. I promise. [Maria Theresa] That’s my girl.

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star-lemonade · 3 years

Text

The Festival (1/3)

A.C.E Junhee x Reader

Cw: fluff, cross dressing

Rating: T (Series R)

Word count: 3.2 k

Junhee was one of the most attractive people you knew. He was good looking, yes, but that was not the main source of his attractiveness. Somehow he always left you with the impression that he cared about people and put others before himself. You never told anyone but it would be nice to have someone care about you. Taking care of him for a change would be nice too. He seemed like he could use someone being there for him. You sometimes spoke in the company kitchen, but you never met outside of work. Maybe, one day, you would ask him out. Maybe.

That day your business trip took you out to a city you had not been to before. It was only a few hours away by car but you never had a reason to come here. The conference would last for three days, Wednesday to Friday. On the first evening there were some unofficial meetings, but soon the parties moved from the hotel to the city. A historical festival was taking place in the city center. The crowd was a mixture of people wearing modern clothing and hanboks. A lot of the vendors were also dressed in historical clothing. The streets were illuminated by lamps that looked like lanterns with open fire at first glance. The moving orange and yellow bands gave the illusion of flames. Foods from the different booths filled the streets with mouthwatering smells.

You noticed that you had lost the rest of the conference people while exploring the festival. Your stomach began to rumble. It was time to eat something. The selection was a bit overwhelming so you entered the nearest food stand that had some tables. Even here the historical feel was present. The low tables stood on elevated platforms with the guests sitting on cushions on the platforms. You sat down at the only free table. The waitress wore a beautiful hanbok, but the stress of working at a festival was written in the lines of her young face.

You ordered something to drink and to eat. Your drink arrived fast and you were thankful for it. You were starving but the drink filled your stomach at least temporarily.

Your eyes followed that waitress as she served food to another table. Two women in hanboks sat there. They looked like they were related, maybe they were sisters? One wore blue, the other green.

When the waitress approached them, you could see the face of the sister in green in front view. She looked familiar, but you did not know from where you knew her. You looked away so as to not get caught staring. Your food came and the mystery woman was forgotten. Your basic needs had to be satisfied. It tasted better than it probably was. Junhee. Junhee! That was who the woman looked like. The thought came so suddenly you almost dropped your spoon. He had sisters, that much you knew but did they live here? It’s probably a coincidence.

You finished your meal and decided to move on. The air in the plastic tent was too thick and hot to have a clear thought.

You left the restaurant wondering if it was just your brain seeing Junhee everywhere. Yes that must be it. Lately he had been on your mind a lot. He was a bit clumsy, but there was something charming about that too. Oh man, I have a crush on Junhee, don’t I?

You heard your name from behind you. The woman in the green stood behind you.

“Can we talk?”

Without saying a word you walked away from the crowds of the festival. You felt the tension of the other person and did not dare to speak up. Around a corner a dark patch came into view. The banks of the river were emptier than the streets with its booths. You stopped at one of the benches overlooking the river.

“I guess I should explain.”

Junhee‘s voice was softer than usual. You were sure now that it was him(?).

“You don’t have to. It’s none of my business.”

Junhee seemed to think otherwise. He(?) pressed his(?) lips into a thin line, but did not say anything. Whatever question came to your mind, seemed inappropriate to ask, but the silence began to weigh you.

“That’s a nice hanbok. It looks good on you.”

It was true and Junhee smiled a little.

“Thank you.”

He(?) looked down at the gravel path that spanned the river bank down to the small pedestrian bridge.

“I like being a man.”

He paused, thinking. You did not dare to say anything. This was a very private moment and even sitting on this bench, so close to Junhee felt almost too intimate. He did not have to tell you anything. Junhee nodded more to himself.

“But going out like this. It feels good.”

You touched his arm.

“You really don’t have to explain yourself.”

“I should.”

He insisted.

“Why? If it makes you uncomfortable? Don’t worry I will not tell anyone.”

“Because ..”

He looked away. The river gurgled and a couple strolled by, talking about something. Junhee stood up. His fist clutching the fabric of the hanbok.

“Let’s meet again tomorrow.”

You simply nodded and Junhee took off into the night.

You returned to the hotel tired and worried. The way Junhee had fled earlier did not leave your mind. You typed “Are you okay?” into your phone. I don’t want to bother him. The cursor whipped the message off the screen.

After a restless night your phone woke you up at 6:30 am the next morning. You had rolled from one side to the other but the unfamiliar bed had made it hard to sleep. Now It was time to meet some old business men. The shower helped to wake you up properly and the breakfast buffet in the hotel’s dining room looked better than expected. You filled your plate with everything that appealed to you in that moment and sat down at an empty table for two. None of the other conference goers were to be seen, so you could enjoy your meal. Your phone lay screen down on the table. How is Junhee doing? You picked it up and looked at the messaging app. Would it be good to text him?

“I hope I didn’t offend you yesterday. I’m sorry, if I did.”

It wasn’t the best thing one could say but needed to say it. You could not stand the thought of Junhee being hurt.

“I hope you are okay.”

Of course he did not reply right away. It was still early morning and he was probably sleeping. The next time you had a chance to look at your phone was during the “coffee and networking” break at 9:30 am.

“You didn’t. I’m okay. Let’s meet today. I have time around noon.”

It was not exactly the right thing to do but you excused yourself after the last talk of the morning session and left. The dinner would be more important, it would be okay if you missed the lunch buffet.

Junhee looked fantastic. He wore a brown leather jacket and his dark hair looked freshly cut. You were not sure which version of him looked more attractive, the one with the fake lashes or the one with the leather jacket.

The restaurant was empty. It was a bit too early for most people to eat. You basically had the place to yourselves. You chewed on your lip.

“I’m sorry if I made you uncomfortable yesterday.”

It was literally the last thing you expected to hear. His shoulders were slumped. It made him look smaller than he actually was.

“You didn’t make me uncomfortable!”

Maybe it came out a bit too fast because Junhee did not look convinced. You wanted to say how much you liked him but how would that look? He may take that as just a thing you said to get out of this situation or worse. What if he thought you only said you liked him, now that you had seen him cross dressing. Was it okay that you had liked it so much?

“Really, it’s all good. It is all good between us right?”

Your tone got more uncertain towards the end. You did not have that much of a relationship with him yet, but you could not stand the thought of him avoiding you.

“You don’t find that weird?” He licked his lips. “That I like to wear women’s clothes?”

His shoulders were tense. What you were about to say next would determine how this thing would go.

“No. You are an amazing person no matter what you decide to wear.”

A blush crept onto his face.

A waitress appeared. You had completely forgotten that this was a restaurant. It had felt like it was only you and him.

When the waitress left with your order, Junhee leaned towards you.

“Can I ask you something?”

Something in his tone made you perk up. Usually this question preceded a not so usual question.

“Only if I can ask you something too.”

He nodded.

“Do you… hm .. is it possible that you.. like me?”

Your mind went blank. He looked at you from the other side of the table. The little beauty mark on his cheek was something that was easy to look at. Did he mean like as in like like? Your next answer could be game changing, for better or for worse.

“Yes, I like you a lot.”

Now you could just cross your fingers and hope that being honest was the right course of action. You did not want to look at him in fear that he would reject you.

The waitress was back with your drinks and it gave both of you a bit of time. Junhee’s whole face was red and it was cute.

“What question did you wanted to ask me?”

So he was just not going to address this? Okay. Okay. You felt your face burn but also did not have the courage to ask him how he felt about you.

“Did your ex know about you cross dressing? Does anyone know?”

It clearly was not the question he had expected, you could tell by the pause that followed. He looked at his drink.

“My ex knew but she didn’t like it much. She didn’t give me a hard time because either. It just wasn’t something we talked about much. My sisters know of course. My parents were a bit worried in the beginning, they are a little old fashioned.”

You nodded. Junhee had broken up with his then girlfriend a few months ago, as far as you had heard. You were not sure why you had asked that question.

“Do you want to go to the festival tonight with me? Like a girls night out?”

It kind of slipped your lips and you prayed he would not take it the wrong way. His brows shot up and looked down at his drink.

“Yes, I would love that.”

A breath you did not know you were holding released.

Your food came and the conversation shifted. You talk about the conference that you had not seen much of yet. There still hung this question between you. You had said you liked him but he had not said anything to address your confession.

He decided to accompany you back to the hotel and you secretly loved that. You walk side by side. The last few days had been a bit cold, but today the sun gave its best to make it seem like it was still summer. Your hands brushed and Junhee caught your hand. He slid his fingers between yours and just like that you held hands. You could not stop a big, stupid smile from break on your face. The streets were not familiar but Junhee seemed to know where you were going.

“This is not your home town, is it?”

“No but my sister lives here. I come to visit often.”

It felt nice to walk with him like this. Your steps had synchronized without you thinking about it. The hotel was not far now, you began to recognize the houses.

“You probably look very good in a dress.”

You could not look at him and your face burnt. Hopefully he did not take it the wrong way.

“You like it?”

The tone was neutral and you could not tell if he approved or not.

“Yes but you look good either way.”

Junhee stopped and you looked at him. A moment later you found yourself in a tight hug, pressed against Junhee’s upper body. You could feel his breath on your neck and tried to protect what little dignity you had left by not melting into his arms. It failed.

“Thank you.”

The words tickled your skin and Junhee pressed a kiss to your cheek as he pulled back. Your brain must have short circuited being in your crushes arms and your face being so close to his. You kissed him. It was more a short peck, really. You did not have time to apologize for your forwardness. Junhee was a good kisser. The way his lips moved against yours made your heart flutter. It ended too soon.

“I have to go.”

Your tone said ‘and I don’t want to’. Junhee nodded but his hands still held you close. How nice would it be to just stay like this?

Technically there would be a dinner with the conference people that evening but the temptation to just skip it altogether was very big. Spending more time with your maybe, soon boyfriend was more appealing than spending the evening listening to the old men. They would only repeat the same stories they told at the afternoon networking session and the morning session. You texted Junhee but he insisted you stayed at least for a bit. His argument of ‘he would take some time to get ready anyways’ seemed like a plot to make you work. Reluctantly you joined one of the tables. You knew some of the men on this table. They were that type that would leave and find a seat at another table soon. Exactly what you wanted. They just had to see you were there, so no one could complain. You doubted that any of them really cared but there was a chance your supervisor would hear about you not being at the dinner through the grapevine.

The dinner was a buffet and you were first in line for food. You did not even remember afterwards what you had, because Junhee texted you with two outfits and asked which one you liked more. One was a grey skirt with a black shirt and a white scarf, the other outfits was a dress. Both would look fantastic, you were sure of that but there just was something about the first outfit that made you send ‘I love the first one’.

After an hour a window of opportunity opened and you left for your room. You changed into something more casual and left the hotel. Junhee would be waiting at the river. A thought struck you. Did he use another name when he was cross dressing?

You arrived at the river and turned right like the evening before. Junhee sat on the same bench, waiting.

“Good evening.”

It was a bit stiff but Junhee smiled at your greeting anyways. You hugged and when he pulled back you used the chance to ask about his name.

“Junhee is also a woman’s name. So just continue to call me that.”

You strolled through the narrow streets arm in arm with Junhee. Even before today you had been comfortable talking to him but now all inhibitions had disappeared. You two giggled and smiled the whole way to the other side of town. Some older people gave you stern looks but it did not phase you. Junhee was in an extraordinarily good mood. You suspected that his secret had weighed heavier on him than he had let on.

Junhee suggested going to his favorite restaurant in town and you agreed.

The place was away from the festival but not too far away. The waiter showed you to a table in a corner.

“At day time you can see the garden, from here it’s really beautiful!”

‘Really beautiful’ was also the person opposite you. The long wig hid Junhee’s sharp jawline and made his face a bit softer. The dark blouse hid his muscular arms and the fake lashes made his eyes shine.

You felt awkward not eating anything so you ordered something small to eat along with the drinks. Junhee devoured his food and when he caught you staring, an embarrassed smile appeared on his face.

“I didn’t have dinner yet.”

The light blush on his face was very cute and you found yourself smiling like an idiot.

Junhee finished the food and got ready for a toast. You raised your glass too and Junhee said: “To us!”

“To us!”

It was not your first glass so it seemed a bit silly but you smiled brightly anyways. The restaurant was full and the noise made it harder to hear. You moved your chair next to Junhee. In your head that had seemed very casual but in reality it was intimate. You were sitting in a corner now with the wall on one side and gorgeous Junhee on the other. The fake lashes really were the worst. Your heart fluttered and you looked away, face bruning.

Junhee took your hand and interlaced your fingers. The thin rings he wore looked good on him.

“Junhee?” You chewed on your lip. It seemed stupid to ask but you really did not want to there to be any misunderstandings.

“Hmm?”

“Is this a date?”

You met his eyes and he smiled, but it was paired with a nervous laugh.

“Would that be bad?”

Junhee furrowed his brows. You panicked thinking he may take that as you not wanting it to be a date.

“Oh. No! no. I just.. wasn’t sure... “

Say something.

“You know.. We kissed and I thought..”

You stopped at the look on Junhee‘s face. You were so close, it would have been easy to lean in a bit more and press your lips against his lips. His hand tightened and his fingers pressed into the back of your hand.

“It is a date.”

The lipstick had the perfect color, You almost could not tell that Junhee was wearing lipstick. Now, so up close you could see the little imperfections in the outline of his lips. You remembered how they felt on your lip and swallowed, your throat suddenly dry.

“Not here.”

The words broke the trance you had been in and you leaned back. He was right, the small town people may not be very happy with two women kissing, and even less so if they happened to notice that Junhee did not exactly fit their definition of 'woman’.

You held Junhee’s hand until your drinks were empty. It was pretty late and you still had to attend the conference tomorrow. Even Though you wanted to spend more time with Junhee, you had to go. The waiter came and Junhee lifted his handbag to look for his purse.

“I’m buying. It’s okay.”

Junhee let the small black handbag sink and smiled.

Arm in arm you walked back to the hotel. The night air cleared your head a bit but the giddy happiness remained.

Thanks for reading :)) see you in the next part.

A/n: this one was kinda tricky. Korean doesn't really have pronouns and especially no 'he' or 'she'. That's the main reason it doesn't get discussed in this fic. In gendered languages like english however it matters how you address people. Please respect people's pronouns.

#wkcnet #noonasinnetwork #Junhee x reader #Junhee fluff #A.C.E fluff #a.c.e x reader #kpop x reader #a.c.e fanfic #A.C.E fics #kpop fanfic #non idol au #star writing #queue for the lemonade stand

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1oserjk · 4 years

Text

— pop goes the cherry

jungkook comes back home to find you visiting as well, all grown up — in more ways than one.

childhood friends / brother’s best friend au

+ this isn’t smut but alludes to the subject of it n the loss of virginity, so if u are uneasy wit the idea then pls!!/ refrain!1!1

x masterlist

* .✫*ﾟ･ﾟ｡.☆.*｡･ﾟ✫*. * .✫*ﾟ･ﾟ｡.☆.*｡･ﾟ✫*.* .✫*ﾟ･ﾟ｡.☆.

“Will you calm down and just listen to what I have to say?”

He’s teetering nervously back and forth in your way too pink bedroom you should’ve grown out of by now. Thankfully, you were visiting for a short amount of time before you’d go back to university to leave him in the dust for another few more years, just like the rest of the times you’d done it. He decided to stop by for a night, courtesy of your brother’s invitation that his little sister was back in town along with them. He mentioned adamantly about wanting the whole family together, which if you added everything up, Jungkook was—and still is—included in the whole ordeal.

He was initially fine, perfectly normal as any other night at the Kim’s house. That was until he walked through the door and saw the face he’d tried to rid out of his head, since he graduated high school and fled to elsewhere, only moving back when you’d finally left home. Until you smiled at him and granted him a whiff of your irritatingly sweet perfume and your strawberry scented hair. Until you tugged on your low-cut dress that hit at the tops of your thighs to reveal an unnecessary amount of skin to him, because now all he could think about was if you really grew a cup size larger than the last time he’d seen you.

He shouldn’t have been thinking these things in the first place when his best friend was just downstairs, probably assuming he’d taken a trip to the restroom, but here he was, in your bedroom with you who sat sweetly with your legs crossed atop each other in front of him.

The room looks the same as a few years back, when he’d come up to knock on your door to announce that dinner was ready, by your mother’s orders. Instead, he’s here, actually inside, by your own asking of a private talk.

What he didn’t expect was for you to ask such an absurd question.

“Will you take my virginity?”

He’s dumbfounded. Absolutely shocked that those crude words had come out of your mouth. It should’ve revolted him that he was being offered something he’d never do to your brother. Never ever. This was sick.

So why did the offer only entice him further? He blamed it on the skirt of your dress that pooled around you when you sat. Or the way your doe eyes widened when you’d look up to gauge his reaction. He was waist-deep in the pool of attraction towards you. It was no hidden fact. Something in your eyes told him that you knew it too.

“I—Can you elaborate on what you just said?”

You shrug. “I just think it’s time to get it over with.”

He would scream in rage of frustration if Taehyung wasn’t in the house, or here at all. The tops of his knuckles turn white in the insides of his grey sweats and his veins that snake around his arms protrude even further. It should’ve made you intimidated, a bit nervous over why he was acting like it was such a big deal but it only makes you rub your thighs together and bite at the corner of your lips. Especially when he stood there, practically towering over you and your small form. It was incomparable, you really should’ve been intimidated. But in the end, it was Jungkook who was.

He timidly takes a seat on the small loveseat spaced out in the corner of your room. Enough for him to actually breathe and gain composure he lost in the beginning. He rests his forearms on the tops of his thighs and he thinks.

Taking a deep breath in, he starts, “Virginity is a big thing to lose..”

Your eyes roll back at the attempt of such an old man approach. “Don’t even try to back me out of this,” you huff. With a pout, you exasperate, “I mean, I’m already twenty-one! Don’t you think I deserve this?”

He tinkers with the thought, “I get that, but it doesn’t make sense over why you’re choosing me to do the deed.” The palms of his hands are splayed out in front of him, like he doesn’t know what to do with himself.

“You don’t have to if you don’t want to, Jungkook,” you promise. “No one is pressuring you to. But I don’t think you realize that I have the capability to choose whoever I want. I’m choosing you for a reason.”

Soon enough, something snaps in him to face the reality of the stupidity in this conversation. “I’m glad you see me as a great candidate,” he drips with sarcasm. “But I’m your brother's best friend. I’ve been his best friend since I moved in the next street over when I was five.”

You shrug again, “—So?”

He glares, feigning cluelessness while he lists off, “Well I don’t know, it’s not something your brother has to lay out for me to know that you’re not allowed to be touched and flirted with. It’s common sense and decency,” he exasperates. “In what sense would it be morally right to fuck you?”

“That’s the problem!” You point. You crawl up on the bed to sit comfortably with your feet tucked under your thighs. A teasing pose you were clueless to note. “I’ve been so deprived from new experiences and feelings Jungkook, it’s absolutely tiring,” you groan. Your fingertips run through your hair and it ruffles messily below your palm. Jungkook takes a long and hard swallow to cope with the stir in his pants. He avoids your gaze when you stare longingly at him.

“Do you remember our time in highschool?” You suddenly ask, and his eyes flutter before shifting precariously to your door, anxious for anybody to knock or even worse—stomp into the room with no warning, something your brother was highly prone to do. When his eyes land back onto you, he nods slowly and carefully. “You were in varsity along with my brother while I had just passed the auditions for a new spot in the junior varsity cheerleading team,” you further explain and his left foot starts to bounce, fingers tightening on the handle of the cushioned chair. Of course he remembers, what with taking up some of the field for practice, running around the track with skimpy shorts, eyes already on you when you would wear the mandatory skirts on game days. God, he remembers so clearly, as if it was just yesterday. “And you had your farewell game as a senior?”

Throat tightening while his eyes widened, only remembering a sliver of what happened right after, when the team had taken their final win for the season.

Tongue coming out from the corner of your mouth to skim across your lips, your head tilts, almost teasingly when you hand him a small smile. “Do you remember, Jungkook? When I ran up to you and—“

“—kissed me,” he finishes off, and your eyes show surprise when he does.

Covering up your slight satisfaction when he reiterates the memorable moment, right before a few months later when he left the town in such a rush. Frankly, you’re quite delighted that he remembered some of the last moments between the two of you. You attempt to keep your cool and the growing grin when you scoff. “On the cheek,” you correct with a shrug. “It was probably nothing to you.”

“But it was still a kiss,” he argues, “And it was from you in the end.”

“Did you like it?” It’s abrupt and rushed, but your feelings were urgent to know. After all these years. “Did you feel anything for me at that time?”

His mouth opens, yet nothing comes out. He closes it back up to think some more, let the right words filter out before he regrets anything. He would be mortified if you were able to pick out his feelings for you, that he failed to stop thinking about you ever since he stepped foot out of this house and never turned back. That he reciprocates the same overwhelmingly long crush you’ve had on him ever since Taehyung had introduced you both to each other.

“I was thankful,” he simply answers. “Glad that I had you along with Taehyung. I appreciate you both.”

It’s a fair enough answer to reel back and to stop mulling it over for a while. At least until he’s gone and you have all night to recall back your conversation of tonight.

He’s so close yet so far away to grasp, so you ask, “Do you know what it’s like to never know the feeling of being touched, Jungkook?”

He takes an interest at the ground, avoiding to give you a valid answer.

You scoff, tilting your head to the side to narrow in at his face, “Of course you don’t. You lost your virginity years ago to Park Chaeyoung,” you spit. His eyes widen significantly. How would you have known? “Right inside of your room while I waited for you downstairs..”

His brows furrow, “I—How?”

Again, you shrugged carelessly. “You were supposed to tutor me that day. I figured you were taking longer to get ready. Until I heard her, and then you.” Your nose scrunches and for a second you let your vulnerability show, a flash of hurt from the memory of walking into the familiar house, finding and hearing out your newfound nightmare and what was the worst case scenario for you to experience. Your head shifts down and you begin to fiddle with your fingers unsurely. “I showed myself out the door when I realized where I was and what I was doing.”

That was right. He had just taken her out after practice to a crummy restaurant and back to his place. He figured he’d do it before his parents got home from work and thought he’d manage to squeeze it before you arrive for your lessons that he volunteered himself for, plainly because he felt you slipping from his fingers when you began your own trek to highschool. He felt like he was the absolute shittiest when he ran a few minutes late only to get a call from Taehyung that you felt too sick to study anything that day. Little did he know you were sobbing yourself goodnight into your pillow.

The tables have definitely turned now. The bed was your throne and you sat there perfectly composed — something you weren’t a few years back. If anything, if jungkook hadn't been sitting like he was now, his knees would’ve buckled beneath him to fall to his downturned fate and humiliation.

“Don’t think that was it, gguk,” you test. “I sat patiently with all of your other pathetic relationships right after.” Your nails pick at the bedding beneath you, right in the middle of your parted thighs, a place he’d like to put his head in between. “You went through a lot of them.. And fucked for most of it too,” you chuckle bitterly.

He watches you slowly crawl at the edge again, fingers digging into the mattress. You can’t help but take notice at the dark chocolate locks placed perfectly at the front of his forehead.

“Swear it was like,” you took time to think, and with a pout you continue, “once you found out how to work your dick, you forgot all about me and left me in the dust.”

He stares dangerously ahead to find you teasing with a smile, like the she-devil you quickly became.

“No fair, Jungkook,” you tsk. “I’m a big girl now.” You wiggle your hips with a giggle. To get him driven to want you—no—need you. To see what he’s been missing all these years. Murmuring hazily, you prompt, “Don’t you think it’s my turn now?”

He stands abruptly, clearing his throat that ran dry, “Isn’t this shit supposed to be meaningful to you? With a person you love and care for?”

Your eyebrow raises, “Was it meaningful with Chaeyoung?” He’s silent. Clapping your hands, you conclude with a sinister smile, “Well then, I think you’ve given me my answer.”

“Why me?” He questions.

Sighing, you run your fingers through your hair that has grown a few inches longer the last time you saw him. Fuck, you were pretty. He’s noticed it growing up, and he’s paying the repercussions of it now. “I don’t know, Gguk.. I want to get this thing I have for you out of my system already.” It was an easier thing to confess when it’s been already a few years to grieve on his absence, a bit impatient from having to drag on the secret you’ve held so near and dear to your heart and scratched into every diary you used to own in your teenage years. Thinking of those, you’ve realized you have been meaning to burn the stash of books under your desk in some time. You make a mental note of that for later. “I figured you owe me this for abandoning me a few years back. I want to have a taste so I can stop these cravings I get so often these days.”

The childish heartbreak runs deeper than that, but you save him the gory details for later—or never.

His throat restricts itself to give an answer but his cock twitches, failing his belief to tell you that he would never go that route to bestow such havoc to your own brother — his best friend. Why didn’t you see any of that?

You click your tongue, observing the older boy squirm in his seat. “Your hands are starting to get fidgety.” Nodding in confirmation, you slide your legs over to sit regularly. A few seconds before you’d make the move of making your own seat on the same spot he had been nervously planted himself at, what was supposed to be a safe distance away from you in the first place.

God, he was so easy to read sometimes.

He makes a fist, ridding them from your view. The tip of his ears run red and he flusteredly looks away.

“You never answered my question,” you taunt.

Exasperatedly, he answers, “Because I don’t think it’s much of a good idea.”

Sighing begrudgingly, you make your advancement towards him. “Jungkook,” Your tone was dipped in honey, stirred around to further the smoothness to it, causing it to make it easier for you to persuade him into the light of all things bad. “That’s not what I asked.”

Now standing in front of him, he has no choice but to look up with a million questions surrounding his head. You precisely slide a knee to the outside of his left thigh and a hand to the opposite shoulder to meld support. You almost catch off balance when you lean further into him. It traps him into grabbing at your hip to steady you. You have him exactly where you needed him most and you don’t even realize it.

You’re already seated on top of him and he starts to sputter for you to get off, especially when you sat so preciously on top of the overwhelming bulge he holds so distinctly.

“W-What are you doing?” He pushes for you to move but you cling both hands on his shoulders to balance the sudden movements from him being underneath.

“Call this an act of bonding.” You massage on his shoulders to relax him and it visibly shows when they start to loosen under your grip. “I haven’t seen you in a while, it’s only understandable.” You shrug. “Why are you so iffy about it now? We always did this when we were younger.”

“Yes, when we were younger. When there was no space in the car or an extra chair to sit on—platonically. We’re adults now, _____,” he emphasizes.

“Which makes it all the more better,” you ease with a smile he melts at. “Because our choices aren’t ran on our mindlessness we used to hold when we were younger,” you shift around and he hisses, “and we can clearly pick out our feelings.” You lean forward, eyes narrowing, letting your hair fall around him, resembling a curtain and covering up the brush of your noses from the suffocating proximity you hold. “So why don’t you make it easier for the both of us—scratch my back while I scratch yours—and tell me exactly what you want.” You ground down and he gasps. “What I’m willing to give.”

“_-_____,” he mutters, pinching at your hip. You hiss and release a bit, your signature pout forming right after. “Are you asking for your brother to catch us like this?” He scolds.

Then, you’re suddenly gone.

You're quick to get up with a huff, even when his hands argue otherwise, practically tugging you forward and down, you ignore it and whip around to return back to the bed draped in the different shades of pink you’ve accumulated over the years.

“What a tough cookie,” you sarcastically mutter to yourself, plopping your ass back onto the bed and returning to the same pose you held just a few minutes ago. “Not a fun one either,” you state for him to hear clearly, observing him stand and walk forward from your peripheral.

He sighs. “Don’t be mad at me.”

“I’ve been mad at you ever since you left, Gguk,” you admit easily and with your eyes, it lures him to hold an expression of guilt when he catches you so sad from the reminder of it, wondering if this was what it was like the whole time he was gone after that.

It hurts him—and it must’ve been even worse for you.

“I missed you.” He hopes you take it as a form of an apology. “Would’ve been worse if I stayed—If I did something to hurt your brother really badly.” He shudders at the mere thought of it.

“Just.. Let’s not talk about him right now?” You reason. “Kind’ve tired of hearing about the bastard that’s stopping me from receiving any kind of action from you right now.”

He snorts and he’s close enough to tilt your chin upwards. “Hey,” he calls. “He loves you.”

You lean back to let your ass meet the bed with your thighs on each side of you. Sighing, you nod, “I know.”

He doesn’t loosen his grip.

“Look,” you start. “It’s not like I’m asking you to light some candles and be gentle. I just want it gone. Take it away. I don’t care if you stick it in, finish, and roll over. I just want to get this over with.”

He scowls and lets his brows furrow together, “Is that all you think of when it comes to sex? Just some time to pass by? To give and that’s it?”

“I’m not left with a lot of theories after being declined from it for so long,” you reason.

He stares at you longingly and you grow antsy when his hands that cradle your cheeks never leave their gentle touch, you wonder if it would be this soft when you would be in bed with him.

“I’m leaving again in a few days,” he abruptly announces and your frail fingers that are wrapped around his wrists loosen significantly. Your eyes widen and you backtrack completely.

“Again?”

He only nods.

Your eyes unknowingly well up and you close in on yourself immediately, alarmed at the fact you have shown your true self to the one person you’ve longed for the most and for such a cost that doesn’t even benefit you in the end. You rip his hands away from you, almost like a band-aid that’s been clinging onto you for a few long days now, turning gross and dirty and you hate it—absolutely hate the way he openly plays you to run into a deceiving mirage, that everything would be okay when he would come back.

He calls for your name, yet you don’t listen.

“I’m sorry,” is all he says. “I—I figured your brother would tell you when I came. I’m only here to get a few things before I would leave again.”

Your eyes flutter closed and you shift your head, refusing to let him see the way you crumble, especially when he practically towers over you when he doesn’t even mean to.

“I can’t—I won’t take something that’s supposed to be special and just leave,” he explains, heart panging when you don’t lift your head. “Please understand me,” he begs.

“Leave,” is all you manage to mutter out. “Please, get out.”

“_____..” He attempts to lift his hand out to touch you again, but you turn away and refuse, only leaving him to be hurt by the action.

“Tell Taehyung I’ll be down in a minute,” then you glare at him, “Because that’s what you came here for, right? To tell me dinner is ready?”

“I-I..” Nothing else comes out, so he only nods to save him from making anymore mistakes.

You let out a small laugh, it cracks in between, but the facade is still there. “I think it’s the fact that If I didn’t tell you the way I felt, if I didn’t sit you down to tell you myself that I want you and make an absolute fool out of myself like this — you probably would’ve never spoken for yourself..”

He falters, close to arguing until you repeat yourself all over again, hurt and annoyed, “Get out, Jungkook.”

He reluctantly obliges, shutting the door closed and ignoring the thump that hits the door right after, one of your pillows hitting against the surface while you pathetically sit in the middle of your room with tears running down your eyes so pathetically and to your own humiliation to bask in.

Taehyung’s brows furrow and he stands in the middle of his parent’s backyard porch with utter shock. It’s close to two in the morning and he’s tipsy. “You’re leaving early? We just got here.”

It’s a long gulp from his own bottle. “Yeah.” He utters some bullshit about his work and how they want him back sooner. Of course, Taehyung never presses, believing in every word that comes out of his mouth. In a lot of ways, you were both so similar. He doesn’t mention the abrupt confrontation that only happened several hours ago, nor the fallout of it either.

“That sucks,” Taehyung says, “You were the one to suggest coming back home.”

“Yeah.” He gulps the rest down and it burns this time. Midway he only realizes he traded out the beer bottle for the cheap vodka when he previously reached his hand out for another. He stops when the face that takes up most of his mind starts to dissipate into something blurry and lacking definition.

This way, it’s easier.

“I did,” is all he replies with.

* .✫*ﾟ･ﾟ｡.☆.*｡･ﾟ✫*. * .✫*ﾟ･ﾟ｡.☆.*｡･ﾟ✫*.* .✫*ﾟ･ﾟ｡.☆.

this was a 1k drabble from my old blog so i cleaned it up n added 2k+ words to it!/!/ i wanted to revive it bc she’s so memorable to me

* .✫*ﾟ･ﾟ｡.☆.*｡･ﾟ✫*. * .✫*ﾟ･ﾟ｡.☆.*｡･ﾟ✫*.* .✫*ﾟ･ﾟ｡.☆.

#bts #bts fanfic #bts smut #bts fluff #bts angst #jeon jungkook #jeon jeongguk #jungkook #jungkook scenarios #jungkook angst #jungkook smut #jungkook fluff #jungkook drabble #mine #pop goes the cherry

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voguingtodanzig · 3 years

Text

THE CELESTIAL JUKEBOX, PRESENT TENSE - 250 SONGS

Again, some of this is personal and sentimental, linked to time and place and experience.

50 Cent, “Many Men (Wish Death)”

100 gecs, “800db cloud”

10,000 Maniacs, “Candy Everybody Wants”

Bryan Adams, “Everything I Do”

Herb Alpert & The Tijuana Brass, “Spanish Flea”

America, “Sister Golden Hair”

Julie Andrews, “My Favorite Things”

Animal Collective, “Brother Sport”

Aphex Twin, “Tha”

Fiona Apple, “Extraordinary Machine”

Louis Armstrong, “What a Wonderful World”

Ash, “Shining Light”

Atlantic Starr, “Always”

Atlas Sound, “Washington School”

Autechre, “Vose In”

The B-52s, “Deadbeat Club”

Bananarama, “Cruel Summer”

The Beatles, “All My Loving”

Beck, “Girl”

Belle & Sebastian, “Seymour Stein”

Benoit & Sergio, “Boy Trouble”

Beyoncé, “Countdown”

Bikini Kill, “Alien She”

Bilal, “West Side Girl”

Bjork, “It’s Oh So Quiet”

Black Dice, “Pigs”

Black Rebel Motorcycle Club, “Stop”

The Black-Eyed Peas, “Imma Be”

Blast Off Country Style, “Cutie Pie”

Blondie, “Heart of Glass”

The Bloodhound Gang, “Your Only Friends Are Make-Believe”

The Box Tops, “The Letter”

Brainiac, “I Am A Cracked Machine”

Michelle Branch, “Everywhere”

Laura Branigan, “Gloria”

The Breeders, “Off You”

Danny Brown, “Gremlins”

James Brown, “Get Up I Feel Like Being a Sex Machine”

Jackson Browne, “Somebody’s Baby”

Vanessa Carlton, “A Thousand Miles”

Harry Chapin, “Cat’s in the Cradle”

Tracy Chapman, “Fast Car”

The Carpenters, “Yesterday Once More”

Julian Casablancas and the Voidz, “Human Sadness”

The Chemical Brothers, “Free Yourself”

Chixdiggit!, “My Restaurant”

Cibo Matto, “Sunday, Pt. 1”

Ciara feat. Missy Elliott, “One, Two Step”

Clipse, “Dirty Money”

Jim Croce, “Operator”

Crosby, Stills, and Nash, “You Don’t Have To Cry”

Christopher Cross, “Ride Like the Wind”

Cryptacize, “Mythomania”

Crystal Castles, “Air War”

Culture Club, “Karma Chameleon”

Terrence Trent D’Arby, “Sign Your Name”

Daft Punk, “Around the World”

Dave Dee, Dozy, Beaky, Mick & Tich, “Hold Tight”

Dead Kennedys, “Kill the Poor”

DeBarge, “The Rhythm of the Night”

Deerhoof, “+81”

Deerhunter, “Octet”

Depeche Mode, “Personal Jesus”

Dial, “Helium”

The Diplomats, “Dipset Anthem”

DMX, “Stop Being Greedy”

The Doobie Brothers, “Black Water”

Dr. Dre feat. Snoop Dogg, “Nuthin’ But a G Thang”

The-Dream, “Love King”

Duran Duran, “Hungry Like The Wolf”

Bob Dylan, “Positively 4th Street”

The Eagles, “Lyin’ Eyes”

Eat Skull, “Cooking a Way to be Happy”

Elastica, “Connection”

The Everly Brothers, “All I Have to Do is Dream”

The Ben Folds Five, “The Battle of Who Could Care Less”

Eleanor Friedberger, “Stare at the Sun”

Eminem feat. Dido, “Stan”

Brian Eno, “Cindy Tells Me”

Eurythmics, “Sweet Dreams (Are Made of This)”

Extreme, “More Than Words”

The Fall, “Glam-Racket”

Roberta Flack, “Killing Me Softly With His Song”

Flipper, “Ha Ha Ha”

Dan Fogelberg, “Longer”

The Free Design, “The Proper Ornaments”

Fur, “Devil to the Lamb”

Garbage, “Only Happy When It Rains”

Judy Garland, “Over the Rainbow”

Kevin Gates, “Paper Chasers”

Ghostface Killah, “Shakey Dog”

Freddie Gibbs, “20 Karat Jesus”

Godspeed You! Black Emperor, “The Dead Flag Blues”

Gorillaz feat. De La Soul, “Feel Good Inc.”

Go Sailor, “I’m Still Crying”

Granddaddy, “A.M. 180”

Colleen Green, “I Want to Grow Up”

Green Day, “Basket Case”

Grimes, “REALITi”

Gucci Mane, “Break Ya Self (Brrrussia version)”

Guided By Voices, “Teenage FBI”

Harvey Danger, “Flagpole Sitta”

Helium, “XXX”

Keri Hilson, “Pretty Girl Rock”

Hole, “Malibu”

The Hollies, “All I Need Is The Air That I Breathe”

Michael Jackson, “Rock With You”

Jay-Z, “Hard Knock Life”

Henry Jacobs, “Guitar Lesson”

Jawbreaker, “Fireman”

Jeremih, “Oui”

Jewel, “Standing Still”

Jimmy Eat World, “Sweetness”

Billy Joel, “Uptown Girl”

Scott Joplin, “The Entertainer”

Journey, “Don’t Stop Believin’”

Juelz Santana, “Mixin’ up the Medicine”

R. Kelly feat. T.I. & T-Pain, “I’m a Flirt (Remix)”

Kool and the Gang, “Celebration”

Lana Del Rey, “Off to the Races”

Lagwagon, “May 16”

The Libertines, “Horror Show”

Limp Bizkit, “Re-Arranged”

Lindstrom, “Where You Go I Go Too”

Lisa Lisa & Cult Jam, “Lost in Emotion”

Lit, “My Own Worst Enemy”

The Lonely Island feat. T-Pain, “I’m on a Boat”

Lotus Plaza, “What Grows?”

Lower Dens, “Candy”

Courtney Love, “I’ll Do Anything”

Love As Laughter, “Idol Worship”

M.I.A, “Bamboo Banga”

Madonna, “Hung Up”

Madlib, “Mystic Bounce”

Stephen Malkmus and the Jicks, “Ramp of Death”

The Mamas and the Papas, “California Dreamin’”

John Mayer, “New Light”

Meek Mill, “Dreams and Nightmares Intro”

Men at Work, “Safety Dance”

George Michael, “Faith”

The Modern Lovers, “I’m Straight”

Modest Mouse, “Heart Cooks Brain”

The Moldy Peaches, “Nothing Came Out”

Chris Montez, “The More I See You”

Alanis Morissette, “Head Over Feet”

Jason Mraz and Colbie Caillat, “Lucky”

MXPX, “Party, My House, Be There”

My Bloody Valentine, “You Never Should”

Nas, “The World Is Yours”

Johnny Nash, “I Can See Clearly Now”

Neu!, “Hallogallo”

New Order, “Subculture”

New Pornographers, “The Laws Have Changed”

Wayne Newton, “Danke Schoen”

Harry Nilsson, “Jump into the Fire”

Nine Inch Nails, “Wish”

Nirvana, “About a Girl”

The Notorious B.I.G., “Warning”

Maura O’Connell, “Summerfly”

The Orb, “Little Fluffy Clouds”

Panda Bear, “Mr Noah”

Pavement, “Harness Your Hopes (BBC Evening Session)”

Pete Rock & C.L. Smooth, “They Reminisce Over You (T.R.O.Y.)”

Liz Phair, “Shane”

Pinhead Gunpowder, “I Am An Elephant”

The Platters, “Only You (And You Alone)”

The Pointer Sisters, “Jump”

Michael Praetorius, “Es ist ein Ros entsprungen”

Elvis Presley, “A Little Less Conversation”

Primal Scream, “Keep Your Dreams”

The Prodigy, “Breathe”

Propaghandi, “Anti-Manifesto”

Brian Protheroe, “Pinball”

Psychic Graveyard, “No”

Public Enemy, “Fight The Power”

Aileen Quinn, “Tomorrow”

Radiohead, “A Wolf at the Door”

Gerry Rafferty, “Right Down the Line”

Bonnie Raitt, “Something to Talk About”

The Ramones, “Chain Saw”

Otis Redding, “(Sittin’ On) The Dock of the Bay”

Trent Reznor and Atticus Ross, “In Motion”

Lou Reed and Metallica, “Junior Dad”

Rihanna feat. Jay-Z, “Umbrella”

Kenny Rogers and Dolly Parton, “Islands in the Stream”

The Rolling Stones, “Sympathy for the Devil”

Linda Ronstadt and James Ingram, “Somewhere Out There”

Rosemary Krust, “Private Amber”

Diana Ross, “Theme From Mahogany”

Roxy Music, “More Than This”

A Savage, “Eyeballs”

The Shangri-Las, “Leader of the Pack”

Shanice, “I Love Your Smile”

Ed Sheeran, “Thinking Out Loud”

Sightings, “Yellow”

The Silver Jews, “Blue Arrangements”

Alan Silvestri, “The Back to the Future theme”

Paul Simon, “Kodachrome”

Ashlee Simpson, “Pieces of Me”

Slade, “Cum On Feel the Noize”

The Smashing Pumpkins, “Here’s to the Atom Bomb (New Wave version)”

The Soft Pink Truth, “Do They Owe Us A Living?”

Sonic Youth, “Jams Run Free”

Jordan Sparks and Chris Brown, “No Air”

Spoon, “The Mystery Zone”

Starving Weirdos, “Land Lines”

Stereolab, “Plastic Mile”

The Strokes, “12:51”

Swell Maps, “Let’s Build A Car”

Taylor Swift, “Style”

Stylophonic, “R U Experienced”

Jazmine Sullivan, “Mascara”

Suicidal Tendencies, “Institutionalized”

Taco, “Puttin’ on the Ritz”

James Taylor, “You’ve Got a Friend”

Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky, “Dance of the Sugar Plum Fairy”

Throwing Muses, “Not Too Soon”

TLC, “Baby-Baby-Baby”

Tortoise, “Djed”

The Toys, “A Lover’s Concerto”

John Travolta and Olivia Newton-John, “Summer Nights”

A Tribe Called Quest, “Can I Kick It?”

UB40, “Red Red Wine”

Joe Walsh, “Life’s Been Good”

Scott Weiland, “Paralysis”

Steely Dan, “Do It Again”

Stiff Little Fingers, “Suspect Device”

Stylophonic, “RU Experienced?”

T.I., “What You Know”

Mary Timony, “Blood Tree”

that dog., “I’m Gonna See You”

The Tymes, “So Much In Love”

Ultimate Painting, “Out in the Cold”

The Unicorns, “Child Star”

The Velvet Underground, “The Gift”

Waka Flocka Flame, “Hard in da Paint”

Ween, “Even If You Don’t”

Weezer, “Endless Bummer”

Kanye West, “Devil in a New Dress (G.O.O.D. Fridays version)”

WHAM!, “Wake Me Up (Before You Go-Go)”

White Hassle, “Oh, What a Feeling”

Matthew Wilder, “Break My Stride”

Bill Withers, “Lean on Me”

Wolf Eyes, “Human Animal”

Stevie Wonder, “My Cherie Amour”

Wye Oak, “Siamese”

The Yeah Yeah Yeahs, “Maps”

Yo La Tengo, “My Heart’s Reflection”

Zaimph, “Removing Bits of History”

The Zombies, “Time of the Season”

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princesscatherinemiddleton · 3 years

Text

DISCLAIMER: I haven’t sat through the entire interview and I genuinely doubt I ever will. I’ve seen clips. I saw part of it when I walked past my front room and it was on. But I haven’t seen the whole thing

Feel free to not read this and ignore I posted it. This is only because I promised to post it yesterday and... forgot. TLDR: Meg is an angel who deserves happiness, I still love and always will love KMiddy (that’s why I have a blog on her bbs), me and Hazza are done, Charles is no longer my friend

I’m going to split this into sections but I need to start by saying that if I could take away one ounce of the pain Meghan went through I would. It sickens to me to know how she felt. I only wish she has the best life with her two beautiful babies and is happy. I also want to say I don’t blame anyone who saw Meghan’s interview and decided they needed to cut ties with royal watching for their own mental health. While there are parts of the interview I may disagree or have issues with, the point remains, this interview was not for me and my opinion is only here for @duchessanon

The Suicidal Ideation: The only blessing I can see here is that Meghan didn’t seem to have a plan. I might has misread it - but I truly hope I haven’t - but I hope it hadn’t reached that stage. I’m angry and upset and in pain that she felt like that. The fact she’ll have to carry that with her forever. The fact she was in so much pain she couldn’t see a way out while she was pregnant. If you don’t believe her or think it’s a lie, please never interact with me ever again

Mental Health: While I don’t blame Harry for his reaction, I also do blame him. I am angry that he didn’t act immediately to protect Meghan when she told him, his family be damned. I’m angry that his reaction was “my family won’t like this” rather than telling his family. I’m furious with “the institution”. I don’t care how it looked - if someone says they’re ill, you get them help. I would love to go back in time to when Meghan was struggling and drag her to the doctor’s myself, but I can’t and I’m sure her friends and family feel the same. I’m angry he has spoken about getting mental health support for himself but wouldn’t get it for his wife. I’m furious that he said he was “ashamed” (although I’ll give him the benefit of the doubt that it was the wrong word)

Mental Health - subcategory Heads Together: From what both Meghan and Harry said, bar one member “high up in the institution” (which sounds like Charles), no one else in the family knew about how Meghan was feeling. I could be wrong, and if so, I will hold my hands up, but the initial reaction of “I don’t want the BRF ever talking about mental health” is dangerous. I don’t think it can be overstated how incredible the positive impact Catherine has had on mental health in the UK is. When my sister was seeing First Response, they spoke to her a lot about Catherine’s Early Years Initiative. That has to continue (I’d like to point out that I don’t blame this narrative on either Harry or Meghan, but rightfully angry fans of the couple)

Kate Made Meghan Cry: I’m here to get kicked out of the KMiddy fan club. I believe it. A heavily pregnant or recently post-partum woman, a soon to be bride, a dress fitting. It’s a recipe for disaster. Meghan said Kate sent flowers in apology and she seems over it so y’all should get over it too

The “Dark” Comment: I know the rumour is Anne but it sounds like Charles to me. I do not stan that man. It’s wrong and disgusting and we all know that

Security: Official security is for working royals and always has been. Non-working royals have private security. The fact we don’t know who’s paying for Andrew’s security is an issue and needs to be dealt with. When they stepped back, the Sussexes were no longer entitled to official security. Should they still have been offered it, considering they were in a pandemic, the DM had leaked their address, and they were targets? Obviously. Just because something should happen doesn’t make it right. But I do understand why the security wasn’t there.

The Exit: Speaking of which, I don’t want to hear about who was or was not blindsided ever again. Harry and Meghan signalled they wanted to leave. They then jumped the gun. They were both blindsided and not blindsided

Titles: Meghan is saying the conversation was that when Charles is King, Archie wouldn’t get a title because he was “too dark”. That’s wrong. She was not saying ARCHIE SHOULD A PRINCE NOW. Read the room people

Being Trapped: The way Harry, and William and Charles to a lesser extent, talk about being royal really frustrates me. Crown Princess Victoria has spoken about what an honour it is the serve Sweden. Kate spoke about how she was honoured to show George off after his birth. Even Meghan spoke about how excited she was to work for the crown and meet people. These men aren’t trapped. They could all leave at any point. They’re babies

Harry: Harry clearly did not prepare Meghan. From the story about the curtsey, to the National Anthem, to what the press are like, he did not prepare her. He lacks and clear and complete understanding of the family and job he grew up in. I genuinely believe he was so scared Meghan would see how she would be treated and (rightfully) say no and he rushed her into marriage, without preparing her properly. Why is he so obsessed with his grandparents (I have guesses)? I’ve run out of patience for this manchild

Other:

Who the hell are the HR people for the royal family? Imagine that being your job

The newspaper articles they showed are honest and great except they also used those magazines that publish stories like “Camilla has KILLED the Queen”

Hazza called the UK Press racist, which is true, but he glossed over the fact the press feeds off the public

The mini vow exchange before the actual wedding was cute AF

Meghan calling the press corps a holiday party is cute but an honest mistake. Harry not correcting her is not so much

I would like to know how Meg made it to 2018 and did not know what the national anthem of GB was. Did she not watch sport?

The oversaturated comment - my initial thought was Catherine but now I’m thinking Eugenie?

Harry says Netflix and Spotify weren’t part of the plan but also said they wanted to be financially independent. What’s the truth? Were they going to get a job at Costco?

I’m surprised Archwell didn’t get a real mention because I very much assumed it was going to 90 mins of drama and 30 mins of promo

BABY SUSSEX IS A GIRL I KNEW IT WE ALL KNEW IT

#mine #personal #harry #meghan #please ignore this

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wallwriterstuff · 4 years

Text

Dear Sister Part 2 ||Alec Volturi x Female Reader||

Dear Sister Part 1

Words: 5451 Warnings: A lot more swearing than I intended, and a fair bit of angst

So this took a lot longer to put up than I had intended it to but unfortunately real life got in the way, but I’m back and ready to get my writing on beautiful humans! Keep your eyes peeled for more requests and some more random crap from the inner workings of my mind :D

Request for @tiger-khans-blog: Hey there I am really amused by your style of writing stories.Can I ask you another request for Alec Volturi? The thing is Demetri's younger younger Sister the reader fled from her family.As they had the tradition to get the girls married in a early age.And the reader is a Creator gifted Vampire.The Volturi gets to her.She is asked to join them.She recognizes Demetri immediately.She goes and hugs him.Demetri recognizes her.And she finds out that Alec and her mate bond.That's why she decides to torment Alec.So that he doesn't want her.But everything goes opposite.Alec falls for her head to heels.Then her Casanova image gets revealed that she is no less than her brother. Alec tries to convince her to give him a chance.Then Alec tries all the ways to make her fall in love with him too. Then she lastly agrees.Demetri gets against of this relationship.Then he tries to make them separated.But he becomes unsuccessful. As Jane is his mate.

How on Earth did they get here?

Alec could only blink as she slammed him into the wall of his room. He felt the stone crumble around his shoulders as she pushed him further into the rubble. He grit his teeth, a sharp sting running over his skin as the venom sealed the small cracks breaking apart his flesh.

“You did this!” she snarled. It was such sweet agony feeling the heat of her body so close to his, her skin sending sparks flying across his own. He wished it were under better circumstances.

“Actually, you were the one who invaded my room.” Alec pointed out, a hint of the bitterness he felt creeping into his voice. He was certain he was in the right; he’d not been sleeping around knowing his mate was in the same building as him after all. He had tried to get to know her, learned to love everything about her, and she’d just…thrown it all back in his face.

“What gave you the right to talk about me like that in front of all of those people? You do not even know me! You ruined everything between Santiago and me! My own brother thinks me a whore! You disgraced me in front of everyone we work with.” she was so close, her lips a hairs breadth from his own and spitting venom his way. Alec hissed, his vision flaring red briefly, but even though he was more furious than he had ever thought he could be he couldn’t bring himself to put his hands on her, to push her away. Once she stepped back he knew she’d be out of his reach forever. He could feel it deep down in his bones that this was a violent, permanent goodbye.

“Santiago should never have been with you in the first place, you belong with me! Fate has said so!” he snapped. Alec balled his fists at his sides, feeling the sweet numbness on his fingertips and knowing he would unleash it if he wasn’t careful enough. He glared her down, her own black eyes swallowing him whole. How was any of this fair? Her anger was unjustified! His was not! He had every right to be furious with her obvious disregard for their bond.

“Fuck fate! I belong to no one! How dare you assume you have ownership of me because you felt your dick twitch when you first saw me!” she spat, shoving away from him. He felt his shoulder crack unpleasantly but ignored the sting of it healing, too busy seething and trembling as he fought back the urge to lunge at her, trap her against the door she was walking towards so she couldn’t leave him. Had all those days spent in the library been wasted? Did she really feel nothing for him? Did she not see he that he would do anything for her?

“Y/N-“

“Keep my name out of your mouth, you have no right to speak it,” she hissed, turning in the doorway to send daggers his way with her eyes one last time. “Keep far away from me Alec Volturi. For the eternity I have left on this Earth I do not ever want to see it again.” She slammed the door shut behind her and Alec crumpled. Venom stung his eyes for the first time in years, and a horrible heaving noise echoed through his room. He didn’t realise it was him until Jane rushed to his side and pulled him close.

Alec hadn’t cried the way he did right then since the day they’d burned.

Y/N wasn’t around for a very long time after that. Months passed without her presence and Alec grew entirely numb to it all. He went to trials, stood in the background on missions, but nothing changed, he didn’t change. Alec had become utterly mute, not even Jane could get him to speak a word anymore and he spent all of his free time sitting in front of the fireplace in his room, stroking the worn cover of a copy of Private Berlin. Y/N had introduced him to the series and this was his favourite one; she’d bought all of the books for him and in his rage this was the only book he hadn’t destroyed. Every passing moment of his day felt like a fight against quick-sand that was trying to drag him down, and he was so, so close to giving up. What was the point? Y/N had taken half of him with her when she left and there was no good reason to continue unless he could become whole again.

Demetri often received post cards from her, and he had heard whispers of what these postcards contained. Clearly, she was having a wonderful time. She was travelling the world and sampling all the types of people each continent had to offer. It made Alec’s very soul ache whenever he had to hear about it. Given his empty state of being it wasn’t hard to understand why nobody really came to check on him anymore – he was hardly offering the most scintillating conversation - which was partially why he was so confused to see Demetri sitting in front of him on his sofa. The tracker looked sombre, forearms resting on his knees as he glanced down at the book in his hands before looking up to meet his eyes again.

“Alec you have to stop this. We are all worried about you.” Demetri sighed. If he had the capacity to feel anything at all, Alec would be angry at him too right now. How was it fair that he could insult his sister and exchange cruel words with her, yet it was Demetri she would still stay in contact with? Alec had made one mistake! He had made plenty more. Demetri waited patiently for him to say something, anything, but Alec wouldn’t give him the satisfaction. What was there left to say after all? His mate had walked right out of his life without so much as a goodbye.

Just leave Alec thought. The very bones of him were tired.

“Jane worries for you, and I cannot stand to see her beside herself over you.” He continued.

Then Jane can tell me as much herself Alec mentally groaned, though his face remained apathetic. Demetri would never guess his head was actually full to bursting with a host of negative thoughts when his face suggested his mind was painfully blank. He traced the images on the cover of his book, heart aching sharply like it was just yesterday she had left all over again.

“When I lost my sister the first time my heart ached in ways I had never known it could ache before. I know the feeling of loss-“

“My sister holds you every night like to let you go would be the death of her. What do you know of the way my heart aches?” Alec couldn’t stop the sharp words escaping him, his tongue whipping the tracker into submission. For the first time in a long time he felt the frustration Demetri brought out in him so strongly it was able to overwhelm the numbness in his soul. Alec was somewhat to be able to feel something for once, but it brought with it the undeniable heartache already nagging in the background, threatening to drown him once more. Demetri was quiet for a long while, staring down at his hands as he thought over his words.

“Alec, I-“

“Do not lecture me on affairs of the heart Demetri, how many did you have to break before you finally found one you felt was worth keeping intact?” Alec huffed, unfurling from the curled-up position he’d been sat in to plant his feet on the floor. He ran his hands up into his hair and scrubbed at his scalps with a sigh. As angry as he wanted to be with Demetri maybe he was struggling to feel it for more than just the perpetual numbness. Maybe he couldn’t be angry because deep down, he knew Demetri didn’t deserve it. The man had lost his sister twice over. He was grieving her absence as much as Alec was.

“The first time my sister left, she was betrothed to an older man in the village who was a shoe in to become a partner in a cloth merchants firm. This merchant was one of the wealthiest men in town and her husband to be would soon have been amongst the upper echelons of society. Our family would have been propelled into wealth, status…these were the things my mother cared about. Not Y/N, though.” Demetri smiled, a wan and wistful thing that radiated hurt so intense it made Alec pause.

“What did she care about?” he asked finally. Demetri’s expression softened.

“The people she loved. She cared about the people she loved. One of them was a girl called Erato, a whore.” He told him. Alec’s brows furrowed. In a fraction of a second he had recalled every conversation they had ever had, the words imprinted on his mind and held dear in his heart as the only reminder she had ever once been with him. He understood almost immediately what had driven her away.

“He was said to have beaten all the whores in the brothel.” He quoted Y/N. Alec could remember the fire in her eyes, recall the sharpness of her tone. The anger she felt at her engagement had been obvious and the hurt had been strong enough to last a millenia. Demetri nodded solemnly.

“Erato was beside herself the night she came to Y/N, but mother would not call off the wedding. She would not trust the word of a whore and ruin our family’s chance at social success. Y/N ran away the very same night and was lost to me for a thousand years until she chose to find us. Do you not see, Alec?” he asked with a sigh. Alec’s brows furrowed, and then he settled back in his seat with a sigh.

“I see the wrong person sitting in front of me. I am tired Demetri, I don’t want riddles, if you’re here to tell me something profound then get on with it please.”

“Y/N has never been quiet about injustice! If she perceives anything that is happening to herself or others to be wrong or detrimental to wellbeing, she fights back. Bloody hell Alec! You stood from afar and never made a move to claim her as your mate!” Demetri sounded exasperated at this point and Alec couldn’t stop the hysterically choked laugh from escaping.

“She’s made it pretty clear I’m not intended to have her as my mate. She’s so powerful she can laugh in the face of fate.” He pointed out. Demetri groaned.

“But she isn’t!” he insisted, pushing to his feet and dropping a stack of colourful looking postcards on the coffee table, “Read them Alec. As loath as I am to admit it, she is miserable without you.” He shook his head as he left, the door closing a little harder than necessary. Part of Alec was satisfied because Demetri finally knew the sheer struggle of letting your sister be with someone you intensely wished they weren’t with. The other part was terrified of the small stack of cards on his tabletop. The loopy handwriting was a familiar scrawl, something that tried to be elegant but was close to illegible because she never had time to write things down, too busy experiencing the moment in real time. He could faintly smell her scent lingering on the surface of each one, and his mouth felt very dry as he reached for the stack.

Demetrius,

Paris remains lovely as ever, but the lights seem dimmer than they were my last visit. Monsieur Ardoin is as hospitable as ever. Give my regards to our mutual friends.

Love, Y/N

So she’d been to Paris had she? He tried to ignore the bitter hatred that roiled in his gut at the mention of this Monsieur Ardoin but it was hard to stop, and the next three were the same. More names, more cities. Alec scowled, slapping down the card and leaning back in his chair. His hand ran over his face, as if he could somehow scrub the words from where they’d been imprinted on his eyeballs. The colourful little cards were taunting him though, the weakest trace of her scent caressing his nose and muddling his mind.

“Damn it all to hell.” He growled, reaching for the next one. They were addictive. A fresh and recent part of her for him to treasure, but the pain in him seared deeper with every word…or not? His brows furrowed, his body leaning forward as if being as physically close to the paper as possible might bring him some relief. If his heart still beat, it might have stopped.

Demetrius,

How am I to believe your words are true? I might have once loved him, but Alec made it clear he never felt the same. How can I believe he held any sort of affection for me when he treated me no differently to any other person in the guard? I will not come back, I could not face any of them. That does not mean you could not visit me, you will always know where to find me after all, brother.

All my love, Y/N

Alec felt his eyes widen. It was…his fault? He did this? He ruined his own chance of happiness? He thought back to all those bittersweet memories he had (the only thing left of her now) where they had wiled away evenings reading in the library. They had always been opposite ends of the sofa, as was proper, never crossing that boundary, and whenever he risked glances at her she never seemed to be looking his way but the distinct tinkling of jewellery…had that meant she was looking at him and turning away before he could notice? The day they met her smirk had dropped for that briefest second, like the freight-train of emotion he’d been contending with had hit her to. Oh…oh how could he be so stupid!

He was out of the door and hammering on Demetri’s in the next second, the tracker opening the door with a deep frown.

“Alec you need to-“

“Where?” he demanded. Demetri blinked, his face going blank for a second. Alec felt every extremity twitch, the urgent need to move move move eating away at him.

“London.” He said finally, his tone obviously reluctant. Alec turned on his heel, ready to leave immediately, the consequences be damned.

“I have to-“

“Find her,” Demetri finished for him, though his face looked like he’d sucked a lemon, “I may not like it, but I suppose you have never liked it either have you? You have to find her. bring my sister home Alec…we’ll see about the rest after.” Alec very nearly laughed but the moment was too serious for that. Demetri’s acceptance of his bond with Y/N, however grudging, only made him more determined to find her.

“Tell me when you have a more precise location!” Alec called over his shoulder, already two floors down and headed for the door. Maybe the masters needed to know of his departure, maybe they didn’t, but if he was certain of anything it was his position in the guard. He was too valuable for them to lose and if he returned home with his mate…well Aro would probably be so pleased that his running away would most likely be forgotten about. Y/N had to accept him after all of this, didn’t she? What was more romantic than running across a continent and through a bloody ocean after your love? By the time Demetri called him back Alec was forced to hide in some rundown warehouse on the outskirts of a city he knew very little given its constant evolution – forgetting his credit cards was a double wounder.

The minute the sun went down he moved.

He was sure the Savile Row tailors wouldn’t miss just one Gucci suit, right? Even if it was worth over £1500. He was fairly sure that ridiculously pruned flowerbed in front of her hotel wouldn’t miss those flowers either. She had already opened the door before he had chance to knock.

“I am going to have Demetrius’s head on a stick.”

“I know you are angry but please, Y/N, give me time to explain.” He wedged his foot in the doorway, surprised when she didn’t attempt to close it. Her expression was devoid of emotion but she wasn’t turning him away just yet. Alec took it as a good sign, even if she wasn’t seemingly willing to let him in just yet.

“Your time is dwindling away Alec. Why are you here?” she asked. Alec looked her over, clearly dressed to go out and enjoy a night on the town. He held out the flowers.

“I want – no I need you to know, that every moment of your absence has been abysmal for me. I need you to know I will follow you to the ends of the Earth, endure any trial, overcome any obstacle, if it means you will understand how necessary you are to my very existence. I made the mistake of not letting you know that before, let me rectify that here, now. Give me a chance to prove to you Y/N that I cannot leave here without you.” He kept his voice firm, bold, but inside he crumbled. Here was this headstrong, independent woman who had survived the world just fine before she met him and could do so again if she made him leave. He had nothing left to do but pray she would accept him. Her eyes fell to the flowers.

“You do know I hate tulips, right?” Alec’s heart fell, chest tightening.

“I do now.” He said.

“I have dinner plans, Alec.” She sighed, leaning against the doorframe.

“Then let me take you to dinner.” He insisted.

“They are not the kind of plans that require a partner or a chaperone,” She retorted, “Maybe your life is abysmal but I happen to be doing just fine without you. Whatever Demetrius has told you in some desperate attempt to bring me home is false. You have my apologies for the inconvenience the journey must have caused.” She reached behind the door and pulled on a denim jacket, bringing some shades out of the pocket and slipping them over dark, burgundy eyes. Alec grit his teeth, watching as she locked her door.

“Demetri didn’t have to tell me anything, I read your postcards. You’re not happy, Y/N, and neither am I, so what is the sense of-“

“Opening someone else’s mail is considered a federal crime in some places. I would have thought a man devoted to upholding such laws would know that.” She snapped, still walking away from him. Alec hurried after her.

“I am not leaving until you give me a chance. Just one, Y/N, just one.” He hissed, reaching for her arm. His hand went straight through her and he stopped dead, his heart breaking all over again as she strode into the lift without breaking stride and pressed a button on the panel. She turned on her heel, pulling her shades down her nose to peer sharply at him over the black plastic rim.

“Just no, Alec, just no.” she retorted. The doors slid closed between them and Alec was left alone, jaw tight and fingers clenching into fists at his sides. He wasn’t sure how long he stood there, letting the waves of pain and frustration overtake him. He really didn’t enjoy the way a warm hand clasped his shoulder, because it wasn’t hers. Alec had whirled before the man even had chance to turn away, his teeth sinking into his windpipe and hands viciously tightening around his biceps. Bones cracked and veins burst, but it wasn’t enough to quell all of his anger. Not until the man and his wife were mangled beyond repair as well as the security guard who was guarding the CCTV tape that could have outed his very existence, did Alec manage to start thinking clearly again.

As a fire consumed their bodies in the dumpster in the next borough over, he fixed his shirt sleeves and refastened his cufflinks. He drew in a deep breath, smelling the oncoming storm in the air and simply listening to the sounds of the city. If Y/N wasn’t going to give him a chance he was simply going to have to create one, and that meant getting imaginative. What did you do for the girl that could have it all? She was powerful enough to create any gift. If she wanted something she easily got it, so how was Alec supposed to get what he wanted? Hell, she had probably already created foresight and was watching his every decision like that Cullen woman could so nothing would be a good enough surprise.

Maybe he didn’t have to surprise her though.

She was still out when he got back to her room, some stolen hotel stationary allowing him to leave a note he hoped she would read on her bed. Maybe flowers weren’t the way to her heart but another type of gift would do better? She was always wearing jewellery of some sort, so maybe some new jewellery was the way to her heart?

She never showed up at the time he had requested to meet with her.

Alec left another note a few days later, tracking her to a new hotel this time, but she didn’t show up so he could take her to the theatre either. He had hoped that a slew of invitations to various date-themed evenings would maybe make her understand he knew what he had done wrong now. He understood that by not making a move beforehand he had damaged her self-esteem and hurt her feelings, but if he could reverse that mistake now…He ran a hand over his face with a sigh, pen poised to write the latest in a long line of invitations to spend the evening with him exploring the Kew gardens. It was closed of course but that didn’t mean they couldn’t sneak in. A soft sizzling noise made him turn swiftly, fangs bared at the intruder until he realised the lingering wisps of red slowly dissipating in the air revealed the one person he wanted to see the most.

Violently red eyes glared back at him, her face set in the ugliest scowl she still somehow made beautiful. Y/N had her arms folded across her chest, her stance defensive.

“I detest flowers.” She hissed. Alec frowned.

“Then talk to me and tell me what you would like to do! I am trying Y/N and I will keep true to my vow. I will try for the rest of eternity to win you back if it’s what has to be done!” Alec said fiercely. He pushed to his feet, feeling frustration give way to hysteria as a short, mirthless laugh escaped him. “For the love of all that’s holy how can you not see the depths of my devotion to you!”

“Because your devotion is not to me!” she cried, “It never is for anybody! Your devotion is and always will be to my power! So many have sought to own me and what I can do and all have come using words and gifts as a way to try and trap me, as if I am so shallow as to be lured in by shiny things.” Alec blinked, taken aback by her tone. He had expected bitter anger, he was ready to welcome her fury and instead she simply sounded broken.

“You think I care for your gift? Y/N, my place in the guard is secure by what I can do. No threat or bribe to get you back brought me here, merely my need to have you by my side.” He murmured, frowning now. She took a step back when he stepped closer, her eyes pleading with him to stay put.

“Then why did you leave me to wonder what I did wrong?” she demanded. He had no doubt now that if she could cry she would have been. “If you felt so deeply for me why did you never say as such? I sat for months on the opposite end of the sofa to you, wishing you might feel the same for me, and when you finally decide to declare your feelings it is not to me whom you declare them but an entire room of strangers who then think of me as a whore for ignoring the very bond you were the first to neglect!”

Alec was quiet for a moment, digesting this information. His mind came up blank. There was no easy answer to it, no way to right the wrong that would ever erase the monumental amount of hurt between them.

“We’ve really made such a mess of this, haven’t we?” he said finally, lowering his gaze.

“How your sister and Demetrius make it look so easy I do not know…it is sickening.” She admitted with a huff. Alec couldn’t help but laugh, the smallest of smiles twitching his lips upward.

“I’ve been telling them so for almost three years now. I suppose that was another thing I did wrong really wasn’t it? I detest that he’s with my sister and yet I threw it in his face that I was supposed to be with his.” He shook his head. There was a pregnant pause.

“I like that better,” She said softly. Alec looked back at her, head tilting as he tried to figure out what she meant. “Be with. I like you saying be with rather than to have.” She clarified.

“That might be the first thing I’ve ever managed to make you happy with then…I truly am sorry, Y/N, for everything,” he said sincerely. She didn’t stop him this time when he stepped forward into her space, taking her hands in his owns and bringing her fingers to his lips. Her breath hitched at the delicate kiss he placed against her knuckles. “I realise now nothing I can do will ever make up for the hurt I’ve caused you, but we’ve both suffered enough haven’t we? If I can’t fix this mistake, give me the chance to start fresh with you, to make sure I don’t make anymore. I love you far, far too much to give up on you entirely, but if you can look me in the eyes and tell me you truly do not want me then…then I’ll leave now and not bother you again.”

The mere thought he might have to just leave her behind was so painful. He knew exactly what he would do if she chose to send him away now, knew exactly where he could go – the Romanians were always looking for a chance to get one up on them after all. Y/N seemed to sense the despair he was feeling. She had rejected all of his advances thus far so why would this one be any different? Her grip on his hands tightened.

“I am so tired of running from you.” She whispered. Alec exhaled sharply, disbelief showing on his face briefly before he composed himself. He tenderly cupped her cheek.

“Then stop running from me, and if you can’t bring yourself to stop running, let me run beside you.” He implored. For once when she locked eyes with him, Alec didn’t feel his stomach drop in anticipation or overcome with nerves. Everything finally felt how it should be when he was with his mate. His spirit calmed, his entire being relaxing into the moment. He didn’t even notice they had teleported anywhere until he was pushed backward and his eyes stopped zeroing in on her. He frowned, glancing about at his bookcase, his bed, all the things he was familiar with.

“Y/N…please-“

“Shhhh, if you’re not quiet enough they’ll hear you packing a bag.” She hissed, giving him a shove towards his closet. Alec blinked in shock, frozen for a minute before he broke into a wide smile, shoulders shaking with silent laughter. He had never moved so fast in all of his life.

“Would you pair please find a room?” Demetri grumbled. Jane glanced at him, her amusement obvious while she cuddled closer to his side. Alec however had no intention as stopping anytime soon. She tasted far too good and stealing kisses from her as they watched a movie was his new favourite pastime. It was only very reluctantly after another complaint that Alec pulled back from his mate, amused by her scowl. She caught his jaw before he could turn away from him.

“Ignore him, he’s jealous Jane doesn’t like the taste of brunette on his tongue.” She quipped. She pulled him back to her with a smirk and Alec grinned a bit, claiming her mouth with a more passionate kiss than before. He didn’t want to push his luck however and parted from her fairly quickly, brushing her pout with his thumb and a twinkle in his eye that promised her patience would be rewarded soon enough. With her legs slung across his lap the group had settled to watch a movie a little over an hour ago, and Alec had been distracted ever since she’d settled against her side. He still found it incredible that they had spent months roaming the world together and still needed to be near each other almost constantly to be even remotely happy. It was unhealthy perhaps, but where else would they be?

The masters had not been happy with his disappearance as predicted, but his position had, as he had predicted meant little punishment. As soon as Y/N had spoken out and told Aro less than eloquently they could easily ‘fuck off’ again, Caius was left to stew in his rage while they resumed normal duties without any severe punishment. They simply didn’t get time off for a while but that was easily worked around, easily endured knowing they were in the same place and not to be separated again.

“Fine, if I cannot kiss you I will not torment myself sitting here and take a shower instead.” Y/N rolled her eyes, kissed his lips lightly and disappeared from his side in a flash of red. Alec smiled slightly, shaking his head a bit as Demetri sighed.

“I understand it now. I understand why you hate me. I detest you Alec, I truly and thoroughly detest you.” He admitted.

“Demetri!” Jane scowled. Alec simply laughed.

“Hate me as much as you like, your sister doesn’t.” he teased. Demetri groaned a little.

“Just…she seems happy. Keep her that way, will you?” he requested. Alec turned serious then, nodding his head as Jane rolled her eyes, protesting he was being a hypocrite.

“If you agree to do the same for Jane.” He promised. Demetri nodded once, both of them quickly diverting their attention back to the TV. It had taken him over a thousand years to find his mate and Alec had no intention of messing it up now. Though their story had begun with hurt, they were both determined to write a better ending, and they had an eternity ahead of them to make it as perfect as could be.

#twilight #twilight fanfiction #alec volturi #alec volturi x female reader #request #jane volturi #demetri volturi #jane x demetri #aro volturi #caius volturi #so much angst in this at the start #but a fluffy end #alec is a clueless boyo and I cannot be convinced otherwise

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