#and while im not doing it right now it is inevitable for me to return to old fandoms-

[energeticpoltergeist]

did you know? Fire Emblem characters are hard to draw, in other news the sky is blue basically just trying to figure out how to draw FE characters and may as well do my first practice run with trying to figure out how to draw Lissa yeah i know it isn't 100% accurate to her actual design, but in my defense im trying to simplify FE character designs so i can actually draw them repeatedly without grinding my hand to dust-

[red-doll-face]

Imagine reader playing with Arthur's hair while he grumbles and pretends he's not totally into it >>>>>>>>😭🙏 But when you actually stop he's like 😳😞

that sounds so cute, i would love to run my fingers through his hair!!! 💖💖💖🥹🥹🥹 i wanted to do something short but writing for arthur always seems to run away from me, idkkk whyyyy i can never do anything bite sized with this man i stg. 😔😳😭😭😭 idk i guess small just doesnt cut it when it comes to this man 😏 i sort of took this as a request so i hope im not doing too much LMAO beware: sweetie weenie boy arthur...veryyyy fluffffy

Arthur doesn't like his hair as long as you like it but he can put it aside for you.

(high honor) Arthur Morgan x fem. reader

You had always thought Arthur’s hair looked nice, just a little bit longer than he preferred. Ok, maybe a lot longer than he preferred it but you couldn't help but like the way the strands fell in his pretty blue eyes, watching his big hands and fingers push it back over his head. His little frustrated huff when it inevitably slips back to feathering over the sides of his face was all too cute. You liked the way the sun caught the more blond strands; turned them a bright gold. You know the big scary outlaw, Arthur Morgan would never use the word beautiful to describe himself but you could use that word for him every day of every week.

And he doesn't always intend to grow it as long as he does, he runs out of time to get anything done about it, much preferring to return to your little corner of camp to rest with you sooner than stop in town. He’d rather come back to you, to get to lay his eyes on you than to spend another moment away from the sweet kiss you give him when he rejoins you.

 Of course, he was as strong as a draft horse. Arthur could handle just about anything thrown at him. But Dutch had a way of running him ragged. When it wasn’t Dutch, it was the other camp members and when it wasn’t them, it was himself. The pressure to be everywhere, to do everything; it crushed his shoulders down. You did what you could to help. It's why you so thoroughly enjoyed these quiet moments, just you and him in the cool evenings. 

“...Look at all this. Honey, I need a goddamned haircut,” he’d say, standing in front of the little mirror where he shaved his scruff after it grew too bushy. You sit on his bed, pouting at him. He stands with his hands gripping the edge of the barrel, turning to the left and the right. The way his hair bounced around made you giggle. 

“But-” 

“Yeah, you like it, I remember,” He sighs.

“I do, Arthur. I just think you look very handsome with your hair like that,” You look at his hair and then your eyes wander to his strong forearms gripping the lip of the barrel. You had found Arthur to be eye-catching the day that you met him. And his personality only bolstered how much you liked him. He could play at gruff simpleton brute but he had more sense and wit than most of the other men combined. He was more soft than he wanted to admit too, but he showed those pieces of himself to you. His vulnerabilities he liked to keep to himself; now he shares with you. 

“Right. You keep on tellin’ your beautiful lies; I might just start believin’ you,” He chuckles at the word ‘handsome’. You make a face at his self deprecating attitude. How he makes jokes of himself to keep his insecurities from seeming like they're bigger than they are. But the corners of his mouth always tug downwards when he’s looking in the mirror, even when he only intended to look at his hair or at his beard. 

“Arthur, I’m not lying. Come here?” You’re more siren-like than you realize; your beckon makes him turn, huffing a little. As if he knows he’s in some degree of trouble. The little disappointed frown you have is something he can’t help but look away from. Arthur leans away from the barrel and steps closer to you. He reaches for his hat that sits on the table at his bedside but you stop him, a gentle hand over the top of his. 

Your hand tugs him closer and he allows you to guide him. You squeeze his palm, those hard working hands, rough from all that he does with them.

He lets himself relax, which he rarely does, he’s always doing something or on his way there. But you love to hold him in your arms. To make him stay still with you for awhile.

He sits and the sweet kiss he gives you makes you light up. But you motion to have him lay over you while you play with his hair, even if you can tell he wants to keep giving you kisses. His head is in your lap while he uses your plush thighs as pillows. He’s a bit stiff, as if unwillingly and begrudgingly doing as you say. His brow still crinkles a bit, some of the lines on his face from pulling grimaces are creased. You lift the strands upwards to marvel at how long they are. 

“Too damn long,” 

“No, never,” you coo at him through his faux displeasure.

“Never? You’re kiddin’ me, sweetheart. Only you could want a man with hair down to his ass,” you laugh, rolling your eyes. You miss how he softens even more at your laugh, he liked that you found his jokes funny or at the very least, silly enough to warrant such a reaction.

“Ok, ok, you can get it cut, but maybe not so short on the sides? I like when it’s long here,” You look down at his eyes, petting the loose locks he usually wants to cut a bit shorter to keep hair off of his neck. 

“I’ll think on it; it’s still on my head, ain’t it?”

You giggle humming contentedly as you continue rubbing his hair in your fingers. He relaxes more even as he continues to murmur about how much he can’t wait to watch it all get chopped off at the barber in town. You shake your head, feeling him go soft from his usual intensity. 

Your nails lightly scratch against his scalp, your fingers pet his hair this way and that. Then you transition to what you know he likes, a repetitive soothing motion through the locks of his hair. The way the small furrow just over his nose bridge flattens out makes you smile. You can see his hands stop fussing, his lungs fill with a deep breath and puff it out slowly. He props one leg over his bed and the other hangs down to the floor. And he might grumble but those turn into simple rumbles of soft pleasure. You watch the tension leak from him, his usual stiffness weakening.

You’re pretty sure you can lull him to sleep like this, the rhythmic stroking over his hair and scalp like a lullaby. You comb his hair backwards, his thick hair is tangled in some places and you help work through it gently. When you feel you’ve perhaps messed with his hair enough, you remove your hands. One of his eyes slips open from where he had both closed in a sleepy gesture; revealing that gem toned hue. He looks grumpier than when you started, perhaps a little disgruntled. 

“What?” you ask, knowing he misses the sensation of your fingers fiddling around in his hair. “Thought you didn’t like me ruffling your feathers,” you tousle it a little. The teasing in your voice is prominent when you smile down at his small scowl, no real bite behind his bark. 

He seems to flush a little bit, you can appreciate the way his blushes crawl up his face, he can never hide how you make him feel. His artificial glare melts away. 

“It should be you, I guess- ya know, rufflin’ my feathers,” his sentimental tone brings him out of his element, showing his nerves around you. Not so steadfast now. You smile warmly and shyly as well, touched by his genuine feelings, the ones he told you just as bashfully that he harbored for you.

I LOVE HIM SO MUCH HE CAN DO NO WRONG 😍💓🫂😭😳🥰 thank you for reading !!

[burnyouwithacigarettelighter]

IT’S YOU, HAPPY ALL THE TIME ─── jonathan breech ✧☾𖦹

ೃ⁀➷ “I ask Jessica what drowning feels like and she says not everything feels like something else." — ‘Jessica gives me a chill pill’, Angie Sijun Lou.

pairing. jonathan breech x reader

summary. you’ve bared your heart to your bestfriend, jonathan, more times than you can count, whilst knowing practically nothing at all about him. what is friendship if it is not equal… what is love if it is not returned? can your relationship survive such one-sidedness?

warnings. swearing, TW mention & description of suicide/attempts & depression, very introspective/kind of a character study???, alcohol & drug use, pining, ANGST!!!!, crying, fluff, smut with feelings, p in v, unprotected sex, oral sex (f), SMUT UNDER THE CUT! 

word count. 10k (WTF??!?!!??)

a/n. the title is from “she won’t go away” by faye webster:) btw this is… rly angsty (and SO long omg im still in shock) so beware🫡 ALSO IM SO SORRY FOR NOT POSTING IN WHILE!! SCHOOL IS KICKING MY BUTT & THIS FIC WAS AN ABSOLUTE MONSTER TO WRITE LMAO

i. 

There are very few words in your vocabulary you can use to accurately describe Jonathan Breech. 

The boy is an enigma, a matryoshka doll that never ends: he is witty and lighthearted and sarcastic, but you’ll always catch that edge, the air of malaise he carries around himself, the unspoken elephant in the room that screams WHO ARE YOU REALLY?

He had always been more of a figure, a landscape; something to witness, observe-- experience without letting it do the same to you. You don’t know if that’s something you want, either: there’s an imbalance in his hilarity, and he always takes things a step too far. Jonathan lights matches and lets them burn all the way down to his fingertips; he shaves and lets the blade leave stinging little nicks, rivulets of blood running down his neck; he chainsmokes cigarettes in his room and only opens the window when he feels his heart hammering in his chest, desperate for air. 

You meet him — or, first experience him in a similar fashion: he had been in the university library, standing on top of a creaky, old bookshelf, shouting something you couldn’t understand over the music blasting through your headphones. You could certainly see him though, gesturing animatedly, dressed eccentrically in his signature winter trapper hat and a velvet blazer. That thin, effeminate figure of his was making winding, marionette-ish steps along the wood, an action that had everyone readying themselves to catch his inevitable fall. 

Then, seemingly out of nowhere and catching you completely off guard, you caught his eye. He began stepping from one shaky shelf to the next, a complete miracle none of them toppled over, before stopping on one close enough for you to read his lips. 

“Hi,” he mouthed, shifting uneasily on his left foot before regaining a steady balance, “you’re in my class, right?”

You nodded, hesitantly— yes, truthfully, you’d seen him in your Introduction to Literary Studies course a couple of weeks ago, sporting the same outfit as he did now, but you thought nothing of him. He’d been generally well-behaved then, asking slightly odd but in-tune questions that more or less answered all your inquiries, so you didn’t think the guy would have a penchant for, well… book-shelf hopping. 

He grinned, about to say something else, before something — or someone, made him flinch. A professor, probably, considering the unintelligibly muffled, booming voice behind you. However, Jonathan made quick work of the situation, sneakily climbing down and escaping out the door. 

The next time you see him, he’s sidled up beside you in your shared class. “Mind if I sit here?” a familiar voice had asked, to which you murmured a non-committal knock y’self out, before realizing with wide eyes.  His presence had caught you off-guard, as he so often did, and you sensed a pattern blooming. 

Jonathan certainly made for an odd desk-partner; his personality warped the environment around you, and it was suddenly so much easier to tear your eyes away from the lecture and land on Jonathan’s own. It’s something you never thought you’d ever do, because you adore the material being taught. 

At the end of class, he asks you out for a drink: he’s just found the best Irish stout in the entire city, and what better way to make it known than to take anyone and everyone he knows there?

Rejection is written on your face clear as day— you have class tomorrow, an essay that needs to be finished, and honestly, pubs just aren’t really your scene. 

But in the end… you still bite. You can’t help it: he’s disarming and warm and looks like he should smell like a bonfire. Somehow, that just does it for your brain; it’s here you learn of the charm that is Jonathan Breech. 

That night goes everything and nothing like you expected: you expected not to be able to predict his actions, and that’s exactly what happens. When you meet Jonathan at the aforementioned pub, it’s not actually the one he’s meaning to take you to— it’s just the closest public place to the on-campus dorm, which is where he says he’s rooming. 

“‘ve got a neighbor m’pretty sure is trying to sleep with me,” he says absently, ushering you onto the back of his bike, which had been leaning against a NO PARKING sign. “He’s always toget’er wit’ our dorm advisor, so I should l reject him before I get kicked out, if y’get what I mean.”

Now, you honestly should’ve expected this from a guy who jumped from six-foot book shelves, but Jonathan’s biking is all swift turns and jilted stops, mere milliseconds from repeatedly running red lights. You want to ask if he just learned how to ride the thing yesterday, but can’t, not with how utterly reckless and shameless he is about it, his terrible steering making you instinctively wrap your arms around his chest. 

You clutch him tightly, making him hum in approval, and you feel your ears burn flusteredly. You would’ve pulled away, but then he cut from the right lane to the left in one swift move, barely missing several cars, and you practically shrieked instead. “Oh my god!”

“Sorry,” he apologizes quickly. You can’t see his face, having shut your eyes in fear, but after hearing the blatant cheekiness in his tone, you can imagine clear as day how gleefully it contorts. You want to slap him somewhere, anywhere, but that’d defeat the point of being mad at his recklessness, so you squeeze him tighter instead, and he chokes on his breath. “Jesus-- m’sorry, really!”

When the two of you make it to the pub — alive and uninjured! — annoyingly all the way across town, your first few steps off his bike are stuttered, dizzy: “We are-- not going by bike next time,” you gasp, leaning against a random brick wall. 

“Next time, eh?” He grins, and this time you really do slap him— just on the arm, bless your self-control and niceties not to beat this oddly comfortable-to-be-around near-stranger to death. 

The pub, with its forgettable name and dingy stools, has a minimal, lackluster crowd. A kitschy neon sign flickers and dies as you walk in, making you raise a brow, but Jonathan merely drags you by the arm to a cozy corner table, then disappearing deeper within the venue before returning moments later with two pints of black beer in tow.

“Go on, then,” he gestures, setting the tall glass on the table, sitting down in the chair in front of you and taking a hearty sip of his own drink.

You let out a little hesitant sigh at his words, before relenting and taking in a long gulp of the liquid. “…Huh,” you remark, impressed. Jonathan smiled knowingly behind his glass, letting out a smug little ah, you see? 

“Worth the long ride?” he inquired innocently, as if that was the only thing wrong with the night.

“Worth the ride, but not worth almost dying for,” you rolled your eyes goodheartedly, knocking back the rest of the bitter drink and making him whistle. 

The rest of the night goes like this: Jonathan orders two more rounds of the quality Irish stout before the two’ve you are stumbling out of the pub, exploring all the nightlife there is to offer, like the crowd surrounding an out-door live comedy group performing down the street that has you and Jonathan giggling for hours after, or the underground speakeasy you accidentally find yourselves shoved into, a nasally guitarist singing on a smoky stage, several more drinks finding themselves in your system despite how nauseous you already feel.

“You-- d’you fancy him?” Jonathan slurs behind you, steadying himself by pressing his hands to your waist.

“F-fancy who?” you blink blearily, leaning into his warm touch.

“Who else m’I talkin’ about, girl? The singer!”

You shake your head no numbly, practically collapsing into his arms now, your head lulling on his chest. You’re so close you can smell the distinct scent of his skin, that unique musk everyone has, and it’s strangely familiar, like those smells that evoke old, nostalgic memories. It’s like how sunscreen summons the smell of the sun after a childhood beach day, or how vanilla extract takes you back to the smell of your mother’s baked goods on a specific winter evening.

“Reckoned you wouldn’t,” he assumes, hands coming away from your waist to wrap his arms around your shoulders, swaying to the music slightly in the crowded club, “looks like a -- right bleedin’ dope… wit’ that mop of hair.”

You giggle, alcohol riddled beyond belief, unable to formulate a response with the conflicting blurry thoughts in your head: it’s telling you Jonathan Breech isn’t the crowd you want, that you need to go home and work, that you let loose too easily— but it also tells you that you can see yourself becoming friends with him very, very quickly. 

It’s there, in that club, Jonathan Breech moves into your life and fills a gaping hole you didn’t know existed, like a hole in your stockings you only notice when you get home. You have friends, certainly, more than you can count on both hands, but they never get as close as Jonathan does. After that night, an unknown force pulls the two of you together, making you run into him everywhere, and a tight friendship blooms like a lilypad in a raging storm; beauty within the chaos. In the multitude of close friendships you’ve harbored, he is the first to see so many sides of you. The last thing that did was your mother; it had only ever been your mother. 

He is an endearing, amazing friend, both the intent listener and the charismatic speaker all at once; he knows his friends like the back of his hand, can recount their life like he can count the number of moles on his face-- but you, and everyone else, know absolutely nothing about him. 

At least, close to nothing-- you know he likes ice cream and hanging out and going to the pub; you know he likes biking and doing drugs and women; you know he hates the sea and his brother and his father, but you don’t know him. All you’ve ever seen him do is smile or laugh or shout in mock anger; there is a carefully glued mask on his face he takes meticulous caution in preserving-- he is terrified to let go, despite the blasé persona he lets on.

Or maybe the mysterious matter of your bestfriend is tripping you up for no reason; maybe you’re psychoanalyzing something that doesn’t need to be psychoanalyzed, reading between lines that don’t exist. But if you were asked to answer honestly, there’s just something about Jonathan you don’t get. There is a split seam in the tapestry of his life, missing pieces in the story he pretends to tell with utmost accuracy. There are things that he never talks about, that he recoils when asked like you’ve poked a tender wound. 

“So, what were you doing before… all this?” You ask him once, laying on his messy bed in his dorm-room and scanning the water-damage constellations dotted along his popcorn ceiling. By all this you mean going to university, being the resident party boy, aimlessly pursuing a degree you’re 99% sure he picked blindfolded (culinary science) and standing here, with you, snorting a line of something on his creaky wooden desk. 

Jonathan freezes, still hunched over. “What d’you-- what d’you mean?” he says, tone breezy but, uncharacteristically tense… jilted and preoccupied. You could’ve brushed it off as him being seriously focussed on his drugs, but the way he shifts, how his shoulders curl in like he wants to disappear, tells you otherwise. 

“I mean, before going to school here�� y’know, what were you like as a dumb teenager?”

You two’re twenty, barely not-teenagers, but it still makes a world of a difference: you’re living away from home, doing what you want, experiencing (a juvenile, naive version of) freedom and adulthood.

“I dunno… kind of a tool, that's f’sure,” he chuckled, rubbing his nose roughly. He’s being funny on purpose, a jester’s distraction: he doesn’t want you to realize his answers’ not really one at all. 

You shifted on his bed, now leaning against his headboard. His answer strikes you as odd and uncharacteristic despite his attempts to evade suspicion: usually, Jonathan pounces at the chance to yap on and on. “What, the great Jonathan Breech doesn’t have any wild stories to tell? No bones broken, girls dumped, houses trashed?” 

He snorted at that, like some inside joke you weren’t privy to was brought up in your words, and he descended back down on a carefully partitioned line of white. “I broke my baby finger once,” he relented vaguely when he finished, dusting off the table and licking the remains off his hand. “I cried and I cried and I cried.”

“Did it hurt that much?” you grinned, mind trailing off to imagine a baby-faced Jonathan Breech, a juvenile highschool boy, doing something silly to break that finger. Maybe he accidentally flung off his bike, broke it because of a dare, or maybe it happened just by slipping and falling. 

“It - uh… didn’t hurt enough,” Jonathan smiled, tight-lipped and paltry. All at once the air in the room had changed, like someone attached a vacuum to the window and sucked everything out. 

Your grin fell, and you watched him carefully: perhaps, had you not been as close to him as you were, he’d have let something show. A twitch in the smile, a break in the facade. But you were, and his face stayed the same, and your thoughts ran circles around themselves. This was… something else, something belonging to the part of his life he didn’t talk about. 

The atmosphere had grown tense, taut, a rubber band twisted ‘round and round, threatening to burst, so you leave the matter of his injury alone; of his life alone. You go back to staring at his ceiling, he goes back to his drugs; Jonathan collapses within himself, and you don’t notice how badly he suffocates… how suffering in silence is also accompanied by the overwhelming desire to be found.

ii.

Sometimes, despite his self-imposed distance, Jonathan lets someone look inside his head. 

You are both the sometimes and the someone; you don’t know why it’s always you, but you chalk it up to the fact that beneath his unpredictable demeanor, the murky and unreadable feelings he holds for others, is this uncharacteristic constant: he holds a softness for you. It’s what lets you know there’s something haunted lurking beneath his happy-go-lucky surface. 

You don’t know where this softness comes from, either. But you know you see it, in lingering touches, tender duchenne smiles unlike the devilish tilt his lips usually hold, how he clasps his hand around yours after a night at the pub and walks you home because he knows you get paranoid. You see it in how he comes over to your apartment when you don’t answer anyone's calls during exam season, how he remembers what your mother’s name is and what your childhood pet was and what your favorite flowers are. How his lips brush past your cheek when he pulls away from hugs, his hands shuddering around your shoulders, like he’s afraid he’ll crush you.

You only wish you could do the same. You want to sit by his side and mend his heart, lend an ear to his most mundane fears, you want to take his hand into your own and kiss it softly, return all that he has done for you, take the same as you have given to him: what is friendship if it is not equal, what is love if it is not returned? It is something broken, unable; split halves of one heart, an imbalance in the scale, Bonnie without her Clyde, a fish out of water. 

Jonathan pours his heart into your own, filling holes you know you don’t have, and you think he may be overcompensating for something else, seeing things in you that really belong to him. It is maddening, and you just want to beg and plead he lets you in. 

But you settle for the gentle pokes, the prodding, and try to decipher the vague answers he gives you. Most days, you can’t really make sense of it. 

“Sorry,” you apologize, about to leave the outing you planned with Jonathan — studying, or, trying to study, at an intimate coffeebar the two of you frequented — “my dad’s gotten drunk with his lads and my mum needs help dragging him home.”

 “Hey, hey, don’t worry. I get it: my dad used to do that all the time,” he waves your words off casually, but you don’t miss how jilted he says used to and the pain in his tone at all the time.

“Oh, surely she was fit to go to the madhouse?” you laughed once, responding to Jonathan’s complaints about an eccentric classmate in his agricultural studies. He laughs back, he always does, but this one is hollow, forced; barely stopping a grimace from coloring his tone. 

You notice these things like it’s a shadow following someone in the sun. He is lying, hiding; about something you don’t know but it is happening. It is happening, and you are so very curious: you pick up on the littlest tendrils of him, fed wholly on any information you can squeeze out. He is a mystery you want to delve within completely; answer that question of WHO ARE YOU REALLY? and leave no room for error. 

You’d give yourself to him the very same if he merely asked; you’d whisper childhood fears and tell the origin stories of faded scars on your knees and why you check under your bed before sleeping. You’d detail your entire life from sunset birth to starry night end if he even made a passing comment about knowing; you would trust your love, your heart, your entire life in his beautiful, shaky hands. This is the relationship you have built around yourselves, and it is beginning to feel terribly one-sided. 

Alas, your curiosity overwhelms him, and you take it too far, just once. Only once. 

“Where’d this come from?” you murmur, brushing your fingers over a scar above his eyebrow. It’s something you see only now, his hair mussed and wild from the various blankets and pillows on your dinky couch. 

He’s crashing at your apartment tonight, an invited event, because you often miss him like you miss home; the boy is sneaky— he slinks away like a street cat and only comes back for food. It’s only fair he lets you wrangle him back like this, making him stay by your side at least once a week.  

Your words make him freeze, like he often does; it reminds you of hikers, who freeze when they see mountain lions— he thinks if he stops and stares and pretends to disappear you’ll look the other way, drop the question, forget him completely.

But you don’t. You don’t know what’s affecting him -- not that he wants you to -- so you just stare back into his cornflower blue eyes. You stop and stare and see right through him; you hold the question like a knife to his neck, and commit him to memory. 

“The scar?” Jonathan pales, shuddering despite it having long since been healed over. The aftershocks of an earthquake. 

You simply nod, fingers pulling away. You’re still closer than ever though, the two of you being the only things in your cramped concrete apartment, the chosen movie on your telly still running and long forgotten. 

Your attention remains on him, brandished into something dangerous, like you’ll carve the answer out of him if you have to— but the moment passes. He doesn’t say anything and you accept that as the answer. Gone is your razor-sharp focus, and there is nothing more to the matter. 

But Jonathan doesn’t register this, no, he’s thinking, gears in his head turning and creaking. His tongue grazes against the backs of his teeth, jaw chattering like it was as cold as it was when… as cold as it was back then, and he doesn’t want to tell anyone— but it’s you. You’re not just anyone. 

You’re the one he holds a certain softness for. The one he equally bares his heart to and holds the most secrets from. The one he’s most terrified to know. The only one he wants to know. 

So, he decides to tell a partial truth— something digestible. People adore that which can easily slide down the gullet: news headlines don’t detail the goriness of a murder, they give the “insider” scoop of the scared neighbor. To be able to digest information is what makes the world go round, and he does not think you could digest the full truth-- he does not think he wants you to. 

He feels ill at the thought of anything between you changing— oh, how ruined he’d feel if you began treating him like fucking glass.

This abhorrent social pressure is what makes Jonathan grit this sentence through his teeth: “I got into a car accident,” he gulps dry, “when I was nineteen. Was drunk… went fer a spin. I skidded off a -- um, an empty highway. The tall sorts; high up, y’know. Fell.”

His voice makes you look back up at him, and your eyes are beautiful and tense— it breaks his heart. He knows you’re probably thinking it was in-character, how expected that is of Jonathan Breech, how you’ll easily take this partial truth, how you’ll never know the full one until it comes in a letter under your door and he’s long gone. 

“Tell me,” you ask him, lips falling into a near-frown instead of laughing or grinning wider. It’s hushed, whispered like a secret, “What did it feel like? Falling, I mean.”

Jonathan licks his lips, bores his shaking gaze into your own, and tells you not everything feels like something else. That the word connotes all you need to know. Falling meant he was falling; his arms raised and the air took him and that was it. 

It makes your brows twist and your lips press into a thin line: his nonchalance is worrying, no more his signature characteristic— there is something wrong about this apathy toward injury, toward the potential death. 

“Is that how you broke your finger?” You murmur, and it startles him. How you pieced the two things together, how you weaved a web from what little you knew about him; how futile his attempts to hide could be.

“What?” he responds, hoarse. There is a lurking shadow in his bones telling him he’ll taint you, telling him to be ashamed, telling him how badly you will never be his. It is such a damning reality, that no matter how much he may yearn for you, he is too incomplete to meet your needs; he is too hurt not to hurt you too. 

“The car accident. Is that how you broke your pinkie?” you repeat, and you gripped his hand resting at your side, bringing it up to present the finger to him like he forgot where his pinkie was. 

Jonathan’s gaze darts from you to the finger, and he feels his insides quiver; so badly does he want to spill his entire soul to you. But that internal reminder -- hurt people hurt people hurt people -- makes him settle for nodding, parted lips locking closed. 

Nothing special happens that night, no shocking revelation or bombarded confession; Jonathan nods, keeps his lips sealed, and gets up from the couch, figure dreary and fatigued. He murmurs an incomplete excuse, something half-baked and blatantly unconvincing that he has to leave, and you let him go. You think you’re imagining the shudder in his shoulders, the shake in his voice as he says goodbye, and you let him go. 

It’s there, like that club so long ago, you discover another thing about Jonathan Breech: push too far and he shuts down, closes shop and puts up his guard forever. It’s the mere fact of how attentive you are to his words; you remember how he broke his finger, and he realizes he cannot hide from you any longer. 

You’re reaching a point in your friendship -- your relationship, no matter platonic or romantic for all lines have been crossed; nobody is so raw to one another with love not involved -- where you’ll bare your hearts on your sleeves, share your every thought and dream and fear. But Jonathan won’t be able to reciprocate, and the very thought of rejecting you, betraying you, makes his stomach twist in knots. That crestfallen face of yours would haunt him for all time, your every melancholy feature burning into his memory like the scars left by cigarettes on skin.

So he leaves, hurt people hurt people hurt people echoes in his ears all the way home; he turns into an alleyway shortcut and prays death swoops down and takes him right there. He leaves his consciousness curled lovingly in your arms; his shell walks home and prays you’re none the wiser. But you’ve already reached that point in your relationship; you already know. 

When people die, or friendships do, sometimes they end with just a goodbye, a mild, casual goodbye because you think there’ll be dozens, hundreds more-- but there won’t be. Suddenly, alone in that cramped apartment, the buzzing from the tv filling your ears, your couch still warm from someone long gone, you know.

You know you startled him, that he’s left your apartment and he’ll never come back. Your heart cools, and she whispers that you took it too far, that you crossed a line you were never made aware of, that when you see him in class tomorrow he might not sit next to you, he might not talk to you, that you might lose him forever because he is too stubborn to open up and you are too stubborn to let him go. 

Well, you were too stubborn to let him go. 

It’s three weeks before you speak to Jonathan again. Three long, dragging weeks, moments in time where he avoided your gaze, evaded your presence, slipped past you before you got too close. You certainly try, of course— you seek him out every chance you get, trying to get an I’m sorry, please talk to me out before he runs off, but it’s virtually impossible.

Once, after class, you’d caught him in the middle of a flurry of exiting students by the velvet blazer, your hands curled around the lapel. “Jonathan,” you panted, trying to drag him off to the side to escape the bustling activity around you, “please, we need to talk--“

But then Jonathan had faced you, eyes widened and spooked like he’d seen a ghost, a never-before-seen-by-you fear covering his gracefully cut features, before he tugged off the black blazer and escaped into the crowd. He had seen you, widened his eyes, left. Such a simple action tore your heart in two; it had confirmed your suspicions— you’d gone too far, he was never coming back, and you were all alone. There you stood, fingers wrapped around one of his favorite articles of clothing starkly without its beloved owner, completely alone. 

In three measly weeks, he has put up a biting winter of distance between you two. 

Your feelings are unable to comprehend themselves— they fight and sob and run circles around your mind, they make you doubt, crumble, devour yourself from the inside out; they make you ask yourself what you can do to salvage this, what can you do to fix this? What is there to make of him, of his behavior; what do you do with yourself and this guilt?

If you could imagine time was a construct, you were certain you could convince yourself this stretch of time was nothing… propel yourself into a present where Jonathan does not afflict your mind, take over your every thought— does not ruin you like so. If only you could do that, you could close your eyes and reopen them when you’ve let go. But you were always too stubborn to let him go, weren’t you?

It’s three weeks to the day before you speak to Jonathan again, and it happens through the crack of his dorm door, your arm wedged through it because you know he is not cruel; he will let you in without a doubt.  

“Please,” you plead to Jonathan, “just— I just want to talk. Please?”

He stares at you straight, expression cold and reserved, before he breaks and pulls away; bites his lip, lets you in his room, doesn’t look you in the eye. Looking around, you sense something in his dorm has changed; it had gained a bereft quality, like it was attuned to Jonathan’s state of mind and felt depressed beyond your comprehension. There was a cold air to the place, an utmost frigid demeanor to a room incredibly warm just weeks prior. In your absence, the dorm had been neglected, gutted, abandoned. 

“I’m sorry,” are the first words that tumble out of your mouth. “I- I know you don’t like… talking about -- about your life before here, and I’m sorry. But please, Jonathan, just talk to me. Tell me what I can do to make it up to you.”

He sits down on the edge of his weak bedframe, pulling his knees up and pressing his face into them. “You don’t need to-- don’t… don’t apologize. You don’t need t’make it better, either. All’s grand.” he promises, words muffled and shaky. It’s a weeping kind of tone; you could just as easily imagine him sobbing with that voice. 

Your brows knit. Your emotions are wavering, treading brutally between disbelief, despair and rancor. “Then -- then why?”

“Why what?”

“Why did you avoid me? Why did you - why did we spend these last three weeks playing cat and mouse, if you weren’t mad at me? Is this your sick idea of a joke?”

“No! I-- jesus christ,” Jonathan looked up from his hands before immediately pressing two fingers between his eyes, “I wasn’t … avoiding you.”

“I haven’t seen you in weeks!” you point out painfully, exasperated. “You know, you’ve been avoiding me for longer than this. You— you push me away any chance you get. You’re afraid. I don’t know of what, but you’re- so fucking secretive, and it’s tearing me apart.”

“I’m not - afraid of anything. I’m just a private person— you know this. Would you, if I ‘pushed you away?!’” 

At his denying deflection, something within you snaps: “Why won’t you - fucking let me in? I’ve — I’ve bared my soul to you; you know me from the inside out. I trust you with my life— why, why can’t you do the same?”

“I didn’t ask you to do that! And I didn’t — I didn’t mean t’get so close to you, okay?!” He bursts, and you flinch. His hands shakily come up to his face once more; he wipes roughly but it’s no use— you’ve already seen his delicate tears threatening to spill, and it burns more holes in your heart than you thought his suffering would.

“What are you talking about?” you pry, now without any cautious reservations about his demeanor.

“I didn’t mean to get so fucking attached, because - ‘cause I…” Jonathan’s hands clenched into fists at his sides, “fuck.”

“What?” you repeat, but it’s softer, concerned; how quickly his body language shifted from irritated to terrified has you scrambling to support him. “Talk to me,” you ask, taking nervous steps closer, like you were approaching a wounded animal.

He sucks in a sharp breath, and holds it, like he did cigarette smoke, before exhaling heavily. “Okay- okay. When I was - nineteen, I drove a car… I drove off a cliff and tried t’kill myself. I was-- admitted to a psychiatric hospital for a year, and when I got out I moved here f’school. I- I… promised m’self I wouldn’t let anyone get too close.”

The confession hangs in the air, a lonely little thing; it’s a bleeding piece of his own heart he’s plucked and placed in your palms. He shudders, and you want to nurture it like nothing else. This is a culmination of a year’s worth of evasion coming to a close; you’re seeing him completely, rawly, for the first time.

“But- but why? You don’t have to— Jonathan, you don’t need to do that just because you - you… y’know.”

“I’m- I know that,” he starts brashly, defensively. “It’s b’cause I am very, very aware of my - of m’own self destructiveness…” His words taper off into something of grief; the Sisyphean struggle of wanting to live, while that depressive boulder pushes him back, colors him completely. “I just… I didn’t want to - t’hurt anyone in case I -- in case next time I succeeded.”

“Next time?” you repeat, and your voice broke in a way you wish was less vulnerable, less blatantly miserable.

“This is why I didn’t want to—“ Jonathan sighs, deflates, “I’m not telling you this because I want you to - t’fucking save me, okay? I’m telling you this because you wanted to know, and I couldn’t hide from you anymore. Because you asked.”

“You didn’t need t’hide it in the first place!” you exclaimed, coming closer to him. “You’ve never had to hide a fucking ‘ting from me.”

“You wouldn’t have understood!” He said back, volume nearing a shout. “You’ll treat me differently now, you see, you’ll look at me fuckin’ different—“

It made your heart sink-- how sure his words were, how certain he was of your rejection. How little trust did he have in you? 

(You remember he wanted to sink, too-- lose himself in the baby blue sea; let it swallow him whole and never be seen again.)

“You - you really think I’ll treat y’differently because of this? You know my every crevice, my every thought-- I have never once doubted that you’ll accept me.”

“I-I… why should I - expect any of this to stay the same?”

Suddenly, you took his face into your hands. “Because I-- I fucking love you, okay? And it’s not just friendly, or romantic, even if it’s both— I’m… I love you like nothing I’ve ever loved before. I accept and adore your every skill and flaw and antic; you wormed your way into my heart and I want to worm my way into yours.”

“That doesn’t mean—“ Jonathan tried to interject, a noise all utter disbelief. You cut him off, though, continuing your sudden confession; you hadn’t been privy to these own romantic feelings of yours till moments prior, but everything being said just felt right. 

“Jonathan, I don’t care if you drove a car off a cliff or cyanide-poisoned our professor or blew something up, because I love you. You, with all your problems and great, big, beautiful life. All I want is for you to want that life; I want you to want me in it. I feel it in my bones that I’m meant to love you; you are meant to be my home, you are everything I am supposed to know. It won’t fix you or fix anything at all but I just need you to know-- I need you to know the why to my every action. It’s because I love you.”

He looked up at you, wide-eyed, head resting in your gentle hold. “I - don’t know what to say… are you - for real?”

“As real as can be,” you smiled back at him, tracing circles along his smooth skin; you could’ve drank in that attentive stare of his for hours upon hours. “I love you, and nothing and no-one, not even you, can change that.” An aching grip had clenched around your heart at his words, that blatant disbelief: are you for real? God, had you ever been-- had you ever fucking been. 

Jonathan’s mouth opened to speak, but instead, he let out an agonizing sort of cry; an exclamation of utter surprise at the loving acceptance. Then, he hesitantly leaned into your touch, as if he’d never hugged before, wrapping his arms around your waist to snatch you as close to him as possible. He held you tighter and tighter as the seconds went by, like this was all a mocking dream his yearning mind had made up; that if he closed his eyes now he’d wake up desolate, alone, without you for eternity. His worst nightmare. 

“…God, I’m so - fucking stupid,” he grumbled, sounding angry, but you could feel vulnerable, hot tears soaking into the fabric of your shirt. “To assume you, of all people, would act that way… you of all people.” He said that tenderly; you of all people certainly meant miles more things you weren’t explicitly aware of, but you still felt the sentiment. “I’m not -- poetic or anything like that… but I love you, too.”

You chuckled a beautiful, wet laugh. “You don’t hafta’ say anything sweet or special. You’re everything to me.”

He squeezed his eyes shut, before wrapping his fingers around your wrist and pulling you onto the mattress with him. He flipped you beneath him, and held himself up by the forearms laying on either side of your head. “Fuck, I love you. I love you.” Jonathan repeated the words several more times, strange and foreign but right at home being said to you. Like his mouth was made to only ever say I love you to you. 

Suddenly, you pressed your lips to his, shutting him up momentarily. You could still feel the vibrations of I love you rumbling in his throat as you kissed him. Your tongues danced along one another, an all consuming waltz; you wanted to know everything about him, down to the taste of his tongue, memorize how sweet his mouth felt on yours. Oh, how you longed for this moment; how could you ever think about love again, and yearn for it, without thinking of Jonathan?

You reckoned that’s what this had been the whole time; your love started as a little flame, something under the guise of friendship, but the two of you had fanned it, nurtured it-- all of a sudden the miniature warmth of platonic love burst into a raging, adoring fire. You’d fed this flame with tenderness, and it responded in kind; you could never again look at Jonathan without a certain intimate reverie. Perhaps that’d been why Jonathan found it so hard to cut off this relationship as he had dozens others: something primal and unconscious within him had begged him not to let you go— some higher being knew his home was only ever in your arms. 

Jonathan deepened the kiss hungrily, pressing his weight onto you and pushing you into the mattress. Your head was spinning from the lack of air, and one of your hands had to sneak beneath his hat and tug at his hair to get him to stop. “Hey,” you panted, looking worriedly into his eyes, “what’s up?”

“Sorry,” he apologized sheepishly, hanging his head lowly for a moment before meeting your gaze once more, batting his long lashes. “Jus’ missed you. Thas’ all.”

“Missed y’too,” you murmured, pulling him back down to kiss you again. Your hands left the crown of his head and trailed down his backside, tracing over the curves and bumps of his frumpy yellow v-neck sweater. 

That touch of yours seemed to spur him on even more, and his kisses began to travel; along your jaw, to your pulse, down the long ravine of your neck, tongue darting out to lick the hollow of your collarbone, making you squeal. He chuckled against your skin, a genuine amusement rather than the mocking one you two so frequently practiced, and it all went downhill from there. His hands skillfully tugged off your tank top, knee between your clenched thighs, more teasing kisses being planted along your now bare -- save for your bra -- chest.

You didn’t mean to come over, profess your love and suddenly jump into a steamy, yearning makeout session (which, you were pretty sure was venturing off into sex…) but you supposed that apologizing— arguing, whatever —meant your relationship went back on track to wherever it was heading… which may have been set to end with an ardor romance anyway. This love of yours would’ve bursted at the seams of friendship; it could not be confined by such mere things as labels. 

“Fuck,” you groaned, arching into his teasing kisses along the peaks of your breasts, his hands ghosting around your clothed chest but never touching. “Please, Jon.”

You could feel his cheeky grin on your skin, “Tell me what you want, love.”

“…Take this off,” you demanded gently, referring to Jonathan’s sweater.

“Your wish is my command.” he snickered, obliging and removing the yellow knit-- as well as his white undershirt and pajama bottoms. He was left in a pair of boxer-shorts and that silly, silly winter-trapper hat, his fingers sneaking up to your supple thighs and tickling the edges of your jean-shorts; a silent plea. 

“Eager,” you mumbled, noticing his over-compliance in completely stripping, smiling and guiding his hands to the waistband of your shorts to tug the tight article off. 

When he did so, you shivered, both at the feeling of being only in your underwear, as well as Jonathan’s sharp, attentive gaze. “You’re so beautiful,” he panted, eyes exploring your every sweet feature. 

He was enamored with your bare body, not in a sexual way despite the blatantly sexual situation, but rather in a worshiping, religiously devoted way. It may’ve been blasphemous to think so, but Jonathan’s sudden chaste kisses along the curve of waist only seemed to prove you right; his mouth on you was gentle, like he’d held you before, except now without any guilt or hesitation. It was a holy way of loving you; something all-consuming, becoming the epicenter of a life, becoming the purpose, motivation, and belief all at once. 

That familiar broiling in your gut occurred as he made his way closer to the pulsing, lace-covered place between your legs; your hands were gripping the sheets tightly in pure anticipation, his hot breath on your sensitive skin. “Don’t be such a tease,” you pouted, legs fumbling for purchase along his body, trying to pull him closer to you.

“We’ve got all the time in the world,” he hummed, but his fingers still curled into the band of your baby-blue panties and dragged them down in one desperate go, “but I do wanna taste you….”

Jonathan’s veiny hands pried your quivering thighs apart, murmuring an offhand already stole y’panties, don’t get all shy on me now when you whimpered flusteredly, before he descended on your dripping lips, licking a flat-tongued stripe up to your clit. 

You gasped at the sudden action, but it quickly morphed into a choked moan when he pressed himself further and parted your lips, nose to your pelvic bone; he made quick work of you, artfully curling his long tongue into your hole and slurping your slick. 

“So sweet,” he praised, the vibrations of his voice making your thighs clench around his head. He hummed in amusement at your reaction, lapping you up quicker; he kitten-licked and slobbered, feeding on your sticky cunt, tongue darting in every direction, feeling your walls and prying deeper into your hot hole, which ached for the cock straining against the mattress now. The bottom half of Jonathan’s face was now positively soaked, glistening with his own drool and your needy wetness, all of it mixing dirtily and sliding down the length of his neck. 

“Jon!” you mewled, hands tearing off his trapper hat and flinging it elsewhere before curling your hands into his mousy brown hair and pushing his face deeper into your pussy, desperate to come. You were riding his face now — or, attempting to, more accurately bucking up into him — adoring his unceasing ministrations. He was basically fucking you with his tongue, overstimulating your clit with teasing licks then pulling away, feeling along the ridges of your walls.

“Pick m’hat up later, love,” he tutted, pulling away slightly to see where you’d haphazardly thrown it, and your desperate whine neared a sob. He breathed in sharply, taking in how quickly he’d undone you: in a matter of minutes, your expression had grown wanton, eyes blown out, drooling, hair askew, bra riding up your tits and revealing your sweet, puffy nipples. 

Jonathan quickly forgot about the state of his beloved hat, and went back down on you, mouth devouring in full force once again. You rolled your hips forward, and when he pulled his tongue out of your wet hole to suckle softly on your fleshy nub, your eyes rolled back into your head and your legs shook around his face, toes curling tightly. A choked moan left you alongside the sudden climax, sounding a hundred percent pornographic and all for him. 

You panted, silent and unmoving for a moment, and Jonathan began moving to get up and let you take a breather before continuing, absolutely terrified to push you too far or do anything you didn’t want to do— he was the spontaneous one, and you were the responsible one, but that didn’t mean he ever wanted to force anything upon you. His simultaneous decisions were made mostly in part with your interests in mind; he made the decisions you were too nervous and over-thinking to choose quicker. 

However, you took a long breath, then trailed your hand over the painfully noticeable bulge within his soft boxers. “Wan’… make you feel good,” you murmured, flattening your hand against his erection. 

Jonathan inhaled sharply, pitifully affected by the minor touch but holding back with an incredible amount of self restraint. “I can wait,” he offered sweetly, one of his hands coming up to your flattened hand’s forearm to rub the skin. 

You shook your head foggily, cupping him through the fabric, slowly adding friction by sliding your hand up and down. 

“S-shit,” he bit his lip, “you want this now, baby?”

You nodded vehemently with a whimper, and to make more of a point, you reached behind and unclasped your bra, tossing it elsewhere on his dirty dorm floor, before beginning to slip off his underwear. 

The hand on your arm stopped you, though, in favor of doing it himself and pressing his weight further onto you, your chests flush with one another. You were only able to take in thin breaths, making your head spin, but it also amplified the  arousal blooming in your cunt when Jonathan slotted himself at your soaking entrance, collecting his saliva and your slick on his tip. 

Before he pushed in, however, his head dipped into the hollow of your neck, plush lips brushing past the shell of your ear. “Is this okay?” he murmured, pressing a wet kiss to your temple. 

“Please,” you whined, hands pushing flat on his back to bring him closer to you.

With that, Jonathan slowly buried his length within your cunt, making your breath hitch. “I love you,” he groaned, entering you inch by inch, relishing how your warmth swallowed him whole. “Fuck, I love you so much.”

Your hole was stuffed beyond belief, but Jonathan was gentle with you, caressing your waist with the rough pads of his fingers and massaging you, trying to ease his entrance into something painless. Obviously, with that length and thickness it couldn’t be painless at all, but his attempts helped your mind drift off elsewhere and take some of the attention off the stinging stretch. 

After a long moment of ragged breathing, Jonathan cooing words of praise into your neck as he kissed you without moving, you dug your fingers into the skin of his back: “More,” you choked out, the fullness in your cunt now feeling delicious rather than cringeworthy. 

He smirked against your skin, “Looks like you’re t’eager one now.”

“Oh, get on with it,” you rasped and he let out a low chuckle, sliding out of your hole before thrusting back in. That first movement already made your hips jerk up into him, back arching. It was like all the warmth in your body had collected in your cunt, leaving you freezing from the tips of your toes to the top of your head, but still with a needy, burning fire in your insides. 

Jonathan’s pace was affectionate and rhythmic: you could feel the tenderness in his each and every gentle roll of the hips. It made you feel like the sun, how attentive he was, but he was also so fucking slow. If anything, that had your walls clenching onto him harder than if he hammered into you— that slow build-up of friction was dizzying. You squirmed, cunt clenching and contracting around his smooth thrusts— you wanted to take him within you completely, cause more friction for you were going stir-crazy with this lazy speed. 

“F-fuck! Faster, please,” you cried out, unable to take his sensual movements any longer. Your legs were twitching with his patient movements, and you could’ve sworn you saw a cheeky grin on his lips. The bastard— even in sex was he teasing you, wanting to torture you until you gave in to the pleasure and begged him to ruin you.  

Sure, this was your first time together, and was going extremely pleasantly and sweetly, but you were actually pretty fond of the idea of letting him pound into you like there was no tomorrow… 

At the lewd thought, your walls pulsed around his cock, making him buck up unintentionally, hitting that sweet spot within you. He grunted at the feeling of your tightened cunt, while you cried out his name, pleasure running like a current through your body. Your face was on fire, reminiscent of a raging fever, and your insides were coiling— god, how did his cock just feel so perfect within you?

“Oh,” he grinned in a pant, “found y’spot, didn’t I?”

Jonathan didn’t give you a chance to speak before he pulled out so far his tip was the only thing in your hole, before slamming back in and making your eyes roll to the back of your head. Props to him-- he hit your g-spot with utmost accuracy, and you let out a long, stuttered mewl, scratching at his freckled back, legs twitching. Your wail was almost catatonic, loud and cock-drunk, dripping unabashed, filthy pleasure. 

“Makin’ such sweet noises f’me,” he praised huskily, hair sticking to the sweat on his forehead, “fuck, ‘ve gotta hear that again.”

He must’ve noticed your neediness earlier, when he was slow and languid, for the new speed he set was double- no, triple that: his hips were snapping against yours, balls smacking filthily against your lips, left hand pinning your hips down and letting him sink into you faster. Shocks of pleasure tore through you at the sudden increase in speed- he’d inured you so well to the torturously slow pace from earlier that this new frenzied one felt like getting hit by a bullet train. You were overstimulated and needing more of him all at once, practically vibrating with need under his touch. 

“I’ve- hnngh- wanted this…” you gasped between moans, “f-for so long…”

“Wanted m’cock?” Jonathan questioned in a hiss, feeling with his every inch how your walls absolutely soaked him. His tone was, obviously, sarcastic, but it still made you feel incredibly lewd. 

You shook your head numbly, “Wanted you… I love you, Jon!”

“So fuckin’ beautiful,” he purred, fucking you faster and making you writhe beneath him, “love you s’much.”

Jonathan targeted the spongy, swollen spot deep within your cunt, suddenly filled with a renewed vigor and motivation to make you come as quickly as possible, and he pounded into that one, specific spot, watching how you twitched and squirmed, heavy moans exiting you. He was relentless, hands reaching to hook under your knees and spread you wider. 

At the new angle, his cock penetrated you even deeper, fuller, which you thought wasn’t possible with how goddamn full you already felt, but when his thick cockhead brushed up against your cervix you thought you were going to burst. Then, one of his hands came up to your tits to knead the flesh, and you squeaked when he tweaked your soft nipples. He was pawing at your sweet tits, fondling you in a needy, boyish way, like yours were the first pair of boobs he’d ever felt. 

“M’close!” you gasped, mind going fuzzy with pure ecstacy. Your skin prickled with goosebumps, cold  sweat running down your spine, a terribly stark in contrast feeling to the warmth buzzing under your skin. 

“C-can’t last much longer either,” he choked, still pumping in and out of your sticky hole and savoring the feeling of your tight warmness on his long length. He looked absolutely exquisite above you, and you lost yourself in the ethereal picture. Maybe you were in love, or maybe he really was just an empyrean beauty; you took in the sight of his focussed iceberg blue eyes, the cute flush spreading along his pale cheeks and bare chest, how he bit his pink lips to muffle his needy grunts and moans. 

Then, you mewled and convulsed around him, your walls spasming and contracting as you came undone, reaching the precipice of your pleasure. That made him fall off the edge— you had tensed all over- all over, and Jonathan couldn’t help how his hips stuttered, knees buckled, cock twitched; he only gave one last, powerful thrust into you before spilling himself inside of you. He painted your soft walls white, and you felt that familiar heat spreading within you; you welcomed it completely, and wanted such warmth to be there forever. 

You milked him for every last drop, cunt like a vice grip, and Jonathan gave you another wet kiss, this time on your lips, and your hands wrapped around his neck, allowing you to kiss him back. Your brows knitted at the sour taste of yourself on his lips, but it just made everything feel so real— Jonathan and you had “made love”. It was a phrase you always wrinkled your nose at, feeling uncomfortable and juvenile at the intimacy it entailed, but now you understood it completely. 

“I love you,” you repeated for what felt like the hundredth time, unable to say anything else that conveyed what you felt for him. 

Honestly, you weren’t sure anything could accurately do so— you felt infinitely about him, your love touching all edges of your mind, heart and soul, filling you completely. You supposed you felt about Jonathan how the sun felt about the moon— without one, there could not be the other. 

“I love you-- too,” he responded, pausing in the middle at the aftershocks of your orgasm, which had caused you to tighten around his softening, sensitive cock for a second. 

You peered deep into his baby-blue eyes, watching the utter love that coloured them; it was like submerging yourself in a great blue ocean, except you didn’t want to come out, because you knew you wouldn’t drown in those eyes. No, you knew Jonathan would always be there to pull you out. 

Speaking of pulling out… Jonathan slipped himself out of you softly, careful not to agitate that first stretch any more than necessary, before collapsing back into your arms. The two of you tangled yourselves in a messy flurry of limbs on his cushy mattress, sweaty and breathy, something that should’ve been terribly uncomfortable but just wasn’t— you swore you could fall asleep anywhere, no matter your own state or the circumstance, as long as you were with him. 

Blearily, both your eyes began to droop, until you gave into the familiar presence of deep, dark sleep. It was a dreamless sleep for you, but you had an ever present comfort at his weight on yours, something you could feel even in unconsciousness. 

Hours later, in a brisk, shuddering early-morning that you felt all over due to Jonathan’s unruly habit of opening his window at the peak of the day’s hottest weather and forgetting to close it before cold nightfall fell, you awoke to Jonathan watching you carefully, so close you could feel his warm exhales of breath on your cheek. 

There was no goodmorning or anything like that, just pure, uninhibited being, reveling in the space you two occupied together. Like you two were the only things left in the world. 

When Jonathan noticed you woke up, he shifted, presumably to extract himself from your grip. You stopped him, though, wrapping an arm around his shoulders and bringing him closer to you.

“What did it feel like?” you asked instead, for the last time. You brushed your fingers over his scar, and, knowing exactly what you were asking, this time Jonathan doesn’t flinch away. This time, he leans into your touch: it doesn’t burn, not anymore, and he wants your tenderness to swallow him whole. 

You didn’t mean what it actually felt like, of course. You meant, what were you thinking? What have you done, and what will you do to yourself? You meant, I love you.

“It felt like,” falling; not everything feels like something else; I raised my arms and the air took me and that was it-- “it felt like… giving in. Letting my desperation find its purpose. It felt like I’d reached a point of peace… gained clarity after a long stretching, wounded moment came to an end. It felt like becoming something only meant to be talked about in past tense.”

You don’t say anything to that; you know he doesn’t want you to. There’s no need for you to hush or plead or make better, you just need to listen, and love him. He knows you accept him for everything he is, all his flaws and his strengths; he knows your love is all accepting- it veers on saintly. 

At your silence, he melts into your arms and you can finally relax; there is an admission in the action, a release, an acknowledgement -- is suffering in silence not also accompanied by the overwhelming desire to be found? -- you have found him, at last, and you will never, ever let go.

You take it too far, just once. Only once. And you let him go just once, only once; never again. 

[court-jobi]

hi! i love your works so much!!! i was wondering if i could request a hawks x pop princess f! reader?

like he does security for her groups concert and hes like “pffft im number 2 why do i need to be here”. then he watches her during sound check and is like okay i need to know more about her. so while shes getting ready hes just hovering backstage trying to talk to her. after the show she finally gives him her number (def against her companies wishes) and hes like trying to be suave and flirty and shes like “oh my god why is this working”. just a lot of hawks being a lover boy and sending gifts to her company anonymously and cutesy stuff like that lol. they have to keep their relationship a secret bc her company has a very strict no dating unless we agree rule. can be pre or post war hawks btw! you can take this wherever you want with it as well! can be nsfw or not.

im sorry that was so long! i was trying to make sure my thoughts were coherent lol.

Ooooo I love this idea so much, what a lovely dynamic to picture: a fanboy Hawks for a change, perhaps?? ~ this was a fun one to work on! @strwbrrykthv i sure hope this one was worth the wait and that I've done it justice!

You all are seriously the best readers a gal could ask for, and these requests are ✨giving me life✨~ Keep 'em coming!!

Who Has the Mic

Words: 4.3k

Rating: T

Warnings: Pro Hero!Hawks x popstar fem!reader, forbidden romance, flirting, mostly FLUFF, mentions of canon-typical threats, protective instincts, Hawks is a little shitTM, we love him your honor

for my My Hero Academia Masterlist, check it out here!

Read on Ao3

Hawks falls prey to a special thrill out of extending favors to others. 

‘I owe ya one’-- such a simple nicety that in the beginning, he doubts anyone would truly come to collect on it. It makes him sound agreeable, charming, starved for connection even before the height of his inevitable fame. 

Then he rose and rose in the hero rankings, securing himself into the very visible and wildly popular top spot, in terms of viewer popularity. 

It’s now that the redemptions of Hawks’ pro-hero favors have come rolling in… The unexpected keeps him on his toes and entertains him for the most part; and if it’s all for the sake of protecting others, then why not have a little fun with it? 

Once upon an overbearing press conference, back when he was first tiptoeing into the public scene… Hawks begged a makeup artist on staff for a spot to hide out in the green room and sneak a snack or two (or ten). He was granted pity for a teenager expected to take a seat at the table of an albeit boring Commission presentation. Well, it seems that particular makeup-artist rose within the talent realm themselves, and ended up reaching out to “that flyboy kid” back for a surprising accommodation: 

Top tier talent warrants top tier security.

Hawks takes a call at his agency and soon finds himself ushered in for the Tokyo opener of the reigning top-of-the-charts pop star with a voice of gold. The first meeting of old acquaintances led the Pro-Hero to tour the brand new, sky-high facilities, then return for the load-in day of the stage. Again for first dress, and each night of the week-long residency.

He carries his presence on the stealthier side, far above the stage floor in the scaffolding. Up here, lights are rigged with steel supports running every which way, where he executes perfect balance while walking in a straight line atop them. He’s checked -double and triple- that each outlet is free from hazard, each line of multi-ton equipment has been secured and safe, so that even his ‘adventuring’ from up high is not a risk.

He’s happy for the variety of work he faces as a hero- but right now, he’s bored. He shouldn't be feeling so dreadful, especially on the job, but he is. It’s not his style to be so down, after all. But Hawks has checked into every nook and cranny of this place and for the sake of an understandably hypervigilant security team, has an eye for which points of entry and exit could use a bird’s eye view come showtime.

His muscles are used to far more fast-paced antics and time-sensitive chases; not traipsing around like a literal vulture ready to swoop in at any moment. Surely he’s needed elsewhere.

But the threats have been rolling in… as they do for all of these larger-than-life musician types who found their way into the spotlight. They’re at risk of going in blind if they don’t have a good team around them to help them see.

So here he is, playing guardian angel to do his part and make sure all goes smoothly. It's a big operation by his count; there’s sixty members on the tech roster, plus the venue stage manager and their contracted staff, then all performers, and of course the headliner. Now where she is, he’d like to know– for not so selfless reasons.

He’d know her music by heart, given how much of an earworm and personal anthem her songs have become for him. It’s rare that the tables are turned, where Hawks is the fanboy and someone else is the idol. That dream is his dangling carrot for completing this mission successfully: he has the most sought-after bodyguard duty in the nation, and as good as a front row seat to her show.

Yet in a weird sense, Hawks also kinda hopes he never meets her. Doesn’t want to crush that bubble, ruin the allusion of the woman he’s got set as his ringtone.

So, he just runs his headcounts on all bodies supposed to be present at the top-of-show meeting to busy his mind. All is in order. ‘Cues’ are rounding up the pre-show acts, each in plainclothes for this rough stumble-through. Still doesn’t see the little starlet yet, and he gets the residual feeling that this might be typical behavior of ‘the talent’ to show up whenever she damn well pleases. 

Though funnily enough, he spots a pretty thing down there sporting some Hawks merch! Always nice to see a supportive fan in the most unlikely places… 

It's a well-fitting quarterzip sporting his red feather blades down each arm, an item he vaguely recognizes from this season’s newest launch. She’s got headphones on and subtly bopping about in her own little world, perhaps running through tonight’s set under her breath, if her self-contained taps of the fingers are an indication of her keeping beat. 

Hawks’ curious attention to that girl on the fringes of the stage is pulled when he hears the strict timbre of the stage director he’d met on day one take center stage.

“Ok, time to rein it in. As we covered in the email from Sec-Eng- which I’m assuming you gen-z’ers have read,” the bossman snarks to the younger members of this crew down below, “we’ve got some additional eyes in the sky pulling security for this leg in the tour. So, I want to give you all a chance to get your excitement out -along with your thanks- to our equally chart-topping hero, Hawks~ who’s… somewhere around here.”

Hoodie girl blanched– as if she’d been told she’d need to share her internet history to her grandmother. Immediately, she tosses off her headset and starts frantically stripping herself of the jacket she wore. While enthusiastic heads all fly around in every direction in search of the hero, Hawks chuckles at the sight of her alone. 

“...//Well, he’s probably checking the perimeters anyway//. How bout we all just send a big thank-you, eh?”

The couple of ‘Hoodie’s fellow dancers were poking fun at her -poor thing still flushed and clammed up- while the group gave a loud, singsongy ‘thank you!!’ up to the stage doors, assuming the Pro-Hero might be busting in, grand entrance fashion on command. The love-laden response from the dancers makes Hawks roll his eyes lightly, but he appreciates their praise all the same.

They giggle about in jazzed excitement with one’s voice carried out squealish and feminine, despite their professional assembly,

“Oh my god, you must be in HEAVEN!! He’s gonna be watching you ALL NIGHT!”

‘Hoodie’ looks downright mortified. The others have seemed to gather around spouting nothing but encouragement to this little fan girl who's doing her best to put on a poker face. Adorable. 

“Now we also need to make some edits before the crew breaks for lunch, everyone, so we are gonna start today with opening of Set 5 instead- hold.. Hold on… WHO HAS THE GOD MIC??”

The mics table scrambles for the one handheld microphone with omniscient audio range to the house. Surely it's the one thing they wouldn't lose and should hand straight to the Stage Manager, right? 

Well, said mic was sitting unattended there on the cart earlier… all for the Winged Hero’s taking when he was making his preliminary sweep earlier. 

From his inner jacket pocket, Hawks catches his lip in his teeth as he remembers where to turn the thing on. Once his throat cleared and the mic blinks red in sync with the soundboard, he amplifies a little trademark bird whistle: for each and every soul in sight to hear. 

The stage erupts in excitement, as planned. ‘Hoodie’ immediately teeters over to one of the props hideaways and stows said jacket away. 

Hawks chuckles with the mic at chest level– only to call her out from his perch,

“Saw that, dear~”

Seems logic caught up with the poor thing, as she -finally- pieced together the true vantage point of her idol’s presence, and looked up. 

Sparing her too much embarrassment, Hawks simply cocked his head on a folded up fist and gave a little wave of some fingers to her. 

Despite her clear shock and surprise, she did smile brilliantly back and gave a little signed ‘thank you for being here’ rather than a scream like all the others.

The stage manager followed her line of sight to where the hero stands in wait, ready to dismount and return his bit of cheekily stolen equipment. Despite some bewildered aggravation to Hawks’ antics, he gestures with the exhaustion of a high school teacher.

“There now, see kids? That's how you protect your voices before a show!! Better than belting your way to the doctor’s office. Our star here sure leads by example now doesn't she–” 

In rare form for the hero, it's Hawks’ turn to be stunned. His fangirl: it’s you.

Everyone else may be calling that first call time your lucky day… but you were intimidated to the point of feeling ill. Thank goodness for your poker face; because locking eyes with Hawks’ stunning crimson canopy and giving you that wink and a grin about sent you into a heart attack. 

You're starstruck. The absolute heartthrob of an idol you revere as your favorite Pro-Hero has been standing over 150 meters above your head, watching for every sign of danger that could threaten you for the last week. 

That near guarantee of safety would trump your fleeting nerves– if you hadn’t given the first impression of a closeted fangirl like you did!!

Nothing short of awe crossed your mind when you so much as think of the hero. A very vocal fan whenever he came up in the news or your social feed amongst your inner circle. Hawks is a household name for you, who you were incredibly fond of… both in how he handled massive crowds or charmed in intimate, one-on-one interviews. 

You know the role; you suck up for cameras, too, as it's all in the optics. But for every PR-guided response you know is crafted by easy-going smiles or a disarming tone, you remember to see past the spectacle of Hawks and look for ‘him’. Remove the wings and hero getup: who is he? Can you spot the tells on camera like your mom can when she watches you? No matter how big of a global phenomenon her baby girl gets, she can still tell when you have a headache while having to give an appearance on a talk show. 

The man you spot on screen has to have a series of faults and slips. Even battle-ready heroes put their shoes on one at a time– just like everyone else. He’s sure to have a favorite lunch spot, a favorite pen to use for autographs, a favorite singer, even… 

Surely not you, but a girl can dream.

There’s a glazed-over glint in Hawks’ eyes when he very subtly checks out when being spoken to which gives you the strong suspicion you two may not be so unalike. And that list of little mannerisms has grown exponentially– with every day that's passed:

Hawks has difficulty staying still, you've learned. He’s also much younger than people assume. Carries a crafty habit of popping up unexpectedly in a way that’s youthful– and borderline cheeky. From atop a stack of amps, to a crowdless green room, to the rigging of lights where you've stunned the crowds for the last four nights, he’s perched out of sight from your thousands of fans. 

Though each little comment thrown here and there in praise has floated down to your ears in sweet jest, things come to a head when the last night of your show arrived: where the crushing realization sought to dampen your mood. 

After tonight, you wouldn’t have your angelic, crimson-winged shadow anymore. 

But Hawks surprises you once again. 

You nearly miss it, too, once your final round of ‘surprise songs’ is revealed and you are snuck down to your assigned hideout to get ready to leave the venue. It’s back in your can-lit dressing room that you’re making double takes down the hall looking for any sign of your security team; especially the one to whom you owe a hefty ‘thank you’ to for all his efforts.

-but as your half-redressed form has donned your beloved Hawks hoodie once more, you’re not so spooked to hear a familiar whistle from behind you this time.

Headphones slung back down around his neck and wings slimmed down to a more presentable manner for tight hallways like these, Hawks slips into your prep space with a speedy uptick of steps. A knowing whisper to ‘shut the door fast so no one notices’ eeks out of him, eliciting a smile from you.

Each one of your suspicions are confirmed with that one comment alone; he knows this game well. Still, playing along with his dance of keep-away from any prying eyes (or cameras) doesn’t mean your heart isn’t  hammering away in your chest at the knowledge of getting your hero all to yourself.

So here, Hawks traipses around your makeshift room with unbidden interest– which, for such a small space, is cute to know how many little details pique his curiosity. Your various outfits still hang all facing the correct way, your personal backpack sits beside it on the end featuring your mess of pins and collected patches from the locations you’ve toured thus far. The run schedule is still taped on the wall, and below it, your laptop has your notation software open and idle onscreen.

“Well, now,” Hawks chimes in with a little crouch over the back of your empty chair, “Surely I’m not looking at our next chart-topping hit in the making, am I?”

“Maybe!” you chuckle, joining his side to quickly save your work before you forget. “It’s getting the lyrics and melody to marry right that’s the hard part. Working out the latter right now, and it’s kinda kicking my butt.”

“But you’re doing it! Look at all this– wait. Is this what you were dancing to earlier?”

Damn his powers of observation. You’d been testing out the rhythm of the hook this week– when you’d been caught under his attention.

“...M-maybe?” you hedge again.

“I knew it-” Hawks beamed, “A stunning starlet and a mastermind. What can’t you do?”

Flattered beyond belief, you answer honestly, 

“Keep myself outta trouble with my managers. Trying to, at least,” you close the laptop to conserve its power, “but between the shows and speaking engagements, it’s left me a bit starved for time to actually make the music.”

“N’why would writing get you in trouble?”

“It takes me away from all the other things I ‘have to do’,” you sigh easily. “They can bring in anyone to make the music and keep pitching songwriting teams to me to take the load off. Just think something’s gotten a little out of balance.”

Without meaning to, you held Hawks’ attention– enough to make him sit back on the armrest of your couch and listen with undivided attention while you explained your creative process more. While most J-Pop performers would be thrilled to have outside writers create the work and easy into a performance schedule with pre-set work to learn, you loved to have a hand in the writing process too. As an art form, it’s personal when you have to perform season after season. 

You’ve chatted quite a bit here and there over these last several days, though not this extensively. He was interested in so much about this whole operation, to the point where you wondered if he’d ever met any of the performers who you knew presented at some of those hero galas he went to. Apparently not, by the way he’d lock onto your every word when you spoke. Either your timekeepers (or his) would inevitably interrupt you, so back to work you two would fly off to.. though you’d seem to circle back to one another and chat about anything and everything if given the chance- little spurts of talk that always left you wanting more.

He’d commiserate with you on that front as well– the balance of stardom and freedom. Bogged down by meetings and public appearances wore on him just as much as you. With every roadblock you described about your recent album development, Hawks nodded along with expected understanding. 

The revolving issue of personal safety might have brought him into your employ, but you know more and more cases like yours filled up his day-to-day life in ways you couldn’t imagine… but he even shed some light on that as well to you. He’d burst the bubble on hero work as an industry through little asides with you offstage: comments he’d likely get reprimanded for if he ever spoke them in a public statement. 

But you’d keep his secrets safe. What happens on set stays on set.

So even now, as he’s tucked himself into your dressing room while you puttered around chatting about your true dreams of getting a new concept album wrapped by the end of the year, Hawks tuned in with genuine interest that only made your heart skip a beat for him more.

“I haven’t always gotten the time to work on it lately… though this week, I’ve had a clearer head to be in here rather than under lock and key with a security force breathing down my neck– which is largely thanks to you, Mr. Hawks.”

“Oh please,” Hawks scrunches his nose and teases, “Mr. Hawks is what the lawyers call me. Just Hawks is fine!”

You exhale, squishing back any girlish outburst from your voice at how fussy he looked. 

“All the same, thank you for your help this week,” you pressed, “It’s -uhm- not often I get to meet my favorite Pro Hero on the job…”

A pleased smirk lifts Hawks’ cheeks, though you spot a funny kind of shyness in them when he studies your sleeve rather than look you in the eye-

“Favorite, huh?” Hawks smiles, “ n’here I thought I was the lucky one, sweet’eart-” he taps his headphones for emphasis, “One day I’m listening to you on repeat on my morning commute– and the next, I’m standing two feet from you!”

“--You’re kidding.”

From his pocketed phone, Hawks challenges you with a press and hold on the speakers to boost the volume as high as it could go. Faintly, you caught your own pop vocals from your second ever album casting from Hawks’ headphones. 

You can’t believe your luck– he’s really a fan? Of yours?

The mix of sentimentality and surprise must be palpable on your face as you grasp exactly which song has Hawks spellbound before he cocks his head with a sheepish grin of his own, 

“Believe me now?”

Words fail you, but you shudder out a little giggle that speaks volumes. He tests with a smile,

“Soooo guess you wouldn’t mind if I asked a horribly stereotypical favor and snagged a selfie while I’m here?” 

Eyebrows shot up to the sky as Hawks dangled his phone between you, you immediately pause. No one on your Communications team is still backstage (to your knowledge), but the engrained warning about checking your professional list of partnerships before posting comes to mind… annoying as it is. All you want is a pic with him, too!

“Nothing for socials-” Hawks assures you with a gloved hand, “If your handlers are just as pesky as mine, they’d never let me live it down. Just– something to keep me grounded, on the hard days.”

That reasoning… it almost broke your heart just as quickly as your potential disappointment had been earlier. 

With a knowing smile, you nodded sweetly to Hawks- he’s charming in a whole new light to you.

“Only if you send it to me too, hm? Favor for a favor?”

“ ‘Course!”

Sliding up into his open space, Hawks clearly knows his best side but keeps you right in the center of his shot. That smile he makes… you are going to keep this proud glint in his eye and sight of his hand around you locked into your mind forever– even if he forgets to send it to your insta handle after this. 

It’s too brief of a moment, watching his wing curl around you though the phone’s front-facing camera burgeoning you close, head tilting gently against yours. Keeping a close-lipped smile seared into your mind when you think of him now.

Then in an even more lightning fast moment, while he’s fussing with a weird flip of his bangs, you reach to tap the shutter as you sneak a kiss onto his cheek. 

He’s stunned by the move, but by the even brighter muted smile, you stand by with pride double checking his photo gallery that the shot made it. It surely did. 

“You have a hard job, Hawks; harder and more dangerous than anyone I know,” 

You step away casually.. Though the need for distance is more for your sake than just optics of your forwardness. 

“... Thought you deserved more than one lil selfie. Hope that’s ok?”

“H-okay?” Hawks breathes out, studying his camera roll with reverence, “Better’n ok..”

Outside a muted feedback from the PA system is calling for Exit team to assemble– get staged for your departure from the venue at last.

“That’s me. Better bounce-” Hawks piped up after a small clearing of his throat. You’re nearly too shy to look at him after this-

-but when a kiss greets your hand, lifted imperceptibly fast and squeezed just as fleeting as his words grace your ears- you couldn’t look away if you tried.

“- a pleasure, dear.”

And before you can utter any further word of thanks or manage something other than a shocked smile, Hawks slips out of the room and off to hand the reins back to your team. You can barely hear from the still-live walkie talkies that your security detail is back at their regular stations, and your Pro-Hero is off for his final step of his hired work. Soon he’d be relieved of his station and off to save someone else from an unsavory fate.

He doesn’t forget to send you the photos; and you now have his private insta handle.

The photo where you snuck a peck onto his cheek would be set as your internal screenshot if it weren’t for your niece’s constant borrowing of your phone when she visits you on set… 

But now, you’re back for a month-long stay at the studio– your reward for a successful first half of the Tour.

Encouraged by your protective muse’s spark at the thought of your new music, you decide to take that energy back to Chichibu. Your headphones might as well be glued to your head, with how much you’ve head-dived into your sound mixing apps and sampling library. In fact, it’s that unwavering attention to your music that you nearly miss the most obvious sight walking through the lobby of the unassuming recording studio. Almost.

But how could you really– when the largest floral arrangement you’d ever seen is gracing the reception table? That stunning piece looks like it costs more than the linoleum flooring the desk sits on. 

A few aides have been distracted by the sight, studying the typed message attached and racking their brains for any sign of a calling card. One of your cutting room techs was currently rounding the base of the standing arrangement for some tucked note, which made you giggle how intently she was studying the thing. 

You know the sound booth manager best out of this group of other visiting accompanists,

“Lucky, lucky girl~” she reels you in excitedly, plucking the card from the other’s sights and handing to you directly. “Sorry to say there’s no hint who it’s from… but it’s for you, little bird!”

You hedge at the pet name once again– the nickname stuck unwillingly not only for your melodic talent, but the association with your clear celebrity (heroic) crush. 

However, as you read the note, the immediate assumption that this may have been another gift from a venue host was thrown right out the window…

This was a personal gift:

To keep my genius company while she makes her magic~ No one can give us the stories you can; don’t ever  let them take your voice. It’s the most beautiful thing I’ve heard. Can’t wait to hear the new demo!

“No matter how high or low I am.. a piece of me will be here with you. It’s- where I'd rather be... Till next time…”

“Next time? Wait, who sent these again?!”

“It was just the delivery guy, from that really flouncy place downtown~” the receptionist answers with interest.

“Nooo, I mean on the card! Who signed the card?

“There's nothing– no initials, nothing..” you confirmed, still reeling over the message. But as you trail off over the cascade of tropical flowers, the flecks of red blooms catch your eye and bring you to study harder. 

Then- tucked under some deep green curls- a spot of red hides. A quill amongst the mossy padding of the arrangement- not unlike a surprise found in a nest.

Sifting through under the guise of feeling tender petals, you grasp the soft, downy feather which bears a small post-it flag on the underside with a sequence of numbers on it. 

“Do you have any idea who?”

Balling it carefully in your fist just as quickly, you answer, “Couldn't tell ya. But the pop of red sure is pretty, isn't it?”

In your booth -set up with your sticker-laden laptop and butterflies in your stomach- you hold the sticky note in one hand, pinching the crimson feather precariously in the other. 

Face warmed and unbelieving of your luck, you think on what to send first to your mic-stealer…

To be continued?

[kittynugg]

Hi!! I love your Lil dilemma au! It gives me life! I had a thought about an au of this au where stan got minified to. The idea just makes me laugh because I wonder if he would be as angry as Ford or just more chill about it. I always envisioned stans innocence and maturity getting along.

okay do you know how badly i've wanted to write this ever since BEFORE I STARTED WRITING THE ACTUAL FIC

stan would be so casual and breezy about it, like ford's trying to shove down that childishness and compensate by being sooo adult but stan would just be running around catching bugs and shit he's frolicking in the fields and ford's just constantly having a mini-panic attack

and he'd do it to himself too no doubt like. he'd walk into the living room one morning all tiny and everyone would just be thinking "oh fuck what did he do"

and when ford inevitably asks (for research purposes because now he's going to have to cure both of them) how it happened stan's like "eh i was bored so i went back to the fair'n bought my own fountain of youth water. its whatever"

(or no i actually envision him being so excited that he's shaking he's running around "AAAAAAA IM SO HAPPY IM SO HAPPY FORD LOOK IM LITTLE LIKE YOU WE'RE BOTH LITTLE I HAVEN'T HAD THIS MUCH ENERGY SINCE I TOOK ADDERALL THAT ONE TIME" and dipper's like "what for adhd?" "how did you know" and he glances up and down stan's form just like with his aura of neurodivergence "..just a hunch")

within the first day stan's entirely used to it and he is HAPPY like. this is is life now. and something about him being a kid too gives ford all these unwanted childish urges so melody ends up the parent figure for a while to keep them out of trouble

alas, trouble is what they do best so like one of the first things stan does after leaving the shack for the first time is get arrested

im imagining this whole scene. so stan scampers outside, ford in tow by the hand, they're both snickering with visions of impending pie theft in their minds, and stan heads right for the car. he still has his keys because he didnt sleep with them in his pocket (i figure they'd despawn along with anything else on the adult body's person, only to return upon re-aging)

and ford snaps out of child brain for a second because "Stan, you can't drive, you're two feet tall."

"the car won't know that"

"..."

"Valid."

and stan actually manages to drive the car fairly well considering how fuckimg little he is, until they get pulled over.

blubs asks him for his license and registration. ford is SWEATING. stan casually hands him his driver's license and durland leans over to look

"..looks alright to me!" blubs nods in agreement and tells the two gentlemen in the car to have a nice day

then they get pulled over a SECOND time by two DIFFERENT officers and are taken directly to the police station do not pass go do not collect 200$ just like IMMEDIATELY asked to step out of the car and cuffed

so stan has to call melody to bail them out while ford cries hysterically on the floor

they get grounded for a month

i feel like they'd switch clothes and pretend to be each other a lot and it'd get really fucking annoying for everyone else to a point where every now and then they'd look reallllllly close and count their fingers to make sure they're talking to the twin they think they're talking to

although what with stan's tooth gap (which i think would give him a lisp until he gets used to it) there'd be a clear difference so idk

anyway there's a little thought about it to go with your other thoughts chances are i'll come back to this, thanks a ton for the ask im always happy to ramble

[pretzelcat-kip]

“If I’m coming down with something, I’d rather go down with you”

I guess I could do this with my Tumblr…Win or Lose sickfic anyone?

—————————————————————————

Yuwen was woken up by his own coughing.

His eyes flew open as his lungs quietly convulsed. He immediately rolled onto his side in an attempt to breathe easier and the hacking stopped. He inhaled, feeling the congestion clogging his nose.

Uuuuggh.

He closed his eyes and tried to slip back into unconsciousness, to delay the inevitable, but apparently his brain was now awake enough to sneeze. He sneezed about a billion times before it finally stopped, only to be replaced by shivering.

Fuuck.

He pulled his blanket tighter around himself. Well, this was gonna be a FUN DAY. He groaned and rolled over again, spotting a familiar figure laying on the floor across from his bed.

FuuuuUUuuuuckk.

He’d forgotten Kai was sleeping over. To be fair, Kai slept over all the time. Well, not literally all the time, but more than normal. Or atleast more than what Yuwen THOUGHT was normal. Actually, he didn’t remember anyone EVER sleeping over at his place before he met Kai. He looked around at his tiny cramped “bedroom,” at the sliding curtain which sanctioned it off from the rest of the RV and acted as his only means of privacy. He’d never INVITED anyone to sleep over here before; why would they want to?

But, Kai was different. He thought Kai might be his best friend. Maybe. They hadn’t known each other that long, she’d moved to Peaks Valley only a few months ago. But, they sorta, got each other. Yuwen felt like no one really got him like Kai did. He didn’t wanna seem desperate but…he hoped she felt the same.

“…no…no…please…” he heard a whisper.

Ah, yes. There was also this discovery. Apparently Kai hadn’t known she talked in her sleep until Yuwen told her, and she was also a much heavier sleeper than him, so he was often awake to hear it. He didn’t mind that much, at least she wasn’t a snorer, and…honestly…well, she revealed a lot more about herself while sleeping than she ever did while awake. He tried not to listen, but sometimes he was curious and…

He felt guilt stab his chest, but he couldn’t help hearing right now anyway.

“…no…mom…stay…hhrrr…”

Surprise prickled through him. Kai never talked about her mom, usually not even in her sleep, and he never pressed her to. She never pressed him about his dad, after all, so he figured he’d return the favor.

Kai whimpered and huffed, her breathing uneven. He rubbed his eyes and peered closer at her. Was she…flushed? It was hard to tell in the dimly lit room and with her darker skin, but he thought her cheeks looked kinda red. Her face and nightshirt had sweat on them and she sounded…raspy…

Oh.

“…I-I don’t want…no…there’s gotta be…” she groaned and sniffled. Even in her sleep, her face was scrunched up. She looked in pain. “Don’t…leave me…”. He suddenly felt uncomfortable. He shouldn’t be hearing this, she wasn’t choosing to share this. He was desperately curious but…

“Mmm, um, Kai?”

Kai jolted awake at the sound of her own name, and immediately had a coughing fit to match his. Eventually it subsided and she groaned, flopping back and draping one arm over her face.

“…Kai?” Yuwen tried again after a moment. Did she even realize he’d woken her up?

She rolled over to look at him with bleary eyes.

“Hmm? Yu? Wutisit?” her voice was VERY raspy, but his probably didn’t sound much better.

“Mmm…im sick, yur sick,” he muttered sleepily.

“Whaat? Siiick? Nah, I feel great…” she coughed a little more and wiped sweat from her brow.

“Mmm, mmhmm,” he hummed skeptically. He already knew this mood of Kai’s. Apparently in her mind any physical ailment she may have, whether it be a scape or sniffles or oncoming heat stroke, was a sign of weakness and must be ignored at all costs.

“Weeelll then whataya doin layin there? Get me some tea, lazy bones!” he trilled through his congestion.

“Right! On it!” To Yuwen’s amazement, she actually began to extract her legs from her sleeping bag and stand up. The girl swayed slightly on her feet, her eyes glazed dangerously with fever.

“Wha-! I didn’t mean actually! Lay down before ya pass out!” he yelped. “It would completely ruin this sleepover if you passed out! Accept your fate, fellow sicky.”

She begrudgingly fell back down on to the bag with an angry sniff.

“Can’t believe you got me sick, to think I was almost starting to trust you,” she huffed.

“Excuse me?! You obviously got me sick! You’ve probly been sick for a week without telling anyone!” he gasped, giving her the most dramatically offended expression he could manage without sitting up.

“Nuh uh,” she retorted.

“Yuh huh.”

“Nuh uh!”

“Yuh huh!”

“Nuh huh!!!”

“Yuh huh!!!”

They both sneezed at the same time and paused to wipe their noses.

“C’mon, I wouldn’t do that,” she said, slightly more seriously, “no one deserves this.” She pulled at the collar of her damp shirt as if trying to cool down. He knew it probably wasn’t any more pleasant, but he sort of envied her for not needing to wrap herself into a burrito to avoid shaking like a wet chihuahua. “Cold weather sucks,” she muttered.

Oh, yeah, it had been pretty cold lately, lots of chilly rain and wind as winter descended on the valley. It never actually got cold enough to snow there, which meant they missed out on the fun part of winter while still experiencing the cold and flu season.

Yaaaay. Welcome to Peaks Valley, new best friend.

“Atleast you actually run warm. Try needing a jacket and pants for anything below 70!” he flashed.

“Doesn’t your greater sensitivity make it all the more likely you caught this and gave it to me?” she pointed out.

“Ehhhh, I’m not legally required to answer that,” his tone was light, but he felt a genuine prick of guilt. He really had felt fine yesterday, if he’d thought he was coming down with something he wouldn’t have let Kai come over. Oh well, atleast now they were going down together. Unless…

“I guess you wanna call your dad and go home?” he said in spite of himself.

“Hmmmmm…I told him I wouldn’t be home til tonight…” she murmured, folding her legs and crossing her arms thoughtfully, “I don’t have to.”

“You’d rather stay here for a sick day?” he gestured at the tiny space and the trailer park outside the window.

“I’ll go out on a limb and guess your mom makes good soup?” she said, flashing a grin.

He snorted. Kai was treated to his mother’s cooking atleast twice a week. Even when she wasn’t having meals with them she was almost always sent home with food. It was kind of embarrassing, but it seemed to make both Kai and his mom happy, so he didn’t try to stop it.

He hesitated, then asked, “Does your dad not make good soup?”

She didn’t answer for a long moment. He wondered if he’d overstepped. Yuwen had met Kai’s father a few times, but only briefly. Whenever the two crossed paths Kai always ushered the interaction along to end almost as soon as it started, as if she was worried that her dad would embarrass her, or that Yuwen would embarrass her. He sincerely hoped it was the first option. After a while, just before he was about to say ‘Kai?’, she piped up-

“No, not really. And, he’s just…not that great with sickness, I think ‘cause of my…” she trailed off. Something clicked in Yuwen’s brain.

“…your mom?” he finished her sentence without thinking. He sorta wanted to kick himself for the shocked and sad look she gave him. “You…talk in your sleep, remember?” he added guiltily, “I didn’t mean to hear…uh…sorry.”

“It’s…okay,” she said.

There was a long awkward pause, then: “Yeah…she, uh, she died when I was pretty young, back when I was…” she hugged her arms tighter around her chest, “…anyway I…don’t remember her much, but I remember saying goodbye to her. They didn’t tell me until right before. I didn’t get to say a lot to her, before she was gone.”

He hadn’t expected her to share that much. He didn’t think her watery eyes were just from sneezing. He figured he should say something, something comforting or insightful.

“Oh,” he said instead.

Kai raised an eyebrow at him. “‘Oh’?” she echoed.

“I MEAN, MY DAD GOT ARRESTED WHEN I WAS NINE,” he blurted,

FuuuuuuuUUUUUuuuuuuucckkk.

“…for…for domestic abuse…and drunk driving…and assault…and attempted-” he cut himself off at the look on Kai’s face. This was not going how he’d planned it. And he hadn’t planned it at all. “B-but, uh, this isn’t about ME!” Now that was a sentence he never thought he’d say. Best-Friendship changed people.

Another awkward silence. Yuwen sniffed loudly.

“Um…so, yeah…” he tried.

“So…yeah, um…” she tried, or atleast he thought she was trying. She was always trying, harder than anyone he knew.

…

“We’re not very good at this, are we?” she said wryly.

“I mean, you’re burning up and I’m a wet chihuahua and we both sound like we swallowed cheese graters,” he reasoned, “but, uh, no.”

“Yeah…thanks for telling me, though,” she said, perhaps a little sheepishly, but still in that wonderful Kai way.

“Yeaahh, a’course. You too…I mean, thanks for telling me, too,” he said, definitely sheepishly, and in a way that felt weirdly naked, like going on stage without a costume.

“‘Course. S’what best friends do,” she said casually.

A little voice in his chest screamed, ‘YEEEEEEESSSSSS!’ while dancing and throwing confetti in the air. It would probably be like that for the rest of the day. It was gonna be a fun day.

“Sorry about your mom,” he said carefully.

“S’okay, sorry about your dad.”

“S’okay. I’ve got my mom. I’ve always had her…” he was a little embarrassed to say that out loud, but it was how he felt, or maybe it was the high fever talking.

“Yeah, and I got my dad…” She looked thoughtful. “I love him but…sometimes he’s too much, and sometimes he doesn’t understand. Having my grandma there helps but, sometimes I need a break from him.”

“Oh,” Yuwen said again, another thing clicking in his brain, “well, you’re always welcome here. Mi trashy trailer park, es su trashy trailer park.”

She chuckled, “‘Preciate that.”

He chuckled back, then his breath hitched and he coughed again.

“Y’wanna wake your mom?” she asked, sleepiness was beginning to slur her words again, but she still managed to look concerned at him.

“Nah, it’s still early. So unless you’re, like, dying, I think we’ll be fine.”

Almost on cue, his shivers started up again. He pulled the blanket in closer and started tossing and turning, trying to warm up. Maybe that hadn’t been the greatest idea, he considered as he rolled slightly too far left and landed with a dull thump on the floor.

“…ow.”

“Y’know, you’ve already come down with something. You don’t have to literally go down,” Kai teased.

“Sh-shu’up,” he croaked, his teeth chattering. The wood was unpleasantly cool, but the thought of trying to stand up and climb back into bed made him tremble more.

He felt a warm hand grab his arm. Kai wordlessly tugged him onto the makeshift palette of rugs and blankets they’d set up for her to lay her sleeping bag on. It was no bed, but it was better than cold hard floor, and Kai radiated warmth. She threw his bed blanket back over him, then another one for good measure. His tremors mercifully receded.

“Mmm…” he grunted sleepily.

“Mmm?” she questioned.

“Mmmm…” he hesitated, “…thanks…”

“Mmm,” she yawned and laid back, “don’t cough on me.”

He felt a smile tug at his mouth, even as drowsiness rose up to drag him back into blissful unconsciousness. “No promises.”

[mousydentist]

I'm trying to decide if I want to send you an unreasonable number of asks for the prompt game... :)

Let's start with The Polaroid Dates™️

hi im so sorry these are taking so long i pinky promise im gonna get to all of them eventually 🙏🙏🙏

the whole idea: some kind of a 5+1 with the polaroid dates and a +1 from post canon

ok so this is one that i actually have something for so im gonna add to it and then post what i wrote on top of it. im not totally sold on actually making it a 5+1 anymore but eh we'll see. also these snippets are kinda just cut out from the middle of scenes so they're not toally complete

ty for the asks fern ilysm 🥰🥰🥰

2.  At some point Kim goes to the bathroom, but really he's watching the live feed of the camera in the living room, just to see what Chay will do. It takes no time at all before Chay’s sneaking around, checking down the hallway for Kim then scurrying around and picking things up. No, he’s placing things?  A bug? Right. This is what Kim was expecting. This is exactly why he started investigating the Kittisawad’s in the first place. They’re clearly up to no good, and here’s proof of it. Kim swallows a lump in his throat.  He's a target. The name Porchay means nothing to him other than a name in a folder next to an age and a photo. He braces himself on the counter for a minute, eyes carefully averted from the large mirror in front of him. He splashes cold water on his face, and it helps. He needs to be Khimhan now. No, he’s always been Khimhan. He’s been Khimhan this whole time. The smiles and laughs, the little gifts, agreeing to bring Porchay here, those were always Khimhan. They were tactical moves to make the target let down his guard and reveal his true intentions. Khimhan had walked into the bathroom, and he has no problem walking out to get Porchay out of his home.  Chay Porchay the target is fidgety when Kim returns, no doubt worried he was caught. Khimhan gives him a Wik smile, and says, “Sorry, I’m not feeling very well. can I drive you home?” As soon as Kim is back to his own apartment, he goes to the large chair in the corner where he remembers the target messing around. Just in case he planted cameras, Kim walks casually, planning to sit in it while he runs a bug detection program on his phone. But when he’s in view of the chair, he pauses. There’s something on the arm of it. He gets close enough to make it out before he picks it up.  A… polaroid? He flips it over, and it’s a tiny picture of Chay making a heart with his fingers and wearing a goofy expression. At the top, he’s written, “Thank you for spending time with me!!!” and on the bottom, “You’re the #1 guitar tutor EVER!!”

3.  Do it. This is the kind of relationship you were looking for, this will tell you everything you need to know about him. He’ll let his guard down completely. Or, don’t do it. You already have most of the information, and if you do this he’ll be expecting even more from you. You have no obligation to this kid. Dump him here and now. It would… be… Kim’s thoughts fuzz out for a second, as he watches Porchay giggle and shuffle around awkwardly. For the first time in a long time, Kim lets himself ask what he wants. His life is not one that regularly awards him the privilege of acting illogically, and given that this could go either way, he thinks it’s been long enough since he’s been selfish. He doesn’t think about how he’s been selfish with Chay this whole time, and he doesn’t think about the way their relationship will inevitably end. He doesn’t think about how this will ruin Chay, or about the exact scar he knows this will reopen on his heart. He pulls Chay into a hug, and presses a kiss to his cheek, because that’s what the emotional part of his brain, the part that he’s handed control over to, decides he wants. He doesn’t think about after, not a year, not a week, not ten minutes. He thinks about Chay’s arms around his neck, and his laugh ringing in his brain, and he thinks, maybe, he’s finally found something he wants. And now, he has it.

(send me a prompt!)

[qoldenskies]

hey dawg, me again

thinking again about cc (do i think of anything else? lol no) and just contemplating about their whole situation *cries*

because what a situation they're in in CW like........I've seen some other asks and your responses to them talking about it but like, the "normalcy" that they are going to get to in the epilogue one shot, mm mm mmm. thinking about the road to healing that they must all go through. thinking about how it all boils down to how does one make amends after hurting someone?

(story time to get my point) once when i was playing a contact sport, i hurt a member of my own team on accident, we knocked heads pretty hard. so hard my teammate was one the ground screaming in pain, holding their face. While i managed to stand and walk off with just a bump on my forehead and a slight headache for a few days, i later found out that i'd hit my head against their eye. they had a pretty bad concussion for a while and months later at the optometrist they found out they had a small tear in the corner of their retina. (not trying to trauma dump, i promise i'm getting somewhere!!!)

the point of the story is just, guilt man. I'd hurt my friend, on accident, but i'd still hurt them and pretty badly too. after the collision there was just nothing i could do to make it right. I couldn't undo the hit no matter how much i wanted too. and because of who they were they didn't like anyone making a fuss about them. it was the first time i can remember hurting someone so badly and being aware of the fact that i was the direct cause. It was my fault. And that's how i think leo and raph and mikey feel in a sense. it feels like the same kind of guilt, the same kind of "i hurt you, it was my fault, i'm sorry, but 'i'm sorry' doesn't fix this, we can heal from this but i can't take back anything i did to you, and still, i'm going to be sorry about this forever" and the riveting conclusion of "i never want to hurt you (or anyone) ever again" (even though it wasn't entirely their faults, even though there is so much they can do to help the healing, even though they/you will end up hurting others again; in life it's inevitable) *falls to my knees and rakes them closer to me like you would leaves* *wailing*

i lub you tmnt ninja turtles, i luvh you complicated sibling dynamics, i loob(hate) you passage of time that does not heal the ache but soothes it like a balm *family guy dead pose*

YEAHHHHGHHH YOU GET IT ,,,,, they are ALL crumbling under the weight of what's been put on their family, and it is Immensely traumatic for the three of them, too. obviously they've been in combat before, but never in a way that's so violent. visceral. leo stabbed him and heard the squelch of the blade tearing through donnie's skin and muscle. he felt his body shudder as he screamed under him. raph returned to clarity with his hands around his little brother's throat, right after hearing him beg him not to kill him. they all remember the sound of the sickening snap of his wrist, the way his terrified pleading and sobbing slurred as he slowly gave up. the sound of his skull smacking against the floor. there was a very real moment after the curse broke where mikey thought donnie's last words to him were "im sorry".

they still smelled the blood weeks after the fact. leo had to confront his injuries head-on in order to save his life, HE was the one responsible for saving his life despite what he'd just gone through (after taking a nasty blow to his head too, mind you). it is. insanely traumatic for them. and now they cant hear the sound of donnie screaming or crying at all without flying into a panic. it really goes beyond simple guilt, it's something so much more painful. not to mention the way that the curse twisted their values and coping mechanisms, so now they cant fall back on them anymore.

even if donnie accepted them immediately in the way raph dreamed about, it wouldnt have healed them. even when he can stand them being around him again, he's still going to have triggers, and so are they. they cleaned up all the evidence and fumbled horribly by removing the footage and rebuilt donnie's room because they wanted so badly to undo it, but there's nothing they can do but wait.

its just. arghghhhh its all so messed up and im loving the fuck out of it

[1lesbianisms1]

Bechloe 😍

BECHLOE WAS REAL AND IM SO MAD THEY DIDNT MAKE THEM CANNON ‼️

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Beca couldn’t believe she’d agreed to this. She would’ve preferred staying in, mixing beats and finding more samples for her arrangements, but after Chloe had practically groveled at her feet to come out, Beca couldn’t bring herself to say no. She told herself she’d put her foot down for once, but when Chloe looked at her with that almost mischievous grin, Beca couldn’t bring herself to refuse her.

So, here Beca was getting ready to go to a party at some sorority house she’d never been to. She’d made Chloe promise she wouldn’t leave her to wander aimlessly through the crowds of sweaty, sticky college kids covered in beer and unknown substances. The red-head swore she wouldn’t let Beca out of her sight, but deep down Beca knew as soon as Chloe started to feel the liquor coursing through her system she would stumble away and leave Beca alone in the endless, confining space of the warm sorority house.

Even though Beca knew Chloe wouldn’t keep her word, she liked to hold out hope that Chloe would stay by her side long enough for Beca to feel that subtle, warm buzz while she inevitably waited for Chloe to return. As Beca thought about the familiar scenario and how awful she would feel without Chloe there to distract her, she began to have second thoughts. ‘Maybe I can skip out on this one…’ Beca thought, staring at the outfit that she’d decided to wear to the party. Her dark mauve shirt suddenly felt more constricting than flattering and she was now hyper aware of the necklaces dangling from her neck.

She didn’t want to disappoint Chloe by flaking at the last minute, but she’d rather deal with Chloe’s temporary disappointment than the smothering feeling of being stuck alone in a house full of stupid, drunk college kids, disaster waiting to happen.

Beca fought with the thoughts in her head, and as if on cue, her phone rang with a notification from Chloe.

Chloe: Ur still coming right?? I'm not going by myself again 😔

Beca laughed. Maybe she would go… or maybe she wouldn’t. She couldn’t make up her mind and Chloe’s unintentional guilt tripping didn’t make her come up with a decision any faster. She grabbed her phone, staring at the text bubble for a moment.

Beca: why don’t u ask Stacie? she’ll definitely go with u

Chloe’s response was almost immediate.

Chloe: Because id rather go with u

Chloe: I feel like we don’t hang out nearly as much as we should

Beca agreed, they hadn’t hung out as much as they used to. Beca didn’t know why. She’d assumed it had something to do with Chloe’s schedule. She missed Chloe, but she never said anything. It was comforting knowing that Chloe felt the same.

Beca: ur right we haven’t. I feel like ur always busy

Beca: plus every time we go out it’s always to somewhere loud and obnoxious

Beca: why can’t we hang out somewhere where we can actually have a conversation?

Beca set her phone down while she waited for Chloe’s response. She knew she wouldn’t have to wait long, Chloe was always quick to reply. She played with the silver necklace Jesse had gotten her for their first anniversary. Even though they’d broken up months ago, Beca couldn’t bring herself to get rid of it. It reminded her of the good times with Jesse and distracted her from the explosive arguments that caused their break up. A notification from her phone caught her attention before she reflected too much on her failed relationship.

Chloe: Ik I’m sorry I’ve been trying to catch up on work

Chloe: if I flunk Mr. Bradshaws class you’ll never see me again 😥

Chloe: Why don’t u like parties Beca they’re fun just give them a chance!!

Sigh. Beca loved Chloe. She really did, but she wished Chloe would just see things from her point of view without Beca having to spell it out for her.

Beca: maybe I’d like them more if u didn’t abandon me to go get drunk when u know I only go to those stupid parties for u chlo

This time, Chloe’s response didn’t come as quickly. Beca told herself it was because Chloe was really considering what Beca had told her before responding. The longer she waited the more self conscious she felt about her response. It sounded a bit mean, but Beca had been dealing with this for an entire semester and she was really getting sick of having to be dragged around by Chloe just to be abandoned. And it’s not that she disliked parties completely, but they weren’t as fun when she didn’t know anyone to bounce of off, that’s what Chloe was supposed to be there for.

………..

Chloe: I’m sorry Beca Ik u dont like them

Chloe: I just thought if I brought u to them enough you’d start to warm up to them

Beca stared at her phone, at Chloe’s message. Beca wasn’t as upset as she once was, now she felt… She didn’t know what she felt, but she knew it was a positive feeling.

Beca: it’s fine chlo I just want the two of us to hang out together… alone lol

Beca didn’t know if that sounded flirty or not. She’d added the ‘lol,’ just in case, but she wasn’t sure if that was enough. Sometimes her and Chloe flirted, but it was always innocent and never backed by anything. It was mostly Chloe doing something to Beca and Beca calling her out. Beca never really reacted because she didn’t know how to. She didn’t know if there was any truth behind Chloe’s teases. At first, she thought it was just jokes, but when someone acts a certain way towards you for so long, you start to question if they’re truly being serious.

And if Beca was being serious… she had feelings for Chloe, she had for a while now. She had no idea for how long at this point, there had sort of always been something that attracted Beca to Chloe. She had never been able to tell what, or maybe it was just Chloe’s overall positive aura that drew her in. She thought it might be Chloe’s boldness. I mean, their first real conversation was in the shower, both of them completely naked. Though Beca had been hesitant to look, she had noticed Chloe’s toned physique, something you could tell she worked for. Her core was tight and toned with an aquamarine-encrusted belly button ring.

Her boobs were perky and Beca could tell she’d recently tanned, it was even and bronze and it complemented the color of her hair so well. Or when she had always tried to stick up for Beca to Audrey, though it constantly fell on deaf ears. There was just something about Chloe that drew Beca in and the feeling had always been there, but now that Jesse was out of the picture, she was finally free to explore her attraction.

It’s not like she was just choosing to believe her delusions, either. Chloe had always acted especially friendly towards Beca. She loved to drop hints towards Beca that she wanted to “experiment” or that she “hadn’t experimented enough.” Beca had a feeling she knew what Chloe meant, but did she mean with her? Beca wasn’t sure. Chloe also loved to grope her. At first, she had been hesitant to be that comfortable with someone, but after Chloe had successfully broken Beca's walls, she began to allow the touches, even started to expect them. She could feel a tinge of concern in her stomach when Chloe didn’t touch her in some way.

She felt comfortable in Chloe’s touch. By her supple, tropical-scented hand lotion, or her matching perfume that made her smell like the freshest fruits. Her gold earrings or her wavy strawberry hair. Everything about her was comforting. Beca had never really felt that with any of her previous friends, only with Chloe. It was a new feeling, she didn’t know whether it was a welcome feeling or not.

Beca was brought from her self reflective ramblings by her phone dinging with a notification.

Chloe: Oh so u want alone time together 😏

There was Chloe’s usual flirting. Usually Beca would try to diffuse a situation like this, but for some reason she wanted to lean into it. She wanted to see how far this flirting would get her. Maybe she could convince Chloe to come over and miss the party. They could watch movies, talk, Beca might even confess her somewhat confusing feelings to her. They might even…

Beca didn’t want to get ahead of herself, so for now she decided to test the waters.

Beca: maybe I do 🥱

Beca: u might see if u skip this party and come over 🖤

Beca hadn’t realized how incredibly suggestive that sounded until she sent it, but she didn’t want to unsend it either. She wanted to see what Chloe would say, so she waited with baited breath as Chloe swiftly sent a reply.

Chloe: Are u trying to coerce me Beca 😨

Beca: idk is it working?

Chloe: tbh yeah 👀

Beca: then yes I am

Beca liked where this conversation was headed. She almost wanted to hit herself for not flirting back sooner. If she had, this might have already been a regular thing for her and Chloe. But this new feeling was invigorating and thrilling.

Chloe: Do u really want me to come over?

Chloe: Cause I will

Beca swallowed hard as she read those texts. She did want Chloe to come over, but what would that entail? By the tone of this conversation, they’d most likely take their relationship to a new level. Did Beca want that? Or more so, was she ready for that?

Beca closed her eyes as she imagined making love to Chloe. Her smooth glossed lips leaving cherry-colored kisses all over Beca’s skin. Feeling her warm, lotioned hands beneath her shirt, beneath her bra. Beca clenched her legs at the thought of it, she started to feel really hot all of a sudden but she didn’t want to keep Chloe waiting, so she responded as quickly as she could.

Beca: yeah I do

Beca: I’m tired of parties haha

Beca waited for Chloe’s reply. She could feel herself getting more excited by the second. Kimmy Jin was gone, so they were free to do whatever they wanted without an audience.

Chloe: Ok I’ll be right over

Wow, this was much more simple than Beca thought it would be. She should’ve done this sooner. As she set her phone down, she looked in the mirror. She was still wearing her outfit for the party. Should she change? Beca thought over it for a moment, she’d spent so long getting ready, might as well let someone see it.

Beca laid back, waiting for Chloe to knock on her door. She wasn’t too far, so she wouldn’t take long. Beca was equal parts nerves and excitement. She’d finally be able to tell Chloe how she felt. It was something she almost wanted to celebrate. Maybe with some alcohol to give her the liquid courage she needed.

A couple minutes later, there was a light few knocks on her dorm door. She hopped up, almost embarrassingly quick, and made her way to the door, making sure to fix her hair before opening it. When she opened the door, she was greeted by one of her favorite sights.

Chloe stood there in a dark blue tank top with an even darker colored cropped jacket, it was unzipped to reveal Chloe’s cleavage that was decorated with a golden necklace with a pearl in the middle. She had flared dark blue jeans and heeled boots on. Her winged eyeliner was more dramatic and smudged than usual and she had a dark stain on her lips, it was almost impossible not to stare. It all contrasted her bright hair and made everything mesh together cohesively. She looked amazing as always. Beca tried to make sure her awe wasn’t obvious, giving the red-head a quick once over before focusing on her face again. It was adorned with a bright smile, as usual.

The familiar scent of papaya and coconut wafted towards Beca as Chloe immediately pulled her into a hug. Beca embraced it, more than usual. She snuggled into Chloe’s shoulder more, wrapped her arms around her waist a little tighter, held her hands a little lower…

Beca pulled away, hesitantly at first. She looked at Chloe who seemed chipper as normal, despite her more intense makeup. She obviously eyed Beca up and down as she welcomed her into the dorm. Beca felt both hot and anxious under Chloe’s blatant stare. Though her gaze didn’t last long, the effect it had on Beca did.

“You’re lucky I love you, Bec,” Chloe joked as she casually sat on Beca’s bed. The bed she’d been sure to make before Chloe came. Beca couldn’t help but notice how alluring Chloe looked sitting with her legs crossed like that, in her flared jeans with that dark makeup, looking at Beca so playfully, like she knew where this night would eventually lead. Beca walked towards her, trying not to make the anxious desire rushing through her detectable.

“I know. I must be pretty important for that,” Beca said, sitting beside Chloe on the bed, once again being greeted by her fruity smelling perfume, a scent she never got tired of. Chloe smiled at her before replying.

“You are… plus, I felt bad for alway dragging you out and then leaving you,” Chloe admitted, her confident, laid back attitude partially being interrupted by genuine regret. Beca had already mostly forgiven Chloe for that, but now with her right in front of her, looking at her with that remorseful look in her eyes, all Beca’s anger seemed to melt away.

“It’s ok. I’m just glad I actually get to talk to you now. I feel like I haven’t seen you in forever,” Beca replied, nervously fidgeting with the layers of bracelets dangling from her wrist. She couldn’t look at Chloe when she had that look in her eyes. It made Beca want to act reckless and there was no room for mistakes tonight. Beca had decided that tonight was the night she would confess her feelings.

“I know, me too, but I’m here now,” Chloe replied. Beca could feel Chloe’s gaze pouring into her and it just made her face feel hotter than it already was. She could feel her lips curling into a nervous smile.

“Yeah, you are. It was easier to get you here than I thought it’d be,” Beca giggled, finally looking up to see Chloe’s smile. It made Beca’s heart speed up, she could feel the rhythmic thumping against her chest, she was almost certain Chloe could hear it, too. Chloe had somehow pulled a bottle of wine from her bag and had already begun opening it. Beca alternated her stare between the bottle and Chloe, she shouldn’t have been surprised but she was. Chloe laughed to herself as she finally got the lid off.

“Did you think it’d be hard or something?” Chloe laughed, taking a sizeable swig from the bottle before passing it to Beca. She wrestled with whether to accept it or not. The liquid courage would help her as long as she didn’t get too drunk. She grabbed the bottle and took a smaller sip than Chloe before handing it back to her.

“I mean, yeah kinda. You don’t like missing parties, Chlo,” Beca said, sitting back against the wall with Chloe soon following suit. Now, they were even closer and Beca could smell the wine beginning to mix with Chloe’s tropical scent. Chloe’s hair fell in framing cascades around her face, the strawberry locks were as soft as fresh linen. Beca wanted nothing more than to run her fingers through it.

“I don’t mind missing a few parties for you, Beca. You know that,” Chloe reiterated, taking another sip of wine and passing it to Beca again. She took it with less hesitation the second time. Beca could tell Chloe was beginning to feel its effects and she wouldn’t let herself fall behind her. Beca was starting to feel herself become more at ease, her shoulders were falling and she could actually make eye contact with Chloe now. She looked as radiant as ever, the alcohol was working to make Beca even more smitten with her best friend. There was a subtle blush to her tan skin, courtesy of the alcohol. With the way the wine was taking effect already, Beca could tell Chloe had pregamed before coming.

“Do I?” Beca joked, eyeing Chloe with a teasing glint in her eyes. Chloe giggled as she put her head down. Beca could see Chloe’s shoulders rise and fall with laughter. When Chloe put her head up, her eyes were sparkly and the red-tinted lip gloss that coated her lips bounced off the lights.

“I know I didn’t make that clear before,” Chloe started, averting Beca’s gaze while turning more red, “but it’s true.” Chloe finished, looking at the brunette with a newfound intensity.

“Well, thanks, Chlo,” Beca responded. She suddenly felt awkward with Chloe so close to her. She wanted a swig of the wine in Chloe’s hand. As Beca reached over for the wine, Chloe pulled it from her grasp. Now, they were closer than ever. Beca could feel the heat between them and Chloe’s eyes made Beca feel… something.

“There’s not much left,” Chloe said, her voice was deep and quiet, maybe because Beca was so close, but that tone of voice didn’t help Beca’s warm face. Beca finally decided it was time to back up, away from that comforting scent. Chloe looked disappointed for a moment, but it was gone as fast as it came.

“D-did you want the last sip or something?” Beca asked, she cursed quietly to herself for stuttering. Chloe’s smile returned as bright as ever. She was clearly enjoying this more than Beca.

“No, you can have it,” Chloe responded, passing the near empty bottle to Beca. She took it, but not without their fingers brushing against each other. Even with that short contact, Beca could already feel the smooth surface of Chloe’s hand.

“If I could have it, why’d you pull it away the first time?” Beca asked, finishing the bottle before setting it on the floor. At some point, Chloe had laid down and put her legs out, covering Beca’s legs with hers. It made Beca suddenly feel a bit better about confessing, clearly Chloe was even more flirty than she was.

Beca knew now was her chance to confess or she’d lose all the courage she’d built up. As the two had a stare down, Beca crept her way up Chloe’s leg, resting just beneath her knee. Chloe tried to make her smile inconspicuous, but Beca could see the corner of her lips curl up.

“I don’t know, I just felt like it,” Chloe teased, eyeing Beca’s hand on her leg before staring at Beca again, taking a detour to gaze at Beca’s lips. Beca scooted closer, careful to make sure Chloe didn’t notice. There was a break of silence between them. Beca supposed she should take advantage of the silence, but the nerves were still holding her back. Chloe had gotten on her phone at this point, giggling at something or someone.

Beca needed to just come out and say it before it ate her alive. “Chlo, I have something to tell you,” Beca started, ignoring the shakiness in her voice. Chloe looked up from her phone immediately like she was waiting for Beca to say something. Chloe set her phone down beside her before sitting up and staring at Beca with intense curiosity. Beca missed the warmth, but this was far more important than that.

“Uhm, the reason I wanted you to come over wasn’t just because I was tired of you leaving me at parties, even though that was annoying,” Beca stated, fidgeting with her hands again to distract herself.

“We haven’t really seen each other lately and I missed you,” Beca continued, she was trying to find the words needed to ease into this, but she couldn’t help but stall. Chloe smiled at Beca’s nervous exterior, she wasn’t really used to seeing Beca’s bashful side… she liked it.

“Aw, I missed you too, Beca,” Chloe responded, waiting for the brunette to continue. She wasn’t trying to rush her, which Beca appreciated, but it meant Beca had to push herself to come out with what she wanted to say.

“Thanks. Uhm… since we haven’t been hanging out as much I’ve been thinking,” Beca almost whispered. Chloe moved closer, simultaneously comforting Beca and making her more nervous.

“About?” Chloe asked, waiting for Beca to finish. There was an anticipating glow in her eyes. Chloe could tell where this was going from the moment she walked in, she just needed Beca to get the courage to say it.

“Us… like, our relationship. Since me and Jesse broke up, it’s made me realize things about myself,” Beca said, finally looking up from her shaky hands to stare at Chloe, her gaze as intense as ever.

“What about our relationship, Beca?” Chloe inquired with a smirk. This was starting to become harder by the minute. Beca knew she should stop beating around the bush, but Chloe didn’t make it easier with her penetrating gaze. She decided it’d just be easier to show Chloe rather than tell her.

Beca stared at Chloe for a moment, unsure. She’d just suddenly stopped talking and she could tell Chloe was starting to get concerned.

“Beca, are you o-�� Chloe started, but before she could finish, Beca bit the bullet and kissed her. Her lips were as soft as Beca imagined and the wine on her tongue made their kiss taste sweet. Chloe melted into the kiss easily, moaning into Beca’s mouth. Beca crawled towards Chloe, holding her back against her. Chloe’s hand was already in Beca’s hair, grazing around her scalp. Her lip gloss was smearing against Beca’s lips, but she couldn’t care less.

Beca’s hand gripped Chloe’s shoulder, pulling her jacket off to expose her freckle-covered shoulder. Beca let out a moan as Chloe spread her legs and pulled her between them. They feel against Beca’s pillows with a thud. Beca pulled away and Chloe was already giggling in the midst of trying to catch her breath.

“Beca… I-I don’t know what to say,” Chloe whispered, pulling Beca closer to her. Beca’s chest was falling and rising in quick succession. She didn’t even know she had that in her. She’d never planned to ambush Chloe with a kiss, but it just seemed easier than stumbling through a confession that could never properly convey her feelings for Chloe anyway. Plus, she finally got to kiss her best friend and that was worth every bit of awkward tension.

Beca gazed down at Chloe. Her breasts were glistening under the light as she caught her breath. Her eyes still had the playful glow that Beca loved so much and her once perfectly glossed lips had smudged and transferred to Beca’s.

“I didn’t either. That’s why I had to show you,” the brunette confessed. She was shocked at herself, but Chloe didn’t seem to be. She acted as if she had expected this at some point. Her smile was so captivating, it made Beca feel like she was on cloud nine each time she caught a glimpse of it.

“I was hoping you would,” Chloe whispered, propping herself on her elbows to give Beca another kiss. It was still as passionate as the last, but much more tender, like they had all the time in the world. Her lips were so soft against Beca’s, it made her want to melt against the redhead. Chloe moaned when Beca’s hand found her way onto her scalp, gently pulling at the silky strands. Chloe wrapped a leg around her, the rough feeling of the jeans grazing Beca’s hip as her shirt lifted slightly. She shouldn’t have been surprised that Chloe was a good kisser, but her imagination truly hadn’t captured the feeling of this moment. All the tension, flirty jokes, times Chloe’s hands had stayed on her for too long finally made sense. Chloe pulled Beca closer, arching into her touch as Beca gripped her hips tightly.

Chloe’s hand traveled to Beca’s shirt, pulling at the bottom as her nails grazed her skin. Before Beca could assist Chloe with her shirt, the door began to twist and rattle. Kimmy Jin. They both looked at each other for a split second before separating. Chloe sat up right and Kimmy Jin came in with her friends, looking at them with disdain, as usual.

“The white girl and her friend are here,” Kimmy Jin said in her permanently monotone voice. Beca stared at Chloe, Chloe stared at Beca, and all Kimmy Jin’s friends stared at them before sitting on Kimmy’s side of the room and starting up some game. Beca really wished she had a single room right about now. Chloe giggled to herself before leaning over to Beca, her lips grazing her neck. Beca tensed, this was reckless.

“My roommate will be out tonight if you wanna come over,” the red-head whispered flirtatiously. She knew Beca wouldn’t refuse her, she didn’t have the strength. She never had. Beca just nodded as she watched Kimmy Jin’s friends closely to make sure they wouldn’t be caught. Chloe looked over at the group for a moment, before turning Beca’s face to hers and leaving a chaste, teasing kiss to her lips. Beca wished it could go on forever, but Chloe got up, grabbed the now empty bottle and headed towards the door with a wave and a wink. Beca smiled and waved back. As she left, Beca fell against her bed, put her headphones on, and waited for nightfall when she could finally show Chloe just how deep her feelings went.

[the1975attheirverybest]

I’ve had a feeling this was coming. The combination of Matty repeatedly making a point to tell us they aren’t going anywhere, Jamie stressing that this is the last set of shows for a while, and Adams ATPOAIM episode is what did it for me. I couldn’t imagine them jumping right back into another album cycle after the year they’ve had, either. I didn’t even expect this second leg on tour.

It’s heartbreaking to hear confirmation, but besides COVID, they’ve been going nonstop for a decade. Longer breaks just seem inevitable as they get older.

He says a lot of stuff that doesn’t come to pass (he also said they’d take a long break after Notes which didn’t pan out), but he also speaks very deliberately. He seemed nervous when he said it, and the vibe shifted majorly, he knows the weight those words hold. Maybe they’ll make a return in 2025 or 2026 instead of the usual two year cycle.

Anyways, I’m hoping this means his solo project sees the light of day.

Yeah I think you’re right. It’s been a wild ride, the album cycle, right? With everything that’s happened, coming back from Covid and all.

I was talking to @abiiors about this, and, we were saying how this might be a similar thing to what ended up happening with the Arctic Monkeys. There were a few years when they paused. As their families and personal lives grew. And we got TLSP in the meantime. You know?

And, like, let me make a disclaim rn cuz some of y’all in my asks and dms need to fuckin chill. Im NOT saying I don’t want the boys to rest. They SHOULD. It made sense for them to operate the way that they’ve been operating for the past decade because they were establishing a career. They were practically children. From Drive Like I do, to The EPs. By the time ST was a thing they were like 23. They’re grown men in their mid 30s now. Mentally, socially, physically, their lives look very different. They’ve been in serious relationships now. Baby boy Hann is growing up and Hann has been on the road for most of these big important milestones as a father.

It just doesn’t make sense for them to keep going the way that they have been. Ross is now a producer. George has produced a bunch of other records. Matty’s broadened out and made friends with Phoebe and Jack Antonoff (who may or may not be his solo project producer). The boys are growing up. (That’s was going to be the subject of my ‘essay’ on BFIAFL btw. That’s why I’d called it ‘boys to men’ like as a pun on Boys II Men.) that means that their art and their jobs are going to grow and change as well. Slowing down is essential.

And while we’re on the subject, I don’t think that the way they’ve been going for the past 10 years is sustainable. It’s not right. Not healthy. You guys know how Matty always says “we create in the same way that we consume”? It’s true. Because of streaming, post-modernity, etc (especially post-Covid), our consumption of art and entertainment has changed. We have shorter cultural attention spans. A song that came out 6 months ago is already old news today. So, with Notes, Matty has talked about wanting to keep putting out records as long as he has something meaningful to say and as long as culture is hungry for more. And while that might sound like great news for us as fans cuz it just means that we’ll always have new content around the corner. But let’s step back from that for a moment, yes?

That’s not healthy for him. He has already worked himself to the bone over the past ten years. Even at his worst and darkest moments he was making music. And he’s a bit of a workaholic. Sure, he doesn’t have a family just yet, but that doesn’t mean he should do this to himself. Obviously, it’s his world and his life and if he feels okay to keep doing things a certain way, that’s his business. I’m just saying that as fans, our investment in the boys doesn’t begin and end with consumption and creation. I’m interested (as I’m sure many, if not all of us) in his health and sanity. I can cite endless examples of great artists from the past few decades who burnt out hard and crashed because they didn’t want to “waste the moment” or tried to capitalize on their fame when it hit peak levels. I’m personally really proud of Matty for doing this past year clean / off the drugs, and in tip top physical health. What I wish for him, whether he chooses to pursue it or not, is that he would give himself time to be bored. Stop and learn how to deal with the quietness of mundane everyday life. Cuz, that can fuck a person up. Sometimes, when you’re so used to the lifestyle that the boys have lived for the last 10 years, just going home and being with the people that you love feels like torture. And people easily start self-destructive habits to cope with that. I want him to learn all that on his own terms, you know?

My sincerest wish for him is that he will continue the tremendous growth that he’s shown over the last few years. By leaning even harder into the healthy habits that he seems to have established for himself mentally and physically. Not backtrack and fall on the old nonsense. But in order to be able to do one or the other he needs to actually HAVE TIME. We all know this is a real issue for him. That’s what fuckin RoadKill is about. “When I think I won’t die from stopping.” “Not really how babies get made,” etc. it would genuinely be healthy for him to feel like he’s gonna die from stopping and then learn that he won’t actually die.

So that he can come back and be creating from a place of security and mortal dread. To pick up a guitar/ pen/ whatever he uses to write because he wants to and he has something to say, not cuz if he doesn’t, he might go insane.

This is true for all of the boys, Ross is the other ostensibly single one whose immediate private life might feel quiet too. (For all we know. Like he might be in a serious relationship that’s not our business.) really this is true for all 4 of them. And of all the people who have loved and supported them over the past 10 years. This isn’t easy on family and loved ones and their live musicians and crew either.

If they have to miss and album cycle or two, then so be it. Maybe we will get Matty’s solo record. Maybe we’ll get DLID, maybe that weird feature film that he’s been writing for as long as I can remember, maybe, maybe, maybe….. all that would be great but not necessary.

HAVING SAID ALL OF THATTTTT. Let’s not fuck around. For many of us, the 1975 has been the constant, comfort, strength, love, meaning etc. and it going away for however long that will be, is LEGITIMATELY A SAD THING. There is absolutely no reason to minimize or trivialize that pain. Or feel that you are selfish or don’t care about the boys, or any less of a fan, just because you find that having to imagine a future when SATVB isn’t on tomorrow or the day after, and we aren’t hyperfixating on or analyzing Matty’s cryptic speeches or thirsting after his torso extremely sad/ difficult/ bittersweet/ lonely/ scary. C’mon. Some people have been in this fandom since ST (not me), that’s their whole fuckin life, man!!!!! It IS sad. You SHOULD cry. ITS OKAY TO BE UPSET. and frankly anyone who makes people feel bad for that is a piece of shit.

Saying things like “oh they’ll be back.” “They’re not going anywhere.” “Matty will be chronically online” are all true BUT THEY DONT CHANGE THE FACT THAT THINGS ARE CHANGING. FOR GOOD. ITS OKAY TO FEEL HOWEVER YOU FEEL.

The boys are still around for the next few months. Let’s cherish them (and each other) while we still can. But imo this is not a silly subject and it’s okay to be upset.

Love y’all. The 1975 forever 🩷

[inkybinkyboink]

hi sorry i gotta ramble incoherently for a second bc im like Moving Out tomorrow and i have. a lot of feelings. so of course i listened to into the woods and i got to stay with me and now i have even more feelings.

i love the idea in into the woods that "children will listen". i love it. the idea that sometimes, adults, and in the shows case, the witch, want kids to listen and think that they dont because they dont reflect the behaviour theyre being told to do. but the thing is they do listen. you just dont always know it. and sondheim says this verbatim in the show "careful the things you say, children will listen". kids hear the shit you say, and they take to heart. you cant control what that is or isnt. its kind of gut wrenching to realize that, and i remember wishing my mom could see that as well. that we are listening, and the shit she says has an impact.

my mom isnt the greatest, and so i remember relating to this song a lot in high school when i was like super into the show, i remember wishing i could show it to her bc it kind of puts into words what i constantly fail to. this idea that you have to let your kids go, that as bittersweet as it is, theyre not your kids. theyre their own entities and souls. it feels like, to this day, ive never been me in my moms eyes, but rather a reflection of different people she knows. it feels like shes never really let me be myself.

whats frustrating is that the witch is kind of in the right for a brief second. it is incredibly valid for not wanting rapunzel to get hurt. the line "princes wait there in the woods it's true/ princes yes but wolves and humans too" hits hard. i get it. but i feel like its human nature to not want your loved ones to get hurt (ignoring the witch's motives for a second) and i get that you'd want them to stay with you. but getting hurt is part of gaining life experience. speaking very broadly in terms of human connection, you learn from others. you learn what kind of people you like and dont like through the experiences you have with them. and thats something you can only really see if you go out into the world and live your life.

hearing the line "stay a child while you can be a child" (again, ignoring the "with me" that follows) is also really difficult to listen to because it's a really bitter pill to swallow. sondheim is so right in this and i agree. please, be a kid while you can still be a kid. being a kid is precious and fleeting and so so so vital and beautiful. but it's also...an unliveable life. you cannot remain a child forever. you must grow up at some point. and i think that's what im like,,,upset abt. ive rlly hit the point of no return. i have to be an adult now.

on a more hopeful note, if you look at this line and also integrate the witches motivations into it, it becomes really interesting. she wants rapunzel to stay a child, but i think you can grow up and still remain childish. and i dont mean childish in an immature sense, i mean it more like "youthful"? like in the little prince, when they say "growing up is not the problem, forgetting is". im criss-crossing themes and messages here but it just feels,,,relevant.

im scared of forgetting, i think? im scared of becoming cold and distant like the adults in the little prince, or mean and possessive like the witch. i dont want to, and i feel like somehow moving out means im inevitably going to wind up like That, even though it know it doesnt.

theres just a lot going on and change is hard and scary.

[otgwbgyu]

ok for my own mental health at the end of everyday (or throughout the day) i will be updating/writing an entry to let off steam or express worries bc anytime i try to talk to anybody i either don’t out of worry of being a burden or it ends up being like talking to a brick wall!

SO today is the first day of this yay

January 7, 2025

Today was the first day back at school. Last night i told myself i’d go to bed at 10 so i can have maximum attention and willpower throughout the day but i ended up going to sleep a little after 2 maybe?? and here i am at 1 in the morning typing a fucking diary entry aren’t i productive. but i ended up getting sleepy halfway through the day so that’s fun. it’s like it’s inevitable anyway, i swear it’s the school air it has to have some type of sedative in it. but the sleepiness only made the day even more unbearable than what it was going to be anyway 😓

started off chill with ethics. nothing new, same seats, same vibe, all cool. 10/10. in AP world, tho, something was off. ohio finally let kinsley go so she’s back now after being gone for almost 2 months and ig her seat was booted from the classroom? or it was moved but it wasn’t there. to help with this, rissa drags another desk over to the empty spot so kinsley can sit there, not knowing it already belonged to somebody else. charlotte ozan, the girl sitting in front of the taken desk, mentioned this, and had rissa return it. idk if she was irritated or amazed at the audacity of rissa’s actions but something felt off from her and her whole group. after this moment, idk if im overthinking, but i saw lily kinda ignoring or not wanting to associate with rissa, kinsley, etc. she has a history of not wanting to be around people who may be an embarrassment as a way to preserve her social image. while that’s fair, i don’t think in situations like these that’s the right thing to do. so i’ve been thinking abt this all day long ever since that incident. an example of when it’s ok to want to un-associate is when your friends are being rude of some sort. i can think of two examples from my life. during a senior witness speech about a girl’s family death, aubrey and ava couldn’t stop laughing. not at the girl, but in general. a case of the giggles. me, lily, and maiya were embarrassed and were sooo mad at them for their lack of etiquette. maybe the stares we got from the people around us didn’t help but it was still very rude. however, we didn’t let that affect our friendship because we talked it out and moved on. no hard feelings (i hope.) a bigger example is the whole sarah situation. sarah is generally disliked for being a know-it-all, stuck-up tryhard in school. (also for being fat but tbh if she wasn’t annoying already they wouldn’t have cared abt her weight as much as they do.) while we all had personal reasons for parting from her, another factor was the sheer embarrassment of associating with her. being in her presence felt like i was losing so much social credit like omfg. so having that off my chest has been relieving.

third hour was chill. had a seating change but it’s okay. me maiya and aubrey now sit in a line and im the caboose so im probably gonna be left out quite a bit iykyk. but it had to be someone so idrc.

fourth hour was nerve wracking just because of mrs. drum. her mere presence terrifies me. the class is cool but she’s a majorrr problem. had a weird ass activity but it wasted time so idgaf. we have to change seats tho so i might not be sitting next to abby or lola anymore :(( that means when she says “turn and work with a neighbor” ill be cooked if im not by any of them lololll and knowing my luck those two will be seated next to each other while ill be on the opposite end of the room

english was chill. mentioned ANOTHER group project so ugh yay more of me being somebody’s last resort. mrs engel also just terrifies me as well

i now have biology 6th hour instead of 7th and it’s way worse than i could’ve ever imagined. i got fucking nick pitman and tim in the same class. oh my god. fml. annoying loud mean kids who like to torture quiet kids (me and lily r in for it this semester 🤕) and it’s also the fact we have history with tim. he once tried to pull the “my friend thinks you’re cute” bullying tactic but i just hit him with a “thanks?” bc i wasn’t in the mood to get bullied. and on multiple occasions last year in spanish he’d yell out to the entire class something abt how lily’s quiet. he knows quiet kids don’t like all the attention being on them so he makes it a point to do exactly that as a form of bullying and it’s fucking cruel. and those two’s little goons r in there as well so it’s basically us against an army of cocky popular kids who find anybody not within their social circle weird. greatttt. the guy sitting next to me seems chill tho, but last year in science he was like the mast sniffler so in the near future im cooked

7th hour photography was the exact opposite. DEAD QUIET. u could hear crickets. it was kinda relaxing after the overwhelming and annoying 6th hour experience but also upsetting bc maiya and i r in the class together and i wanted to talk with herr :(( but we couldn’t bc everybody would be able to hear r conversation thats how quiet it was!! i just did the pjsk sanrio gacha and i got airi, emu, and toya 💪💪💪 no ena tho :c

after school felt like a fatass but the guilt kicked in immediately and i stopped eating halfway. ate abt less than 1000 cals today 👊

i’m hoping the stress and dread i’m feeling abt the new semester r just fears of change and once im back in the swing of things i’ll just settle into regular school year anxiety which i prefer over anxiety over the unpredictable anyday tbh

anyways goodnight i need to go to sleep if i want to function as a human being tomorrow byeeee

[moodymeangirl]

i haven't listened to music for a while. thinking critically abt what it gives me and what i do with it. already go a week without it here or there thanks to autism. but now im listening to recitation as my first activity of the day. music is tied to how we placate the ego; its fear. and the cycles are too tightly rolled; i won't reconstruct them quickly. recitations cover the ego and its struggles as well, but deeply they tie to the soul: ease, sturdiness, and free breath. in music i am always searching, grasping at half of a feeling. i am placing myself into the band, dreaming ego fulfilment. death is right by sleep, is right by dreams. more and more unless i can stomach the pain of return, i will not listen to music anyway. and when i have done so and cannot, then we turn to making it. the compulsive ego strives and strives and marches. we have tried to separate the dreaming. we have tried to remain present, to remain ourselves, and no: songs we can't disassociate to, we only like in theory. becomes another favourite thing we will never consume again. music has to be a little unreal. we don't play video games solo because to suspend disbelief is to accept a return to real life. hurts too much. listening to music, we are addicted to dreaming, to chasing and never solving. no half sound is ever going to calm our brain entirely. and full feeling is found in recitation. is full feeling found only, in recitation?

ps. there's a difference, i think, between eternally chasing internal ease in the listening & having no need for compulsion, no need to try and know what Allah only knows, because the recitation is both the fullest of knowledges as well as a signpost marking the end point of mine. it is all i can know, do, feel. is it all i can feel? will no other means make me full? is everyone other means merely an echo? mimicry?

pps. and does being always half way thru, does it impact the unfinished and abandoned elements of our life? the awarded unpublished manuscript playing dead on the table? the friendships forgotten? the days sweeping by unacknowledged? our death of bravery in affection once we admit to liking someone (like that)?

if the resting state of the soul is overrevved, idling and whining loudly, frantic in its need to go, in becoming overcharged is it simeltaneously forbidding this movement?

ppps. how will we resolve this when, inevitably, we crawl back to music on dirtied hands and knees? how actionable is the revelation now? and how will it remain so, once we have failed to control ourselves?

continuing to cope with an insecurity inadvertently maintains it. centres it. keeps it at the front of my mind. the top of priority. i want to live in a manner in which i am not compelled to imagine myself the artist i am listening to, because i like feeling the ease of my breath and the textures of my brain when i listen to music. i want to listen more to Quran recitations than music overall, because i like where the centre of my focus is spiritually. Alhamdulillah, i like how i feel spritually, with Allah. i want that to be my centre, Inshallah

[fulgurbugs]

returning to where we left off, i return to the box and grab klefki to fill the spot left behind. welcome aboard, camembert.

after this most recent loss, our boxes are looking quite bad… comparing the quality of the mons in my alive versus dead box says a lot about my skill at this (which is bad)

anyways, following the death of Oaxaca is the anistar gym, which poses little trouble to our team, with crunches from Brie and foul plays from Camembert. olympia is dispatched fairly quickly

next up is the end of the team flare storyline, so we head back to lumiose to the evil team flare cafe

i get jumpscared by the first lysandre battle. i completely forgot this battle was here, and as such i am completely unprepared. and so… the worst happens

im completely unable to deal with his gyarados. it just has really good coverage against my whole team, and eventually, the only play i can see is to switch in brie and go for iron head flinches. i get one, but it merely delays the inevitable and gyarados retaliates with an aqua tail that easily oneshots brie. im able to get in Havarti for the revenge kill, but its a really heavy loss. Brie was a staple team member for a really long time, and this is the first loss of a member of the reformed team after the hawlucha incident.

what it does do is kick me to make sure my team has a gyarados answer. so back into the box it is, and American the electrode joins the team

the second battle with lysandre manages to go off without anyone dying.

however, now we have a different problem for the next and final lysandre fight. the gyarados is going to mega evolve, so it won’t be 4x weak to electric next time. it also has (and has had) earthquake, which makes pivoting to american very dangerous.

we are once again not so lucky in the lysandre fight. manchego goes down to the pyroar she had previously handled, which starts doing far more damage this time. then, fromager makes the ultimate sacrifice versus gyarados, setting grassy terrain to weaken ground moves. however, this ultimately ends up being a misplay, as gyarados finished her off with an outrage, meaning that if had used protect to scout i could’ve had a free switch to camembert. camembert comes in anyways, and finishes off gyarados with two dazzling gleams for a victory, albeit a heavy one.

fromager…. the sole survivor of the hawlucha massacre…. i had really, really hoped she’d make it to the end, but….

the run keeps going.

hunting for more encounters to pad out my pathetically sad box, i also get camembert murdered while going way further than i had any right to be in terminus cave than i had any right to be and running into a trainer with sturdy sawk. ugh

all that for my encounter in terminus cave to be an ariados. great

how i have to rebuild half of my entire team. i grab piloswine and my skiddo, and then looking at the rest of by options, it looks pretty bleak… but i do have one option.

i backtrack to parfum palace and pick up a magikarp.

then, with this new squad trained up, it’s onto the rival bridge gauntlet before snowbelle city. and these are the secondary rivals, they shouldn’t give me any trouble, right?

i lose havarti to tierno’s roserade. this thing. hits two crits on petal dance, out of its three turns using it. one of them crits ricotta, who i initially swap in to deal with it. then, since she’s taken too much damage, i swap in havarti (who has already taken a small bit of damage) on a non-crit petal dance, which does a decent chunk but he has what looks to me like more than enough to survive a second petal blizzard even if it crit.

he did not survive the crit.

this is a big misplay from me, this roserade actually only knows the move petal dance, which means i could’ve completely safely swapped to chèvre, who has sap sipper, every time. ugh.

this loss is fucking brutal. i finish the rest of the gauntlet with little issue, but havarti was basically my only answer into the upcoming ice type gym…. almost done of my other pokemon have any way to hit ice types for supereffective damage.

and now i need to train up *another* team member. i’m getting real tired of grinding here…

on this same route, i pick up a sligoo. not really great for the upcoming ice type gym, but still a lot better than any of the shitters in the box, so i name her cream and add her always. i also end up EV training her in spdef and spA to make her a little more formidable with her good coverage moves.

the Wulfric fight is. pretty scuffed. i lead Cream into abomasnow to get a oneshot off with flamethrower, then swap ricotta in on cryoganal and start setting up calm minds. this is really my only play, as i dont really have a way to deal with avalugg, especially if it starts setting up curses if i switch. it’s not foolproof, cryoganal does get a freeze and a crit at one point which could’ve been bad if i didn’t manage to thaw and get a recover off in time, but I’m ultimately unpunished. once i get to +6, (definitely overkill, but hey) i oneshot cryoganal and avalugg for the win.

after that, it’s just the pokemon league left. i don’t lose any mons or gain any new encounters here, so i’ll skip it and get to the league. here’s the team i take, all up to 65

as for the battles, i won’t recount them in too much detail. they basically all get swept by varying degrees by mozzerella and her dragon dance shenanigans

so we move onto diantha without any deaths. she leads hawlucha, i lead american for the easy outspeed and oneshot with thunderbolt

and then, his mission completed, i salute american and let him do what he was always born to do…

explode for literally no reason. O7 american… you were a real one. i bring in BittoStoricco for the kill with earthquake, then she brings in goodra, so i bring in mozzarella and start setting up dragon dances. i set up 2, then kill her with an ice fang, then kill arourus with a waterfall. mozzerella then fails to kill gourgeist with a +2 ice fang, surprisingly, and she goes for phantom force, so i have to switch out. i then, very stupidly, swap in chèvre. the entire time, i’ve been under the impression that skiddo and gogoat were grass/normal type. literally, the whole time. so gogoat takes big damage from phantom force, and i decide my best option here is to let him go down… so bittostorico comes in the for the revenge ice fang, and then it’s just gardevoir. i keep bittoscorico in, thinking that ill just let him get in earthquakes until i go down. surprisingly tho earthquake almost oneshots gardevoir, and i also outspeed the mega gardevoir, so on the second turn after diantha full restores, a high damage roll knocks out her final pokemon, and the run is won!

this team managed to drag their way over the finish line, despite all the hardships and friends lost along the way. i had a ton of fun doing this run, and it was way fucking harder than i thought it’d be. next up, the final run through of all the deaths in the run… a highlight reel if you will…

alright, time for another long post that i’ll update regarding a new nuzlocke…. at this point, given how most of the game went doing the heartgold nuzlocke, i feel confident enough to ban items, so here’s the ruleset

Typical nuzlocke rules (first encounter only, if a pokemon faints it’s dead, must nickname all)

my pokémon’s levels are capped at the level of the gym leaders ace. if they go over this, they can’t be used for that gym fight

no items in battle - this includes potions or any other healing items used from the item menu in battle, including x-items as well.

held items are still allowed

im playing pokemon Y! been a while since ive played these ones, and there a bit on the easier side, so i think they’re a good starting point for a harder ruleset

of course, as previously mentioned, the nickname theme this time around is cheese

thus our name

as for the starter, i rolled 1-3 and got froakie. i named him paneer

here was my team going into viola’s gym!

…and my team right after exiting it. luckily i leveled up feta to evolve right before actually fighting viola, so the butterfly mirror match ended up working pretty well. but… only because i got really lucky with her deciding not to click infestation until right at the end, so paneer barely survived and didn’t have any more turns left in him. but still, no deaths!

i stopped right after getting the kanto starter from sycamore. here’s the team right now, before i start having more pokemon than team slots and have to start picking them

[simpclaralouvette]

Quirkless! Single Mother X Keigo Takami/ Hawks

💝Proof reading Complete! (new phrases added!)

Synopsis💞

He was the Boss of an Agency. Hold on, lemme just reiterate that. He is your Boss and your his assistant.

──●◎●──

Info

💌Female Reader age: 24

💌Keigo Takami age: 25

Part 2 (complete) Masterlist

🧡He was the Boss of an Agency. Hold on, lemme just reiterate that. He is your Boss and your his assistant. When you first met, he expected you to Fangirl , but you didn't. He felt your extraordinary determination to work at this agency. Of course, this is one of the top agencies where you could get the best salary, so who wouldn't want to work here.

  🧡 On your First day, papers filled your table, the phone rang the whole room, and the email pings were everywhere. Hawks was testing you. Whether you are up for the job or not, it's a natural routine. I mean, last week, you were reeking of determination to have the job, and now, you must have the will power be a worthy person for the position.

Beginning the day, you started your task filled with doubt and unsureness, mediocre at best, quirkless, and clumsy. He was ready to fire you at the end of the day. Lunch break came, and you were exhausted. "Welp, Im grabbing lunch; good work!" he said as he flew off the balcony, leaving you alone in his office.

  🧡 Lunch break, alone in the office, you sat down at your desk and pulled out your small, relatively simple bento box. Proceeding to eat it in silence while scrolling through your phone. "I can do this. I'm gonna make her proud and make my family happy". You said, motivating yourself while staring at a picture of you and your daughter. The lunch break nears its end, and your ready to face the inevitable. Sure, you started off awkwardly. You were surprised that this agency accepted you despite the many more applicable fitting applicants. It reminded you of some schools where the entrance exams were easy as pie, but good luck getting out of the school with a diploma. This agency totally has that vibe.

Hanks returns just in Time to start working again. To Hawks's disbelief, He thought you were a different person because of how well you manage things, full of confidence and professionality. That my folks just made him intrigue to you more.

  🧡 Days and months go by. You are the most stern person he met, so strict on schedules and meetings that he thoughts you are his Boss now. You were just doing your job. Right now, he is running late for an interview. You told him to meet you at the front of his agency. Furious, you took the elevator back up to his office. Upon reaching the door, you knocked. "Hawks, you are late for an interview " No reply. You knocked, no response again. That's it, you opened the door, and he is night there..... dancing? No more bopping his head and listening to music via headphones. Feeling the vibration from his wings, he immediately looked towards the door. Seeing you, he realized his mistake immediately removed his headphones, faintly letting out a familiar tune, "Your late for an interview was all you just said, he chuckled. "Got lost track of time, I guess," he awkwardly said.

🧡The music he was listening to was your own song covers. When you discover that he listens to your cover, you internally panic. "You listen to that?" you asked. "Oh yeah, do you know her too? -"You cut him off by saying, "Her voice is too cringe" " Then let me hear you try." he said, smirking. Thankfully, He doesn't know it is you who runs that channel.

🧡 Time has passed, and your relationship with him took a more friendly turn, although you are still strict towards him, especially on his schedule. Aww, c'mon dove, you know the traffic can't stop me. I can Fly us there!" he tried to convince you. "Are you serious? Have you forgotten that I am quirkless??" you reasoned, clearly angered that no matter how many reminders he still forgot this damn meeting. "Of course not, but I promise you I won't drop a beautiful person like you," and that's it... "I'm not taking the risk. I'll just take the service there, cya." sad hawks stood alone in his office, disappointed that his move didn't work on you. He sighed before taking off" Oh, dove, you don't have to be that tough to reject me' and took off.

  🧡 When he learned that you have a daughter. He was devastated. He thought his chance of courting you was over. "Your joking, right?" he asked, trying to hide his heartbreak. You laughed in return, "I'm not joking, hawks. I had her when I was 19. Say hi to him, sweety" you said as your daughter went and introduced herself. "Hello, mister Hawks. My name is Yua; it's nice to meet you!!" "Show him your special skill, sweet pea." Hawks got intrigued when you told the child to show him something. "Will he not get mad?" she asked. "No darling, in fact, he would be happier" When you said that, she nodded and began to focus. Then 2 water-like wings sprouted From her back and amazement struck hawks face.

  🧡Ever since you introduced your daughter to Hawks, he wouldn't stop bugging you to bring her ever." DOVE!! Please get her here!" he begged. "Hawks, I will bring her here After her school," you said, trying to calm down, massaging your nose bridge. He seemed pleased with the reply, "And do your paperwork, please" you plead, and he agreed and played your cover songs on his office speakers. It became his work playlist, and you got used to hearing your voice, but to be honest it's kind of distracting.

  🧡 Finally, you could brought your daughter to the agency again. The Hawks can finally quit bugging you about it. "Alright, kid! excited for your flying lesson?" "Absolutely, mister hawks!" she said excitedly. "I hope I can fly like you though I don't know if water would help me to Fly," she said, dejected. "Be optimistic, kid anything can happen if you believe in it. Let's get to the balcony before your mom over there gets angry at me," he said, making the child giggle. He played his work songs and started the lesson. "Alright, kid, First things." "It is one of Mom's songs!" she said enthusiastically, 'What? He thought, confused."Okay, I'm ready for the lesson now, mister Hawks," she said, switching her Focus back to Hawks. An hour passed, and with much determination, your daughter was able to fly. Hawks felt like a proud dad, For real.

 "Mom! I can fly!" "Now, my sweet pea Im so proud!"

Hawks, Following behind, ready to tease you with a new found knowledge.

"and I Didn't know you could sing song bird." he started. "how come you never told me, that it was you I was listening to, hmm?" he said nearing close to you, from personal to intimate space. You blushing and a child giggling. Your gonna lecture your child later.

  🧡 A year has passed, the both of you got closer, and hawks heart Basically yearns for you. He is passionate about loving you now that he knows about your past relationships. A Jerk who promised the world to you and then left when he learned you were pregnant. He wished he was there for you, when you were dealing with pregnancy alone.

To him you aren't just his assistant now, he sees you as someone he can rely on and, you also have warmed up to him too, trusting him with your problems. He loves what you both have, a good relationship, seeing each other as equals, and he wanted more, his instincts saying more.

He is determined to earn your trust and your heart "one day" he whispered, siting on his office desk alone staring at a selfie of him, you with your daughter smiling genuinely, and somewhere on his mind he imagined a family with you.

[heyiwrotesomethings]

HI HOPE IM NOT LATE!!

Can I request shinobu with a female reader who when they meet is always thirsty, like even them just walking a few steps makes them so thirsty for water they feel like their gonna pass out (and they sometimes do) and there's nothing wrong with there health at all! but of course it somehow doesn't effect their missions until the very end.

Thank you sm if you consider 😭😭

I love your writing so much eidhaksjdjr

Water…

Shinobu Kochou x She/Her Reader

A/N: Here you go, hope you enjoy it! Everybody go drink some water! Word Count: 1,240

“Ahh, so refreshing,” (Y/n) hummed pleasantly after downing a cup of cool, soothing water, “I’m ready for our walk now!” She beamed, quickly joining Shinobu at the doorway.

“Very well,” Shinobu smiled in kind.

She barely took three steps out in the sun before she felt (Y/n)’s hand encircle her arm.

“On second thought, maybe I need a little more? I’ll be right back.”

Shinobu watched her go, shaking her head in amusement.

At first, she had been disturbed and concerned by (Y/n)’s seemingly never ending thirst. She put her through every test in the books to find out if it was a symptom of some underlying health condition, but (Y/n) seemed perfectly healthy by all measures of known science and medicine. She just had a tendency to be very thirsty, very often.

“Ready?” Shinobu asked once (Y/n) returned, ever patient when it came to her.

“Yeah— wait… maybe one more.”

“Let’s fill up a gourd bottle. Then you can carry some with you.” Shinobu decided. She did want to get out of the mansion at some point today before she was inevitably pulled back into work.

“That’s a great idea! I’ll go drink some more water while you get it. That way, I’ll maximize how long it’ll last me.” (Y/n) clapped.

Shinobu nodded and went to retrieve and fill a bottle. She let the water fill the container to the brim and corked it, holding it securely in her hands. The size of the gourd should have been more than adequate for the short outing but…

“Maybe one more.” Shinobu decided, already filling up a second gourd.

***

It had been a good idea, but it was not enough for the poor girl.

“Shinobuuuu,” she called, sounding like she had gargled a mouth full of warm, dry sand, “I, I ran out of water…”

“Already?” Shinobu pulled up the two gourds by the string hanging loosely over (Y/n)’s shoulder and found them to indeed be as light as air.

“Mouth so dry… World is spinning…”

“Here, sit in the shade for a minute. Take slow, deep breaths.”

“Shinobu? Am I dying?”

“No, no you are not. Just lay down and breathe, I’ll get you more water.”

“Shinobu, don’t leave me in the desert alone!” (Y/n) wheezed, weakly gripping Shinobu’s pant leg.

“We are in an evergreen forest not even two kilometers away from the mansion. I’ll just run home and refill these. I’ll be back in less than ten minutes.”

Shinobu untangled the gourds from (Y/n)’s person, then she was gone.

True to her word, she was back in no time at all, although in (Y/n)‘s delirium, it seemed like years.

“H’nobu, you came back for me… look at you, still so young. You haven’t aged a day…”

“That’s because not even eight minutes have passed since I was gone. Here,”

Shinobu had doubled the amount of gourds she had brought the first time. She uncorked one and lightly began to pour it over (Y/n)’s face, hoping to snap her out of the strange thirst-induced fog she had succumbed to. Shinobu made a mental note to always bring more water on sunny days like this from now on.

At first, (Y/n) didn’t register the sudden gush of ‘rain’ the washed over her, but then she blinked rapidly and swiftly sat up, snatching the gourd out of Shinobu’s hands to down the rest in a couple of rapid gulps.

She pulled her lips away from the gourd with a deep breath like she had been underwater for an almost worrisome period of time, then she looked to Shinobu, her eyes carrying more of their usual shine than they had just a moment ago.

“Wahh!” She latched onto Shinobu, hugging her tightly, “Shinobu! You saved my life!” She cried.

“I’m sure you would have survived, but please don’t cry, you’re going to lose more water and I can only carry so much at a time.”

“I’ll try.” (Y/n) sniffed, pulling back from Shinobu who offered her another gourd from the pile.

(Y/n) thanked her and put the gourd to her lips, drinking less like a frantic person lost in the desert for three days.

They took some time resting in the shade together and as (Y/n) picked up the third gourd, her crow came swooping down from the trees to alert her of a mission she would need to prepare for later that night.

Shinobu had a feeling that she would need to refill those gourds sooner rather than later, and maybe add another two to the pile while she was at it. She found herself wondering for not the first time since she knew (Y/n), how she survived this long as a demon slayer.

“Let’s make sure you are as prepared for this mission as you can be.” Shinobu said, helping (Y/n) back to her feet.

“Aww, you care about me.” (Y/n) gushed teasingly.

Shinobu held out the last gourd, hearing the water swish inside, “If you want this, and I’m sure you will, keep quiet.” Shinobu smiled a tad menacingly.

(Y/n) made a motion of zipping her lips and hurried after Shinobu, three empty gourds clinking against each other as she went.

***

Shinobu couldn’t help but be worried as she saw (Y/n) off at sunset. She couldn’t help but hover over her the rest of the day, making sure (Y/n) had adequate hydration and didn’t eat anything high in salt that would make her thirst even more troublesome. Usually, she gave no second thought to (Y/n)’s missions because she always came back in good health, but the chaos earlier in the day gave her trepidations. So when (Y/n) left with eight gourds hanging off of her shoulders, Shinobu decided to follow and observe from a distance.

Before long, (Y/n) had gone through six gourds. She wasn’t even halfway to the demon’s stomping grounds yet. Shinobu watched on, though she was concerned, she was also curious. Obviously (Y/n) had managed to survive just fine thus far, but how?

When (Y/n)’s crow alerted her than the demon was near, Shinobu rubbed at her temples as (Y/n) downed the last two gourds. Surely she would get thirsty during the battle, shouldn’t she save some at least? Or maybe, there wasn’t time to drink during? Even then, Shinobu thought she should at the very least save some for after.

The demon came out and swiped at (Y/n) as she took her last gulp. Shinobu watched with bated breath while (Y/n) fought it for several minutes, wondering when she should jump in to assist, but (Y/n) was holding her own just fine. It was incredible, honestly. Was this really the same girl who couldn’t go on a light walk without consuming her body weight in water?

(Y/n) then delivered the blow that decapitated the demon. She flicked the blood off of her sword and put it away with a satisfied nod. Shinobu then saw her footing falter and went to catch her without delay.

“(Y/n), are you alright?” Shinobu asked, checking (Y/n) over. Maybe the demon had nicked her somewhere…

(Y/n) had fainted, but even unconscious she found the strength to utter a single word,

“Water…”

“This girl,” Shinobu shook her head in disbelief.

Good thing she brought more with her. Maybe she should convert one of her bigger training gourds into a water bottle for (Y/n) in the future. She imagined it would be quite heavy though. She’d have to think on it.