#[[ though he might still need to touch for it to work; like the floor or something? ]]

[steddieas-shegoes]

breaking down walls

for @switcheddieweek prompt 'exposure'

technically part two to this but can be read standalone

rated e | 2165 words | also on ao3 | no cw | tags: switch eddie, switch steve, light bondage, light spit kink, camera, established relationship, dirty talk, wall sex (more like wall masturbation? wall frottage?), coming in pants, come eating (more like licking)

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Steve’s looking at the wall like he expects it to grow hands or a hole to fuck. He might back out. He may finally have a reason to say no and mean it.

Eddie’s watching from the chair, tied up in a way that would allow him to get himself out if there’s an emergency, but not thinking about it. He can’t ruin the illusion of being unable to move.

He’s more fascinated by Steve standing in front of the wall, naked except his boxers, biting his thumbnail nervously. He looks like he’s either gonna run away or pass out. Hopefully he does neither of those things, but jury’s still out.

“You gonna get closer or are you gonna fuck into the air and hope it’s enough?” Eddie asks when the impatience wins out. He can’t sit here all night waiting for Steve to be brave; He’s gonna force him to be brave or to say he can’t.

“Shut up,” Steve says back.

Eddie raises a brow and lets out a breath. “I’d rather not, actually. I’m supposed to talk you through this, right?”

Steve shrugs. “I don’t need anyone to talk me through it.”

“Okay. Get your boxers off and get started, then.”

To his credit, Steve immediately does as he says. His boxers pool at his feet and he steps closer to the wall. There’s nothing in this space, no pictures or trinkets that might fall if Steve gets carried away. He’s almost definitely gonna get carried away. Eddie got him so worked up before they started this, he’s already desperate.

It’s gonna be so fun to watch.

Even better to see the recording.

He glances at the camera set up on the counter to the right of Steve. The red light is flashing, and he hopes the angle they tested works as perfectly as it did earlier.

“Go on,” Eddie doesn’t feel like being patient, not with ropes digging into his wrists preventing him from getting his hands on Steve’s hips to physically guide him. “You were so desperate a few minutes ago.”

“That was when it was your thigh,” Steve snaps at him. “The wall isn’t your thigh.”

“Nope. It’s the only thing you can use, though.”

Steve’s not supposed to touch his dick at all, not even if he needs to adjust himself against the wall. That’s the main rule for this. That and making sure he paints a nice picture with his cum.

He moves in until he’s almost completely against the wall, face turned towards Eddie. He’d prefer if he looks at the camera, but he doesn’t mind that much if he can watch in real time now. He’ll just file it away in his Memories That Will Go To Hell With Me folder in his head.

He winces.

“Cold?” Eddie asks with a grin. His apartment has terrible insulation. He keeps a space heater in his bedroom for the winter, and the rest of the time he just wears layers. The walls are always cold, the floors are even colder.

Maybe next time he’ll make him use the floor.

Steve whimpers in response. Eddie clenches his fists, feels like he might go insane with the rope burning his wrists. A constant reminder that he can look but can’t touch, can lead but only from a distance.

“Doesn’t feel as good as my hand or my mouth, huh?” Eddie continues through his teeth. He’s grateful he stayed half dressed for this. He can kind of hide how hard he is in these pants. Steve’s too far gone right now to even notice.

“Cold,” Steve says with his cheek pushed against the wall. There’s an absolutely hideous wallpaper in the kitchen, something that could not have been the decision of any sane human being. Having Steve against it like this might make it a bit more tolerable in Eddie’s mind. “Hard.”

“You wanted to come, right?” Eddie asks, already knowing the answer.

“Yeah.” It’s breathy and whiny all at once and it makes Eddie’s cock jump in his pants. Jesus, he may have overestimated how normal he can be about this.

“You should fuck the wall, then, baby.”

The baby comes out a bit mean and Steve whines again.

His hips start to move slightly, but his dick is hidden out of view. Eddie thinks the way he’s got his hips tilted is to show the camera more than him. He may just have to deal with it.

The light catches on something on the wall, shiny.

Spit is dripping down the wall, a single track of drool that’s gonna hit the floor. Eddie could make him lick it up after. He’d do it. Steve does everything Eddie asks him to, including humiliating himself on his hands and knees licking the floor.

“Move faster.” He immediately starts going faster, letting out breathy moans every time the head of his dick catches on the wall. It can’t feel that good, only getting limited friction on the head and one side. “You like using the wall? You know how much I hate this wallpaper. You should ruin it so they have to let me paint over it.”

Steve smirks, but groans when he turns to face the wall entirely. Eddie catches him letting out a shaky breath as he slows down again.

“I can’t,” he says quietly.

“You can’t what?”

“Come. I need more.”

“No, you don’t. You come untouched all the time. Just pretend the wall is my leg,” Eddie shifts in his seat, tries to get a tiny bit of relief on his leaking dick. He can feel a wet spot spreading across his crotch and he knows if Steve turns his head, he’ll see it. He can’t give him the satisfaction. “You love rubbing yourself off on my leg like a dog. This isn’t any different.”

“It is,” Steve whines. He’s still humping forward, though. Still desperate and needy. “Not warm or soft.”

“Baby,” this time it’s softer when he says it. He can’t help it.

Steve’s so…gentle. There’s so much softness inside him. Eddie’s lucky to get to see it, to hold it in his hands and shape it into the love that’s right for them. It’s still new, this affection they freely give. It makes the mean words they spit back and forth taste like burnt sugar.

“You know how to stop if you need to,” Eddie reminds him. “But if you don’t need to, then you need to fuck the wall.”

Steve moans. He pulls away just enough for Eddie to see the tip of his dick glistening with precum. It’s an angry red, probably from a combination of being on edge and the roughness of the wall. He’s gonna be sore later.

Eddie will kiss it better.

“Go on,” Eddie tells him. He’s persistent because he knows Steve wants him to be. “Get yourself off.”

The words are said with enough authority that Steve closes the small gap and does it without hesitation. One hand is behind his back and the other is against the wall, holding him steady so he doesn’t end up with bruises on his beautiful face. He’s going faster now, letting out barely there grunts as he tries to find the pleasure he needs.

Eddie is rutting up into the air, wishing he had Steve in his lap, riding him until they both came.

“Fuck me,” Eddie says under his breath, shaking his head to try not to come.

“Can I?” Steve asks. “Please?”

“So polite. But you know you can’t do anything until you come on my wall.”

Eddie forgets for a moment that there’s a camera recording all this, that he had the brilliant idea to keep this on tape forever. The camera beeps once, drawing Eddie’s attention away from Steve to see the red light is gone.

“Shit. Hold on,” Eddie manages to grip the rope between his fingers and pull them loose, dropping them to the floor. He stands and goes over to the camera, frowning when it doesn’t turn back on. “I think the battery died.”

“I’m gonna die if I don’t get to come in the next minute,” Steve whines. “Fuck the camera. C’mere.”

Eddie does as he’s demanded. What else is he gonna do? Waste time getting the backup battery in the other room and potentially miss Steve painting his wall? Not fucking likely.

He leans on the wall, arms crossed over his chest as he stares at Steve’s sweaty face. He’s being good, not stopping his movements even though he slowed a bit when Eddie got up.

“Not sure what you’re waiting on,” Eddie says as he looks down at Steve’s leaking dick. He’s gotta be in more pain than pleasure right now. “You gonna come or what?”

“Get on your knees.” Steve’s panting, glassy eyes silently begging him to do what he wants.

Eddie drops to his knees easily. He likes the view from down here. It’s a little different tonight since Steve’s facing the wall, but he’s eye level with the show. Can’t complain about that.

“Do it. Come for me, baby.”

Eddie’s a little shocked when he does. He started to worry that maybe the wall wasn’t gonna be enough and he’d have to touch him.

But the writing— or cum —is on the wall.

Eddie feels his own dick twitch in his pants and the moment he covers it with his palm, he’s coming, too. He’s not usually on a hairpin trigger like this, but he’s starting to think Steve’s ruining his stamina. He’s just so fucking hot when his knees nearly buckle and he bangs his hand against the wall, when he whispers Eddie, Eddie, Eddie, baby, Eddie as he catches his breath.

He’s leaning his head against the wall, breathing heavily when Steve nudges his knee with his foot.

“Clean it up.”

Eddie blinks up at Steve, mouth hanging open in awe and bewilderment.

“What?” He asks, hardly able to speak at all.

He feels completely undone, everything around him shifting into a new universe within seconds.

“I saw you staring earlier. Lick it off the wall.”

Steve takes a step back, giving enough room for Eddie to scoot in closer. He’s surrounded by heat and legs and Steve’s soft dick nudging against his cheek. There’s still some spit dribbling down the wall, but most of the mess he can see is cum.

He doesn’t feel any shame when he starts to lick the wall, moaning as the taste consumes him. It’s salty and bitter, a hint of sweetness that drives him crazy. It’s so Steve.

“Fuck, you look so good like this,” Steve groans, hand covering the back of his head and gripping his hair. He’s rough. Eddie loves when he’s rough. He’s shoving him forward until his tongue is flat against the wall, nose pushed uncomfortably into it so that he can barely breathe. “Tastes good, doesn’t it? You love tasting me anywhere you can.”

“Mhm,” Eddie whines. He can’t do anything else with Steve pushing him into the wall harder.

“Get it all. Can’t have anyone seeing what you made me do.”

His hand loosens after another minute and Eddie takes in a deep, shaking breath. He turns his face and rests his forehead against Steve’s thigh.

He laughs once, then twice, wrapping his hand around Steve’s ankle.

Steve’s fingers are running through his hair, calming him.

“That was hot,” he says and Eddie can hear the smile in his voice. They always get up to some crazy shit and Steve always acts like he’s surprised it worked out for them. Maybe he is. “Hotter than I thought it’d be.”

“Yeah, well, you’re lucky I didn’t make you lick anything off the floor like I wanted to,” Eddie kisses the mole on his thigh before he looks up. “I think my knee wiped it up.”

“Next time,” Steve shrugs like he’d be into it. Shit, he’s smiling like he’d be into it, too. “Wanna get cleaned up?”

“Only if I can suck you off in the shower.”

Steve pulls him up and kisses him, hard and bruising. “If I ever say no to that, fuckin’ slap me. And not in the way I like.”

“Deal.”

It’s hours later, when they’re both almost asleep, that they both remember the camera.

Eddie sits up and looks down at Steve, who is already laughing into his hand.

“We gave it back to Jon with the tape in it,” Eddie joins him in laughter, leaning down to hide his face in the pillow. “Oh god. He’s gonna see your entire naked ass.”

“Maybe he’ll bring us the tape without checking it,” Steve hopes out loud. “Or at least recognizes what it is before my whole ass is out.”

The phone rings next to Eddie’s bed and they know who it is before Steve manages to answer.

“You guys are never borrowing this again. Actually, take it. Take the whole thing. I can get a new one.”

[supraxstcllas]

@dementedspeedster: (@ Match) "There was something I was wondering..." Thad starts, "You know how your telekinesis sorta just expands around you?" Like how his hair would move and float at times, Thad couldn't help but think, but he doesn't mention it out right for both of their sakes, "Is there a limit to your range? Could you theoretically pick something or someone up a distance away? Can you feel anything when you use your power?"

" Yeah? " he says, head quirking at the line of questioning. arms cross over his chest as he thinks, " I think I have a limit? Haven't really checked it since before I uh... left the Agenda. They'd test me every once in a while to see if it had gotten stronger. " now that he thought about it, maybe he should do a few tests himself.

" As for feeling... its like static on my skin and a warm feeling in my chest. It doesn't take much thought, it just kinda happens. Like breathing or blinking. " he says, pointing his hand at the other and letting his ttk spread out to gently raise the blonde's hair in the air, " Just point and shoot, basically. "

there's a soft hum, " We're both curious now, wanna help me test it? "

[hotroadkill]

today 2 years ago i was in america and i had the worst hangover of my life and i was in a waffle house with my friend in awkward silence bc we’d fought in a stranger’s kitchen the night before and the server refilled my water for the 5th time while i fought to swallow half a forkful of hashbrowns and she said “i know that look, y’all had a good time at the superbowl last night” and i was thinking actually we had a mediocre time at a nerd bar where u throw darts and all the drinks r named weird things and anyway my friend gives the fakest laugh ive ever heard followed by “yep we sure did” like are we in a CW show right now what was that line delivery and also what even is the superbowl i was born here and should know but honestly i’ve always just pictured everyone gathering at a comically large bowl of cereal but her nametag says leslie and she’s really nice and she’s refilling my water for the 6th time so yeah sure whatever i’m a red blooded american i’ll be anything for leslie in this moment and she tells us stories about working at bars downtown and my friend tells me bad jokes and i feel a little better even though my heart is kind of withering away because my flight is in 17 hours and theres not enough time never enough time i won’t see him for another year and a half and i won’t ever see leslie again and if i ever run into the italian stranger who fell in love with me over darts then it won’t be the same because we won’t be dancing and i’m sitting in a waffle house while the sun sets and i’m sweating gin and tequila and my flight is in 16 hours and i have so many goodbyes to say in this

city because when i was fifteen somebody threw my glass heart onto the floor of my childhood house and bits of it shattered everywhere and fell into the cracks of the floorboards and behind the fridge and i’ll never ever get them out much less back together but i feel like ive been trying for eight years all the same and my flight is in 15 hours but maybe if my friend brings me home now i can spend three of those looking for more shards even though i’ll cut my hand because time never wore down any of the hurt because time might heal wounds but it cant really do jack shit about a metaphysical glass shard its still gonna make me bleed and my friend brings me home and we curl up beside each other in my childhood bedroom thats too small for us it was really a supply room but it became my bedroom when i was eleven and i painted it blue and put up stickers of fish and never took them down but someone someday will take them down and hopefully the house burns to the ground before anyone can touch them theyre mine i grew up here theyre mine dont touch them dont please dont please please please i grew up here and my flight is in 12 hours now because i fell asleep beside my friend and he let me because he knew i needed it he kept watch even though we dont have time we never do because he has to go now and all i can give him is a hug and my hoodie to keep safe until i can see him again and fight him in a stranger’s kitchen again and the sun is gone now and i go and i sit with my dad and my flight is in 10 hours and im trying

not to cry im trying to stare at the stickers because maybe if i look at all of it hard enough i’ll get to stay but i dont because thats not how it works and now my flight is in 4 hours because i fell asleep in my childhood loft bed and now i have to leave i have to pack up and go for the fifth time and it never never gets easier and i know i only have a few more trips left until someone takes my stickers down and paints over my ocean but for now my best friend’s stepmother comes with me and my dad to the airport because my best friend is in college two states away and my flight is in 3 hours and i cry i cry so much and she cries too because she loves me and i think it is such a beautiful blessed thing that i am so loved but oh it is so painful too because i spend more time in its absence than its presence and my flight is in 2 hours and i have to go and my dad is waving goodbye and i see it because i looked back because im stupid i always look back i never look forward i’m forever walking blind through my life because i’m looking back and i can tell my dad is crying and now i have to go through TSA sobbing and it’s awkward because they ask are you okay kid and im not but i cant tell them sorry its just that when i was fifteen somebody threw my glass heart onto the floor of my childhood house and bits of it shattered everywhere and fell into the cracks of the floorboards and behind the fridge and i’ll never ever get them out i cant tell them that so i nod yes im okay and i go and my flight is in 1 hour and i hope it fucking crashes and my flight is in the air and im so far away from all those shards on the kitchen floor now but they’re hurting me all the same and i think i look kind of insane sobbing in the middle seat but how can i miss so many people and so many rooms at once and not lose my mind a little bit? i was going to tell you a short witty little joke about the time i realized i was 21 and didnt know what the superbowl was but i think i slipped on a shard. i’m sorry. maybe next time i’ll get it right. maybe in another two years. maybe you’ll never see me again. maybe this is all the time we had.

[gf2bellamy]

hi, first of all, I love your stories and am a fan of your work 💓 I have a request, in a case with the team, spencer meets a girl who understands his intelligence and talks about the same topics like: science and the reader feels jealous and insecure that she is not smart enough for him despite working at BAU.

insecure — spencer reid

pairing: spencer reid x fem!reader ( no use of y/n ) contente warnings: established relationship, reader feels insecure / not smart enough and jealous , some tears, but otherwise it's just emotional fluff <3 a/n: hii !!! hope you like this :) also another john steinbeck mention sorry ( found this in my drafts whoops )

The words washed over you like static, scientific facts, literary references, inside jokes that might as well have been a foreign language.

You stood beside Spencer, arms crossed, staring blankly at the crime scene photos pinned to the board. The images should have held your focus, but they blurred at the edges, your mind too occupied with the conversation happening just inches away. Spencer and a woman from the field office, were exchanging rapid-fire dialogue about something you couldn’t follow. A quip about quantum physics, maybe, or a pun so niche it sailed right over your head. Whatever it was, it made her laugh and Spencer chuckled in response.

You knew Spencer loved you. He told you constantly, in cozy moments before bed, in rushed kisses on your temple between cases, in the way his fingers lingered whenever he handed you a coffee.

But right now, you felt like an outsider in your own relationship. 

You swallowed hard, forcing your attention back to the case files. Then, a gentle touch at the small of your back. Spencer’s hand was warm, his thumb brushing lightly over your spine before he pulled away to circle something on the map. “You okay?” he murmured, voice low enough that only you could hear. 

You nodded, offering him a quick smile. “Yeah.” But the word felt hollow. You turned away before he could read the lie in your eyes, pretending to sift through the files at the end of the table. It was easier to focus on the paperwork than the ache settling in your ribs. 

You managed to keep up the act until it was time to leave. Just as you reached the door, the woman called out to Spencer again, something about an obscure novel you’d never heard of. He responded without hesitation, and you bit your lip, staring at the floor as you waited. A beat passed. Then another. Finally, Spencer’s footsteps followed, and before you could take another step, his fingers slid between yours, squeezing gently. 

“Hey,” he said softly, tugging you to a stop just outside the conference room. His brows knit together as he searched your face. “You’ve been quiet.” 

You shrugged, forcing another smile. “Just tired.” 

Spencer wasn’t fooled. He never was. But he let you be. 

He knew you, knew the way your fingers tapped restlessly against your thigh when you were upset, the way your gaze fixed on nothing when you were lost in thought. Right now, you were doing both, and though every instinct in him screamed to press, to fix, he held back. If you needed space, he’d give it to you. 

On the jet, he sat beside you, close enough that his knee brushed yours. Normally, you’d lean into him, your head finding its place against his shoulder, your fingers lacing through his without a second thought. But today, you kept your distance, arms folded tight across your chest as you stared out the window. Spencer set a coffee in front of you, just how you liked it. You didn’t grin at him like usual. Instead, you offered a faint, wary smile that didn’t reach your eyes before turning away again. 

His stomach twisted. 

Across the aisle, Emily glanced up from her file, her eyes flickering between the two of you. Spencer met her gaze. Then, Emily raised an eyebrow, tilting her head subtly toward the kitchenette. Spencer hesitated. His hand was still on your thigh, his thumb tracing absent circles over the fabric of your pants. He gave you one last gentle squeeze before standing, half-hoping you’d reach for him, pull him back. You didn’t even look up. 

Emily was already pouring coffee when he reached her, her expression unreadable. “What’s up?” Spencer asked, leaning against the counter. 

She didn’t answer right away, stirring sugar into her cup slowly. Then, without looking at him: “You chatted a lot with that woman.” 

Spencer blinked. “What woman?” 

Emily shot him a look. “The one you talked about all that nerdy science stuff with? At the precinct?” 

It took him a second, then it clicked. The local liaison, the one who’d laughed at his terrible pun. He hadn’t even registered the interaction beyond professional courtesy. But you had. 

His stomach dropped. “Oh,” he said, voice quiet. 

Emily studied him over the rim of her mug. “You really didn’t notice, did you?” 

Spencer ran a hand through his hair, exhaling sharply. “I was just—it was case-related. Mostly.” 

“Mostly,” Emily repeated, dry. 

“I wasn’t—” He cut himself off, frustration bubbling up. Not at her, not at you, but at himself. How had he missed it? How had he not seen the way you’d withdrawn, the way your smile had faltered? 

Emily sighed, setting her coffee down. “Reid, look. You’re brilliant, but sometimes you’re oblivious.” 

He swallowed hard, glancing back at you. You were still staring out the window. His chest ached. Without another word, he pushed off the counter and crossed the cabin, sinking back into the seat beside you. This time, he didn’t hesitate, he reached for your hand, threading his fingers through yours and squeezing tight. You turned to him, looking at him for a long moment, his warm hand still enveloping yours. Part of you wanted to pull away, to protect that bruised, vulnerable part of your heart that still stung from earlier. But you didn't.

Then you caught Emily's gaze from across the jet. She looked away quickly, but not before you saw the knowing glint in her eyes, the subtle satisfaction in the way she sipped her coffee.

Of course.

You turned back to the window, but you kept your fingers laced with his. The rest of the flight passed in quiet. Spencer didn't push. His shoulder was solid under your cheek when you finally gave in and leaned against him, his fingers never once loosening their grip on yours.

An hour later you reached his apartment. You kicked off your shoes by the door as you suppressed a yawn.

"Are you okay?" Spencer's voice was soft behind you.

You turned to face him, forcing a smile. "Yeah." 

He didn't look convinced. His brows knit together as he stepped closer, hands hovering like he wasn't sure if he should reach for you. "You've been quiet since—" 

"I'm fine, Spencer." The words came out sharper than you intended, and you watched as his face fell, just slightly. Guilt twisted in your gut. "Just tired." 

Spencer exhaled slowly, running a hand through his hair. "You know you can talk to me, right? About anything." 

Of course you knew. But this insecurity, this childish fear that you weren't enough, not smart enough, it stuck in your throat, stubborn and suffocating. "Yeah, I know." Your smile felt thin as you turned to hang up your jacket, fingers fumbling slightly with the hanger.

When you turned around, he was right there , closer than you expected. His long fingers twitched at his sides like he wanted to reach for you but wasn't sure he should. "Do you?" he asked softly, the words tentative, his head tilted in that way that meant he was analyzing every microexpression. 

You bit your lip, the sting of tears threatening behind your eyes. Forcing yourself to meet his gaze, you raised your hands to his face, thumbs smoothing over the deep furrow between his brows.

"Yes," you murmured, "just not feeling too great today." 

Your hand drifted down to cup his cheek, thumb brushing the sharp plane of his cheekbone. You hoped he wouldn't notice the slight tremor in your fingers, but of course he did ,Spencer noticed everything. His eyes darkened with concern, and he caught your wrist gently, turning his face into your palm to press a kiss there. 

"You've been quiet since the precinct," he observed, his voice carefully neutral. Too carefully. You recognized his profiling tone. 

"I'm just tired," you lied again, pulling away to busy yourself with straightening the blanket on the couch.Spencer followed, his socked feet silent on the hardwood.

"You know," he said slowly, "when I was eleven, I memorized The Grapes of Wrath because I thought it would make my mom happy." He paused, waiting until you turned to face him. "It didn't. Because what she really needed wasn't facts or figures. She just needed me to sit with her." His hands found yours, long fingers threading between yours. "I don't need you to understand every reference or equation," he murmured, bringing your joined hands to his chest where you could feel his heartbeat. "I just need you here. With me." 

The dam broke. A tear slipped free, then another. Spencer made a soft, wounded sound and gathered you close, his chin resting atop your head as you buried your face in his sweater. 

"I felt so stupid," you admitted, the confession muffled against his chest where his heartbeat thrummed beneath your ear. The wool of his sweater scratched lightly at your cheek as you turned your face deeper into him, hiding from the vulnerability of your own words. "Watching you two talk like that. Listening to you talk about things I didn't understand." 

Spencer's hands, those elegant, restless hands that could calculate bullet trajectories in seconds, slid up to cradle the back of your head with the most gentle touch possible. His fingers tangled gently in your hair as he pulled back just enough to see your face, his thumbs brushing away the dampness on your cheeks you hadn't even realized was there. 

"I love you because you're you," he said, voice tender. His palm came to rest over your heart, warm even through the fabric of your shirt. "Because you see people, really see them, in a way I never could. You notice the way Garcia's smile doesn't reach her eyes on bad days before she even says a word. You're the one who always remembers to bring Morgan that terrible gas station coffee he likes after overnight surveillance." 

His fingers traced the line of your jaw with reverence, calloused fingertips catching slightly on your skin. "You know exactly what books I want to read when I'm too overwhelmed to think straight," he continued. "And when I'm lost in my own head..." His hands cradling your face. "You're the only one who knows how to bring me back." 

He smiled softly at you. "You're my home," he murmured, the words so simple yet so devastating in their truth. "All the equations in the world couldn't change that." 

A tear escaped despite your best efforts, tracing a hot path down your cheek. Spencer caught it with his thumb, his touch achingly gentle as he brushed it away. "You're too sweet, Spence," you finally managed, the words coming out watery and broken between a sob and a laugh. Your fingers twisted in the fabric of his sweater.

Spencer huffed a quiet laugh, his nose brushing against yours. "Only for you," he whispered, his voice rough with emotion. "Always only for you." 

[stressed-cryptid]

Unjust Tears

Sylus x Pregnant Fem!Reader

Nothing rains on your mental parade like a bad day. So bad in fact that it brings you to tears. Good thing husband is there to save the day!

Labels: fluff, cursing, attempt at non-consensual touching, allusion to vomit, vague description of kidnapping, implied torture/murder

Wc: 2.2k

Whoever said pregnancy was a beautiful thing was a dirty liar. At least that's how it seemed after such a long and taxing day. It started in the morning, when you had to ask twin troublemakers, Luke and Kieran, for help with putting on your shoes. At almost eight months pregnant, needing help with getting your shoes on wasn't anything new, but usually Sylus was the one to help you with that. He, however, had to leave for an early meeting with some dealer who thought he was too great to wait for the King of the N109 Zone, so he wasn't there to assist you. You loved the boys, but having them help you with this felt just a tad embarrassing; even if they didn't mind.

The second difficult experience of the day came when you tried to eat breakfast. Your private chef had prepared something that you were normally okay with, but today? It might as well have been prison slop. You turned the plate away before it was even set down in front of you, on smell alone. It was pungent and made your stomach turn. So what did you have instead? A peanut butter and jelly sandwich. With pickle slices and a side of orange juice. You were only able to eat about half of it before you noticed the chef give you a barely-there-but-still-visible side eye, and suddenly the sandwich was very unappealing. You excused yourself, citing that you felt full with only half the sandwich (another recurrent problem you had but that wasn't true at the moment) and went about your day while trying to shake off the shame.

You planned on going shopping for more baby clothes, despite already having plenty. After all, it never hurt to have a few extra clothes for your little one. Actually it was probably a good idea, since there was no telling just how many times you'd end up have to change the baby into some clean clothes. It was here that you met the next inconvenience on the list: the elevators in the base weren't working. They were having regular maintenance done, and it wouldn't be done until a couple hours later. The only one that was still currently running was the elevator that went strictly between the penthouse and the second highest floor of the base.

It was frustrating, but you were undeterred, refusing to back down from this metaphorical beast. So, brilliantly, you decided you'd try going down the stairs. It started well, really. You were taking them slow since you couldn't quite see past your bump, and Luke and Kieran were right on your heels to catch you in case you stumbled. After only a few flights though, you were winded and your feet were starting to hurt. Sylus may have bought you the best maternity shoes money could buy, but they weren't magic. You had to pop in on the closest floor to take a seat and rest. It was meant to only be a short break before you began your descent again, but your body decided it was nap time. So you fell asleep in a chair in the middle of the base, with the twins watching over you. By the time you woke up, the elevators were running again, but you couldn't stop beating yourself up over having fallen asleep like that.

So many inconveniences, and it was just barely about to be midday. What bad luck that the rest of the day followed in a similar pattern...

You were dead set on going to Linkon to look for baby clothes, wanting to see the sun and just generally some daylight instead of the N109 Zone's usual gloom. The ride there wasn't normally too long, but traffic on the freeway into the city was a nightmare. It took so long that you nearly peed yourself in the car. While you were perusing the many outfit options in the baby section, a random old lady came up to you and tried to touch your belly. You naturally smacked her away because, hello? You don't know her? She had the audacity to act shocked, and then everyone around you looked at you like YOU were crazy!? You didn't stick around for much longer after that.

You were hungry so you went to a nearby café for a snack to tide you over while you decided on what to buy for lunch. A stranger, for whatever reason, assumed you must've been there for coffee and got in your face about it. You screamed back at them before the boys - who had accompanied you - could do anything. It left everyone stunned as you stormed out, but the interaction ruined your appetite for the next hour.

Eventually, you managed to choose somewhere to eat, though mostly for the twins' sake. You didn't want them to be hungry just because you weren't. Luckily, your appetite came back just in time, and you were able to enjoy lunch for a while. Sylus also found some time to text you back in the middle of you eating, so that was a plus. This was the only good part of your day so far. And it stayed that way. He told you business was holding him up, so he didn't know when he'd be back home. It felt like a punch to the gut, and instantly brought your mood back down, leaving you unable to finish your meal. After lunch, the three of you decided to get dessert at your favorite ice-cream shop, but unfortunately it was out of your favorite flavor. You settled for your second favorite, but it wasn't nearly as good.

On the walk back to the car, someone bumped into you and nearly knocked you over. Luke caught you, thankfully, as Kieran called to the guy, but all you got back was a "Fuck off, Bitch!" During the drive back, some idiot who must've gotten their license by the blessings of an Etsy witch for ten gold nearly ran you off the road. On top of that, the ride was made almost twenty minutes longer because a gang war started on a main road and you had to take a detour.

By the time you got back to the base, your last nerve was worked about as thin as one ply toilet paper. The straw that broke the camels back however, came at dinner. The chef had prepared something delicious, you were devouring it, and it even seem like you were going to finish your food. That was until your baby - beloved parasite you couldn't wait to meet - decided it was time to practice their kickboxing with your ribs. In an instant, you felt full and couldn't eat anymore. Actually, it felt like what you managed to eat was going to be sent back up. You rushed to the nearest bathroom and knelt by the toilet for the next fifteen minutes until your baby calmed down. Your appetite didn't come back though, so your half-eaten dinner was discarded.

You laid down in bed, trying to relax, but could stop yourself from going over every little thing that happened today. Even now, you couldn't free yourself from whatever curse afflicted you. No matter what way you turned, you were unable to get fully comfortable in bed, your legs were sore from all the walking you did today, and your stomach felt empty and full at the same time. So as you turned the entire day over in your mind, again and again, you couldn't stop the stinging in you eyes.

Any other day, you would've gotten over it. Any other day, you would've stopped thinking about it hours ago. Any other day, the frustration would've fizzled out by now. But today? Today you didn't have Sylus by your side. You didn't have him to defend you from judgmental chefs or touchy old ladies. You didn't have him to carry down the stairs or drive you around. You didn't have him to avenge you against inconsiderate, self-absorbed assholes. You didn't even have him to hold you and tell you it was okay. So today, aided by the shackles of pregnancy hormones, the weight of the day came in the form of tears. Dripping down the side of your face and into your pillow.

You were so consumed by your emotions that you never noticed you husband coming in.

"Well this simply won't do." The words put a sudden halt to your sniffles and quiet sobs. You almost thought you had imagined them until Sylus came around to your side of the bed, kneeling in front of you and taking your hand. "Why are you crying, Sweetie? Who upset my gorgeous wife?"

You starting crying again, quite a bit louder this time. "Sylus, I had the worst day ever today!" You managed to say through sobs.

"Is that so? What happened?" His hand came up to stroke your hair, wiping away what tears he could.

After a few sniffles and gasps, you were able to speak. "First-!" You told him everything. Every little detail, from start to finish. The shoes, the chef, the oldest lady, the rude guy; all of it. And Sylus listened. So carefully, like you were telling him the secrets of the universe. He nodded and hummed along, and he didn't interrupt. He let you go on for as long as you wanted about it all. When you were done, he leaned forward and planted a soft, lingering kiss on your forehead.

"It seems the feisty kitten in front of me truly had the worst of days. Come here." Sylus got up from the floor and sat on the bed, turning to face you then helping you sit up as well. Then he hugged you. One hand on the back of your head, the other on your back rubbing up and down. You stayed like this, in silence, for several minutes before he spoke. "Do you remember what they looked like? The people who bothered you in Linkon?"

You sniffled and answered a simple, "Sylus, no." And that's all it took for him to back down from the idea.

"Alright, I won't go after a bunch of strangers, but I am firing the chef. I don't care how unusual the dish is, their job is to make you whatever you want and that's it. Any judgment is to be kept inside and off of their face. I'll have them replaced soon enough, but in the meantime, I'll stay home and make all of your meals. How's that?"

You nodded, hugging him tighter, or at least as tight as your belly allowed. "Sounds good."

"Luke and Kieran told me you haven't had a full meal all day. Is there anything you're craving right now?"

You think for a moment. After having a good cry, and having your husband by your side again, you think you might be able to stomach something. Like Sylus said, you haven't finished a single meal today, so you are pretty hungry. After some contemplation, you land on, "Strawberry yogurt and fries."

"Does it matter where the fries are from?" Like a good husband, he doesn't question the combo. The only questions he asks are the important ones.

"Do you not know where my favorite fries are from?" Hormones strike as visceral rage fills you at the thought that he doesn't know you inside and out.

"Of course I know, Sweetie. Just wanted to make sure you didn't want fries from somewhere else. I'll be back shortly." Sylus walks with a purpose out of your shared bedroom, making sure to fire the chef on his way out. The moment Luke and Kieran hear that, they pounce. Sylus already knew the gist of how your day went; the boys reported it to him the moment he walked through the door. He instructed them to wait for his say-so to take care of that disrespectful pest. He wanted to hear the true severity of the damage their critique caused from you first. He was never going to just fire the chef, but now he's certain they'll never see the light of day again. How unfortunate. Oh well.

True to his word, he comes back quickly. Your craving hasn't changed and he is safe from your wrath and your tears. As you eat, he massages your legs for you, the both of you relaxing as you watch a movie in your home theater. He's changed into a black sweater and white pants, and barely pays attention to what's on the screen. All his focus goes to you, and it makes you wonder what kind of day he's had. Did he have a bad day, too? Was it just as bad as yours? Maybe it was worse. Yet he doesn't say a word about it...

"Sylus, aren't you tired? You spent all day taking care of business, and now you're spending the rest of the night taking care of me. Don't you want to relax instead?"

His response is quick. Decisive. "I am relaxing. And no, I'm not tired. Even if I was, I'd never be too tired to take care of you."

Warmth blooms in your chest, spreading to the tips of your fingers and toes. It's moments like these that you know you married the right man, and you know he'll be a great father, too. You had a bad day today. Definitely one of the worse ones, for sure. But tonight, you'll sleep feeling lighter, at peace, because you know you have your husband to lift you up. After all, he thought your sadness was the greatest injustice in the universe.

You know you'll always be okay because Sylus has your back, and that's never going to change.

A/n: This is my first time writing in years and my first time writing for Sylus so sorry if he's ooc and seems like it was written by a raccoon with greasy hands and eyebags to mars

Dividers by @/cafekitsune

[sugurouge]

── all the things you do to me. sylus x f!reader

"your tender loving care is going to last the whole night, huh?"

. ˳༚༅༚ explicit content, smut, mdni: body worship, praise, blowjob, spit, deep throating, marking (lipstick stains, scratches, hickeys), pet names (my love, my perfect/good girl | @ sylus: my birthday boy, baby), size difference

♱ word count: 2.1k

♱ synopsis: sylus receives more than just birthday wishes on his special day. tonight, the one he trusts most disarms him beneath her worshipful touch. from a symphony made of praise, vulnerability, and desire he learns what it means to be truly cherished

The penthouse was quiet, save for the soft sounds behind the closed doors of Sylus’s master bedroom. What happens behind those close doors was a secret shared tonight.

The city’s glow shining through the giant floor-to-ceiling windows casts Sylus's broad figure in gentle light as the crimson moon hangs low to witness the lust and sin exchanged through filthy kisses and longing touches. 

Two bodies move in perfect tandem—slow, deliberate. It started with lips tasting of wine and cake which kissed you like you were the very air Sylus needs to live. Strong hands lead a gentle roam beneath your clothes, savouring every inch of skin he discovered until bare chests pressed against another.

By now, your worship borders torture. Your mouth alone is enough to unravel Sylus: the warm drag of your tongue between his digits pure eroticism to lust-laden eyes while adoring fingertips skate over the dips and valleys of muscle like a stroke of a brush, nails dragging lightly down his chest causing shivers to prickle over tanned skin.

The ever-composed man of calm control turns all flushed cheeks, shaky breaths and trembling fingers, undone by the simple intimacy of being wanted.

"You’re so strong," you whisper in a voice that drips with sinful promise before branding his collarbone in open-mouthed kisses and deep red lipstick, "so beautiful."

Sylus watches you with dilated pupils and bated breath, bravely fighting for a semblance of dignity though already long lost to the claws of his huntress.

A heavenly mess created by the mercy of your lust, you continue to work on the masterpiece: Lipstick stains leave a trail down his chest before your tongue flicks over one nipple as your nails press into the firm sides of Sylus’s waist, grounding him, locking him in place. 

His own fingers move to play a silent tune over the soft skin on your arm before curling around your shoulder. But not to guide you—only to feel, to tether himself to this very moment.

"You make me feel–," the confession is paused by an uncommon moment of insecurity. Though as quickly as it came, it’s chased away by a reassuring kiss above his hip bone, leaving the skin there tingly and tinged in purple hues. A groan more sinful than previous ones escapes Sylus's lips before he murmurs, "as if I were the most desirable being on this planet."

And he is. To you, Sylus is the most precious thing in the whole wide universe. Hence, why you wanted to take your time, wanted to cherish, explore, and praise him until your love weaved itself into the very fabric of his being. However, the reactions he rewards you with in response to your touch and your voice, they left you aching for more, for everything. 

You slide off the bed until you kneel on the carpeted floor, perfectly seated between his spread thighs with the man of the day looming right above you, powerful in theory, yet softened by the adoration behind each touch and loving gaze directed at him. 

It’s still his birthday—your first together—and tonight, you want to spoil him, completely. Want to show him what it means to be worshipped in every sense of the word.

His chest rises and falls with anticipation, every breath drags through his throat like he’s never known a touch this tender, this loving.

The thick weight of his cock encased by your smaller hand might already be enough to drive him crazy tonight. Sometimes he forgets how fragile you can be, how much smaller your hands are until he holds them... or you hold his length.

Sylus will never tire of the sight of your fingertips failing to circle him full. He’s so big, so hard, yet twitching helplessly under your gentle strokes—utterly undone by your devotion. A tremble runs through his frame as you spread the beads of precum dribbling slowly down the head. He watches you with those ruby eyes, wide and wondrous, like you’re some divine being he can’t believe is kneeling before him, just for him. 

"You're so pretty, baby," you murmur into the thin skin along the side of his cock, lips dragging in a slow, savouring kiss.

A groan leaves his chest—deep and almost pained—and his fingers, ever so gentle, brush your cheekbone, trace your jawline, before his thumb skims over your brow as though memorising every curve of you. 

His cock pulses in reply, in recognition of your praise as you swipe your thumb over the sensitive slit, spreading the sheen across the flushed head before leaning in to kiss the very tip of him.

The first touch of your tongue has Sylus exhaling sharply. But he can't fall apart this easily, not yet. At least that is what he tells himself until you continue your whispered praise.

"You really are beautiful like this," while the tip of your nose grazes along the thick vein running along the entire length of his cock. Of course, the wet pursuit of your tongue follows before you reach the goal and with a teasing flick, your mouth soon wraps around the thick tip.

Tonight leaves no room for you to hesitate, not with the flushed mess the Onychinus leader has turned into for you.

Through heavy lids, you stare into the depths of Sylus’s very being as your tongue swirls slowly, purposefully. 

Adorable.

He is adorable with his reactions. How his abs tighten too quickly, and a quiet curse falls from lips used to well-spoken words and poems. 

Sylus feels like a virgin all over again. Your eyes, your hands, your mouth, they disarm him in his entirety causing his hips to twitch upward. His jaw clenches tightly in regret while the colour to his features reaches up to the tips of his ears—a pretty shade of deep pink not even the crimson moon seems willing to cover. 

What a gorgeous, flustered mess. Indeed, Sylus receives praise like he’s never known it before—like he doesn't think he deserves it, and yet craves it all the same.

"You enjoy playing with the weak, donn't you?" he breathes with a voice roughened by restraint. He's so receptive tonight, soaking up every word you offer like oxygen. You swirl your tongue around the swollen head, coating it generously with your saliva. But instead of urging you to invite him in deeper, Sylus only receives what you offer with a sigh so pretty, it makes you ache between your thighs.

Your nails scrape gently along the firm muscles of his thighs, leaving marks in your wake, grounding him in the reality of your touch, making sure he fully witnesses how you slowly pull back.

Your lips drag along his length, tongue teasing the underside as you move until a wet pop finalises his welcomed stay inside your mouth. 

The cold air hits him first, before your messy lips press yet another heated kiss against the head.

Ever the innocent actress, you blink up to witness your most beloved expression on Sylus’s features: his brows are softly creased, lips pressed tightly shut as he tries to contain a mess of pleading words for you to keep going. Though the desire pools silently in crimson hues, the yearning, the need.

"Do you feel good, baby?" Is nothing but a whisper, a gentle rasp, as you tease the thin skin of Sylus's inner thigh before fondling his balls. 

A smirk tugs on the corners of his mouth in acceptance of tonight's defeat. May he rest easy in the palm of your hand, wholly at your mercy.

"You make me feel really good, my love," he praises alongside a cradling brush of his palm over your head. His words are soft, so soft, almost too kind. Just like his touch and patience.

"Could you make me feel even better?"

After all, Sylus is as much a glutton as you are. A match made in the abyss, true kindred spirits.

His hand moves again, cupping your jaw, then sliding up to run his thumb across your cheekbone. He traces the curve of your ear, the line of your neck, thumb lingering on your lips as you open for him. The gentleness in his touch breaks your heart a little. He is always so guarded, so unreadable—but not now. Not with you. Not here, on his birthday, with nothing between you but devotion.

You hum, before your lips curl in a smile meant to ease, though it only excites. "Anything for my birthday boy."

With renewed hunger, you leave a trail of kisses down his shaft, slow and unhurried, tracing every ridge, every pulse. You lick along the underside, tongue flat and soft, then circle the head once, twice, to encourage louder gasps and groans from Sylus.

Spit drips past your lips, thick and slow, while a pair of greedy eyes watches it slide over his cock. A generous pump of your hand spreads the wetness to coat him generously. 

No matter how hard Sylus may try, the shudder running through his built is evident–you feel it, see it.

With your mouth slackened, you take him in again, deeper this time. His length slides along your tongue, hits the back of your throat, and you choke once, causing more spit to pool around your lips. 

Sylus's breath stutters, hips jerking momentarily though he fights it, lets you keep control. "You're perfect," he rasps, nearly delirious with pleasure, the praise slipping out as naturally as breath. "My girl," the words akin to something soft and sacred.

His voice breaks once the thick head presses past the back of your throat unexpectedly. The groan that escapes him is pure, needy gratitude, accompanied by the deeper dig of strong fingers into your shoulder. Sylus needs to hold onto you, needs to feel you, to anchor himself as you take him in, inch by inch, and allow your wet heat to welcome him until your nose brushes his groin.

The tightening of your throat follows in natural response upon the thick intrusion as your nails press into the muscle of his thighs for support, leaving crescent marks behind.

Sylus watches you take him in again,transfixed, bewitched, he cannot look away. "That's it… that’s my girl," he murmurs, voice catching on a groan as your throat tightens. "Just. Like. That." Silver brows draw together, his breath growing heavy as he lays open for your devotion. 

Building a rhythm, your cheeks hollow with each bop of your head, and your tongue presses against his length with every stroke. The tension in Sylus’s body builds and builds until each breath seems to burn his throat from the unfamiliar and unrestrained noises he makes.

Pushing and pulling, you take him deeper still until every muscle in his body flexes and strains as you honour him with mouth and tongue.

He’s shaking—this massive, dangerous man, trembling because you love him just right.

His fingers graze your jawline, then they stroke your neck in slow, grounding motions to ease the strain he puts you through. But you feel so good, allow him to be selfish for one night. 

Sylus tries to draw it out, but the way your throat flutters around him, the pressure on his balls, the image of your swollen lips and teary eyes—it's too much.

Every noise he makes is a reward—groans and breathy moans, half-whispers of "gorgeous" and "my good girl" tangled with sharp intakes of breath as you fondle him, coaxing even more pleasure from him.

Restraint only goes so far.

"Vixen," Sylus groans—a breathless, shattered sound, more awe than anything else. Then, his head falls back in surrender, exposing his neck, flushed and slick with sweat, when he finally gives in.

The familiar red and black mist swirls around you like smoke, playful in its pull. It presses you down, holding you steady as Sylus bucks his hips and spills into your mouth with a desperate sound.

Sweet praises spill between moans. A messy mix of "so beautiful," and “thank you," breathed out from his heaving chest and trembling voice thanks to the sheer intensity of his climax.

The taste of him floods your senses—warm, slightly sweet, wholly Sylus as you swallow him down without hesitation. Your eyes are watery and your cheeks smeared with mascara, though your body hums in pride at his surrender.

Then, gently—always gently—does the mist move to swirl around your waist to ease you back onto his lap. Strong arms move to wrap around you, to hold you tightly against his chest like he might fall apart without you there to catch him.

Eager and messy, your lips find another only a heartbeat later, and he kisses you like a man starving. Like he can’t get enough of you.

He tastes himself on your tongue, savouring the echo of what just happened.

"I love you." A confession between kisses, between the tug of his teeth and the drag of his tongue.

"I love you too, Sylus."

You sigh, nearly whine thanks to the mist coiling tighter, rocking your hips slowly against his own, a teasing nudge to give him further rewards on his special day

Happy birthday, Sylus!

dividers: @/cafekitsune

[farfromharry]

Summary: Oscar’s extra soft in the mornings and you love it

Oscar Piastri x Reader

w/c 724

Oscar was always more soft in the mornings. Something changed in him right after he woke up. He was clingy, more loving. She couldn’t explain it, but she would never complain.

Y/N was a little groggy upon first opening her eyes, just as any non-morning person would be. Being surrounded by the warmth of her lover certainly helped though. He was curled against her back, legs tangled with hers, his eyes still closed and his breathing deep. She might think he was asleep if it wasn’t for the kisses he placed sporadically on her neck and shoulders. The room was shrouded in peace, silent other than their quiet breathing. It would be boring to some, but they couldn’t ask for anything better.

She knew he was beginning to rouse when he began running his nose along her neck. He pressed a kiss on her jaw, tugging her a little closer to his body. “Love you.”

Her stomach fluttered. His arms circled her body, one of his hands splayed over her forearm, tracing patterns against her skin. At least she thought they were patterns. The more she paid attention, the more she realised he was spelling something out. She felt bad for taking so long to realise it. I L O V E Y O U.

A surge of affection rushed through her and she linked one of her hands with his, bringing it up to press a few kisses to his knuckles. She adored him. 

They laid there tangled together for what felt like minutes but was really quite a while. The day was flying by and Y/N thought it best to get up and get ready, make the most of one of Oscar’s rare days off. He wasn’t sharing the same sentiment. Sure his trainer would probably rage if he knew he hadn’t had breakfast or done a workout today, but the Aussie was simply planning on not telling him. To Oscar, this would be a day well spent. 

She brushed his hair out of his eyes. “We need to get up, sleepyhead. I’ll make us some breakfast.” She kept her voice to a whisper, not wanting to be too loud when he was clearly still tired. She respected his desire for peace.

Her legs had barely got out of his before he was whining. It was supposed to coax her back to him, but it hadn’t worked how he had hoped. Instead she swung her legs over the edge of the bed, feet landing on the cool floor with a soft thud. Apparently this greatly upset him. “No, come back.” His arms were tight around her waist, giving her no wiggle room to escape. She laughed, her hand finding its way into his unruly hair in an attempt to tidy it up a little. “5 more minutes, please. Not done loving you.”

It was a miracle she hadn’t melted into a puddle. 

She did in fact climb back into the bed, turned to face him with a shy look on her face. His face was still sleepy, but it only made her long for him more. “Hi,” she whispered. 

His lips curled into a grin. “Hi, lovely.”

They stared at each other for a long time. Just two people hopelessly in love. Oscar leaned in, bumping the tip of his nose against hers and tilting his head to the side ever so slightly so he could slot his lips against hers. Her hands rested on his chest, the fabric of his shirt soft on her palms. Meanwhile his own hands had snuck under her shirt, running up her back with the lightest of scratches that made her shiver. He knew every button to press and spot to touch to make her fall even more in love with him. 

She pulled away first, tucking her head just under his chin. He held her close. There were never any expectations with Oscar, just pure, unfiltered love. A calm morning didn’t have to be anything other than exactly that. 

“Can we stay here forever?” he asked, quietly.

This was a side of him that no one saw but her and she cherished that. Oscar Piastri had many sides to him, but his soft side was her favourite now and forever. She grinned into his shirt, snuggling impossibly closer to him. “I’d love that.”

[seongminiz]

/ᐠ - ˕ -マ good kitty ₊˚⊹♡

. . ? boy pussy cat hybrid jungwon x gn reader – smut / minors dni ; 1135 words

cw dubcon ? , switch/sub leaning jungwon , possessive jungwon , scratching , dry humping , heats , fingering , praise , a liiiiittle tiny bit of spit .. ; very half assed n not proof read bc thats the jo seongminiz way of life , yes i did that thing where my grammar/writing gets better the further u get into the fic IM SORRY

(dont ask me how i had this idea it just spawned in my brain through the sheer power of lesbianism)

cat hybrid!jungwon was kind of shy when u first started living together , but he quickly warmed up to you n became sooo clingy, now he follows u everywhere you go n asks for cuddles n head scratches at any time of the day , no matter how busy u r ..

despite being so clingy , though , jungwon was never as desperate for your attention as he has been for the past few days : constantly sneaking up on u n wrapping his tail around your waist , or letting it snake up your leg , rubbing his nose on your neck and holding you tighter than usual when you cuddle .

jungwon has also started showing a possessive streak , wagging his tail and flattening his ears in discontent when you come home from work n your clothes smell like someone else – rationally , he knows its normal , he shouldn't be this upset by you simply going outside n interacting with other people , even other hybrids .. but there's a more irrational part of him that has started to think its not fair , n he should just keep you all to himself

this all culminated on one particular night , jungwon has been restless the whole day , waiting for you to come home more eagerly than ever because he needs to see you, to be close to you , to touch you and ... his thoughts trail off as he feels a familiar heat between his legs , one he has forced himself to ignore ever since he moved in with you , but it's been getting so much worse lately , maybe if he asked you for help you could ....

the door clicks open , n you immediately notice something is wrong , mostly because jungwon is sitting quietly by the door , slightly dozing off , the blush on his cheeks more prominent than usual and a hand absentmindedly slipped under the waistband of his sweatpants , just .. there .

'jungwon?' u call out , his ears immediately perking up and twitching as soon as he hears your voice . he should feel bad when he sees the worried expression on your face , almost scared , not knowing exactly whats going on with him – instead , jungwon is happy and , to be completely honest , slightly turned on by it .

'wonie? are you sick?' you try again , crouching next to jungwon , shaking him by his shoulder to catch his attention , but all you get from him is a pained whimper that makes you immediately retract your hand , scared that u might have hurt him in any way .

despite his condition , jungwon still has the quick reflexes of a cat , he wraps his hand around your wrist and he pulls you closer again , claws digging slightly into your skin.

''m sorry' jungwon mumbles, rubbing his nose on your hand before licking the tips of your fingers . it's then you realize his other hand is still between his legs , moving so imperceptibly you wouldn't have noticed if u were any further away . the realization finally dawns on you .

'wonie are you ..' u let the question hang as another whimper leaves the cat hybrid's parted lips . jungwon nods weakly and , before you have time to process it , he has pushed you to the floor , hips straddling yours and both hands now holding you down.

'it hurts' he confesses, not so subtly grinding his hips down on your thigh . you should push him off , help him get through his heat in an appropriate way instead of letting him do however he pleases with you – instead , you just lay there , one hand slowly slipping out of jungwon's desperate grasp and brushing on the exposed skin between his shirt and pants , despite the small feeling of insufferable guilt at the back of your head .

you hook your fingers into the waistband , and jungwon swears he could cum just from you taking his clothes off . he doesn't , but he sure as hell would if he had just a bit of self control less than he does right now .

'what do you want?' you ask , now impossibly turned on too . it would be a lie to say u never felt attracted to jungwon , but this is the first time you have to face that attraction with no other way to cope with it than to act on it . to fuck him .

jungwon doesn't answer , opting to hump your thigh again instead with a broken moan . you can feel his wetness seep through his underwear and your own clothes , and it drives you even more insane .

'jungwon.' you reprimand , voice more firm as you hold his hips still . he tries to protest , but relents once he realizes you won't let him get away with being a brat , not when he's the desperate one at least .

'need ...' he stops for a second , looking like he genuinely can't form a coherent thought – and he probably , truly can't . the blush on his cheeks deepens as he avoids your gaze , his tail twitching against your legs .

'need your fingers.' he finally mumbles , bending down so he can hide his face in the crook of your neck out of embarrassment .

'see? it wasn't that hard, was it?' you pet jungwon's hair , as your free hand finally slips past his underwear . and god , he's even more wet than you expected , completely soaking your fingers the moment they come in contact with his pussy .

jungwon moans , loud , his whole body freezing up for a split second as you immediately push two fingers in his hole , his walls contracting around them before he relaxes against you , drool dripping out of his mouth and onto the collar of your shirt .

'good kitty,' you praise as you start to move your fingers , relishing in the way jungwon twitches , and moans , and squeezes at every little movement , until he's gripping your shoulders and his claws rip through your clothes – you'll definitely make him pay for that when he's in a more sound state of mind – to mark your skin .

''m gonna cum' jungwon's voice cracks , slightly more high pitched as you add a third finger and curl them inside of him .

'you're gonna cum for me?' you push the heel of your palm on his clit 'gonna cum like a good kitty?'

'yes' jungwon whines , grinding his hips down to meet your thrusts . 'like your good kitty.'

that one self-admission is enough to send jungwon over the edge, trembling and moaning, and cumming so hard he soaks your clothes too , clenching around your fingers until he's completely spent .

you both just lay there , on the floor , too tired to move , or do anything , really – despite your own , new 'problem' between your legs . you'll take care of that later , though . for now , you stay still , petting jungwon's head as he licks and bites along your neck , mumbling 'thank you's and small apologies , and saying something about cleaning you up .

[utopeian]

a man who yearns

SUMMARY Having his hands on you keeps him present. Little does Bob know, his touch is what keeps you present.

PAIRING bob reynolds x gender neutral!thunderbolt!reader

GENRE vague relationship, but they like each other, fluff, a lot of nonsexual intimacy

WORD COUNT 1k+

WARNINGS not proofread! reader wears heels and makeup, no mention of Y/N

AUTHOR’S NOTE hi, this is my first time writing for bob! so sorry in advance for the inaccuracies.. this was based off a little dream i had, hehe.. hope y'all still like it, though! <3

The minimal chatter and droning of the television that usually echoes throughout the newly renovated living quarters are absent. A rare occasion. The only way one can get to experience this wholly is to sneak out of Valentina’s galas hours earlier than intended; that’s exactly what you and Bob did. Over, and over, and over again. The rest of the team stopped questioning your sudden disappearances after the first few times, eventually understanding that the two of you need a head-start to recover from social settings.

“I don’t understand it. Just don’t interact with anyone when you get tired, easy!”

“Alexei, that is not how it works.”

Although this time, you might’ve had one too many servings of champagne tonight before booking it out of the flashy venue. You wanted to try something out of your comfort zone, slowly but surely. You knew it was a disaster waiting to happen when you asked Yelena in passing if you should let loose, but you still wanted her validation. (Of course, she enabled you; she always thinks you deserve to let loose).

The tipsy haze slowing your movement and speech might not be clear to you, but it is to Bob. Even if he wanted to drink as much as you so you wouldn’t feel all alone, it would’ve evaporated the moment it entered his system, because of the serum and all. Instead, he settled for the next best thing: being your guardian angel for the night. That’s how the two of you end up on the floor, you using one of the sleek couches as a backrest as he sits across from you. He’d follow you anywhere, no matter how questionable. Bob doesn’t mean to cut your tangent off when he blurts out, “Why are we on the floor again?” He tenses immediately when he imagines your reaction to what he just did. He prepares for the worst.

You blink twice, not too bothered that the topic changed, knowing it had to stop at some point. You don’t really remember what you were going on about, anyway. “Oh! My heels are still on. Don’t wanna get up anymore.” The reason doesn’t make sense, but Bob keeps that comment to himself. The last thing he wants is to upset a tipsy you, or you at any moment in time. He instead focuses on the fact that you don’t hate him just because he diverted your attention away from what you were talking about.

You straighten your legs in front of you from their initial folded position, alternating each polished shoe tip to playfully point in Bob’s direction. Despite your follow-up complaint that you want them off, you do nothing. He knows you’re fully capable of doing things on your own when you want to, that’s only one of the many things he loves about you, but he tries to grab every opportunity to show you that he cares. This is no different. He shuffles in his place and takes advantage of your position as you start talking about a movie you rewatched the other day, oblivious to what he’s planning. 

He reaches over to gently grab the back of your shoe and slips it off your foot, shyly glances up to see that you’re still distracted, then takes the other off. Bob has one heel in each hand and hesitates for a second, thinking of where to put them. The poor, patient soul had really tried to listen to you while multitasking, but your words started running into each other. He didn’t catch the title of the film you were talking about (did you even mention it?). Your monologuing continues as he settles to put them about an arm's length away from the two of you, nodding at whatever you were saying, ensuring the pair was still in pristine condition. 

You fold your ankle over the other mindlessly, not noticing all that’s left to cover your feet are your stockings with some runs at the bottom. A corner of the brunet’s lips fondly quirks up at your action. Bob finally exhales through his nose; he’s thankful he can go back to listening to you properly. Well, he never listens to you fully, though, because he gets distracted by how beautiful you look in the dimly lit space with your makeup a little worn in, how the intimate setting fuels the wildfire spreading throughout his chest. Before he can stop himself, Bob inches closer to you, afraid to startle you but desperate to touch you in any form. As long as it’s you, it doesn’t matter how. Having his hands on you keeps him present. Little does he know, his touch is what keeps you present.

Unknowingly, in a way that makes it look like it’s as simple as breathing, he pulls you softly by the ankles to rest your feet on his lap. His hands don’t leave. Instead, they soothingly circle the inner parts of your ankle. Bob sees you practically melt under his touch, dissolving your train of thought to a sigh of relief. It’s enough to get him giddy; making you feel good makes him feel good. Your eyes flutter closed for a good minute before you remember where you are. “If you wanted me to shut up, y’should have just told me.”

His actions halt for a second, before he continues out of fear of getting chastised. “No! Keep telling me about Mr. Darcy and how a man who yearns is a man who earns.” You smile dopily at him and his heart wants to race out of his chest. You gladly continue.

The distant twinkling of the city lights against the abyss of the night, the occasional sirens and the flashing blues and reds, the humming of airplanes passing. The world around you accompanies your aimless conversation, but in this moment, you forget that you are two out of billions of… everything. It doesn’t matter, these details don’t matter. Everything fades away in the background because you have each other. That’s all you need. 

[luckyroll3]

Taking off the Edge

Summary: After several months away, you return home for a night of comfort and intimacy with your husband Chan and reconnection with your daughters.

Girl Dad Chan x Reader (f); Smut; Fluff

Warnings: This work of fiction is intended for 18+ audiences only. Includes explicit sexual content, graphic language, etc. Author chooses to not extensively tag in order to preserve some elements of storytelling.

Word Count: 20,687

A/N: Let me apologize in advance for all the feels you're about to experience. [Sorry, not sorry]. Enjoy!

You slip through the front door like a shadow returning to its owner, careful not to disturb the silence that greets you. The house smells of cinnamon and something else… Chan's cologne maybe, faint but familiar. Your muscles, tense from days of hyper-vigilance, refuse to uncoil even as you set down your bag. Home should feel safe, but you've forgotten how to feel safe anywhere.

The stillness of the house wraps around you. No teenage footsteps thundering down the stairs, no music leaking from behind closed doors. You check your watch; it's 4:30 PM. Isabella should be at soccer practice. Emilia should be at her dance class. Chan should be at the hospital, elbows-deep in someone's chest cavity, saving lives with those steady hands you know so well.

A noise from upstairs catches your attention. Your hand instinctively moves to where your weapon would be if you hadn't already locked it away. Old habits. The training never really leaves you, even when you step through your own front door.

You ascend the stairs, each step deliberate and silent. The wood doesn't creak beneath your feet because you know exactly where to place your weight. Another noise, followed by what sounds like humming. The bathroom door, adjacent to your bedroom at the end of the hall, stands partially ajar, a ribbon of steam escaping through the gap.

With two fingers, you push the door open wider. The hinges offer a small betrayal, a squeak that announces your presence.

Chan is there, submerged to his chest in a tub full of steaming water, his head resting against the porcelain edge, eyes closed, wireless headphones covering his ears. Unaware. Vulnerable. Beautiful.

His eyes snap open at the change in light, and he jolts upright, water sloshing over the rim of the tub. Recognition floods his face, followed by relief, then something warmer, hungrier.

"Jesus fucking Christ," he breathes, yanking the headphones off. "You scared the shit out of me." His voice holds no resentment, only wonder, as if you're an apparition he's afraid might vanish if he blinks.

"I scared you?!?" You lean against the doorframe, feeling the ghost of a smile tug at your lips. "You're supposed to be at work, Dr. Bahng."

"Emergency appendectomy. Got covered in blood. Twelve-hour shift turned into sixteen." He gestures to his naked body submerged in the bath. "Needed this before I could even think about cooking dinner."

Your gaze travels over the familiar terrain of his face. The stubble on his jaw is darker than usual, the shadows under his eyes proclaiming his exhaustion. Yet his brown eyes still radiate that same warmth they did seventeen years ago when he first loclked eyes with you across a crowded emergency room.

"When did you get back?" he asks, his voice deliberately casual, though you can hear the underlying worry.

"About three minutes ago." You begin to unbutton your blouse, revealing inch by inch the landscape of your skin, sun-darkened in places, marred in others.

His eyes track a fresh bruise blooming along your ribs, but he doesn't ask. He never asks directly. That's the deal. Instead, he says, "Bad one?"

"Aren't they all?" you respond, letting your blouse fall to the floor, exposing more evidence of your absence: a healing cut along your collarbone, a yellow-green bruise on your shoulder. Your bra follows.

Chan watches silently as you shed each layer, his gaze a physical touch. You step out of your pants, then underwear, standing naked before him, all pretense stripped away with your clothing.

"Move backward," you tell him, and he obliges, creating space for you at the front of the tub.

The water is hot enough to make you wince as you step in, steam rising around you like the ghosts of your recent past. You settle between Chan's legs, your back against his chest, and his arms come around you, careful to avoid the worst of your injuries.

"Too hot?" he asks against your ear.

"Perfect," you sigh, letting your head rest against his shoulder. The warmth of the water works its way into your muscles, loosening knots that have been tied for days. Weeks, maybe.

Chan's fingers trace idle patterns on your upper arms, gentle enough not to hurt, firm enough to remind you he's there. Real. Solid.

"I had to tell Mrs. Peterson her twenty-two year old son was dead today," he says after a while, his chest vibrating against your back with each word. "Motorcycle accident. No helmet."

This is how it always goes. He tells you his horrors so you don't have to tell him yours. Because you can’t. 

"Did she cry?" you ask, knowing the answer.

"No. That's the worst kind. The ones who go completely still, like they've turned to stone." His hands move to your shoulders, thumbs pressing into the tense muscles there. "She asked to see him. I had to tell her it wasn't a good idea."

You close your eyes, letting his words and his touch wash over you. "You did what you could."

"Yeah." He doesn't sound convinced. "Your turn."

You hesitate, calculating what you can share. "I spent three days in a room with no windows."

His hands pause momentarily before resuming their gentle exploration of your shoulders. "Alone?"

"Mostly." You don't elaborate. “And I got kneed in the ribs.”

“I noticed that.” Of course he did. He probably knows what every bruise and cut and scar came from; he’s seen it all as a trauma surgeon who often times subs in to work the emergency room. But he doesn't push.

“It was six this time,” you say softly. Again, you don’t elaborate, but he knows what you mean. 

“That’s a lot less than last time,” he says causally as he continues massaging your shoulders. 

“Yeah, the number goes way down when its hand-to-hand vs an aerial strike,” you say sarcastically. He doesn’t respond.

"Your neck's a mess," he says instead, fingers finding a particularly tight knot. "What'd you do, sleep standing up?"

A bark of laughter escapes you, unexpected and rusty. "Bold of you to assume I slept."

His lips press against the back of your head, a kiss so gentle you might have imagined it. "I could prescribe something to help with that. Take the edge off."

"The government already keeps me highly medicated," you reply, the words coming out more bitter than intended. It's not a lie; there are pills for sleeping, pills for staying awake, pills for pain, pills to make you forget. Pills to help you remember.

Chan's arms tighten around you, his chest expanding with a deep breath. "That's not what you need, though, is it?"

The question hangs in the steamy air between you. You both know the answer, have known it since the first time you came back to him from an assignment, hollowed out and raw.

"No," you admit, your voice barely audible over the soft lapping of water against porcelain.

What you need is this…his skin against yours, his steady heartbeat at your back, his breath in your hair. The reminder that there's still a place in the world where you're not a weapon or an asset or a liability, but simply a woman. His wife.

The scent of lavender and eucalyptus rises from the water, mingling with the clean, soapy smell of Chan's skin. You realize he's added your favorite essential oils to the bath; he anticipated your return even when he couldn't be sure of the day or hour.

"Isabella?" you ask, suddenly remembering your daughter.

"Soccer practice until seven. Kiki is bringing her home." His hands move lower, massaging the tight muscles of your lower back. "She missed you, even if she doesn’t admit it."

The words carry weight, implications. Your daughter's resentment is a tangible thing these days, sharpening with each absence.

"She'll get over it," you say, but you're not as confident as you sound.

Chan makes a noncommittal noise, his fingers working their way back up your spine. "She's sixteen. Everything's the end of the world at sixteen."

You let your eyes close again, sinking deeper into the water, into his embrace. The tension that's been your constant companion for weeks begins to dissolve, molecule by molecule, replaced by a different kind of tension, a slow-building heat that has nothing to do with the temperature of the water.

“I didn’t realize Kiki was driving now,” you say softly. Kiki and Isabella have been best friends since they met the first day of Pre-K.

“Her dad bought her a Jeep Wrangler for her birthday a couple weeks ago.”

“Hmmm. Sounds expensive. I bet Phyllis didn’t like that.”

“Not one bit. I ran into her at the grocery store and she bitched about Tom for 10 fucking minutes.” Kiki’s parents had a nasty divorce four years ago. “I had to fake a call from the ER to escape,” he added with a chuckle. His hands kneaded a particularly tough knot just under your shoulder blades, causing you to hiss lightly. Chan responded by using his thumbs to dig in a bit deeper as he kissed your shoulder. 

“And Emilia?” you ask wondering about your younger daughter.

“Leila’s mom is taking them to dinner after dance; she’ll probably be back by 6:30. But you know Emi; she’s always good. Yes, she misses you too, but she doesn’t take it as hard as Isa.”

“She takes after you in that way,” you whisper.

Chan's hands have moved to your sides now, his thumbs tracing the outline of your ribs, carefully avoiding the fresh bruises. His touch is clinical yet intimate, the touch of a man who knows both the fragility and the resilience of the human body. Of your body, specifically.

"I've got a shift tomorrow, mid-morning," he murmurs against your ear, his lips brushing the sensitive skin just below. "But tonight, I'm all yours."

The promise in his words sends a shiver through you that has nothing to do with the gradually cooling water. You turn your head, seeking his mouth with yours, finding it with the unerring accuracy that comes from years of knowing exactly where he will be.

His lips are soft, contrasting with the roughness of his stubble against your cheek. The kiss is gentle at first, a reintroduction, before deepening into something more urgent, more honest. Your hand reaches up to cup the back of his head, fingers threading through his damp hair, holding him to you as if he might try to escape. He doesn't.

When you break apart, both of you slightly breathless, his eyes are darker, pupils dilated. "Water's getting cold," he observes, though neither of you moves.

"I hadn't noticed," you lie, and he laughs, the sound reverberating through both your bodies.

"Liar," he accuses, pressing another kiss to the corner of your mouth. "I can feel you shivering."

"That's not from the cold," you admit, and watch as his expression shifts, hunger overtaking exhaustion.

"No?" His hand slides from your side to your stomach, fingertips dancing along the sensitive skin there. "What is it from, then?" When you don’t answer, his hand slides further down, finding its way in between your legs. You sigh deeply as his fingers enter you slowly. Water sloshes over the edge of the tub with the coupled movement of your chest and his fingers, but neither of you pay it any mind. You close your eyes, and for the first time since you walked through the front door, you feel the last of your professional persona slip away.

The water drains from the tub in a slow, gurgling spiral, like time washing away between you. Chan rises first, water streaming down the planes of his body, and extends a hand to you. "Shower," he suggests, his voice low and graveled with intent. "Let's get you properly cleaned up." The words are practical, but his eyes tell a different story, one of hunger barely contained, of promises waiting to be fulfilled.

You take his hand, allowing him to help you stand. Your muscles protest after the temporary relief of the hot bath, and a small wince escapes before you can suppress it. Chan notices, he always notices, but says nothing, just tightens his grip slightly, steadying you.

The shower is only two steps away, part of the luxurious master bathroom you'd renovated three years ago during a rare six-month stretch when you were home. Chan reaches in and turns the knob with practiced precision, not even looking as he adjusts the temperature. Steam billows out almost immediately, curling around your naked bodies like a lover's embrace.

"After you," he says, and you step under the spray, allowing the hot water to pummel your shoulders. The pressure is different from the enveloping warmth of the bath—more insistent, more direct. Like Chan's gaze on your body.

He follows you in, sliding the glass door closed behind him. The space is large enough for two, but only just. His body radiates heat that rivals the water, and you feel yourself drawn to it, a moth to flame.

"Let me," he says, reaching for the soap. You turn your back to him, offering yourself to his care. The soap makes a soft scraping sound as he works it between his palms, building a lather that smells of sandalwood and something citrusy. It's a new soap he must have bought while you were away.

His hands make first contact with your shoulders, thumbs pressing into the knots at the base of your neck. Soap makes his touch slick, reducing friction as he works the tension from your muscles. You let your head fall forward, giving him better access, and a soft sound of pleasure escapes your lips.

"Too hard?" he asks, his breath warm against your ear before he kisses the bruise on your shoulder.

"Not hard enough," you reply, and feel his chest vibrate with a low chuckle.

He works his way down your back, fingers tracing the knobs of your spine, palms spreading lather across your shoulder blades. When he reaches the fading bruise at the small of your back, a souvenir from being slammed against a wall four days and half a world ago, his touch becomes feather-light.

"This is very new," he observes, voice neutral.

"It's nothing," you reply automatically.

His lips replace his fingers, pressing a kiss so gentle to the bruise that you barely feel it. "It's not nothing," he contradicts, "but it's healing."

You close your eyes as water streams down your face, washing away the retort that rises instinctively to your lips. Chan has always had this effect on you, disarming your defenses with simple truths.

His hands continue their journey, sliding around to your stomach, fingertips grazing the sensitive skin below your navel. Your breath catches as his soapy palms move upward, cupping your breasts with familiar reverence.

"Missed these," he murmurs, thumbs circling your nipples until they harden under his touch. He's always had appreciation for your small, but perky boobs.

"Just these?" you ask, arching into his hands. You turn around to face him and arch an eyebrow. The water now hits your back, rinsing away the suds.

He kisses the cut on your collarbone. "Among other things." His voice drops lower as one hand abandons your breast to slide downward again, fingers finding the juncture of your thighs. He doesn't linger, though, instead continuing his methodical washing, down your legs, carefully avoiding the still-tender cut on your right thigh. He kisses that too.

When his hands return up your body, they're empty of the soap but still slick with lather. He’s now face to face with you. His eyes are dark with desire, but there's something else there too; there's a careful assessment as he catalogs every mark on your body.

"Your turn," you say, reaching for the soap, but he shakes his head.

"Not done with you yet," he replies, reaching past you for the shampoo. "Hair." He turns you back around.

You submit to his ministrations, closing your eyes as he works the shampoo into your hair. His fingers are strong, massaging your scalp with just the right amount of pressure. The repetitive motion is hypnotic, and you find yourself leaning into him, your body seeking his warmth even under the hot spray.

"Tip your head back," he instructs, and you comply, allowing him to rinse the suds from your hair. Water cascades down your face, and you keep your eyes closed, surrendering to the sensation of being cared for; it's something you allow yourself only here, only with him. He repeats with a creamy conditioner.

Once your hair is clean, Chan's hands return to your body, but their purpose has shifted. No longer methodical or clinical or assessing, they now explore with clear intent, tracing paths of desire across your skin. His thumb brushes your nipple again, lingering this time, teasing until your breath catches.

"Chan," you murmur, his name both question and answer as you turn to face him again.

"I'm here," he responds, his lips finding yours under the spray. The kiss tastes of water and longing, of months apart and the promise of reconnection. His tongue slides against yours, and you press yourself against him, feeling his arousal hard against your stomach.

Your hands begin their own exploration, running down his chest, following the trail of dark hair that leads below his navel. He groans into your mouth when your fingers wrap around his cock, a sound that vibrates through your connected bodies.

"Thought you were tired," you tease, stroking him slowly.

"Second wind," he gasps, his hips moving involuntarily into your touch. "Or maybe it's my wife's magic hands."

You laugh, the sound strange to your own ears after days of tension and silence. "More likely your own stupidly high libido."

"Only for you," he says, his voice suddenly serious despite the playfulness of your exchange. His hand moves between your legs again, finding you slick with more than just water. "Only ever for you."

The declaration, simple and true, ignites something warm in your chest. You capture his mouth again, kissing him with renewed hunger, your body pressing against his as if trying to eliminate any space between you while you continue to stroke him.

His fingers are inside you now, curling in that way he knows drives you mad, his thumb circling your clit with deliberate pressure. Your hand falters in its rhythm as pleasure builds, and you brace yourself against the tile wall.

"Bed," you manage to say between kisses. "Now."

Chan reaches behind you to shut off the water, the sudden absence of sound almost as jarring as the cooler air that replaces the steam. He slides the shower door open and grabs a towel, wrapping it around you before taking another for himself.

Your drying is perfunctory at best, more a hasty rubbing than an actual attempt to get dry. Chan's hair still drips as he leads you through the door that connects the bathroom directly to your bedroom; another renovation choice, one you've never regretted, particularly in moments like these.

The sheets are cool against your damp skin as you fall onto the bed together, a tangle of limbs and half-dried bodies. Chan's weight above you is familiar and exhilarating all at once, his solid presence a reminder of what's real when so much of your world is shadows and lies.

"I need you," you whisper against his neck, inhaling the clean scent of his skin.

"You have me," he answers, positioning himself between your thighs. "Always have me."

He enters you slowly, both of you groaning at the sensation of finally, finally being joined after months apart. The stretch and fullness of him inside you is a homecoming more profound than walking through your front door earlier.

His movements are measured at first, careful of your bruises, but your urgency communicates itself through nails digging into his back, hips rising to meet his thrusts. The message is clear: You don't want careful. You want him.

"Harder," you command, and he obliges, his control slipping as he drives into you with increasing force. The headboard knocks softly against the wall, keeping time with your shared rhythm.

Your world narrows to sensation: the slick slide of him inside you, the pressure of his pubic bone against your clit with each thrust, the soft grunts he makes, the taste of his skin when you bite at his shoulder. Water drops from his hair onto your face, mingling with the sweat that's beginning to form despite the room's cool air.

"Look at me," he demands, and you open eyes you hadn't realized were closed. His face hovers above yours, flushed with exertion and desire, eyes burning with an intensity that matches the heat building low in your core.

One of his hands slides between your bodies, finding your clit again, circling with just the right pressure. Your breath comes in short gasps now, tension coiling tighter with each thrust, each circle of his clever fingers.

"Channie," you breathe, a plea.

"I know baby," he answers, increasing his pace, his own control visibly fraying. "Together. Cum with me."

The command, delivered in that voice rough with need, pushes you over. Your orgasm crashes through you in waves, muscles clenching around him as pleasure radiates outward from where you're joined. He follows you over the edge with a hoarse cry, his hips jerking erratically as he empties himself inside you.

For several heartbeats, neither of you moves. Chan's weight presses you into the mattress, his breath hot against your neck. The only sounds in the room are your combined panting and the distant hum of the house's air conditioning cycling on.

Eventually, he shifts, rolling to the side but keeping one arm draped across your waist, maintaining contact. His free hand brushes damp coils from your forehead with a tenderness that contrasts sharply with the urgency of moments before.

"Welcome home, baby" he whispers, pressing a kiss to your temple.

You turn your head to look at him, taking in the contentment that softens his features, the way his lips curve into a smile that reaches all the way to his eyes, displaying his dimples. This is what you fight for, what you come back for. This man. This bed. This moment.

"It's good to be back," you reply, meaning it more than you can express.

Chan's fingers trace idle patterns on your stomach, dipping occasionally to the juncture of your thighs where you're still sensitive. The touch isn't meant to arouse, not yet, but to maintain connection, to ground you here with him.

"How long?" he asks after a comfortable silence, the question inevitable.

"Sixteen hours," you answer truthfully. "I leave again tomorrow morning."

He nods, accepting without protest. This is the dance you've perfected over seventeen years; these brief interludes of normalcy between your absences, these moments stolen from a life that's never entirely yours.

"I'm making lasagna tomorrow," he says, as if deciding what to cook is the most natural response to knowing you'll leave again soon. "Isa's been asking for it."

The mention of your eldest daughter brings reality back into sharper focus. "How bad has she been?"

Chan sighs, his fingers stilling on your skin. "The usual. Slamming doors. One-word answers. She's channeling most of it into soccer, at least."

"And Emilia?"

"Quieter. She writes you letters that she never sends." His voice catches slightly. "I found a stack of them in her desk when I was looking for her field trip permission slip."

A knot forms in your throat. Your younger daughter, always so understanding, so careful not to add to anyone's burden. Sometimes her acceptance is harder to bear than Isabella's anger.

"We should probably get dressed," Chan says, glancing at the clock on the nightstand. "The girls will be home soon."

But neither of you moves, reluctant to break the bubble of intimacy you've created. His hand resumes its gentle exploration of your body, this time tracing the outline of a scar on your hip; it's an old one, from before you met him. It’s always intrigued him since your first night together.

"Tell me something good," you request, a ritual between you.

Chan thinks for a moment, his fingers continuing their journey across your skin. "I saved a kid last week. Ten years old. Fell from a tree house, ruptured his spleen. Parents thought they were going to lose him."

"But they didn't."

"No," he says, satisfaction evident in his voice. "They didn't."

You turn onto your side to face him fully, your hand coming up to cup his cheek. His stubble is rough against your palm. "You're a good man, Dr. Chan Bahng."

"Good enough to deserve another round before the girls get home?" he asks, waggling his eyebrows comically.

You laugh, shoving his shoulder playfully. "Insatiable."

"Only for you," he repeats his earlier declaration, but this time he pulls you on top of him, his hands settling on your hips as you straddle him. "Always for you."

His arousal is already returning, pressing against you, and you feel an answering heat building again in your core. You lean down to kiss him, your wet, elongated coils creating a curtain around your faces, a private world of just the two of you.

"Round two it is," you murmur against his lips, rolling your hips in a way that makes him groan. "But we'd better be quick."

Chan's hands tighten on your hips, guiding your movements as you begin to rock against him. "Quick can be good," he says, his voice strained with renewed desire. "But I prefer thorough."

"Show me thorough, then," you challenge, and his eyes darken with promise as he flips you onto your back and enters you once more.

Chan's mouth traces a burning path down your neck as you arch beneath him, fingernails digging half-moons into his shoulders. The world has narrowed to just this: his weight pressing you into the mattress, the sound of your mingled breathing, the slick heat where your bodies join. You're close again, teetering on the edge of release, when the bedroom door swings open with a decisive click that might as well be a gunshot for how it freezes you both mid-motion.

"Dad, can I—" Isabella's voice cuts off abruptly.

For one excruciating second, time suspends. Chan's body still covers yours, his face buried in your neck, your legs wrapped around his waist; a tableau of intimacy never meant for your daughter's eyes. 

Isabella stands in the doorway, her soccer bag dropped at her feet, mouth open in a perfect O of shock. Her dark eyes, so like Chan's, widen to impossible dimensions as understanding dawns.

The suspended moment shatters when Isabella makes a strangled sound somewhere between a gasp and a scream. "Oh my GAWD!" The words explode from her as she spins on her heel, nearly tripping over her abandoned bag in her haste to escape. You hear her add an “Eeewww!” as she quickly retreats.

"Isa, wait!" Chan calls, but the sound of her retreating footsteps drowns him out, followed by the definitive slam of her bedroom door down the hall.

Chan rolls off you with military precision, the mattress bouncing slightly with the sudden redistribution of weight. "Fuck," he mutters, dragging a hand down his face. “I keep telling her she needs to knock before just barging in here.” His chest rises and falls rapidly, arousal giving way to parental panic.

"I thought Kiki was bringing her home at seven," you say, yanking the sheet up to cover your naked body. The clock on the nightstand reads 6:11. "It's not even six-thirty."

"Practice must have ended early," Chan replies, already reaching for his sweatpants folded neatly on the bedside table. "Shit, I should have locked the door."

"There's a lock?!" The question comes out more sarcastic than intended, a defense mechanism kicking in.

Chan shoots you a look that's half exasperation, half lingering mortification. "Not the time babe."

He's right, of course. Your sixteen-year-old daughter just walked in on you having sex. The fact that you didn't know the bedroom door has a lock now is irrelevant at this point.

Chan pulls on a t-shirt, his movements efficient as he transforms from your lover back into a doting father. "I'll go talk to her," he says, already heading for the door. "Try to explain that it's natural, that when two people love each other…"

"Let me handle it," you interrupt, surprising yourself as much as him.

Chan stops, turning to look at you with raised eyebrows. "You sure?"

The question stings more than it should. Yes, you're sure. You're her mother, even if you've been an intermittent presence in her life. Even if Chan is the one who's been there for every skinned knee, every failed test, every broken heart. Even if Isabella looks at you sometimes like you're a stranger who happens to occupy space in her home every few weeks.

"I'm sure," you say, swinging your legs over the side of the bed and reaching for your robe hanging on the back of the bathroom door. "This is something a girl should hear from her mother."

Chan hesitates, doubt written clearly across his features. You tie the sash of your robe with a decisive tug, waiting for him to protest, to remind you of all the times you've failed miserably at this particular aspect of parenting.

Instead, he says, "Okay," in a tone that's carefully neutral. "But if you need backup..."

"I won't." You cross to him, placing a hand on his chest. "I know I haven't been..." The words tangle in your throat, inadequate before they're even spoken. "Just let me try. Plus she doesn’t need to hear any of that sappy shit from you right now," you add playfully to bring levity to the situation.

Chan smirks at your bad joke. “You love my sappy shit.” He covers your hand with his own, squeezing gently. "Just remember she missed you," he says simply. "We all did." He kisses you lightly.

The words carry no accusation, just fact. Somehow that makes it worse. You squeeze his hand back.

You slip past him, out into the hallway that leads to the girls' rooms, stopping to pick up the abandoned soccer bag. The house feels different now, charged with adolescent horror and parental embarrassment. The wooden floor is cold under your bare feet, each step bringing you closer to a conversation you're not prepared for but can't avoid.

Isabella's door looms at the end of the hall, plastered with posters of soccer stars Hope Solo, Megan Rapino, Sophia Smith, and Trinity Rodman. There are also warning signs: "Enter at Your Own Risk," "Knock or Die," and a new one since your last visit, "Privacy Please, I'm Having an Existential Crisis." The humor feels pointed now, a reminder of all the moments of her life you've missed.

You pause outside her door, hand raised to knock but not yet making contact. What are you going to say? Sorry you caught me having sex with your father? Sorry I'm home so rarely that my presence in my own bedroom was shocking to you? Sorry I'm the kind of mother who prioritizes national security over school plays and soccer games?

None of those apologies would be entirely honest. You're not sorry for loving Chan, for finding comfort in his body after days of isolation and danger and after months away from him. You're not entirely sorry for the work you do, even when it takes you away from your family. And you're definitely not sorry for having a sex life, even if Isabella might wish you didn't.

What you are sorry for is the hurt in her eyes in that split second before embarrassment took over. The hurt that said: You're only home for a few hours and this is what you choose to do?

You take a deep breath and knock, three sharp raps that sound unnaturally loud in the quiet hallway.

Silence greets you. You wait a beat, then knock again.

"Go away!" Isabella's voice is muffled but unmistakably upset.

"Isa, it's me," you call through the door. "Can I come in?"

"No!" The response is immediate and vehement. "I don't want to talk to you!"

You could leave it at that. It would be easier. Let Chan handle it later, when tempers have cooled and the initial mortification has faded. He's better at this anyway, knows the right words to say, the right tone to use. Isabella would probably prefer him anyway. Of your two daughters, she’s definitely the daddy’s girl.

But that's the problem, isn't it? The easy way out is what you've been taking for years when it comes to parenting. Leaving the hard conversations to Chan, the day-to-day struggles, the emotional heavy lifting. You've been more operative than mother, more asset than parent.

"I'm coming in," you announce, turning the handle before she can object again.

The door isn't locked; a small mercy. 

Isabella sits on her bed, knees drawn up to her chest, a pillow clutched protectively in front of her like a shield. Her face is flushed, eyes red-rimmed but dry. She glares at you with a mixture of embarrassment and defiance that's so familiar it makes your chest ache. It's the same look you see in the mirror on your worst days. Her eyes might be Chan’s, but the rest of her face, her brown skintone, is undeniably yours. The combination still takes your breath away sometimes.

"I said I don't want to talk," she says, her voice thick with emotion.

You close the door behind you, leaning against it as you drop her bag to the floor. The room is a collision of childhood and impending adulthood, with soccer trophies and stuffed animals sharing space with makeup, clothes, and posters of bands you don't recognize. A photo on her desk catches your eye. Chan and Isabella at her last birthday, his arm around her shoulders, both grinning at the camera. You're not in the picture. You were in Beirut.

"Then you don't have to talk," you say, keeping your voice even. "But I think I should."

Isabella rolls her eyes, a gesture so perfectly teenage it would be comical in any other situation. "If you're going to give me the sex talk, I already know where babies come from, thanks." That dry sarcasm is also undeniably yours.

"That's not…" you begin, then recalibrate. "Well, not entirely."

"Mom, please," she groans, burying her face in the pillow. "This is literally the most humiliating moment of my entire life. Can we just pretend it never happened?"

You cross the battlefield of discarded clothes, school supplies, and sports gear to sit on the edge of her bed, careful to maintain enough distance so that she doesn't feel crowded. The robe gaps slightly at your knees. You adjust it, suddenly conscious of the irony, covering up after what she's already seen. "We could," you concede. "But I think that would be a missed opportunity."

She peeks over the top of the pillow, suspicious. "An opportunity for what?"

"For me to acknowledge that I haven't been the most... present mother," you say, the words difficult but necessary. "And that walking in on... that... must have been especially shocking because I'm hardly ever here."

Isabella's grip on the pillow relaxes slightly, her eyes studying your face with an intensity that reminds you of interrogations in far less comfortable rooms. "It would have been gross no matter what," she mutters, but there's less heat in her voice.

"Fair point," you acknowledge with a small smile. "No one wants to see their parents having sex."

"Ugh, don't say it out loud," she groans, but there's a hint of an unwilling smile tugging at her lips.

The tension in the room eases fractionally, enough that you risk moving closer, perching more fully on the bed. "I'm sorry you saw that," you say. "We should have locked the door."

"There's a lock?!" she asks, unknowingly echoing your earlier question.

"Apparently," you reply dryly. "Your father was equally surprised that I didn't know about it."

A reluctant laugh escapes her, quickly smothered. "You guys are so weird."

"Maybe," you concede. "But we love each other. And we miss each other when I'm gone."

She looks at you and the unspoken question hangs in the air between you: Do you miss me too?

Isabella's eyes drop to the pillow she's still clutching. "Kiki's mom says you travel too much for work," she says, not looking at you. "She thinks you're like, a pharmaceutical rep or something."

You’ve never corrected the assumption whenever Phyllis has brought it up. It's a convenient cover, one that explains your absences without raising too many questions. "What do you tell her?" you ask, curious despite yourself.

Isabella shrugs. "That you work for the government. That it's important." She picks at a loose thread on the pillowcase. "I don't tell her that sometimes I wish you had a normal job. Like a teacher or at an office or something."

The words sting, but they're nothing you haven't thought yourself during long nights in foreign countries, missing bedtimes and school events and ordinary family dinners.

"I wish that sometimes too," you admit, surprising yourself with the honesty.

Isabella looks up, clearly startled by your confession. "You do?"

"Of course I do." You reach out, hesitantly tucking a strand of hair behind her ear. She doesn't pull away, which feels like its own small victory. "I miss so much. Your games, your school stuff. The day-to-day things that seem small but aren't."

"Then why don't you quit?" The question is direct, challenging; so like you it's almost unnerving. "Dad makes more than enough money."

It's a reasonable question, one with a complicated answer that involves national security, specialized skills, and oaths you took long before she was born. But also simpler truths: that you're good at what you do, that it matters, that some part of you needs it in ways that are difficult to articulate.

"It's not that simple," you begin, but Isabella cuts you off.

"It is that simple," she insists, anger flaring again. "You choose to leave. Every time."

The accusation lands like a physical blow. "Isa…"

"Don't call me that," she snaps. "Dad calls me that. Emilia calls me that. People who are actually here call me that."

You absorb the hit, forcing yourself not to flinch. "Isabella, then," you say, keeping your voice steady. "You're right. I do choose to leave. The work I do is important."

"More important than us?" Her voice cracks on the last word, betraying the hurt beneath the anger.

"No," you say firmly. "Never more important than you. Or your sister. Or your dad."

"Then why?" The question is small, vulnerable in a way that makes your chest ache. "Why aren't you just... here?"

It's the central question of your life, the one that keeps you awake on long flights home, the one that follows you into dangerous situations and quiet moments alike. Why can't you just be a mother, a wife, nothing more and nothing less?

"Because the world isn't safe," you say finally, choosing your words with care. "And I have skills that help make it safer. For you, for everyone."

Isabella studies your face, looking for the lie or the evasion. Finding none, she sighs, some of the fight leaving her body. "That sounds really noble and everything, but it still fricking sucks."

A laugh escapes you, unexpected and genuine. "Yeah," you agree. "It does suck. For all of us."

She's quiet for a moment, considering this. "Dad never complains," she says. "About you being gone. He always acts like it's just... normal."

"Your father is an extraordinary man," you say, meaning every word. "Far better than I deserve, most days."

"He loves you a lot," Isabella says, and though the words are simple, they carry weight. "Like, a lot a lot. It's gross sometimes."

"He loves you too," you remind her. "More than anything."

"I know." She looks down again, fingers still winding the loose thread. "He's always here."

The unspoken accusation hangs between you: unlike you.

"Isabella," you say, waiting until she looks up at you. "I know I've missed a lot. Too much. And I can't promise that will change in the short-term. But I want you to know that every day I'm gone, I think about you. About your sister. About your dad. You're what I come home for."

She doesn't respond immediately, absorbing your words. Then, with a hint of playful sarcastic humor, this time purely Chan’s sass, she says, "Clearly," with a pointed look in the direction toward the bedroom you've just come from.

Heat rushes to your face, but you refuse to be embarrassed for loving your ridiculously hot, sweet husband. "Yes, that too," you say, holding her gaze. "All of it. The whole package of having a family, even the messy parts."

"Speaking of messy," she mutters, then immediately looks horrified at her own words. "Oh my god, I didn't mean…"

You can't help it; you laugh, a real laugh that bubbles up from somewhere deep inside you. After a moment of mortified shock, Isabella joins in, the shared laughter breaking the tension that's defined your relationship for too long.

When the laughter subsides, she looks at you with eyes that seem older, wiser. "Mom?" she says, the word still feeling like a gift after so many months of strained silence.

"Yes?"

"Next time, please just lock the door." Her face is solemn, but there's a glint of humor in her eyes; Chan's humor, but also yours.

"Deal," you promise, reaching out to squeeze her hand. She allows it, even squeezes back briefly before pulling away.

It's a small moment, insignificant in the grand scheme of things. You haven't solved the fundamental problem of your absences. You haven't healed all the hurts or bridged all the distances. But it's something; a foothold, a beginning.

And for now, that will have to be enough.

“It was so awkward,” you add. 

Isabella snorts. "Ya think?"

The silence stretches between you, elastic and uncomfortable. You notice a crumpled test paper on her nightstand, a 98%, circled in red. Pride blooms in your chest. She's always been brilliant like her father, even when you weren't there to see it.

Isabella's shoulders hunch forward. "I was so grossed out by what I saw," she finally blurts, the words tumbling out in a rush. Her eyes are wide, fixed on the wall opposite, as if making eye contact might summon the image again.

You laugh, the sound unexpectedly loud in the quiet room. "Yeah, I bet. If it makes you feel any better, I once walked in on my own parents when I was a teenager. I was fourteen and I woke up with stomach pains in the middle of the night. I walked to their room for help… it was pretty gross then too. My mom was riding my dad…" You nudge her with your knee. "Pretty sure it scarred me for life."

"Ew, Mom!" But there's a reluctant smile tugging at her lips. "I did not need that mental image of Nana and gramps either." She shudders.

"The circle of trauma continues," you say solemnly, and this time she actually laughs, a brief, bright sound that reminds you of when she was small, and a mama's girl, before your absences started stretching longer, before Chan became her favorite parent, before she learned to guard her joy around you.

After a couple of moments of silence, you finally speak, your voice barely above a whisper. "You know, I was the one who gave you the nickname Isa when you were just a few months old." The memory of her earlier comment still gnawed at you, sharper than any of the physical bruises and cuts you’d accumulated over the past weeks.

She looks at you, her gaze steady and sincere. "I know," she replies, her voice carrying a hint of regret. Her eyes, filled with an earnest apology, hold yours as if trying to bridge the gap her words had created. "I didn’t mean what I said."

"I know," you respond with a small nod, acknowledging her sincerity, hoping to ease the sting that lingered between you both.

She picks up a stuffed elephant from her pillow. It's an old gift from you, brought back from some forgotten mission in Africa; Tanzania you think. She hugs it to her chest. 

Not so grown up after all.

"How will I know when it's the right time?" she asks suddenly, her voice smaller than before.

You blink, recalibrating. "The right time for what?"

Isabella gives you a look that could wither plants. "Sex, mom. How will I know when it's the right time to have sex?"

Your instinct is to say "never" or "when you're thirty," but you swallow those words. You promised yourself you'd never lie to your daughters, even when the truth is hard. Especially then.

"Is this a theoretical question, or is there a reason you're asking?" You keep your voice neutral, careful not to spook her.

She twists the elephant's trunk between her fingers. "Some of my friends are already doing it. And Jake…" She stops, then continues in a rush. "Jake's been talking about it."

Jake. The boyfriend. The one with the floppy hair and the skateboard and the easy smile and the smooth talk that makes your trigger finger itch. You've met him exactly twice, and both times, you resisted the urge to toss him in a dark room for an interrogation or run a complete background check. He looks like fucking trouble to you, but Chan claims he’s a good kid. Jake is lucky you trust Chan. Otherwise…

"You know they're probably lying, right? Your friends."

Isabella rolls her eyes. "Not all of them."

"Fine. But you shouldn't base your decisions on what other people are doing." You shift to face her more directly. "Look at me, Isa."

She does, reluctantly.

"You'll know it's the right time when you're not asking me when the right time is. When you're not doing it because your friends are, or because Jake wants to. You'll know because you'll want to, completely and without doubt, and because you trust him, and because you're ready for whatever comes after."

"That's not very specific," she complains.

"Because it's different for everyone." You take her hand, and she lets you. Her fingers are long like Chan's, capable. "But I'll give you some concrete advice. Only have sex when you're ready; not when you're drunk, or high, or feeling pressured, or because some boy has told you he loved you. Always use protection. Always, no exceptions, no 'just this once.' And come to me with questions. Not your dad, unless you want to hear all his sappy bullshit about true love. And definitely not your dumb ass friends who think they know everything about sex because they watched Euphoria or some porn once."

Isabella's face contorts in horror. "Mom!"

"What? They are dumbasses. And porn is a terrible sex ed teacher, by the way. It’s all so fake. Women rarely cum from shit like that."

"Please stop talking."

"No, because this is important." You squeeze her hand. "And if Jake ever—ever—makes you feel like you have to do something you're not comfortable with, remember that your dad would absolutely murder him and I would help hide the body in parts of the globe that have been generally untouched by civilization for millennia. I can promise you

 he will never be found again."

This startles another laugh out of her. "Dad wouldn't hurt a fly."

"Let me tell you a secret. On my third date with your dad, he got into a fight with a guy who touched me inappropriately and broke his nose.”

“Really?” Isabella asks, completely shocked.

“Really! It was so hot.” Isabella rolled her eyes and you laughed. “You'd be surprised what Chan would do for his girls." You smile, thinking of your husband's gentle hands that have both saved lives and held you with such fierce possession. "He'd destroy anyone who hurt you. So would I."

She picks at her pillow again. "Jake's not like that. He's... nice."

"Good. He better stay that way. And remember, you can always say no, even if you've said yes before. Even if you're in the middle of things. Even if…"

"Oh my god, mom, I get it!" She covers her face with her hands, but you can see she's smiling between her fingers.

You lean back, studying her. There's so much of yourself in her: the stubbornness, the sharp mind, the way she holds herself like she's always ready for a fight. But there's softness and silliness too; Chan's influence. You wonder if she knows how perfectly she balances between you both.

"Any other questions?" you ask. "Anything else you want to know?"

She hesitates, twisting the coils of her ponytail around her finger. "Does it hurt? The first time?"

The vulnerability in her voice makes your chest ache. "It can," you admit. "But it shouldn't be awful if you're relaxed and with someone who cares about making it good for you." You pause. "But the first time is always awkward, regardless of the circumstances. It gets better with practice though."

"Gross," she mumbles, but she's listening intently.

"And Isabella…" She looks back up at you. "Sex isn't just physical. It changes things between people. Sometimes in ways you don't expect."

She nods slowly. "I know."

"Do you?" You search her face, trying to see if she really understands.

"I think so." She shrugs again, but it's different from before. It’s less dismissive, more thoughtful. "I'm not in any rush. I don’t think I’m ready yet."

Relief washes through you. "Good. That's good."

You notice a string of polaroid photos pinned above her desk: Isabella with Kiki and their other friends at an amusement park, with Jake at a party, with Emilia on the couch. There's one of all four of you, taken last Christmas. Chan's arm is around your waist, your head tilted against his shoulder. You don't remember seeing the camera flash or even the picture being taken.

"Did you and Dad wait?" Isabella asks, breaking into your thoughts. "Until you were married?"

You snort before you can help it. "God, no."

"Mom!"

"What? You asked." You grin at her, unrepentant. "We met when your dad was in his first year of residency. Have you seen pictures of your dad at twenty-five??? My twenty-one year old brain couldn’t handle the fucking sexiness that should have been on someone’s runway, not in my hospital room.” You fan yourself dramatically as Isabella rolls her eyes again, but this time with a smile on her face. “He’s still very attractive now… I had gotten injured on a mission and was his patient. He was beautiful and sleep-deprived and kept trying to hit on me using cheesy medical pickup lines."

"That sounds like Dad," Isabella says, smiling.

"It was ridiculous. And adorable. And extremely effective." You remember Chan's dimples, the way his hands shook slightly the first time he touched you. "We waited two whole dates. I would have on the first date, but he was too much of a gentleman to push for more than a kiss."

"I cannot believe we're having this conversation," Isabella groans, but she's still smiling.

"Believe it. And remember it next time you forget to knock. Your dad and I are still very hot for each other, even after all these years. Not many parents can say that," you say proudly.

She flops backward onto her bed, arms spread wide. "I'm never coming into your room again. Ever!"

"Smart girl." You run your fingers through your still damp coils. "I'm sorry you saw that, but I'm not sorry we had this talk."

Isabella props herself up on her elbows. "Me neither, I guess." She pauses. "Thanks, Mom. For not being weird about it."

"Oh, I'm extremely weird about it. I'm just hiding it well." 

“I don’t think any of my friends are comfortable enough with their parents to talk like this.” You don’t respond; you just reach out and rub her shin lightly, thankful that she values your openness in this way.

"So," you say, rising from the bed and retying your robe more securely. "I should probably put on some actual clothes before your sister gets home."

Isabella rolls her eyes, but there's less heat in it now. "Probably a good idea."

You lean down and press a kiss to her forehead; she doesn’t pull away. She smells like honey shampoo and the vanilla lotion Chan buys for both girls' stockings every Christmas. You’re not sure how you ended up with a man who loves such cutesy scents. The thought makes you smile to yourself. 

You turn and walk away.

You pause at the door, looking back at your daughter, this strange, wonderful creature who is half you, half Chan, and entirely her own person. "Isabella?"

She looks up, eyebrows raised in question.

"I love you," you say simply. "Even when I'm not here. Maybe especially then."

She doesn't say it back, but she doesn't look away either. "I know," she says finally, and it's not everything, but it's not nothing.

As you start to open the door, you hear her voice once more. "Mom?"

You pause, hand on the doorknob, turning to look back at her. "Yes?"

"I'm glad you're home. I love you too." You nod, a small smile curling your lips. 

You start to walk away, but you turn back again. "One more thing…"

"Oh my gawd! What now?"

"Protection. Seriously. Every time."

"Get out of my room, woman!"

You close the door behind you, grinning. 

A strange sense of accomplishment settles in your chest. One difficult conversation down. These are the moments you fight to come home to, the conversations that matter more than any mission. 

As you stand in the hallway, your ears pick up the sound of movement downstairs: the front door opening, the sound of rapid patter of small feet, high, excited chatter. 

Emilia. Your youngest. Your Emi.

That sound, Emilia's voice, hits you like a shot of adrenaline, more potent than any combat stim. Your bare feet move silently across the wood floor as you head for the stairs, robe now firmly tied, ready for a completely different kind of mother-daughter moment.

"Thanks for the ride, Mrs. Patel!" Emilia's voice carries from the entryway, followed by the sound of the front door closing.

You pause at the top of the stairs, taking a moment to observe without being seen; an old habit. From your vantage point, you can see the living room but not the kitchen, where Emilia is presumably dropping her backpack and lunchbox. You hear the refrigerator door open and close, the crinkling of a snack wrapper. Everyday sounds that should be mundane but instead feel precious, collected like souvenirs from a normal life you only get to visit.

You descend the stairs quietly, still unnoticed. The house smells like the cinnamon candles Chan lights when he knows you're coming home; it’s his way of making the space feel warm, lived-in. The hardwood is cool under your feet, grounding you in this moment, in this home that sometimes feels like it belongs to someone else.

Emilia bounds into the living room from the kitchen, a yogurt pouch in one hand between her lips being sucked dry, her dark curls escaping from what was once a neat braid this morning. She's in her ballet uniform, a light pink leotard, brown tights that match her skin tone, and a pair of soccer shorts that she probably traded with her tutu after class. When she sees you at the bottom of the stairs, she freezes for a split second, her eyes growing comically wide.

"MOM!" The yogurt pouch drops to the floor, forgotten, as she launches herself across the room.

You brace yourself just in time as forty-five pounds of pure muscle and enthusiasm slams into you with a powerful leap that would put pro basketball players to shame. Emilia's arms wrap around your neck like a vise, her legs encircling your waist. You stagger back a step, laughing as you secure your hold on her.

"Well, hello to you too, Emi," you say, pressing your face into her hair. She smells like strawberries and playground dust and the faint chemical sweetness of whatever craft project her class did today.

"You're home!" she squeals directly into your ear, the volume making you wince even as you smile. "I didn't know you'd be here! Dad said maybe next week! But you're here now! Are you staying? How long? Can you come to my recital? Did you bring me anything? I missed you so much!"

The questions come in a breathless rush, no pause for answers. You carry her to the couch, her body still clinging to yours like a koala. When you sit, she immediately settles in your lap, finally pulling back enough to beam at you with Chan's same smile and dimples and your intensity.

"Slow down, squirrel," you say, tucking a strand of hair behind her ear. "One question at a time."

Emilia bounces slightly on your lap, unable to contain her energy. "Are you staying?"

The question, the same one Isabella would ask with guarded eyes and careful indifference, comes from Emilia with nothing but hope. No accusation, no memory of past disappointments. Not yet.

"No," you say, because you never make promises you can't keep. "But I’ll only be gone for about two weeks this time."

Her face lights up. "So you'll be at my recital at the end of the month?"

"Front row." You tap her nose with your finger. "Wouldn't miss it."

Emilia throws her arms around you again, squeezing with surprising strength for a ten year old. Her small hands pat at your back, your arms, your face, as if reassuring herself that you're really here, solid and present.

"Tell me about your day," you say when she finally releases you.

That's all the invitation she needs. Emilia launches into a detailed account of everything that happened since she woke up this morning: the pancakes Chan made (chocolate chip, with extra syrup), the spelling test she aced (twenty out of twenty, even getting "necessary" right), the drama at lunch (Maya wouldn't sit with Zoe because Zoe said Maya's new haircut looked weird but Emilia loves it), and the art project (papier-mâché planets, which explains the dried paste under her fingernails).

You nod and make appropriate sounds of interest, but mostly you just watch her face, the animated expressions, the dramatic eye rolls, the way her hands never stop moving as she talks. She's so much like Chan in these moments, the same inability to tell a story without his entire body becoming involved.

"And then in dance class," she continues without missing a beat, "Ms. Leanne said my arabesque is getting much better, and I might get to be in the front row for the spring showcase if I keep up the good work. Look!"

She scrambles off your lap and stands in the middle of the living room, striking a pose with one leg extended behind her, arms gracefully positioned. Her form is near perfect, and her face shows fierce concentration.

"Very impressive," you say, meaning it. The last time she showed you this move, she was quite wobbly. "When did you get so good at this?"

"I practice every day," she says proudly, switching to an attitude by effortlessly bringing her lifted leg forward and bending it to 90 degrees. "Dad helps me. He holds my hand so I don't fall over."

The image of Chan, all 5’7” of him, still in scrubs after a twelve-hour shift, patiently holding Emilia's small hand while she practices ballet poses makes something twist in your chest. All the things that happen when you're not here, small moments building a life without you.

"And for cheerleading, Coach says I have the best spirit, even if I'm not the loudest." Emilia drops the ballet pose and immediately breaks into what must be a cheer routine, complete with jumps and claps. "Ready? Okay! Tigers, tigers, roar and fight! Win this game with all your might!"

Her solitary braid bounces as she jumps, feet landing with heavy thuds that probably have the next door neighbors wondering if you're renovating. You don't care. You'd let her stomp through the floorboards if it kept that smile, Chan’s smile, on her face.

"I'm working on my standing back handspring too," she says, breathless. "I already have the roundoff back handspring. Wanna see?"

"Maybe not indoors," you suggest quickly, having visions of Emilia's feet connecting with the coffee table. "But I'd love to see it in the backyard tomorrow morning."

"Promise?" She bounces back to the couch, landing half on you with her elbow digging into your thigh.

"Promise." This one feels safe to make.

She nestles against you, suddenly calmer, her small body warm against yours. Her fingers trace the old scar on your forearm, a thin tan line, slighter lighter than your skin tone, from a mission in Jakarta that she thinks came from a cooking accident. You never correct her. She’s loved playing with it since she was baby.

"I made you something," she says, her voice softer now. "It's in my backpack."

"Yeah? What is it?"

"It's a surprise." She looks up at you, her expression suddenly serious. "I make you something every week. Dad helps me keep them in a special box for when you come home."

Your throat tightens. "That's... that's really sweet, Emi."

"There's a lot in there," she says, and there's no accusation in her voice, just a statement of fact. "Dad says it's okay because your job is important. You help people, just like he does."

You swallow hard. "I try to."

"Are you like a superhero?" she asks, eyes wide and earnest. "Is that why you have to go away sometimes? To save people?"

The question catches you off guard. You look down at your daughter sporting Chan's face and your determination, all wrapped in innocent curiosity, and wonder what to tell her. Not the truth, certainly. Not about the blood and the fear and the moments when you've been more monster than hero.

"Not a superhero," you say carefully. "Just someone doing a job that sometimes takes me away from the people I love most." You press a kiss to the top of her head. "Which is the hardest part of all."

Emilia seems to consider this, her fingers still tracing the scar on your arm. "I think you're a superhero," she decides. "But with a secret identity. That's why you can't tell us everything."

You laugh softly. "Something like that."

She beams, satisfied with her own conclusion, and launches into an explanation of her cheerleading competition next month, complete with demonstrations of the "super hard" clap sequence they have to learn. Her hands pat against yours as she tries to teach you, her smaller fingers drumming impatiently when you deliberately mess up just to hear her giggle.

"No, Mom, like this!" She takes your hands in hers, manipulating your fingers with determined concentration. Her touch is light but insistent, the casual physical contact of a child who hasn't yet learned to guard affection.

Time slips away as Emilia continues her cheerful monologue, bouncing from topic to topic: the class hamster's escape attempt, the new girl who can speak three languages, the birthday party where they had an actual magician. You absorb each detail like water in a desert, storing them away for the next time you're somewhere you can't be reached, when these memories will have to sustain you.

Eventually, you notice the angle of the sunlight changing, the late afternoon stretching toward evening. You check the delicate watch on your wrist, a gift from Chan, engraved with a date that means something only to the two of you, the day you first said I love you to each other.

"Homework time, Emi," you say gently, stroking her hair.

She groans dramatically, flopping back against the couch cushions. "Do I have to? You just got home!"

"I'll still be here after homework," you promise. "And maybe we can convince Dad to get ice cream later."

"Vanilla and chocolate fudge sundae?" She perks up immediately.

"Is there any other kind?"

She scrambles off the couch with the same enthusiasm she showed jumping into your arms. "I only have math today. It's easy. I'll be done super fast!"

"Take your time and do it right," you call as she races to retrieve her backpack from the kitchen.

"I will!" she shouts back, already halfway out of the room.

You stay on the couch for a moment longer, listening to the sounds of her rummaging through her bag, the scratch of a chair being pulled out at the kitchen table. Normal sounds. Home sounds. You stretch, feeling the pleasant ache in your muscles from earlier activities with Chan, and think about checking in on him. The bedroom door was closed when you came downstairs. He's probably napping; the hospital had him working overnight shifts all week.

You rise from the couch, pausing to pick up Emilia's discarded yogurt pouch from the floor. As you toss it in the trash, you hear the soft scratch of pencil on paper from the kitchen table and smile to yourself. Two daughters. Two completely different relationships. Both worth coming home for.

It's time to check on your husband.

You approach the master bedroom with careful steps, the residual warmth of Emilia's enthusiasm still humming under your skin. The door stands slightly ajar, a thin blade of light cutting across the hallway floor. You push it open just enough to slip through, then turn and deliberately slide the lock into place, a pointed correction to the earlier oversight. The room is dim, curtains drawn against the afternoon sun, but there's enough light to see Chan waiting for you, propped against the headboard with an iPad forgotten in his lap. His eyes find yours immediately, warm and patient and knowing, a smile playing at the corners of his mouth. The air between you feels charged, heavy with unspoken thoughts.

"Locked this time?" he asks, his voice a low rumble that still, after all these years, sends a current down your spine.

"Lesson learned." You move toward the bed, shedding the tension of parenting with each step. "Though I think we scarred our daughter for life."

Chan sets aside his iPad and extends a hand to you. His fingers are long, elegant despite their strength. Surgeon's hands that have both saved lives and mapped every inch of your body. "She'll survive. I did, after walking in on my parents when I was twelve."

"That's exactly what I told her." You take his hand, letting him pull you onto the bed beside him. The mattress dips beneath your combined weight, bodies gravitating toward each other like planets locked in orbit.

Chan's thumb traces circles on your palm, a small, mindless gesture that feels more intimate than a kiss. His hair is mussed, dark waves falling across his forehead. At forty-two, there's a bit of silver threading through the black at his temples, lines deepening around his eyes, evidence of years spent squinting under surgical lights, of nights spent waiting for you to come home.

"How did it go with Isa?" he asks. "After she ran off screaming about her eyes burning."

You lean back against the pillows, your shoulder pressed against his. "Better than expected. We had the sex talk."

His eyebrows shoot up. "The full version?"

"As full as it gets when your teenager is dying of embarrassment." You run a hand through your hair, still damp and tangled from your earlier activities. "She asked about Jake."

Chan's expression shifts, the casual relaxation hardening into something more alert. "Jake? What about him?"

"He's been talking about sex." You watch your husband's face carefully, catching the slight tightening around his jaw, the narrowing of his eyes.

"She's sixteen," he says, as if reminding himself more than you.

"I was fifteen when I lost my virginity," you point out.

"Not helping."

“And you were…?” You know the answer already; he was sixteen and a junior counselor at a sleep away summer camp. You smile, nudging his shoulder playfully with yours when he ignores you instead of acknowledging his hypocrisy. "It’s not just Jake though. Apparently there are several people in their friend group who are now sexually active.” Chan makes a face. “I told her to wait until she's sure, to always use protection, and that her father would murder any boy who pressured her."

"Good advice." His hand finds yours again, fingers interlacing. "Though I wouldn't murder him. Maim, maybe."

"You wouldn't hurt a fly and we both know it."

Chan turns to you, his free hand coming up to cup your face. His palm is warm against your cheek, familiar and grounding. “Did you forget about that guy I punched for you?”

“How could I? It was so sexy and if we hadn’t already had sex, I certainly would have fucked you that night.” 

“If I recall correctly, you did fuck me that night,” he whispers. “We didn’t even make it out of the car.”

“I remember,” you whisper back before kissing the tip of his nose. 

He smiles before his face turns serious again. "For you and our girls? I'd do things that would shock you."

The intensity in his voice reminds you why you fell for him, this gentle man with a core of steel when it comes to protecting what he loves. Not so different from you, really, just operating on a different scale.

"I believe you," you say softly, turning to press a kiss to his palm.

His eyes soften again. "What about Emilia? I heard the elephant stampede downstairs. How she manages to create so much noise with that small body I will never know."

You laugh. "She showed me her arabesque and her cheerleading routine. Apparently, you've been helping her practice."

"Someone has to stop her from breaking her neck." His smile is fond, a little sad. "She misses you. Talks about you constantly."

The words settle like stones in your stomach, heavy with implications. "She thinks I'm a superhero with a secret identity."

"Aren't you?" Chan's question is light, but his eyes search yours.

"We both know I'm no hero." You look down at your hands; they’re unmarked now, but you can still feel phantom blood under your nails sometimes.

Chan lifts your chin, forcing your eyes back to his. "You are to them. To me."

The conviction in his voice threatens to undo you. This man who knows the worst of what you've done—not the details; not the who or the where; never the details, but enough—and still looks at you like this.

"I don't deserve you," you whisper.

"Probably not," he agrees with a grin, dimples appearing like punctuation marks at the end of his smile. "But you're stuck with me anyway."

His hand slides from your face to the nape of your neck, fingers tangling in your hair. The touch is gentle but deliberate, a question being asked. You answer by leaning in, closing the distance between you until your lips meet his.

The kiss is soft at first, tentative in a way your earlier coupling wasn't. That had been frantic, desperate, hands everywhere, two months of separation burned away in a fever of need. This is different. Slower. More deliberate.

Chan's lips move against yours with practiced patience, the kiss deepening by degrees. His tongue traces the seam of your mouth, and you open to him with a sigh that carries the weight of too many nights spent alone. His hand tightens in your hair, just enough to send a shiver down your spine, and you press closer, seeking his warmth.

Your robe has come loose again, the sash barely holding it together. Chan's free hand finds the gap, sliding inside to trace the curve of your waist, the dip of your spine. His touch is reverent, fingertips skimming over your skin as if rediscovering territory he's mapped a thousand times before.

"I missed you," he murmurs against your lips. "Every day."

You could say the same, but the words feel inadequate. Instead, you show him, shifting to straddle his lap, your robe falling open completely now. Chan's eyes darken as they sweep over you, taking in the scars and curves with equal appreciation. His hands settle on your hips, steadying you as you lean down to kiss him again.

This kiss is deeper, hungrier, but still controlled. You can feel him holding back, savoring each moment instead of rushing toward completion as you did earlier. His thumbs trace circles on your hipbones, a maddening tease that makes you rock against him instinctively.

He's still wearing his sweatpants, the thick cotton material doing nothing to hide his arousal. You grind down against him, swallowing his groan with your kiss. His hands slide up your sides, thumbs brushing the undersides of your breasts, a ghost of a touch that makes you arch toward him, seeking more.

"Chan," you breathe against his mouth.

He smiles, you can feel it in the kiss, and finally, finally cups your breasts fully, thumbs circling your nipples until they peak under his touch. Heat pools between your legs, a slow-building ache that's all the more intense for its unhurried development.

You reach between you to tug at his sweatpants, and he lifts his hips to help you slide them down. When you wrap your hand around his dick, his breath hitches, head falling back against the headboard. You watch his face, the flutter of his eyelashes, the parting of his lips, the flush spreading across his cheekbones. Beautiful. Yours.

His hands leave your breasts to cup your face, bringing you down for another kiss that's almost painfully tender. "I love you," he whispers against your lips. "Every part of you. The mother, the wife, the warrior. All of you."

The words break something open inside you. a dam holding back emotions you can't afford to feel in the field. Here, with him, you can be vulnerable. Here, with him, you're safe.

You guide his cock to your entrance, sinking down slowly, taking him in,  inch by inch until you're fully seated in his lap. The stretch is exquisite, your body still sensitive from earlier. Chan's hands return to your hips, not guiding, just holding, his eyes never leaving yours as you begin to move.

This isn't the frenzied coupling from before. This is a conversation without words, each roll of your hips a declaration, each responding thrust from him an answer. Your hands brace on his shoulders, feeling the coiled strength beneath warm skin. His thumbs press into the hollows beside your hipbones, not controlling but encouraging, matching your rhythm.

The room fills with the sound of your breathing, increasingly ragged, and the soft rustle of sheets beneath you. Chan leans forward to press his lips to the hollow of your throat, tongue tasting the salt of your skin. You tilt your head back, offering more of yourself to him, and his mouth traces a path up your neck to the sensitive spot behind your ear that makes you shudder.

"You feel like coming home," he murmurs, his voice rough with emotion and desire. "Every time."

You tighten around him at the words, drawing a groan from deep in his chest. His hands slide from your hips to your back, pulling you closer until your chests are pressed together, hearts beating against each other like birds in neighboring cages. The new angle changes everything, sends sparks shooting up your spine with each movement.

Chan's mouth finds yours again, the kiss messy and desperate now as the careful control begins to slip. One of his hands tangles in your hair, the other sliding between your bodies to where you're joined, his thumb finding the bundle of nerves that makes your rhythm falter.

"Look at me, baby," he urges, and you do, your eyes locking with his as he works you higher, his hips rising to meet yours with increasing urgency.

The pleasure builds like a tide, inevitable and overwhelming. You can feel yourself approaching the edge, your movements becoming less coordinated, more frantic. Chan holds you steady, his hand in your hair, his eyes on yours, his voice a constant stream of praise and encouragement.

"That's it, my love. Let go. I've got you."

And you do, coming apart in his arms with a cry that he catches with his mouth, kissing you through the waves of pleasure that leave you trembling and boneless against him. He follows a moment later, his rhythm stuttering, his arms tightening around you as he buries his face in your neck.

For several minutes, neither of you moves. Your heartbeats gradually slow, your breathing evens out. Chan's hands stroke lazily up and down your back, soothing and possessive at once. You press your face into the curve of his shoulder, inhaling the scent of him: clean sweat, faint traces of antiseptic that never quite wash away, and something uniquely him that you'd know blindfolded.

Eventually, you shift, sliding off him to curl against his side. He immediately pulls you closer, arranging your limbs until you're draped half across his chest, your head tucked under his chin. His fingers trace abstract patterns on your shoulder, dancing over old scars with familiar tenderness.

"Do you think Isabella will be okay?" you ask into the comfortable silence. "About what she saw, I mean."

Chan's chest rumbles with quiet laughter. "She'll be fine. Traumatized for a week, maybe, but fine. It's good for kids to know their parents still desire each other."

"Still?" You prop yourself up on one elbow to look at him, eyebrow raised. "Did you think that would change?"

His smile is soft, a little wistful. "Two months is a long time."

The unspoken truth hangs between you… that sometimes it's longer. That sometimes, you leave without knowing when you'll return. That he never asks where you go or what you do, because he understands the concept of classified information better than most civilians as someone who treats military personnel often with limited information , but also because he's afraid of the answers.

You trace the line of his jaw, feeling the slight stubble that's grown since this morning. "Some things don't change," you say. "No matter how long I'm gone."

He turns his head to kiss your palm, a mirror of your earlier gesture. "I know." His eyes hold yours, patient and understanding and so full of love it makes your chest ache. "I'm here. Always. No matter how long."

"I don't know why," you admit, voicing the doubt that creeps in during the darkest nights away from home. "I'm not here enough. I miss recitals and parent-teacher conferences and dinners…"

Chan silences you with a finger to your lips. "You're here now. That's what matters."

"Is it enough?" The question is barely audible.

"It has to be." He pulls you back down to rest against his chest. "Because I'm not going anywhere, and neither are the girls. We're your constants. Your fixed points."

"My home," you murmur, feeling sleep beginning to tug at the edges of your consciousness, your body heavy with satisfaction and the release of tension you didn't know you were carrying.

"Always." Chan presses a kiss to the top of your head. "Rest. I'll wake you before the girls get hungry enough to start a revolution."

You smile against his skin, allowing yourself to drift. Here, in this bed, with this man, you are not a weapon or an asset. You are not defined by the blood on your hands or the secrets you keep. You are simply loved. Completely, unconditionally, and without reservation.

It may not be enough to erase what you've done, but it's enough to remind you why you do it. Why you always come back, no matter how difficult the mission or how deep your cover. This. Them. The family that waits for you with open arms and understanding hearts.

Your last thought before sleep claims you is that maybe Emilia is right. Maybe you are a superhero, in your own way. Not because of what you do out there in the shadows, but because you've somehow managed to hold onto this… this slice of normal life, this love that persists despite everything.

And that might be the most heroic thing of all.

****

You wake to the gentle pressure of Chan's arm draped across your waist, his breath warm against your neck. The familiar weight anchors you to this moment, a fleeting treasure you're already mourning. Your body knows what your mind refuses to accept: by mid morning, you'll be gone again, your family a memory to sustain you through whatever waits beyond the threshold of your front door.

Chan stirs beside you, his consciousness rising to meet yours in the soft pre-dawn light filtering through the curtains. His eyes remain closed, but his fingers spread possessively across your hip, pulling you closer into the curve of his body. You feel the solid press of him against your back, a reminder of what you'll soon be without.

"You're thinking too loud," he mumbles, voice rough with sleep. His lips find the sensitive spot behind your ear. "I can hear the gears turning."

You turn in his arms, facing him with a half-smile. "Sorry. Occupational hazard."

"I know a cure for that." His eyes, now open, are warm brown pools that see too much.

When he kisses you, it's with the urgency of a timer counting down… because it is. His mouth moves against yours with a hunger that makes you forget, just for a moment, about passports and weapons and the car that will arrive in a few hours. His tongue pushes against yours, resulting in a moan that feels wrenched from somewhere deep inside.

Your hands tangle in his dark, wavy hair, still marveling, after seventeen years together, at how it feels like raw silk between your fingers. His left hand cups your face, thumb stroking your cheekbone, while his right travels a practiced path down your side, over the curve of your hip, gripping your thigh to pull it over his.

You arch against him, your body responding with the muscle memory of countless mornings like this. And nights, and stolen afternoons when the girls were at school. The kiss deepens, becomes something desperate and adolescent, and you bite his lower lip just hard enough to make him groan. His hand slides beneath your sleep shirt, fingers splaying across the small of your back where he knows you're sensitive.

"We shouldn't," you whisper against his mouth, even as your body contradicts your words, pressing closer.

"We should," he counters, rolling you beneath him, his weight a delicious pressure. "We absolutely should."

His mouth finds the pulse point low on your throat, and you gasp as he sucks gently, deliberately marking you. Leaving something of himself on your skin to take with you. His ritual. Your fingers dig into his shoulders, leaving crescent moons from your nails that will still be there when you're a thousand miles away.

"The girls," you remind him, but it's a weak protest.

"Still asleep. Emilia still sleeps like the dead," he says, confidence in every syllable. His hand slides lower, squeezing your ass. "Besides, we have a lock on the door now."

You want to say yes. Want to lose yourself in him one more time before you go. But the digital clock on the nightstand catches your eye. 5:37 AM. And reality slices through desire like a blade.

“Chan,” you say, as he continues to mark your throat. You’re fighting a losing battle with your own resolve, your mind urging you to stop, but your body screaming yes, yes, yes.

“You don’t even have to do anything,” he whispers, lips brushing your skin. He makes his way down your body as he moves lower, biting at your skin through the shirt along the way. Each nip of his teeth makes your resolve dissolve a little more. “Just lie there,” he encourages softly, words hot against the now uncovered skin of your lower belly. His fingers hook into your waistband, tugging your panties down and off, leaving you exposed and wanting more than you can handle. 

Then he's between your legs, looking up at you with that infuriating smirk that tells you he knows exactly what he's doing to you. You’re helpless. He nudges your knees open with his shoulders, and his breath is hot against your folds before his tongue even touches you. The anticipation alone is enough to make you gasp. Then he licks a slow, deliberate stripe up the center, and you nearly come undone.

“Ohhhhh,” you moan, the velvety slide of his tongue exquisite, each stroke sending electric currents through your entire body.

Your hands grip the sheets above your head, your body arching and offering itself to him, completely lost in the moment. He laps at you with slow, languid strokes, varying the pressure in a way that makes you writhe and gasp and forget about everything except this moment, this man, and the delicious torture of his mouth.

You give in with a kind of wild abandon, hips lifting off the bed as he sucks your clit hard. He knows exactly where to push, exactly how to make you lose yourself, exactly how to leave you trembling and weightless beneath him. You’re panting, the tight coil inside you winding tighter, tighter. Your mind starts to fade to white, filled with just him, just this.

You try to speak, but all that escapes is a breathless, desperate sound. He takes it for what it is and presses two fingers inside you. A groan tears from your throat as he curls them just right, in perfect time with the sinful orchestra of his tongue. You’re beyond caring if the entire block can hear. Each stroke and flick sends shockwaves through you, until you can barely stand it. Until you don't know how much longer you can hold on. 

Until you can’t hold on at all.

Your release is shattering, a white-hot explosion that leaves you shaking. You cum so hard you see stars.

“Fuck,” you breathe out, as Chan makes his ascent back up your body. “How are you still so good at that?”

“It’s easy when you’re so delicious,” he whispers against your lips before kissing you hard so that you can taste yourself. 

“I’d love to reciprocate, but I can’t move,” you say in between his kisses.

“Don’t worry about it babe. Next time.”

“Next time,” you whisper in agreement. “Definitely. Every day for a week at least. You deserve it.”

"I'll hold you to that," he says, pressing his forehead against yours before pressing a quick kiss to your lips.

You fall back asleep in his arms, your face tucked into the crook of his neck, breathing in the scent of his skin like it's oxygen, another memory to tuck away for when you’re gone. But sleep is fitful, plagued by dreams where you're running down endless hospital corridors, trying to find Chan and the girls, but every door you open leads to another empty room with blood on the floor.

When you wake again an hour later, the space beside you on the bed is cold. The clock reads 6:42 AM. Chan's already up, and the distant sounds of kitchen activity drift upstairs: the soft clunk of the refrigerator door, the gentle sizzle of bacon hitting a hot pan, Emilia's high, clear laugh followed by Isabella's deeper chuckle.

You lie still for a moment, eyes fixed on the ceiling, memorizing the contours of the small water stain in the corner that Chan keeps promising to fix. Another weekend project that will have to wait until you're home to help. Another piece of normal life suspended in your absence.

With a sigh, you swing your legs over the side of the bed. The hardwood is cool beneath your bare feet as you pad to the bathroom. The woman in the mirror looks back at you with dark, serious eyes. No visible bruises this time, at least, save for Chan’s love bite from this morning. The last one across your jaw a few months ago had been hard to explain to the girls.

You brush your teeth with mechanical precision, shower quickly. The hot water splashes over your body, washing away the last traces of sleep but not the weight in your chest. You dress in clothes that could belong to anyone: dark jeans, a deep green button-up short-sleeve shirt, sensible boots. Nothing memorable, nothing that would make a witness' description specific. Your wedding ring goes into a small hidden pocket in your bag, next to your real passport.

The duffel waits in the closet, already packed with generic clothes and toiletries. Thanks to Chan, that fucking saint. Sometime last night he’d removed your dirty clothes and repacked with clean ones. He’s also refilled your toiletries. You add a few last items: the photo of Chan and the girls at the beach last summer, folded small and tucked into an inner pocket where it won't get damaged. The worn silver chain with your mother's wedding ring that you never wear but can't bear to leave behind since she passed away.

When the bag is zipped, you place it by the bedroom door and stand for a moment, looking at the rumpled sheets, the indentation where Chan's head rested on his pillow. Your hand smooths over his side of the bed, a gesture both tender and final.

The hallway is quiet as you move down it, your footsteps deliberate and silent from years of training. You pass Isabella's room, door firmly closed as always, then Emilia's, half-open with stuffed animals visible on the unmade bed.

At the top of the stairs, the sounds from the kitchen become clearer: pans clattering, water running, the rhythmic scrape of a spatula. You descend carefully, one hand trailing along the banister, past the gallery of family photos that lines the wall. Chan insists on updating them regularly, filling the frames with evidence of a life you're only partially present for.

You pause at the kitchen doorway, unseen by your family, and the scene unfolds before you like a painting you want to step inside and never leave.

Chan stands at the stove in his worn blue pajama pants and a faded Georgetown Medical School t-shirt, flipping pancakes with the casual competence of a short-order cook. There’s a red glitter heart sticker just under his right eye and a silver star left of his chin. His hair is still mussed from sleep and your fingers, and he hums tunelessly as he works, occasionally glancing at the girls with a smile that crinkles the corners of his eyes. At forty-two, he's more handsome than when you met him during his first year of residency; the years have etched character into his face, deepening his dimples, adding scattered silver at his temples that makes your stomach flip every time you notice it.

Isabella sits at the island, long legs crossed on the stool, scrolling through her phone. At sixteen, she's all sharp angles and careful distance, her athletic frame draped in an oversized soccer jersey, her dark hair piled in a messy bun of coils on top of her head. You catch the blue glittery moon sticker on her neck; probably too cool to have it on her face like her dad. Chan never worries about being cool. Isa makes a dry comment that you can't quite hear, and Chan's laugh booms in response.

Emilia dances around the kitchen in a continuous orbit, setting the table with more energy than precision. Her pink pajamas have unicorns on them, and her dark hair bounces in a ponytail as she twirls between the fridge and the counter, chattering non-stop about a school project. She moves like Chan, all fluid grace and expressive hands, and has his features: eyes, nose, cheeks, dimpled smile, and his soft unruly curls. Chan’s mini-me. If you hadn’t seen her emerge from your own body with that same milk chocolatey brown skin as yours, you would have thought she was his clone. She has pink glittery hearts at the corner of each eye, and a silvery star that matches the placement of Chan’s.

The scene contracts your heart to the point of pain. This is what you protect, you tell yourself. This is why you do what you do. But the justification feels hollow as you watch Chan expertly juggle four different components of breakfast while engaging with the girls, as you see Isabella's genuine laugh when Emilia does a dramatic reading from the back of the syrup bottle, as you notice how your husband has already set out a mug for your coffee, the one with the chip in the handle that you refuse to throw away until the handle breaks off completely.

The kitchen smells of warmth. It’s maple syrup and fresh coffee, bacon and Chan's cologne, the ever-present scent of the lavender dish soap he insists on buying because he knows you love it. You stand frozen, absorbing every detail, storing it away to revisit in cold hotel rooms and surveillance vans.

Chan turns toward the doorway, some sixth sense alerting him to your presence, and for a second, your eyes meet across the kitchen. A smile blooms on his face, the one reserved only for you. It’s a complicated expression of love and resignation, desire and understanding, and the ache in your chest expands into something too large to contain.

You feel it then… that uncomfortable heat that you recognize as guilt.

You step into the kitchen, and the other two pairs of eyes swivel toward you with varying degrees of surprise and delight. The tableau freezes for a heartbeat: Chan with a spatula suspended in mid-air, Isabella's phone forgotten in her hand, Emilia halted mid-twirl with a napkin clutched to her chest. Then the moment breaks, and they're moving again, the kitchen's rhythm altering to accommodate your presence like a new instrument joining an established melody.

"The sleeping beauty awakens," Chan announces, his eyes crinkling at the corners. He's holding the spatula like a microphone now, gesturing grandly toward the table. "Just in time for Chan's Famous Breakfast Extravaganza."

Your packed bag sits heavily against your leg, a physical reminder of what comes next. You lean it against the wall, trying for casual, but the sound it makes hitting the floor is too final, too loud. “I thought the Breakfast Extravaganza was reserved for Saturdays,” you say with a soft smile. 

“Usually,” Chan starts, “but since you’re here, we moved it up a day.”

"Mom! Dad's putting jalapeños in the eggs again," Isabella says, her phone now recording Chan's culinary crimes for her latest TikTok series. "Tell him normal people don't want their breakfast to make them cry."

"Weak!" Chan declares, pointing the spatula at your eldest daughter. "Your mother likes them spicy. Don't you, babe?"

His eyes meet yours across the kitchen, and there's that familiar spark, the silent communication perfected over seventeen years of marriage, sharpened by the repeated partings and breathless reunions. 

Yes, you like things spicy. And yes, he's well aware of exactly how much heat you can handle.

"Mom likes them super spicy," Emilia chimes in, abandoning her napkin-folding to skip toward you. "Daddy says it's 'cause you have a dragon inside you."

Isabella rolls her eyes. "That was when you were like, five, Em."

Emilia wraps her arms around your waist, tilting her head back to look up at you with Chan's exact smile, dimples and all. "I know that now. Mom's just tough."

You run your hand over her hair, savoring the silken feel of it, just like Chan’s, knowing that in a few hours, your hands will be holding something much less gentle. "Tough enough for jalapeño eggs," you agree, pressing a kiss to the top of her head. “Unlike the rest of you!”

“I love how dad calls me weak when he can’t even handle black pepper,” Isabella says sassily.

“Watch it kid! I can eat spicy food… sometimes.”

“Not without crying and turning pink,” Isabella adds under her breath. 

“You would turn pink too if we were the same complexion, daughter. Genetics gave you my tastebuds.”

“And I got mom’s,” Emilia chirps, her arms still wrapped around you. You kiss her forehead before she walks away.

Chan flips a pancake with theatrical flair, catching it perfectly on the other side. Isabella slow-claps, her sarcasm not quite hiding her admiration for his dexterity. He takes a bow, then glances at the clock on the microwave, a casual gesture that couldn't be less casual.

"Do you have time to stay for breakfast?" he asks, his tone light but his eyes serious. He knows the answer already. He always asks anyway.

"You know I can't," you reply, the familiar script bitter in your mouth.

Chan sets down the spatula and crosses to you, his movements as deliberate as they are graceful. He rests his hands on your hips, tugging you closer until you're flush against his chest. The smell of him, sandalwood, coffee and sleep-warm skin, wraps around you like a favorite blanket.

"Can't?" he murmurs, his bottom lip pushing out in an exaggerated pout that has no business being so effective on a forty-two year old trauma surgeon. "Or won't?"

His lips brush against yours, a whisper of a kiss that promises more. You're acutely aware of the girls watching, Isabella pretending disinterest while still recording, Emilia unabashedly staring with a hopeful grin.

"The car will be here soon," you remind him, but your hands betray you, rising to rest on his chest. You can feel his heartbeat through the worn fabric of his shirt, steady and familiar.

"It can wait, no? Like ten, fifteen minutes? That's practically forever," he says, kissing the corner of your mouth. "Time enough for pancakes, at least."

"Dad, ew, the eggs are burning," Isabella interrupts, though nothing is on fire. She's wearing the expression of teenaged disgust that barely masks her pleasure at seeing her parents still so obviously into each other.

Chan turns his head toward her but doesn't release you. "Impossible. I'm a professional."

"Yeah, at taking people apart, not cooking," Isabella retorts, but she's smiling as she says it.

"Show some respect to your father, the Pancake King," you say, and Chan beams at you, knowing he's winning this battle.

"Stay," he whispers, his forehead touching yours. "Just for breakfast. The world won't end if you're twenty minutes late."

But sometimes it would, is the thing you can't say. Sometimes twenty minutes is the difference between extraction and abandonment, between a mission completed and a target lost, between life and…

You push the thought away, focusing instead on the pressure of Chan's hands, warm through the fabric of your jeans as they slide to your ass. On Emilia, who has returned to setting the table, humming the same tuneless melody her father was. On Isabella, who's watching you with eyes too perceptive, too knowing for sixteen.

"Please, Mom," Emilia says, wielding the word like a weapon she knows you have no defense against. "Dad made blueberry pancakes. The good kind with the lemon zest."

"It’s a new recipe. And he'll be impossible to live with if you don't at least try them," Isabella adds, her tone casual but her eyes pleading in a way her words aren't. “And Emi can’t eat all those jalapeño eggs by herself.

Chan's hands travel up your sides, a slow ascent that leaves heat in their wake. "Thirty minutes," he bargains, pressing a kiss to your neck,  first on the mark he’s left, then just below your ear. "That's all I'm asking. Thirty minutes of normalcy before you go be a badass."

The offer is seductive in its simplicity: thirty minutes of what other people take for granted. Thirty minutes of chewing blueberry pancakes while Isabella details the latest drama with her soccer team and friend group. Thirty minutes of watching Emilia demonstrate her back handspring. Thirty minutes of Chan's knee pressed against yours under the table, his fingers occasionally brushing yours as he passes the syrup.

Your training screams against it. Protocol demands that you maintain separation, that you don't establish patterns, that you never, ever delay a departure. But protocol didn't account for Chan's fucking adorable dimples or the way Emilia's eyes shine with hope, or how Isabella is trying so hard to look like she doesn't care when you all know she does.

"Thirty minutes," you agree, finally caving, and the kitchen explodes with activity.

"YES!" Emilia pumps her fist in the air, a gesture so like Chan that your heart contracts.

Isabella tries to hide her smile behind her phone, but you catch it, a flash of relief, quickly masked.

Chan kisses you full on the mouth, a quick, passionate press that conveys everything he's not saying: Thank you. I miss you already. Come back to me.

When he pulls away, he's wearing a grin like he just won the lottery. Only Chan can manage to beg for ten extra minutes, and end up with thirty. “Girls, I’ll take you to school late so that we don’t have to rush,” he calls over his shoulder before he releases you and walks to the kitchen counter. "Well, don't just stand there looking pretty," he says, tossing you an apron that was hanging on one of the cabinet knobs. "Make yourself useful, babe."

The apron hits you in the chest, and you catch it reflexively. It's baby blue, with "Spice Handler" embroidered across the front in white letters. A Christmas gift from Chan three years ago that made the girls groan and you laugh until you cried.

"Bossy," you retort, but you're already tying it around your waist.

"You love it," he says, returning to the stove where the eggs are, in fact, just starting to stick to the pan.

And that's the bitch of it. You do. You love this impossible man with his terrible dad jokes and his gifted hands that can spend six hours reassembling someone's shattered femur and then come home to make elaborate breakfasts for his daughters. You love the life you've built together, these stolen moments of normalcy between assignments that get more dangerous every year.

You take a second to text your driver and your team, alerting them to the delay. Then you move to the counter beside your man, picking up a knife to slice the cantaloupe waiting on the cutting board. The weight of it in your hand is different from the knives you use for work; it’s lighter, less balanced, but your hands are just as precise. Chan watches you from the corner of his eye, always a little turned on by your competence with blades.

"Nice technique," he murmurs, bumping his hip against yours. "Very… efficient. And sexy."

"Eyes on your own work, Dr. Bahng," you warn, but you're smiling, feeling the tension in your shoulders loosen incrementally.

Across the kitchen, Isabella has abandoned her phone to pour orange juice into glasses, while Emilia arranges bacon on a paper towel, blotting the excess grease with the methodical focus of a bomb technician.

"So, like, when will you be back?" Isabella asks, her back to you, voice carefully modulated to sound casual.

The question hangs in the air. It's not one she usually asks, knowing the answer is always the same: I don't know.

You pause, knife hovering over the half-sliced cantaloupe. "I'm hoping before your next tournament in three weeks," you say, knowing it's risky to even suggest such a timeline. Knowing how much it will hurt if… when… you miss it. 

Isabella turns, juice pitcher still in hand, her eyes wide. "Really?"

The hope in her voice makes your chest ache. But this mission is supposed to be just surveillance. If everything is routine, you’ll be back in ten days. But in your line of work, very few things end up being ‘routine’. "As long as everything goes as planned, yes. And I'll do my best to make that happen," you say, which is all you've ever been able to promise.

She nods, understanding the unspoken disclaimer. But there's a small smile playing at the corner of her mouth as she returns to her task, and you count it as a win.

Chan slides up behind you, his chest warm against your back as he reaches around to steal a piece of cantaloupe. His lips brush your ear as he chews. "Delicious," he says, and you know he's not talking about the fruit.

"Insufferable," you counter, but you lean back into him anyway, allowing yourself this moment of contact. He kisses your neck softly. “And you have something on your face,” you add, referring to the stickers.

“They make me look pretty and sparkly,” he says with a grin. “Just the way you like me.” He snuggles into you, rubbing his nose on your face. You chuckle in response as you roll your eyes.

“I have some for you, too!” Emilia exclaims, bouncing over with a half-filled sticker sheet in her hand. “Which one do you want?”

“Can you choose something that matches my outfit, please?” Emi nods as she assesses what you’re wearing, then chooses a black sparkly star before peeling it off and pressing it to your left cheek. “That one’s perfect. Thank you, Emi.” You kiss her on the nose and she beams before skipping away.

The eggs are done, the pancakes stacked high on a platter, the bacon crisp, the fruit arranged in a colorful display that Chan insists makes it taste better. You all settle around the table, a choreographed routine of passing dishes and pouring syrup and arguing over who gets the crispiest pieces of bacon.

"Mom, tell Dad that his pancakes are better than IHOP," Emilia says around a mouthful, her cheeks bulging like a chipmunk's.

"Don't talk with your mouth full, squirrel," Chan chides, but he's looking at you expectantly, waiting for your verdict.

You cut a piece, make a show of placing it in your mouth and chewing thoughtfully, as Chan makes a face that questions, Well…? "I don't know... those IHOP ones with the face are pretty darn tasty."

Chan clutches his chest in mock horror. "Betrayed! By my own wife!"

"The face ones do hit different," Isabella agrees, hiding her smile behind her juice glass.

"Oh, I see how it is. Gang up on the chef." Chan reaches over to tickle Emilia, who squeals and squirms in her chair. "At least my Emi loves my cooking, don't you, baby girl?"

"Dad! Stop!" she giggles, nearly knocking over her juice. "I love IHOP too!"

You catch Isabella's eye across the table, sharing a moment of amusement at Chan and Emilia's antics. She holds your gaze for a beat longer than usual, and you see it there, the silent plea that echoes your own heart. 

Stay. Just stay.

"These are better than any restaurant," you say quietly, and Chan stops tickling Emilia to look at you. "Always have been."

His smile is soft, private. "Yeah?"

"Yeah." You reach for his hand across the table, squeeze once. "Nobody makes them like you, Channie."

The timer on your phone chimes, a warning that your thirty minutes are nearly up. The sound slices through the warmth of the moment like a cold knife, and everyone at the table stiffens slightly.

"Ten more minutes," Chan says, his hand tightening on yours. It's not a question.

You should say no. You should stand up, gather your things, and wait by the door for the car. That's what the protocol demands. That's what twenty years of training has ingrained in you.

Instead, you nod. "Ten more minutes." Somehow, again, Chan has managed to squeeze an extra forty minutes out of you and it makes you smile. If you weren’t the senior officer on your team, you’d be in deep shit.

And as Chan's face lights up, as Emilia launches into a story about her science project, as Isabella offers you the last piece of bacon with a small, shy smile, you think: Some rules are meant to be broken. Even yours.

These extra forty minutes stretch and contract like a living thing, the kitchen becoming a sanctuary. Time behaves differently here… slowing for the brush of Chan's fingers against your wrist as he takes a plate from your hands, accelerating through Emilia's breathless stories about school drama, stretching languorously when Isabella actually laughs at something you say. You move among them like a ghost already, memorizing details: the coffee stain on Chan's shirt collar, the chip in Emilia's purple nail polish, the new silver hoop in Isabella's right ear, a new piercing that you hadn't noticed before. Chan probably did it for her.

"Mom, you're doing it again," Isabella says, catching you staring as she loads dishes into the dishwasher.

"Doing what?" you ask, though you know exactly what she means.

"That thing where you look at us like you're taking mental pictures." She slides a plate into the rack with precise movements. "It's creepy."

"Creepy? My own daughter thinks I'm creepy for looking at her?" You clutch your chest in exaggerated hurt, and Chan snorts from where he's wiping down the stove.

"She got you there, babe," he says, flicking the dish towel in your direction.

Isabella rolls her eyes, but there's a smile fighting at the corners of her mouth. "I just mean... you don't have to memorize us. We'll still be here when you get back."

The simplicity of the statement, both promise and accusation, catches you off guard. You reach out to tuck a stray coil behind her ear, an excuse to touch her. She allows it, which feels like its own kind of victory.

"I know," you say, though you're all too aware that in your line of work, there are no guarantees. "I just like looking at you. You gorgeous creature that I created. Is that a crime?"

"If it is, lock me up too," Chan says, abandoning the stove to wrap his arms around you from behind, hooking his chin over your shoulder to stare at Isabella with an identical wide-eyed expression. "Look at our beautiful daughter, so grown up, so angsty."

"Oh my gawd," Isabella groans, but she's laughing now, her shoulders shaking. "You guys are the worst." Chan reaches over to tickle her and she playfully slaps his hand away.

"The absolute worst," Emilia agrees, appearing from nowhere to join the conversation, her face smeared with what looks like chocolate. "Dad let me lick the spatula after he made chocolate milk, and now I'm WIRED."

Chan gives her a mock-stern look. "Snitch!"

"Wired how?" you ask, reaching out to wipe the chocolate from the corner of her mouth with your thumb. "Like, ready to clean your room wired? Because that would be very convenient."

Emilia wrinkles her nose. "No, like, ready to show you my new cheer routine before you go wired."

"Ah," you say, as if considering a serious proposition. "That sounds more plausible."

"Please?" She bounces on her toes, all kinetic energy and hope. "It'll only take like two minutes, I promise, and Madison says I'm getting really good at the toe touches."

You glance at the clock. Your extra ten minutes are nearly up.

Chan's arms tighten around your waist, his breath warm against your ear as he whispers, "Say yes babe. The world can wait two more minutes."

You lean back into his solid warmth, allowing yourself to absorb his certainty. "Let's see it, Em."

Emilia's face lights up like Times Square, and she dashes into the living room, shoving furniture aside to create a performance space. Isabella follows, shaking her head but settling onto the couch with her phone ready to record, always the supportive big sister beneath the layers of teenage indifference.

Chan takes your hand, threading his fingers through yours with practiced ease, and leads you to join them. The simple contact of his palm against yours, slightly calloused from weightlifting, warm and dry and familiar, sends electricity up your arm, a reminder of all the ways your bodies know each other. He sits on the floor and pulls you down next to him, draping your legs over his.

"Ready?" Emilia calls, positioned in the center of the room, feet together, arms at her sides, the perfect picture of concentration.

"Ready," you and Chan answer in unison, and she launches into a routine of jumps and claps and spins that looks impossibly complicated to your eyes but has Chan nodding along with professional assessment as her personal trainer.

"Nice height on that jump, Em," he calls out, and she beams without breaking stride.

You watch your younger daughter's face, the fierce determination, the flash of joy when she nails her standing back handspring, the quick glance at you to make sure you're paying attention. Ten years old and already she understands the value of the moments when you're actually present. The thought cuts deep, a blade slipping between your ribs with surgical precision.

When she finishes, striking a pose with her arms raised in a V, you and Chan applaud wildly while Isabella whistles through her teeth, a trick Chan taught her that you've never quite mastered.

"That was amazing, squirrel," you say, opening your arms as she runs to you, crashing into your chest with the full force of her small body. You breathe in the scent of her hair, strawberry shampoo and the lingering sweetness of syrup, and close your eyes, another memory to store away.

"Was it really good?" she asks, her voice muffled against your shirt. "Like, good enough for when we have the big competition in a couple months?"

A couple months. Another event you'll likely miss, another milestone observed through Chan's detailed text messages and video clips.

"It was perfect," you assure her, meeting Chan's eyes over her head. He gives you a small nod that says, I'll record everything, I'll make sure she knows you wished you were there, I'll handle it. As he always does. “And holy shit that back handspring was spectacular!” you add, causing Emilia to giggle. She always giggles when you swear. Which you do often. Isa used to giggle too; now she’s used to it.

Your phone chimes again; not a warning this time, but a notification. The car is outside.

The atmosphere in the room shifts like a weather change, sun giving way to clouds. Emilia's arms tighten around your waist. Isabella's smile falters, her eyes dropping to her phone though the screen is dark. Chan's jaw flexes, a tiny muscle jumping in his cheek, making the glitter star scatter light.

"Time to go, huh?" he says, his voice carefully neutral.

You nod, unable to force words past the sudden thickness in your throat.

Goodbyes in your household have a protocol all their own. You disentangle from Emilia's grasp, kneeling to her level. Her eyes are already shining with unshed tears, her lower lip caught between her teeth in a valiant effort not to cry.

"Be good for Dad," you say, smoothing her hair back from her forehead. "Help with the dishes without complaining. Finish that science project. And practice those toe touches; they're already incredible, but by the time I get back, they'll be Olympic-level."

"When will that be?" she asks. It’s the same question every time, though she knows the answer.

"As soon as I can," you say. It’s the same answer every time, though you all know it's not enough.

She nods solemnly, then throws her arms around your neck, squeezing with surprising strength. "I love you a million billion," she whispers, your private exchange.

"I love you a million billion and one," you reply, pressing a kiss to her temple before letting her go.

Isabella stands awkwardly by the couch, hands shoved in the pockets of her sweatpants. Approaching her is like approaching a half-wild animal; too much eagerness will make her retreat, too little will convince her you don't care.

"I'll do my best to make it to the tournament," you say, keeping a careful distance.

She shrugs one shoulder, the picture of adolescent indifference. "Whatever. It's just the semifinals."

Just the semifinals that she's been training for all season. Just the semifinals that could lead to a championship. Just the semifinals that might catch the eye of college scouts.

"I'll be tracking the scores of the games between now and then," you promise. "And bothering your father for constant updates."

"Hourly," Chan confirms. "Whether she likes it or not."

A small smile flickers across Isabella's face before she can suppress it. "Just... be careful, okay?" she says, eyes darting up to meet yours, then away.

The words strike like physical blows. Be careful. Such a normal thing for a daughter to say to a mother. Such an impossible promise for you to make.

"Always am," you say lightly, stepping forward to pull her into a quick hug. She allows it, arms stiff at her sides for a moment before they come up to return the embrace. “And I made an appointment for you with Dr. Ross for next week to get birth control,” you whisper softly so that only she can hear. “And if you want to wait for me to go with you, just let dad know to reschedule it for when I’m back. Totally your choice, okay.” She nods against your shoulder.

"Love you," she mumbles into your shoulder, so quietly you almost miss it.

"Love you too, Isa," you reply, using the nickname she pretends to hate but secretly loves. When you pull back, her eyes are suspiciously bright, but no tears fall. She's so much like you sometimes it's terrifying.

And then there's Chan, standing by the door with your bag already in hand, watching you with eyes that see everything: your fear, your resolve, your gratitude for him, your guilt about leaving. Seventeen years together, and he's never once made you feel like you have to choose between your family and your duty. Never once suggested that the work you do isn't worth the sacrifice. Never once failed to be here, solid and steady, when you return.

You cross to him, taking the bag from his hand, letting your fingers linger against his. "Thank you for making me stay for breakfast," you say, the words carrying the weight of so much more: Thank you for understanding. Thank you for loving me anyway. Thank you for making a home I can always come back to.

"Anytime," he replies, his smile soft at the edges. "Literally any time. Even if you call at 3 AM and say you're coming home, I'll have pancakes waiting."

You laugh, the sound catching on the edges of the emotion lodged in your throat. “And jalapeño eggs?” He nods. "I know you would."

His hands come up to frame your face, thumbs brushing over your cheekbones. "Hey," he says, voice dropping to a register meant only for you. "Remember what you're coming home to."

Then he kisses you, and it's not the frantic, desperate kiss of earlier. This is slow, deliberate, a promise and a claim. His lips move against yours with practiced precision, knowing exactly how to make you forget, just for a moment, about anything beyond the two of you. Your hands fist in his shirt, pulling him closer, memorizing the feel of him: the solid wall of his chest, the beat of his heart under your palm, the slight scratch of stubble against your skin.

When you pull away, you're both breathing harder. Behind you, Emilia makes a gagging sound, and Isabella mutters something that sounds like "get a room," but there's no real heat in it.

"I'll call when I can," you say, the familiar departure script.

Chan nods, tucking a strand of hair behind your ear, mirroring when you did the same for Isa moments ago. "We'll be here."

You shoulder your bag, turn toward the door, then pause to look back at them, your family, arranged in a tableau that will sustain you through whatever comes next. Chan with his arm around Emilia, who leans against his side, Isabella standing slightly apart but still undeniably part of the unit. Your heart contracts painfully, a physical response to leaving them that never gets easier.

"Bye," you say, the word absurdly inadequate.

"Bye, Mom," Emilia calls, waving enthusiastically.

"See you," Isabella adds, lifting her hand in a more restrained gesture.

"Come back to me," Chan says quietly, the same words every time, his eyes holding yours.

"Always," you promise, the same response every time. And you mean it; you will always come back to him, to them, whatever it takes. 

Until the day you can't.

The front door closes behind you with a soft click, and the world beyond your home reasserts itself… the waiting car at the curb, the driver, Dan, standing by the open rear door, the weight of the bag on your shoulder containing everything you need to become someone else. Your skin feels too tight suddenly, like you're molting, shedding the person who makes pancakes with her family on Friday mornings and embracing the one who does things governments deny knowledge of.

You slide into the back seat of the nondescript black sedan, setting your bag beside you. The car pulls away from the curb, and you allow yourself one glance back at the house, your anchor point, your true north. Through the living room window, you catch a glimpse of them still standing together, Chan's arm now around both girls. That familiar ache returns. 

No government-issued cocktail of meds can fix the pain of leaving them behind again. Because this—Chan, your daughters Isabella and Emilia, their love—is the real medicine you need to take the edge off.

A single tear escapes, tracking down your cheek, the only one you'll allow yourself. You brush it away with a quick, impatient gesture and slip on your sunglasses, blinking rapidly until the burning in your eyes subsides.

Dan, meets your gaze in the rearview mirror. "Airport, lieutenant?"

"Yes," you say, your voice now cool and professional, the softness of home packed away like civilian clothes. You pull a folder from your bag, scanning the contents with practiced efficiency. "And I'll need to make a stop on the way." He nods as you give him the address. He pauses for a second, before tapping his left cheek lightly. You reach up to touch the same spot, finding the forgotten glitter sticker. “Oh… thanks Dan,” you say as you start to peel it off. He nods again, this time with a small knowing smile, then refocuses on the road ahead. You place the star inside the pocket of your bag, pressing it onto the fabric. 

As the car accelerates down the quiet suburban street, you feel the transformation complete; wife and mother receding, agent ascending. You run through mental checklists, review contingency plans, prepare yourself for what waits at the end of this journey.

But beneath it all, like a hidden compartment in a suitcase with a false bottom, you carry them with you: the taste of Chan's kiss, the sound of Emilia's laugh, the rare gift of Isabella's smile. Not baggage, but ballast. The reason you'll do whatever it takes to complete the mission.

The reason you'll always find your way home.

A/N: Every time I edited this, the goodbye scene always made me tear up. Every damn time. Hope you liked it! Share your thoughts.

My Masterlist

[thewinterdrafts]

Flesh and Metal | The White Wolf

Pairing: Bucky Barnes x Reader (1st Person)

Word Count: 6,062

Summary: Bucky Barnes is everything you ever wanted—soft, thoughtful, devoted. He loves you with a quiet intensity that should make you feel like the luckiest person alive. But after so many months of being together, he still hasn’t touched you. Not like that. When you finally confront him, you realize the truth is so much deeper. He does want you. He just doesn’t know how to ask. And tonight, for the first time—he’s finally ready to give in.

Warnings: 18+ NSFW, Sub!Bucky (lots of begging you guys), Angst, Swearing, Dominance & submission dynamics, Self-doubt & insecurity, Trauma responses & PTSD, Fear of abandonment & rejection, BDSM themes (light control, praise, permission-based dynamics), Overstimulation & begging, Implied past abuse

A/N: hey guys! this is my first ever story here, and i've worked so hard on it, my brain might dissolve through my ears tonight. i hope you'll like it, happy reading 🤍

📍Masterlist

It has been four months. Four months and one day, to be exact, since Bucky Barnes became mine. I’ve never heard so many people congratulate me and warn me in the same breath, but I never cared. Not when he’s been so precious, so thoughtful, so achingly romantic. Not when he’s spent every single day making me feel like the luckiest girl in the world.

I love him more than life itself. And with him—life and death feel closer than they should.

So why does it feel like I’m still not enough?

Four months, and he hasn't touched me. Not once. Not like that. 

Every time I try, every time I lean in, every time I press just a little too close, he pulls away. Sometimes subtly, sometimes not. Sometimes it’s a hesitant step back, sometimes it’s a firm grip on my wrist, pushing me away just enough to make it clear.

I tried everything. Cute lingerie. Whispered invitations. I even got my hair done for our anniversary last night. Nothing helped, I couldn't shake his composed demeanor, no matter what I did.

Maybe, he doesn’t want me at all. Why would he?

The Bucky Barnes could have anyone. Someone like Natasha—gorgeous, cool, effortlessly magnetic. The kind of woman who could hold her own against a super soldier, the kind who wouldn’t hesitate. The kind who makes sense with him.

Me on the other hand? What was I thinking, believing I would be enough? Just a simple girl, coming from a boring family, with no interesting backstory, nothing to show, nothing to–

"Baby?" Bucky put his face an inch from mine, which immediately snapped me out of my spiralling thoughts. "You okay? Is your stomach upset?" He pointed to the remaining of mac and cheese he cooked. 

He grew to be extremely good at reading my expressions over the past few months. He usually doesn't need to ask; he just knows what's wrong, and eliminates the problem without a word. This time, though, he didn't know. How could he?

"No," I say flatly.

"Sure? Because–"

"I am fine," I snap, louder than anticipated. 

I immediately regret my tone when I see Bucky stiffen, the sound of his metal arm clenching into an unbreakable fist. He takes exactly three steps back from me; measured and calculated. His eyes terrified; I can almost see how he is searching for the possible threats or punishments he would receive, now that he senses the change in the mood. He's still as a sculpture, except for the arms; they are shaking from how strongly he is sqeezing his fist.

Oh, I fucked up.

"I'm sorry. It's just been a really hard week on me, I-"

"You're hurt." 

It's not a question, it's a fact.

"I'm not hurt–"

"I hurt you."

It's not a fact, it's a crime. At least that's how he says it.

I look down to the tiled floor where I can still spot the signs of Bucky's cooking. I cannot look at him. I would need to lie to his face and that is one thing I was never able to do. Not after what he's been through. 

I notice a small movement from him as he takes another step; farther. Way farther away from me. I take a deep breath and force myself to look at him, wishing I didn't as the sight instantly breaks my heart; his eyes are filled with tears, and he's so confused. Scared. Terrified of what is coming. He's gripping onto the side of his shirt, like he always does when he feels unsafe. A lump forms in my throat as I try to open my mouth to speak. I've ruined him. 

"I– uh." The sound I made was barely a whisper, but it made him visibly flinch. "Do you... Do you not... want me?"

Bucky's terrified gaze turns into utter confusion in a matter of seconds. He blinks – for the first time in maybe minutes – as he's struggling to understand my question. I collect all my leftover courage and hope to keep talking. 

"You push me away," I say, trying to be as soft as possible. "We've been together for months, but never... together."

I feel so stupid for not being able to just straight out say it. I'm hoping he somehow understands what I mean, but judging by his scrunched eyebrows, I'm gonna have to be more specific.

 I let out a big sigh and close my eyes to make the embarrassment less painful. "Bucky, we never had sex." 

As soon as the words leave my mouth, his face drops. I lose him again somewhere very far away from me, and he keeps looking at me like I am about to destroy him completely. 

"If you don't want me, that's okay," I assure him, ignoring the bitter taste in my mouth. "I know I'm not the prettiest girl, and you've probably seen better—"

"No!" he snaps, so I lift my head up. He looks horrified, like I've just said something unspeakable. I wait for him to continue, but instead, he keeps staring at me, as if his eyes could tell everything he is unable to.

"No?" I echo. "Then why do you run every time I try to touch you like that?"

He breaks the eye contact by strictly looking at the kitchen counter right in front of him; or at anything that is not me. From all the months I've spent in his presence, I recognize this look too well. He's ashamed. 

"Bucky..."

Silence. He grips the fabric of his shirt, twisting it in his hands. A nervous tick, but to him, a grounding mechanism. He's really trying not to lose himself.

"I—, I don't—," he stutters. "I don't know how."

"What?" I blink. “Bucky, you’ve—” I hesitate. “You’ve been with other women before.”

His head jerks up with a flicker of panic and frustration.

 “That’s not—that’s different.”

“Different how?”

Bucky is refusing to look at me, so I stand up from my seat to make way towards him. He takes a sharp breath when I'm within his reach, but doesn't move. That's a good sign. 

"Look at me, baby," I ask, softly. His eyes snap up instantly, and I see it all there. The fear, the desperation, the battlefield in his head. "Tell me what's wrong."

He tries to do so; he opens his mouth, swallows, exhales, shakes his head, tries again, but he fails, no matter how hard he tries.

"Do you want me?" I ask bluntly.

He nods, still staring at the marble countertop. Okay.

"Are you scared to ask for what you want?"

Another nod. 

"Do you trust me?"

This one is instant.

"Yes."

"Then tell me."

He lets out a shaky breath before he swallows. He turns his head to me, face flustered, his chest moving up and down as he tries to regulate himself.

"Please, can you—," his voice dies before he can finish. He clearly is struggling, like he doesn't know how to want things and the fact breaks a small part of my heart permanently.

"Go on, Bucky. What do you need?" I encourage him.

"I—," he stutters, and then shakes his head hard, like the words are physically hurting him inside his head.

 His body, however, tells the truth on behalf of him. The way his hands tremble and his chest heaves with each exhale, the way his metal fingers twitch against his thigh—he is fighting himself.

I let the silence stretch, waiting, watching the way his face twists with frustration, with hesitation. With want.

“Baby,” I say softly.

His eyes cracks open, blue burning with something raw, something pleading. He sucks in a breath, and for a moment, I think he finally gives in, but then he shakes his head again, hard, turning his face away.

I click my tongue, grabbing his chin, forcing him to meet my gaze. “You want something. I can see it. I can feel it.”

His chest rises sharply, lips parting, but still, he doesn't speak. I lean in, lips brushing against the shell of his ear. 

“Do you need me to guide you?”

His entire body jerks, a sharp inhale ripping from his throat. His fingers are clenching into fists, the tremor rolling through his shoulders like a quake. But he still doesn't answer me.

My grip tightens slightly, my voice dropping to a whisper. “Bucky, if you don’t tell me what you need, I can’t give it to you.”

He exhales shakily, a frustrated, broken sound. His brows knit together, his hands lifting before falling back to his thighs, his whole frame trembling.

“Please,” he whispers.

My heart clenches. “Yes?”

His head dropped forward, breath ragged. “Please… please tell me what to do.”

Oh. 

Oh, fuck.

I smile, slow and knowing, letting the moment stretch, letting him feel the weight of what he's just asked for.

“I’ll show you.” I say, and I find my voice firm. Commanding.

His breath stutters, his entire body tensing, every muscle coiled tight with restraint, with hesitation. He’s fighting it, clinging to the instinct to resist—until I lean in, my mouth brushing over the shell of his ear.

 “If you'll be a good boy for me.”

The sound he makes—soft, broken, fucking relieved—rips through me like a shockwave. My core tightens, ignites, burns, a volcano threatening to erupt at the sheer power of it. 

Bucky Barnes is submissive. For me. 

"Follow me," I say, and as if I freed him from an invisible curse, he makes his way after me.

All at once, every doubt I ever had—about myself, about us—disintegrates. How did I not see this before? How could I have been so blind? He doesn’t need distance. He doesn’t need time. He just needs me. Me in control. Me guiding him. Me telling him exactly what to do.

And fuck, if that isn’t the most intoxicating realization of all, I don't know what is.

I may not be the most experienced woman alive, but that doesn’t matter right now. What matters is that he needs me to be present. He needs me to take this. Own this. There’s no room for doubt, no room to shy away, when he trusts me to take care of him.

I release him just to check his expression, searching for even the slightest hint of hesitation, but to my surprise, I find none. Not a single trace. His eyes track my every movement, locked onto me like a soldier awaiting an order.

And it shouldn't turn me on the way it does.

"Do you want me right now?" My voice is steady, even as I close the space between us, just by one step. 

His gaze sweeps over me, dragging from my lips, to my throat, to my body before he gives a sharp, assured nod.

 "Then take off my dress." 

He moves instantly, without hesitation—like he’s been waiting for this since the moment he met me. His fingers find the hem of my dress; his touch cautious, reverent, like he’s afraid I might pull away at any second. Like he can’t quite believe this is happening.

The contrast of his warm, flesh hand on one thigh, and his ice-cold vibranium fingers on the other, sends a shiver tearing down my spine. Slowly, deliberately, he lifts the fabric over my head, the brush of his knuckles against my skin leaving a trail of fire in their wake.

Once I’m bare before him, he takes a small step back—just to look. His lips part slightly, his breathing uneven, chest rising and falling faster, deeper. His eyes—piercing, devastating—roam every inch of me, burning me from the inside out.

And then, he moves.

He throws the dress across the room without looking, never once taking his eyes off of me. His entire body is vibrating, like he’s barely holding himself together, barely restraining the need thrumming beneath his skin.

The sight of him is stealing every breath I have left.

“Can I take your shirt off?” I break the silence, my own voice softer now.

“Please,” he begs.

I waste no time. I step in, close enough for his ragged breath to ghost over my skin, and strip him bare. It’s a summer night, so he’s only wearing a thin, black V-neck, already clinging to the sweat on his chest–or at least, he was. With one fluid motion, I pull it over his head and let it drop to the floor.

I take a moment, just a few seconds, to admire him.

His body is all strength, broad shoulders and sculpted muscle carved by battle and time. Scars litter his skin, testaments to wars fought and survived, and yet, under the soft glow of the moonlight, he looks like something untouchable. Ethereal. Unreal.

I swallow hard, licking my lips as my gaze travels downward, over his defined abs, the way they tense under my attention, down to the dark trail of hair that disappears beneath the waistband of his boxers. I feel it then—the heat pooling low, the unbearable pulse between my thighs. And he’s just standing there, watching me, eyes so dark they’re nearly black.

I’m already so wet for him, it’s almost embarrassing.

"Undress me," I whisper. 

His breath catches, eyes flash with hunger, the way they always do when he wants but won’t take. But this time, he moves.

With careful fingers, he reaches behind me for the clasp of my bra, hesitant yet desperate. This is as far as we’ve ever gone. Four months of waiting, of skirting the edge, of Bucky refusing to let himself see me without clothes. Back then, I thought it was because he didn’t want me, because I wasn’t enough.

But now? Now I know the truth. He wouldn’t have known what to do. He was afraid to ruin this. Afraid to ruin me.

I snap out of my thoughts as I feel the cold air of the AC dance on my bare torso. My nipples instantly harden as a result, and Bucky notices it just as quickly. His lips are apart, and he's staring at them like an animal on his prey. The way he wants me fills me with every ounce of confidence I’ve ever needed.

"You can touch them," I whisper, not sure he even heard me, but then he takes two steps towards, putting his flesh hand on my waist.

I gasp, the breath catching in my throat as his warm, steady touch trails up my skin. His movements are slow—painfully, torturously slow—like he’s memorizing me with his hands, drinking me in through touch alone. He reaches my left breast and he cups it, his thumb immediately finding my hard nipple. His breath shudders, sharp and heavy, his chest rising with a strained inhale as he circles my achingly hard peak with his thumb, teasing, testing, learning me.

I struggle to hold in my moan, my teeth sinking into my lip as he pinches it, sending a sharp jolt of pleasure straight between my legs. And fuck, he’s watching. His vibranium arm remains stiff at his side, fingers curled into a tight, trembling fist, his jaw slightly slack, his lips parted as he watches himself touch me.

He’s fascinated. Hypnotized. Like this is the first time he’s ever allowed himself to truly want something.

"Both hands, please." My voice is barely a whisper, barely a sound, just a needy, broken plea. His head snaps up, and for the first time in what feels like forever, his eyes meet mine.

His metal hand, still clenched in restraint, relaxes. With slow, careful hesitation, he brings it up, inch by inch, his fingertips skimming my ribs before finally—finally—he touches me. A shiver rips through me, my body instinctively arching into the icy contrast of metal against my heated skin. I don’t pull away; if anything, I lean into him, chasing the sensation, craving more.

"You're being so good for me," I praise, my voice low.

Bucky fucking breaks.

His entire body stutters, trembles; his breath hitching, his knees nearly buckling beneath him as a wrecked, desperate whimper falls from his lips.

Fuck. That has to be the sexiest sound in the world.

“Can I—” His voice cracks, his fingers flexing against my skin. “Can I please kiss you?”

He is pleading, over and over, his voice shaky, utterly undone.

“Please, I need it. Please.”

His words shoot straight to my core, the need in his voice a direct pulse between my legs. I want him so much, I might sublime from the heat he ignites inside me.

I don’t hesitate. I grab his arm, pulling him against me, forcing his bare chest to crash into mine. He melts against me, his body burning, muscles taut, already trembling with restraint. And then, I kiss him. Or maybe he kisses me. Either way, the moment our lips meet, Bucky loses himself.

He kisses me like he’s starving, like he’s drowning and I’m his only air. His mouth is hungry, relentless, desperate, lips crashing into mine as he’s trying to devour me whole.

And fuck, his hands.

They roam everywhere, one gripping the small of my back, the other skimming just beneath my panties, teasing, taunting me, and just when I think it couldn't get any better, his metal hand clamps around my ass, gripping tight, keeping me steady. Feeling the cool vibranium pressing into my heated skin, I moan straight into his mouth, my body shuddering in his hold.

“Put me on the bed. Now.”

The words leave me in a command, and Bucky moves before I can even take another breath. With one arm, just one, he lifts me with ease, like I weigh nothing to him. He lays me down, gentle but firm, already moving to cover me with his body—but I stop him.

“Not yet.”

I shake my head, and he immediately halts, his breathing labored, controlled. He looks wrecked, like he's using every bit of self control to keep himself away from me. Still kneeling between my legs, still so fucking obedient, and yet—his eyes. His fucking eyes, they’re eating me alive.

“Take it off,” I order, nodding toward his jeans.

Bucky keeps his eyes locked on mine, hands trailing down, slow and deliberate as he reaches for the button of his jeans. With a quick flick of his fingers, they’re undone. His piercing gaze never leaves me, his eyes dragging over every inch of my body, devouring, worshipping.

I don't have much time before he stands up and slowly pushes his jeans down. I gasp when I see the thin, black material of his boxers that do nothing to hide him. The thick, heavy outline of him, pressing against the fabric, takes my breath away.

I’ve never seen him like this before. Not even close. I’ve felt him—hard, pressing against me on nights where he’d let himself have just a little. But then he would stop and shut it down. I couldn't understand why, not until now, and I don't have one second to think about it, because he pushes his boxers down. His cock is finally bared to me in full, and Jesus fucking Christ.

He is huge. How is that gonna fit?

“Please,” I hear a small plea towards him, and I shot my eyes back to his face. 

His breath is wild, erratic, chest heaving like he can’t get enough air, like he’s on the edge of breaking. His flesh hand is poised, ready to touch himself, to relieve even an ounce of the pressure, but he doesn't. Not without my word. I bite my lip, reveling in the power of it, in the way his entire body trembles under restraint.

“Take this off, too,” I instruct, gesturing to the lace panties that I’d bought months ago—back when I thought he’d see them then.  Back when I thought we’d be here so much sooner. 

But I don’t have a single complaint left in my body, because when Bucky finally moves—he rips them off. The thin fabric tears from me in one sharp pull, and for a split second, I wonder if he just ripped them in half.

His eyes drag over me, drinking in every inch of bare skin, mapping the places he’s never let himself truly look at before. I feel just how wet I am, now that there’s nothing to soak up the slick. I can feel it all pooling between my thighs, proof of just how badly I want him.

A flicker of  shyness grips me—how did I get this lucky? How did I end up with him, undone and starving, in front of me? But I don’t let myself hide; instead, I sit up slowly, deliberately, my movements calculated, letting myself kneel on the soft mattress.

I look up at him, like I could devour him with a single breath. The six-foot-tall ex-assassin is towering over me, radiating pure heat, his entire body coiled tight like a predator barely holding back.

And then, soft as a prayer, I say, “I want you.”

As if I’ve broken a curse, Bucky snaps. His fingers clamp around my throat, his mouth slamming into mine, the sheer force of it knocking me back onto the bed. He pins me down, all of his weight pressing into me, heavy, suffocating, absolutely fucking perfect. The way he kisses me makes me crazy; he's hungry, possessive, and so filthy, I can only moan as a response.

His cock, thick and heavy, sliding between my soaking slit, his length gliding right over my clit with each slow, torturous grind.

“Fuck—” I moan straight into his mouth, my hips instinctively tilting up, chasing every ounce of friction he gives me.

I lose every bit of control I had left. Overcome with greed, I grab at him, pull at him, take as much as I can. My fingers tangle in his long hair, keeping him locked to me, refusing to let him break the kiss for even a second. 

I let my other hand wander; I trace the sharp lines of his back, trailing lower, until my palm finds his ass. I squeeze, hard, forcing him to rock against me even harder, dragging his cock rougher, deeper through my slick folds. My breathing is a wreck, my body moving instinctively, clinging to him, needing more, more, more.

I want him. All over me. Inside me. Taking me apart.

“Can I—” His voice shatters, breathless. He pulls back just enough to meet my gaze, his eyes wrecked with need.

“Can I please put it in?”

And fuck, he looks at me like a puppy, wide-eyed, begging.

“Please, I’ll make you feel so good,” he purrs against my neck, teeth grazing my skin, lips pressing open-mouthed kisses.

“God, yes,” I groan.

Bucky grabs himself, his fingers shaking with need as he positions his cock right at my entrance. He could thrust in immediately, take what we both want without hesitation, but he doesn’t. Instead, he pauses; his eyes flick back up to mine, searching, waiting, needing something more.

And I know exactly what he wants.

“Be a good boy and fuck me, Bucky.”

I'm way past hesitation or shame. All I want is him taking over me, claiming me, pressing me into himself. The words shatter something inside him; his mouth parts, his pupils blown wide, and then—without ever breaking eye contact—he slides inside.

A broken moan leaves my lips as my spine arches, my body opening for him, stretching around him, and fuck, he fills me.

Completely. Entirely. Devastatingly.

I’ve been aching for this moment for months. I’ve fantasized about him taking me, and now he’s finally inside me. A deep pressure builds low in my belly, tears pricking at the corners of my eyes as he pushes deeper and deeper, until I feel the blunt tip of his cock press against my cervix.

He’s so fucking hard. I can feel him throbbing inside me, feel the pulse of his cock against my walls, and it drives me insane. I wait for him to finally move, but after a few seconds of stillness, I open my eyes.

Bucky is watching me so carefully, his eyes flicking over my face, searching for even the slightest sign of discomfort. His arms shake violently, his knuckles white from gripping the sheets beside my head. He’s breathing fast, erratic, his small, shaky breaths cold against my ear. And he’s moving too slowly, like he’s terrified of losing control.

“Relax, baby. You can let go.”

I lift my hand, gently stroking his beautiful face, my voice barely a whisper. His eyes soften, then immediately darken.

“I don’t want to hurt you,” he rasps, his voice hoarse, ruined.

“You can’t,” I assure him. “I can take it. I want to take it.”

The sound that escapes him—a helpless whimper, like he’s been waiting his entire life to hear those words. His body trembles, his control hanging by a thread, his cock twitching inside me at the sheer relief of it.

He might be above me, but he is completely at my mercy.

“You’re doing so good,” I murmur, just inches from his lips, my breath fanning over his skin. “Don’t stop.”

The second I say it, he melts.

Raw, desperate need unleashes from him so suddenly, it knocks the breath from my lungs. I wheeze in surprise, barely able to keep up before he grabs the bedframe above my head with his vibranium arm and picks up the pace—hard. The deep, wrecked moan that rips from his throat sets me on fire; a wildfire raging low and uncontrollable, consuming every last of my coherent thoughts. All I know is him—the way he moves, the way he fills me, the way every precise thrust hits where I need him most.

I wrap my legs around his waist, pulling him impossibly closer, and he collapses into me, his mouth claiming mine in a sloppy, desperate kiss. His thrusts are relentless, shaking the entire goddamn bed, and I have to grip his vibranium arm for dear life just to keep myself in place.

Somewhere in his haze, even now, he thinks to protect me—his flesh hand cradling the top of my head, shielding me from the bedframe. My chest tightens at the gesture, and I let my lips trail down his sweat-slicked neck in silent gratitude, my teeth grazing over his skin.

Something inside me snaps as I feel his salty skin on my tounge. My nails rake down his back, digging into the hard muscle, desperate to leave my mark. My teeth sink into his shoulder, biting, scratching, taking him. We’re sliding against each other, slick with sweat, the heat of the summer night making everything feel even filthier, more raw, more real.

And Bucky is falling apart.

He’s moaning, breaking, unraveling against me, the sounds deep and ragged, each one rougher than the last. If I didn’t know better—if I didn’t know how utterly overwhelmed with pleasure he is—I’d think he was in pure agony from the helpless little cries slipping from his lips.

“Tell me I’m good for you,” he whispers, almost afraid to ask, his lips brushing against the shell of my ear.

Oh. My. Fucking. God.

“You’re such a good boy for me, Bucky.” 

The words fall from my lips like a promise, and fuck, the sharp, broken gasp he lets out shreds me to pieces. It’s high and desperate, so fucking needy, and it goes straight to my core.

He kisses me, hard and possessive.

“I’ve been waiting…” His voice is unraveling, barely understandable.

”… for so fucking long.”

Then suddenly—

Thrust.

“And you—”

Thrust.

“Feel—”

Thrust.

“So—”

Thrust.

“Good.”

His voice rasps in pure, guttural pleasure. I’m nothing but a puddle beneath him, completely ruined, and somehow, he’s not finished.

His rhythm snaps, his thrusts turning harder, rougher, deeper, more possessive.

“Mine,” he snarls, his voice low, primal. He slams into me, hard, forcing me to take it.

“Mine, you understand?”

I can’t speak. Can’t think. There’s no rational thought left, no words, just pure, consuming pleasure. So instead, I match his pace, my hips rolling up to meet every devastating thrust. The way his words set me on fire, I let the flames consume me. My orgasm builds dangerously fast, and I’m hanging by a fucking thread, barely holding on under the brutal precision of his movements.

“Bucky—God—”

His name falls from my lips like a prayer, breathless and desperate.

“I’m—”

Judging by his increased pace, he knows exactly what I'm trying to say. He lifts himself, just enough to look me in the eyes, and I’m trying so hard not to let my eyes roll back, not to completely lose myself in him.

“Please.”

His voice shatters, breaking apart in my ear, pleading.

“Please cum on my cock. Please, baby, please—”

This is all I need to spiral. The coil inside me snaps violently, my entire body arching, shattering as a scream tears from my throat. I crash into pleasure, drowning in it, my walls clenching tight around him, milking him, pulling him deeper.

“Oh, fuck—” Bucky’s voice breaks, his hips stuttering, his rhythm completely unraveling as he feels me fall apart around him.

“That’s it—fuck—that’s my girl.”

His praise sends a violent aftershock through me, my body trembling, shaking, completely spent. I gasp for air, trying to regulate myself after the most devastating orgasm of my life, but I don't stand a chance. Bucky's not finished, not yet.

“I—I can’t—”

Bucky’s voice isn’t even human anymore. It’s a shattered, breathless little whimper, choked between desperate gasps, his body trembling like he’s about to break. His hips falter, his cock twitching so agressively inside me I swear I can feel it in my throat.

But he won’t let go. Not yet.

Not without permission.

“Please—”

The word falls apart in his throat, barely even understandable.

“Please, baby, please—please let me cum, I need it, I need you, I can’t hold it, I can’t—”

He’s whining, his breath is gone, his voice is gone, his body is gone; he is completely, utterly mine.

“Release it, baby.” My fingers tighten in his hair, dragging him deeper inside me. “Be a good boy and give it to me.”

And that’s it; he doesn’t just fall apart—he disintegrates.

His hips slam forward, burying himself so fucking deep inside me, holding us together, his muscles locking up, convulsing. And if this wasn't enough, he whimpers.

“Ohhh—fuck, fuck, fuck—”

His cock twitches and throbs uncontrollably, and I feel everything. The first violent, overwhelming pulse. The hot, thick flood of him spilling deep inside me. His hips keep jerking, his muscles keep locking up, his whimpers keep breaking apart into desperate, breathless sobs.

“Baby, baby—please, please, oh my God, I—I can’t—”

His hands claw at my waist, face burrowed into my neck, his breath a gasping mess. His voice cracks, completely breaking apart, and then a single, desperate sob escapes from him.

He cries. Bucky Barnes cries when he cums.

His body shakes uncontrollably, his hips rocking forward on their own, like he’s trying to push it even deeper, like he’s chasing something he’ll never be able to reach.

“Baby, baby—please hold me, please—fuck, I love you, I love you so much—”

His voice is cracking, completely gone, and I gasp as I feel another orgasm building inside me. Another slow, rolling wave, ignited by his moans, his desperate little whimpers, the way he’s still trembling inside me.

“Bucky—oh, fuck—”

The second he realizes what’s happening, it destroys him all over again.

“Baby, you’re gonna— Fuck, fuck, fuck—please, baby, please—”

His hips snap forward as a last burst of desperate energy, his hands gripping my waist so tightly I feel the bruises forming.

“Oh, baby—please, please cum on my cock again, I wanna feel it—please, baby, please, please—”

The filth of it, the raw need in his voice immedately shatters me. I scream his name, my body convulsing around him, my walls tightening, pulsing, taking him deeper, squeezing him so hard he sobs.

“Oh—oh fuck, baby, I’m still cumming—”

His cock throbs again, another weak, helpless little spill, and he whimpers so high and wrecked he sounds like he’s dying.

“I can’t stop—baby, I can’t stop, I can’t stop—”

His breath is gone, tears spilling onto my skin, his voice a trembling, begging mess, pleading for the final release. Not a moment later, he collapses.

His body slumps into mine; arms useless, his breathing erratic and broken. His tears still fall, his entire body shivering, overstimulated, still whimpering, still sobbing.

He’s still inside me, throbbing. Utterly gone from this world.

His hands stay locked firmly around me, fingers clutching, shaking, gripping, like he’ll die if I let go. And on top of that, he just won't stop crying. Soft, helpless little sobs hide into my skin, as he's holding onto me for dear life.

“Baby,” he whispers, his voice so broken and small.

“Baby, please don’t let go—please don’t go.”

My heart shatters to a million pieces in a matter of seconds. It becomes evidently clear that he's not here right now. He’s somewhere else, somewhere dark, somewhere cold, somewhere where he had nothing and no one. I feel it in the way he clings to me and his hands shake as they grip my waist. The way his face tucks into my throat, burrowing, searching, nuzzling like he’s trying to disappear into me; like he’s afraid this isn’t real.

"Shhh, Bucky,” I murmur, kissing his damp temple. “I’m right here. I’m not going anywhere.”

Even though I wanted my words to soothe him, he breaks even more instead. His breath catches on a sob, his entire body curling into me, fingers fisting in the sheets, in my hair, in anything he can hold onto. 

“You’re so good to me,” he gasps, his voice shaking. “So perfect, so soft, I—fuck, I don’t deserve this—”

His lips quiver against my skin, hands tightening around me, pulling me closer. The realization that he’s not just crying from overstimulation, hits me like a brick. He’s crying because he’s never felt this before.

Never felt this safe. Never felt this loved. Never felt this cherished, taken care of. 

“Bucky,” I whisper, cupping his tear-streaked face, making him look at me.

His blue eyes are glassy and vulnerable, still wet with tears. God, he looks so much younger like this. Like a little boy, back in the ‘40s, nineteen years old, held too many responsibilities, never got held in return.

I immediately want to fix every bad thing that's ever happened to him.

“You deserve all of this, my sweet boy,” I whisper, pressing my lips to his forehead. “You deserve every single second of love. You deserve to be taken care of.”

He lets out a tiny little sob that slits my heart in half, like a butcher knife.

“But I—” His voice cracks, his fingers digging into my waist. “I don’t—I don’t know how to do this. I don’t—”

His breath hitches, his chest rising, falling too fast. I know him enough to realize he’s panicking, his brain is fighting him, pushing against the comfort, trying to tell him he doesn’t deserve this.

I also know how to shut it down. I pull him into me, wrap my arms so tightly around him that he has no choice but to believe that this is real. I'm real.

“It’s okay, baby,” I say gently, stroking his hair, feeling his body relax against mine. “You don’t have to know how. Just let me love you.”

He immediately eases into me, his breath slowing, his shaking finally dying down. He doesn't know, but he's holding my own broken pieces together too, since I've never felt a love so consuming before. 

“If I fall asleep,” he whispers, as if he is about to say something unthinkable, “will you be here when I wake up?”

My dear God. 

"Of course, Bucky. I'll be right here, always," I promise, my voice firm, not leaving any space for doubts in his broken mind.

He buries his face into my neck as an answer, and with that, Bucky Barnes is fast asleep in my arms.

[sorryitsmyfirstdayonearth]

Dream

(Dean Winchester x female reader)

Summary You love Dean when he’s awake, but there’s just something about him when he’s sleeping. CWs Consensual somnophilia. Sleeping Dean. That's it, really. 18+. 1.2k words.

Dean Winchester masterlist ⏐ SPN masterlist

You agreed on this a long time ago, but it still feels illicit every time you do it.

The case done, you catch up with some old girlfriends from college who live close by. They think you’re a traveling saleswoman, maybe part of a pyramid scheme, but the small lie doesn’t hinder the fun you have. While you dress up before the evening, tight jeans, breasts pushed up, Dean watches you intently.

“You’re gonna have a hard time keeping the local Neanderthals off you,” he says and you grin while you apply lipstick in the mirror.

“I have my ways,” you say, smacking your lips together, then looking at Dean in the reflection. He chuckles a little, but his look tells you he would prefer to bend you over something right now to you going out. Too bad your hair is already done, or you might let him. Later.

You get up, grab your bag, run a hand through your hair and Dean walks up to you. One arm goes around you and he looks at you like you’re a snack he can’t wait to get between his teeth.

“Have fun now,” he says and then inclines his head. “Just not too much fun.” You wink at him, give him a small kiss, then run your thumb over his lips to wipe off the lipstick there.

“I don’t know how long I’ll be,” you say and look into his eyes. “I’ll try not to wake you.” You see the second Dean registers what you say. He nods slowly, a smile playing on his lips.

The evening is full of drinks that are too sugary and that perfect mix of scandalous gossiping and soul-searching deep talk. You show the girls a picture of Dean and one of them, your former roommate, shakes her head.

“I would buy five of him, even if he wasn’t on sale,” she says, clicking her tongue. You grin.

“Believe me,” you say, taking a sip from your drink and playfully running your tongue over the top of your straw. “You don’t need five of him. One does everything you need him to.” The other women squeal and then suddenly you’re dancing, hugging each other, and there’s one or two Neanderthals but you couldn’t care less about them.

 It’s extra hard being quiet when you come back to the motel, because you’re a little tipsy. You unlock the door, sneak in. Bag goes on the floor, shoes are carefully kicked off. Then you look up.

Your eyes are still adjusting to the darkness but you can see Dean’s shape in the bed, sheets tangled between his legs. You bite your lip. Your jacket goes too and then you are crawling onto the bed, trying to move as carefully as possible.

That was one big challenge when this all started – Dean has the instincts of a hawk, so one worry was if he would actually stay asleep long enough for it to work. You got lucky, though. Apparently, your sounds and actions don’t register to his subconscious brain as threatening.

You just look down at him for a second. God, he’s beautiful, especially like this. Puffy lips slightly parted, long lashes resting on his skin. Unguarded, like he’s a living thing that could actually get hurt and not the god of war that appears once daylight breaks. It makes love and a good host of arousal run through you.

Then you extend your hand, and with the gentlest of touches, lay it on his crotch, over the boxershorts he wears to sleep. Small circles, that’s how you start.

Dean’s responsive as all hell. It’s one of the things you always liked about him. How all you need to do is to bend over, pretend to pick something up, look back at him and he’s ready to go.

It’s the same now, and after only a few seconds, you can start to feel him respond, his cock slowly hardening, growing, until it strains in his shorts. Your other hand pulls the waistband down slowly while you reach in and take him out. Perfection, you think as you lean forward on your elbows, and start licking at him. Curved and with soft skin and a pink head.

You nibble at that head now, spreading a little bit of saliva on it. Dean, all of Dean, twitches in his sleep, and you wonder what he’s dreaming. Wonder if maybe you can turn one of his frequent nightmares into a good dream.

You hear the side of his face hit the pillow when you take him deep for the first time. He tastes salty and slightly musky, and you would like to bottle him up if you could. You bob your head up and down, slowly, but go deep each time, the head of Dean’s cock tickling the back of your throat. You actually close your eyes at the feeling of him, because you are just that much of a lost cause.

He’s making some wonderful noises in his sleep so you speed up, letting more spit collect in your mouth to ease the passage. The sounds your mouth makes make you clench and for a moment you think to stop, to instead get naked and ride Dean. But you don’t want to stop, and you can be patient.

Dean whimpers a little, a light sound deep in his throat that he wouldn’t be caught dead making during his waking hours, and it’s enough to make your eyes flutter open, because you know what will happen next. You live for this part. You keep going, and soon you can feel the twitch that’s telling you he’s about to come.

Without moving your mouth off him or stopping your movement, you bring your hand to Dean’s arm, gently scratch your nails along the skin there.

The feeling along with the budding orgasm help bring him into wakefulness just as you feel his balls tighten. It’s not easy from the position you’re in but you just manage to look up at him.

You know Dean’s awake though when he twists his hands into the sheets, desperately fumbling for anything to hold on to, his hips bucking up and you make eye contact just before he shoots down your throat.

Beautiful, desperate whines leave him as his stomach muscles contract, sounds he would be much too controlled to make otherwise. You wish you could drink them down along with his come, you catch yourself thinking, and nearly roll your eyes at yourself.

You finally move off him, hand lazily pumping him a few more times while Dean catches his breath. His chest is rising and falling, and he looks so perfectly broken that you want to touch yourself just to how he looks right now. Guard down, spent, no pretense. Just the perfection that is him.

You wipe your hand across your mouth, then crawl up to him and snuggle against his side. His hand pats your arm, uncoordinated.

“Fuck,” he says and you grin. You bury your face against his neck and settle down to wait.

Dean is extra generous on nights like this. He’ll take care of you, filthily and thoroughly, in a little bit. But just now, this is all you want, all you need. To know that Dean has let go, and that you were the cause of it.

You grin to yourself. It’s gonna be a long night.

[hy6erion]

Hello~!

There is one thing I need and that's Viktor's head on my chest, you know, imagine he came from work all tired and stressed and then reader is there, waiting for him with dinner ready and before sleep she holds him all lovingly and rest his head between her breasts and he just lay there between consciousness and sleepiness, holding and toying with her boobs just because they're squishy and warm 💕

𝐒𝐨𝐟𝐭 𝐚𝐬 𝐒𝐚𝐧𝐜𝐭𝐮𝐚𝐫𝐲 - 𝐕𝐢𝐤𝐭𝐨𝐫 𝐱 𝐫𝐞𝐚𝐝𝐞𝐫

✰⍣..𝐚𝐟𝐭𝐞𝐫 𝐚 𝐥𝐨𝐧𝐠 𝐝𝐚𝐲, 𝐕𝐢𝐤𝐭𝐨𝐫 𝐟𝐢𝐧𝐝𝐬 𝐩𝐞𝐚𝐜𝐞 𝐢𝐧𝐬𝐢𝐝𝐞 𝐲𝐨𝐮𝐫 𝐚𝐫𝐦𝐬, 𝐫𝐞𝐬𝐭𝐢𝐧𝐠 𝐡𝐢𝐬 𝐡𝐞𝐚𝐝 𝐨𝐧 𝐲𝐨𝐮𝐫 𝐜𝐡𝐞𝐬𝐭, 𝐬𝐚𝐟𝐞 𝐚𝐧𝐝 𝐰𝐚𝐫𝐦 𝐢𝐧 𝐲𝐨𝐮𝐫 𝐠𝐞𝐧𝐭𝐥𝐞 𝐞𝐦𝐛𝐫𝐚𝐜𝐞

𝐦𝐚𝐧 𝐢 𝐧𝐞𝐞𝐝 𝐡𝐢𝐦 𝐬𝐨 𝐛𝐚𝐝 (ෆ˙ᵕ˙ෆ)

The apartment was quiet, bathed in the warm amber glow of the setting sun, casting long shadows across the walls. A gentle breeze filtered through the open window, carrying with it the faint sounds of Piltover’s bustling streets, but here… here, in this little sanctuary you’d built together, it was peaceful.

You stood in the kitchen, carefully ladling hot soup into two ceramic bowls, the comforting aroma of herbs and roasted vegetables filling the air. A fresh loaf of bread, still warm from the oven, sat on the counter, and you’d set the table with care—nothing extravagant, just a soft candle and folded napkins, the kind of touch that made a house feel like a home.

Viktor was late again.

You’d stopped worrying about it, not because you didn’t care, but because this was his rhythm—long hours at the lab, his brilliant mind always burning, pushing the boundaries of science. But no matter how caught up he got in his work, he always came home to you. Always.

As if on cue, the faint, familiar sound of his key turning in the lock reached your ears. You glanced up, wiping your hands on a dish towel, a soft smile already forming. The door creaked open, and there he was—Viktor, framed in the doorway, exhaustion clinging to him like a heavy coat.

His coat was half-off his shoulders, his gait a little slower than usual as he leaned on his cane. The dark circles under his eyes spoke of long hours and little rest, but when his gaze found yours, something in him seemed to loosen.

“You’re home,” you said softly, stepping forward to meet him.

A small, tired smile tugged at the corners of his lips. “I am,” he murmured, voice rough with fatigue, as though the very act of speaking took effort.

You closed the distance between you, hands coming to rest gently on his arms. “Long day?”

He let out a breath that was almost a laugh, though there was no humor in it. “You could say that.”

“Come,” you whispered, guiding him toward the kitchen. “I made dinner. You need to eat.”

For a moment, he looked like he might argue, but the warmth of your touch and the promise of food seemed to sap the fight from him. He allowed himself to be led, sinking into a chair with a soft sigh, leaning his cane against the wall.

You set a bowl of soup in front of him, along with a thick slice of bread, and watched as he ate—slowly, methodically, like someone too tired to fully engage but aware that his body needed the nourishment.

He didn’t say much, but his free hand found yours on the table, his thumb stroking absently over your knuckles, grounding himself with your touch.

When the meal was finished, you cleared the dishes, gently brushing off his mumbled attempts to help. “Go lie down,” you said, pressing a soft kiss to the top of his head. “I’ll be there in a minute.”

Viktor didn’t argue. That, more than anything, told you how drained he was.

By the time you joined him in the bedroom, he was already half-undressed, his shirt discarded on the floor, leaving him in just his trousers. He sat on the edge of the bed, shoulders hunched, elbows resting on his knees, staring down at the floor as though he couldn’t quite summon the energy to move.

Wordlessly, you climbed onto the bed behind him, wrapping your arms around his waist, pressing your cheek against his bare back. His skin was warm, his muscles tense beneath your touch.

“Come here,” you whispered, tugging gently until he let himself be pulled back into your arms, into bed.

He all but collapsed against you, his head finding its natural place—nestled between your breasts, the softness of you cradling him like something sacred. You settled back against the pillows, one arm draped loosely around his shoulders, the other threading through his tousled hair, scratching your nails lightly against his scalp.

A soft, shuddering sigh escaped him, and you felt him melt, the tension bleeding out of his body as he let himself be held.

“Mm…” he murmured, already half-lost to that warm, hazy place between wakefulness and sleep. “You are very soft.”

You smiled, tracing slow circles along his back with your fingertips. “I know.”

His arm came around your waist, pulling you just that fraction closer, and his hand found its familiar place—resting gently over one of your chest, his fingers splayed, warm and absentmindedly toying with the flesh there.

It wasn’t sexual. Not really. It was comfort, a ritual you’d both fallen into without ever really discussing it.

“You do this every time,” you teased softly, your voice a lazy murmur.

“Can you blame me?” His voice was thick with sleep, muffled against your skin. “They are… very pleasant.”

A quiet laugh bubbled up, and you felt the corners of his lips curve into a small, lazy smile against your chest.

“Mm,” he hummed, giving a gentle, idle squeeze, his thumb brushing over your skin in slow, hypnotic circles. “Warm… and soft…”

You could feel him slipping, his body growing heavier, breaths slower.

“You work too hard,” you whispered, pressing a kiss to the top of his head.

A soft sound of agreement rumbled in his chest, but there was no fight in him, not now, not when he was so thoroughly enveloped in you, your warmth, your scent, the steady rise and fall of your breathing.

“You should sleep,” you murmured, your fingers still moving through his hair.

“I am sleeping,” he whispered back, though the smile in his voice betrayed him.

A few more minutes passed like that—quiet, warm, intimate. His hand grew heavier, his touch slowing until it was just the faintest, unconscious brush of his fingers.

“I love you,” he whispered, so softly you almost missed it, like a secret meant only for the space between your heartbeats.

“I love you too,” you whispered back, holding him just a little tighter.

And there, with his head resting on your chest, the sound of your heart in his ear, Viktor finally let the world go.

[mandalhoerian]

(4) 🦭 signed, sealed, delivery pending...

Raf doesn't take well to you leaving for university. Shenanigans ensue. Congratulations on giving a literal seal separation anxiety.

genre: fluff, comedy | word count: 7K | read on ao3

< previous | next >

note: i'm sorry this is late but i hope you enjoy that it's a bit longer in the word count! we will be back to the present in the next chapter with THE REVEAL! YAYYYY

It’s your last evening on the island.

Your bags are already packed. Two suitcases, a duffel, and now a fourth carry-on — one Mom insisted on adding last minute. It's half-insulated, stuffed with three Tupperwares of home-cooked rice and frozen stew andthree packs of marinated something-or-other wrapped with ice packs and to be put into the dorm fridge ASAP, jars and jars full of pickled vegetables, frozen dumplings layered in foil, a suspiciously heavy thermos labeled 'for emergencies only,' and god knows how many packs of your favorite snacks. There’s even a loaf of bread wedged on top like an afterthought. It’s less of a bag and more of a portable pantry. She’d kept slipping things into it all morning, muttering about how the dorm won’t have "any real food and you have to cook your own" and you’ll thank her when you’re freezing and tired and want something warm.

The other bags are crammed tight, zippers barely holding, the fabric stiff from years of use. One of the suitcases is missing a wheel. It screeches whenever you drag it across the floor, like it knows this is the last time it’ll scrape across this house.

Your ferry ticket is tucked into your wallet, itinerary triple-checked, outfit for the next morning already laid out on the back of a chair. Tomorrow, you’ll board the ferry not to work it, not to haul crates or wrangle tourists, not with your shirt tucked into old cargo shorts and your name on a patch, but to leave. For good, or for long enough that it might as well be.

University waits on the mainland. City air. Dorms. Cafeteria food. The smell of dry-erase markers and hand sanitizer and too many strangers crammed into a lecture hall. Your name printed on a laminated student ID that looks nothing like you.

Your parents had gotten a bit emotional, naturally. Mom kept touching your face like it might disappear, brushing your hair off your forehead with a smile that twitched at the corners. Dad had retreated to the garage, insisting he needed to reorganize the fishing tackle, though nothing had changed in that cabinet since you were ten. You’d caught him wiping his eyes with an oily rag.

Your friends had made plans for one last group call the night you arrived. Someone had promised to mail you festival candy every year. Someone else swore they'd visit, though you all knew they wouldn’t. Everyone was being kind. Everyone was pretending not to notice the knot in your throat.

Except — you hadn’t seen him.

Not really. Not in days.

You’d caught glimpses of him at a distance, once from the second-story window of your school during lunch, his sleek shape out past the reef where the sea meets the cliffs, another time while biking past the overlook near the old radio tower, just a head bobbing in the shallows.

But not at the cove. Not where you always found him.

Not since the day you skidded onto the sand beside him and babbled about your university housing being confirmed, about the dorm you'd picked and how it had real hardwood floors and a communal kitchen. You’d talked too much, too fast, nervous energy bleeding into every word, and he just sat there. Still, as if his body had forgotten movement. His eyes had gone wide, not cartoonish or expressive, just strange. The way some animals look when lightning cracks the sky — more instinct than comprehension.

He’d made a faint sound, something between a chirp and a cough, and then rolled away to show you his back with this stiff, resigned shuffle. Like air leaving a balloon.

You hadn’t thought much of it at first. You thought maybe he was bored. Maybe full. Maybe the tide was too low and he didn’t want to move again.

He had just stared out at the horizon.

And then hadn’t shown up the next day.

Or the one after that.

You’d started going by the cove each evening just in case, each time finding nothing but waves and rockweed and the ghost of where he used to be.

So now, with your heart thick and your sandals in hand, you leave the house to seek him out for one last time. The sky has gone soft and lilac with the last light of day, bruising gently at the edges like an old plum. The wind brushes against your cheek like breath, carrying the distant scent of salt and something faintly metallic, seaweed sun-warmed and half dried. The sand is still warm under your feet, tender from the afternoon sun, and each step feels both too slow and too fast.

Your dress is plain this time, something old, soft and familiar, already wrinkled, smelling faintly of lavender detergent and ferry salt. There's a safety pin holding the hem where you never got around to mending it properly. The pattern’s nothing special, just a scatter of flame lilies across soft white cotton, but Raf’s always been weirdly drawn to it. You’d caught him staring at it more than once, eyes fixed not on you, but the bright, strange flowers trailing down the side of the skirt. Maybe it was the shape, the color, the unfamiliar way it moved in the wind like flickering candle fires. You’d decided, in a half-laughing sort of way, that it made sense. He was a seal. He’d probably never seen a flower before.

And it's a cheap way of trying to hold his attention now. 

You wind your way around the tidepools, stepping over seaweed-slick rocks, squinting into the breeze as gulls wheel overhead, screeching their approval of the approaching twilight. The cove is quiet. The way it always is this time of day — tide low, sky deepening, water turning to silver glass, like someone poured a breathless hush over the entire shoreline.

And here he is, completing the painting.

Raf.

He’s lying at the edge of the rocks, lumped in a pile of his own sulk, flippers tucked close and head turned toward the horizon where the sun is beginning to dip. He looks like a statue someone forgot to carve the face onto—still, slow-breathing, stubbornly present.

You stop a few feet away and raise your brows. "Hi, hi, hi, my cutie pie," you call, in the same rhythm you've always used—the sing-song greeting that once had him springing upright, barking like he'd been summoned by royalty.

He doesn’t move.

Doesn’t even look startled. Like he knew you’d come. Like he’s been lying there for hours, maybe all day, waiting for you and doing a terrible job pretending he hasn’t.

"Raaaaf," you whine. "Don’t do this."

You inch closer, navigating the rocks with practiced hopping, one foot bracing while the other leaps forward, the soles of your feet stinging from the uneven stone. He shifts slightly as you approach, but only enough to angle away from you, offering you nothing but the slope of his back and the faint twitch of one earless head.

You sigh, easing yourself down beside him, careful to keep a respectful distance. You wrap your arms around your knees and let the silence stretch, like a long breath held between waves.

"Seriously? You’re gonna be like this?" you mutter. "I’m not dying, you know. I’ll be back."

He flicks his tail once, like punctuation. Noncommittal. Moody.

"You know," you go on, voice softening, "most seals would’ve at least looked sad. Maybe whimpered a little. Instead, I get full passive aggression. Complete stonewall."

Still nothing.

You rest your chin on your knees. The wind plays with your hair, threading it across your face. It smells like dried kelp and brine, and the faint sweetness of crushed beach plum.

He’s still watching the horizon. Pretending you’re not there.

You remember not being able to sit still on the beach without Raf nosing at your backpack, tugging it half into the water just to get your attention. Once, he dragged your towel three meters down the shore while you were diving, then looked genuinely offended when you got angry.

He brought gifts, too — bits of sea glass, shells worn smooth, a shiny bottle cap once that you’d still kept in your drawer. Once, he rolled up with a perfectly intact Gucci sandal that definitely wasn’t yours and dropped it in your lap like an offering. Always a treasure. Always for you. You always joked that he had a hoarding problem, but deep down you wondered if he just liked seeing you surprised.

You also dove together. Or rather, you dove while he spiraled around you like a corkscrewed comet, all fins and glee, sometimes vanishing below you only to burst up like a shadow chasing light. He liked playing chicken with your bubbles, popping up right in front of your goggles with a bark that echoed through your mask and made you choke from laughing.

But lately, none of that.

"You’re the only one I didn’t get to say goodbye to," you murmur. "And I thought — well. I don’t know. I thought you might at least come see me off."

He doesn’t respond. But his curled whiskers twitch. Barely. Maybe it's just the wind. Maybe not.

You don’t blame him. Animals know. Cats sit in suitcases. Dogs vanish when the leash comes out. You just didn’t think a seal could tell. But then again, Raf was never just a seal.

"I’ll be back during holidays," you promise. "And I’ll bring snacks. The good kind. They have so much variety in the mainland. None of the soggy fish fries. I’ll get those crunchy things you liked. You remember those?"

He lets out a soft, resigned noise. Less a huff, more a breath held too long. For all the ignoring and sulking, the usual dramatics of his is missing, and it’s making your heart clench.

You smile, a little. "Okay, okay. I’ll try harder. You’re so high maintenance."

Still, he doesn’t come closer. Doesn’t nudge your hand or toss something shiny at you. He just lies there, quiet and distant and solid as stone.

You stay until the sun slips behind the sea, until the sky turns to bruised blue and the stars begin to appear. One by one, the cove starts to change, growing cool and strange under moonlight. Your legs ache. Your eyes sting. You’ve said goodbye in your head a dozen times now, but it still hasn’t landed.

Eventually, you rise. Sand clings to your toes. Your dress rustles in the wind.

But you pause before you go. Just once. Just long enough to glance back.

He’s watching you.

You smile, small and wobbly. "I'm going to miss you the most, you know."

The morning of your departure is mostly quiet. The island is smaller than it has ever felt before. Or maybe you’ve just grown too big for it.

Mom wakes you with gentle hands and a bowl of warm congee, topped with a perfectly jammy egg, and as you’re washing up, the sight of your bags lined up neatly by the door of your family home feels unreal, like it belongs to someone else’s life. The ferry you’ve spent your whole life working on will be taking you away this time, but not just across the water to another island. This time, it’s the mainland. This time, you won’t be coming back in a few hours.

Dad loads the last of your stuff into the trunk as you’re having breakfast while muttering about ferry times like it's not him who gets the final say about them. You’re wearing the outfit you picked three days ago: practical, still slightly wrinkled, but something that makes you look like someone who has a plan.

Your dress from yesterday hangs near the door, flame lilies fluttering in the breeze each time someone opens it.

There are only a few things left to pack into your backpack, your charger, your toothbrush. Mom tucks a flat envelope into your duffel when she thinks you’re not looking. You let her.

“Are you sure you have everything?” she asks, and you know she’s not really talking about the bags.

“Yeah,” you say, shifting the strap of your carry-on over your shoulder. “I triple-checked.”

There’s a silence that settles between the three of you — not uncomfortable, just heavy with the weight of change.

Dad clears his throat. “You know, if you need anything—”

“I know.” You smile, trying to keep things light. “You’ll have me on the next ferry back before I even finish a sentence.”

Mom huffs a soft laugh, shaking her head. “Not if I have anything to say about it.”

The joke lands, but the truth sits beneath it. Leaving feels impossible even as you stand at the threshold of it.

The ride to the dock is short, too short, the windows slightly fogged from the still-chilly morning. The conversation in the car starts with Mom nagging before the seatbelt even clicks. "You triple-checked your toothbrush? You always forget your toothbrush. And your charger—the thing with the thing—the long plug one? And a rain jacket. You didn’t pack a rain jacket, did you?"

You're already dissociating. She takes that as permission to continue.

"And don’t wait too long to buy your textbooks, because the good copies go fast. And when you run out of what we packed, don’t just live on instant noodles. You need real food. You need greens. Do you even know where to buy produce? Ask someone. And don’t sleep with your hair wet. You’ll get headaches. You will."

Dad doesn’t say a word. He drives like he’s praying for tunnels.

"And don’t put your laptop on your bed," she adds. "It overheats. You do that. You do that all the time."

You sigh. "I’ll be fine."

"You won’t be fine if you fry your hard drive again. I don’t want a crying phone call from the mainland at two a.m., asking if we backed up your files. We didn’t. Don’t do that to me again."

You nod. Because if you speak again, you’ll laugh or cry or scream, and none of those are safe. You nod, promise, nod again.

Everything’s been arranged: they’ll drop you on the mainland and spend the day in town, just to stretch the goodbye a little longer. Mom has already named three restaurants she wants to try. Dad has said “we’ll see” to all of them.

The dock is alive with movement — vendors dragging ice chests into place, deckhands coiling ropes, early commuters standing in quiet lines. The ferry waits at the end, squat and familiar, ropes taut and mist clinging to its sides. Somebody’s playing music through a phone speaker too loud, and it echoes between the beams of the terminal.

You stand with your parents near the loading ramp. Dad double-checks your ID for the fourth time. Mom tugs your sleeve down over your wrist, then back up again. She smooths the back of your collar like it’s a goodbye ritual—like maybe if the fold is just right, you’ll be protected from everything.

Then—

“Wait,” Mom says, sharp and alert. “Where’s the red suitcase?”

You blink. Scan the stack beside you. Duffel. Suitcase. Food carry-on.

Three.

There were supposed to be four.

“The red one,” she says again, louder now. “The one with your bedding. The toiletries. The extension cord! And your skin care—do you know how expensive that serum is?”

You turn slowly.

And then you see it.

Out in the harbor. A bright, bobbing flash of red. Moving steadily away from the dock.

Being dragged.

By something large, round, and unmistakably gray.

“RAAAAFFF!”

There’s a pause on the dock, like the hush that comes over a herd upon a loud noise. Then someone nearby laughs like it’s a sitcom.

He’s paddling like he has all the time in the world, flippers slicing through the water with purpose. The red suitcase is clamped in his jaws, handle caught like a leash.

“Oh my god,” Mom gasps, slapping Dad’s arm. “He’s stealing the luggage! He’s actually — he’s taking it!”

“Relax,” Dad says, shielding his eyes with one hand. “It’s fine. They’re waterproof.”

“Not animal-proof!” she hisses. “What if he unzips it with his teeth? What if the sunscreen pops open? It’ll be like an oil spill in there!”

You stagger forward. “Raf! What the hell! Get back here!”

The dock crowd thickens — fishermen with crates half-unloaded, tourists with raised cameras. Two kids shriek with laughter. A woman in a floral bucket hat whispers, "Is that trained? Like one of those therapy dolphins?"

Your entire head is on fire.

“Raf!” you shout again.

He swims like a parade float, silent and committed, red suitcase bobbing behind him like an accusatory balloon.

“I swear to god, Raf, this is not a bit! This is NOT CUTE!”

He pauses. Just long enough to make eye contact.

Then gives the suitcase a little tug and keeps going.

“Do something!” Mom cries, pacing in tight frantic circles.

“I am,” you snap, yanking off your shoes.

“WHAT? No, you’re not—don’t get in the—!”

Too late. You’ve dropped your backpack along with your jacket and mentally said goodbye to your cute outfit, and are halfway down the dock ladder.

The water bites immediately. Icy and dense, winding its way into your clothes with zero mercy. You grunt, teeth clacking. "Raf," you sputter, dog-paddling furiously, "if you don’t drop that suitcase right now, I will bite you back."

Your arms ache. Your dress — your going-away outfit chosen specifically to make an impression on your dorm mates — is plastered to your skin, heavy as a sack. You slip once, crash forward, get a mouthful of salt and indignity.

“Come here, you kleptomaniac!”

His fin splashes. Not too far away, but not within grabbing distance either. He makes it look effortless — long body cutting through the waters without a hitch, flippers paddling leisurely, his precious stolen luggage swinging to and fro in tow like the tail end of a comet.

He barks at you once, quick and clear above the slap of waves. Taunting you, almost. Calling you back. Come catch me. If you think you can.

"Yooooouuuu," you growl, dragging your freezing, seawater-logged self forward, arms stiff and dress dragging like annoyingly behind you. "You absolute menace. After days of ghosting me like a moody little shit, this is your grand finale? This? This is what you pull the morning I’m leaving?"

It happens quickly — the cold has slowed your reaction times and made you clumsy. An uneven wave buffets you from below and sends you lurching sideways. There's a confused second before your head sinks under the surface and icy black closes around you. You kick automatically, heart pounding, lungs burning with sudden terror. But it's only seconds before you bob up again, gasping and spitting out seawater.

And he’s right there.

Raf floats beside you, nose hovering near your shoulder, eyes wide and black as obsidian. His nose nudges at you, first one side, then the other, gentle, inquisitive pushes against your shoulders like he's testing the give of you. It should be funny, a seal checking in on you like this. 

You blink at him, dazed. His expression — if a seal can even have one — is alarmingly innocent. No trace of mischief. Just concern. That wide-eyed, alien kind of worry that somehow reads so clearly across a face that isn't built to show it.

A laugh escapes you, helpless and watery. It’s all too much: the cold, the shouting, the absurdity of nearly drowning because your emotionally unwell sea-friend decided to hijack your journey.

From the dock, someone’s yelling your name. You can hear Mom now, shrill with worry. The sound of boots clattering. The unmistakable click of a camera shutter.

"Aw!" someone coos. "He’s helping her swim!"

"Silly boy," you chide fondly, reaching out carefully with one stiff hand. "Trying to play savior after kidnapping my belongings."

But Raf remains where he is, letting your fingers brush briefly across the top of his slick head, his whiskers tickling at your inner forearm in soft bristles. The intent he has in looking at your face with those deep, unfathomable twin dark mirrors that reflect your own image back to you tells you he means something by it. Something significant. He whines quietly in the back of his throat, low and rasping. You hear something in him in that moment, something mournful. The sound seems to travel directly through water to nest itself inside your ribs.

"I'm very angry at you," you murmur, patting him gently one final time on the nose before pulling away. "Give it back."

He noses at your shoulder. As if asking for another stroke. As if he hasn’t done anything wrong. As if this is just another normal day in paradise and there isn't chaos unfolding overhead, nor witnesses observing the weirdest act of petty theft ever witnessed in these parts.

You wrestle the handle free from his surprisingly tight grasp and glare at him reproachfully, pushing the suitcase back towards shore like a surfer sending her board off on its own mission. You hear cheers from the direction of the ferry. More than likely, they assume you got whatever had attracted the seal's interest away safely and are celebrating accordingly. But Raf's cries behind you sound plaintive rather than victorious at having succesfully delayed your departure, almost apologetic. You ignore them stubbornly, instead focusing on getting yourself and the suitcase back ashore in one piece.

He's the better swimmer of course, so it doesn't take long for him to catch up with ease. His giant bulk bumps you repeatedly in the side like he's trying to help keep your head above water in case the weight of the luggage drags you down. He makes an obvious attempt at stealing it from you mid-stroke every so often, but he seems more interested in keeping you company rather than any real attempt at further sabotage, content enough to simply be nearby rather than running off again with his ill-gotten prize.

You reach the dock ladder exhausted and out of breath, Dad lifting you up bodily by your armpits onto the dock as though you weigh nothing while Raf circles below in clear agitation at not being allowed up onto dry land himself. Mom's clearly been fretting this whole time judging from her frazzled appearance when you finally make it to the surface again, wrapping a thick blanket around your shoulders with the urgency of someone trying to contain a small explosion and clucking over you like an anxious hen as Dad attempts to lure the wayward suitcase closer in order to fish it back in.

“You spoiled him,” she snaps, pointing an accusatory finger at the gray head still bobbing below. “He thinks he’s family. This is what happens when you let wild animals eat from your hands and sleep next to you. I told you this would happen. I told you.”

You know she's upset and concerned, but still it irks you to have someone else talk about Raf that way. Even if the trouble's been caused due to his bad temperament for the day. "I know he's not a pet," you snap. "He's just playing, Mom."

Dad looks up from his attempts at retrieval. "Have you noticed him becoming aggressive recently?"

You shake your head immediately, remembering the tenderness of Raf's worried attentions moments prior when you both had been alone together. The same worries which Mom is currently expressing aloud. "Not at all, no, and even if he were, we'd know because we've seen the signs long before it became a problem, Dad. Don't treat him like he's sick or rabid. That's just cruel. He's doing great."

Dad lifts both hands in defeat, giving up on making any sense of the situation.

"C'mon, let's get you changed," Mom decides finally, guiding you away towards the family ferry with one of your carry-ons trailing behind her.

You twist around to look for Raf — who hasn't seemed to realize yet that the two of you have abandoned their efforts — only to feel your chest clench painfully when you find him gone completely from sight, as though he never existed in the first place.

It begins the moment the dock recedes, the ropes unwinding from their cleats like threads unraveling from the hem of a shirt you can’t stop wearing, even when it no longer fits. The ferry groans forward. Beneath the swell and churn of propellers, your mother is still murmuring into the lid of her thermos, rehearsing the list of things she’s convinced you’ll forget the moment you step foot into the dorms, though she’s already said it twice, maybe three times.

You don’t register the splash. Not over the drone of the engine, the high, desolate cries of gulls circling overhead like winged punctuation marks. But others do. There’s a shift in the air — an intake, a thrum, a ripple of attention moving across the deck.

“Is that the same seal?” someone says, the words caught halfway between delight and disbelief.

You know before you turn.

There’s a charge in your chest, a tightening beneath your ribs, the inexplicable weight of knowing you’re being seen.

Raf.

Not basking on the rocks. Not lurking near the moorings. He’s in the open now, out in the deep, and he’s keeping pace.

A streak of mottled gray slicing through the wake. Each curve of his body surfaces, glistens, then vanishes again. Unerring. Tireless. As if the ocean were built to part for him.

It’s not a game. It’s not curiosity. He’s following.

“Like a dolphin,” someone breathes.

You fold your hands into your coat pockets as if you could anchor yourself there, contain the vertigo rising in your chest. He’s never followed the ferry, never even crossed the cove’s border over to the populated areas. He was fine in the open sea. He liked the quiet vastness of it, the way the water stretched wide and unpeopled. What rattled him was the presence of others. People. Crowds. The tight concentration of noise and motion. Places where voices bounced off concrete and metal, where strangers reached and pointed and lingered too long with their eyes. He'd always skirted the edges of such spaces, drawn but wary, inching closer only to vanish when attention turned sharp.

He'd avoid the fishing boats, the ports, the children with their bright towels and sticky hands. You’d seen it — how the jerk in his posture came quick and absolute, how he slipped into the water like a breath held underwater the moment someone raised a voice. His world had rules, unspoken but absolute: stay hidden, stay safe, stay away.

And now — he is here. In the thick of it. Among the diesel-smudged air and the spectacle of faces. Moving with intention, not accident.

The meaning of that hits you hard, sharp beneath the ribs.

This isn’t a lapse. It’s a decision.

And now, here he is. Out where it’s loud, unpredictable and unkind.

The significance lands with a weight that makes your knees ache. This isn’t just a fluke. It’s not momentary courage or curiosity. It’s will. It’s devotion dressed in salt.

You’d never thought him capable of that kind of leap, of forsaking instinct for longing.

And maybe that’s what stings most. That he would go where even people haven’t. That he would follow when others chose not to. That he would brave something that once made his whole body flinch.

For you.

The ferry’s path threads the archipelago, a slow, ceremonial glide from island to island, each stop familiar and hollow. Wind-worn docks. Sun-cooked ropes. The same children pulling at their parents’ sleeves, the same vendors stacking crates of sugar fruit and bread. But everything feels warped now, longer, thinner, stretched too tight.

At the first island, you almost allow yourself relief when he doesn’t appear right away. But as the horn sounds and the ferry pushes off again, he surfaces in the wake.

At the second, he’s waiting. Still. Still as stone, except for the water whispering over his back.

By the third, a crowd has gathered. Children at the rails. Teens with phones out. Someone throws a cracker. Raf doesn’t so much as twitch. His eyes don’t leave you.

You sit pressed against the window, arms crossed so tightly across your stomach it aches. And still your gaze drifts, pulled to the edge again and again.

By the fourth island, you feel it in your shoulders — the pressure, the strain. Every dock feels harder to leave.

By the fifth, you’re standing, wind tangling your hair, your eyes burning.

By the sixth—

Your hands are clenched on the railing. Your eyes overflow without warning. There’s no noise to it. Just a slow descent of tears, tracking over your cheeks, falling onto the scarf your mother insisted you bring.

Most animals understand human patterns to an extent, even intelligent mammals like dolphins have been studied for their social intellec t, but seals operate on different cognitive mechanisms altogether compared to the more popularly researched sea animals, and whether Raf could comprehend anything beyond being a nuisance at best for most folk still remained unclear.

But. He’s still there.

He shouldn’t be.

But he is. A small, relentless shape. Never flagging.

And something about that undoes you.

What kind of creature follows you this far? Not for food. Not for spectacle. Just because it cannot fathom not following.

Not even people do that. Not even the ones who promised to.

There is something about his persistence, mute, unwavering, ferocious in its simplicity, that hollows out your chest. It’s devotion in its rawest form. Without language. Without demand. And it devastates you.

He follows without knowing where you’re going. That’s what shatters you. That he has no map, no endpoint, no idea of how far or how long, or what he'll be encountering. 

He doesn’t follow the route. He follows you. And even that is too simple.

He follows the grief of your absence before it’s fully formed. He follows the outline of goodbye.

And it undoes you. That kind of devotion. That kind of belief.

You press your knuckles to your eyes, heat blooming beneath your lids, something bitter and unwelcome tightening behind your sternum. The shame swells in the silence, low and heavy and undeniable. You were unkind. Too sharp. You treated him like he was something ordinary like a kid throwing a tantrum.

He's following, of course he is. Because you're all he knows. Because you taught him connection, safety, love, companionship unique to humanity. He thought you to be permanent. Stable. And trusted that no matter what happened to you, even if something took you away from him temporarily, you would return. That's how it had always been like for three years now. And instead of saying your goodbyes properly, like friends would, like friends ought to, like he deserves, you had cut things short by storming off.

He was a fucking seal for god's sake, you wouldn't be able to text him later or call to apologize, or invite him around yours once you've settled down properly at school. What does he know about distance and change, time passing, plans changing, responsibilities?

What does he know about leaving, period?

The mainland bleeds into view like a wound stitched from concrete and steel. 

Steel-gray docks yawning out across the harbor, cranes like rusting skeletons, the skyline stacked with buildings and noise. The water darkens here, churned by hulls too large and too many, and everything smells like salt drowned in engine grease.

People swarm the terminal, dockhands shouting over backup alarms, tourists fumbling with overstuffed bags, someone loudly asking where the restrooms are in a dialect not meant for shouting.

You feel it before you see it, the grit in the air, the way the water thickens under the ferry’s weight, the scent shifting from brine and seaweed to engine oil and burnt plastic. The sky flattens. The noise rises. It’s too bright here, too many sharp edges. The city swells toward you with its teeth showing.

A break in the noise.

A wave of sound fractures across the dock, screams, laughter, confusion honed to a blade’s edge.

He breaches the harbor like a rupture. Like something breaking the surface that was never meant to be seen.

Back home in the archipelago, it would’ve been met with little more than a glance. A hum of acknowledgment. Maybe a laugh, if he bumped into someone’s net or made a mess of a drying line. Seals weren’t miracles, they were a fact of the shoreline. They barked at low tide, hauled out on back porches like they owned them, draped themselves across sun-warmed stones under strict observation and firm protection. The archipelago didn’t just live alongside them, it carved space for them. Regulations kept their beaches clear, nets modified, engines slowed. Raf wouldn’t have been strange there. Just another wet face in the crowd. Maybe even invisible.

But not here.

But here—

Here he is spectacle. Alien. Out of place and unallowed.

Their fascination curdles fast. Not wonder, not even confusion, but that wide-eyed, teeth-baring kind of hunger. The city doesn’t know how to love a wild thing unless it can be packaged. Catalogued. Consumed. And Raf, still panting and soaked, has become a glitch in the script they thought they were following.

Raf, soaked and singular, rising from the water as if the sea itself is offering him up is a slick blur of grey and glinting salt. He’s already on the ramp. Not floundering — no. He throws his body forward with that stubborn, undignified determination only he can wear like majesty.

Phones raise like weapons. Fingers twitch with the instinct to reach. No one touches him, but it’s not restraint. It’s restraint like a child watching flame, longing to burn their fingers just to see if it will scar.

He knows. You can see it in the set of his shoulders, the too-wide stance of his flippers, the way he never once turns his back. He’s pressed taut with it, the knowledge of being watched by a crowd that doesn’t believe he should exist in their space.

He’s never looked more out of place.

Never smaller.

His flippers slap against the aluminum. He grunts. He screams. He galumphs. There aren't any docks here, no rocks for him to perch on, none of the old familiar salty scent of ocean he's so accustomed to. There are strangers. Scents and sounds that frighten him. There is nowhere else to go but onward.

People scatter in the ferry. A cup of coffee drops. A camera flashes. Somewhere, a child claps.

He disappears for a moment, past the threshold, into the ferry’s belly.

By the time you reach him, he’s tucked himself into the far corner of the lower deck, pressed against the vending machine like it’s the last safe place on earth, chest still heaving, whiskers trembling, his flippers flush to his sides like some strange version of a hug. He doesn't respond immediately despite seeing you, seeming more stunned than anything else as if trying to make sense of this new environment.

"Raf, holy shit, I am so sorry." The words spill out all at once, almost clumsy in your hurry to get them out. The floor hums under your knees as you sink to them, the metal cold through your jeans. "Look at you, oh god, I'm so sorry I left you behind—"

Your name hangs between you, threaded through with things unsaid, the gravity of a thousand shared days suddenly coiled too tight.

When he moves, it feels like something unsticking — a bone sliding back in place, a bruise blossoming, a slow surrendering of distance. It shudders up his entire body, a tremble that works its way from toes to fins until his tail slaps the ground once, hard, a final, reluctant release of control.

And then he’s on you, squirming close and eager. Lumbering with relief and excitement, almost knocking you flat as he nuzzles and paws at your shoulder insistently with those giant paddles, still somewhat damp, shaking so hard his whiskers quiver. He huffs softly against you as if still having trouble believing you're truly here now after following the ferry all the way from home.

"Oh, my cutie pie, yes hi hello," you mutter quickly, attempting pet him while simultaneously keeping both your bodies from toppling over backwards. "I'm right here. No need to panic anymore."

After several minutes of vigorous cuddling, Raf finally settles a little when you continue scratching soothingly down his side, leaning into it like he's finally allowing himself to believe you're really in front of him now.

You sigh quietly through your nose, carding gentle fingers through his furry head as his rumbling squeaks resumes again within his chest.

"Yes, you were so brave. I promise you we won't do this ever again. You're amazing for making it this far and sticking with me the whole way. Good boy."

He flops against you bonelessly as if finally feeling safe enough to let his guard down now that you're both aboard together and seemingly alone for now. With no witnesses around to react negatively or try touching him without your approval first, he relaxes more and lets his eyelids droop, his snoring soft and pleasant.

"God, you're silly. Look at this... you think I've forgotten about you stealing my stuff? Oh no, honey, not today."

Raf sighs gustily, nudging your cheek with his nose in halfhearted protest.

You stare fondly down at him and consider what the hell you're supposed to do now. He can't remain here like he would be able to back home -- his home. Wildlife restoration would undoubtedly send someone to relocate him immediately if they got wind of it, and there's also the risk of getting cornered by animal control services who would come and take him away for fear he might bite or attack people if provoked. Not to mention the dangers of either being hunted or caught in a fishing net while being too tired to swim to freedom... The thought of either happening fills you with dread.

No, Raf can't stay here, this place isn't made for him.

It's good that he's currently in the ferry. Dad can take him back on board, since he'll have to turn around anyway to go home; surely, the crew won't mind another passenger along with them back across the channel.

"I'm sorry I made you push yourself," you say, even though it's just you and him and an empty, humming hallway. "And I'm sorry for not telling you goodbye properly. That wasn't fair of me. I was just so. So..." You shake your head, throat pinching dangerously. "I don't know why it didn't occur to me that leaving wouldn't be something like just going next door and I could come out and spend time with you when I wasn't so angry anymore. How could I think I'd see you everyday still?"

He offers only silence, save for the faint whistling in and out of his nostrils. His warmth steadies you, despite everything. Like standing knee-deep in an ocean that hasn’t decided yet which way to shift.

"This has to be animal abuse, right," you blurt, scrubbing roughly at your face.

He chuffs at you impatiently, bumping your elbow with his nose. When you look down, you catch the flash of one black eye gleaming in the low light of the ferry's hallways while the other is buried in the shadow of your coat. If he understands or not, you can never quite tell. But the look he gives you is oddly patient — tender, almost, the same gentleness that draws seabirds to follow ships, the instinctual tug of home and kin.

His chest puffs like he's inhaling a great lungful of something, then sags again, sputtering. It's impossible to tell whether he means to answer or just exhale noisily to distract you, but it does draw your attention nonetheless.

“Yeah, okay, thank you, heard loud and clear,” you continue, falling silent for a while. “You gotta leave though, Raf, you can’t stay here.”

He wiggles as if refusing, and you double down. “You can’t. You saw outside, people don't—it's not like home, there are more people living on this city than on the rest of the archipelago combined. And most of them haven’t seen animals like you doing what you did today before, and certainly not so closely... If word gets out, people might try to capture you, take photos of you, stuff you away inside a glass case... And it's gonna happen no matter where you go here because they don't have any wildlife landmarks like we have at home. At least there you're in open space. Here, if anyone catches you, you'd be taken away from me one way or the other."

He goes very still. Still like water before a wave breaks. There is a hush to him. A quality to his attention you recognize now — focus, not fear. Attentiveness, not alarm.

He's so smart. Impossibly perceptive and sharp. Clever as he comes. An animal with the intelligence of a human child twice their age. He looks up at you now as if trying to convey that he understands perfectly what you mean with the threat of danger inseparable from your explanation, and isn’t pleased by this.

"That’s why you have to be a good boy and let Mom and Dad drop you off back home, okay? You just need to stay where you are and let the ferry carry you away, okay? You'll be safe and sound. And I—"

Raf lets out an agitated squeal and begins pawing frantically at you, startling you badly as his flippers smack repeatedly at your sides. He scrabbles onto your lap with his awkward gait until you give him your hands and then, using them as a grip, squeezes your forearms urgently. There are sounds you don’t understand but recognize — indignant clicks, low croaks, mournful huffs. They thrum through his body as if through a flute. The noises vibrate somewhere between anger and distress, each one higher than the last.

“I’m not leaving you forever,” you breathe. Your voice is torn silk. “I’m not.”

He digs his claws harder into your forearms like an admonishing kitten, making insistent warbling calls back at you. He's upset, afraid; his vocalizations grow frantic, almost desperate, seeking reassurance.

"You can trust me on this one," you say, petting him gently, soothingly. "I'll come back. Promise. Okay?"

He whines pitifully against you, sounding unconvinced by the notion.

"For breaks and holidays, yeah, plus visits too. Just because I won't be around as much doesn't mean I've disappeared completely or abandoned you. I'll just be a little farther away for awhile and there will be more time between the trips to see each other."

And when Raf merely grumbles louder rather than showing any sign of having understood, you pull him closer into you, tucking his head under your chin protectively and hold him tight for as long as you dare, ignoring the ache beginning to blossom in your knees from squatting here on the cold floor, letting your pulse slow and fall in time with his own steady breathing. You run your hand down his smooth pelt one final time, savoring the sensation and imprinting it deep within your memory.

"I love you, you know that right?" You mumble into his silky fur, knowing he likely couldn't actually understand or process what that particular phrase meant aside from recognizing it as something he's heard countless times before and which calms you significantly every time it passes your lips, yet perhaps he does, or maybe there's the barest hint of comprehension from whatever he takes away from the emotional subtext rather than the literal meaning of your words. "I won't go ahead and forget you that easily. Never could."

In response, Raf shifts just enough so he can meet your stare, eyes like glossy ink drops blinking up at you slowly. Then he licks your cheek very firmly in an approximation of affection, prompting you to wipe your saliva stained skin with your sleeve.

[himasgod]

ACE X READER

Where neither of you will admit that you are in love with each other

It's inspired by Faye Webster's song But Not Kiss, and I tried to follow that vibe throughout the oneshot, playing it in the background and basing it on the lyrics. Reading it with the song playing might be advisable to get into the vibe <3

It’s raining when he shows up.

Not the soft kind, either. It’s a storm—ugly, loud, relentless.

And yet, there’s Ace on Ramshackle's door, soaking wet, hoodie clinging to him, his sneakers leaving muddy footprints as he steps inside like he’s been here a hundred times before.

He has.

You blink at him, wrapped in a blanket, your hands still holding the warm mug you were nursing before he arrived.

“What the hell, Ace?”

“I forgot my umbrella,” he says, like that explains why he crossed campus in a thunderstorm to get here.

You give him a look. He doesn’t meet your eyes.

You hand him a towel. He dries off in silence, his jaw tight, his shoulders a little more tense than usual.

Something’s wrong. But if you ask, he’ll brush it off. You know how he is.

So instead, you go back to the couch. You leave space. You wait.

He joins you after a moment, quiet as ever, and you both sit there like ghosts in the storm.

“I hate this weather,” he mutters, pulling the towel over his head.

“Then why’d you come?”

He doesn’t answer right away.

Then—quietly, almost too quiet—you hear:

“Didn’t wanna be alone tonight.”

Your heart lurches. But you don’t say anything.

Not yet.

Ace shifts closer. Not enough to touch. Just close. Like he’s pulled by something he doesn’t want to name.

You study him through the corner of your eye.

His fingers are clenching the fabric of the towel. His mouth moves like he’s working up the nerve to speak—but he never quite does.

Finally, he says it. Sort of.

“You know I—” He stops. Laughs under his breath.

“Never mind.”

You look at him. But he won’t look at you.

And that’s how you know.

That’s how you know he loves you.

Because Ace Trappola isn’t afraid of most things. He’ll run his mouth at Riddle, prank the teachers, throw himself into chaos without blinking. But when it comes to you?

He’s terrified.

Because if he says it, it’s real. If he says it, it could fall apart.

So instead, he leans back against the couch.

Lets your head fall against his shoulder.

And whispers, so quietly you almost miss it:

“I’m here when you need. I always have been.”

And he stays.

But not kiss. But not say it.

And you don’t make him.

You wake up hours later. The storm has passed. The towel’s still on the floor.

And Ace is still there, arm slung over the back of the couch behind you—not touching, but close.

You don’t wake him. You don’t move.

Because for now, this is what you get.

And it’s not everything. But it’s him.

He’s here again.

Or anothter night, in Ramshackle, the ghosts long asleep. You're tucked under a thin blanket on the ragged couch you pretend isn’t falling apart.

He doesn't knock. He never knocks. Just lets himself in like it's natural. Like it’s his place too.

Ace drops his bag with a careless thud. Kicks off his shoes. And then plops right down beside you like he belongs there.

He does. He doesn’t.

You scoot over, even though you don’t have to. He’s already sprawling across half the cushions, claiming space that should be yours.

You let him. Always let him.

You don’t say anything for a while. Just the soft hum of whatever weird late-night show’s still playing on your flickering TV. His arm brushes yours when he shifts, and your heart does that stupid, traitorous skip.

It always does.

“I got into another fight with Deuce,” he says eventually, voice soft and lazy. “Dude was acting like a total idiot during alchemy. Tried to mix nightshade with lemon juice. Blew the whole table up.”

You laugh a little. Because that’s what you do. You laugh, and you listen, and you let him talk.

Like you’re not holding onto every word like it matters more than anything else.

Your head falls lightly onto his shoulder.

He doesn’t pull away.

He never does.

“I should’ve let him fail,” Ace mutters, more to himself than to you. “But I bailed him out. Again.”

You hum in response, and your eyes slip shut.

The couch is old. The air is cold. But here, in this moment, wrapped in silence and his warmth, it feels like the safest place in the world.

You shift closer. He lets you.

You want to sleep in his arms. But not kiss.

You long for his touch—but don’t miss.

You don’t want to regret any of this.

And maybe that’s why you’ll never ask for more.

You wake up with your head in his lap.

At some point in the night, the TV had turned off on its own. The blanket’s fallen to the floor, but Ace is still there. Still awake.

His fingers are in your hair, like he forgot he was doing it, or like he’s too tired to stop.

Your throat tightens.

You want to ask him if he meant to stay this long. If he meant to touch you like this. If he meant to let you get so close, without ever stepping closer himself.

But you don’t.

Because the truth is, you want this version of him—the one that stays late and touches your hair and tells you things he won’t tell anyone else.

Even if he never means it the way you want him to.

Even if it’s killing you.

You see him in your dreams sometimes.

Not the Ace that teases you in the hallways. Not the Ace that rolls his eyes when you’re too sentimental. Not the Ace that acts like it’s all a game.

In your dreams, he’s different. He reaches for your hand like he’s meant to. Like it’s the most natural thing in the world.

But you wake up and forget. Because if you remember, it hurts.

You’re meant to be—but not yet. He’s all that you have—but you can’t get.

So you bury it.

You smile through it.

And he keeps showing up.

“Yo, you’ve been quiet,” Ace says one afternoon, kicking at a pebble with his boot as you both sit on the front steps of Ramshackle.

It’s warm. The sun paints his hair copper-red. You can’t look too long or it’ll burn you.

“Just tired,” you lie.

“You always say that.”

You shrug.

“It’s always true.”

He watches you for a second. Long enough that you feel it.

Then he nods, leaning back on his elbows.

“Well, don’t go dying or anything. You’d leave me with Grim, and that’s honestly the cruelest thing you could do.”

You huff out a laugh. “Noted.”

But you don’t say what you want to.

You don’t say "I hope you’re okay too." You don’t say "You’ve been in my head for days." You don’t say "I love you so much it makes my ribs ache."

Because if he’s in a good place, you won’t mess with that.

You never will.

You love him. You know you do.

But it’s the kind of love that can’t go anywhere. The kind that lives in the corners of rooms, in shared glances, in his silly jokes that carry too much weight. It’s a love that has no name, no direction, no safety net.

He leans on you when he’s tired.

You patch him up when he gets hurt.

He calls you his “partner-in-crime” and pokes your forehead like he’s never thought about kissing you. And maybe he hasn’t.

Or maybe he has. Maybe he’s just like you.

Too afraid of what would happen if either of you broke the spell.

So you stay here. In this almost. This purgatory. You want to ask. But you don’t.

You want to say it. But you won’t.

Instead—

You reach for his hand one night, quietly, without looking at him.

He doesn’t pull away. He squeezes it once. And for a moment, it’s enough.

You’ll hold onto this.

But not kiss.

[fear-is-truth]

THINGS I WANNA SAY TO YOU (BUT I’LL JUST LET YOU LIVE) — bruce wayne x reader

the dark knight has been shouldering gotham’s weight for too long. tonight, he might just need someone else ease the burden. // wc : 773

raindrops traced uneven paths down the floor-to-ceiling windows of the wayne mansion, the soft patter filling the otherwise tranquil room. fire crackled low in the hearth, its amber flickers like demonic fingers, clawing and reaching, scraping at the shadows that clung to the vaulted ceilings. BRUCE WAYNE sat on the edge of the leather couch, shirt sleeves rolled up, his tie discarded carelessly on the coffee table. there was a dull ache in his shoulders—a reminder of the endless strain he subjected himself to. but tonight, there was nothing demanding his attention. no calls to answer, no suits to don, no crises waiting in the alleyways of gotham. for once, quietness held.

bruce intended to keep it that way.

his gaze followed you as you entered the room, his thoughts unspooling before he could stop them. the life he’d constructed, brick by brick, with walls of steel and grief meant to keep others out. yet somehow, you’d slipped through. the way you fit into his life, seamlessly yet entirely your own, never ceased to disarm him. you were so different from everything he was—light where he was shadow, warmth where he was cold.

somehow, you belonged here. with him.

you set the tray down on the coffee table, the clink of ceramic pulling him from his thoughts. you started to sit on the armrest, but he caught your hand, long fingers curling around your wrist. “come here,” he said, tugging you toward him. your brows lifted slightly, but you didn’t resist as he guided you until you were settled in his lap, facing him, your knees bracketing his hips. one of his hands resting on your waist, the other trailing up your arm idly.

“what was that for?” you tilted your head with a curious smile, your hands instinctively settling on his shoulders. bruce didn’t answer, his gaze fixed on your face as his mind scrambled for the right word to capture the sight before him. eloquent, articulate bruce wayne, who always seemed to find the perfect phrase, drew a perfect blank. ethereal was the closest candidate, but even that felt inadequate. the firelight danced across your features, softening the curve of your lips and the elegant slope of your nose. for a fleeting moment, he felt utterly unmoored.

“you’re so tense,” you murmured, breaking the quiet as your fingers pressed into the tight muscles along his shoulders, working with a steady rhythm. bruce allowed his head to tilt back slightly, eyelids fluttering shut as he surrendered to your touch. your fingertips dug into the knots, slowly unraveling the tension that had built up over days, coaxing a deep exhale from his chest. the pressure was firm but gentle, easing away the stiffness in his muscles. as you continued, bruce’s thoughts drifted, and this time, he made no effort to reign them in.

the sound came first—a sharp, ominous crack. bruce stood on an endless pane of dark glass, its surface trembling under pressure. fractures raced outward like veins, jagged and merciless, the splintering sound echoing like gunfire. beneath his feet was nothing but darkness, a bottomless void that yawned wide, waiting to swallow him whole.

shit, he’s going to fall.

and then, your touch—fingers gentle but firm against his skin—and the cracks stilled as though startled into submission, the jagged edges softening under the warmth of your palms. the glass rippled, smooth and fluid like water, its sharpness dissolving as if it had never been.

he swallowed back a groan, adam’s apple bobbing as his fingers tightened briefly on your hip. the reaction didn’t go unnoticed. “relax,” you teased, your voice a lilting chirp of amusement. his lips twitched in response, though his grip on you remained firm. “you make that sound easy,” bruce countered gruffly, the strain in his voice a contraction to his words. your hands slowed, one drifting to rest over his chest, where you could feel the steady thrum beneath your palm. leaning forward, warm breath skimmed his jaw, impossibly close yet maddeningly restrained.

“better?” you asked softly, pulling back just enough to meet his gaze, eyes searching.

“better,” he replied, though the word couldn’t begin to articulate even a fraction of what he felt.