#I can’t even scroll the following tab without getting exhausted

[steve-brules-rules]

I got a Bluesky account >:] my bluesky will function the same as my Twitter: it’s where I’ll post my art and not much else ! Hoping I can find other w101 artists to follow over there too 🫶

[wincore]

runway (m) | jung yoonoh

pairing: model!jaehyun x fashion designer!reader

words: 18.7k

summary: there are some things that come with dedicating your life to fashion: a taste for finer fabrics, a splash of love for art, and an appreciation of the human body. none of these are supposed to include the hottest model you have ever laid eyes on, or the fact that you completely, utterly hate his guts. 

genre: enemies to lovers, angst, fluff, light smut, comedy-ish

warnings: sexual content, mentions of anxiety

a/n: woohooooooo she’s finally here!!!! i cant believe this!! everything aside, i do not have first hand experience working in the fashion industry so please do take this with a grain of salt. i’m also going to pass out. good night <3

A list of things you appreciate: colours, satin, comfort.

A list of things you do not appreciate: Jung Yoonoh. Jaehyun. Whatever.

The hum of the car engine has little effect on you; you travel like this almost every day. Tall buildings, scorching pavement, the blare of traffic—it’s Seoul, after all. You sigh, more of a short expression of annoyance, scrolling down with your thumb and back up again. Since when did he get permission to post pictures from pre-fittings? And one of your works, no less. 

His feed is so messy. You click your tongue. For a model, that is. 

You open the story again and consider messaging him. It’s your cherry red coat, or rather the collar of it, golden thread sewn in swirls of patterns, and a sheer floral shirt extending all the way up to cover Jaehyun’s neck. You frown. It’s meant for showcase, not teasers. Even if the picture extends just from the curve of his shoulder to his parted lips, you can’t stand the sight of it on him. It’s not bias, you try to tell yourself. This is business. You tap your fingertips rapidly against the back of your phone. This is obviously business. 

Seoul Fashion Week is the height of your anxiety, which means you have little regard for anything else decorated around you. With a new frenzy arising in every minute of your day—you don’t have time to think, a sense of madness in the way you keep busy. Your Elixir collection is more than what you had hoped for it to be, a twinge of satisfaction sitting at the pit of your stomach. It nicely puts together everything rich and extravagant, humanity’s first love—everything you despise really, so Jaehyun wasn’t a bad choice for a model. 

You backspace on your text. Is this rude? Should you care if you’re being rude? How unprofessional, you imagine his voice saying. It wouldn’t be the first unprofessional thing you’d done.

The final text reads ‘Glad you’re enjoying my designs, but they were not meant to be publicly displayed before the official show, as common sense predicts.’ 

No, of course you’re not trying to be snarky. It’s perfectly formal. All that time writing professional complaint letters to companies for ripping off your designs paid off, you suppose.

You exit the Uber, thanking the driver quickly before you rush into the building, checking the time on your watch. It’s sunny, and hotter than you anticipated. You can only hope it’s cooler tomorrow so the heat doesn’t suffocate your models.

The company building is another madness in its own. Joohyun greets you with a quick smile, a bunch of fabrics being handed to her before she can make any conversation with you, and the rest of the workers bow in greeting before getting back to their own individual windstorms. You step over a few boxes on the grounds, beelining to your workspace so you can settle down your bag.

You’re team leader, you tell yourself, a short breath tumbling out of your mouth. Even so, you don’t do very well under several pairs of eyes on you at once. Some part of you is still the timid fashion designer, packing your entire identity into a small sketchbook.

The sunlight is blaring out of control in the place—it’s meant to be spacious and sunlit, of course, but the heat makes you adjust your collar before you can move forward. The bustle of the style and design team along with the production team in the same place is akin to a nightmare, and you trace your steps quickly.

“Guys,” you begin, fidgeting with the leather strap of your watch as you continue, “Firstly, good job.”

There’s a bunch of short cheers and clapping to interrupt before you can continue. 

“As for tomorrow…stylists, I need you to touch up the collars in all the Western-style coats. The detailing needs to be kept clean and sharp. I want the audience to be able to see it.”

You pause, your tone still neutral. “And let’s not start again on the lacing. We had that discussion yesterday.” 

There’s some nods and sounds of affirmation. 

“Production team…I don’t think I can say much to you without Doyoung getting on my case.”

There’s collective laughter and you crack a smile. With a few more rapid words, you dismiss yourself, walking over to your colleagues to help them out. You’re team leader, the one with the final say in all the designs, but you can’t possibly imagine completing it without Joohyun or the others. 

“Good pep talk there, (name),” Joohyun says, walking over to you as her hands sharp and steady as they go through the clothes rack. 

“They think I’m an asshole,” you say, breathing out. You know your words are too direct. Drunk co-workers on a Friday night are not the best place to discover facts about yourself. Sometimes even you think you sound bossy. You check the key parts for each item, knowing you’ll be doing this once again before the show.

“We wouldn’t be going anywhere without direction,” Joohyun responds, laughing as if you’d said something silly. “We’re all glad you’re here, (name).”

Words like these are so easing for a mess like you, not that you’d admit it. Joohyun has always been a sort of mother figure to you after you entered this company, followed by Doyoung. A good few years senior to you, she started out as a model before she moved on to designing. 

It’s her last year working in this place. But of course, it’s a given when she’s starting her own label (mom clothes and children’s apparel, she’d called her clothing line, rolling her eyes) and one of the most well-known names in South Korean fashion not having her own label is sacrilege (according to your colleagues anyway). She’d said to contact her when you start your own family, and maybe she’ll send a congratulations package for both you and your baby. You’d laughed. Out of all the insults you could ever receive, that was perhaps the loveliest one.

Ridiculousness aside, you’ll miss the comfort of her presence. You were still in school when your designs led you to a showcase in New York Fashion Week, your sponsor more than generous. You stepped into it too soon, too eager. It was breath-taking and awful all at once—and the first time you saw a world outside of your own. It was overwhelming. There are few people in this new world as kind as Joohyun.

The sound of your notification snaps you out of your thoughts. You swear you kept it on vibrate, a little irked at having to search for your phone when your hands are full. The notification itself brings on a stronger wave of vexation.

_jeongjaehyun:

My manager told me it was good publicity

But I could take it down for you

The ‘for you’ adds an unnecessary effect, you think as you hold back a scowl. And what does ‘could’ mean? A miscommunication with the sales team isn’t even on the list of things you need to worry about. Honestly, you don’t have time to fight him, quickly typing out a ‘whatever. it’s okay’ before looking back up.

You jump, the look on Joohyun’s face a little suspicious for what might come out of her mouth.

“It’s not a crime to text people.” She shrugs, shuffling through the rack one more time to take the clothes for transportation. 

You’re quick to jump to your defence. “I have nothing to do with him.”

Joohyun looks at you, amused. “He’s not a bad person, you know? How long are you going to keep hating him for one thing he did?”

“It’s not one thing,” you groan, averting your gaze to the clothes so as to help her. “I just- he’s so- so- oh come on. You know how I feel about him.”

“I’m just saying you don’t have any reason to. Everyone’s different from what they appear to be. Especially in this line of work.” Joohyun balances the clothes you give her across her forearms.

“So he’s fake. I hate that even more.” You sigh, pulling out the blue silk overcoat, the colour matching Joohyun’s work dress.

“You mean unreal? Models tend to be that way—don’t be so harsh on him, honey.”

You simply shake your head, words entering one ear and out the other. Joohyun presses her lips into a line but lets it go soon enough. She knows you’re capable enough to separate professional from personal and that should be enough. You’re not keeping a tab on something as warming as spite. 

You can’t believe you’d ever been within five feet of him without turning your nose. You can’t believe you’d smiled at his jokes once, even if it was just that one night. He was the godsent Prince Charming, just perhaps not yours. Paris surely had a distressing effect on you that year. 

You don’t make the same mistake twice.

You walk back to your desk to take a seat and scavenge through your belongings, most of the people already outside. Fashion Week, which once upon a time was a faraway dream, now is part of life—exciting and exhausting. It’s almost always over in a flash, your love for it whisked in peaks of bittersweet. (“You work your ass off for six months and it’s, what, fifteen minutes long?” your mother had asked after you’d brought her to one of the shows.)

This line of work is a nightmare without mental preparation. You have a degree, you have experience and yet it doesn’t feel enough, confidence easier to drain in a person than blood. And you’re not very fond of pale cheeks.

It came to asking yourself if you really have it in you for a few months—a test of sorts everyone puts themselves through at least once in their lives. At that time, your favourite professor, a bald man nearing his retirement years with the wrinkliest face you’d ever seen, had asked you just one question. 

Do you love it? 

Of course you fucking do. 

You couldn’t say that to his face, sure, but you know he saw it in you—either the effort you put out every day of the semester or the way your hands moved across fabric like a machine, your designs made with the persistence of nature. Your final year project landed you an internship at one of the largest clothing brands in Seoul and your internship landed you a job at the same. Your job, well, lead you to Jaehyun, among many other things. 

You scowl at the image of his face that appears when you close your eyes, massaging your forehead—it’s hard to not see it everywhere already, from Cosmopolitan to Vogue.

While you were biting your nails in New York, Jaehyun had flown out to Paris with Saint Laurent, one of the younger male models to show his face for the first time. He’d taken the whole place by storm, you had heard from a friend. To say half the world had fallen in love—either with his dimples or his confident walk—would be an understatement. A privilege, to be gold-plated in a mercenary world.

You’d briefly made eye contact at the airport the first time you saw him, a year later, when you were arriving in Incheon and he was leaving it. It was London, that time. For him, Milan. As much as you couldn’t believe living a fashion student’s dream, Jaehyun’s face was truly, unironically much more unrealistic. Your classmates’ gabs and gossip in sewing class had suddenly made sense. You taught yourself to not be swayed by faces, even if they look like they’re stitched together by Aphrodite and Apollo with their bare hands—friendly advice from seniors at the orientation night ‘party’. 

You’d met him formally in Paris, after you’d graduated from fashion school. He was certainly the most beautiful face in the room—and you weren’t the only one aware of it. The entire night you’d been starting conversations you couldn’t relate to, till he came along with his charming dimples and a faux connect. You were naive, and a little tipsy. The attraction was obvious, and it had been you by the bathroom pulling him in for a drunk kiss till he’d snapped out of the daze—as if it were some joke you’d been playing. He’d apologized before leaving, like it wasn’t a big deal, with silken lips parted in a gesture of remorse and a short, firm bow. It didn’t settle very well alongside the merlot in your gut.

You. You’re a big deal. 

You were alone in a room full of painted faces and he sat atop the throne they worshipped. Why had you expected any more from him—in the understanding nods or the few kind words that escaped his lips? You felt stupid. He made you feel like smiling for the first time that night and you hated him for it—you’re sure he doesn’t care either way. Or maybe he does, with the wonderfully irked responses he graces you with. 

Jaehyun made something out of himself in these nine years, just as you have. Runway supermodel to the face of South Korean men in fashion to an entrepreneur, he might as well have a documentary on him—and he would if he didn’t evade paparazzi and reporters like his life depended on it. Enigmatic, the articles wrote. You scoffed. Conceited, more like. After the initial years, he decided to settle in New York, frequently flying to Seoul and other fashion capitals for business and contractual events. Some of those occasionally include your shows.

Having Jaehyun gets more attention but it’s not like you’re a new, doe-eyed kid. Your works have been featured for popstars and foreign celebrities, and you’ve been invited to several interviews with big magazines. You’ve gone global (albeit under the brand’s name) and you’ve been to places you’d only seen pictures of in the very same magazines you looked up to. They can describe your work as unique all they want—and you don’t mean to sound fucking pretentious—but your job is nothing more than an expression of the self. It’s a part of you; you first started sewing patches onto things simply because your closet lacked colour. And eventually, you found yourself searching for more—colours, fabrics, dreams. You’re devoted to your job because you love it, you want to do it. You’re allowed to be a little arrogant about it. 

If only trying desperately to be arrogant did something about your insecurities.

You hope your works redefine themes, your need to stand out contrasting with your fear of it. Eye-catching is always your forte; this time it’s fairy tales and royalty in a mix of East meets West. 

D-1. Same feeling, new season.

The press is here, you take note. Photographers. Models. Students. Vloggers. It’s a burst of colours down there.

You hate running late, rushing down the stairs to the plaza through the crowds of people. Some recognize you, as they make their way to you but you end up walking a little faster to minimize your presence.  You curse yourself for wearing the jacket. It goes nicely with the rest of your outfit and March isn’t supposed to be this hot. You wipe the sweat from your hairline, hoping the makeup is waterproof like it said.

You consider stopping at the café for a fix of coffee but stop when you notice Joohyun holding a bunch of cups by the venue. She doesn’t look too happy about the sun, or the burdening errand of fetching coffee. You adjust her little red beret at her request, smiling at her annoyance but trying your best to keep it hidden. You don’t want to get cussed out by Joohyun. 

“Someone tell Doyoung to get his coffee,” Joohyun complains. “I’ve been waiting for half an hour.”

“I’m sure that’s an exaggeration,” you say, sipping your coffee. The taste fills your senses with a pleasant dose of energy and you hum out a satisfied note. “Why are there so many students out here? Influencers? Did we sponsor this many kids?” 

Joohyun shakes her head.  “Jaehyun just got here.”

You suppress an eye-roll. “Wonder why he still comes back for Seoul when he’s booked full for New York.”

“It’s his hometown.” Joohyun shrugs. “I’d come back too. Even if I’m paid more out there.”

You finish your coffee and duck into the fitting room, much to Joohyun’s displeasure as she’s left alone again. Doyoung’s in for an earful, you chuckle thinking about it.

It would look like a hell of a mess to anyone not accustomed to this. Everyone is a flurry by themselves alone but if you mix them with the eclectic crowd you find at a Seoul Fashion Week backstage, it’s more of a disaster. A colorful one, at the very least. 

New York was worse. You were too young, in a world that was too big. It’s a miracle you even received an opportunity from so big a name. But, you suppose, it hardly matters now.

You no longer live in a world where Seoul is far from Paris. Fashion and art are things unmarked by place of origin.

It’s easy to spot Jaehyun in a corner, two people adjusting his coat for better fitting at the waist. His makeup’s done, you notice as you get closer. Good, you think. If any makeup were to get on the fabric, you’d go feral (although you do have full confidence in the makeup artists here and their choice of product).

“Jaehyun,” you greet. Your co-workers give each other a look before excusing themselves. You raise an eyebrow, too late to stop them. They didn’t finish the looping of the belt properly, you take notice. You wrinkle your nose. Sloppy. 

“(name).” He responds with an equal lack of amusement. 

You pull the belt at his waist, Jaehyun stiffening at the contact.

“What are you doing?” he asks, looking down at you with a raised eyebrow.

“My job? What do you think, genius?”

Jaehyun presses his lips together and lets you complete the altercations. The chiffon shirt allows you to see the hazed definition of his core, a rather flustering thing to be exposed to for anyone with eyes. When you look up in a moment’s mistake, you’re reminded of why his face is everywhere. Flawless, almost. You hate it. Averting your eyes, you fix the collar so the pattern stands out more. You can feel his eyes over your outstretched hand all the way to your face, subtle as ever. If Jaehyun thinks you’re bothered by it, he’s an idiot for believing so. 

You take a step back to analyse the coat. The golden threads are flawlessly detailed, spiraling in patterns of different flowers and vines around the collar, gradually getting larger as they twine at the base of the neck. They meet the polished rhinestone buttons a little lower. You almost smile. You’d sewn each thread and each button in yourself the first time. It hardly looks the same now.

Bright red is an eyesore if you look at it longer than five minutes, you realize. The frown that’s been itching to show up finally does. Suddenly, you’re glad Jaehyun is modelling this piece. You shake your head and look back at his face, from his deep-set brown eyes to his full, tinted lips before pausing. The little Swarovski pearls line strands of his hair in a starry display, perfect in every angle of it. It’s easy to appreciate the human beauty when you see his face, and even if you claim your vehement dislike for him, you’re not a liar nor an idiot. 

How infuriating it is, to let things be. Bad blood can only dry to an ugly, unusable brown.

You narrow your eyes at the thinning layer of glitter on his peach-blushed cheeks. He doesn’t exactly need much more of it but the unevenness bothers you.

“Your makeup needs retouching,” you say, frowning. “Did you touch your face? I thought you were a more...professional model than this, Jaehyun.”

“You walked in,” he replies, casually. “I was distracted.”

You feel your cheeks colour. “That’s- that’s not a reason.”

He smiles politely. “I suppose I’ll leave you then. You must have other work to do.”

You hold back a biting remark. His playfulness doesn’t sit well with you; he’s polite just enough to annoy you and straightforward just enough to make you want to throw something at him. He could’ve directly told you to fuck off maybe—but oh no, it’s Jung Yoonoh, seamless and radiant, with only the sweetest collection of words on his tongue. You think of the first time you met, something warm in the corner of your heart. You’d mistaken it, of course. 

He didn’t care for you, or any of the people trailing after him and his silver flute, or the rest of the shallow carcass of a world so undeniably obsessed with him. It didn’t hit you till he’d left you hanging, mangled memories of something close to hurt. You’re glad you didn’t kiss him. You wouldn’t be able to get over the embarrassment, the blow to your pride had it escalated any further.

And of course, the one thing he did to make you absolutely certain of his distaste—was simply choose another designer’s work over yours when given a choice. It seems silly, unprofessional even, but the lack of response to your Fall/Winter ready-to-wear collection had been embarrassingly low, someone else’s designs sold out at an equally awful rate. You—your insecurities—wanted to blame your own failings—maybe it was the lining of the coats, or the colours maybe— the fabric? Perhaps, you hadn’t focused on comfort all too well. But it was clear, a word from Jung Yoonoh could change the minds of a fashion-forward youth as easily as his face and physique scored contracts with the biggest brands and labels. And it was clear he didn’t like you very much.

You walk over to the other models, eyes scanning down to the T. You glance over one of Joohyun’s designs, a modern men’s hanbok. The blood red paired with yellow is certainly easing on the eyes, though the shades vary from top to bottom, like a sunset. The dark grey chunky shoes fitted under dark tights complete the entire future oriental look you suppose she was going for. She’s only showcasing two of her designs this year and they’re just before the centrepiece. You shake your head, clutching the fabric of your jacket sleeve. You hate seeing other designs before a showcase, even if they’re a friend’s. 

You turn your head to make eye contact with Jaehyun across the room. It takes a few seconds but you snap your head in another direction to break the spell. 

How strange. You haven’t had nearly enough coffee to feel jittery under his gaze.

You’re forced to take a breather away from this jungle of liveliness. 

The amount of people outside the venue gives you yet another headache. Excited college students and fashion vloggers stand outside expectantly, and you give a short bow and polite ‘hello’ to anyone who approaches. You desperately want to be left alone. Even if it’s for a few seconds.

You walk quickly, your feet soundless against the floor. Your mask performs considerably (and surprisingly) well in hiding you. You consider visiting the Design Market to enjoy a seat alone and charge your phone before it’s show time.

Open spaces. You need open spaces. Suddenly, the DDP seems to be suffocating you despite its tremendous size.

“Hey!” You’re greeted with a sudden force to your right side, an arm wrapping around you. You look up to see Johnny, a wide grin on his face and you let yourself mirror it, shaking your head.

“Big day,” he says. “Want me to take some pictures? I’ve got some time between shows—lovely outfit, as usual.”

It’s strange how Johnny’s the photographer and not the model—you’ve heard he receives a lot of requests to get on the other side of the camera though he always refuses. He doesn’t visit Seoul as often, but he has much to do in uplifting the mood with his strangely effective sense of humour. The coffee-coloured shirt he’s wearing goes well with the plaid grey coat, reminiscent of Fendi’s Spring collection, and sometimes you wonder whether a job as a fashion photographer ever had much to do with his style. Johnny has always been effortlessly impressive. 

You politely decline, your mind still focused on the smooth running of things. Nothing’s ever on time when it comes to Fashion Weeks—yes, it’s called fashionably late but it just makes you annoyed. You consider ducking back to your venue, adding some final final touches and any more last-minute altercations. Years have passed and you’re still not used to it, fingers itching to do something about everything. You’re grateful the company gives you your creative space but it only makes you wonder just how far the limits are. 

Johnny accompanies you to the charging station till he’s distracted by some of the children in the latest Fendi kidswear and you make a mental note to never bring your kids to Fashion Week, if you ever choose to have them.

You breathe in and out for a few moments, feeling lightheaded before the sense of reality touches on you. People walk in and out of the stores lining the pathways, a soft buzz of conversation in the air as your eyes follow their movement. You wonder if you’ll have your own stores opened in plazas like this—here, in Seoul, and on brightly lit streets of the world outside. After all, colourful dreams are the hardest to get rid of. You sit quietly till you get a text from Doyoung asking you to get your ass over there quickly with several exclamation marks. You smile to yourself. Joohyun might have had a sour effect on him.

You arrive back at the venue, trying to tear your eyes away from anything that might want to make you fix it. You avoid Jaehyun’s eyes even more so, like you’ll jinx something right before it’s showtime. 

The buzzing reaches a peak before everything is drowned out.

The show finally starts. And it’s over. Twenty-two minutes, this time.

That’s the way it goes. You hold your breath till you’re sure it’s safe to let go, blind to everything that goes on in between. Sometimes it’s underwhelming, sometimes you can’t give a fuck when you love doing this anyway.

You breathe a sigh of joy when everyone gathers backstage, Johnny making all the models pose together for one giant group photo. It’s like a ritual for him, always finding time for a backstage picture with the models goofing off.

Jaehyun looks at you instead of the camera, a nervous shiver running through you. His gaze is not something of inconsequence, eyes piercing into you with words hanging in the air that you don’t care enough about. You think he sends you a smile, cockier than you’d like. Despite your efforts, you have to look away.

Now, what should your dear Fall collection look like? You exit by yourself, relief humming through your veins when you think of getting back to your apartment, papers to be sketched on in your hands, soft fabric to be sewn on your table. Maybe they’ll display your works in the front rows of the stores, maybe you’ll even have displays outside of Seoul. You’re not a student anymore and your job has taken you enough places. 

Even so, Paris and Milan sneak into your dreams often. You used to dream of them so much that it was hard to consider them reality—finding yourself in those streets, in between all those beautiful picture-book monuments.

You prefer Seoul, you decide after conscious thinking. You don’t have to worry about the world outside. 

Afterparties are not your thing. 

You somehow still find yourself in them, hoping to catch a drunk video of Doyoung for blackmail or make eye contact with an attractive stranger only to stop at exchanging numbers because you never find the time. 

It’s a social event. You’re supposed to be doing social things. It’s exhausting.

The last person you expect to bump into is Jaehyun, drinks in hand as he looks down at you with a greeting of surprise on his tongue. He’s wearing a simple dark Oxford button-down, two buttons at his chest undone, and tucked neatly into his pants. His hair looks untouched since afternoon, parted in messy waves, minus the pearls. The music changes to something with slower beats as you stare at each other for a few moments.

“What are you doing here?” You raise an eyebrow. There are other afterparties he could be attending. Big ones.

Jaehyun tilts his head, cracking his neck before smiling. “Charming, as always. I’m here because I want to be here, obviously. So does everyone, I’m sure.” 

“Fucking narcissist,” you mutter to yourself. You think Jaehyun might have heard you because you get a dirty look thrown your way, masked with the signature apathy across his relaxed lips.

“That’s a little rich from you,” he mumbles.

The muscle by his mouth twitches but he doesn’t say anything more. This is probably the most emotion he shows, you think. Wouldn’t his lovestruck magazines relish seeing him riled up like this? They’d still find a way to fall in love with him.

You could have, too.

No way. You tell yourself that’s ridiculous. 

You’re aware he’s booked for at least three other shows this week. It’s a miracle he agreed to yours, considering your mutual distaste for each other. You suppose it had more to do with his agency than himself but it wasn’t like you were the keener one. Jung Yoonoh is the face professionals look for and your company loves the publicity, although you keep telling yourself your designs would still shine without him. 

Jaehyun excuses himself before you can get on with any unpleasant conversation you might have. At least you have something in common—that is, trying to avoid each other as much as possible.

A few minutes (and uncomfortably snaking through swarms of bodies) later, you find Doyoung, unfortunately sober and intending to remain so, people congratulating him with claps on the back for securing the position of PR Head. You think it was supposed to be a secret, but someone higher in the ladder must have spilled early. Joohyun never attends these, and honestly, good for her. 

Afterparties are not your thing.

You shouldn’t have taken those shots but you’re on the dance floor now anyway—what more could happen? It’s easier when you’re not paranoid about all the eyes on you, dancing against a stranger with a lion tattooed against his neck. Maybe you’ll go home with him, maybe you’ll leave at the first signs of attraction. Romance isn’t quite on your to-do list, but an occasional intoxication with the skin works just fine. You could live like this for a few moments.

Your back runs into someone else’s rather forcefully and you turn around, apology bubbled up to your tongue already, mixing with the alcohol.

“Oh look.” You roll your eyes. “It’s the prince of high fashion. What can I get you today, sire?”

Jaehyun drives his tongue over his lips, quite definitely over your antics. Soft breaths leave his mouth in a rhythm irrelevant to this box of laughter and blaring music called a party. You love how he never knows how to respond—what new words will he choose to keep false dignity? If you think about it, he’s the embodiment of why you always thought everything was so out of your reach—big names, exclusive parties, not for kids like you. They were never for fashion students too honest to know their own worth.

“Jealousy isn’t a good colour on you,” he says, just loud enough for you to hear.

You scoff, a pang of annoyance sizzling through you. “Jealous? Of who? You?”

You sneer at the last part, Jaehyun’s frown deepening. Some days you just like to think you’ve won. A few moments pass between you two, the sound of pop music filling in the gaps. 

Jaehyun presses closer to you, your chests almost touching as your breath hitches in your throat.

“Do you know what makes success?” he says, head dipping lower to look you in the eye. The smell of alcohol disturbs you for a second before your heartbeat gets loud enough to drown it. You try to not focus on how his mouth is so near yours—and perhaps if you were drunk enough, you might commit a mistake against the very core of your being, something you’d been dangerously close to once.

You stay quiet, the pulsing in your ears too loud in the shallow distance between the two of you. You swear it’s always the two of you pressed up like this once you’re drunk enough, the dislike growing stronger and stronger with every breath exchanged. You’ve intertwined each other into a strange garden of contempt, easy to forget when you're facing him. Jung Yoonoh has the prettiest face in the industry, and the only one you can’t bear seeing. 

“It’s confidence,” he answers, as slow and steady as ever. “And there’s a thin line between confidence and arrogance I intend to keep. I’m not so sure about you.”

The rest of the night passes without conflict and you retire early, Jaehyun’s breath still hot against your face. Only when you collapse on your bed do you get an urge to shout, yell, anything that doesn’t make you call him up and scream at him. You have your precious dignity too, something he seems to look past. The effect he had on your breathing, the crawling over your skin—God, you hate him. You’re too stubborn to not continue doing it.

“What’s this?” you ask, your eyes darting in between the director of design and Lee Taeyong.

To say you were surprised to see him would be an understatement. You note the simple dark rimmed glasses in contrast with his light dyed hair, the mellow blue of his cashmere sweater sporting his own label’s logo—Lee Taeyong is a household name. You feel yourself shrink the tiniest bit.

This industry’s all about names, you think miserably. You meet people and you remember the ones who can get you ahead. It’s tiring.

Taeyong started his career even earlier than you did, and before he had changed his major to fashion. He’s a little older than you, though he doesn’t look it and he had begun with working exclusively on jackets. Several rejected designs later, he had popped up as one of the designers to look out for in Seoul Fashion Week. Now he has his own global label slowly turning brand, several worldwide stores and everything dreamers in the same place as you look up to. You think you’re fine here, you tell yourself despite that.

The director smiles at you, her hand gesturing rapidly at you to come forward.

“You’re going to be so happy,” she says, signalling Taeyong to continue.

“Uh, hi,” he greets.

A little awkward for a world-class designer, you think.

“I’m Lee Taeyong. You might have heard of me—”

“I know who you are,” you interrupt, ignoring the disapproving look of the director.

“Oh, that’s good!” He smiles. “I’ve seen your work—I’ve been following your work for a few years now…and, well, I’d love for you to work under my label—in a collaboration of sorts. You’ll have full creative freedom, of course! I’m just there more or less for supervision, really…”

You think you feel your heart stop for a few moments, Taeyong’s sudden stream of information fading out. The pinnacle of your career, you believe, had been Paris Fashion Week four years ago and you’d been dreaming of it ever since. This is a business contract, you’re sure, and you don’t know if you have a real choice but maybe you could take that step forward you’ve always wanted to.

“Isn’t that great, (name)?” The director interjects. “You get to work under the Lee Taeyong label. And…surprise! You’ll have your work presented at New York Fashion Week in September. They’ll hit the stores a week later.”

You freeze. 

“New York?” you manage to squeak.

“Yep!” Her voice a notch away from annoying. She’s not the first person you’ve met who sounds so goddamn manufactured. “Pack your bags, darling. You’re flying next weekend.”

You must be looking like a deer caught in the headlights because Taeyong opens his mouth to say something, alarmed. You speak before he does.

“Okay,” you say, more to yourself than them. It should be a good thing. It’s supposed to be a good thing. Even so, you feel the anxiety in your ribcage threatening to overgrow into thorns. 

“I’ll- I’ll do it,” you clarify. Looking from your manager’s bright yet stern face to the hopeful smile on Taeyong, you don’t think you have much of a choice.

New York, huh. How long has it been? You shudder at the memories, your focus a little off for the rest of the day.

Joohyun visits you a day before you leave. She places the box of chocolates on the coffee table, that Doyoung apparently sent for you. 

“You know, I’m really happy you’re getting this chance,” Joohyun says, crouching down beside where you’re splayed, trying to count the travel essentials and everything else on your messy checklist.

“He gets promoted and now he can’t even come visit me, huh?” you say, shifting to grab the box and tear off the clear wrap.

Joohyun laughs. “He’s certainly enjoying his duties. I can’t wait to boss him around again after I leave.”

Your shoulders hunch, a sigh leaving your lips. “Great. You’re leaving. Doyoung’s too busy to annoy. And now I’m a part of this godforsaken project for almost six months.”

Joohyun softens a bit, running her hand through your hair. “I heard you accepted it. All by yourself. You’ll do just fine, don’t worry.”

You feel yourself turn pink, a feeling of warmth you’ve been missing for a week. It’s cozy in your apartment, always the right temperature with a tinge of happy memories. You wish you could find comfort in people as easily as others do. Everything happened so fast, you can barely remember the conversation you had with Lee Taeyong. A few moments pass, Joohyun and you picking out chocolates before you can rummage through your suitcase again.

“I hate New York, Joohyun. Just what else can you throw into the mix to make me hate it even more?”

She freezes for a fraction of a moment, pressing her lips together before clearing her throat. “Oh. Uh. I probably shouldn’t tell you what I was about to tell you then.”

You turn your head to her, eyes narrowing. “What?”

She shrugs, eyes not meeting yours. “You know. New York. Fashion capital of the world. Lots of things to love.”

“What are you not telling me, Joohyun?”

She sighs, defeated. “A certain someone might be on the same flight as you. I was about to give you his number in case you needed help.”

You pause to think, curling your lips. “It’s Jaehyun, isn’t it?”

“Yes.”

You groan, dropping your head back and yelping when it hits the coffee table. Joohyun moves to rub your head and ease the pain as you let out a stream of complaints.

“You really thought I’d call him for help?” you yell. “Him? Of all people?”

“I think you’d rather have a known face there. Besides, he’s a good kid,” she reasons, looking you in the eye. “And stop yelling.”

You quieten a bit at her glare, gulping. She adds the number to your contacts, saving it with a professional ‘Jung Yoonoh’ before she helps you clean up, advising you on how to manage your finances abroad. You know she’s trying to ease you, but how could she—after dropping this awful news on you like it shouldn’t matter at all? She doesn’t even know what happened—almost happened in Paris, or the fact that your honeyed feelings had turned bitter so easily. She’s worked with him before, you know this, when he was a much younger model and she trusts him more than you ever could. 

But maybe, just maybe she can’t see what you see—after all, she’s also part of the elite, crème de la crème of this industry, more so in this country. It’s frightening, and so vague what goes on up there, at the top of the chain; and whatever you have—it might never be enough. 

You’re you. Sometimes, that isn’t enough.

You jump at the water rushing from the shower, too cold for skin and scramble to twist the knob the other way. This time, the water’s too hot and you yelp, shutting it off altogether.

You press your hand against the shower glass, breathing heavy. You’re trying—you’ve been desperately trying ever since you landed a week ago. Change is not something you can take lightly. You miss the dim lights of your apartment in Seoul that Joohyun always warned would get you some brand new prescription glasses. You miss walking down the streets to your favourite convenience store at three in the morning to get honey butter chips. You miss picking fights with Doyoung over which detail to scrutinise during your project discussions. This project seems to have torn apart several things that belonged to you.

You can’t seem to get your head into it either—even spacing out during the meeting you had with Lee Taeyong among several other things. You can’t remember a single design detail he’d specified or what the theme was even supposed to be—a bunch of bright foggy lights replacing whatever fuzz was growing in your head. A twenty-something-year-old shouldn’t be letting homesickness affect them like this. 

You finish the rest of your shower with a heavy heart and a clouded head. 

Taeyong booking a luxury suite for you was a bit…much. Not that you’re complaining, but it gives more fuel to the profound sense of emptiness you keep drawing. There’s no intimacy to this place, no love. It’s a little hard to create things without love, and comfort.

Still, you grit your teeth and get dressed into something more comfortable for the night. If not today, then tomorrow. Something will have to give, even if it costs you—whatever the hell your parents keep telling you when you’re going through problems. What if you don’t want to be cost things? Compromise isn’t as delicate as it sounds. You try to comfort yourself, rocking yourself on the much too large couch, hugging a pillow close and trying to think of things that don’t immediately make you want to throw up.

The memories of your first visit are a little less than pleasant. You think you cried after the entire ordeal because you thought you did a bad job of talking, socializing, the most ordinary things. There are some people who are good at wearing masks—good at making copper look like gold, good at shining under dim lights, and good at using words that don’t have much meaning to their existence other than being pretty. 

You were not one of them. 

The intense need for everything to be perfect was still there, even when you couldn’t possibly have achieved it. You wanted to make things and show them to the world—what was so wrong with that? Why did being there make you feel like you could never even touch your dreams? You were so out of place, feeling completely out of touch with yourself. There were people from the top there, established and famous. It felt out of your grasp. You felt fake.

The city lights twinkle with life but there’s no sound, the windows shut tight. The ambience of the room is kept to a caramel minimum—the best you can do to honour your sweet little home back in Seoul.

The hatred for everything pretentious was born with your first step into this place, into the game that the big boys play. It showed in your designs, your choice of fabric, your distaste for certain people. You wanted reality—you wanted a taste of life in your everyday clothes. You wanted that flavour you feel on your tongue in a room full of strangers or the one on a quiet night by yourself at your apartment rooftop. You didn’t want dignified fur coat ensembles, you wanted the naive chaos you feel every day and you wanted to make it look good. It’s driving you insane just how much you feel like you’re losing now.

You take out your phone after what seems a few minutes of contemplation. 

Jung Yoonoh. Your finger hovers over the call button. What would he say if his night is interrupted by your voice?

You’d met at the airport after landing, though you were only two seats away in the plane. You’d made no error in acknowledging his presence, browsing through the inflight magazine half-heartedly. Truth be told, sometimes you couldn’t really seem to get over him. Sometimes the thought of him made you so pissed, you had no idea what to think of it. 

“Welcome to New York,” he had said shortly after you’d exited, a giant crowd of people greeting out-goers, holding up placards with names of people, in numbers you’re unaccustomed to. Or, used to be accustomed to.

You hadn’t talked since—and really, you weren’t expecting to.

You press your home button, any lingering thoughts of him vanishing at the force with which you tell yourself it’s not worth it. How is Jung Yoonoh better than anyone else you know here? He might have been living in New York for quite a few years now, and he’s probably the only one you’d feel comfortable enough to swear at—that doesn’t mean you’d actually ask for help. That doesn’t mean he’d actually help. Joohyun must have had her hopes far too high to have convinced you for even a moment.

The couch feels colder all of a sudden, and you turn down the air conditioner. This place will never adjust to you, and your stubborn little self won’t either.

You think of Jaehyun from the afterparty, loose shirt and knowing eyes, and you wonder if he feels just the same frustrated agony, if not more. You think of his parted lips and breathing words close enough to be provocative, discomfort growing at the base of your stomach. Who does he think he is? He might have the airs and dignity of someone way up in the hierarchy of society but you know what people can be like. You know envy, you know malice, and you know lies. He has to fit in there somewhere—and perhaps you would have hated him less if he did.

Even if you’d scoffed at the idea of jealousy, that might very well be the closest to what you feel, what you keep hidden in the darkest corners of your locked chest. When you first met at that star-spangled dinner, you’d felt what it’s like to watch a fireworks show or a big musical opening; but the fireworks are being blocked by skyscrapers and you’re only the helping staff at the theatre, watching from a balcony at the very back. Jaehyun was impressive with barely any words. It annoyed you so much and somehow, the only solution you arrived at was the tremendous need to understand him, pick him apart and see what made him.

No. That’s wrong. You were annoyed because you still wanted to kiss him after he’d pushed you away, his dislike steaming clear. It strikes you as gently as lightning that the only reason someone would have to hate Jaehyun is being attracted so violently to him. God, you hate making a fool out of yourself.

You pass the night in quiet contemplation, promising yourself a better tomorrow. After all, no one else is going to do it. 

You walk with your chin up as if you don’t feel the weight of the world on your shoulders. You picked out your black Harrington jacket to look at least a little more professional, but you might have miscalculated the size and the material in the equation because you look completely and utterly ridiculous in it. No one would look at you and think you even work in fashion, much less be competent in that line. 

(To be fair, you wear the same beige sweater and black corduroy pants to work and if your coworkers choose to judge you, you wouldn’t blame them.) 

It’s only been a month and somehow, it translates to forever to you. You think you’re adjusting better now, and you pat yourself on the back for it. It’s not raining today at the mercy of the skies, a tidal wave of sunlight splashing through the buildings every time you take a turn. The city doesn’t scare you all that much anymore. It’s a good day, for once.  

You lean your head against the car window, eyes trailing up and down the reflective blue of each skyscraper. You can barely see any clouds, and the sky’s endlessly the same, comforting blue. Just like back home, you think for a moment. Your eyes move back to the sidewalk, people passing by—mothers with their babies in strollers, kids clutching the strap of their school bags as they run, men and women in all levels of professional clothing. No one stops in this city. Except the fucking traffic apparently.

You sigh, glancing at your watch. Only moments ago, you were moving and yet again, you’ve stopped. The cycle keeps repeating and you’re trying to keep patience focusing on things around you that you can appreciate. 

Maybe you jinxed it when you said it was a good day.

You reach Taeyong’s studio just in time (not that you’d get yelled at or anything, he’s too nice of a guy). Your eyes fixate on the numbers that light up on the elevator one by one till it finally reaches the first floor.

You walk right into someone’s chest, an apology tumbling out of your lips as you bow out of habit. 

“(name)?”

You look up to find Jaehyun in the elevator of Taeyong’s building, a casual white shirt clinging to his frame that’s tucked into his jeans to look somewhat formal. A pink overshirt hangs at his forearm and from the windswept styling of hair and his perfected dark locks, you’ll assume he’s here for a shoot—even without it, he looks like something from a teen magazine, someone people would see and instantly daydream of. Best known for high fashion, Jung Yoonoh is still a spectacle in casualwear. 

“I can’t believe I have to see your face here too,” you mutter, getting into the elevator. You’ve had your share of moments with him.

“Good to see you too,” he says, bemused. 

You make a sound of acknowledgment, taking out your phone to turn the damn notifications off so you don’t feel it vibrate in your pocket every few minutes. You feel eyes on you for a moment and snap your head to the side.

Jaehyun has his eyes focused on the door, quiet breathing fresh against his lips and you hesitate before concluding you might have been mistaken in your perception. 

“You’re here for a shoot?” you ask, curious about his relationship with Taeyong. 

“What else can I be here for?” He says nonchalantly. 

“Sarcastic. Very nice.”  

“It’s a little weird, you trying to make conversation with me. You’re usually raving about me too much to actually talk to me.” He smiles, the dimples provoking and eyes the familiar beguiling brown. 

“I’m not trying to make conversation,” you hiss, crossing your arms. “I’m sorry, I forgot you’re only a person in front of cameras.”

Jaehyun takes a sharp breath before turning to you, a not-so-happy look on his face despite the calmness over his features. You’ve seen it enough times.

“How long are you going to keep up the pretentious this and pretentious that before you face it, really?” He looks at you with tight lips, poisonous implications in his question. “Why you love to get up in my case all the time?”

The words take time to settle in. You shake your head when you realize, a sardonic laugh leaving your lips. Of course he’d think that.

“Oh my god,” you scoff. “You’re so full of yourself. You think I’m interested in you? Don’t let what happened years ago get to your head.”

“That’s not what I—”

“Oh, what did you mean then? Pray tell.”

“First of all, stop cutting me off,” he says, taking a step towards you. A certain feeling of uneasiness runs through you when you detect annoyance in his quiet statement.

“Secondly,” he says, taking a another step forward just as your back hits the wall of the elevator, “Stop treating me like I’m the bane of your existence. I have nothing to do with you.”

He’s right, of course, but the words sting where they hit. Asshole, you think. He has no business telling you what to do and what not to do. But in this moment, you can’t fish for the correct words—you don’t have the strength to when you’re so close to each other like this, the scent of his cologne syrupy and sickening. His tall stature is intimidating, with his straight shoulders and proud jawline.

The elevator dings at the seventh floor, Jaehyun stepping away from you without a glance or care, striding out just as smoothly as on a runway.

You take a moment to breathe, unsaid words burning holes into your tongue. You wish you could’ve said something better, anything that didn’t make you feel so pathetic. Maybe you should’ve told him to stick his words up his ass, sounding vulgar being the least of your worries. You wait patiently to reach the last floor, each ding souring your mood little by little. 

You are so glad you didn’t call him that night. To think he’d ever help you knowing it’s mutual, the whole hating each other’s guts. You just can’t believe the audacity of him—to accuse you of, what, romantic feelings? In an industry where you can’t tell apart gold from copper? Where all the people warming up to you are fair weather friends and competitors? He must have let all that attention get to his head. Runway faces aren’t as easy to fall in love with as he thinks.

“(name)! Come quick!”

Taeyong’s voice urges as soon as you enter and you settle your bag down, rushing to him. His smile drops when he sees your seething figure place your bag on the desk with a loud thud. You turn to him, without a hint of sweetened formality and ask him the day’s schedule.

Taeyong gulps before responding, undoubtedly afraid of your lips, a twitch away from a scowl, but he explains nicely nonetheless.

“Can you do a rerun of these designs for me?” he says, arranging the papers on the desk. That’s how he says these need improvement. No wonder the interns love him.

Taeyong’s in his usual attire, still too chic for you but strangely comfortable to look at. You nod, immediately scrutinising them, your (almost pointless) years of training trying to give you hints as to where you went wrong. You’re not really expecting to find big flaws or anything—just details you can enhance. You’ve learned enough about Taeyong in a month and it’s that his sense of style encompasses comfort, even in the most abstract of concepts. You respect him for that. It doesn’t change the fact that you think it’s a little overdone maybe.

Taeyong laughs, breaking you out of your daze. You raise an eyebrow.

“Is- Is something wrong?” You look at him, perplexed.

“It’s just that- It’s just you remind me a lot of the fashion students.” He smiles at you.

Your shoulders droop. Amateur. New. Unprofessional.

“Oh.”

Taeyong rephrases himself quickly, waving his hands about. “I don’t mean it as a bad thing! It just means you still…love doing it.”

It sticks with you longer than you’d expect, as you work throughout the day. You think Taeyong is too nice to criticize you properly but he eventually gets the point across—stick to the theme, written in Taeyong’s dainty handwriting and pinned to the softboard. 

Secrets. 

What an atrocious concept. Firstly, it makes no sense apart from sounding like a fucking lingerie collection. Secondly, when you went over Taeyong’s designs with the layers and patches, you supposed he wanted to focus on the inside of things because everything he’d drawn was inside out. Thirdly, when you heard him explain it, you were a little taken aback to hear it was going to be all about you, us. The designers, the models, the photographers, the magazine editors—there are millions and millions of people working to make sketches come to life, for a few items of clothing in someone’s closet. It feels nice to hear that from him. You promise you’re going to perfect it. 

And perfection is your dear old friend. 

It’s what you always strive for, but end up with something else that’s a little less beautiful. You take slow breaths, removing and adding details (after all, art is in the details). But perfection can easily grow tiresome. It makes you increasingly frustrated and you don’t think you have the heart to tell Taeyong everything in his studio stresses you out.

“So, you’re working with Jaehyun?” you ask, trying to look less antsy.

Taeyong blanks out for a moment before responding. “Yes. Why? Is he- Is he making you uncomfortable?”

Uncomfortable wouldn’t even begin to explain what he makes you feel. 

“No,” you deny. “Just curious.”

Taeyong smiles. “We usually work on summer shoots together. It’s like tradition.”

“That’s…nice,” you say, trying to reciprocate his smile.

“Oh, but we’re having terrible weather so the shoots keep going longer than planned. That’s why I’m having to compromise planning time with you. Sorry about that.”

You try to keep your posture despite the mild annoyance brewing at the back of your head. Great. Now you have to see Jaehyun’s unbelievably annoying face every time you walk in. Maybe if you plead enough, you’d get permission to leave early and not want to throw some insults at him. 

You decide to walk, despite Taeyong insisting his driver help you get home. He doesn’t act like it but he’s a busy man, with side projects and interviews coming up so often you lose count. It’s no wonder he had to, and you hate using this word, hire someone for the label’s next venture. You think articles like Lee Taeyong loses touch and hires designers instead of doing his job would make him upset but he seems to genuinely not let it bother him. It’s about ideas to him. His label, almost large enough to be a brand, is for ideas; what a pretty thing to base your business around. While you thought you were a big shot back in South Korea, you’re almost nothing more than Lee Taeyong’s co-designer—assistant here.

You feel drops of what you felt years ago trickling down your throat. Overshadowed. Powerless. Imposter. Something about New York makes you want to pull all your hair out. You wish you hadn’t been here in the first place, maybe then this would seem more of a fun trip than memories weighing you down. But then if you hadn’t been here, you might not have even started.

You hug yourself at the sudden downpour, clouds kind enough for it to be nothing more than showers but you’re soaked anyway. Kind, but still a little cruel. Running under the eaves of a store, you curse yourself for not bringing an umbrella the only day you needed it. You stand there for a while, just breathing.

Real life is never like movies, is it? Cameras lie. Pretty faces lie. Sometimes you end up stuck in New York rains without an umbrella or a friend to call or a lover to protect you. You end up getting an Uber, taking awfully long to arrive due to the traffic the rain had ensued and try your best to ignore the disgruntled driver mumbling about you wetting his seats.

You still don’t know how the goddamn shower works. 

You manage to complete without either scorching your skin off or freezing it to Greenland and back—a feat much more successful than whatever you had going on for today. You slip into the absurdly soft mattress, pillows and covers swallowing you into a state of sleep.

You start the day almost pouring coffee onto Jaehyun’s spotless white shirt. And you might have were it not for immense self-restraint, and the fact that Taeyong’s eyes were trained on the two of you.

“So…are you two…a thing or something?” he asks, eyebrows furrowed.

“No,” Jaehyun responds calmly while you sputter it out.

Taeyong apologizes, a laugh following. “You seem to have worked together before. Jaehyun, you never told me that.”

“I…I thought you knew,” he answers, leaning back against the tabletop.

“Ah, well,” Taeyong shrugs. “Thanks for helping me out with this, (name). Maybe- maybe we can draw some inspiration for the collection from outdoors.”

“Of course,” you say as you smile wide, trying hard not to break the coffee mug in your hand.

If you’re being honest, you had a gut feeling you’d be asked to help with Taeyong’s (apparently) infamous summer shoot. He walks into his studio every morning with hair in a disarray, talking to more people than he might enjoy and the entirety of New York weather against him. There’s only so much time a man can have and under pressure, he’s going to have to choose. It’s easy to feel sorry for someone like him.

This should be the stylist’s job. Jaehyun stands with his chin up as you adjust the fitting, smoothing out creases and making sure the cerulean shirt is pinned right, satin feeling cool and nice under your fingers. Sleeveless is back in trend this summer, and so are low-cuts.

“Careful there,” he says when you hand brushes a little lower, just below the full-grain leather belt.

You hope your face isn’t steaming from the rush of heat but you manage to limit your emotions to a sound of discomfort, remembering the horrendous accusation he’d thrown at you. “I don’t care about your dick, twit.”

Jaehyun laughs, bending a little to whisper. “I wouldn’t mind if you did.”

“You look like you’re having a wonderful time making me uncomfortable.”

“You’re just so easy to work up.”

His dimples are getting on your nerves. You reach up to button his collar, perhaps a little too harsh because he chokes, an uncharacteristic sound leaving his mouth as he winces. You suppress a smile, glad you managed to do something about the look on his face.

The sunlight over this park feels like Christmas come early, with the way Taeyong is flitting from model to model and stylist to stylist with the intensity of a five year old after an ice-cream truck. 

“Is he- Is he usually like this?” you ask, eyes on the makeup artist getting directions from Taeyong.

“I just assumed all of you are this way,” Jaehyun, responds looking at the same sight.

You roll your eyes. “We’re not all crazy.”

Jaehyun raises an eyebrow.

“Okay, maybe a little bit,” you correct yourself, watching Taeyong almost trip over someone’s bag in order to greet the magazine’s style director. 

Jaehyun chuckles, eyes meeting yours for a moment before the two of you go about your own business.

You like magazine shoots for the most part. You never find a glass of water anywhere, but some intern or the other will definitely be there to fetch you Starbucks. There’s at least three people fussing over each model and at least two exasperated photographers trying very hard to snap clean shots. The stylist and designer look as though they might explode any minute, although the relief on their faces after it’s all over is something worth looking at. The skies are so bright and blue, you think, for a cosmopolis. The trees and shrubs lining the park are in a state of tranquility compared to the chaos it encircles.  

Magazines might not be as important in an age of social media advertisement, almost part of nostalgia now—but maybe some of you are not yet willing to deny kids the thrill of reading a magazine under their blankets in the middle of the night. It often gave hope to little boys playing dress up and little girls sewing their own clothes. 

You’d forgotten just how exhausting shooting with magazines is. The models must be having it worse but their masks don’t come off easy. If you had ever underestimated their job difficulty, it comes back to throttle you at full speed every time you’re at a shoot.

 Looking good in front of a camera is pretty damn hard. 

They don’t even get to keep the clothes, unless some asshole of a designer decides to pay them in apparel instead of actual money. Most models leave New York in debt. Men are paid even less than women. You’re surprised Jaehyun is as celebrated as he is—or the fact that he was clever enough of a businessman in launching his own high fashion-themed restaurant. You’ve heard he barely visits it, like a careless afterthought. But you’re not one to get carried away by sketchy articles on the internet. All you’ve needed are more reasons to hate him.

You sip the iced coffee, its effect pretty much worn out during humid afternoons. It’s time for a break, but no one’s willing to break momentum. You find yourself feeling a little awkward, as nothing more than a guest with creative advice, and so you sit under the comforting cool of the giant green umbrella at one of the tables. You could sink into your chair were it not so damn uncomfortable.

Jaehyun takes a seat right beside you to your surprise, offering you a box of diced mango before you fervently decline. You still think he’s an asshole. It doesn’t make any sense—why accuse you of unsaid affections and then flirt with you like he never said it? It’s not like you’re even friends, how ridiculous. There are quite a few jerks you’ve met in your life, but Jung Yoonoh really takes the cake.

“What?” you snap when his gaze gets on your nerves.

“I didn’t say anything.” He raises his hands defensively, eyes still on yours. “You don’t seem to be enjoying yourself.”

“I enjoy the air conditioned suite Taeyong booked me more than this, yes.” You sigh, leaning back. “I don’t really have anything to do.” 

“I’m assuming he booked you the luxury suite on the fifteenth floor,” he says, chuckling.

You furrow your eyebrows. It’s not impossible that Jaehyun knows Taeyong’s favorite suite to book for guests.

“The view’s pretty nice from there, right? Oh, and you must be enjoying the silence.”

“I actually like the outside sounds,” you defend. “It’s calming.” 

“Not when you’re on the third floor,” he says, shoving a piece of mango into his mouth with a fork. “All you hear is middle aged men screaming.”

You rest your elbow on the table, placing your chin against your palm. The shade is separated from sunlight by a thin line against his chest, pale blue satin glimmering where the sun meets it. Jaehyun’s eyes shine a darker hue of honey under the shade, moving to the box in his hands occasionally before trailing back to the background noise again. Taeyong really does love pretty fits, but this might just be one of the most gorgeous pieces you’ve seen this summer (and you’ve already been through all the ready-to-wear lookbooks you possibly could). A thought passes you in a breeze, that maybe it's the model making it seem that way.

“You’re talkative today,” you note quietly, the sun harsher on your cheeks than before.

Jaehyun shrugs, hurrying to finish all the pieces. He suddenly pulls a face, one you don’t see very often in high fashion websites and Instagram pages. It’s almost cute. 

“Sour.” 

You find yourself laughing, a gentle influx of peace filling the inside your chest. You quickly recover, looking back up to see Jaehyun simply staring at you, breathing. He looks caught off-guard, no camera to warn him. You straighten, your cheeks flushing with heat.

“Is- Is something wrong?”

He immediately shakes his head, more to himself than you. There’s a pause before the two of you are happily distracted. The style director appears to be gesturing at him from the other side and Jaehyun responds with a curt wave.

“You’re doing two different concepts today?”

“Three, actually.”

You raise your eyebrows. Well, they’re definitely taking advantage of the good weather. They could just photoshop it, in your opinion, but authenticity is everything when it comes to magazines nowadays. 

“Well, don’t let me hold you back,” you say, your tone dismissive. “Go get changed into whatever pretty shirt Taeyong has up next in his collection.”

“The next shoot doesn’t have a shirt,” he says, the corner of his mouth quirked upward.

You almost choke on your coffee, blaming the heat for your weak state of mind. You’re just having one of those strange days—just that, nothing else.

You finish the rest of the coffee, cup resting in your hand till you find the energy to get up and find a trash can.  

Jaehyun was right. This time the shoot’s a little too wet and a little too much skin for you to enjoy. The only thing added to Jaehyun above the waist are a dainty red scarf knotted over his neck and a small, flat hoop earring on his left ear. The velvet fingerless gloves, although you’re not very fond of them, complete a rather rugged yet soft look. You didn’t expect Taeyong to come up with something like that. 

Jaehyun’s well-developed physique, while you’ve seen it in other shoots and online articles, is completely different when you’re a few feet away from it. The dark blue cargo pants, silken, are a signature style of Taeyong but the details don’t distract you easily enough. Funny, this is the first time you’re feeling somewhat flustered in a place full of half-naked models. 

You suddenly think of reds and oranges, lilac shrubs and a hint of Burberry men’s perfume. In a way, it reminds you of the strums of the guitar your roommate used to play while you stayed up late, coming up with concepts. Cherishing, soothing—and special, just enough. The corner of your lips twitch and you take out your pocket sketchbook. It’s never too late to add a design to the collection, right? After all, you have secrets too. Maybe Taeyong was right about the outdoors for inspiration. 

Something sets into motion, subtle but sharp.

The next time you walk into Taeyong’s studio, you feel the sun on your face better. Everything seems to be fitting into place, as you smooth through designs at a pace your student self would be jealous of. When Taeyong praises your work, you feel a rush of pride smearing the inside of your chest and you finally feel like everything’s not falling apart. It feels good. It feels like you’re someone.

The days go by in what seems like barely seconds—you know what they say about New York minutes. The mustard cloth draped over your desk to the cottage blue of your curtains, the colours around you change as quickly as the wind. Sometimes they’re abstract—and other times, well, they have more to do with a stranger’s eyes, or the swirls within a coffee cup. It’s the way in which transition occurs around you, that you often forget it moves something within you too. 

You’ve put together some samples with Taeyong, most of them by yourself; the process of making is ever comforting, fabric even more so. You’ve sent the revised designs for production, feeling giddy about whatever is to come like it’s something new. (It shouldn’t be.) 

You fucking hate how different this is. Seoul is nothing compared to New York. The anxiety is nearly ten times worse, the streets are far more attractive when it comes to inspiration and the figure of Jung Yoonoh is no longer as easy to ignore. 

Even after the summer shoot’s over, Jaehyun often comes by to hang out at the studio, dressed in what you would call the simplest fucking thing you’d ever seen and still managing to look just as gorgeous. He blends in well with university students, often wearing the ugliest baseball cap you’ve ever seen, and the look of his face feels much, much worse than ever before. It’s at ease, smug even, but never failing to smile at you when you’re trying to focus. You don’t care how good of friends Taeyong and Jaehyun are—you want to tell him to leave. 

But you just can’t bring yourself to. It’s not that you don’t trust yourself, you certainly do, but whatever New York has done to you, includes making you feel a different way about him. Sometimes you find yourself pressing your legs together harshly, stiffening at any proximity with him and a pool of warmth at the base of your stomach you’d rather not feel.

It’s embarrassing to even think about it—the fact that he makes you feel that way, so hot and bothered like it’s your first time. You blame your lack of going out these few months because after all, anyone could fall in love with runway faces. It doesn’t have to mean it’s him you want. You carry on doing what you’ve been doing for the most part of your career, your best to avoid him. There are more pressing matters, and your head might just implode if you keep on worrying about things (a man, of all) you need not. 

Time passes even faster when all your thoughts revolve around the same thing.

One month. D-30. Whatever the hell you call time before the end of the world.

Your palms sweat a whole lot easier here. It’s a little weird, considering you don’t find much difference in humidity between Seoul and New York. Your heart often catches up in your throat too. Not a great feeling, your heart choking the breath out of you, but you’re used to it. You cope and you learn, that’s what it means to be human.

You pull your hand down before it reaches your teeth. The day ended in a meeting with Taeyong’s production team—everything’s running smoothly so you need not worry, he said. 

Why are those the words that make you worry the most? 

You check the time on your phone. 23:05 and a whole month to go. You better get some sleep for all the meetings you have scheduled tomorrow. You close your eyes and for a while, everything falls quiet.

You dream of New York Fashion Week. People come here to feel included. Everyone wants to be a part of something they don’t understand.

The models walk down the runway in increasingly uncomfortable outfits. You didn’t design any of them. Where are the ones you worked on? You can’t move from your seat, or turn your head from the runway, anything at all. Something’s wrong, everything’s wrong. You don’t belong here. Thunder strikes outside the venue and you wake up with a gasp caught in your throat, and the clock on the bedside table flashing 2:14.

You’ve had enough. You swear you’ve had enough.

You get up out of bed, pacing the giant bedroom, the empty spaces making you feel more and more miserable. The city twinkles with innumerous stars beyond your window, curtains half drawn so they can comfort you whenever you need—but these lights don’t shine for you, or anyone else. They shine for themselves. That’s what it means to be in New York again. 

What time is it in Seoul? Could you call your mother? Joohyun? Everyone must be busy right now—you don’t know what to do. It’s been a long time since you’ve felt so helpless. There’s a reason you’ve been avoiding New York for this long and now it’s come crashing down on you. 

This was a mistake. All of it was a mistake.

You look down at your phone, the light hurting your eyes despite being set to the lowest brightness. You think a little, and then some more. There’s no one else you can call. Even if he’s busy charming all the other employees whenever you see him, even if half the world is in love with him, there’s no one else you can call. This time you don’t stop yourself.

You tap the call button beside the Jung Yoonoh saved neatly. Tapping your foot against the floor nervously, your mind goes blank for a few seconds or so. He answers when you’re just about to hang up, breath hitching in your throat at the sound of his voice.

“Hello? Hello? If this is a reporter—”

“It’s me, Jaehyun.”

The line goes quiet for a moment and your voice overlaps his before he can begin.

“I- I didn’t mean to call so late. Sorry…uh.”

You scrunch up your face at your own voice. This is not getting you anywhere.

“Is everything okay?” he asks, voice lower.

You fall silent, unable to answer without breaking down into tears. You did not call Jung Yoonoh for that. 

“Yeah,” you choke out. “Fine. Completely fine. I just…”

You trail off, trying to get yourself to breathe.

“I’ll send you an address. Be there in an hour.”

You blink back tears, confusion adding to the burning pile of worries inside your head. 

“What?”

“Address. I’ll text you. Be there. One hour.”

“I’m not stupid, Jaehyun,” you snap, strength refilling your voice. “Why?”

“I’m not answering questions, just be there.”

With that, the line goes flat and an embarrassing amount of ‘hello’s get you to realize that he hung up. A notification pops up a minute later and you’re too groggy to decipher it, logging it to Maps instead so you can follow. It’s fifteen minutes away, you realize with a sigh of relief, so you can at least present yourself within the given constraint. 

You can’t grasp what you feel in the moment, the night air and warm streets beckoning you to leave the clamped apartment soaked in fear. You think this is unlike Jaehyun, what he’s doing, but you’re too shaken to care. You need some respite, even if it comes from somewhere you can’t picture.

“You…wanted to meet me at a Korean barbecue restaurant?”

Jaehyun’s ears turn red, as they often do when he doesn’t know how to respond to you.

“I-It’s not that I…Never mind,” he tries to explain, fidgeting with the cloth over his shoulder. “We can go somewhere else if you want.”  

We? You think, eyes scanning his face in confusion. If you want? Where’s the uncaring Jaehyun you’ve known, foreign eyes and impassive lips? He hardly looks the part he’s meant to play—a billboard face with a confident jawline and nothing more behind it. Outside of work—you don’t even know what else to call this—Jaehyun looks hardly intimidating, or abrasive. He seems different, gentle almost, although the dark circles under his eyes might have something to do with it. Maybe he’s too tired to say anything more and that’s it.

But he still came all the way here.

“Aren’t you a little…overdressed?” 

There comes the remark you were hoping to not hear. You just wanted to look nice; you’d hardly call this overboard. The loose, mustard-colored chiffon shirt cinches at the waist, paired with your nicest (only not faded) pair of light blue jeans and shoes that haven’t seen the light of day since you arrived here. You barely ever design clothes for yourself anymore but you thought you looked good in this.

“No,” you defend quickly, feeling your face grow warm. “You’re underdressed.”

You say that, but he clearly looks good in anything he wears. Could you expect any less of  a supermodel? He doesn’t seem to have dressed in as much a hurry as you had. Clad in a plain black T-shirt that’s half tucked into skinny jeans, he’s added his hideous baseball cap and a pair of navy blue shades which looks just as ridiculous as it sounds. You really think he shouldn’t be leaving his house without the help of a stylist. 

“I…I just mean you don’t wear anything other than the same sweater and pants combination to work, so… please excuse my surprise.”

Jaehyun's eyes flicker over your figure before masking it with an awkward cough. You reach out and pull the shades over his head, the look bothering you more than anything else. He doesn’t respond to it, at least not in a way that’s obvious, as if it’s the most natural thing in the world to do—you fixing his hair and unquestionably awful sense of style.

“There’s a soju place a few blocks ahead. Or if you’re not into that, there’s a noodle shop just at the edge of K-town,” Jaehyun rambles on, not meeting your eye. “If you’re looking for something inexpensive—"

“You came all the way here to give me directions?” You raise an eyebrow. You might even be enjoying this, although your inner voice bites back at you, denying it.

Jaehyun shakes his head, the red in his ears pulsing back up. “No. I…I needed some fresh air.”

“You…have someplace to be then?”

Jaehyun might not realize it, but the answers he gives always have room for teasing. Aloof. Vague. Yet somehow sweet.

“And you’ll go alone? At this hour? No, I’ll accompany you,” he says out loud, trying to play off the sudden vocal inflection. You sigh. Boys will be boys, as they say. Even if they’re twenty-six.

You let him keep you company. Though the first few minutes are painfully quiet, neither of you knowing quite what to say without starting a disagreement, you continue your walk through a city that never sleeps. It’s awkward even, being side by side without you seething at his charming, (undoubtedly) fake smile. He feels real, for once, and you don’t know how to react. There seem to be some gold-tinted cracks appearing in your reality, slowly but surely, and you’re not very good at patching anything other than fabric.

“You know, it’s actually a little relieving to see Korean letters here,” you say, sighing. You never thought you’d be so corny, but it really does feel good being here. 

Or is it him? 

“Thanks,” you add quietly, hoping he doesn’t hear. No, maybe you do. You can’t tell at this point.

“I…I know what it’s like,” he says, so softly that it almost gets carried away by the wind. He clears his throat, an ‘ah’ escaping his lips as he stops abruptly.

“We…We missed the turn,” he declares, a little sheepish as he scratches the back of his head.

You look at him in disbelief. “Jaehyun, how long have you lived here?”

“Oh, I was born here actually,” he says, tilting his face to look at you, blunt sarcasm evident on it. “How many times have you lost your way to the convenience store in Seoul?”

“Literally zero times.”

Jaehyun puffs a cheek before going back to normal and turning a hundred and eighty degrees down the street.

“Hey, wait up!” you huff at his increased pace, half jogging to keep up.

You reach the acclaimed noodle shop, your breath barely within your lungs and swearing at Jaehyun who looks like he wasn’t bothered one bit. He reaches his hand out to help you and you swat it away, chest still heaving with your hands on your knees.

“Dickhead,” you hiss.

“I don’t think I deserved that,” he responds with a widening smile. 

“Asshole,” you say, standing up straight to glare at him.

“What would Seoul say hearing their beloved designer swear like this?” Jaehyun looks almost amused, as if you hadn’t shared an awkward time together, like two teenagers who were forced to walk home together from the bus stop.

“They can go to hell,” you retort. “As can you.”

Jaehyun laughs, a strange sound to hear and you blink a few times, unsure of what to do. You wonder if it’s the night playing tricks or if Jaehyun really is an actual person, not the basket of preprocessed insults you were used to. The cracks are widening—you’re not sure if they’re meant to be patched.

Perhaps you were a little eager to enter someplace warm, but you feel immense relief in this little shop, despite the smell of chili paste and noodle soup wafting through the air. It’s a little empty; in fact, you two seem to be the only people there apart from some students at the other corner, but you sit there in your own bubble, talking with Jaehyun of all people about which singer is better. He laughs occasionally, still managing to catch you off-guard with how honest it sounds and you wonder for a moment, how nice this feels. For the first time in a month, your heartbeat seems to have settled at a normal rate.

“What?” you enounce, a little offended. “What’s so wrong about my love life?”

“You just- You just don’t seem that type,” he explains, his ears as red as the bowl.

“I don’t have time for commitments, Jaehyun,” you sigh. “It’s what happens when you’re good at your job.”

Jaehyun nods, something akin to agreement in his response. 

“So, your, uh, what is it? Training camp? What’s that about?” you ask, in between blowing your food.

“You could really Google things once in a while, you know?” he replies, bringing his chopsticks close to his mouth.

You roll your eyes. “I’m sorry I’m not one of your creepy stalkers, Mr. Jung.”

“Nothing to do with that,” he says, shaking his head. “It’s for kids interested in fashion, modeling, photography—stuff.”

“Oh? How so?”

“I just sponsor them. You know how difficult it is to get noticed in…this industry,” he explains, like it’s not a big deal. Nothing ever seems to be a big deal to him.

You nod, unable to help the smile. Maybe it isn’t a big deal, but you’re sure now that you were mistaken. Just a little bit. 

“I was lucky,” you mumble. “I can’t believe they saw those ugly embroidered patches and decided to sponsor me, oh my god. That sweater was hideous.”

Jaehyun laughs loudly. “They saw me cleaning outside my school and decided to pick me up and ship me straight to Paris.”

“Nothing’s worse than the first day.” You take another mouthful, the taste savoury and filling. 

“You know, I’m pretty sure they photoshopped my ears out in the first magazine shoot I had.”

You laugh, leaning in a little closer. “Your first year was rough, huh?”

He hums, his eyes flickering from your nose to your lips. It makes you a little self-conscious, blood rushing to your cheeks at an unexpected pace. Who knew Jaehyun could have such an effect on you? 

Your eyes flutter over his face once again.

He’s handsome. But it’s the sort of handsomeness that tells you, you don’t know much beyond it. You look back at your bowl, sobering up and completing the rest of the noodles.

It’s still midnight blue in the faraway sky as you walk down the streets. Most of the people you see out and about are those drunk off their faces from club hopping or a particularly enthusiastic group of tourists. The watermelon soju, while better with budae-jjigae and arguably the best soju flavor, somehow had little effect on you with the bitter aftertaste still settling in. The crowds in other places would make for great people-watching but you walk in a lonely street that calls for proximity. Beside you, Jaehyun sneezes, the sound of it making you jump on the quiet sidewalk.

“Jesus Christ, Jaehyun,” you huff, wincing at the sound, “you sounded like a fucking tractor.”

Jaehyun laughs, looking down at the pavement. When he looks back at you, the circles underneath his eyes seem to have darkened and you wonder if yours are the same. Yours can’t possibly be as important as his, though, and you wonder if it’s appropriate to laugh at how dorky he looks.

You find yourself not wanting to walk back into the safety of your suite. Jaehyun has a look of calm across his features, drawing over the landscape around you. New York lights don’t faze him, they only reflect in his eyes. 

The way his soft breaths fan out against his lips remind you that he is human, after all—he has a soul and body, thoughts and its beautiful intricacies. When he turns back to you, you feel those criminal feelings all over again, except this time it’s even louder. It feels so wrong, and yet you can’t help but think of the liberation that could come with his lips on yours. 

You could swear out loud, all the colorful words ready at the tip of your tongue.

“Your collar’s…”

Jaehyun’s voice trails off, his hand moving to fix your flipped collar, and when the heat of his skin brushes your neck, you try to not think of where else his hands could be, his lips could be. 

In fact, there’s a moment within where it’s perfectly reasonable for him to kiss you, the taste almost on your tongue. But Jaehyun moves away, an indecipherable look across his face.

“I should get going,” he says, “I have a- I have a shoot early tomorrow—today.”

You nod, cheeks coloring at your own unsaid thoughts. Just what have you done to yourself? Why is your skin searing, why does your stomach feel upside down and why were you so ready to give in to him? To Jaehyun? You’ve never felt want like this before, this need to press skin against skin in a manner so illicit. 

You part with a short goodbye, the sudden loneliness in your path making you want to backtrack, ask if you can go somewhere else again—maybe there’s a club nearby so you can see him through a round of shots as you usually do. Maybe the bitter feelings will return then. 

When you think of the words you exchanged over the course of so unusual a night—your former unforgiving words contradict you. You hate the realization but being so obscure in front of a camera doesn’t have to mean he’s pretentious. Maybe you were wrong. Maybe someday you’ll even admit it.

You feel a flash of heat in your face. You are not running to Jung Yoonoh—what an embarrassing thought. If the very core of your being isn’t repulsed by it, there’s something wrong with you. 

There’s something definitely wrong with you, love.

You breathe sharply, trying to organize your thoughts. As if the paparazzi wouldn’t have a treat out of this meeting you had with him if they got to know. You’d better limit it to the only one.

You bite your nails out of force of habit. It’s not going to help. You know. But there’s hardly anything else to cool your nerves.

Front row tickets to New York Fashion Week—the most mortifying dream out of all the ones you’ve ever had. The way Taeyong fidgets, you want to believe he’s in the same boat as you—it makes you thankful even. 

Even outside of New York, Lee Taeyong is known for booking out exclusively intimate spaces. There are some props for the pre-show photography, including inked sketches on giant vertical banners stuck to the walls and tables with a messy collection of coffee cans, pencils and a sewing machine. Diverse types of fabric roll off the table in long strips, gently lining the floor till they end midway to another table. It’s a mess—a mess you made look good.

You’d left that and the backstage behind now. All eyes are on the sparsely lit runway, your aspirations coating the air in a thick veil. Are you ready? You won’t know till the first model steps out and till you can elicit a response from the audience.

Jaehyun’s at another venue—career before friendship, or, heaven forbid, attraction. You’d seen the fitting, cape skirt doing daringly well with his long legs clad in black pants, and a classy vest over a ruffled white shirt. You hate seeing other designs before a show, but god, were you glad you’d visited Givenchy to meet Johnny. 

But you’re relieved even, that Jaehyun isn’t here. You don’t have the strength to face him anyway, all your energy directed into this chasm of whatever you’d call six months of effort. You want to call yourself accomplished. You want to be proud of yourself.

So this time, you remember all twenty-six minutes of it.

God, they look so beautiful up there, when they’re being looked at, seen for what they are—you’ll never get over it. There’s still hardly much to remember, except this time you’re happy to do it all over again. Effort only exists if it’s acknowledged.

It settles in quite a while later, the weight of all you’d done. You could almost cry, but that’s better left to pillows and the unrelenting skies above a midnight-coated rooftop. This is your moment. For once, you’re anything but afraid. 

Afterparties are still not your thing. 

However, you had your nicest outfit picked out and Lee Taeyong’s fancy, themed afterparties are something notorious among your colleagues. You’ve heard designers tend to go all out, wearing the best things they’ve designed even if it makes them a little embarrassed to be wearing their own work.

You feel a sigh leave your lips as you finally find a place to sit, your earlier conversations leaving you drained of social energy. You don’t feel alien—it’s strange—and their compliments feel almost warm. The music playing over the speakers is something, you’re sure, from a 60’s American movie, and while it has its own strange allure, the champagne gives you a larger dose of relief. 

In fact, if you’re not mistaken, it’s quite like the ballroom in Paris, although significantly smaller. Burgundy wallpaper and lit up crystals hanging in hexagonal shapes across the ceiling—it’d look lovely on a dress too.

Taeyong’s speech, of course, gives you a spike of anxiety with the sudden announcement of his label’s future, a brand now. He smiles on the small podium, everyone admiring his radiance when suddenly he gestures at you, the glass in your hand feeling hotter and hotter.

“…I couldn’t do this without the only designer I felt was up to this—the first designer to work under my brand, as of now…” 

You try not to blush under all the pairs of eyes that turn to you. 

“(name), thank you.” 

Success feels good. Gratitude feels even better.

Everything feels natural, as if a dream gone right. You’re no longer afraid of the world you stepped into, or the accumulation of feelings that molded you into the person you are now. The confidence you so chased after as if it were morphine, you’re going to be keeping an eye on it before it can run away again.

There’s still one little problem to your night of triumph, though. 

Jaehyun hasn’t taken his eyes off you ever since you entered, a conversation yet pending. You already know he looks good in the plainest of T-shirts, so it might be a no-brainer that he looks absolutely stunning in a suit. The crystals lining the lapels of his coat glimmer amidst the crowd he’s gathered. It’s hard to come in contact, however. He’s magnetic, almost formidable in the way he attracts attention, and you know it’s something that comes with being a man of few words. 

“You’re not enjoying the party?” you ask, taking in Jaehyun’s figure on the veranda overlooking the garden. He sits on one of the mahogany chairs, swirling the glass of champagne with a look of indifference coating his eyes and lips.

“I am,” he says, turning to face you. “Needed a short break.”

“I suppose being the most attractive man in the room needs a break,” you say, taking a seat beside him.

A wry laugh leaves his lips, as he lays his eyes on you. “You don’t seem bothered by it though?”

“I believe that pretty is as pretty does,” you say, your lips twitching.

Jaehyun smiles, furrowing his eyebrows yet still. “You think multimillionaire companies are built on things like inner beauty?”

He’s right. What’s inside is beautiful—it’s too idealistic a phrase. You sigh, adjusting your sleeve. It’s a difficult life, walking the runway no one dares to step on. 

I think you’d make that cut too, you want to tell him.

“You know the best thing I got told today?” you ask, diverting the stream of conversation. You think he’s a friend. Even if it could be the champagne talking. Even if you want something more than the innocence of friendship. 

Jaehyun raises an eyebrow. “Did Cristóbal Balenciaga’s ghost show up to compliment you?”

“No,” you emphasize, laughing at his pronunciation. “It was this girl. A student. Said she wrote an essay about me.”

Jaehyun hums, dimples marking his cheeks. “I didn’t know a student could get you so giddy.”

You laugh, looking down at your hands before resting your gaze on him again. He leans forward in his seat, strands of hair falling over his face from the rest and a contemplating look over his features. He looks much, much different from when you first saw him, and even handsomer, if that were possible. He’s grown up from the awkward boy you saw in the press release pictures of the Saint Laurent Fall Collection—he looks sharp and valiant on front covers, his shoulders broad and his eyes darling. Jaehyun is still unironically the most breathtaking man you’ve ever met. He might even be one of the sweetest, inside out. 

You look to his lips, full as ever. Perhaps you have something to confess. Secrets aren’t meant to be kept so long.

“Jaehyun,” you call, bringing his attention before faltering. It’s not like you’re the only one fawning over his smile. You get up instead, excusing yourself. “I’ll see you inside I suppose.”

“You know I like you, right?”

You turn around. “What?”

Jaehyun gets up, brushing his suit and fixing the lapels. The gentle night haze and the contrasting calls of the brightly lit party inside brush over an effect you’ve never felt before. “I…I like you. It’s pretty straightforward, I think.”

You deny it, or rather, some repressed little emotion inside you denies it vehemently. “Jaehyun, really. I admit I was a complete asshole to you and- and...it was…kind of you to accompany me that night but—”

“Stop. Don’t- Don’t call that kind. You’re not seeing the full picture.”

You stand there, unsure of what to do as you feel your chest grow warmer. Jaehyun turns his head upwards, letting out an audible breath. You can see conflict on his face, the struggle of someone still mulling over the perfect words.

“I don’t hate you. I never really hated you even if I wanted to.”

You suppose it wouldn’t be the right time to say that you might have indulged in that.

“I did,” you confess. “I hated you for a very, very long time, Jaehyun.”

“I know,” he whispers, looking straight at you. “I didn’t mean to leave you hanging—”

“Jaehyun, I don’t care about that,” you say, your voice rising, “You told me you felt suffocated in bow ties and laughed when I asked if you wanted to run away with me. I just ended up thinking you were a goddamn liar.”  

“Fine,” he says quietly in his baritone timbre, sounds of the chatter from inside numbing away. “Then let me be honest.”

“When I met you, I thought there was someone like me doing just the same—so…suddenly in the midst of everything. Even if you were a complete asshole to me. You were still real.”

He phrases it delicately, lilting, as if that hasn’t been your whole purpose here.  He’s only a breath away from you, but you don’t want to push him away this time. There’s a moment’s pause.

“Between work and myself, which is more important? For once, I thought I could answer that question.”

Your breaths are soft and shallow as they fall, trying to understand his words.

“And then you just fucking stopped. You stopped flying out and I’d barely see you outside of Seoul like you- like you gave up or something. I didn’t understand—what happened to you?”

Jaehyun looks at you with a hardened expression, ears turning red as if he hadn’t expected this outburst of truth. He gulps, Adam’s apple bobbing up and down. It’s not like him to open his mouth and let out words that are raw and honest; it makes you feel the weight even more. You were still kids that night. You’re not anymore.

“Jaehyun,” you whisper before reaching your hand out and placing it against his cheek.

It’s so hard to not take in the details. The prominence of the muscle by his mouth when he speaks, the fine lines by his nose which appear sporadically or the look of complete reverence in his eyes when he’s staring at you like this—everything those runway shots can’t possibly capture. Your eyes trail to his lips, your own drawn to it with a desire you don’t know how to comprehend—and don’t quite wish to, either.

You want to believe he made the first move but you give in so easy, it’s alarming. Your lips move against his in a rhythm new and frantic, his hands gripping you with full strength at the waist and you part your lips to allow a deeper kiss. Your hands are free to roam his perfectly styled hair, tousling it in a fashion that makes him groan, only to push you harder against the wall. 

“I should’ve- I should’ve let you kiss me that night,” he mumbles against your lips. “Maybe I…I wouldn’t have made you hate me.”

“Maybe you should shut up and kiss me right now,” you respond, your mouth pressing against his, effectively doing the job.

It’s not difficult to see stars when his hips press against yours, his hand resting on one thigh to pull it up slightly. You feel the impact of it head-on, gasping out loud when his fingers press harder against the back of your thigh.

“Tell me- Tell me you want this,” he breathes out when he breaks the kiss.

You respond with reconnecting your lips, your tongue sliding against his in fervent affirmations. You’ve already forfeited your modesty, there’s no reason to stop.

You leave early, getting into the car you’d booked for the night. It would be far more embarrassing were it not for the separation between the front and backseats, when Jaehyun’s hands are up your clothes and his lips rough against your neck. The lip colour has smudged by the side of Jaehyun’s lips, a short giggle escaping you when you notice. It’s not enough to halt the kissing, or feeling each other up —something that feels long overdue. You try to keep your sounds to a minimum but Jaehyun seems to not care about things as worthless as shame, at least for the moment.

“Well, you’re about as graceful as a sea lion when you’re off the runway,” you hiss when Jaehyun’s teeth prick your skin.

“I haven’t done this in a while,” he responds in a low tone, the rest of his retort pushed away by his lips against your mouth.

You don’t have time to take in the details of Jaehyun’s apartment because he’s already carrying you to the bed, your legs around his waist and continuing to kiss you as if making up for something. All those years, you could have been doing this. Maybe you do have some regrets.

The material of his dress shirt feels expensive but clothes are not what you need right now. His phone rings once but he drags a finger over it to reject the call, his mouth still pressing against your collarbone. The only sounds you hear are rugged breathing and you fumbling with the buttons of his shirt as you pull it over his shoulders. The city lights below you reach through the drawn curtains, all the unrelenting complications left behind in those faraway streets.

Jaehyun makes a sound of annoyance at the phone ringing yet again. He breaks apart from you, receiving the call while his fingers massage his temple.

“Hyung, I’m fine. I’ll talk to you later—”

“I was just wondering where you disappeared and you don’t even grace me with a hello?” Johnny’s voice rings clear in the all too silent bedroom.

“Hyung—”

“Wait a minute.” There’s a pause within which Jaehyun seems to tense up. “Are you fucking? Like did you leave the party to get la—”

“Hyung. I’m hanging up.” 

The coral pink spread over his ears is almost as pretty as the look of pure annoyance over his face.

“That—”

“Didn’t happen,” you complete, giggling. If someone were to tell you’d be seeing Jaehyun like this a few months ago, you wouldn’t know whether to be embarrassed or exhilarated.

You place your hand at the nape of his neck, pulling him into another kiss.

Sex is barely ever beautiful—even if it’s Jung Yoonoh over you, planting kisses from your mouth to jaw, neck to chest and whispering sweet, delicious words against each part. He certainly knows how to use his assets better than you’d expect from a boy so pristine.

It doesn’t matter if it’s not beautiful, when it’s just like a slow dance—in shared solace and love out of time. You bite your lips to stop smiling too often for it to feel as serious and indifferent as all the other times. Sometimes you feel Jaehyun grinning into the crook of your neck, the giddiness of love taking over the movement of your hips against his. The perfect anatomy of his, paired with his candied words makes you think that maybe you do fit together.

You let someone else take charge for once, his praising whispers of ‘that’s my baby’ or ‘you just look so good’ far too teasing but he follows through, your body barely able to respond apart from shaking and shuddering till you reach your high. 

The sound of skin against skin dies down well into the night and you get cleaned, still blissed out from making the summit of all your senses. It’s warm inside, despite turning the air conditioner on.

“Jaehyun,” you call, lowering yourself to press a quick kiss to his lips. 

“Hm?” He gives you a drowsy smile, arm under his head and hair sticking to his forehead funny.

“Did you really not hate me? Not even once?” You rest your cheek against your palm as you lie beside him.

Even under the dim lights, it’s not hard to spot the blush on him when he positively glows. Jaehyun reminds you of warm auburn and the touch of cool satin—it’s easy to make things, find inspiration in love.

“Oh my god, you were lying!” you accuse, sitting up straight. “There’s no way you didn’t hate me. I called your modeling as good as a coconut under spotlight!”

“As you so love to remind me,” he mumbles.

There’s a brief moment before the two of you crack up, his deep laughter perfectly mismatched with yours. There’s hardly many sounds on the eighteenth floor, but maybe you’ve always been yearning for this privacy—this proximity in shared laughter and warm touches. 

“No, I didn’t,” Jaehyun answers your question after it’s quiet once again. “I thought...I think you’re…”

Jaehyun trails off, his eyes flickering over your face before fixing on your lips as his own tug into a smile. He gulps. “I think we’d be in trouble if the paparazzi saw us throwing choice words at each other, don’t you think? You were barely out of school then.”

“Me?” You laugh. “You were thinking about me?”

“And a little bit about me.” 

You fall asleep against Jaehyun’s chest with the certainty of kinder tomorrows, a thing he teaches you through whispers against the pillow and fingers playing with your hair. There’s something private in the way he holds your face, something delicate and homely running from his long fingers to his flushed knuckles and the rest of his hand as it presses against your cheek. It’s warm here, and safe, and maybe home is where the heart is, after all.

“Really? You’re not even a little bit sad I’m leaving?” you ask, placing your hand over your heart. “Who’s going to help you when you’re getting bullied in the workplace now?”

Doyoung huffs in annoyance, placing the box down beside the moving truck. “You’re the only one who bullies me in the workplace.”

You adjust the ugly baseball cap on your head, the one Jaehyun had pulled over your head in an attempt to stop you from complaining about his messy apartment. You hadn’t realized you’d worn it all the way to Seoul till the articles about your questionable choice of accessories had surfaced.

“Your boyfriend’s calling,” Doyoung says, making a face as he picks your phone up from the box near him. “I can’t even believe this. All those years of flirting and—”

You snatch it from him, glaring at him for the choice of words. He raises his hands defensively, rolling his eyes at your sudden movement.

“Are you sure you don’t want me flying to Seoul?”

“Unless you’re planning to work in a truck rental.”

You hear Jaehyun laugh on the other side of the line. Is it normal to have blood rush straight from your chest to your ears at the sound of laughter? You hope that doesn’t change.

You’d visited him a day before your flight. It hasn’t been all that long but Jaehyun certainly makes it out to be, just so he can use his cheesy one-liners. You try not to smile thinking about how he had flung his hair band out, immediately tousling his hair back into a pretty mess and struggling to keep a straight face when you’d visited out of the blue. Jaehyun wakes up at one in the afternoon when his schedule is empty and it had appalled you enough to help him out with basic chores before you left. (It didn’t end well. He kept putting his chin on your shoulder and sneaking his arms around you while you did the dishes.)

“(name)? (name), are you daydreaming again?” 

You sigh. “You can’t wait three more days, Jae? It’s, what, one in the morning there!”

“Do you want me saying something cheesy?”

“Absolutely not.”

“I don’t think I can sleep without waking up to your face.”

You pinch the bridge of your nose, unable to grace him with a response. The dreamy languor in his voice is more than recognizable and if you’re not mistaken, he’s going to be saying something highly inappropriate.

“Do you know what dream I had last night?” he asks, the smile almost evident with how suggestive it sounds.

“Jaehyun, no,” you warn before lowering your voice. “I swear if it’s another dirty dream—”

“Come home and I’ll tell you all about it. With demonstrations.”

This time you can’t help the laughter, trying to mask it with a cough only to fail. You push the back of your hand against your cheek in order to soothe the involuntary blush. Your perfume smells just like him, and you realize suddenly why he’d gifted it to you.

“That definitely makes me want to leave faster,” you quip.

“I certainly hope so.”

It’s different now, especially if you remember your feelings just last February. Change feels easy for the first time in your life. You check off your list of items, counting the boxes as they’re lifted onto the truck. It took a good amount of thinking, and a bunch of fights before you could decide. New York isn’t so bad. Not when you have reason to be there. You’d like to call it love.

A list of things you do appreciate: Jung Yoonoh. Jaehyun. Whatever.

[spicykoreantatertots]

Fractured Hearts & Floral Lungs - Part One

Pairing: Yoongi x Reader x Jungkook

Genre: hanahaki, angst, established relationship

Rating: 18+

Word Count: 2400

Warnings: blood, choking, coughing, vomiting, hanahaki disease, relationship issues, fighting, mentions of cheating, mentions of sex, mentions of hospitals

A/N: this is my first fic in a while and i’m happy to finally be able to share something again. i’m determined to finish this series by the end of may and finish my soulmate series this summer. 

thank you to @shadowsremedy​ for this banner and to @thesoftsoobin for beta reading for me.

this was meant to be a gift for @dee-ehn, well it still is a gift, but it should’ve been posted a long time ago. i’m happy to finally be able to present you with this gift, i hope you enjoy part one of Fractured Hearts & Floral Lungs!

~~~~~~~

[Thursday Night]

Tonight isn’t the first night that you’ve shown up at Jin’s door sobbing. At this rate, it probably won’t be the last. He still hasn’t read your texts about needing a place to stay, so he’s probably asleep. 

You knock loudly a few times, careful not to disturb the floral wreath hanging on the center of the door. And after a few moments you can hear some footsteps inside the apartment. There’s some more silence and then you can hear hushed whispers. 

The door creaks open and Jin’s boyfriend Namjoon is standing before you. 

“Y/N, what are you doing here?” Namjoon sighs sleepily. 

“You scared us! I even got my old tennis racquet out of the closet!” Jin complains before he pokes his head around Namjoon’s broad shoulders. The tear stains and redness of your face instantly catch his attention. “Oh no, what happened?” 

For a moment, you can’t say anything. Your chest fills with emotions. Pain, frustration, sadness, heartbreak. The words can’t get past your trembling lips, and soon you feel Jin’s arms envelop you, his sweater absorbing your burning tears. 

Somehow, through all your blubbering, Jin has been able to understand what happened with Yoongi. He’s rubbing soothing circles on your back, guiding you to the couch that will be your bed for the next few nights. Namjoon has brought over a pillow, blanket, and a glass of water for you. 

“Why don’t you lay down and try to sleep now? This isn’t going to be resolved tonight, unfortunately,” Namjoon interrupts Jin’s comforting whispers. 

“He’s right, Y/N, I can tell you’re exhausted. Try to get some rest.” Jin helps you get settled in bed before following Namjoon into their bedroom. 

Jin was right. You are completely exhausted, emotionally drained. But every time you attempt to close your eyes, all you can see is him, the flowers, and the blood.

~~~~~~~

[Thursday Evening]

Something is off. He’s been coming home late everyday for the past few weeks. You hoped that today, of all days, he would make an effort. But here you are, alone, surrounded by a table full of his favorite foods. From the moment you got home from work, you’d been on your feet cooking. As if your job waiting tables wasn’t strenuous enough. 

Lately it feels like you’re the only one making an effort in this relationship. He leaves for work before you wake up, returns after you’ve gotten into bed for the night. He doesn’t even take the lunches you pack for him to work anymore. You never would have suspected Yoongi of cheating on you, but his behavior is making you question everything you thought you knew. 

Today will be the final straw, you told yourself. If he didn’t make it home in time for dinner on your three year anniversary, it would be time to confront him. But as six turns into seven and seven into eight, you decide to pack the meal into tupperware. 

You expected tears to come, but they didn’t. Your cheeks are bone dry while you pile the rice into a slightly warped plastic container. You’re in disbelief, or perhaps you just expected this all along. The containers of untouched anniversary dinner stack neatly in the refrigerator. 

The sound of keys jingling against the door signals his arrival before he opens the door. You lean yourself against the kitchen counter, grounding yourself. 

“Hey babe, happy anniversary!” Yoongi’s smile shines, like it always does, but his eyes aren’t as bright. He’s carrying a bouquet of small sunflowers. 

“Happy anniversary.” A faint smile crosses your face as he hands you the bouquet. He looks a little puzzled by your lack of gratitude. But then he notices the pile of dishes in the sink. 

“Oh, did you make dinner?” You nod silently as Yoongi shuffles the pots and pans around in the sink. “I made us reservations at The Table. Did you eat already?” Your eyebrows shoot up.

“No!” You try again, this time suppressing the surprise in your voice. “No, I haven’t. That sounds really good.” Maybe things aren’t as bleak as they seem; at least he didn’t completely forget.

The ride to the restaurant is nearly silent, some tacky radio advertisements playing quietly. He’s holding your hand, but you’re looking out the window, focused on everything but the uncomfortable quiet. Yoongi breaks the silence and mentions something about the project he’s working on at the studio. 

The studio, you think to yourself. Of course that’s all he can talk about. His passion has always been music. You were both thrilled when he got an entry level job at a music studio, and at the beginning things were good. But Yoongi always strives to be the best, and he moved up the ladder to Assistant Producer in less than a year.

Whatever album he’s working on now has kept him away from you for far too long.

“So when is that album releasing anyway?”

“Later this summer, but our work on it is almost done.” He says, and you breathe a sigh of relief. 

“So you’ll be back home at normal times?” 

“Well...” Yoongi glances over at you. “Jungkook wants me to work on another project with him when this one’s over.” 

“I’m glad your boss likes your work, but hasn’t he ever heard of a work-life balance?”

“Jungkook is NOT my boss. He's-” Yoongi starts.

“Well he’s not your girlfriend either!” You shout. “You’re never home anymore Yoongi.” Your hand slips from his and you cross your arms.

“This is my career.” Something catches in his throat, he coughs a little. You knew he loved his job, but you never heard him get emotional about it.

“So I just need to accept that I’ll never get to see you again?” Yoongi pulls up to the front of the restaurant, in line for valet parking. 

“Do you want to go home and keep fighting or do you want to get dinner?” He asks, still trying to clear his throat.

The restaurant is very nice: a robust wine selection, a pianist playing in one corner, and a sleek menu. The other tables are talking in quiet voices to retain the romantic ambiance of the place. You and Yoongi are doing your part by not speaking at all. 

He’s making it tough though; he keeps coughing. You hope he’s not getting sick.

“Are you okay?” You ask, passing him a tissue from your purse, trying your best not to sound angry.

“Yeah I’ve just got something stuck in my throat, excuse me.” Yoongi snatches the tissue from your hand before walking toward the restroom. 

When he returns, he looks a little worse for the wear. His skin looks paler, his hair mussed, and a wet spot on his shirt. 

“Are you getting sick?” You have to ask him now. “What’s that?” You point to the wet spot just below his collar. 

“I got some spit on my shirt. I do think I’m coming down with something, but I’ll be fine.” Something doesn’t seem right. He looks more than sick, almost paranoid. 

Through the rest of the night he coughs here and there, but he seems to regain his composure. His long dark locks get tucked behind his ear, and for a moment you can forget how hard things have been lately. He asks about your work friends and hobbies and seems to listen intently. The curve of his smile draws a smile out of you too. 

Between dinner and dessert, Yoongi reaches across the smooth table cloth to take your hand in his. His thumb gently strokes your fingers. 

“You know that I love you, right?” He asks, his smile faded to a straight line. You squeeze his hand. 

“You’re going to have to do a better job of showing it.”

~~~~~~~

You’re not sure if it’s the best move, but you want to show him that you haven’t given up yet. When you step out of the bathroom, wearing a revealing chemise, Yoongi is sitting on his side of the bed, facing away from you. 

“How are you feeling?” You ask, climbing onto the bed. He sighs, and you reach for his shoulders. You begin rubbing his shoulder muscles, feeling the tension in them slowly releasing. Kneading his back muscles with your fingers, you lean forward to lay kisses along his broad shoulders. 

“Baby, can we not tonight?” You freeze, not sure you heard him correctly. “I know it’s our anniversary, I just don’t feel good.” You remove your hands from his body.

“Yeah, of course. There’s some cough medicine and painkillers in the bathroom if it will help.” You reply, leaning back against the headboard, scrolling through your twitter feed so you can hide your embarrassment.

“I’m going to take a shower. You don’t have to wait up for me.” He gets up from the bed and enters the bathroom without glancing your way. You settle into the blankets and try to relax.

You can hear him coughing again once the shower turns on. You turn over in bed, his sudden cold demeanor reminding you of the trouble your relationship is really in. It’s hard to fall asleep to the sound of your boyfriend coughing violently, but you manage to drift away.

~~~~~~~

[Friday Morning]

The sound of Namjoon leaving the apartment wakes you. It must be around 7:30 or so. Jin is in the kitchen quietly making coffee, still in his pajamas. 

“Jin, are you not going to work today?” You say in a half-whisper, not wanting to startle him. 

“I called in sick. I wanted to stay with you today,” Jin explains, walking over to the couch with two mugs of coffee. He made yours just the way you like it, almond milk and a little bit of sugar. The warmth of the drink momentarily soothes your sleepy body. 

Jin reaches across the coffee table and picks up the tv remote. He turns on a morning talk show, some washed-up celebrity talking to slightly less washed-up celebrities about what projects or life events they have going on. 

“And later on in the show we will be joined by Jackson Wang, who will share his story of heartbreak and unrequited love that ultimately lead to the creation of his latest single, 100 ways.” The audience cheers for a moment before Jin switches the channel. 

“Sorry.” He sighs. 

“I don’t think that’s what the song is about...” You joke, sarcasm seeping through the pain in your chest.

Jin chuckles at your remark, but he sits uncomfortably at the end of the couch picking at his fingernails. 

“Listen I wanted to say something...” He starts. 

“Jin, do you think I could shower before we get into anything? I just need a minute to wake up and I feel kind of gross.” The mascara stains from the night before are beginning to irritate your skin, and a hot shower could do wonders for you. But truthfully, you just aren’t ready to talk about it yet.

“Sure, I’ll grab some sweats you can borrow.” Jin sighs, getting up from his seat.

 The hot water melts away the tension in your muscles, but the tension in your mind remains. It’s difficult to keep the images of Yoongi coughing up dozens and dozens of yellow and orange petals from flooding your mind. The drops of blood on the petals and the floor just showed you how far the disease had progressed. How long he’s been in love with someone else.

The floral scent of Jin’s lavender body wash is a little too reminiscent of the smell from the night before. Sickly sweet flowers with a hint of acidic bile and metallic blood. The clean water rinses the suds but the scent remains on your skin.

When you close your eyes to rinse shampoo from your hair, the scene from the night before plays out in vivid detail.

~~~~~~~

[Thursday Night]

You had been awakened by the sounds of Yoongi retching in the bathroom. You called out for him, but he didn’t answer, so you let yourself in. 

He is doubled over the toilet. A dozen or so brightly colored petals scattered around him, some smeared with watery blood. The moment you burst in, he tried to hide the extent of it, tried not to let you see but he knew it was useless. He let himself lean against the wall in defeat. 

The violent episode he was experiencing seemed to come to a halt.

“Are you...” You pause, there are too many questions to ask, but you know there is only one you can ask in the moment. “Are you okay?” He closes his eyes and nods slowly. You take a moment to examine his face. It’s red, and there are tear streaks clear down his chin. There’s drops of blood and sweat on his bare chest. His heavy breathing is slowing back to normal. 

And then you have to leave. You can’t stay and look at him and his flower petals any longer. It looks like he’ll be okay for the night, so you grab your purse and phone and walk straight through the door.

~~~~~~~

[Friday Morning]

Bumps rise across your skin as you exit the shower and step onto the cold floor tiles. You wrap a towel around your body and sit on the edge of the bathtub. Your phone, face down on the counter, buzzes again, and you decide to face the messages you ignored last night. 

You scroll through the usual email and social media notifications to get to the dozens of texts and missed calls from Yoongi, still unsure if you should even hear him out. How can he still be in love with you when he’s been growing flowers for someone else?

A phone call interrupts your thinking. The number has a local area code. A sudden feeling of nausea tells you that something is wrong. 

“Hello?” Your voice echos against the tiled walls.

“Hello we are trying to reach Ms. Y/L/N Y/N.”

“This is her.”

“You are listed as an emergency contact for Mr. Min Yoongi. He has been admitted to the ICU at Grace Regional Medical Center, how quickly can you get here?”

~~~~~~~

A/N: thank you so much for reading. check out my master list here, and check back in for part two. it will be posted by the end of april 2021!

[doitforstamets]

A fanfic..!

Edit: AO3 with more chapters!

Star Trek Discovery Hugh Culber/Paul Stamets Before Discovery General audiences / Not beta read

Paul sits in the dim hotel lobby, tapping on his thigh with one hand and mindlessly browsing a PADD with the other. There is text on the screen he doesn’t read, and pictures he glances over but doesn’t look at.

His heart jumps at an incoming message.

“Be there in 20 minutes”, Hugh writes.

Paul is frozen staring at the message pop up until it disappears. His hand stops the nervous tapping to grab the PADD from the glass table, and to write back.

“Can’t wait.”

And he really can’t. 20 minutes, still? Paul feels like he’s been waiting for weeks – and technically he has. But he’s only sat in the hotel lobby for a while, just long enough to finish a cup of coffee and go trough his presentation one more time, sloppily. Hardly a way in which he does anything, usually. He takes pride in being very particular about his work.

But not this weekend.

After an unexpected encounter on Alpha Centauri 6 weeks ago – Paul checks in his head, yes, it really has been 6 weeks since he met Hugh – they’ve only been in contact via video calls and messages. Not that it hadn’t been nice – it’s been very nice – Paul was starting to get impatient with not being close to Hugh, physically.

For a while, he had been afraid to say anything, in case Hugh felt differently. He had tried to focus on his work, only messaging Hugh once or twice a day compared to the earlier long daily conversations and calls.

He didn’t mean to get so lost in the research, but that’s just who he was. One day, he had forgotten to message Hugh completely. He had spent his entire day calculating and testing yet another idea for harnessing the potential of the spore drive. It didn’t work.

He returned to his apartment, overlooking the research station on Deneva, defeated and annoyed. He had frustratedly kicked off his shoes, thrown his jacket on the couch, rest of his clothes leaving a messy trail to the bathroom. He didn’t pay much attention to anything while showering. He’s pretty sure he had washed himself.

Stepping out of the bathroom to be met with the warm glow of the Denevian sunset, Paul sighed.

Instantly, there was a muffled vibration coming from somewhere near the entrance to his apartment.

Oh shit, Paul realized. He had not looked at his personal PADD all day.

Quickly making his way to the entrance, he tried to grab the jacket he wore today from the coat rack. It wasn’t there. He turned around, remembering throwing the jacket on the couch, only to realize the buzzing was coming from his feet.

Paul grabbed the PADD from the case on the floor, almost instinctively answered the video call, before realizing he was wearing nothing but a towel around his waist.

Hastily, he grabbed the nearest shirt he could find, struggled while putting it on trying to simultaneously hold the PADD. He took a few steps to the couch and answered the call while flopping down on the couch.

Hugh’s face appeared on screen, his brows furrowed a bit, but his mouth turning into a faint smile at the sight of Paul.

“Hey,” Hugh greeted in a soft tone.

“Hi.”

“Where have you been?”

Paul had realized his mistake just moments before, and took a second to think of the answer, no matter how obvious it was.

“In the lab,” Paul answered sounding a little exhausted.

“Of course,” Hugh smiled. “Anything exiting?”

Paul sighed again, turning his gaze to look at the sunset taking its final breaths in the horizon.

“Not really. Another day spent with algorithms and experiments only to prove myself wrong.”

“Oh,” Hugh exhaled with an apologizing look. “That sucks.”

By now, Hugh knew better than to answer Paul’s disappointment with the previously tried encouraging facts, like “that’s part of the research. You’ll get there eventually.”

Instead, he had noticed, Paul took comfort in him just agreeing that sometimes his work was a pain in the ass.

Looking at the pale man on screen, direct sunlight hitting his face and hair, illuminating it even lighter and bouncing off his blue eyes with a beautiful glow, Hugh definitely agreed that right now, he would rather have Paul not so invested in his research. Maybe they could spend some time together, if it wasn’t for their distance and both of their demanding jobs.

Hugh sighed smiling, studying Paul’s white-appearing eyebrows, now furrowing a bit in a way that had become quite familiar to Hugh. Paul quickly turned back to face the screen.

“I don’t really want to think about it,” he huffs. “How was your day?”

“I missed you,” Hugh answers without hesitation.

Paul is taken aback by the honest statement. “Sorry. I didn’t mean to ignore you,” Paul murmurs, realizing there are at least a few notifications unread on his PADD from Hugh.

“I know. You were working.”

“Still. I could’ve at least messaged you,” Paul goes on to say, genuinely annoyed at himself for ignoring Hugh for a full day. He meant to keep his distance, but not this much.

“Yeah, you could’ve,” Hugh admits, flashing a grin that almost melts Paul.

Hugh is still in his white Starfleet uniform, although the jacket is open, revealing an undershirt with a far more giving neckline. Paul tries not to stare.

“But I had a busy day too,” Hugh continues. “I have time now.”

“Good,” Paul smiles, although he’s a tiny bit uncomfortable remembering that he isn’t wearing any pants.

“You’re home?” Paul asks an obvious question. He’s seen enough glimpses of Hugh’s quarters to recognize it.

“Well,” Hugh looks a little surprised. “I guess.”

Paul raises an eyebrow as in asking Hugh to elaborate.

“It still doesn’t feel very... homey.”

Hugh had lived in these quarters on this starbase for about six months now. He’d gotten used to it, and felt physically comfortable where he was, but he had never referenced to it as “home”. Maybe because he spent so much time on duty outside the starbase.

“I get that,” Paul answered. He in turn had lived in this apartment for almost 6 years. It was a place to sleep, eat and shower, above anything else. If there was a place he’d consider home, it would be the garden in the lab.

Both men startle slightly, as Paul’s PADD receives a message. Paul furrows his brows and purses his lips, opening the message. Hugh recognises the look from previous calls, often followed with an apologetic Paul having to head back to the lab.

Paul groans at the message in frustration. He places the PADD on the coffee table, disappearing from the screen.

“What is it?” Hugh asks while grabbing something off the screen himself. Might as well fill some reports if Paul must head back to work.

“Umm,” Paul huffs from outside the screen. “It’s Straal.” He reappears wearing grey collage pants and scuffing his damp blonde hair with a towel.

“Back to work?” Hugh asks with a tender smile.

“No... Well, not right now,” Paul answers, reading the message again. He scoffs. “He’s bailing on me for a conference next weekend.”

There’s an annoyed look on the man’s face, as he dismisses the message and leans back on the couch, defeated.

“Fucking Straal,” he hisses, just audibly for Hugh to hear. He chuckles to himself, trying to hide a smile.

“Where is it?” Hugh asks, apparently while writing some notes on another device in front of him.

“Betazed.” Ugh. That’s far.

“Really?” Hugh raises his brows and opens a new tap on his PADD with a swift touch. Betazed is closer than Deneva, that’s for sure.

“I’m so tired of having to act like an idiot at these things,” Paul starts ranting. Hugh nods, but is still flicking trough tabs on his device to look at something else.

“I don’t know anyone, or even if I did, I don’t care enough to remember them. Most people don’t actually care about the research and are there just for the show and... gossip,” Paul huffs. “Who goes to a science conference for gossip?”

Hugh glances at Paul and gives a small chuckle. He’s reminded of what often goes on during Starfleet Medical personnel seminars, after and in between the lectures...

“I know some people,” Hugh laughs. He’s dug up a file listing his work shifts, displayed in thick boxes of multiple colors for multiple sites and types of shifts. He scrolls down to next week.

“It’s obnoxious. Would be fine if it was just the presentations, but there’s always some afterparty you’re expected to attend if you’re to actually make connections and get sponsors. Escapes me how my social presence has anything to do with the research...” Paul rants on.

They’ve had this conversation before, a few weeks ago, when Paul was getting ready for another one of his trips across the galaxy to present his genius research to much less interested audiences. It was clear Paul wasn’t much of a people’s person. He was a convincing speaker, though. Hugh had been intrigued from the first moment he saw Paul give his presentation. Intense, captivating and so excited about his own work, it was hard not to be. Or so Hugh had thought. Apparently, he was in the minority.

“Why does Justin just get to inform me he’s not coming. I better be in a hospital if I were to skip one of these things."

Hugh looks at Paul on the screen, his face now more frustrated than annoyed.

“Please don’t hurt yourself for that,” Hugh kids. Although there’s a slight chance Paul actually might be that stupid, he admits.

Paul smiles back at him softly. A moment passes in silence, before Hugh continues.

“You know... I have vacation days saved up. I’ve always wanted to visit Betazed.”

________

GAHH. I have not written fanfiction in years..! Please be gentle, I know I also change the tense halfway trough, sorryyy. But also, this needs a name I guess?

[perksofbeingaharrie]

In The Night

Another one - man I’m on the roll huh. 

Enjoy this one too. I defo enjoyed writing this one here aha 🌝

SUMMARY 

A weekend getaway with family and friends is all great even when there’s not much talking with one another in between. But the real action goes down when in the night it is just him and her. 

Type: SMUT, little angst (?) and just pure love

Word count: <3000

MASTERLIST  o  REQUEST BOX 

---

The Gerbers had to be the best of hosts she has ever come across.

Harry has dragged her along to many parties, get togethers, holidays hosted by a lot of people from the industry, but events hosted by the Gerbers is the only time she looks forward to them.

And it is not just about the great food, decoration, ambience or selection of place, but the mere fact about how coordinated and understanding the whole family is with one another.

The parents and the kids already know their place, what they have to do and how they must do it and that results in the most smooth and comfortable transition of events throughout the day.

This time around again, as Thanksgiving approaches right around the weekend, the Gerbers were very kind to welcome Harry, Anne and her, along with just two more families for this weekend getaway.

The location was perfect – their house in Canada, with the perfect firewood to warm up their cozy home and traditional food and drinks exquisitely for the guests.

Again, the coordination was beyond thought, as all Y/N could do was follow Mrs. Gerber around the house, watching how perfectly she handled everything.

Mrs. Gerber was equally kind to share everything and anything in Y/N’s company. Over the years of Harry’s and her relationship, Y/N managed to make the best of friends with the most genuine people of the industry, one such being the Gerbers.

The dinner was well lit and placed at their veranda which overlooked the most beautiful mountain ranges. The families were all seated at the long table, with the ladies to one side while the gents on the other.

Y/N was happily tucked with Anne on her side, and while she kept looking out to meet Harry’s eyes from across the table, that was all the contact she could manage all through the entire day since their arrival here.

With such a close knitted friend circle gathered in this place, it was never easy to only stick by one person the entire time, or sit with one group the whole trip. You just knew everybody and could not avoid even one of them.

So as their eyes could only meet discreetly once or twice all till midnight, this obviously could not be enough to make up for the lack of talking the entire day.

When the dinner finally was completed, and the guests extinguished to their rooms after a hearty feast, all Y/N and Harry could be happy about was having one entire guest room to themselves.

They followed Anne to her bedroom, and only after making sure she was tucked in well, they walked over to their room.

There was no doubt a little tipsiness in their walk and words from the drinks as they stumbled into their room, and immediately fell to their bed.

A moment of silence passed as they lay side to side, arms flayed like a snow angel on the white sheets. It was impossible to guess if either of them had already fallen asleep.

It had indeed been a long day.

When Harry finally sighs out loud is when there is a subtle movement in the room, and all while lying in the same position, he says on his second breath –

“We should get changed first.”

To this, Y/N sighs herself, turning to her side without much thought. At once does she come in contact with his body, she curls up into a ball and tucks herself over his open arm, snuggling into his armpit.

His hand comes down automatically too, palm flat against the small of her back like holding a baby to his side.

“You go in first please. I’ll need another minute here.” She says, dragging onto her words in a lazy tone.

Another beat of silence goes by before he, with a groan, sits up on the bed and looks back down at her.

“Just two adult introverts absolutely exhausted after an entire day of socializing.” He says, locking eyes with her.

“An entire day.” Her eyes widen in humour and he snickers into his shoulder.

Falling prey to his urge, he comes down to press his lips on her cheek, and she curls into the mattress more as he begins snogging all over the right side of her face. His nose snuggles into her skin, lips purposely kissing everywhere with a loud smack.

She finally whines out loud when it becomes impossible to breath, and he gets up, chuckling after his accomplishment.

Not done yet, he manages to even slap her behind as he gets up to head to the bathroom. He hears her tsk out loud behind him and that adds up to his satisfaction.

He comes out in good ten minutes, dressed in a soft shirt and joggers, having washed up pretty neat. He passes her on the way to the bed as she stumbles into the bathroom and in ten minutes too she is out, having removed all the makeup and now dressed in a comfy night dress set.

He is on the bed when she looks at him again, his shirt off and his phone in his hand, scrolling through his feed.

“Harry.” She scolds, climbing on the bed on her knees. “Don’t strain your eyes now. You’re tired enough.”

His head immediately snaps out of his device and he looks at her, turning off all the tabs and ready to put his phone away. His eyes scan her get up and he smiles, eyes crinkling in a fond feeling.

“This is cute.” He comments, pulling her shirt’s sleeve.

She smiles back, putting the extra pillows away and with just one pillow to rest her head on and lies her head down on it immediately.

He slides from the headboard too, turning to his side and moving closer so they now face each other as they sleep, bodies just a few inches away.

Her eyes are closed and lips pulled up in a pout, and in a small voice she instructs him – “Please turn off the lights, baby.”

He uses the switch on his side and does so, quickly turning back to her and with the same big eyes, adoring her sleepy face.

“I can still see you so clearly even after turning off the light.” He tells her, his voice now a little quieter and hush in accordance to the setting.

“Hmm?”

“Yeah, the moonlight coming from the windows is really beautiful.”

“Mmhmm.”

“Don’t you wanna look at it too?”

“Hmm.”

“Open your eyes too, and look at me.”

Her humming this time is even quieter that even from such a proximity he does not catch it.

“Open your eyes, please.” His voice is softer than before. “Just this once.”

She stitches her eyebrows together and slowly, with a flutter, opens her eyes. Though the initial look is not very pleasing, when she finally roams her eyes all over his face, it all changes.

The moonlight as it comes through the drawn curtains over the tall French windows beautifully decorates their room, falling in the right places, and his face.

She smiles at his smiling face, bringing her hand to his face and cupping his cheek, running the soft pad of her thumb against it.

“Told ya.” He answers to her expressions in a proud smile, already aware that he roped her in for a good thing.

Her smile widens and she leans forward to plant a peck on his lips.

Though what was intended a peck does not remain one – he leans forward to her as she begins moving back from the kiss, and he captures her lips in his mouth again, drawing her back to him.

What is an exasperated, happy sigh is released from inside her as he moves closer to her body with his lips pressing more into hers; to the extent that when they pull away, his arm is circled around her hip and her is around his shoulder.

“What are you doing?” She chuckles, looking at his satisfied expressions.

“Kissing you?” With this, he plants another smooch on her lips.

“Okay…” She draws her word and that gives him another opportunity to kiss her. “But we can’t go any further than this you know.”

He pouts and with the puckered-up lips, leans in for another kiss.

She is quick to block him, and leans up to his ears to say in a low tone – “We can’t get someone else’s bed sheets dirty.”

His frown intensifies when she brings her face in front of him again, and he breathes solemnly, rubbing his fingers in circles on the small of her back – his patent method to pushing her into anything and everything.  

“I cannot sleep right now though.” His voice is a sad whisper.

“Hmm…” She thinks. “Why don’t I tell you about my day.”

His eyes narrow in an expression of disbelief.

“C’mon.” She chuckles, obviously enjoying his desperation. “We hardly were together the entire day.”

A beat of silence he takes to think (or actually not) and then nods slowly. “Okay.”

“Alright, so, I was with Anne and we were walking around in the lawn outside – so this is about the time when it got a little warm; maybe 2-ish –“ She goes on and on about her day, literally.

Harry listens, smiling at the way she is happy to tell him about all the sunshine and birds of the day. But it isn’t quite very deep into the story when the hand which was placed on her lower back begins to slide into her shorts from behind.

She catches the action, but not his intention.

When his hand entirely slides in and his long fingers get a grip around the full shape of her butt, for him to finally squeeze it with full resolve, does her voice squeak in the middle of talking.

“What are you doing, Harry?” She whisper-screams at him, eyes widening at him as his become narrow when he grins back at her.

“What-?” He chuckles, showing his full teeth. “Don’t worry, just keeping warm.”

She gives him the eye, but he acts to not mind any such warning and asks her to continue with her whereabouts of the day.

She is talking again, trying to piece together where she had begun and left at. But it not very late before her breathing begins to pick up. She is taking longer, deeper breaths in and she knows what’s up.

His abrupt squeezing of her behind picks up a rhythmic pace. It’s very subtle at first, and as soothing as a massage but soon there is a tension which drives into it.

She stops talking entirely. Her body is pushed up in the bed in the same pattern of his hands moving around her behind, and she is pulled back and to him too leisurely to be any subtle about the undertone of it all.

She breathes heavy against his mouth, their lips coming together to touch but also to not.

“I am not done talking.” She manages the words out of her mouth.

His voice has picked up the rough tone, coming right from the back of his throat. “Then talk.” He tells her, pausing his action for a bit. “I’m all ears.”

“Mmhmm.” Her eyes close in all the feels as his hand resumes again, going up and down the way her butt curves.

His fingers wind all the way to her front and then retract. Repeatedly, he takes her to this edge and watches her wither under the influence.

“You stopped talking.” He reminds her, lips pressing against her chin softly.

She moans, titling her face up so he kisses along her neck entirely.

His lips come down till her collar bones in open mouthed kisses, leaving a trail of his tongue’s mark, making her insane.

“Talk.” He pesters her again. “I’m gonna have to stop if you don-“

“No.” Her eyes open. She finds his face right in front of her again, cheeks flushed red and warm like hers, and pupils dilated like a beast in the night.

She moves closer to him, grabbing his chin in between the thumb and index finger, and tilts his to the side to angle their kiss deeper.

Graciously, her picks her up to pull her to him from where his hand already is, his fingers pressing down firm against her clit.

She quivers into the kiss, and his fingers gather their pace, drawing circles on the newly found skin.

All hell breaks loose.

Her hand goes up behind him, clutching the back of his hair and she is bringing her tongue in for the kiss, releasing the held back moan finally into his mouth. Her leg lifts up on his thigh under the blanket, spreading her core more and she is grinding to the way his fingers move on her.

He pulls from the kiss, throwing her leg off of his thigh, catching her off guard. They are both breathing heavy, even after Harry pulls his hand out from her pants.

She slowly moves closer to him again, warm, as he brings his hand up between them. He moves his one finger to her mouth, watching as she licks all over and around it, and his own mouth reaches for the index finger pointed in his direction; and they are fighting for this too.

“How are you doing? Down there?” She asks him as his hand comes to cup her face next.

He looks down into the blanket on her questions, lips lifting in a snicker and he shakes his head.

She understands this very confusing gesture of his, and instantly, her hands reach under the covers to inside his joggers.

He swallows her gasp in a kiss that erupts as her hand gets a hold of his very active muscle inside the pants, his body shaking from the touch.

“Are we really doing this?” She asks him once he pulls his lips and hands from her face, and his hand goes down to the front of her shorts.

“Listen,” He breathes, heavy, as his fingers slip inside her thin panties. “I do not know how thin or thick these walls around us are – so let’s play it safe, alright? Let’s just…keep it low.”

She grins, nodding.

They both go into work together.

Her hand wrapped around his dick get on with pace, feeling his entire length at once in an up and down stoke and thumb coming up to flick the tip in a tease. He curls more into her, their foreheads touching and breaths mixing with all the work.

His lubricated fingers are quick to feel her up; his forearm pushing her leg up his hip to spread her out more. He slides his fingers up her core, biceps flexing with the pressure he builds up inside her with his fingers curling and thumb pressing on her nub.

They’re both easily worked up within the few early minutes. After having to hold back their frustration and desire to moan and release the tension, their climax is sooner than they thought.

Together, they feel it coming.

Their eyes meet, fiery and understanding, face red and hot. Harry slides his other arm under her neck and pulls her to him. Her face lands on his shoulder while his goes on hers, and they are breathing out their hot, annoyed breaths on their skins.

He takes the liberty to bite her shoulder too, as with one last pumping of their fingers and hands, they both come undone, an absolute state of bliss and cold air surrounding them at once.

It doesn’t end there.

When they pull their hands back up, they wind it around one another, faces burying in each other’s neck and for a while they hold each other. Their breathless effort to trying to catch their breaths again ends at once, and they relax, feeling pure and together in this at once.

When they face each other again, Harry still has her neck on his arm while the other hand comes to position her face and end the night with one final kiss.

They turn their faces up to the ceiling, watching the exquisite cut work of the top and the next thing they know - they burst out laughing. Why?

“I am laughing because we literally cannot stop. Ever. Can we?” She says.

“I am laughing because…” He pauses to laugh some more. “Because we’ll have to clean now…and what if – what if tomorrow morning at the breakfast table too.”

He says and watches her eyes turn wide in horror while his own palm comes to slap his face.

“Just don’t say that. Please.” She consoles him, reaching over to give his tummy a rub and pepper his skin with kisses.

“Let’s begins a little clean up now?”

“In the shower?” She adds for him.

Their foolish smiles are the same.

“In the shower.”

[flowerfan2]

Everything You’re Looking For

David/Patrick, 2000 words, A03

S05e06 coda

In the days after what Patrick thinks of as the Ken incident, Patrick finds himself hyperaware every time a guy around his age comes into the store.  It’s bordering on ridiculous, but each time Patrick approaches one of them with what he steadily maintains is his usual cheerful greeting, he can’t help but wonder what they see when they look at him.  Is he now giving off some kind of gay vibe?

Adding to the insanity of this preoccupation is the fact that Patrick still, for the most part, has no idea whether any particular guy he looks at is queer.  He’s actually pretty sure that making that judgment based upon a guy’s appearance is incorrect, and yet he doesn’t have the time to banter with everyone he meets for a few weeks to find out whether their eyes linger on his lips when he calls out their sloppy mouth, so he’s not sure how to discover if there might be an attraction between them.

It’s not as if he wants there to be an attraction between them – he doesn’t want to be with anyone other than David, that was never really in doubt, and now it’s firmly established.  But he just can’t help considering what people think when they meet him.  If Ken had seen something in Patrick that told him “yeah, he might be open to this” does that mean that Patrick has changed?  In his whole life, before meeting David, no guy has ever hit on him.  Something must have changed.

Of course it might also be that Ken saw Patrick interacting with David, or looking at David, or existing near David… Patrick thinks he’s pretty obvious, at least now, when it comes to his attachment to his boyfriend.  Stevie has gone so far as to describe him as “besotted,” at least when she was high.  On the other hand, if it was clear that Patrick was in a relationship, why would Ken have asked for his number?

It’s confusing, and distracting.  Desperate to get his mind off the topic, Patrick tells David that he’s going to hide out in the back room for the afternoon and work on the books.  David seems fine with this – he’s got no reason not to be – and so Patrick sits himself down with his laptop and proceeds to stare unseeingly at a half-finished profit and loss statement until his eyes start to cross.

Patrick wonders if this would all make more sense if he knew any other queer people their age besides David. He thinks that’s part of why David wanted him to experience a date with Ken.  Having someone to talk to seems like it might help.  But the last thing he wants is to make David think he wants to meet other gay guys because there’s something lacking in his relationship with David – there isn’t.  David is gorgeous and impossible and everything Patrick had never known he wanted.  Patrick can’t imagine being more deeply in love than he is with David, and in his heart of hearts, he doesn’t see that ever changing.

But Patrick is, for lack of a better word, curious.  He’s never been a gay man in any environment other than Schitt’s Creek; no one knew he was gay until he became David Rose’s boyfriend.  (His parents still don’t know, but he pushes that thought away – it’s a problem for another day).

He finds himself poking around online, looking at LGBTQ+ community center websites.  There’s one not too far away with a wide range of programming, including groups that center around identity, advocacy, mental health, and the arts.  There’s even a book club.  Patrick tries to imagine showing up to a meeting with a dozen other queer people.  He’s not sure how it would feel.

A few more searches bring him to an online chat group.  He meanders about for a while, reading threads on coming out, and religion, and the challenges of being gay in a small town.  He finds one that seems friendly, and without letting himself think too hard about it, he posts.

I haven’t been out for long, even to myself.  I’m pretty happy hanging out with my boyfriend and his   - he rapidly backspaces, deleting “his” and changing it to “our” - our most likely straight friends, but should I be making an effort to meet more queer people?

Patrick forces himself to tab away from the chat group and spend some time entering data on vendors into a spreadsheet.  It’s easy work, though, and not nearly distracting enough.  He doesn’t know why he thinks random people who have nothing better to do than screw around online are going to have anything valuable to say, but he’s still dying to know if he’ll get any responses.  

Finally five o-clock rolls around, and he joins David out in the store to get ready to close up.  David’s in a good mood, humming and strutting around the display tables with a broom that is serving more as a prop than a cleaning device, and Patrick forgets all about his post.  They pick up a pizza on their way home, and waste time faux arguing about whether they’re going to go to Ray’s house next weekend for game night (they will, in the end, but David needs to get in a good rant first to feel like he’s being heard).

Alexis stops by for a few minutes, and she teases David for a while about a haircut he once got while drunk – in her opinion it was even worse than the one Jocelyn got at the casino.  Patrick thinks Alexis is lonely now that David spends most nights out of the motel.  He doesn’t mind her lingering in their space as if she has a right to be there.  It’s nice, really, feeling like he’s part of David’s family, and he doesn’t like the idea of Alexis feeling alone.

David kicks Alexis out around ten, and they get changed into sleep pants and t-shirts and climb into bed. Patrick grabs his laptop and David smirks at him, finding a magazine and tucking himself close against Patrick’s side.  It’s not weird for them to read for a while before going to sleep, even if it means that they don’t mess around every night.  Patrick tips his head and kisses David’s forehead.  He always felt guilty if he told Rachel he wasn’t in the mood, but it doesn’t work that way with David.  David doesn’t have any doubts about the fact that Patrick finds him sexy.  They’ve played with this often enough, David cranking Patrick up just with a sultry smile and a finger trailing along his skin in just the right place.  But tonight, at least for now, Patrick has other things on his mind.

Bracing himself for disappointment, Patrick goes back to the chat.  There are a number of replies to his post, and he bites his lip as he reads them.  There’s a good smattering of “don’t worry, there’s no way to do it wrong” responses which are nice enough, but he’s already had David’s voice in his head telling him that.  There’s one comment about how he should ask himself why this has occurred to him now, and if someone in the friend group is making him uncomfortable (no one is).  Another tells him to consider whether this is a situation of internalized homophobia or if he feels safer with straight people than gay people (he doesn’t think that’s it).  Another asks him if maybe he’s just not that into group activities, which is off the mark but makes him chuckle.

The response that resonates the most, though, that makes his shoulders relax and his nervous finger tapping subside, is this one:  Do what feels comfortable for you now, and stay open to other possibilities.  There’s no rule that you have to pick one way to be queer and stay that way forever.  Maybe next year you’ll decide to express your sexuality in different ways, or feel the need to meet more people.  If you are fortunate enough to have a few good friends, and someone who loves you, you’re doing just fine.

Patrick breathes deeply, thinking this through. It feels right. David stirs next to him.  

“Ready to go to sleep, or is there still a spreadsheet that needs your attention?”

Patrick hesitates for a moment, and then turns his laptop towards David, who props himself up on an elbow to read the screen.

“I was considering an LGBTQ book club,” Patrick says, as lightly as he can.  “Or maybe a bowling league.”  

“Ugh, please.  I know you’re just saying that to torment me.  Who came up with an activity that requires you to wear unsanitary shoes?”

“I think they’re cute.”

“You do not.”  David scrolls up to see Patrick’s original post, his eyes flickering over to Patrick’s face and back to the screen.  “I was in a queer book club for a while.  Mostly because Adrien’s caterer had a Cordon Blu trained pastry chef on staff.  Those chouquettes…” David lets out a little groan of appreciation.

“Did you like it?  The book club, I mean, I know you liked the pastry.”

David slings his arms around Patrick’s neck and looks at him steadily.  “Patrick, I ran art galleries in New York City.   I lived in Chelsea.  I didn’t need a book club to find my people.”

Patrick feels silly for a minute, remembering again how very different David’s life has been from his.

“But it was fun, on occasion.  When does it meet?”

“I don’t know, I didn’t get that far.  I wasn’t seriously considering it.”  Patrick pulls away from David, needing just a little less eye contact.  He slides down on the bed, and David follows, tucking his head on Patrick’s shoulder.

“Well, let me know if you change your mind.  I’ve exhausted all the reading material at the motel.  I wouldn’t want to risk our relationship by taking any more of those quizzes.”

Patrick’s brain trips over this for a minute.  “You’d want to come with me?”

David turns to him, and it’s clear that he understands that this conversation is more than just Patrick trying to decide what to do with his Sunday nights.  “I’d like to.  There’s a definite dearth of non-straights in Schitt’s Creek.  But not if it’s something you wanted to do for yourself.  That would also be fine.”  

It dawns on Patrick that maybe David could use more gay friends too, or pan, or just friends in general that aren’t his sister or Stevie.  And he imagines going to a queer group with David at his side, David’s arm in a fuzzy sweater wrapped around his own, David’s chin tucked over his shoulder.  He likes the idea.

Patrick turns and kisses David, his mouth lingering on his lips.  “I think that’d be good,” he says against David’s cheek.  “If we both went.”

David hums his agreement and kisses Patrick back, heating it up, his hands roaming around Patrick’s body in the way that never fails to turn him on.  Things fall away from Patrick for a while after that, as they strip off their clothes and press close, David’s naked body grinding hot against his under the sheets.

“I wondered about it too,” David says later, after they’ve caught their breath and nestled back together, sweat cooling on their skin.  “How Ken knew right away.”

“Yeah?”

“Mmm.  I thought maybe he saw the way I looked at you.”

Patrick can’t believe there’s enough energy left in his body to blush, but he knows he’s doing it.  He rubs his nose in David’s hair.  “Yeah?  How do you look at me?”

David laughs softly, digging his chin into Patrick’s shoulder.  “Alexis says besotted.  And she’s right.”

Patrick holds David tighter and kisses him again.  “The feeling’s mutual, babe.”  It’s love that’s changed him, Patrick thinks, as he drifts off to sleep.  And it’s changed David, too.   It’s shining out of them so brightly, it’s no wonder people can see it.

[heysoup]

Fluffy February Day 2 - Movie Night

Reminder to follow @fluffyfebruary ​ to see the prompt list and that I’ll be using the tags #fluffyfebruary and #fluffyfeb for these.

Continuing the fics with day two! I’m super proud of this one; It’s dripping with fluff and teenage angst. Warning for potential secondhand embarrassment - they’re both idiots in love and have no idea how to show it.

Chapter 2: Films and Fears

Pairing: Butch/Male Lone Wanderer

Summary: Dealing with life in the vault can be tough, especially for an outcast like Jamie. When he befriends Butch through his G.O.A.T. assignment, however, the two make their own safe place. Butch decides to surprise him there one day with the promise of treasure, and it leads to something more than they both expect.

Ao3 Link

Jamie tosses and turns in his rat’s nest of a bed. It’s midnight – he’s too hot, the vault’s ventilation system’s groaning is echoing around him like a damn chorus, and his sheets keep scratching uncomfortably against his clammy skin. He brings his wrist close to his face to mindlessly check his Pip-Boy for the millionth time that night, his arm feeling as heavy as lead, and he squints at the fluorescent light of the screen as he taps it awake.

Though Butch showed him a few times before, it still takes him a moment to remember the right sequence of buttons to push to unlock developer’s mode and navigate to the messaging tab the other boy set up for them. It’s only been about a month since Butch found an old Pip-Boy manual in Stanley’s locker and got this trick to work, but already there’s a considerable backlog of messages between the two.

Jamie scrolls through them with the dial on his Pip-Boy, worrying the skin of his lower lip with his teeth as he reads through some of the older messages. It’s become a new habit for him on these particularly rough sleepless nights. When he’s too exhausted to write in his journal, draw, or jump around his room in an attempt to tire himself out; he talks to Butch.

If someone had told him a year ago that Butch DeLoria, his childhood bully and teenage rival, would be one of his only sources of solace these days he would have called them insane. Turns out, giving the vault’s two delinquents deadbeat jobs with no supervision and shoving them in the same closet of a studio space could make them form a pretty strange alliance. The enemy of my enemy and all of that, right?

It also doesn’t help that Amata is forever busy with her new duties as overseer’s assistant – or whatever her job title is actually called. Jamie misses her like he’s lost a part of himself, and even though he knows she’s not locked away with her father by choice he can’t help the nagging part of his brain that is convinced she abandoned him.

Butch is dealing with the same thing, though with less consequence. His fellow Tunnel Snakes are relatively busy with their new jobs – Wally as a security guard and Paul as an engineer – but they still make some time to see each other. Butch is just one of those people who needs constant attention, which is where Jamie supposes he comes in handy. He tries not to think too hard about it.

He’s is snickering to himself while he reads some messages sent a few weeks back during one of their spats, most of which were petty insults and some pretty creative curses, when a new message blips through and pulls his screen to attention.

913473: nosebleed u up?

Perfect timing, Jamie thinks, sitting up in his bed to type. The 6-digit code is what Butch called his Pip-ID – apparently every Pip-Boy comes with one coded in by default. It was weird at first, trying to memorize the numbers and calm his own paranoia at the thought of someone hacking into their conversations, but Butch said that their numbers were for their Pip-Boys alone, so Jamie trusted him. The horrible, agitated crawling under his skin that was keeping him up all night begins to fade as he replies.

604272: didja even have to ask? 913473: just say yes or no damn 604272: k. no 913473: oh fuck off

Jamie can’t help the soft laugh that escapes him, and he grins like a complete idiot down at the screen.

913473: if ur done being an ass i have somethin for us to do 913473: if u aint busy of course 913473: meet at the place? 604272: sure. be there in 10

He switches his Pip-Boy screen off and hops out of bed, stretching languorously before grabbing his jumpsuit from where he left it earlier that day in a heap on the floor. He tugs it on leg by leg and zips it up before checking himself in the mirror.

His hair is a mop of curls on his head and he does his best to smooth it down, knowing Butch will scold him for not using the correct conditioner to tame his flyaways like he showed him. The bags under his eyes are a bit darker than usual, but there’s nothing to be done about that. He shrugs to himself and turns to the door. No point in being too self-conscious about his appearance this late at night – isn’t like this is a date or anything, he tells himself.

He doesn’t bother being quiet as he leaves his room, knowing his dad would still be working at the clinic or at the very least passed out there on one of the cots. He doesn’t come home much these days.

Jamie shoves his boots on, not even bothering with socks, and peers out of the thick window into the hallway. It seems empty, so he hits the button and creeps out through the door.

The neon blue emergency lights that run along the edges of the ceiling and floor greet him when he steps out of his apartment. He shoves his hands in his pockets, a nervous habit, and peers around the corner before continuing his path. The door closes not-so-softly behind him and he walks down the hall past the restrooms that separate his and Butch’s apartments. He stops momentarily outside the door to the DeLoria’s apartment, noticing it’s dark and quiet inside.

Butch must already be down there, Jamie thinks, picking up his pace as much as he could without making too much noise. Despite the constant creaking and rumbling of the vault’s ventilation and reactor systems the halls at night could carry quite an echo, and his boots aren’t the quietest things to sneak around in.

Patrols were lax recently but knowing his luck he’d get caught breaking curfew and would have to clean the bathrooms again. He briefly regrets not wearing socks because he refuses to take his boots off and walk barefoot on the cold steel floor, even if it is quieter.

Further down the hallway and a bit past the occupied wing of apartments, Jamie stops at the top of a short set of stairs that lead down to a small corridor with one door. A large INACCESSIBLE sign glows ominously above it, and in the corner of the hallway facing the stairwell is a single security camera. It rotates at a snail’s pace, its gears clicking audibly with every circuit it makes of the dead-end hallway.

Jamie ducks down near the wall at the top of the stairs, watching the camera as he has so many times before to study its crawling path. When Butch had discovered this place, they figured out a way to tilt the camera up ever so slightly with the handle of a broom from their shop – creating about thirty seconds of a blind spot to get them from the stairs and through the door without getting caught if they hugged the left wall.

Peering down the hallways around him one more time to make sure no patrols were coming; Jamie types a quick message into his Pip-Boy.

604272: here

He waits a few moments until he hears a couple sharp raps on the metal door down the way, telling him that Butch is there whenever he’s ready. Jamie waits a few more moments and listens to the camera click back into its blind spot before he hops down the stairs, staying low and to the left as he stalks toward the door. He hits it lightly with his palm when he gets there, and it slides open. He has just enough time to duck inside, slamming his fist on the button to shut it just as he hears the security camera restart its rotation.

“You’re still gonna act like it's some big heist no matter how many times we come down here, huh?” Jamie turns around in the darkness and is met with Butch’s grin, a bottle of beer already in one of his fists. His Pip-Boy light is on, basking them in a dim green glow.

“Keeps it interesting,” he replies, punching Butch playfully on the arm. On this side of the door is a long flight of stairs and they continue further down into the pitch darkness, hands pressing along the walls for purchase with nothing but about three feet of lighting in front of them.

The emergency lights are shut off down here, along with the security cameras – probably to save power, so Jamie turns his Pip-Boy light on as well. It’s a bit brighter, but not by much. They’ve been down here enough times by now that their bodies remember how many steps there are, but Jamie always has a nagging fear in the back of his mind that one day the staircase will just keep going forever. He shakes that thought from his head, listening to the sound of their boots stomping down the steps and focusing his gaze on Butch’s free hand as it slides against the railing.

For the past month or so this has been their escape. Butch somehow figured out how to break into the door they just passed through, and they discovered a whole wing of abandoned apartments under the ones they were currently living in. So far all they had done was clear out one room that had a ratty old couch, some blankets, a broken Nuka Cola mini-fridge, and a few wooden storage crates in it. Jamie had also rigged up a small emergency generator and they were able to find some lamps to make it a little less depressing.

Most importantly, they had booze smuggled from Butch’s mom’s liquor stash, a few cartons of cigarettes they’d traded with Stevie for some chems Jamie snuck from his dad’s clinic, their collection of comic books, and Jamie’s old BB gun for when they got bored. It’s far from perfect, but it’s space, and when you’re destined to roam the same hallways with the same people for the rest of your miserable existence – that amounts to a lot.

“So, what are we actually doing?” Jamie asks as they turn into the apartment they’d claimed as their base. Butch has the generator running and the room smells thickly of his peach pomade and cigarette smoke – he must have been down here for a few hours already.

“I,” Butch begins, stopping to pull the cork out of his new bottle of beer with his teeth before spitting it on the floor and taking a swig, “am gonna show you some treasure.” He finishes with a flourish, a self-satisfied smirk on his face, and plops down onto the couch next to his discarded Tunnel Snake jacket.

Jamie snorts and pulls up a crate, sitting down on the opposite end of the couch and propping his feet up. He clicks his tongue in mock annoyance when Butch’s boots crowd his own on the small surface and, in a fruitless endeavor, they battle for leg space before giving in to sharing. It’s obvious the other boy is already a bit tipsy.

“Treasure, huh? That’s cool, I guess,” Jamie snickers, snatching the bottle of beer from Butch and downing some before he could protest. It burns in his throat and brings a comforting warmth to his chest. He continues nursing the drink and settles further back into the worn corduroy couch, his posture absolutely terrible. Butch reaches for another bottle.

“Yup.” The bottle pops open and another cork joins the pile growing on the floor. Another drink and an obnoxious burp, then Butch sits forward - feet falling to the floor, his hands on his knees, and an excited light in his eyes. His leg is bouncing incessantly.

“Listen, I was going through some rooms down here and I found an old projector – like the one Brotch has?” He glances at Jamie, blue eyes a soft, dreamy color in the low light, and Jamie can’t help but gulp at the intensity he sees there. When Butch has a plan he’s excited about, he turns into a different person – like all the stress of conforming to the monotony of vault life has washed away and he’s finally allowed to be the mischievous and passionate person hiding underneath it all. Or… something like that. Jamie’s waxing poetic again, something he can’t help but do when around Butch.

“That’s pretty cool,” is all Jamie can bring himself to breathe out as he sips on his beer. He picks at the loose threads on the arm of the couch as he tries not to think about the fact that Butch had his lips on this same bottle just a few seconds ago.

Butch deflates a bit. “Pretty cool?” he mocks, leaning closer. Okay, maybe he’s more drunk than Jamie had first thought, if the redness of his cheeks were any indication.

“Nosebleed, I found full on ho-lo-disks,” Butch emphasizes, blowing a few messy curls away from his forehead. Jamie just shrugs.

“Okay?” he begins, not seeing the big deal. They already have these things in the classroom. “What’re we gonna do, watch some lectures? Don’t tell me DeLoria wants to brush up on his studying,” he taunts.

Butch just sneers at him in response, standing up and only swaying a bit – much to Jamie’s surprise. “You have no imagination, dweeb. Stay here!” And with that, he storms out of the room and into the hallway, closing the door behind him.

Jamie can see the green light of his Pip-Boy flash on through the window as he walks further away into the dark.

It’s a few minutes before he comes back, and Jamie can hear the ruckus he’s causing before he sees him. He’s startled out of his comfortable position on the couch and perks up. The door slides open and Butch pushes the projector into their base on its rolling cart. One of the wheels must be rusted because its screeching like a damn rat, scraping against the metal flooring as he drags it to the center of the room. He grabs an old cardboard box from the lower shelf of the cart and slides it on the floor over to Jamie with his foot before going back to set the projector up with their tangled mess of extension cords.

Jamie picks it up and grimaces at the box – it’s a little rank and it feels crusty in some spots. “This thing is probably covered in like a hundred different types of mold,” he complains.

“Didn’t give it to ya so you could judge the box!” Butch snaps, banging the top of the projector impatiently when the power flickers. “Open the damn thing.”

Jamie places the box on the couch beside him and sits up, peeling it open to peer inside. His jaw drops in amazement at the sight – more holodisks than he’s ever seen in his life, all with unique and eye-catching, full-color illustrations on the covers. He stares at Butch in disbelief and catches the other boy staring at him, an unabashed, beaming smile on his face when he sees Jamie’s reaction. When their eyes meet, Butch clears his throat and snaps his attention back to the projector, fiddling with some dials that don’t seem to change anything.

“Cool, right?” He says, his ears turning red as he dismisses his earlier excitement with a sheepish shrug.

“It’s fucking great!” Jamie laughs and begins to rummage through the box. There are real films in here, like he’s only read about in pre-war history classes or his cheesy novels. Aside from a whole slew of superhero films starring characters like The Silver Shroud and even some of Grognak the Barbarian, there are titles that look like they’re about pre-war animals in different parts of the world, some with soldiers in power armor, some ancient recordings of sports, and what looks like a few western and sci-fi films

Butch walks back over and sits beside him, throwing his arm over the back of the couch and leaning in to look at the titles. Jamie’s breath hitches at his closeness and he can feel his cheeks heating up. He tries not to show it, leaning in ever so slightly to let their shoulders brush.

“You can pick first, my treat,” Butch says while gesturing to the patchwork sheet he’d hung up on the opposite wall of the small apartment – Butch must have stitched it together himself out of whatever excess fabric he found. It’s hanging a little crooked and the projector’s STAND BY image is a bit fuzzy, but a bubble of excitement forms in Jamie’s chest regardless. He doesn’t want to read too far into things, but Butch had found this and made it a surprise specifically for them to share. That made him feel a certain kind of way.

He blinks those embarrassing thoughts away and nods, his face warm. Looking over their choices carefully, he finally decides and picks the western – he always did have a fondness for the freedom that seemed to come with being a cowboy – and walks to the projector to pop it in and press play.

He half expects Butch to make fun of his choice, but the other boy is oddly quiet, carefully inspecting his fingernails as Jamie switches off the lamps and kicks off his boots before returning to sit cross-legged on the couch. Butch still hasn’t scooted further away or removed his arm from the back of the couch, so their knees bump and he can feel the warmth of Butch’s arm behind his neck and it sends prickles through his skin.

Only as the movie begins do they realize they don’t have any speakers hooked up – so it’s completely silent in the room other than the whirring of the film in the projector.

“I didn’t even think of that,” Butch sighs and shakes his head in disappointment. Jamie just laughs.

“It’s still cool,” he assures him. “They used to have silent movies all the time apparently – especially back in cowboy days. It’s authentic,” he purses his lips at the end, trying to do his best impression of Mr. Brotch. It seems to work because Butch cracks a grin at him and snorts.

“Sure, it’ll work for now, but I saw some terminals in another apartment down here. We can check for some speakers there later,” Butch says and then his playful grin becomes roguish. “Push comes to shove, we can just swipe one from upstairs. Who’d notice a missing speaker?”

Jamie just scoffs and elbows him, turning his attention back to the film as the title screen fades in and he reads, ‘High Lonesome.’ He didn’t bother to read what the film was about, but it opens with a group of people in a wagon on a vast desert plain with plateaus towering in the distance.

There isn’t too much to see at first, but one thing that sticks with him is the impossible vastness of the sky as the camera zooms out to show a wider view of the prairie they’re riding along. He’s seen pictures of the sky, sure, but something about watching the tiny silhouettes of people move around under it was chilling – it was huge and incredibly empty. He didn’t know if what he was feeling was amazement or terror.

Despite the film being in black and white, the shimmer of the sun on the horses’ flanks as they gallop is bright enough to seem real and Jamie is completely entranced as he watches. And, luckily enough, there seem to be subtitles, so they’ll still be able to understand what’s going on.

Jamie’s trance is momentarily broken when Butch leans down and grabs something from under the couch. He returns with a box of fancy lads which he presses into Jamie’s hands. Jamie mumbles his thanks, his eyes never leaving the picture as he tears into a package and shoves a whole powdery cake into his mouth.

Butch just laughs at him and pulls a pack of cigarettes out of his back pocket. He lights one just as the young cowboy on screen does – much to Jamie’s delight – and they chuckle at the absurdity of it all.

They pass the snacks, beer, and smokes back and forth between each other as they watch their movies. When the western is over, Butch picks a film called ‘Teenage Caveman,’ saying that it has to be good because the cover has tits and a giant lizard monster on it. It ends up being the worst piece of garbage they’ve ever seen – and that’s saying a lot considering they’ve only seen one other film in their whole lives.

“That dude didn’t even look like a teenager! He had to be like thirty,” Jamie says, tossing the film into a box they decide to label ‘shit.’ According to Butch, they were like pioneers and had to record their findings, so not only were they watching the films, but they were sorting them from best to worst. As Butch had put it in his best overseer impression, they were doing future vault residents a great service and fulfilling their civic duty… by saving others from watching total pieces of trash.

“There wasn’t even a single boob,” Butch mopes, snubbing out the last of his cigarette in the cracked coffee mug functioning as their makeshift ashtray. “Talk about false advertising. The giant lizards were kinda cool, though.” Jamie smacks him upside the head.

“You wouldn’t know what a boob looked like if it smacked you in the face.”

“You take that back!” Butch laughs and tosses their snacks on the floor, lunging for Jamie who’s cackling just as hard. They’re fucking hammered at this point and they roll off the couch into a heap on the floor, knocking a crate over as they grapple at each other. They wrestle like this sometimes – it’s a great outlet for Jamie’s aggressive energy and, when they’re less drunk, Butch actually teaches him how to kick ass. Now, they’re just breathless laughs and fumbling hands as they scramble for purchase on the floor and try their damnedest to pin the other down.

Butch may be stronger on a normal day, but at the moment he’s piss-drunk compared to Jamie who still has a bit of his wits about him. He flips the taller boy over so quickly it’s almost comical and pins him, pressing his knees against his thighs and holding his wrists at his sides to stop him from getting up. He laughs triumphantly.

“What’s wrong, Butchie? You’ve never lost a fight so fast!” He grins down at the boy smugly but stops short when he sees the look on Butch’s face. It’s endearing how red his cheeks are, his hair a mess and his blue eyes wide. Butch just fixes him with those piercing baby blues.

“Don’t get cocky, Nosebleed. I let ya do it,” he says in a soft voice, his tongue darting out to wet his lips. Jamie’s mouth goes dry, his eyes fixed on Butch’s unbelievably pink lips. He hates himself for how much he wants to kiss him then and without thinking he begins to lean forward. He catches himself, though, and his thoughts have him jumping off of Butch and falling back against the couch like he’s been shocked, his chest heaving. He feels dizzy and he can still smell the earthy spice of the other boy’s aftershave enveloping him like a thick haze he can’t shake.

Butch laughs and pulls himself up into a sitting position, shooting Jamie a dazzling grin from his seat on the floor. “What’s wrong, Jamie?” Butch teases, his voice only a bit slurred and a shit-eating grin creeping its way onto his face. Hearing his name come from Butch is rare and it knocks the breath out of him. All he can do is stare.

Butch clambers ungracefully back up to the couch with him, leaning awfully close and whispering, “cat got your tongue?” His breath is warm on Jamie’s face and it smells like a mixture of smoke and alcohol, something he never thought would smell so intoxicating, but of course it does – it’s Butch.

Jamie’s heart is in his fucking throat and he can’t breathe. Butch is pressed against his side and his back is against the arm of the couch. There’s nowhere for him to escape to – not that he necessarily wants to, but he was never very good with facing his feelings. Either Butch is actively trying to flirt with him or he’s fucking around, and Jamie can’t decide which one is worse.

“You’re drunk, you idiot,” Jamie laughs weakly and goes to push Butch away by the chest but stops when he feels his heart pounding under his t-shirt. The other boy’s breath hitches and his body stiffens at Jamie’s touch, his lips parting as if he were trying to think of what to say.

“So are you,” Butch finally settles with, reaching up to wrap his fingers around Jamie’s wrist. His touch almost feels like it burns. They sit like that for a moment, staring at each other, eyes like fire.

The generator chooses that moment to shut off, leaving them in pitch darkness. Out of instinct, Jamie curls his fingers into Butch’s shirt, his ears ringing at the sudden silence in the room and his breathing becoming labored. Darkness feels suffocating to him sometimes, and this is one of those moments. It lays over them like a thick blanket, and the only thing that pulls him out of his internal panic is Butch’s free hand cupping the back of his head, fingers twining through the thick, curly hair at the nape of his neck.

He doesn’t even have time to think about what Butch might be doing before he feels the press of the other boy’s lips warm against his own. Though they’re unbelievably soft, the kiss is rushed and clumsy – desperate almost – and Jamie grunts when their teeth knock together. He wastes no time returning the kiss, though, his eyes fluttering shut as he focuses on the feel of Butch’s lips against his own and the rough burn of his stubble as it brushes against his chin.

It must have just been a power surge, because suddenly the generator kicks back on and the projector screen lights up the room. Their eyes fly open and they wrench apart, still holding onto each other as if for dear life. Whatever safety they felt shrouded in the darkness is ripped away and they’re left feeling vulnerable and exposed. Jamie’s breath comes out in stutters and he dares to glance up at the other boy.

Butch’s eyes are filled with a fiery heat he can’t even describe and something akin to tenderness – which is hard for him to pinpoint since he’s never been looked at like that before. He sucks in a sharp breath. For some reason, even though he’s been dreaming of this moment for months, he just feels terrified and embarrassed – like he fucked up somehow. The panic must be written clearly on his face because Butch pulls away like he’s been slapped and falls back to the other end of the couch.

“Sh-shit, I,” Butch stutters, his hand clutching his chest where Jamie’s was a moment before, “fuck, Jamie, I didn’t mean to.” His voice cracks, sounding almost pleading. Jamie doesn’t know what to say, his mouth flapping uselessly, and it’s too much for him to handle. He doesn’t understand what his problem is. Everything in his heart is telling him to leap forward and continue kissing Butch, but he’s just too fucking scared.

“It’s fine!” He practically snaps, standing up suddenly. He’s shaking and feels clammy and he’s sure he’s as pale as a ghost – is it even possible for something good to give you a panic attack?

He glances around for his boots for a moment, but it’s still too much and he can see Butch starting to reach for him with concern in his eyes. “I have to go,” he blurts out, and he turns tail and runs.

The last thing he hears before he leaves is Butch yelling his name, but he jogs up the steps in the darkness, tripping over his own feet and bruising his knees. He knows he’s acting like a child, but he can’t bring himself to care. He is absolutely not ready to face what’s happening and he needs to be alone in his room now.

When he reaches the door, he doesn’t even stop to think about the security camera on the other side, he just slams his fist on the button and rushes out and thankfully luck is on his side this time because he can hear the camera click into the end of its circuit.

He slows down when he reaches the halls, his bare feet making a lot less noise than his boots, but fuck the floor is cold and he regrets not stopping to find his shoes. Soon he reaches his apartment, and he rushes inside, thankful to see that it’s still empty. He locks himself in his own bedroom, suddenly feeling like everything is too much, and he rips his jumpsuit off, flopping onto his bed in just his tank top and boxers and pulling the covers over his head.

He wants to scream, maybe tear his hair out a little or punch the wall. He cannot believe how badly he fucked that up. He doesn’t even know what this means for their friendship – if he had tried to make a move on Butch and the other boy ran away, he would be devastated! Would Butch even want to talk to him anymore? He worries over these thoughts for a few hours until his brain feels like jelly. The last thing he’s aware of before falling asleep is how his lips taste ever-so-slightly like the sweet mint chap stick Butch always carries around.

---

He wakes up later to the sound of incessant beeping coming from his wrist. He groans, rubbing his hands over his eyes and down his face. He feels like complete shit – hungover, most likely, and his head is swimming.

He looks at his Pip-Boy to check the time and realizes he’s overslept. It’s two in the afternoon and he’s late for his work assignment at the studio but if he’s being honest the thought of having to drag himself out of bed and sit in a room with Butch all day doesn’t seem as great as it used to. He can’t help it when he opens the messaging app, biting his lip as he prepares to read whatever might be there.

913473: it was a prank haha i rly got u good

That one was sent almost immediately after he’d left last night, according to the timestamp. Something about it makes his gut twist, gives him a bit of nausea. He’s not sure if he believes Butch or not. Once again, he’s not sure which is harder to deal with. Dated about an hour later there are a few more.

913473: jamie im sorry pls answer me 913473: don’t ignore me man if ur mad just come beat me up 913473: are u sleeping? damn out of all the times 913473: its k. i kno u need it. gnight

Jamie doesn’t realize he’s chewing his lip to shreds until he tastes blood, and he curses, wiping it away on the hem of his tank top. His eyes are glued to the screen, his heart thundering in his ears. Dated even later are a handful of other messages and he can tell by their contents that Butch must have kept drinking in his absence. The thought of that tugs at his heart a little – maybe he isn’t the only one who’s terrified of his own feelings and kind of a fuckup.

913473: i know ur asleeeep 913473: gdamn typing onthis shit. fcking sucks 913473: m drunk but idc. i kissed u jamie n itfucking rocked 913473: wasnt a prank. im srry. dont hate me 913473: u can hit me all u want. ill evenlet u win the fight. 913473: jsut dont hate me

Jamie groans and grabs his pillow, shoving his face into it a few times and letting out as loud of a yell as he dares. It’s not enough, but it will have to do. Breathless and flushed, he’s about to lay back down when a new message comes through and his heart leaps so high into his throat that he nearly chokes. He peeks at it over the pillow.

913473: yo you’re late dude. like super late! 913473: i figured id let u sleep off the hangover a bit but damn 913473: i aint gonna cover ur ass if the overseer comes knocking. i have enough of a headache. 913473: so get down here!!! 913473: speakin of headache i was drunk as shit last night. dont remember a thing past that crappy monster movie. so ignore whatever embarrassing crap i sent you, k? 913473: and dont tell anyone im a talkative drunk or ill pummel you, nosebleed.

Jamie looks at the messages in disbelief and flops back onto his bed, his thoughts racing. He can’t tell if Butch is lying or not – he knows even if Butch doesn’t remember there was still something different about what happened last night but fuck if he’s going to bring it up now.

He’s relieved, but also disappointed, maybe a little angry – either at himself or at Butch, he can’t tell. He’s shaking, wracked with nerves at the sudden sense that everything might change soon. He can’t handle change – can’t handle much, if he’s honest with himself, but change is the hardest of all. He curls his fingers into his hair, tugging ever so slightly and trying to resist the urge to pull it out in chunks. He’s losing himself in his worries again when another message notification shakes him out of it.

“Fuck!” he shouts, wishing he could rip his Pip-Boy off his arm and throw it away.

913473: NOSEBLEED GET THE FUCK TO WORK NOW 913473: its boring alone

Jamie feels like he’s actually going to tear his hair out, but he can’t help himself from laughing. He gives in and types out a quick response.

604272: for the love of GOD 604272: STFU 604272: im on my way now 604272: and i didn’t read ur stupid messages don’t worry. too many for me to care

He bites his lip again, his heart twisting uncomfortably in his chest as he writes out one more message.

604272: i don’t even remember much of the shitty movie lol, u know im a blackout drunk

There are a few minutes without a reply and Jamie starts to think maybe he’s fucked it up again, then more messages come through.

913473: u stupid fuckin idiot 913473: what would i do without u 913473: to pick on i mean

Jamie lets out a trembling sigh and gets out of bed, shaking himself free of his worries and tugging on his jumpsuit again. His hands are quivering, probably will be all day with the way his nerves are, but he can handle it.

It’s only as he’s going to leave does he realize he doesn’t have his shoes.

913473: i have your boots btw dumbass

Jamie is terrified of change. He’s terrified of his own emotions, especially when he can’t control them. He wishes things were simpler and he wishes he could have been born into a more agreeable body in a more agreeable time, but as he walks, shoeless, out of the apartment and to the studio space he shares with Butch, he feels a bit comforted in the fact that Butch might feel exactly the same way. Even if shit is messy and he fucks it up, Butch keeps coming back - and that’s good enough for him.

[trashinaglass-archive]

Worst Travel Day Ever

Y/n and Tom get in a fight while traveling for press tour.

A/n: Idk man, I love it.

     Tom had planned for you to join him on his press tour for Far From Home. You were excited to be able to go after being apart for so long. You had packed your bags and were waiting at the airport along with Harrison. The plan was for the two of you to get on a flight to meet Tom for a connecting flight to finally go to Japan. Your first flight was about five hours. You and Harrison found your seats, Harrison letting you have the window seat. Once you had put your carry-on in the overhead compartment, you sat down and immediately started playing with the screen in front of you, looking at the different movies you could choose from to watch.

     “Oh come on,” Harrison muttered. You looked at him then followed his eyes to his screen.

     “What’s wrong with you?” You asked him.

     “The bloody thing isn’t working. Every film I try to play says ‘not available.’” You watched as he went down the list of films touching every single one to see a warning pop up each time.

     “Sucks to suck,” you laughed at him. He turned toward you sharply.

     “You’re gonna have to share your screen with me then,” he said looking at you completely serious.

     “Boy, who do you think you are?” You asked him. The screens were super small and only took one headset for sound.

     “I think I’m the guy who gave you the seat with the working tv,” Harrison said back. You looked at him unamused. It was true. Harrison’s ticket was for the seat you were in, and he let you take it because you wanted to be by the window. You should’ve been the one with the messed up tv. You also know Harrison would share his screen with you.

      “You’re the worst sometimes, you know that?” You said looking at him. He laughed and agreed with you. “What do you want to watch?” You asked him while scrolling through the list. You two decided on watching Pirates of the Caribbean movies. You had scooted over with your back to the wall of the plane while Harrison scooted a little closer so he could see the screen easier; you each had one earbud in your ear.

     Harrison eventually fell asleep, his head leaned back against the seat. You looked at him and took the earbuds out of his ear and stuck your tongue out at him. You put it in your ear and finished watching your movie.

     You finally landed and made your way to find your next gate. You were so excited to see Tom. You were almost skipping through the airport, you couldn’t wait to hug him and talk to him and to look at his face. You began to approach your gate and saw him standing up, looking at his phone with his back toward you. You ran and hugged him from behind making him jump with shock.

     “Hey, babe,” he said to you. You immediately knew something was wrong as soon as you heard his voice. He looked at you as you walked around him to face him.

     “What’s wrong?” You asked him. He sighed and shook his head.

     “Nothing, I’m just exhausted, stressed,” he explained to you. You could see it in his face, he wasn’t his normal happy self. It made you feel bad; he was able to do what he loved, but it wasn’t always easy.

     “Well, you have the next six hours to get a good shut eye,” you told him. He nodded his head, silently hoping you were right. He felt bad that he was so down; he wanted to be happy to see you like you were to see him, but he couldn’t bring his energy up no matter what he tried.

     You boarded the second plane with your seat next to his, Harrison across from you. Tom immediately put his headphones on and closed his eyes. You watched him, silently wishing he could just pretend to be happy to see you. You understood what his job entails, but you couldn’t help but feel selfish from time to time. You grabbed your own headphones and plugged them into the screen in front of you. You saw two of the recommended movies were Infinity War and Homecoming. You thought to yourself, if he doesn’t feel up to talking right now, maybe watching one of his films will make up for it.

     You were about halfway into Homecoming when you started to feel extremely uncomfortable. After being on a plane for five hours and being on another one for six hours, you were struggling. You kept adjusting, trying to find a spot that you were comfortable in.

     “Stop moving,” Tom muttered. You immediately stopped and looked toward him. His eyes were still closed, and he hadn’t moved an inch. You slowly tried to sit back, dealing with the soreness you knew was coming. You pulled the lever on the side of the seat, leaning it back more. You sat there and watched the rest of the movie before the flight attendant came around asking if you wanted anything to drink. You asked for a water for you and Tom, in case he needed some. She handed you the waters and two bags of pretzels, and you placed all of it on the tray in front of you.

     About an hour later, Homecoming was over, and you really had to pee. You looked at Tom. He was still asleep, and you didn’t know whether you should wake him or try to climb over him. He wasn’t the deepest sleeper, and you could almost guarantee he’d wake up either way. You tapped his arm lightly.

     “What?” He asked you, again without opening his eyes.

     “I have to pee,” you told him softly. He sighed before finally opening his eyes and moving so you could get out. You made your way to the back and used the restroom before heading back to your seat. You saw Tom looking through the films on his screen waiting for you to get back.

     “Sorry,” You said to him, scooting back to your seat. He didn’t bother to look at you or say anything- he started a movie and slouched back into his seat. You put your headphones back in and started to watch Infinity War.

     After what seemed like a three day flight, you finally landed in Japan. Tokyo, to be exact. You were starting to feel excited. You had never been to Japan before, and you had a list of things you were hoping to see and do. Tom stood up from his seat and grabbed both of your carryons. You headed off the plane and toward the baggage claim. No one had really said anything, you assuming because the boys were both so tired. You began to talk about how excited you were. Not only were you joining Tom, but you were also in a new country.

     “I was reading about the different stuff they have here, and it’s all so cool. Like the Robot Restaurant and the different animal cafes?” You started to tell the boys as you walked. You were sick of the quiet- you almost couldn’t stop the words from falling out of your mouth. “Oh, and my friend came here one time and was telling me about this park she visited. It sounded so cute and the pictures were gorgeous,” you weren’t able to get anymore out before Tom turned to look at you.

     “Could you fucking stop already?” He yelled at you. You stopped in your tracks and looked at him. You were taken aback by his reaction. “I didn’t get to sleep at all that entire plane ride cause you couldn’t leave me alone and now you won’t stop talking. Can you just shut up and leave me alone for five fucking minutes,” he finished, walking away from you.

     You stood there in pure shock. You looked at Harrison wondering what you did to receive such a reaction. That’s when you noticed- everyone in the airport was staring at you. Your heart sank to your stomach, and you felt tears well in your eyes.

     “Come on, don’t worry about it,” Harrison told you as he ushered you to follow Tom. You had made it to the baggage claim and saw Tom standing there. The conveyor belt just began to spin as you walked up. You stood on the opposite side of Harrison away from Tom. You watched as Tom reached out and grabbed his luggage followed by yours. He waited for Harrison to grab his, and the three of you walked out of the airport. You hailed a cab to the hotel and checked in. You and Tom would be sharing a room while Harrison had a seperate one connected onto yours.

     While you were waiting for the two boys to check in you scrolled through your Twitter to pass the time. You stopped on a tweet that stuck out to you.

“Damn, y/n must have really fucked up😂”

     You looked at the tweet in confusion. What the hell is that suppose to mean? You went to the search tab and looked up your name. Your jaw clenched as you saw what they were talking about. Someone had filmed Tom yelling at you in the airport and posted it online. You started to read the comments as you realized the boys were done and headed for the elevator. You read the tweets as you walked.

“Girl, what did you do?!”

“I wish there was audio, this is hilarious”

“I love seeing Tom yell at Y/n. She probably deserved it”

“I knew she was a fake bitch the first time I saw her”

     You felt tears start again as the elevator reached your floor. You shook your head and followed the boys, silently. Tom stopped in front of the room and opened the door, holding it open for you. Harrison noticed your hesitation to follow him.

     “I had to ask y/n about something, give us a second?” He asked Tom. He rolled his eyes and said ‘whatever’, closing the door.

     Harrison opened the door to his room, and you immediately sat down on the chair at the desk.

     “Is it about the airport?” He asked you noticing the tears you were holding back. You shook your head and showed him the video on Twitter.

     “Oh, my gosh,” Harrison said shocked. It was your turn to be angry at Tom. It wasn’t his fault that he snapped, he’s exhausted and couldn’t help it, you understand that. It wasn’t even his fault that it was filmed. But it was his fault that he couldn’t wait until you were in private to yell at you. He knows how popular he is, he knows people watch his every move, he knows people are bound to film him. He should have known to hold his anger until you two were in your hotel room with no one watching.

     “Y/n, you should talk to him about this.”

     “I don’t want anything to do with him right now,” you told Harrison, your voice cracking with the tears in your throat.

     “I understand exactly where you’re coming from, but you can’t just let this simmer,” Harrison told you. You shook your head, you didn’t want to talk to him. With the state he’s in now, he’d probably chew your head off for crying in front of him. “Do you even want to stay with him tonight?”

     “No,” you said without hesitation. “I don’t want to be around him.”

     “Right,” Harrison said. He hated that two of his best mates were fighting. He didn’t want to be part of it, but he also didn’t want to leave it alone. “I’ll stay with him.” He grabbed his bags and knocked on the door that joined the two rooms. Tom unlocked his side and the door opened. “Hey, mate,” Harrison said with a smile as he walked in and closed the door.

     “What are you doing?” Tom asked him confused, seeing his bags in hand.

     “I’m staying with you tonight,” Harrison told him.

     “She’s really that pissed that I yelled at her?” Tom said with a slight sneer. You’ve been in arguments before, but no matter how bad they got, you always made up before you went to bed.

     Harrison shrugged, “her feelings were hurt when you yelled at her. She’s pissed off because someone filmed you yelling at her and posted it online for everyone to see and mock her for. She’s the laughing stock of the night, no thanks to you.” Harrison pulled his phone out and pulled up Twitter.

     “What?” Tom asked. He couldn’t believe what Harrison was saying. Harrison handed him the phone, and he watched the video. It showed him while he yelled at you, you shrinking back from him- the camera following him as he walked away. It swung back to show you looking at Harrison and wiping a tear as you walked away, head down. There wasn’t any audio, the person must’ve been covering the mic with her finger, but actions speaks louder than words. There was no mistaking the anger in Tom’s face and body language nor the sadness in yours.

     “I didn’t realize someone was filming,” Tom tried to explain himself feeling defeated.

     “I’m not the one that needs an apology, mate,” Harrison said gesturing toward the door. Tom looked toward it then back at Harrison.

     “Do you think she’ll talk to me?”

     “I think if you’re nice to her, she’ll at least listen to you.”

     Tom was dreading walking into that room with you. He didn’t deserve your time or forgiveness. He took a deep breathe and walked toward the door. You hadn’t locked it so it opened with no struggle. He poked his head in and saw you laying on the bed. You were on your stomach with your head laying against your arm, the other hand holding your phone.

     “Hey, darling,” he said softly. You turned to look at him for a second before looking back at your phone. He took your lack of ‘get out’ as permission to come in. He walked into the room closing the door behind him. He walked over to the desk and rolled the chair over towards you and sat down. “Harrison showed me the video,” he told you. You had put your phone down and gave him your attention. You didn’t look at him, but he was okay with that.

     “I’m sorry for yelling at you like I did. It was unnecessary, and I shouldn’t have lost my temper like that. Especially towards you. You weren’t doing anything wrong. You were just excited, and I took that away from you. I’m sorry,” Tom apologized.

     You lifted your head, wiping the remaining tears. “I don’t care that you yelled at me, I’m upset that you couldn’t wait until we were out of the airport to do it,” you finally looked at him. You saw that he was upset with himself and was genuinely sorry. “Tom, you know that people watch you. You know what people say about me for no reason, and you literally handed them a reason. You just added fuel to a fire that was already massive.”

     “I know,” he said softly. “I wish I could take it back. I wish I could rewind time and redo it, but I can’t. I will do everything I can to make this right to you.” He looked at the closest clock to check the time. It was 8:32. “Will you let me take you to dinner at least?” He asked you hopefully. You laughed lightly.

     “I don’t think anyone wants to look at me right now,” you said thinking about the video and how red your face must be from crying.

     “I do,” Tom told you. “And I like to think my opinion is more important that others.” You looked at him while a small smile.

     “What about Harrison?”

     “Fuck Harrison, he can eat crackers from downstairs for all I care,” he replied making you laugh for real this time. He smiled hearing your laugh, and you heard Harrison yell ‘hey’ thought the door. “So, will you join me for dinner?” He asked with his hand out to you. You smiled at the cute gesture. You grabbed his hand as you sat up.

     “I will. But I want to change first,” you said looking at your sweats you’d been wearing all day. You quickly grabbed your suitcase and changed into a pair of jeans and threw your hair into a ponytail. You grabbed your phone and followed Tom into the other room as he grabbed his phone and wallet, double checking that he had his room key.

     “We’re going to grab some dinner, do you want to go with us?” Tom invited Harrison, silently hoping he’d say no. He loved his mate, but he wanted to have this time to be with you by himself, especially since you were so upset with him before.

     “Nah, I’ll stay in and grab some room service. You guys have fun though,” he replied much to Tom’s delight.

     “We will, see you bro,” he told Harrison as you exited the room. You turned your head and waved at him. He shot you a thumbs up in return.

     You walked into the elevator, and Tom looked at you. “So you were saying your friend visited here before? What did she recommend?”

I loved this so much. Not even going to hide it.

[razorblade180]

Lasting Embers pt19: Spawn of lightning

[Jaune’s House, it’s storming outside]

*Bzzzz Bzzzz!*

Yujin:*groaning in bed* Ugh five more minutes...

*Scroll begins to ring constantly, the sound of gong playing repeatedly*

Yujin:I know that ringtone.... *raises her to look outside* Well looks like no outside training today; it’s already pass ten?

*Bong!!!!! Bong!!!!!!*

Yujin:*grabbing her scroll* Tenzen I know you’re probably bored but don’t just blow up my-.......

............

Yujin:*springs out of bed and rushes down stairs* Mom!!!!! Dad!!!!!! Auntie Ruby!!!!!!!!!

*Ruby and Yang watching the rain as lightning dances across the sky*

Ruby:Wow, this looks like it’ll be going on for awhile. I sort of miss storms like this.

Yang:.......

Ruby:Yang?

Yang:Huh? Sorry I zoned out.

Ruby:You okay? Humidity getting to you?

Yang:It’s not that. This storm is bothering me though; I don’t like the feel of-......Ruby *points to the distance.*

Jaune:*swings open the door with Yujin* Guys we have trouble! It’s- *gasp*

*pink lightning shooting off in the distance. Followed by a single orange one further away*

Jaune:Nora........

Yujin:(Tenzen....)

Yang:Tsk, *running to the car* Everyone in! If I floor we can make it to an airship and get there in-

Ruby:No way that’s fast enough on its own. Jaune, amp me up....... I’ll meet you there. *grabs scythe*

[Emerald Forest]

*every sound washed out by the noise of explosions and down pour. Nora running and sliding through the now muddy landscape; cuts all over her as blood runs down her face. Messing with her vision in her left eye*

Nora:*huff* (Come on Nora...just keep moving!) *spins around firing a volley of grenades before turning back around and sprinting*

*cult members dodging left and right as grimm take the hits*

Member:Agh! Master Jericho! She’s pushing us back!

Jericho:Resilient aren’t you? No wonder she survived the last encounter. *a group of Ursa tanks the oncoming barrage and keeps charging* resilience runs out however; keep advancing Catalyst Mercy!

Nora:(Almost our of ammo, was Tenzen just late or......focus Nora. They would’ve used him to bait me) *slides behind a tree* (How did they even find us? We’ve been so careful....)

Jericho:You know you’re only making this longer than it has to be? We killed your little guardians or whatever they’re called so nobody is keeping tabs on you. Can you just make this easy on me?

Nora: *tensing her body to remain still* (They got Mercury and Emerald...?)

*beowulves sniffing along the ground*

Jericho:(Stupid rain....) I hear this isn’t your first encounter with us? I’ve only been here a couple years but you’re quite the name in our little organization. Took down our brothers and sisters over a decade ago after we jumped you and your pathetic husband.

Nora:*gritting her teeth*......

Jericho:Say, where is that guy now? Writhing in pain somewhere? I hear we put quite a beating on him like nobody’s business. Arms, back, ribs, femur; I’d love to meet a guy like that and see how the bones heal after that kind of punishment. Tell me something.....

Nora:........

*thunder crackles across the sky*

Jericho:Do you think your son can take that type of punishment?

Nora: *jumps out and blows the beowulves apart before running at him* TOUCH MY FAMILY AND SEE WHAT HAPPENS!!!!

Jericho:So angry..... *jumps back as his men run forward*

*body crackles with pink lightning as she slams her hammer down and electrifies the soaked ground; shocking the enemies*

Nora:Get back here! *clearing anything and everything in front of her with a few swings. Eyes blurry and body trembling she proceeded to right hook an Ursa Major; sending it right at the master*

Jericho:To be this strong without an ounce of aura left is incredible. However..... *points up*

*giant Nevermore feathers pierce into the ground and pins Nora’s arms between them. A long the end of one feather stabbing right through her foot*

Nora:Agh! Ugh...! *struggling* You think....I won’t get out of this!?

*several cult members lining up next to their master as their guns find a killing shot to take. The grimm slowly loom behind Nora ready to maul her has the Nevermore circles above*

Jericho:Somehow I’m not too worried if you do. *walking up to her*It took awhile but we finally have the Lightning Empress herself near minutes away from being nothing but a story to tell; on a stormy day no less. It’s kinda sad, but you’re too dangerous to be left alive. *rubs his hand across her face*

Nora:*trembling at his touch, attempts to bite him but too slow* Hands off!

Jericho:Your eyes still show no fear. Are you not afraid of death? Knowing that after this moment your family too will end?

Nora:........*eyes widen as fast as they do tear up as she continues to struggle in vain* Leave them out of this!!!! Ren can’t..... he can’t even fight anymore. My son is young and has nothing to do with this. *wheepin* JUST KILL ME DAMNIT! Don’t.....don’t touch my family...

*tears, blood, and rain all mix together as her body finally goes limp in defeat; too tired to scream anymore*

Jericho:Now those are the eyes I wanted to see. Looks like even people like you can break with enough pressure. If it was up to me you might’ve won me over; it’s not my call though. My orders were very specific. Seeing how the bird caught you it’s only fair it gets to eat-

Mercy:Get down! *tackles him as the Nevermore crashes down on the grimm; killings the majority or them and the Nevermore itself*

Jericho:Agh! What the hell happened!?

Mercy:I...I don’t know. One minute I was controlling it find then it crashed. Was it struck by lightning?

“Something like that....”

*orange and pink aura flow down the feathers trapping Nora. It wraps around her and hugs her almost like water*

Nora:*Looking up* T...Tenzen?

*Tenzen sits perched up on quills while holding another one in his right hand. His aura overflowing out him turning his eyes orange and pupils almost reptilian like. Natural orange hair with pink strip now inverted as his body crackles with a bit of lightning matching his aura*

Tenzen:.......

Nora:Tenzen you have to go. These people are no joke; they-

Tenzen:Hurt you and dad back then right; causing everyone so much trouble and grief? *his voice calm, devoid of energy yet filled with confidence and clarity* You don’t think I could just leave you like this could you? Don’t worry mom, I got this.

Jericho:*standing up* I gotta say I didn’t expect to see the runt here. So you’re their k- *Tenzen’s finger right on his chest* (when did he-)

Tenzen:Get lost...*collapses his hand into a fist; caving in Jericho’s chest a bit and sending flying back into a tree*

Mercy:Jericho!!!! Everyone attack!

*A massive gust of wind sends them flying back as Tenzen swings the giant feather like a fan. Only to promptly ram into member to swipe a gun. Shooting two more and leg sweeping another one before stunning then all with his aura shocking the ground*

Jericho:*coughing* You little punk. I’m gonna-

Tenzen:*lifts Nora bridal style* You’ll have to catch me first..... *dashing past them in an instant*

Jericho:Catch them both and bring them back here now before they get.....get.....*starts seeing triple of everything fading in and out constantly*

Mercy:Sir....*looking around* You’re seeing this too right? I think we all are; I can’t tell what’s what!

Jericho:*grits his teeth has he holds his chest* That stupid guardian of theirs is alive.

*green bullets fly out from the forest in random locations until they suddenly stop*

Jericho:Show yourself!

Emerald:Come and find me if you can. I’m gonna enjoy cutting you all down for hurting my partner.

Jericho:Mercy, we need her dead if want a chance of finding them.

Mercy:Don’t you think I know that? Everybody with me, *sending grimm in every direction* we’re going hunting....

Nora:*holding on tightly* Look how strong you’ve gotten.

Tenzen:I’m sorry for being late. I....I should’ve been here from the start. *looking at her wounds*

Nora:*rests her head and takes a breath* It’s alright, you were just in time.

*Tenzen trails off in between some bushes were Mercury sits up against a tree. He sits Nora right next to him*

Nora:You’re alive!

Mercury:I better be; everything hurts to much to be dead. I called for help like you asked. *tossing him back his scroll* It took a minute but she finally picked up like you said.

Tenzen:That’s good; all that’s left is to buy time. I’m going back for Emerald now before it’s too late. *aura slightly dimming*

Nora:Be careful, are you sure you can hold out. You’re burning through a lot of aura.

Tenzen:All the more to get this done fast. Sigh, should eaten breakfast or something. *blasts of once again into a blur of sparks and aura*

Mercury:You have a smart kid. *pulling at his own scroll* I’d say this plan is insane if everyone involved wasn’t crazy themselves. Now we wait.

Nora:Wait for-

*a massive blast of wind blows by them almost pushing them. The raindrops fly everywhere as a storm of rose petals blankets the area *

Ruby:Where...*huff* are they? *huff*

Mercury:*tosses his scroll to her* Follow the orange dot.

Ruby:It’s moving pretty fast.

Mercury:Afraid you can’t keep up?

Ruby:Hmph, I’ll catch up. *looks at Nora’s condition* I’ll definitely catch up. I brought a gift for the both of you.

*Raven’s portal opens up with her and everyone else coming out of it in the car*

Jaune:Hey strangers need a hand? *hands glowing*

Mercury and Nora:Yes!

Tenzen:*his hair eyes constantly switching back and forth between its regular color and inverted* Come on Tenzen you can do this. Just keep pushing a little more...... it’s almost a over. I just need to make it to the cliff wall.

Emerald:*approaching the wall, physically exhausted and injuries everywhere. A distinct bruises around her neck* God this better work. I bought you all the time I could.

*she extends one of her sickles and flings into into the wall. Yanking on it to make sure it’s secure*

Emerald:All or nothing now....

“Isn’t it a bit too wet to be rock climbing?”

Emerald:*immediately flings the other chain outwards as she turns around. Missing all the cult members and grimm that now surround her while the chain’s end lands somewhere*

Jericho:*shaking his head* For a guardian you kinda suck.

Emerald:We’re called Sinister Shadows you jackass. You think you’d know that by now. If you’re gonna try and kill someone then make sure they actually die.

Mercy:I’ll be sure to remember that next time I hang you and your partner.

Emerald:There’s not gonna be a next time. Should’ve caught that chain....

Tenzen:*runs by and yanks it. Emerald punching Mercy while being propelled back into the forest and into his arms* Hold on tight. *picks her up and heads straight back to the wall*

Emerald:Oh this is so insane.... *grabs the chain in the wall as Tenzen starts on the side of it. Steadily curving upwards like a pendulum*

Tenzen:Almost there! Just a little more- *semblance fizzles out and slips on a rock* .......

Jericho:Looks like someone is all out of steam!

Emerald:*heart drops*

Tenzen:I’m gonna throw you......

Emerald:You’ll wha-aaaah! *launched the rest of the way up the cliff to safety as he falls back down to the ground hard* Tenzen!!!!!

Tenzen:*aura broken on impact* Ugh, that....really hurt......

Jericho:*standing over him* That fall is the least of your worries.

Tenzen:Hehehe I guess you’re made about the bunch? Good..... *kicked and stomped on repeatedly*

Jericho:Do you have any idea how long it took to orchestrate this plan? *stomps on his ribs* how perfect every thing was going!? *kicks is face* Then you came along and ruined it. *grabs him by the neck*

Tenzen:...... *spits blood on his face* Guess you... didn’t plan well enough.....*slammed into the wall*

Jericho:You know your mommy was supposed to be the one die first but I guess you get the honor. Mercy, hand me your gun.

.............

Jericho:*turning around* MERCY I SAID-........ *drops Tenzen on the ground*

*Ruby standing in the middle of every cult member one the ground savagely beaten. Most of them near death or wishing for death; every grimm turned to stone as her eyes shine*

Ruby:*holiding Mercy by the collar before dropping her limp body on the ground* Did you have a plan for dealing with me? You must’ve if you didn’t think I wouldn’t find out about this.

Jericho:*starts trembling* Re...retreat immediately; no one survives The Red Reaper alone.

Tenzen:*vision fading* You made it.....thank goodness. *passes out*

Ruby:......*walks pass Jericho and picks him up* Not half bad kiddo; not bad at all. *walks away*

Jericho:You....you are letting me go?

Ruby:I personally have more important things to do then hurt you. Her on the the other hand... *steps aside*

Nora:*standing quietly as she’s soaked in the rain. Her hammer gripped with both hands and aura shining brighter than ever*

Jericho:*face goes pale*

Ruby:You have her full undivided attention. Nora, we need this one alive. *dashes up the cliff to grab Emerald then leaves*

Nora:You heard her you’re not gonna die. *lightning strikes getting stronger* You’re just gonna really wish you were.

Jericho:*back pressed against the wall* What....what are you going to do to me?

Nora:You’re interested in beatings right? Let’s see how durable your legs are.....

[kaoru-takaida]

Lost In Translation Fanfiction

DISCLAIMER: I do not own any of the characters mentioned or portrayed in this fanfiction. (Except for “E”.) Please support Jjolee and their amazing works including the Lost In Translation Webtoon on the Webtoon app and follow them on their social media. Thank you.

Chapter One: The Wyld Incident...

Jaewon yawns and opens his eyes, rolling over in his bed. It’s been a week and the anonymous texter hasn’t responded to his “Who are you?” text he sent after the short picture message that was sent to him. He looks at his cellphone and sighs, not seeing the unknown number in any of his recent texts. Jaewon sits up, standing straight. He raises his hands yawning again and stretching. As he does, there’s a ding from his cellphone, as if on cue. Jaewon chokes, stopping mid-stretch. He quickly slides over to the side of his bed and eagerly opens the new text message. Low and behold, it was from the same number. “I’m sorry I didn’t respond right away. You must have been anxious.” Jaewon cocks an eyebrow. They were worried about him? They weren’t some stalker, were they? “I’m sure you want an answer, but I can’t tell you who I am or how I know everything I do.”

Jaewon scowls. “Why?” He texts back. “How did you get that photo? And why tell me you have it?”

Elsewhere, a mysterious hooded person frowns. They look up at their computer. They begin typing. “As to how I got the photo. I can’t tell you.” Jaewon tsks seeing this. When his phone dings again he glances down and his jaw drops. “But I’m telling you because I want to help you. Like you helped me.” Jaewon’s eyes lit up… He helped this person at one point? He rubs his head, tussling his deep red hair, puzzled at who this could be. “I promise to try my hardest to help you out of this without making Mayhem suffer.” Jaewon gasps. He stares at the message in awe. An admiration crept in him over that message. That was all he cared about in this. The reason he was worried about this person knowing the truth. He purses his eyebrows.

“What’s your name?” He texts them.

The person messaging back inhales sharply. It was so tempting to tell Jaewon everything. Why they were doing this. What their name is. What Jaewon means to them. They exhale a long breath and begin typing. "Call me E."

Jaewon cocks an eyebrow at the letter name. "'E'🤨??" He texts back. "But I need more than a letter…" He says aloud. He doesn't type it and instead, texts something back. "What's your favorite animal?"

E stands straight and stares at the monitor. "Huuuuuh?!" "My favorite animal? Why?"

"Just tell me."

They tsk before typing in their answer. "Don't laugh. My favorite animal is a mouse." Jaewon smiles before laughing a little.

"Mouse, huh?" He says to himself. He texts back. "Mice are cool.😎"

"You laughed, didn't you?😑"

"Yeah. A little,😁 lol." He then clicks on the cellphone number. He taps "save as contact" and he saves the contact as "E🐭". He screenshots it and sends it to E. He doesn't know why, but he felt he could really trust them. Although he desperately wonders why they're bothering to even help him. Jaewon hears the phone ding.

"Lol I like it." Jaewon smiles.

E smiles now, too. They sigh and then scowl, flipping tabs on their monitor screen and pulling up a CCTV view. It's inside High Class Entertainment HQ. And in the CEO's office no less. (Mr. Park… )They think to themselves. (You'll get what's coming to you… I swear it.)

The next day…

E stares at the photo on Twitter. (This picture… was taken inside Jaewon's apartment! How?!) They swallow hard, tabbing out and opening up Twitter. They click on the profile. It's set to private. Of course. E searches for more results on the internet. There was nothing. Just the many pictures of Jaewon as Wyld, fancams, and Wyld focus videos at Mayhem's concerts. They pull up their Messenger. “Jaewon, that picture is suspicious.” E texts. “Please text me.” An hour passes and E grows restless. "Jaewon, are you ok?" There's no response. E frowns. Another hour passes. "Hello? Jaewon?"

E readjusts the black medical face mask on their face, fussing with their hood. They watch as D.Min helps Jaewon into a sleek black car. No doubt belonging to Kang Dongho himself. A patrol officer is there, seeing them off. As D. Min gets into the car, the officer waves. When the car pulls out of sight, E strides up to catch the officer.

He was about to enter his vehicle when he noticed E. "Woah! I have a friend who lives in this building. What happened here?" E asks. The patrol officer cocks an eyebrow at E.

He glances at the young lady, handcuffed in the back of his cruiser, sobbing. "Wyld~~~!" She shrills. E scowls, pulling the face mask from their face. When the officer sees this, he softens his expression.

"A piece of work, this one. She broke in and kidnapped one of the tenants here." He says. "I can't tell you the full details. But if I were you, I'd make sure your friend is safe.” E’s eyes widen. “Make sure you tell your friend to be more careful from now on.” E gives a slight bow. “Thank you, officer.” When the cruiser drives away, E looks over to the doorway of the apartment complex. E walks over to the door of the apartment complex. They look around to make sure no one was around, before dialing the code in. The door unlocks. E opens the door and walks in.

Jaewon sighs, slumping down into the covers D.Min lent him. He frowns, turning on his side and hugging his pillow. He then glances at his cell phone. “That’s right…” He says to himself. “I turned it off after everything that stuff happened…” He hits the power button. After a few seconds, the phone lights up. And as soon as it does, the multiple dings scare him. He swipes the phone open and sees how many messages he has from a certain someone. “What?! Fifteen text messages?!” He scrolls through the texts with a surprised expression stuck to his face.

“Jaewon, that picture is suspicious.”

“Please text me.”

“Jaewon, are you ok?”

“Hello? Jaewon?”

“Pls tell me ur ok!”

“Jaewon. Someone might be in your apartment!”

“Pls txt me!”

Jaewon blinks wide eyed at the concerned messages. Then the final text makes him sit up quickly. “What the-?!”

He stares at the text. A bead of sweat rolls down his cheek. “I’m on my way over! Please be okay!” E was on their way over?! But this was an hour ago… They could be gone by now. Jaewon looks around to see if D.Min or his butler was anywhere near. He swallows hard before inhaling sharply. “E. I’m okay now. I’m sorry I didn’t see your texts.”

E sighs a big sigh in relief, walking home. They lean against the wall of a building. The worry melts into relief and they slide down the wall to squat a little, texting back. “OMG! THANK GOD AND ANY OTHER GODS THAT EXIST!” They text back in all caps. “Jaewon, are you hurt?! Nothing happened, did it?” Jaewon felt his breath catch in his throat. The thought of what happened makes his heart beat faster. His body trembles and he purses his eyebrows. E takes the silence as a bad sign. “You don’t have to tell me.” Jaewon is surprised at that. “I’m just happy you’re okay.”

Jaewon stifles a trembling inhale. “Me too.” Jaewon texts back. “Can I call you?” E chokes. They stare at the message. (He… wants to call me?) E begins to text. Before they could respond with their response of “not a good idea” the cell phone dings again. “Please?” E closes their eyes. They sigh and open up an application on their phone. They click on Jaewon’s number and swipe “call”.

Jaewon hears the cell phone ring and quickly answers. “Ah… hello?”

There was a long silence that made Jaewon a bit anxious. And then… “J-Jaewon…” Jaewon’s eyes widen a little. He felt a familiarity in the voice. He swears he’s heard this voice before. “Are you… sure you’re okay?” Jaewon chokes a bit, a trembling sob slipping from his lips.

“N-No…” He says, tears welling into his eyes. He’d tried to hold it back. But hearing someone else other than D.Min ask him that after everything had happened… It made him overflow with emotion. E gasps at the sound of Jaewon’s sniffles. “I… was so scared…” E frowns and purses their eyebrows.

“I’m so sorry you had to go through that…”

“I…” He sobs quietly, trying to avoid having D.Min or his butler hear. But E can still hear him. “I’m sorry.”

E sits down on the pavement. “Why are you apologizing, Jaewon?”

He wipes his eyes gently with his hoodie’s sleeve. “I don’t know.” Jaewon says.They both don’t say anything for a few moments while Jaewon collects himself. “There was a fan that found their way into my apartment.” E scowls. (WHAT?! That’s crazy!) E thinks. “She put a tracker in a gift she gave me at one of Mayhem’s Fansignings to find out where I live. And then she installed a camera to get the keycode to my apartment.” Jaewon hears E breathing unsteady on the other side. (I should have known this could happen.) “She ambushed me and tied me up threatening me with a knife from the kitchen.” E closes their eyes.

“I’m sorry that happened.” E says. Jaewan can tell the voice was familiar, but can’t place whether the voice was male or female. The voice was very androgynous, and despite Jaewon trying to focus on their tones, he can’t place the voice with a gender or a face. But he knew without a doubt he’d heard this voice before. But where? (At a fansigning or meet and greet for Mayhem? I can’t be sure… )“I… will try to prevent that from happening again…” Jaewon scowls a bit.

“Because you know where I live, right?” Jaewon asks. E freezes and can’t help but feel a bit nervous. How is Jaewon reacting to this? Was he mad? Skeptical? Suspicious? E stammers a bit. Jaewon sighs, letting it go for now. Call it exhaustion, or just his gut feeling that E wasn’t a threat, but he didn’t feel like pursuing this any further at the moment. “Are you still there?”

E stands up from their seat on the pavement. “Ah… no.” E replies. “I-I’m not. But I promise I didn’t go into your apartment. I just wanted to see if it was secure.”

“It’s fine.” Jaewon says. He pauses now. “E, can I ask you something?”

“Mm?”

“Why won’t you call me Wyld?” Jaewon asks. E bites their lip a little, tempted to answer. “You’ve only ever called me by my real name. You never use my Stage name. Why?” E doesn’t say anything. But Jaewon still waits for an answer. When E doesn’t answer Jaewon sighs again. “I get it… You can’t answer.” E looks down at their sneakers. Jaewon smiles, though he knows they can’t see it. “Please, be safe…”

E chuckles. “I should be saying that to you, Jaewon.” E says, fussing with their hood. Jaewon ends the call. He tiredly slumps back into the covers. He hugs the pillow next to him and wraps himself in the comforter. He scowls, frowning. He buries his face into the pillow his head was on and tries to sleep. Just around the corner, leaning against the wall of the hallway outside, D.Min puts a hand to his chin, deep in thought.

He’d heard the entire conversation… (Wyld can’t go back to his apartment. Not with everything that had happened.) D.Min thinks. (But… who was this “E” he was talking with just now? Do they know about what happened? They seem to know a great deal about him and then some.) D.Min cocks an eyebrow, peeking into the room through the doorway to see Wyld finally falling asleep. The most D.Min can see is his bright red hair poking from beneath the soft heap of comforter. It rises and falls slowly, relaxed with Wyld’s breathing. (Is it possible E knows all about the scandals he told me were “misunderstandings”? Are they trying to help him?) D.Min crosses his arms, a scowl on his brows. (Or are they just pretending so they can get close to him?)

Author’s Note:

Hi hi, lovelies! So I know it’s taken a while. But with COVID-19 and my lack of work and rollercoaster health concerns, I hope you all understand. So I took extra care to make sure this chapter was airtight and nicely done.

First things first, about this mysterious “E”, I am addressing them as “they” to keep the identity a secret. They are the original character I’ve hinted at previously and there will be more information about this character in the coming chapters. You’ll be learning about this character as the other characters do. I won’t be giving any hints or answers on said character. But if there are questions about this fanfiction anyone has, just let me know in the comments and I will work on answering them the best I can. I hope you enjoyed it and look forward to my future chapters ^.^

Jjolee’s twitter: https://twitter.com/_jjolee

Lost In Translation Webtoon: https://www.webtoons.com/en/drama/lost-in-translation/list?title_no=1882

[minyoongijjangjjangmanboongboong]

Ephemera Chapter Eighteen

Ephemera: In art, transitory written and printed matter (receipts, notes, tickets, clippings, etc.) not originally intended to be kept or preserved.

Alternatively, things that exist or are used for only a short time.

Description: Nobody knows who Vante really is. Everything about the popular artist is shrouded in secrecy: from his face to his name to everything in between. After years of working for his art gallery, Y/N feels she may just be the closest thing he has to a friend. Between her success at work and her relationship with campus hot-shot Jeon Jungkook, Y/N’s life has never been better. But is Jungkook truly who he says he is? And who will Y/N protect now that she knows Vante’s livelihood may be on the line?

Genre: Romance, Drama, Fluff, Angst

Pairing: Jungkook x (f) Reader x Taehyung

Word Count: 5.0k

Tags: Non-Idol!Au, Gang!Au, Art History Student!Reader, Film Student!Jungkook, Art Student!Taehyung

Warnings: Swearing and mentions of alcohol, although infrequently

A/N: THAT TEASER!! Man, I’m not the biggest fan of Halsey (not because she’s done anything wrong, but because her music isn’t my style) but I can’t wait to see how their collaboration sounds! Oh and about the chapter lol. I hope you guys enjoy it! One more chapter to go, I think! I need to finish outlining, and then I’ll know for sure. Anyway, please don’t be shy and send feedback, critique, questions, theories, and comments my way. I’ll be sure to respond to all asks I receive within a day of receiving them! Links will be added later, so for now check my masterlist to find previous chapters!

And again, if you want to follow my Twitter, my username is @/plzpunchmebts. I’m super active over there and hopefully in the future I’ll do some livestreams/chats with you all! And concert videos!!

- Mercury

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Masterlist

Weekly updates: Sunday, 1PM (PST)

I scoffed. Of course it had to be Min fucking Yoongi.

Without thinking, I strode toward the pair. Once close enough to touch them, I grabbed Yoongi by the front of his shirt and yanked him down to look me in the eye. His expression was no good, all round eyes and gaping mouth.

“So you have time to double cross your friends but not to fix things with Nara?” I asked, anger thinly concealed in my wavering voice. I clenched my jaw and made sure not to look away, not even for a second.

He swallowed hard and glanced toward Namjoon to placed a hand on my shoulder. It was meant to be consoling, but my nerves were on fire and I turned to him with a deathly glare. Even he seemed affected, removing his hand at once as my own dropped to my hip. Suddenly, my rage found a new target in Namjoon. I nodded once, mouth agape, arms crossed.

“You’ve been working with them, then?” I asked, scoffing. “This is ridiculous. Why did I expect anything different?” I shook my head and turned on my heel, but before I could step back toward the crosswalk, someone grabbed the crook of my elbow and to my surprise, it was Yoongi. “What?”

He shook his head. “Y/N, you’re completely misunderstanding,” he said, blinking rapidly. “This-I-Y/N, this is the first time Namjoon and I have met.”

I nodded. “Alright?” I said, my tone reading sarcastic. “What’s that got to do with anything?”

“He contacted me, Y/N. About the people coming for my company,” added Namjoon. He sighed, gripping his nose bridge like I was exhausting him. I swallowed hard and managed my expression. “He wants to help.”

I eyed Yoongi sidelong, still holding on to me, and cocked a brow. “You wanna help?” I asked.

Yoongi nodded. “I…this is my way of taking responsibility, Y/N.”

The memory of his guilt-ridden face at the headquarters came flooding back to me and I clamped my jaw shut. Just like that day, there was a sincerity, a vulnerability, in his eyes that was hard to discredit. The two of us remained locked in a tense stare-down, neither one particularly keen on breaking first, and I worked my cheek between my teeth, brow furrowing. His gaze was imploring, searching for something in my expression that likely wasn’t there. But it was unmistakable. He was being earnest.

I shut my eyes with a sigh and shook my arm from his grip. I ran a hand along my jaw and nodded once, eyes still shut. “Alright,” I said on an exhale.

He sighed and I opened my eyes once more to see the relief running through each of his features. “Good,” he said, nodding. “Listen, I can explain everything,” he said, an eagerness in his face.

I raised my brows. “Right now? Aren’t you two in a meeting?” I asked, gesturing toward Namjoon who by then was scrolling absently through his phone.

Yoongi glanced over his shoulder at him and sighed. “Hey, CEO,” he called, seizing Namjoon’s attention from his screen. He nodded once. “Can we add one more to the reservation?”

Namjoon scrutinized me, eyes scanning me from top to bottom, and after a moment he sighed and waved his hand. “Sure,” he said, shoving his hands in his pockets and leading the way into the restaurant.

I followed behind Yoongi, keeping my eyes on him all the while. His sincerity was indisputable, but that didn’t mean I trusted him. Didn’t mean he was someone worthy of my trust. The three of us walked in a row like ducklings inside the ritzy building. The interior was dark, mysterious, and housed plenty of water features: a stone-faced waterfall beside the hostess station, a tiny pond beside a panel of glass, a fountain made of several sleek squares of concrete, water flowing down like glacial ice. The hostess didn’t ask a single question as we entered, simply bowed at Namjoon and led the way to the back of the restaurant. She slid open a bamboo door and waited until we entered the dark private room. One large, Japanese-style table set low to the tatami floor. Yoongi sat on one side and Namjoon on the other, leaving me to choose between the two.

They glanced up at me, expectant. Namjoon raised his brows. Yoongi met my eyes.

Truthfully, both options looked grim.

The hostess eyed me from the doorway and, feeling the pressure, I sighed and walked around to the head of the table, sitting down criss-cross with my eyes on the dark wood table. Namjoon released a little chuckle and I glanced at him. He had one elbow hooked around his knee as he sat on the floor, running the pad of his index finger along the rim of his empty wine glass.

“Looks like Y/N is leading this meeting,” remarked Namjoon as the hostess wordlessly filled his glass, as if sensing his cue.

I sighed. “I’m not here because I wanna be,” I said, crossing my arms. The hostess filled my glass and then Yoongi’s before bowing and taking her leave, sliding the door shut behind her. “Let’s just…get on with it.”

Namjoon cleared his throat and nodded, lifting his glass to his lips and meeting Yoongi’s eyes over the rim. “I’m also pretty curious,” he said, and for the first time he really looked like a businessman. “Why did you reach out to me?”

Yoongi glanced over at me and sighed, rubbing his chin. “Well, it’s a bit hard to explain.”

“We’ve got time,” said Namjoon.

I eyed Yoongi, his slouched posture, his hand holding the neck of his wine glass without moving it to take a drink, his gaze transfixed on the liquid sloshing up the sides. “That day you came by,” he said, looking at me quick. I jumped a little. “I had just gotten out of a meeting with my father. He…really wants me to leave this business and come work for him. Says I’ve got talent that he could use.”

I nodded. “So you’re trying to sever ties?” I asked, brow knitted.

He shook his head. “Not exactly,” he said with a nod. “He’s right that the company could use me, but he’s an idiot if he thinks I’m coming over that easy.”

“Why don’t you want to work for him?” I asked, watching him as he finally took a sip of wine.

He shut his eyes as the wine slid from his glass to his mouth then down his throat. After a tense moment, he opened his eyes and looked my way. “Because,” he said, “I know firsthand how horrible that company can be.”

“Firsthand?” asked Namjoon, but by the smirk on his face I could tell he’d already figured it out. Much like I had. The sinking feeling in my gut was enough of a tell.

What was the one thing tying all of us together?

“My father is the CEO of Sanyo Industries,” said Yoongi gravely as he finished his glass in one swig.

There it was.

I gripped my knees in both hands, holding tight to keep from saying something reckless. I stared at Yoongi, but he refused to look my way. “Well…this is interesting,” said Namjoon with a chuckle. “You’re coming to your father’s competitor after months of working to dismantle my company?”

“Yeah…,” said Yoongi, then sighed. “Dad only knew about our business because he was keeping tabs on me. I think he used us for the job rather than any of the other groups around town because he thought he might convince me to come work for him.”

“And you won’t?” asked Namjoon, leaning forward on his elbows.

Yoongi shook his head. “Not without getting something in return.”

“And what’s that?” Namjoon countered, lacing his fingers and resting his chin atop them. Had I been the subject of his intense, hooded gaze I’d have surely felt the pressure. I was glad I hadn’t chosen to sit beside Yoongi.

“I’ll have him stop coming after you,” said Yoongi with a nod.

Namjoon smirked and nodded. “I see…and what will it cost me to have you do that?”

Yoongi eyed me and sighed. “You’ll give Nara a job.”

“Yoongi-,” I began.

He shut me up with a steely look. “I know that’s why you agreed to spy, Y/N,” he said. “It’s the only incentive you’d have to keep an eye on us.”

I raised my brows. “How’d you figure it out?”

He scoffed. “I’m not Seokjin,” said Yoongi, rolling his eyes. “He might be easy to fool, but not me. I knew the second you agreed to work with us that you weren’t being sincere. And I know everything about you anyway. Your dad doesn’t need the support from Ori. You don’t need it either. That leaves only one person Namjoon could exploit.”

I swallowed hard, unnerved. Just how much had he dug up about me? “You…,” I began, but shut my mouth and turned my eyes to Namjoon, awaiting his response.

“Well…that works for me,” he said with a shrug, chuckling. He sat upright, seeming to settle the palpable anxiety in the room with a gesture alone. He smoothed his hands along his dress pants and nodded. “But it seems too easy.”

“That’s because it is,” said Yoongi with a sigh, rubbing his forehead. “I’m not gonna be able to convince him to call off the attack on you. Not without some sort of bargaining chip. He’s…relentless. It’s kinda why I left in the first place.”

“You didn’t agree with his business practices?” I asked, raising my brows.

He shook his head, eyes severe. “He brought me in when I graduated high school and told me I could work in IT. But…when he let me into the business, I saw more than I should have because he was my dad. I saw the way he sent people after his enemies, like it was nothing. Like…they were nothing. Stockholders who sold their shares, ex-employees who threatened to expose his dirty laundry, international warehouses that tried to unionize…he was like a tyrant.” Yoongi stared grimly at his empty glass. “And nobody ever saw anything. Just this successful tycoon, this massive business. I hated it. That’s why I was worried about you that day at the warehouse. This world isn’t a place for someone like you.”

“Seokjin said something like that too,” I said, nodding. “That the corruption is inescapable.”

Yoongi sighed. “He and I grew up together. Same neighborhood. So when I started working for my dad, he saw that it was really taking the life outta me. He offered me a way out and I took it.”

“The way out being…Bangtan,” I said.

He nodded. “Yeah. I’d been working on computer science in college anyway and I was already good at coding. He asked if I wanted to work intel for his new agency. Expose the bad shit or at least uncover it and use it against the guys at the top. The idea was…really attractive to me.”

“And you’d just give all that up to help this girl?” asked Namjoon, his grand facade giving way to a genuine curiosity, a gentle investment.

Yoongi chuckled. “No,” he said, and I furrowed my brow. Before I could probe him, he continued. “It’s about taking responsibility.”

I blinked at him. “You’ll go this far?” I asked.

He nodded. “My dad said something when I left the household and his company,” he began, sighing. “He said I was running away, that I wasn’t mature enough to face reality head on. That that was why I was leaving, so I could bury my head in computers and avoid my responsibilities.”

I stiffened, shaking my head. “Yoongi, had I known I never would have said all that before,” I said.

He turned his eyes to me and smiled, just barely. “I’m glad you did. Because you’re right.”

“Back to that bargaining chip,” said Namjoon, shaking his head. “We don’t have any evidence it was Sanyo calling the hits on me. But if you can get any-,”

“There’s no paper trail. Dad’s not that dumb,” said Yoongi with a chuckle. “The only person who can prove it is Seokjin because he has the phone records. But he’d never say anything. It’d be too dangerous.”

“So we’re…back to square one,” said Namjoon with a deflated sigh.

I pursed my lips. “Not exactly,” I said, grabbing my phone from my purse.

Namjoon’s smile returned slowly as he watched me scroll through my phone and I pulled up my recording. “You’ve got something?” he asked.

I pressed play and set the phone in the center of the table. As the recording played, phasing from scuffled audio to clear, well-enunciated sounds, Namjoon eased forward once more, like the gears in his mind were turning. He rested his chin atop his laced fingers once more and smiled, eyes lowering to my cell phone as the recoding continued.

A few moments passed before it finished with Seokjin’s admission, and once the dead air once again retuned, Namjoon reached for my phone. But before he could snatch it, I grabbed it and held it beside my ear, eyeing him.

“You’re not gonna give it to me?” he asked, cocking a brow. “Even though it’ll help your friend? Even though it’ll help Taehyung?”

I rolled my eyes. “Don’t get all corporate with me, CEO. Intimidation’s not gonna work anymore,” I said, pressing the phone face-down on the table. “Of course I’m gonna give it to you.”

“Then what’s the holdup?” he asked, and for the first time I glimpsed the impatience of a man with a lot on the line. He had, after all, devoted his entire life to this company. If anything happened…

I sighed. “Nara’s not gonna take a handout,” I said with a nod. “She’s made that perfectly clear to me.”

Namjoon groaned, rubbing his jaw. “Then what?”

“You’ll interview her. Just like any other candidate,” I said.

Yoongi jumped a little. “That defeats the whole point,” he protested, a pout in his voice.

I turned only my eyes toward him. Suddenly, I was the one in charge. Sitting at the head of a table in front of a big-shot CEO and a corporate heir, and I held all the cards. I tapped my fingers against the cell phone and raised my brows and Yoongi settled, sighing.

“If she passes the interview on her own merit, you can give her a job. But she has to earn it,” I said, returning my attention to Namjoon. “I can’t just hand it to her.”

Namjoon laughed. “That’s all?” he asked, then clapped his hands. “Easier for me! Less red tape.”

I held out my hand for him to shake and he took it with a big grin. “Then it’s a deal.”

“It is,” he said, dimpled smile on full display.

I nodded and handed my phone to him. As he worked on sending himself the recording, Yoongi touched my forearm gently to seize my attention. I turned to him and saw concern in his eyes.

“I feel like it’s not right to cut Nara’s job out of the deal,” he said, voice low. Like he was taking me seriously. Like we were really negotiating.

That surge of power returned and I met his dark eyes. “She’s not gonna take it anyway. She wants to get herself together. All I can do is give her an opportunity to get it for herself,” I said, nodding.

“I-,”

“If you’re that troubled, then go visit her,” I said, my expression softening into a smile. “She’s got class on Monday. English building.”

Yoongi’s skin tinted pink and I could see it even in the low light. “I…I couldn’t just…go see her, right?”

I shrugged, glancing back toward Namjoon as he slid my phone toward me. “I dunno,” I said, sighing as I noticed a new message from Nara herself. A photo of her resume and the caption, Off to Ori! I smiled. “Maybe she’s hoping to see you somehow.”

Yoongi opened his mouth to respond, but Namjoon beat him to it with a chuckle. “Well…we should come up with a game plan.”

I raised my brows. “We?” I asked, scoffing. “I thought my part of the bargain was done.”

Namjoon shook his head. “Not quite,” he said, smirking at me. Calculating, intelligent, but never sinister. A good CEO. “I’ve got one more job for you.”

Jungkook opened his front door, rubbing his eyes, after the third knock. He seemed to have been napping while I was in a meeting with Yoongi and Namjoon, or perhaps he’d gone to sleep early. Our talk lasted more hours than I expected, and by the time we exited the dim restaurant the sky was dark and the traffic was light. We’d parted ways, agreeing to meet up on Wednesday at eight to finish this thing. How I’d gotten mixed up in all of this, I couldn’t really say. Everything in the past few months had been building toward this, culminating at one final event. It was hard to focus on anything else and before I knew what I was doing, I was in front of Jungkook’s door.

Upon taking me in, he smiled and opened his arms wide. Without thinking, I fell against his chest and wrapped my arms loosely around his torso, sighing against his shirt. He chuckled and rubbed my back, humming a little as he guided us backwards into the apartment.

“Is Jin home?” I asked, praying for the answer I wanted.

Jungkook chuckled, the sound rumbling in his chest, and rubbed my head. “No.”

“Good,” I breathed, leaning away to get a good look at him.

His hair was growing out lately, a little shaggy, curling at the ends and messy from sleep. His long-sleeve shirt was loose on him, sliding off his collarbone, and his sweats were half-rolled up to his knees, likely from kicking his legs in his sleep. He looked rested, smiling just a little, skin a flushed with life.

He sighed and laced his fingers through mine. “I’m glad you came by,” he said with a yawn, jerking his head toward the hallway. “I was working on something I wanted you to see.”

I nodded and let him lead me by the hand. He looked soft as he walked in front of me, fluffy. Like some sort of comfort I’d been searching for. Perhaps if I didn’t have to meet with Yoongi and Namjoon on Wednesday, I’d have gone home for a few days. Gotten my mind and my heart back in alignment. Gotten my thoughts straight.

But instead I’d come here.

Strange…

Jungkook opened the door to the computer room. The space was smallish, just two desks facing each other with massive monitors, scant decorations on the walls like video game characters and and some film posters. No windows, which was probably why they made it the computer room to begin with. But Jungkook’s station, the one facing the far wall, had changed since I’d been in there. He’d set up a cozy gaming chair and a big blanket, a mug of something sitting beside the keyboard. It looked like this was where he’d been resting when I’d knocked on the door. He turned to me with a smile and sat down first on the chair, pulling me down to settle atop his lap. He wrapped one arm around my stomach and let the other slide along my side to reach for his mouse, shaking it twice to reawaken his monitor.

I leaned back against his chest and he gave a little giggle, squeezing me a little. “You’re affectionate tonight,” he mumbled against my shoulder as he scrolled around his computer for a moment.

I flushed and played with my fingers. “I’m affectionate all the time.”

He laughed. “Not these days,” he teased, but I felt him smiling. He inhaled slowly, holding me close, and pulled up his video editing program. I raised my brows. Sensing my reaction, he chuckled. “Something you said a while ago really bugged me.”

“Hm?”

“You’ve never seen one of my films,” he said with a sigh. “To be honest, I don’t really…show my films to anyone.”

“Really?” I asked, turning to him slightly with wide eyes. “Why?”

He averted his eyes and smiled gently, humming. “Just…kinda insecure I guess? I showed one to my mom once and she didn’t like it much. Said it was a waste of time and money,” he said with a chuckle. “I don’t really like rejection like that, so I tend to keep it to myself.”

I furrowed my brow and turned at the waist to get a better look at him. “That’s stupid,” I said.

He smiled gently and used his free hand to brush a stray hair behind my ear. “I’m…getting better,” he said with a soft smile. “You’ve helped. Having someone believe in me…be proud of me…it’s nice.”

I blushed, swallowing hard, and cleared my throat, glancing away. “It’s nothing.”

He chuckled and hugged me back against him. “It’s not nothing,” he said, then sighed. “Anyway, I want to share this with you. I’m working on a portfolio for this small company that gave me an interview. They want a videographer since they’re just starting out, and it seems like a good fit.”

I grinned, eyeing him. “You’re doing so well,” I commented, poking his cheek. “When did you get so mature?”

He rolled his eyes. “I’ve always been mature,” he said with a laugh. Quietly, he grabbed for the chunky headphones sitting beside his mug and placed them gently over my ears. He adjusted them slightly, smiling at me as he angled my hair out of the way. His fingertips hovered over my skin for a moment before he nodded and I turned toward the monitor. “I was thinking of you while I was editing. So if it’s cheesy, that’s why.”

I laughed and squeezed his hand. “I’m sure it’ll be great.”

He held me close and pressed the space bar, starting the film.

The film began with an upbeat, slightly sentimental song. The title screen opened to a shot of one of the big oak trees on campus, branches swaying and sky endlessly blue overhead. On cue with the beat of the song, the shot changed to an artful slow-motion frame, following someone’s back as they walked down a crowded, nighttime street in Seoul. The person turned and I raised my brows in surprise as I noticed who it was.

“Jimin?” I asked as the small young man gave a big goofy grin and twirled elegantly down the street, much to the amusement of the other pedestrians beside him.

Jungkook chuckled. “Yeah. He and I are pretty close,” he said with a nod.

“He’s graceful,” I said with a laugh as he waved his arms.

“He and Hoseok are dancers. Used to work at a studio but it shut down. That’s why they came to Bangtan,” he said.

I pursed my lips as the shot changed. “He should’ve stuck with that…”

Now the camera followed the dizzying Seoul skyline from one of the above-ground subway lines, crossing over the Han River. The music continued, adding a sense of softness, a feeling of nostalgia to the scenes. After a few more beautiful shots of the city, Jungkook’s voice came through the headphones, making me jump.

“What does it mean to be strong?” he asked, the music lowering to give his voice a fighting chance at being heard.

“Ah…,” responded Jimin with a laugh as the shot changed to him, sitting in a chair backdropped against the brick wall in the HQ warehouse. He glanced up and over the camera as he pondered it. “I guess…being strong means…believing in yourself enough to be brave.”

I stiffened. Such an astute answer from such a small, soft person. I watched in awe as the scene changed again and the music’s volume increased. As the film continued, more a vignette than a plot-driven story, I was struck by just how adept Jungkook’s filming and editing was. The shots were beautifully framed, well focused, sharp, and purposeful. It was like a dance, flowing from one scene to the next effortlessly. But I was sure it had taken him hours to get it done.

Suddenly, the music lowered and Jungkook’s voice returned, along with Jimin sitting with a smile as he leaned back against the bricks. “I think being strong is recognizing that you’re capable,” he began, and Jimin giggled. “Capable of making your own path.”

“Ugh, so cheesy,” complained Jimin through laughter.

The footage stopped abruptly and, chagrined, Jungkook removed the headphones. “Sorry, it’s, uh…it’s not finished.”

I turned to him with wide, scanning eyes. “Jungkook…”

He was blushing bad, avoiding my gaze, and fidgeting below me. His arm slackened around me. “I wish I could have made it better-,”

Before he could say another word, I leaned down and pressed my lips against his, resting a hand against his neck and shutting my eyes. It took him a stunned moment to regain his composure, but as he did he wrapped an arm around my waist and held me close, lifting one free hand to hold my jaw. I could feel how warm his cheeks were from how near our skin was to touching, and I pulled back only to give him another peck before furrowing my brow at him.

“I’m mad,” I said.

He stiffened, eyes wide, and stared up at me like a captive audience. “H-huh?”

“You’ve been hiding your talent from me,” I said, leaning away and crossing my arms.

He broke into a wide grin slowly, eyes turning to crescents. “What?” he asked with a giggle.

“You’re clearly incredibly talented, Jungkook. I can’t believe you’ve been keeping this under wraps for so long,” I said, eyeing the monitor with a gape. “It was artful.”

“You…you really think so?” he asked, timid.

I rolled my eyes and gave his forehead a flick. “Yes, stupid.”

He winced, then laughed and gave me a bright smile. “Thank you,” he said, his gaze unarmed, completely bare.

It startled me and I felt my face go red. “Uh…what for?”

“For everything,” he said with a shrug. “I just…I think I really love you.”

I swallowed hard and stared down at him, unable to process what he’d said. Of course, he’d confessed before. But so much had changed between then and now. I chewed on my lower lip for a moment. Before I could say anything, my phone buzzed in my pocket. Still too surprised to check, I simply blinked down at Jungkook as he smiled, fingers rubbing circles into my hip.

“I think your cell’s going off,” he said, laughing as I fumbled with it.

Nararawr: Oof, new article about you. Came out this morning. Some ‘news’ outlet they are, doxxing you.

I stiffened as I read the article Nara had attached to her message. “Vante’s Mystery Girl Revealed,” I began aloud with a sigh. I read the body and, indeed, I’d been doxxed. My age, my name, my major. I rolled my eyes and rested the phone on the table with a thud. “I hate that,” I mumbled, rubbing my arms.

Jungkook smiled gently and wrapped both arms around my waist. “Don’t think about it too much,” he said, resting his chin on my shoulder. He pressed a kiss to the side of my neck and I flushed from the bottom up. “Wanna watch Your Name and order some chicken?” he asked.

Under normal circumstances, perhaps I’d have refused.

But Jungkook’s offer was tempting. And besides, I didn’t want to go home and be alone with myself after seeing that article. I figured some of the more dedicated reporters might have already found my apartment. It was a good thing I came here instead.

I leaned back against Jungkook’s chest and nodded, shutting my eyes. “Can I borrow some clothes?”

I padded toward my apartment’s mail box the next morning, still dressed in Jungkook’s baggy sweatpants and a sweatshirt he’d gotten from some game tournament. To my surprise, the reporters either hadn’t found me yet, or had been shooed away by the security staff in my building. I grabbed the few bills and promotions crammed in my tiny mailbox with a sigh and shoved them under my arm, adjusting my hold on the old shopping bag Jungkook had given me for my work clothes. Quietly, I wandered toward the stairwell and took them slowly.

I emerged on my floor with a yawn and stretched my torso side to side. After a few moments of struggling to find my key, I shoved open the front door and dropped my mail on the coffee table, walking first into my bedroom and dropping the bag on the floor. I stretched and grabbed for the watering can I kept beside my windowsill plants, giving them a little spray.

After a few moments of housekeeping, I walked back out into the living room and fell in front of my couch, resting on the floor in front of the coffee table. I clicked on my TV and watched as it blinked to life, reruns of Goblin playing. I smiled and leaned back, watching for a few moments as I absently went through my mail.

As expected, nothing noteworthy. Electric bill, cell phone bill, water bill, Etude House promotion, internet bill, Skin Food promotion, and…

A letter?

I pursed my lips, brow furrowed, and tilted my head to the side. Puzzled, I scanned the envelope. There was no return address, but the handwriting was elegant, near-perfect. Intrigued, I pried it open and unfolded the letter. Scanning it once to see the sender, I nearly gasped when I noticed the name at the bottom. My heart kicked up speed and I felt my palms grow sweaty. Nerved wracked through me like waves and I clenched my jaw shut tight, eyes wide and fingers shaking.

There in the bottom left corner were words I never thought I’d see again.

Sincerely,

Mom

[theskyisneveralwaysblue]

The Long Mistake

I love you. I love you from the tips of your fingers through to the deepest part of your soul that no one else sees. I love the curve of your smile, your witty humour. I love the way you say my name, when you talk about our future and make me smile even if it’s for a small while. I love your tattoos, the bright colours on your tanned European skin. I love the way I have to stand on the tips of my toes to kiss you, I love when you hold me close and I feel your arms firm around me. I feel safe, my protector. You don’t like it when other guys are rude to me, you defend me before I hit back at my own accord. I love the way you laugh and sexily dance in the kitchen when you cook dinner and you look back at me like I’m the only girl in the room, physically I am. Digitally I am not.

We’ve all been there, even you reading this now. We’ve all dated someone who wasn’t right for us but we loved them regardless because we see past the shitty things we don’t want to see when we are in love. Maybe it’s just lust and we get stuck there for a while.

“Hindsight, it’s a wonderful thing”, someone said to me very recently. We had been talking for a week and we met on the beach. It was a hot afternoon, I can still smell the salty air. He was so quiet and I was so very inquisitive wanting to know everything about him. We started seeing each other on the regular, he would come to my place and have dinner and sleep the night; only two weeks in of fucking and he said “I love you”. I laughed because it was such a perpostorous thing to say to someone... when you’ve just had sex and in a short period of time. I laughed and I said “I think you’re just cunt struck”... romantic, I know. I didn’t love him, I was in lust. It took me longer to return the feeling. I was more cautious, the previous man in my life left me standing at the airport after I told him I loved him after six months of dating - that shit shattered me and it’s made me hard. I take other peoples feelings into consideration, ultimately I am protective of my own because I don’t want to be hurt, again. But this one is different.

I remember sitting there talking to my housemate saying things like; “I don’t think he really likes me”, “what if he doesn’t actually like me”, “Do you think he’s into me?”, “I don’t think he’s really into me”, “I don’t think we would last”, “I think he’s just going to treat me like every other male has so far and is going to fuck me and then run” - hindsight. My friend assured me “If he didn’t like you, he wouldn’t be hanging around like he is, you just need to give him a chance”. I remember my eyes rolling into the back of my skull and saying “Yeah, righto, I’ll give him a chance”. I can’t be doubtful all my life.

The chance.

A couple of months in a friend messages me; “Are you still with him? Because he’s on Tinder? What’s happened?”, I think about it, he’s already told me he’s not on it. I confront him and he says he’s on it for a joke with a mate. Weird joke but okay. I accept it because I mean I struggle to take dating apps seriously. Eventually he asks me to move in with him, I did, I wanted to, I really like him. No I love him. We get into the rhythm of doing life together. He goes to work, I go to uni, we come home we watch a movie and eat dinner. We go to the strand on the weekends because I love the ocean and we like that quality time together when we’re both not working. Like any other normal night I go on the computer and I was so fucking tired - exhausted. He was working and I thought nothing of it. “Reload last session” - I reboot it. My eyes drooping while I get up to make my fourth coffee for the day so I can stay awake and work on my uni assessments because I had been researching earlier that day. I looked back at the computer with confusion, “This is not research”, I sat there and scrolled over the page - a webcam site. I’m confused and I look at all the tabs now open... all of them, webcam sites. I click on each one feeling my heart sink. Each one with a different name; “Omegle”, “Slut Roullette”, “Chaturbate” and several others I can’t remember the names of them. I remember seeing where the webcam should be connected and reading on the website “Your device has been blocked” Suddenly I’m awake. I message him “we need to talk when you get home”. I assess the dates and times of when he searched these sites and I look back at my diary to see where I was during these times. I carefully construct a collage of everything I’ve found - a literal power point presentation. Because I’m not going to approach a subject without proof. His Facebook is still wide open and I see a conversation between him and my co-worker’s boyfriend; “who’s tits in the background?” And his response “my mrs, ssshhh. I didn’t realise she was there”. I sit there staring at it for a bit and part of me felt frustrated; how could he be so wreckless and send a photo with me topless in the background. But I also decide against bringing it up because it’s just tits. I’ve been topless at parties before - but I guess back then I wasn’t as conservative as I am now, older and wiser that kinda thing. Whatever. I also find a conversation with him and some friends in a group chat “Oi I just got a blow job” followed by a detailed experience and I just kinda don’t think much of it because whatever. Guys are gonna talk to their mates and I suppose it’s the same for women? In my personal experience though I’ve only really talked about hook ups with guys to mates who were fucking shocking and a one off experience before I go AWOL on their ass.

He comes home after an all night shift and I’m sitting there at the table with my leg crossed over my other leg ready to begin a Spanish Inquisition. “What’s this?” I ask while staring at him for a direct answer. He sits down and he looks me in the eyes and he says “It’s a habit I had before I met you. I don’t know why I’m still doing it, I’ll stop”... I take a deep breath - how am I going to approach this. He’s 19 and hasn’t had a serious relationship before. I lay it out black and white and I say “Look, I get you’re young and you’re gonna go and look at weird shit on the internet because it’s a male thing and that’s fine, whatever, I don’t want to know about it. But I think it’s different if you’re on webcam sites as opposed to porn sites because you’re COMMUNICATING with other women therefore you have an intention”. He agrees that it doesn’t look good and says he’ll stop. A couple of weeks pass and we’re jokingly getting on each other’s phones and uploading Facebook status updates on each other’s accounts... I got on his phone and I noticed an app... Whatsapp... KIK... what’s this? I’ve never heard of it. I open them curiously and there it is in plain black and white... “got any pics?”... “I’m in the army”... “you’re cute”... he’s sent photos of himself, shirtless, naked, partially in uniform. I remember waiting for him to wake up from his nap. “Who the fuck is this?”, he looks at me confused “I don’t know”, “YOU DON’T KNOW? BUT YOU’VE SENT PHOTOS OF YOURSELF TO THEM? YOU’RE ASKING FOR PHOTOS OF THEM?”, he’s embarrassed, he calms me down and says “I’m sorry, this won’t happen again”.

The next time it happened I had been at work for five hours and my shift comes to an end, I pull my phone out of my bag and I have a message request on Facebook. I open it and see it’s some random girl from America messaging me, I open her message and it reads “Hey, I think this is your boyfriend?”, I open the photo sent to me from her and it’s his cock. I keep my calm and I say goodbye to my co-workers, I walk up the escalator and I get to the car, he’s sitting there waiting for me not ready for the shit storm I’m about to unleash as I rip the car door handle and the door flings open and he’s looking at me confused and I ask who she is. He sits there and tells me “I don’t know what you’re talking about, I don’t know who you’re talking about?” - I shove my phone under his face and I can see the look of panic and the colour draining from his face. His eyes wide. I slam the door shut in his face as he leans across to say “I’m sorry” and I run down the stairwell with my eyes red, tears flooding down my face. I get myself together after 20mins and find him still there. In the parked space. Waiting for me. I come back and get in the car and we go home. I walk ahead and get inside and I start to pack my things. Apologies upon apologies “I love you, I won’t do it again”. The next day he brings me a bouquet of roses to me at work telling me he loves me. This is the second time in my life I have ever received flowers from a guy. I accept them but there’s this sadness. I’m slowly starting to pick myself apart physically, I don’t think I’m attractive and that’s why he does it.

Things calm down and I don’t notice any odd behaviour. We move house and it gets worse. I catch him on KIK and Whatsapp another time and it starts to feel like collateral damage. I’m now sliding into depression. “Why does he keep doing it?”, “Am I a hard person to love?”, “Maybe I’m just the girl guys fuck and then move on to find the love of their life because that’s how it feels”. He goes on an exercise to Malaysia and I wait. I wake up in the early hours of the morning before he walks out the door and I hold him close. I don’t want him to go, I’m used to him being there. Everyday I sit by my phone. I want him to tell me he loves me. I want him to tell me he misses me. Nothing happens. I so desperately want him home but a small part of me starts to progress. I fuel myself with vegetables, chicken and water, I start going to the gym again. But emotionally I am exhausted. We start to fight. Oh how we fight. Fear has taken over me and I am terrified he is cheating on me. I don’t trust him, is he back on KIK? Is he back on Whatsapp? Suddenly... Why is his ex all the fucking way over there in the same fucking country near him and conveniently liking his photos on Instagram? - I confront him head on and he says “I don’t know, I haven’t seen her, she’s not near me”, “YeAh Ok”. The trust, it’s long gone. He tells me I’m being too much and breaks up with me via messenger while In a foreign country. I sit there and stare at it and I respond with “You can come home and say it to my face like a fucking adult”. I’m tired. Im physically sick. I’ve spent several hours vomiting in the bathroom with nothing to bring up. I’ve had two friends comfort me, one held me in their arms while I cried and cried and questioned “Why am I not good enough? Why does he always make me feel like this? Why am I always treated like a piece of shit by any male I date? Why is it always the same story?”. It’s late at night, he comes home from his exercise and holds me in his arms and this is where it really starts and he says “You turn everything into a fight and you pushed me to this point. I’m sorry, I love you, I won’t do it again”.

I struggle to be happy. Everything feels like it’s a lot of effort. Waking up in the mornings are hard and most nights I’m staring at my reflection in the mirror thinking about what life could be if he just cared because it sure felt like he didn’t. Being spoken to like I’m a piece of shit becomes routine I snap back and he tells me I’m putting him in a bad mood. But I still love him. I keep going, I persist. He said he would change, right? I catch him on KIK and Whatsapp again. This feels like the 600th time. Yet the conversation is the same. I get to the point where I am worn out; “Can we please just end this shit if you don’t want to be together because it’s killing me. You’re breaking my heart every time I catch you and you’re wasting my time”. He says he’ll stop and he still wants to be together. Of course I stick around because he said he would change and I love him and I’m clutching on to that ray of hope that he means it. I start to resent myself. I hate going out. I hate socialising. I keep my distance from male friends when we go out because I don’t want to make him uncomfortable. I’m too concerned to hang out with female friends because he starts asking me for threesomes with them and I keep saying no. Now I’m concerned he will try to fuck one of my friends so I keep my distance. Isolation.

We go out with his friends and their girlfriends are young and beautiful and I sit there resenting myself and I can see him looking at them. I see him looking at other girls when we are out - I know it’s a natural thing to do to look at someone else and admire them from afar when you’re in a relationship but this always felt like it was more, probably because I had already caught him multiple times messaging other girls. I pin myself into a corner and resent myself more for letting myself go. I feel hideous. I don’t feel good enough. He goes to his dental and physio appointments and tells me the nurses are into him. He pokes me for a reaction. He gets it. He starts to call me crazy.

He complains that he’s always broke and has no money, I tell him to apply for RA. He refuses to. I eventually do it for him because he asks me to, and a notification comes through to say that his payments for live on accomodation will be ceased... $213 a f/n. For three years he had been paying $213 a f/n while we were on a lease together for a room on base. RED FLAG RED FLAG ALARM BELLS. I ask him pointedly “Did you have a room on base you were bringing girls back to?” - “No I didn’t”. Logical me can see he was but I so desperately wanted to believe him. Frustrated me pointed out that the total wasted amount was close to a house deposit or a new car. I am mentally drained. My parents, my Aunty and a selected small handful of friends tell me to “stop parenting him”. “Stop being his mother”.

He goes away to see family on the Gold Coast and I’m anxious. I don’t trust him. Who is he really with down there? I call; “I’m just with dad doing this”, “ok”. I venture onto the computer now that he’s not here, he has 3 emails... I don’t know all of the passwords, so I’m a little crafty - I go to settings and venture in a little further and I reveal the passwords. I’m not completely stupid. I then begin to explore each email and I type in key words of alias names he’s used on chat sites, sure enough KIK and Whatsapp appear again. I type in key words like “dating” and “hookup” a website appears I start reading the email headings “Cinnamonxo has responded to your message”... I download the app, I click forgot password and I enter the email and I change the password on him. Because fuck him. I go into the app and I read the messages “are you available at 12.30pm?”, “blow job $50”. My eyes swell. Here we are back at square one. Where was at 12.30pm on that day? I look back at my diary - work. What am I doing. I call in floods of tears, here we go again to play the same game of him trying to lie his way out of a confrontation. Mentally I’m exhausted at this point. He says he didn’t follow through with it but I had already messaged her and received a response from her saying “I am so sorry, I had no idea he had a girlfriend, please know it was nothing personal, I’m just trying to earn some money” to which my response was “I know, I just wanted closure and confirmation, I’m not coming after you”. He came home and we fought. I wanted to know what he had really been doing down there on the coast because I didn’t trust him. He says just seeing family. Now I’m paranoid every time I go to work. This isn’t good. “what’s he doing? Who’s he with?”.

We make it through the years, there’s engagement parties, there’s weddings - these are friends I’ve had for years from my childhood. I ask him to come with me and be my date to functions and he says “No, I don’t want to go, just tell them I’m not feeling well” and he games for hours with headphones in. I go as my own date, my own rock, almost ready to have a mental break down. I just wanted a supportive boyfriend. The one engagement party we did go to he locked himself in the bathroom and bags out the night to a female friend who says “why go anyways”. They both swap photos of their bodies showing each other their tattoos and I’m agitated. The night is almost ruined for my friend and she yells at him to grow up and not to ruin her night, she takes me to the bathroom and comforts me. She asks me “what’s wrong?” And I cover his ass because I love him.

The conversations become the same. I start to see it for what it is and I start to want to break away. I tell him I think we aren’t working I ask him if anything is going to change and he promises it will. I’m defeated. We go out together and people can see it. They ask if I’m okay. I say “I’m fine”. Friends stop to talk to me at the shops and he walks away without saying anything or completely walks past and doesn’t stop to say hello. I’m wrestless and on edge and it’s a sick combination.

It’s my birthday and I’m turning 27, I have this overwhelming feeling I get when it’s my birthday. I always feel like I haven’t accomplished anything and I see all my friends engaged, married, kids, and in careers that they enjoy. I reflect a lot on my life and I know I shouldn’t compare it but I do. It’s even worse because I don’t feel loved. He’s asleep on the bed and I go onto the computer, I have a sinking feeling “What’s he done now? What am I going to find?”, I go into search history and I see the title “BBW Gives Blow Job”, I feel my eyes roll into the back of my head “won’t have sex with me but will go looking this shit up”, I grimace as I open it up. It takes me a moment to realise what I’m watching. His cock in some thing’s mouth. I feel like I’m going to be sick. I’m literally sitting there watching a homemade porno of him being deep throated by what I think is a male at first. I fly off the handle. He wakes up and is confused like he always is and I’m there yelling at him; “DID YOU FUCK A GUY?” my voice is loud and shrill and I’m almost certain the neighbours are listening. I’m distraught. I yell at him to get the fuck out of the house and to fuck off. I sit by the window and I watch him drive off, tears flowing down my eyes. I feel a deep sadness. Why do I keep putting myself through this. Why do I love him and why do I keep sticking around for someone like him. A friend calls me and comforts me. He comes home and we talk, I feel ready to punch a wall. He says he’s sorry and he cares and loves me and won’t do it again. I don’t know what to think. I know I should walk away but at the same time I think he means it.

I slowly start to reconnect with friends. I come forward and tell them what’s happening in our life, some of them cry and ask me why I’m still in the relationship and I say “because I love him and he said he wouldn’t do it again, and he would change”. Friends constantly tell me “He’s abusive as fuck, leave” and I let it ride out. I can only say I’ve had one positive relationship experience and even then he still left me. I just simply felt like this was all I would ever get in life, this would be the best relationship I would ever have and it would be the one I deserved. Because eventually he’ll change, right? Occasionally a male friend will message me and ask me how I am and he sees the messages and demands to know “do you want to fuck him?”... obviously I don’t because I’m in a relationship and I’m committed. There was so much he was projecting onto me from his own actions and I’m tired. I’m so old school, I don’t get in a relationship unless I want to be in it and then I’m in it for the long haul. I guess I was too proud and that’s why I wouldn’t walk away. I’m grabbing at the ropes and they’re sliding through my fingertips.

Weeks later again I find appointment times made during my work hours with prostitutes. We fight again. The neighbours are probably listening again and I’ve raised my voice for the I don’t know how many times in fucking pain. I blast him. I resent him. But I love him. He’ll change I know he will, because I love him and he told me he loved me and promised me again that he would. I call my Dad, a shrill of desperation in my voice as it breaks, he’s held me many times when I’ve broken down. He says “I taught you to walk away from men like this, I’ve always taught you better than this, you know this. Why are you still with him?” I sobbed and said “I love him”. My Dad reminded me “There is better out there and you will see it one day” I can hear his heart break through his voice when he talks to me. He just wants me to be happy. My Dad pulled him aside and told him to straighten up or leave. We always had the same conversation, I would always say “Please leave if you’re going to keep putting me through this shit because it fucking kills me, you’re wasting my time and breaking my heart” I feel like a broken record player at this point. And it was always the same response “You pushed me away, that’s why I did it, but I swear I won’t do it again, I’ll change, I love you”.

I was tired of being sex deprived a lot of the time, he rarely wanted to fuck me. Usually I’m a pocket rocket and will want to go every night but it was always the same “not tonight, I’m too tired”, “I’m not in the mood”, I was shafted aside for games and prostitutes. I asked the same questions throughout the relationship; “Is it because I’ve put on too much weight? Is it because I’m not fit like I was? Am I unattractive? Do you just not find me attractive anymore?” The response is always the same “No. You just fight with me all the time and it pushes me away and I go looking elsewhere, you need to see a psychologist, you need help. Everything with you is a fight”. It’s not. It’s the constant cycle of repetition. It’s the constant poor behaviour, me catching him out and being livid for weeks on end and then him pulling the same shit again. “You turn everything into a fight, you pushed me to this point, I’m sorry, I won’t do it again”. Humiliated I was booking appointments with doctors each time because I needed to be checked for STDs, thankfully nothing.

I was tired of being snapped at and spoken to like I’m trash, I retaliate and everything becomes my fault. I would be the joke. “She’s crazy” he would say to his friends in front of me while laughing but I had every right to be on the edge. He made me feel that way. I would threaten to speak up and he would panic - “I don’t want my friends to think any less of me, I don’t want to lose friends” he was conscious and well aware of his actions. He would look at old photos of me from when I was 18 and make comments like “I wish I fucked you when you were 18” and I would feel sick to the pit of my stomach, it must have been written on my face because he would back up his comment with “I’m just kidding”. The other comment was “I wish I had a girlfriend with tattoos” and I felt even more shitty because I felt like I wasn’t physically appealing enough.

I was so tired of constantly being the one that cleaned up. I did a lot in the relationship, a lot of background work, it comes with the territory of being the partner of a military man. Some days I would let the house go when he would be home because I thought “He’ll actually do something about it” and he wouldn’t. I would be stepping over dishes and becoming frustrated out of my fucking mind. His excuse was “I pay the bills therefore I don’t need to clean up” - like as if I didn’t put my fair share of effort in. So much pent up resentment. On nights he was coming home from field I would lay there in bed awake till late at night when he would come home and it didn’t matter if he smelt and looked like shit I still flung my arms around him and was always greeted with a grunt. It never overly felt reciprocated, but I also put it down to “he must feel stressed and tired”. Then for weeks on end I would stare at my reflection in the mirror with the light of his pc reflecting off of it while he was gaming and I would cry myself to sleep. He would tell me his parents thought I was crazy and that he had told them everything - which I highly doubt. I’m sure he told them I was nuts and I was clingy but I’m sure he skipped on all the details of him cheating on me constantly and telling me it was my fault why he did and why I had become so untrusting of him.

More weeks pass. I think we’re in a better place. I get on the computer and I’m curious; “Does he message girls on his gaming server?” I go looking. I guess the password. I’ve become good at this because everything is consistently the same. I’m not sure what the fuck this is. I’m not a gamer. I go looking through the channels, I have my quick eyes on and I’m skimming over conversations quickly. I finally find it “Hey, got any pics?” To three different “girls” and I have to sit there and say “you don’t know for sure if they’re actually women or what their ages are”. We play the same old game “You pushed me to this point, I’m sorry I won’t do it again”.

I never wanted to be this type of girlfriend. I never wanted to lurk around in his messages and be hurt time and time again. But it was the constant reasons he gave me to go looking. The look of panic on his face if I picked up his phone and hadn’t opened it. I knew then that something was there. Part of me would start to miss my ex prior to him, not miss him personally but miss the relationship we had. Sex every single night - but it never felt like a routine - always spontaneous, exercising together every afternoon, laughing together, watching movies together, going on dates, we never once looked at each other’s phones because we trusted each other, randomly slow dancing in the kitchen together, the feeling of being whole - people saw us together before we were dating and thought we were already together, we were 100% comfortable in each other’s company. I would compare it to what I had now in that moment and it would break me. I was constantly saying to him “Please do not waste anymore of my time, please let me move on. If we aren’t working can we please just end it” and he would always say “I’m sorry, I won’t do it again”. It was the same thing time and time again. I knew I always looked like a tired stressed mess. I would also start to think about every guy I had met and not given an opportunity to and I would feel like perhaps they would have been far more worthy of my time and love than this guy is - was.

For months he spends hours upon hours gaming and I’m ready to throw the computer off the balcony. I ask if we can do something “Can we go out?”, “Do you want to watch a movie?”, “Let’s go get dinner”, “let’s go see a movie” and the response was always the same “I’m tired, I don’t want to, I’ve already made plans with the boys you should have asked me yesterday”. And once he’s done gaming he runs out the door to spend time with them. We play happy family for social media, everyone thinks we are madly in love - at least they have it half right. I’m in love with him. He comes home we fight he goes to sleep on the couch and I blame myself for his shitty behaviour and I beg him to come back to bed.

For years I tell him everyday “I love you” before he leaves for work in the morning, before whenever I leave the house, before he leaves the house for anything, before he goes out field, when he’s having a shit day. I tell him I think he’s handsome almost every day. I’m grunted at or hear a “love you too” and it feels like an invisible bruise.

I go out to coffee with a friend and she’s introducing me to her baby, I love him - he cries and I put on Mozart and he’s out like a light - call me the baby whisperer. We’re friends from high school and we’ve known each other forever. She tells me I shouldn’t move, it’s a bad idea. Secretly I know it is too. I tell her I love him but if it doesn’t work at least I haven’t moved down there if I stay here a bit longer if he does something. She tells me she thinks he’s cruel, emotionally abusive and he’s wasting my time, silently I agree but I hold onto this tiny flame of hope that he will change. She says “You need a man, not a boy”.

The end of the year is coming and quickly and I have this streak of overwhelming anxiety because I know he’s moving. He’s posting away. We’ve agreed I’ll hang back till I can get a transfer with work or find something down there. I feel this burning sensation in the backs of my eyes for weeks. I desperately want to cry and beg him not to go but I know that will do nothing. He tells me “Don’t you cry”. He leaves and I’m watching out the window as he drives off with his dad in toe. Tears roll down my cheeks, deep down I have this feeling and it’s saying “He’s going to hurt you, he doesn’t love you. He’s going to leave you. He’s going to fuck another girl”. For two weeks I drink and then I start taking sleeping pills so I can knock myself out and have decent nights sleep, I’m too busy laying there staring at the ceiling if I don’t. I feel like I’m going crazy and I keep telling my friends “I don’t trust him, I’m so stressed out”.

The days they feel so much longer without him around. I’m trying my best. I’m still running errands, I’m holding down the fort, I’m feeding the dogs and taking them on walks, I’m bpaying all the bills on his behalf for him, I’m trying to call within the right times because of daylight savings. I call and he tells me “You need to ask me if you can call first, I’m busy”. Suspicions arise. “I shouldn’t have to, you’re on leave... I would if you were working but you’re not”. He lags in response to my messages and stops answering my calls. I can see him responding to friends messages and ignoring mine. I see him deleting messages to a friend and I question him - “You won’t like what he sends me”, I become aware and cautious. I’m hanging out with an old friend and I tell him, he asks me what my Facebook password is and I have nothing to hide. I pass it on. He tells me the next day he didn’t go into my messenger but I can see in my settings I’m logged into a Samsung S10 in Tamworth and I confront him. He says “that’s weird because I’m not” and I say “that’s weird because I don’t own a Samsung S10 and I’m not in Tamworth”.

I later go trawling through his messages and I see a message to his sister... “I’m sorry, I’m not coming to training this afternoon, I’m going to see a mate in Armidale, he’s posting away”... I message him and ask him what he’s doing and he says “having drinks with my sister”. I’m already very aware that this is a lie. I contact his dad because he doesn’t message me for a bit and I say “Hey, Is he still having drinks with his sister?” And his dad doesn’t respond. I go back into his messenger and I can see his dad messaging him “she’s asking me if you’re having drinks with your sister, what do you want me to tell her?”... you see I’ve already searched his messenger and there is no friend in Armidale in his messenger contacts. I did go into his Facebook and find a girls name consistently come up and she’s located in Armidale. I message him and I say “Can you please be honest with me for once”, he says “you’re not going to get much out of me my phone is on 1%”. I messaged again; “Are you in Armidale with another girl?”, I got no response. I go back to his messenger and I see him message his dad back “I know, I’m not talking to her, she’s being too much, just tell her I’ve gone to bed”. I wait for the message covering his son’s cheating ass - received. All I wanted was a straight answer. He messaged me the next day and said he was going to meet up with her and didn’t. It wasn’t until weeks later that I called his bluff and told him I had contacted her and she told me she had seen him... he said “Just because I hung out with her doesn’t make her a whore”. We talk some more and he calls me crazy again. He tells me he doesn’t love me and hasn’t for a while. I’m broken, I’m shattered.

I collapse on the shower floor, the hot water dripping down my body to soothe me. I’m crying, I’m sobbing. Lily; her eyes are so big and round, her brow furrowed with concern, she slowly approaches me looking at me and licks my hand. She’s been my biggest support, she’s my biggest companion. She’s always been there for me and has come to my rescue numerous times putting herself between me and our old dog that was sick and tried to attack me several times. She knows when I’m vulnerable. I’ve been so loyal, I’ve never cheated, I love him and I pour all my energy into him, why am I not good enough? Why am I never good enough? I feel like running a warm bath and taking one of his knives and dragging it along my wrists because I don’t want to have to deal with feeling these emotions, I’m not good enough. I don’t think I’ll ever be good enough. I feel like it’s hard to breathe at times and all the walls are closing in, I panic and I’ll message a friend who says “it’s okay”. I want to be loved. I want a family in the future. I want a man who loves every part of me and who supports me in being happy and healthy. I want what many other people want; someone who is committed and doesn’t make me feel unworthy like I have felt over the last four years. I continue to lay there in the foetal position holding onto myself. I eventually stand up and I scream at the top of my lungs because I have so much pain, hurt and anger and that’s all I can manage because I don’t have that will power to kill myself. I’ve spent years looking beyond his flaws and seeing the good in him, because I love him. This isn’t right.

He leaves me with all his crap, two dogs, and to move house on my own, he says “I’m not leaving you to do everything on your own” but he does, and I do it with the help of three friends. The three friends they look around and say “He really did leave you to do everything”. I pack all his things into black plastic bags and I find his aftershave, I take a break and I lock myself in the bathroom and I sit down for five minutes and I open it up and smell it - that refreshing smell. I take a moment and I throw it into one of the bags. I find one of his t-shirts and I hug it, I can smell his deodorant on it and I cry because I miss him and I know that’s the last I’ll have to deal with the senses of knowing he’s there. I it also into a bag and I do it up, I don’t want to look at his stuff again. I want to wipe if from my mind, quite frankly I want to bin it all.

He messages me asking me questions and I tell him to sort it out on his own, deep down I just want to say “I miss you, I love you” but I hold my ground and keep it direct and civil because that would change nothing. I’ve been answering his beck and call for years, “I’m tired of having the same conversation” I tell him, he excuses himself and says he’s been working and to several different bases in two weeks so it’s not at the front of his mind, reluctant I tell him “That’s not my problem” I’m now trying to break away he’s a big boy and doesn’t need me telling him what to do, I’m not his mother. He tells me I’m being a smart cunt and I made an issue out of nothing. I don’t bother responding because I am so fucking exhausted of playing “Mummy” to a 22 year old adult male. Suddenly a sigh of relief: “Thank god we aren’t married”, “Thank god we don’t have kids” (the dogs are close enough), “Thank god we don’t own a house together”.

I go to my first therapy session and my psychologist is blunt. He’s a clinical psychologist. The kind of psychologist I like. We quit the lovely dovey warm crap and cut to the chase, he looks at me and says pointedly “Your depression scores are incredibly high, but I won’t put you on medication because I know it will hinder your career choice that you’re aiming for. I can see you’re hurting, I can see it in your eyes and I can see you’re tired. He’s gaslighted you for years, he’s a piece of shit. You’re progressing really well though, more so than the other people I see who are still stuck in those really depressive stages. Let’s figure out how to move you forward”.

I start doing life without him, I feel like how Ariel must have felt when she was standing on her own two feet for the first time, I feel like I’m 18 again and I just moved out of home and I’m learning how to adult at an accelerated pace again. I can walk the dogs with no complaints. I can do the grocery shopping without hearing the huffing and puffing in the background. I come home and I feel like I’m not walking on eggshells. I can do the laundry without having a rant at finding the wet clothes/sheets just dumped in a pile on the washing line or stacks of dishes laying around. If I don’t want something in my way in the house I don’t need to ask a 22 year old child to move it - because theres nothing there to move. He never remembered my birthday - 24/04/1992 the day before Anzac Day, every year... It’s not hard to forget. I’m laying in bed staring at the ceiling and I don’t feel like crying. At times I feel lonely then I remember how alone he made me feel when we were dating... and then other times I feel so much more alive than I did a couple of months ago. I don’t feel like the biggest piece of shit in the world anymore, I resented being asked “Do you want to fuck him?” whenever he saw messages from guys in my messenger literally asking me if I’m okay or how I am - because it made me feel like utter filth when I was so committed in the relationship. I’m finally moving on.

It’s been 5 weeks. Friends, they reach out because they care, I’m grateful, and sometimes I reach out to them because I’m panicking and having an anxiety trip - thank you for responding, I love you all. I’ve lost 9kg and on a mission to lose more and get my booty back. I’m looking to go back to roller skating. I’m applying as an RFS volunteer. I’ve brushed the dreadlocks out of my hair, I’m wearing make up and for the first time in 4 years... I feel human. I’ve questioned myself for years... “Am I not attractive enough? Am I shit in bed? Am I really that fucking horrible he has to go looking elsewhere?”... He never once told me he thought I was beautiful - in fact the one time he did it was because a friend told him to because I was having a really shit day, completely resenting myself and my weight gain... and I found the message from her to him, I suppose it was something I wanted to hear because he just kept hurting me and I felt like I was not attractive enough and that’s why he kept looking elsewhere. The more I reflect the more I become aware it’s a him issue. I’ve booked in for my next therapy session. I refuse to go back on a dating app. If I date someone I feel it has to be someone I already know or someone I have connected with. I’m cautious. I will love again because I won’t let this experience dictate the rest of my life. I know I will trust again but it will take time and patience, when the right guy comes along I know he will respect that. I feel less harsh on myself. But I’m finding it hard to love myself again but I know with time it will be easier. I’ll get back to where I was and I won’t look back. There are times where I sincerely wish I had cut the cord years ago rather than begged to just end it if the behaviour wouldn’t change and I would be filled with empty promises and nothing changed.

I swear if at any point in my life I ever have a son I will raise him to never treat a woman so disrespectfully, I will raise him to be honest and to not use their partner as a cop out excuse. If I ever have a daughter I will also raise her to be honest and to walk away from a trash partner before she begins a process of self loathing and unworthyness. If you’re in a relationship similar to this walk away now. Know your self worth, because I lost mine and it’s going to take what feels like forever to gain it back.

I love you; I love you for cheating on me and fucking right off out of my life so I can finally breathe, I can finally meet someone who will love me and show me respect and I will give them the same back. I love you for allowing me to have the opportunity to be healthy and happy again. I love you for allowing me to pour all the positive love I had for you towards someone new one day and I hope they appreciate it anot let it go to waste like you did. Here’s to 2020, and here’s to my new life.

PS. Here’s a direct message from me to you if the shoe fits; Hooroo and Go fuck yourself.

[private95]

A Day In Dalaran

(On Ao3)

It had been an exhausting few weeks that followed the events of the battle Jaina took part in. Reports were requested, written, delivered, requested again and so on. Rhonin was a great help through all of this. Doing everything he could and making sure that Jaina ate and got to her room at the end of the day.

Another day. Another bunch of papers to fill in and classes to attend.

With her hands full of scrolls, Jaina was navigating the halls to her next class when, upon turning a corner, she collided with someone, everything she was holding tumbling onto the floor.

“Oh, Tides! I’m so sorry!”

“No, I should be the one apolo-”

Two pairs of eyes met and smiles bloomed.

“Ah! Lady Proudmoore! What a pleasant surprise!”

“Jaina is just fine, Lieutenant Windrunner.”

“Vereesa then, I insist.”

They both picked the dropped scrolls and Vereesa handed them to Jaina.

“What brings you to Dalaran, Vereesa?”

“Playing the messenger, you see.” Was the reply, as Vereesa patted a lather bag on her side. “Not exactly complaining. This is sure better that worrying about skirmishes on our borders.”

Jaina nodded with a smile.

“Can’t agree more.”

“Speaking of. My squadron deemed you a hero and an honorable soldier to the Rangers.” Jaina couldn’t help but blush, shaking her head. “They are going to be so jealous when I tell them I’ve got a chance to talk to you.”

“I did nothing so spectacular to earn such a high praise.”

“You don’t give yourself enough credit, Jaina.” Vereesa said with a kind smile. “You alone saved a lot of our soldiers and without you, who knows, Sylvanas might not have been with us still.”

At that Jaina shuddered. She tried to push the memories of Lady Windrunner bleeding. There being more blood than Jaina would have liked. Her whizzing, ragged breathing. Her skin paling by the seconds. Jaina shook her head.

She still had that nightmare from time to time.

“How is Lady Windrunner fairing by the way?”

“Bah, still a pain in the ass.” Jaina really tried to hold back the giggle, but she was weak. “And refusing to let Lor’themar deal with all the reports and finally get on leave so we can rest from her.”

They both chuckled and Jaina was just about to ask Vereesa something else when she heard Rhonin’s voice. “Jaina! There you are!” Both her and Vereesa turned and Jaina smiled at him.

“I was just heading to class, Rhonin. You needed something?” That was when she noticed a stack of papers he was holding which made her groan. “Please tell me this is not what I think this is.”  

“As much as I would like that, I can’t.” He smiled innocently. “You know me, Jaina. I’m an honest man.” With a deep frown Jaina grabbed the papers from him. “You know where you can shove that honesty of yours at this moment?” Rhonin laughed again and then Jaina watched him finally notice Vereesa. With a smug smile, Jaina noted the way his cheeks dusted with a light shade of pink. She was honestly surprised when she saw Vereesa looking back at Rhonin, her cheeks were just a tab bit brighter shade of red. Jaina just stood between the two, eyes darting from Rhonin to Vereesa and back. Rhonin was the first the gather himself, clearing his throat. “Forgive me my rudeness, my lady. Rhonin Redhair. At your service.” “Vereesa Windrunner. A pleasure to make your acquaintance, Rhonin.” “The pleasure is all mine, my lady.” He gave Vereesa his most charming smile and Jaina rolled her eyes so hard she was surprised she didn't see the back of her skull. She quickly smiled when Vereesa turned to her. “I'm sorry, but I must leave you, Jaina. These documents won't deliver themselves.” “I wouldn't dare holding you back any longer. You know where to find me. I'd always be happy to see you whenever you find yourself in Dalaran. And gave Lady Windrunner my regards.” “The same sentiment goes to you as well, Jaina. You should visit every time you're in Silvermoon.” The smile she gave her next made Jaina worry. It was the smile full of mischief and of an unspoken secrets that Jaina wasn't in on but was linked to. “And I’m sure Sylvanas would appreciate it.” Jaina barely contained another eyeroll when Vereesa turned to Rhonin, giving him a small and somewhat shy smile. “Again. A pleasure meeting you, Rhonin.”

“And you as well, my lady.”

Only when Vereesa’s footsteps were a distant echo down the hallway, did he turned to Jaina.

“Well, you keep an interesting company, Jaina.”

“How so?”

“You just seem to surround yourself with powerful and well known people.” Jaina shrugged.

“It’s not like I’m doing it on purpose, Rhonin.”

There was a moment of silence between them. Jaina was already planning the rest of her day ahead now that she had another heap of reports and papers to write - on top of her lessons - when Rhonin nudged her lightly.

“Do you think I have a chance on talking to Lady Windrunner again?”

Groaning loudly, Jaina swiftly turned on her heels and continued on her way to her first class. She almost turned around and threw an ice lance an Rhonin when he called after her:

“Is that a ‘yes’?!”

Two weeks later and Jaina finally was left alone and the stream of questions about Quel’Thalas’ protection wards tapered off. She could finally get back to her books and her studies.

She was heading to her room after a long, but productive day of classes when she was called over but one of the older mages.

“There’s someone asking for you.” Jaina frowned.

“Asking for me? Where?”

“In the grand hall.”

Thanking her fellow mage, Jaina quickly went to her room, disposing of her bag and books before heading down to the entrance of the Violet Citadel.

Looking around, she saw a few mages, some soldiers and Paladins and common folk. Everyone was talking between each other and no one was alone or out of place. Was there actually someone looking for her? Or was it Rhonin again, trying to make her leave her room more often?

Jaina almost jumped out of her skin when someone tapped her on the shoulder. She spun around, ready to slap whoever it was… and came face to face with a laughing Ranger-General.

“Forgive me, Lady Jaina. I didn’t mean to startle you.”

“Lady Windrunner!” Jaina placed a hand over her heart, making sure it stayed inside her chest. “I’m starting to think that you enjoy scaring me way too much.” Lady Windrunner raised her hands up, still shaking with laughter.

“I’m truly, terribly sorry, Lady Jaina.”

Jaina took another deep breath, gathering herself together and looking up at Lady Windrunner again. “What brings you to Dalaran? Besides the fact that you wanted to scare my spirit out of my body?”

“Well, you see,” Lady Windrunner started, putting hands behind her back, a stance that was a second nature to her by then, Jaina guessed. “I’m on my leave, currently. And everyone around me insisted that I spend it somewhere away from them.”

Jaina couldn’t help but giggle. “I believe Vereesa mentioned something along those lines.”

“Or course she did.” Lady Windrunner grumbled. “My point is, I will be in Dalaran for the next four days and I was hoping that you’d show me around?”

“This isn’t your first time in Dalaran, is it?”

“It isn’t, but before that I’ve only been here because of important matters and didn’t get a chance to explore.” Sylvanas said, with a smile. “And I was hoping that you’d have some time to, perhaps, show me the city?”

“Oh.” Jaina was shocked, to say the least. “Oh, um… I’d be happy to, Lady Windrunner! I- I, um… I’m going to be free tomorrow, so i-if you’re so inclined, we could explore the city.”

Lady Windrunner chuckled, “I’d be most happy to. What time and where can I meet you?”

“P-perhaps here, by noon?”

With another charming smile, Lady Windrunner took her hand, leaning down and pressing a kiss to Jaina’s knuckles. “It is set then. I cannot wait for tomorrow, Lady Jaina.”

She left and Jaina was still standing there, face set ablaze and the feeling of soft lips and warm breath still on her skin.

Jaina was embarrassed how long she’d spent in front of her cupboard and mirror, choosing what to wear. She berated herself the whole time. You’re not heading out for a date, for Tides’ sake! She chose her favorite Kul Tiran green skirt and flowy white blouse and a pair of her warn in boots that she always wore when heading for a sail with her father. Brushing her hair and quickly washed her face and finally happy with what she saw in the mirror, she locked her room and headed out.

Jaina stood on the steps of the Violet Citadel, looking through the stream of people, trying to spot Lady Windrunner. It wasn’t that hard. Her impressive and rather intimidated height was easy to spot in the crowd of people who were mostly a head shorter. Jaina's heart hammered wildly in her chest when Lady Windrunner spotted her on the steps and headed right towards her with a bright smile.

How's Lady Windrunner even more beautiful in her common clothes?

Jaina immediately shook her head, her face blazing hotter. No, no, no. Those thoughts were not welcomed. But she did look somewhat dashing in her yellow, almost golden, silk tunic and leather breeches and boots.

She stopped a step below. “Forgive me, have you been waiting here for long?”

“N-no. I've been here for a couple of minutes only.”

Lady Windrunner offered her hand, “shall we?”

With a shy smile, Jaina took the offered hand and weaving through the crowd, led Lady Windrunner to the first destination she thought of.

Leading Lady Windrunner down the most decorated street, Jaina told her about the buildings and stores Ranger-General might be interested in. Lady Windrunner, on her end, commented on where she thought things and designs reminded her of Silvermoon.

Their first stop was a small inn that Jaina stumbled upon when she first came to Dalaran. It was tucked away between houses and was quieter than most, but what Jaina like about it was the diversity in the kitchen. They had dishes of almost every nation on their menu. But to Jaina, most important was their fisher’s pie that reminded her of home.

Her and Lady Windrunner found themselves a table at the back on the inn and ordered. The conversation continued and Jaina couldn’t help but wonder how easy it was talking to the other woman. She couldn’t help but think about when it all was gonna go down the hill. Everything was too good to be true.

“Would you be so kind as to stop giving my food that look?” Jaina asked, pointing her fork at Lady Windrunner, who was looking at her fisher’s pie with a look of pure disgust.

“You will have to forgive me, Lady Jaina, but that looks absolutely ghastly!”

Jaina gasped, with caricature look of hurt on her face. “How dare you! This is the famous dish from Kul Tiras!”

“I’ll admit that the crust looks good, but the stuffing looks like a vile grey blob!” Lady Windrunner shot back, scrunching up her nose even more.

“Preposterous! You haven’t even tried it!” Piling some crust and stuffing onto her fork, she pointed it towards Lady Windrunner again, who recoiled, leaning as far away as possible.

“Lady Jaina, I will do almost everything for you,” her face twisted in a queasy grimace and Jaina had to bite the inside of her cheek to stop herself from laughing. “But I draw the line at this.” She spat the last word.

“Oh, please, Lady Windrunner! I promise it’s delicious!”

They went into a stare down. Jaina was not backing up now. She would make Ranger-General submit to her will and it would be a glorious victory. Lady Windrunner was leveling her with an intense gaze of her own. Jaina knew that the stand-off would be long but she’d be damned if she backed off. She’s a Proudmoore. And Proudmoores were nothing if not persistent and stubborn.

She expected another scoff and a flinch as Lady Windrunner pulls away and returns to her own meal and only then Jaina would relent, because it would be a small victory all on itself (because she even had courage in the first place to go that far with the whole thing without her face going ablaze). What she didn’t expect was a deep breath in from Lady Windrunner and her leaning forward and taking the forkful into her mouth and pulling back.

Jaina sat, holding her breath, watching her chew. She couldn’t help but break out laughing as Lady Windrunner's face morphed into the look of pure abhorrence that made Jaina almost fall out of the chair with the force of her laughter.

“Why is it so salty?” Lady Windrunner mumbled over a mouthful, not daring to swallow.

“Because it’s supposed to be!” Jaina said through her, at that point, hysterical laughter.

“And the texture!” She made a show of gulping down the pie and quickly grabbing her tankard and almost draining it. “It’s appalling!” But Jaina just kept on laughing, swearing to always remember this moment.

They’d left the inn after they’d finished their food. After the short argument about who should pay and after Lady Windrunner quickly tossed the coins in barmaid’s hand they headed for Runeweaver Square. They mingled through the stalls and people. Jaina hanged back by the flower stall, thinking that maybe her room could use some color. She could enchant them perhaps so they stay alive? Otherwise they’d weather for sure. She mover on to the next stall, glancing over the wares. Glancing back Jaina smiled when Lady Windrunner navigated the crowd towards her. Jaina just opened her mouth to suggest heading to the park, when Lady Windrunner reaches her hand and tucked hair behind Jaina's ear and then placed a flower in her hair.

Jaina just stood there, flabbergasted, already feeling the heat creeping into her face. Lady Windrunner smiled down at her and said softly.

“Forgive me, Lady Jaina, I couldn’t help myself.”

Sputtering and mumbling under her breath, Jaina turned around and headed to the park, trying to ignore the low chuckle behind her.

And again, Jaina became hyperaware of Lady Windrunner's presence by her side. The warmth radiating from her body, the smooth baritone of her voice. Jaina could barely remember what they were talking about for the rest of their walk. All her thoughts were focused on Lady Windrunner. The warmth, the cadence of her accented voice, the light pressure of her hand on the small of her back.

With the sun slowly lowering behind the buildings and the sky taking on the warm orange hue, Lady Windrunner walked Jaina back to the Violet Citadel.

“I thank you for sacrificing your day to show me around Dalaran.” Lady Windrunner said as Jaina stopped before the stairs of the Citadel. “I’ve had a wonderful time.”

“I’m glad to hear that, Lady Windrunner.” Jaina said with a smile, hoping her cheeks weren’t as bright red as they felt.

“I hope I can find and still you away for one more day before I leave back for Silvermoon.”

“That would be most wonderful, Lady Windrunner.”

Jaina's smile turned shy when Ranger-General took her hand, bringing it to her lips and pressing a soft kiss to the back of Jaina's hand. Then, she leaned down even further and pressing another kiss to Jaina's cheek.

“Then I cannot wait. Have a good night, Lady Jaina.”

Her head up in the clouds and her lips stretched in a dreamy smile, Jaina was on her way to her room. She was warm and fuzzy, in her little world of possibilities and sweet fantasies of just as sweet kisses and touches, when she was cruelly brought back by the voice of her friend.

“Jaina! There you are! Where have you be-” Rhonin stopped before her, looking her up and down. “Would you look at that! You were outside! On you own volition!”

“Yes, I was Rhonin.” She smiled, hoping he wouldn’t question everything too much.

“Good-good. I’m glad I didn’t have to drag you out of your room again.”

“Was that why you were looking for me?”

“Indeed.” Rhonin smiled, before turning around and being on his way. “I won’t hold you back any more. Enjoy the rest of your evening.” He was half way down the ha;;, when he added over his shoulder. “I like the flower, by the by. Brings out the blue of your eyes.”

Jaina frowned before remembering the flower Lady Windrunner had put behind her ear. She carefully took the blossom from her hair and looked at it. Big wide bright blue petals with white middle and tips on petals. With a smile, Jaina brought the flower to her nose and inhaled. The scent was faint but sweet.

Jaina couldn’t remember when was the last time that she slept so soundly. With her dreams so pleasant.

And the flower, enchanted to never whither, rested in a thin glass vase on her desk.

1. A Faithful Meeting

2. A Day in Silvermoon

3. The Angel On The Battlefield

[sweetme86]

Friendly proposals

It’s finally here!!! Several days late, because life keeps throwing me curve-balls, but at last the wait is over. 

This is written for @abovethesmokestacks​ Summer Madness Challenge, and is based on the prompt “We are not getting married!” which you’ll find in the fic in bolded letters :) 

I hope you enjoy it, it’s the first thing I’ve written in months and months. 

Word count: 1,494

Pairing: Steve/Bucky

Tags: College AU, Friends to Lovers, And They Were Roommates!

Title: Friendly proposals

Find it on AO3 here!

“Give it a rest Stevie,” Bucky sighed, “I checked every financial aid option out there, there’s nothing else to it. I’ll just get a job until I’m 24 and then start over or something.”

“You’re not dropping out Buck, we’ll figure something out.” He kept scrolling mulishly through the dozen or so tabs he had open about college tuition, loan applications, scholarships and anything else he could think of that would help Bucky pay for college.

There wasn’t a whole lot that Bucky hadn’t already tried, he hadn’t been lying when he told Steve he exhausted his options.

“You know you’re not considered automatically independent by your 24th birthday? You have to be 24 on January first for that to work. That’s almost an entire extra year of not going to school Buck!”

Steve heard Bucky groan into the pillows of the couch he was basically drowning in. “Can you just.. not right now? Let’s just drink tonight and forget about it, we can pick this up again in the morning”

“Fine, yeah that’s. Let’s do that, this is depressing” Steve sighed.

***

“Buck!” Steve burst through Bucky’s bedroom door the next morning, laptop in hand, “Buck, I think I got it!”

“Ungfh” was the only response he got.

“C’mon Buck, told you you weren’t dropping out!” He said excitedly as he dropped down on the foot of Bucky’s bed.

“Steve...” Bucky groaned, “Stevie. ‘s still bedtime. See?” An arm came waving from under the duvet in the general direction of the window, “drapes closed, still bedtime, now shhh”.

He tucked his hand back under his pillow and wiggled around a little to get comfortable again when Steve said, “Fine, sleep the day away. Just thought you should know we’re getting married and you’re not dropping out.” With a pat to the leg sticking out from under Bucky’s duvet he got up and made his way back to their living room.

The wiggling immediately stopped, but Steve had made it back to the living room by the time he heard Bucky shout “What?!”

“We are not getting married.” Bucky said as he launched himself over the back of the couch, landing close to Steve and making the couch dip just enough to make him lean into Bucky a little.

It had taken Bucky a considerable amount of time to actually manage to get out of bed after Steve's very unexpected proposal of sorts, but eventually he got up and after pointedly opening the drapes he joined Steve in their shared living room.

Steve closed his sketchbook and glanced over at Bucky’s face. His face flushed as he said maybe a little too loud “You’re not dropping out Buck. Besides, we can just get a divorce or something in a couple years when everything's settled” he finished in a much more subdued tone.

The casual nonchalance Steve was trying to portray seemed a little forced to Bucky, but he wrote it off as the lingering side-effects of being raised Catholic, even if the religion hadn't quite stuck.

He didn’t look at Steve as he replied “No. We’re not getting married.” He crossed his arms and sank down a little further in the couch, but didn’t say anything else. Steve would’ve sworn he saw a pout on those lips but knew better than to comment. Noticing Bucky's pout wasn’t uncommon for Steve, but commenting on it would bring attention to the fact that noticing Bucky’s lips was something he did. He did, often, but Bucky didn’t need to know that.

So instead he did what he did best. He argued. “Why would you choose to drop out if we can just get married? We already live together, I don’t know if this is the kind of situation where people would come and check if we’re actually together but I seriously doubt it.”

He had a hard time sounding as confident as he wanted to be, because the mere idea of getting married to Bucky made his heart skip a beat. He knew they were just friends and had been forever, it wasn’t like this would suddenly change just because they signed their names on a piece of paper, but still. It’d be a bit strange proposing marriage to the guy you low-key had a crush on since hitting puberty without getting a little jittery. Even if it was for a sham marriage.

When Bucky stayed silent, still glowering at the coffee table instead of at him, Steve soldiered on. Best to get it all out at once so everything was out in the open. “It’s not as if the divorce’ll be difficult right. Won’t even cost much, I checked. The people that complain about divorce being expensive are just all those folks fighting each other on every decision. We can just have one of those friendly divorces where we both agree to it and stay friends after. I think it’s the lawyers fighting with each other that makes divorce expensive.”

Bucky still wasn’t looking at him, or even arguing back. Which was odd. He usually at least glared at Steve whenever he did or said something stupid. Bucky’s jaw tightened and he looked away. He muttered something, but Steve didn’t catch what he said.

“C’mon Buck, is the idea of getting married to me really so bad you’d rather drop out of school?” he asked.

“What, no!” Bucky finally turned towards Steve with an incredulous look on his face. “You're an idiot if that’s what you think!” he said as he got up and walked around the couch. He turned on the spot so he was facing Steve again, but for once Steve couldn’t get a read on his face. “Getting married isn’t the hard part Steve, it’s the part where it’s a sham and the part where we’re already planning the divorce that I don’t think I can do! Do you seriously not know this? I mean I know you’ve always just kinda ignored the awkward one-sided feelings thing for the sake of our friendship, but - damn it I can’t do this” he muttered as he made his way into the kitchen, away from Steve.

For a minute Steve stayed seated, dumbfounded, listening to Bucky getting a glass of water and draining it in a few gulps. Bucky was filling his glass for the second time when Steve found his voice again and said softly, “feelings?”.

“Oh don’t pretend this is news. We talked about this years ago!” Bucky sighed in frustration and put his glass down. “I know you meant well, but it’s just a bad idea all 'round.”

Steve followed Bucky into the kitchen and when he turned towards him again he was shocked to see him so withdrawn. “What the hell d’you mean Buck? We’ve never talked about anything like this at all”.

“Yeah we did. Back in high school. One of those stupid hot days when we couldn’t decide if it was a better idea to just stay inside where the sun couldn’t get us or to sit outside where we could maybe still catch a bit of a breeze, so we just kinda -”

“Hung out on the fire-escape?” Steve finished with a chuckle as Bucky trailed off.

“Yeah.” Bucky said. “I made some stupid joke you thought was hilarious for some reason and you were laughing your ass off. That’s when I couldn’t stop myself and I told you I loved you and you just kept laughing until you said ‘I love you too Buck, you’re my best friend’. So I just... never brought it up again.”

“Buck...” Steve said, “I -”

But Bucky interrupted him, “No it’s fine Steve, just, let’s just forget about this and find some other way I can stay in school alright”.

“No.” Steve said forcefully, “I am not forgetting about this, because apparently we don’t know each other as well as I thought we did, because you’ve got it all wrong if you think any feelings you might have are one-sided.”

Bucky had never looked more like a deer caught in headlights as he did just then. “Huh?” was his eloquent response, because he honestly wasn’t capable of anything resembling an actual sentence at that point. “How, wait, what?” That wasn’t all that much better, but at least they were actual words if not yet a sentence.

“I have been in love with you since I was fourteen years old and you were cleaning cuts on my knuckles for the umpteenth time. You love me, you said so and you can’t take it back. So, we might as well get married – no be quiet Buck, I’m talking now – we might as well get married without the divorce-plans, so we can spend the rest of our lives together and you can stay in school.”

“How would it look if I accepted a proposal from a guy I only just started dating Steve?” Bucky replied with the dopiest grin Steve had ever seen on his face.

*the end*

[california-grethan]

Under False Pretenses - Hidden Identity // {G. Dolan}

Description: As a fangirl, there was nothing that hurt more than knowing you might not ever meet those you idolize. That was probably the most difficult aspect of the entire thing: nights were often spent wishing that you could be in their life, having the ability to text or call them whenever. But, no. The harsh reality was that they didn’t know of your existence, yet you continued to fangirl and support them on a website that they don't even visit. Why? Well, they were your happiness. There was also nothing that you loved more than being able to escape to this website, bonding with others that felt the same way as you. It was your happy place, your safe haven; the one place that you could shamelessly showcase your love for the two boys that made you happy. 

Warning(s): there’s really nothing I can think of🙃

Requested: [yeahhh] // [nopeee]

Word Count: [2,514]

masterlist // blurb nights // come talk to me!

His P.O.V

I’m stuck in bed, sick with a ridiculously high fever. I feel absolutely miserable, and it’s made worse by the fact that we have to skip a Tuesday because I’m too sick to film. I hated this entire situation. I hated being sick. I hated being stuck in bed. But most importantly, I hated letting our fans down. I couldn’t help but feel like it; they were our entire world. Ethan and I would be nothing without them; they’re responsible for the successes that we’ve been blessed with.

I wish I could talk to each and every single one of them, so I could tell them how much they mean to me. It was hard, though. There were so many of them and they were all over the world. Social media made connecting with them feasible, but it was hard to be able to give them all the recognition they deserve.

They were all such incredible people who continue to blow my mind every single day. So many of them were such creative human beings: making edits, drawing incredible portraits of us, writing about us. Our fans were definitely the best and I hoped, everyday, that every single one of them knew it.

I was cocooned in blanket, shivering despite the fact that I was emitting so much heat. I couldn’t help but feel sorry for myself as I blew my nose, adding yet another tissue to the massive pile on the floor next to my bed. Hearing the sound of my door creak open, I turn my head to the door, waiting for Ethan to come into the room.

He gave me a pitying smile, “Hey, bro. How’re you feeling?’

I coughed, groaning because it hurt. “Like absolute shit, but I’d feel better if you cuddled with me,” I mumbled jokingly.

Ethan stayed standing by the door, no doubt wanting to stay away so he wouldn’t catch what I was sick with. He grimaced at my words, “Bro, what?”

Giving him a shit-eating grin, I repeated myself, “I feel like absolute shit, but I’d feel better if you cuddled with me.”

He rolled his eyes at me, “Dude, whatever. Listen, I’m gonna head out for a little bit because Bryant wants to get the shoot with the Ducati done. Is that good? Or do you seriously need me to stay home with you?”

I shook my head. “No, go ahead. I’ll be fine. I’ll probably just stay in bed all day,” I managed to get out, my voice sounding hoarse.

“Alright, do you want me to pick up any food on my way home?”

“Could you buy some soup? Oh, and medicine. We don’t have any.”

“Yeah, sure. I’ll see you later. Remember to keep hydrated.” He shut the door behind him, leaving me in the quiet of my room. I turned back to the TV, grimacing because of how loud it was. I reached for the remote, turning it down as it did nothing to soothe my pounding headache.

I sighed dejectedly, not knowing what to do with myself. Grabbing my phone and unplugging it from its charger, I unlock it. I turned the brightness all the way down, the screen far too bright for my liking. Mindlessly scrolling through social media, I like and retweet posts I stumble upon. Social media was a goddamn black hole, one post leads me to another and before I know it, I’m looking through Tumblr, reading fanfiction about Ethan and I.

Whenever I found myself on this app, I end up going through blogs for hours. Every single fan that ran a blog was so dedicated; it was absolutely mind-blowing. This time, a certain blog catches my eye because of a post that was written about me, more specifically, about my laugh.

---

I want you to close your eyes for a second and do me one favor. I want you to imagine the most wonderful sound that you can think of: a favorite song, the sound of the waves crashing against the ocean, the crunch of fallen leaves as you walk on them, it can be anything.

…

God. His laugh was truly mellifluous. It was the best sound I’ve had the pleasure to hear, both through a speaker and in real life. It was simply angelic, which made sense because he was an angel sent from above, I was sure of it.

There was so much about it that I absolutely adored; it wasn’t just the sound itself, but rather everything associated with it: from the way his face would scrunch up as he did so, to the way his arms would curl into his body during the process.

…

His laughter was infectious. I couldn’t help but to giggle to myself whenever the sound floated through the air. It was one of those sounds that had the power to make a person happy because it was laced with happiness. What person can’t help but to be happy in the presence of happiness?

…

His eyes were the first to indicate that laughter was about to come. There would be a light in them that screamed excitement. Then, the apples of cheeks became more prominent as his lips curled into a giant grin, his rows of perfect white teeth showing. Lastly, he would throw his head back: this was the best sight because it indicated that it was a genuine laugh. But there was nothing that made me smile even wider than when the sound died out, quickly becoming a wheeze rather than a laugh. This told me truly how funny or entertaining he had found whatever it was that had him laughing.

With that said, was the sound you were thinking of at the beginning still the best sound? Or have I managed to convince you otherwise?

---

I couldn’t help but to simply stare at the screen of my phone when I finished reading. Astounded by the fact that someone could write something so beautiful about my laugh. There was nothing remotely special about it, but whoever wrote it made it sound as if there was. Intrigued by their writing, I click on their blog, trying to learn more about them.

It didn’t take me long to find out that the owner of the blog was a girl. Y/N. After reading other things that she’s posted, her talent for writing was so obvious to me. It was mind blowing. I scroll further down her blog, laughing periodically at some of the things she’s posted. She intrigued me, whoever she was. There was just something about her that made me want to find out more.

Without thinking twice, I click on the button that says “Come Talk to Me:)” and begin typing.

Hi! I just found your blog and I wanted to tell you that everything you’ve written is incredible!

- B. D.💜

Y/N’s P.O.V.

I let my bag drop from my hand, hitting the floor with a ‘thud’. I was absolutely exhausted, my classes for the day sucking up all my energy. Groaning, I collapse onto my bed, hissing in pain when I realize I landed on my laptop.

“Ah, shit. Please don’t be be broken,” I beg, speaking to the inanimate object as if it had a say in whether or not my weight caused it damaged.

I flip over to the other side of my bed, allowing me to grab my laptop from underneath me. Setting it on my lap, I scan it for any possible damage, letting out a breath of relief when I saw that it was perfectly fine.

“Oh, thank God,” I mumble to myself.

Since I already had my laptop out, I decide to log into Tumblr. I immediately smile when the twins pop up on my dash. Scrolling through, I like and reblog posts of the blogs I followed. This was my getaway. No matter how stressed out or tired I was, this website seemed to be able to make me feel better instantly. I don’t know exactly what it was. Maybe it was that when I’m on here, I’m surrounded by others that share my love for the boys. Maybe because it provided me with a creative outlet, a place that gave me the opportunity to share my writing. Or maybe, it was because it was the one place that I never felt judged; everyone in the fandom is so kind and welcoming that I always felt loved, even if none of us had never met.

My eyes lit up when I saw a little ‘1’ pop up next to the icon for my ask box. Clicking on it, I see that someone left an anonymous ask. A smile found its way onto my face as I read it.

Hi! I just found your blog and I wanted to tell you that everything you’ve written is incredible!

- B. D.💜

My heart swelled at the kind words. I clicked onto the ask, quickly typing out a response.

Hey lovely! Thank you so much for taking the time for reading my work and dropping by my asks! Hope you have a great day☺️

I run my blog and write because it makes me happy. I love being part of a fandom and forming friendships with people that share my interests. I choose to write because it’s something that I enjoy and it’s a creative outlet for me. I don’t post anything on my blog with the hopes that I get recognition, it’s simply a bonus of it all. To know that others find enjoyment in the content I create means the world to me and makes me want to share even more of my writing. To others, this entire thing may seem ridiculous, but to me, it’s my one true source of happiness.

I reposition myself on my bed, trying to find a more comfortable way to sit. I click onto a new tab, opening Google Docs and trying to start a new piece so I can finally get something posted. For far too long, I stare at the blank document, the blinking cursor taunting me. Every time I start to write something, I end up hating it, rushing to delete everything I’ve managed to type. My eyebrows furrowed, growing frustrated at the lack of progress that I’ve made so far.

Just as I’m about to admit defeat for the day, an idea immediately pops into my head. I start to type furiously, terrified that my inspiration would leave me. A smile plays on my lips as I add more and more words to the document, falling into a comfortable groove.

I sit back when I finally finish, happy with what I’ve written. Scrolling to the very top of the page, I start reading, looking for mistakes I’ve made and parts that were awkward and needed to be changed. It probably took me longer to edit and revise than it took me to actually write the piece, but it was worth it. There was nothing that brought me more satisfaction than finishing what I’ve written and knowing that I made it the best I possibly could. Knowing that if I spend anymore time criticizing my writing, it would never get posted, I don’t give it anymore thought and post on my blog.

Logging off Tumblr, I shut the lid of my laptop and climb off my bed. I stretch, trying to gain feeling in my limbs before I make my way downstairs to the kitchen in search for some food.

His P.O.V

I look over to my nightstand when I hear my phone vibrate. Groaning, I lean over to pick it up, wanting to see what notification popped up this time. A smile formed on my lips when I saw that it was from the Tumblr app. I couldn’t help but get a little excited when I read that she had posted something new. I click onto the notification, bringing up her newest post.

---

The bright rays of sunlight made their way past the curtains, interrupting your deep slumber. While stretching your arms above your head, you look to your right, your vision only to be met with a gorgeous boy, his skin still retaining its sun-kissed color despite it already being a month into autumn.

You turned your body over, trying your best not to wake the piece of art that rested at your side. your eyes raked down his sleeping figure, admiring the beauty of the human that you were blessed to call yours.

…

His face was calm, peaceful, and younger. Making it seem as if sleep was his only true getaway from the stress of his life. It allowed him to leave everything behind, to forget everything that he had to get done, although it was only for a few hours.

His bleached hair became frizzy in his slumber and was pointing every which way, enticing you to run your fingers through the gorgeous locks. But you resisted once again, not wanting to disturb his peaceful sleep.

The sunlight shifted, now hitting the sleeping figure next to you. The golden glow highlighted his tanned skin, making him look even more like an angel, like God’s gift to this earth.

…

His body turned to face you, his eyes were fully open, his hazel orbs were bright, the sunlight that was hitting him highlighting the greenness of them. His lips contorted to a sleepy smile, making your heart swell even more at the man.

You brought your left hand up to grasp the side of his face gently, your palm coming in contact with the rough scruff that he had managed to grow in the past two weeks due to his laziness to shave. A small smile rested on your face as you caressed his gorgeous face.

He leaned into your grasp as he laughed at your words, his laugh even more magical than his morning voice. “I would do the same thing if I were to wake up before you, just stare and admire at the beauty that I get to call my girlfriend,” his voice was just a whisper, making his words sound like a secret that could only be said between the two of you.

…

“Ok, fine, only because you’re cute.” His chest was pressed up against your back, his hand resting on your slim waist, and his arm stretched above your head to reach for the spice. His long, nimble fingers wrapped around the container and he backed away from your body. You turned to face him, staring at his muscular physique, taking in the angelic figure that you were lucky enough to call your boyfriend.

---

I was amazed yet again. I couldn’t comprehend how someone strings words along the way she did. Hell, I can barely speak the language sometimes. Without thinking twice, I find myself in her asks again, but I stop myself. Nervously, I decide to ditch the idea of leaving her another anonymous ask, messaging her directly instead.

Hey, I’m Bailey...

A/N: I wanna say a big thank you to @tidsoptlmist, @spiffydolan @sunflower-dolans, @graysearring, @spongebobrose, @damndolanz, and @maryneedsadamntish for letting me bother them and have them give me feedback! This is a series that I’m very excited to be writing and I hope you guys enjoy it! 

[aswithasunbeam]

The Three Ten to NYC, A Modern Hamliza Fic

[Read on AO3]

Rating: Teen and Up

Summary: Eliza and Alexander are stuck at Union Station in the middle of the night. Despite long coffee lines, angry tweets, and general sleep deprivation, Eliza is head over heels in love and feels like the luckiest girl in the world.

A fluffy modern hamliza AU

The dull drone of an announcement crackled over the speakers. Eliza listened just long enough to hear something about a delayed southbound train, then tuned it out once again. The line for coffee, which snaked back and forth through several loops of sleep deprived passengers, inched forward a little more, only for the woman who’d finally stepped up to counter to hesitate over her order. Apparently, the fifteen minutes she’d been standing in line wasn’t quite enough time for her to work out what she wanted, Eliza thought with an internal huff.

Trying to block out her frustration, Eliza swiped at the screen of her phone and opened the photo gallery. Alexander’s handsome face grinned at her from the latest picture. It was a photo she’d snapped just hours ago in their cramped hotel room. He’d already removed his jacket and loosened his tie, and he was trying to entice her to join him in the shower.

“I sat through a two hour meeting about climate change and the importance of water conservation today. I’m feeling very motivated.”

“We’re supposed to be washing up and taking a nap,” she’d reminded him, lying atop the covers on their bed scrolling through her phone. “Our train leaves at three in the morning.”

“Yeah, of course,” he’d agreed innocently, slowly removing his tie and backing up towards the bathroom. “This is just about being responsible with precious natural resources.”

“Uh huh.” A dimple had appeared in his cheeks as she’d hummed with disbelief. She’d snapped the picture just before she pushed off the bed to follow him, unable to resist. They’d never quite gotten around to properly washing up or napping. But a little sleep deprivation wasn’t such a high price to pay when he’d looked so damn cute, she granted herself.  

Usually when Alexander traveled to D.C. with the Senator, she remained behind in New York. This time, though, the dates of his trip happened to line up with a child welfare conference that she’d been wanting to attend anyway. Not being away from her new fiancée for a full week had only been an added benefit.

When Senator Washington heard she had accompanied Alexander to D.C., he invited them both to his second home on the Potomac for a quiet dinner. In Mrs. Washington’s kind and capable hands, that quiet dinner had turned into a surprise blowout engagement party, complete with many of Alexander’s oldest friends, a live band, and thousands of white lights strung up from the house all the way down to the river. Eliza wouldn’t have traded that magical night of laughter and dancing for anything in the world.

She was playing with the filter on a picture of the two of them down by the water when she finally found herself at the front of the line. Thrusting her phone into the back pocket of her jeans, she stepped up the counter to order two black coffees and, impulsively, a buttery croissant from the bake case. The two coffees were passed to her over the counter as she paid, allowing her to bypass the huddled mass of customers waiting on lattes and macchiatos. She placed her brown pastry bag on the coffee station to add a half and half to her cup, then headed back towards the benches with her purchases in hand.

Alexander had long since traded his suit jacket and tie for his ratty Columbia sweatshirt before they left the hotel, and thick framed glasses were sliding down his nose. The light from his laptop screen reflected in the lenses pounded at the keyboard. His eyes always carried a slightly bruised quality, but the circles seemed darker in the harsh unnatural lighting, and his face and shoulders looked tense.

“Hello, handsome. Is this seat taken?” Her voice was heavy with exaggerated flirtation and she batted her eyes ridiculously as she sat beside him, hoping to make him laugh.

He smiled weakly and accepted the coffee from her. The drink was still piping hot, but he gulped it down like it was room temperature. Putting the cup down on the bench on his other side, he jabbed his finger at his laptop and said, “Look at this.”

She scooted closer so their shoulders were pressed together while she looked at the screen. Twitter was open, and he was gesturing at a tweet from a senator’s aide in the opposition party. Why he insisted on reading that garbage and getting all riled up over it, she still didn’t understand.

Pressing a kiss to his cheek, she answered vaguely, without really taking in the content of the tweet, “How awful.”

“This kind of blatantly racist bullshit is why we can’t have intelligent, rational conversations about immigration in this country,” he fumed, and switched tabs to a google doc to resume his furious typing. He’d already filled a page and half with text, she noticed. A smile crept over her face as she tried to figure out whether he was writing some kind of op-ed or just an extremely long thread of tweets.

“Any updates on the train?” she asked, interrupting the rant she heard gathering steam under his breath.

“I guess it was delayed coming out of  Richmond,” he answered, still focused on his computer. “They’re estimating another thirty minutes.”

She sighed and pulled the croissant from the paper bag. Splitting the pastry down the middle, she offered Alexander half. He gave it a sidelong glance and shook his head. “I’m not that hungry.”

“You’re sure? You didn’t eat much before we left.”

“Yeah.” He slid his left hand under his glasses to rub his eyes. “My head is killing me.”

“That’s what you get for using up our nap time.”

He smirked and readjusted his glasses. “Nah, it was worth it.”

Leaning over, she placed a kiss against his lips and pushed his laptop closed. He chuckled warmly, although the tension in his brow remained. She ran her fingers through the hair at his temple tenderly. “I think I have Tylenol in my purse. Do you want some?”

He nodded. She bent down to rifle through her bag until she felt the travel sized bottle on the bottom. Dry swallowing the two pills she handed him, he chased them with another gulp of coffee.  

“Want to look at some pictures from the party?” she offered, a transparent ploy to keep him away from twitter. “People have been sharing them with me all day.”

Thankfully, he gave in easily despite the obvious tactic. Twisting on the bench to face her, he invited “Let’s see ‘em.”

She shifted closer so they could both see her phone. He laughed at the first picture of him, Gilbert, and Mulligan with their arms around each other, though she thought she heard a hint of melancholy in the sound. She’d seen dozens of similar photos of the group from over the years, but always with a fourth member: the legendary and beloved Jack, who’d been killed on his third overseas deployment a few years earlier. She didn’t linger or press, and his laugh turned lighter when she showed him the next picture of him looking at the buffet table. “Oh, God, please get rid that one. What is that face I’m making? I look like I have three chins.”

“You do not,” she laughed.

“No?” he asked as he made a goofy face and pulled his chin back towards his neck.

She snorted and broke out into giggles. “So sexy.”  

“Wow, I need to borrow those love goggles of yours.” He reached out and slid his finger over the screen to look at the next photo: a selfie she’d meant to delete already because her eyes were half shut. “See, now, that’s better.”

She rolled her eyes. “I don’t think you need to borrow anything.”

They spent the next several minutes sipping at their coffees and scrolling through the rest of the photos.

“I want to print this one,” she told him, stopping again on the photo of them by the river, the same one she’d been fussing with in the coffee line. Mrs. Washington had snapped it early in the evening, so they both looked fresh faced and happy. Eliza was smiling for the camera, but Alexander was looking at her with the sweetest, softest expression she’d ever seen him wear. The pure love she saw shining in his eyes made her heartbeat quicken and her stomach fill with the wonderful kind of butterflies.

He nodded seriously. “We should. That came out nice.”

She cuddled closer and leaned her head on his shoulder. “It was a beautiful party.”

“It was,” he agreed, twirling a finger through the loose hair on her shoulders.

“I’m just glad I didn’t embarrass you.”

The words had tumbled out of her mouth before she’d really thought them through. He stilled beside her and then straightened. She could feel him trying to catch her eye.

“What are you talking about?”

She winced. Exhausted as she was, she’d let slip the insecure thoughts that usually floated, safe and unspoken, around in the back of her mind. She had a healthy amount of self-confidence, really. She knew she was kind, moral, beautiful, and far from stupid.  But ever since she’d started dating Alexander, she’d had a deep, dark fear that one day she’d say something in a group of Alexander’s genius friends that would make him realize how much she didn’t fit in with them. It was something she worried about secretly, late at night, when she watched him sleep beside her and wondered what sort of miraculous, world-changing ideas were brewing in his mind.

“It’s just…everyone there was so accomplished. So brilliant.”

“You’re brilliant.”

She scoffed. “Not like they are. Not like you.”

“Eliza, you are the most beautiful, compassionate, loving, amazing person I’ve ever met.”

Her gaze fell to her lap, not able to look at him as she tried to explain. “I barely made it through college. I’m never going to be a doctor, or a lawyer, or a scientist. I only have the chance to do so much volunteer work because my family has money. I just, I worry that someday you’re going to look at me, and….”

“Hey.” He tilted her chin up. “You go to work every day and help dozens upon dozens of kids in awful circumstances. I see the kind of hours and the commitment you put in. You fight for those kids, you raise money for them, and you care about each and every one of them. You are smart, and capable, and driven. And I am so proud of you.”

Her throat went tight with emotion, and her vision turned a little blurry. “Really?”

“Yes, really,” he assured her. He gave her a sweet, soft kiss. “We all sit around and talk about policy language, and rant at each other on social media, but you’re the one doing the real work. It’s one of the first things that drew me to you. If everyone took the privileges they were given and used them for good the way you have, the world would be a beautiful place.”

A strange, but wonderful realization dawned on her.

As she’d gotten to know him, she would from time to time pick up on his insecurities, and she’d always find herself puzzled. It seemed to her that the things he felt the most self-conscious about were, in reality, his greatest strengths. He worried about his past, about his job, about his lack of money, but all she saw was someone who’d overcome long odds, who did great and important work, even at the cost of personal glory and fortune.

Now, seeing all that love in his eyes again, she realized for the first time that he felt the same about her. All those things she worried about late at night in the dark, the parts of her she’d tried to hide from him, he’d seen in her all along. He’d seen her, and he loved her, not in spite of those parts, but because of them. Never before in her life had she felt so wholly and completely loved.

“I love you so much,” she whispered.

He smiled. “I love you, too.”

The grainy voice announced their train would be arriving at platform ten, intruding on the tender moment. They shared a quick kiss before they stood and collected their baggage, Alexander shoving his laptop back into his bag while she popped up the handle on her carry-on. They fell easily into step as they made their way to the platform.

They didn’t speak as they stood under the orange lights on the platform to wait for the arriving train. Eliza turned to face him, and she wrapped her arms around him, holding him close in the cool spring night air. Hardly anyone was around for the late night train to the city.

She felt the powerful whoosh of air as the train approached, and she reluctantly released him so they could board. Thankfully, the cars weren’t particularly full. They found seats towards the back of the car and settled in next each other. She’d expected him to pull out his laptop again when they settled in for the three and a half hour ride home, but instead he rested his head back against the seat and closed his eyes.

“How’s your head?” she asked softly.

“Better. I’m just really tired.”

She tugged him towards her, so that his head rested against her shoulder. He removed his glasses off, shoving them into the pocket of his sweatshirt, and adjusted to rest against her chest, his arm stretched out to embrace her. Her hand traced patterns over his back as the train pulled away from the station towards home.

In the quiet of the train, as Alexander began to snuffle softly, she gazed down at the diamond ring on her left hand and smiled. She was engaged to the love of her life. All the little frustrations and worries from the past hours had melted away. Delayed trains and long lines, angry politicians and sleep deprivation—none of those things mattered in the slightest. Not when Alexander was in her arms.