#bashful and big and broad and so so so earnest

[woahjo]

cw: mentions of spit but mostly head and unexpected cumshot okay

giving pro hero deku head and he’s holding the base of his cock because he’s too big to fit all the way in your mouth. you can see through your lashes the way his arm muscles are tensed and he’s groaning and whining a little because your mouth feels so good. right before he cums, he gets just a little too carried away, gets just a little too into how sexy you are and pulls out. he runs his hand up and down his spit soaked cock and cums on your face with a low groan. he’s such a big guy and his fist is squeezing the head of his cock as he throws his head back and cums across your cheek and lips.

it takes him a moment to come back to himself, he’d been so into the way you treat him that he’d forgotten his manners and for a moment, just sort of stares at you with this bewildered look on his face as you swipe it from your cheek and reassure him that “it’s okay, i like the way you taste” before popping your cum soaked finger in your mouth.

okay goodnight at 3 pm everyone.

[tender-rosiey]

What about sukuna with his shy babygirl when reader goes away for a week and hes left alone to take care of her?

I ABSOLUTELY ADORE YOUR SUKUNA WITH HIS SHY BABYY

silence speaks — ryomen sukuna x f!reader

a/n: my favorite duo ever and this is really centered around them cuz they so cute but you do make multiple appearances also BIGGGGGG thanks to @bluebell33 for beta-reading <33

sukuna rarely concerns himself with trifles. the great and feared king of curses has no patience for the mundane.

yet, when it comes to his daughter—his little, bashful shadow—he finds himself tackling challenges he never imagined, especially now that you’ve gone to visit your ill mother for the week.

and left him alone with her.

you had reassured him it would be fine, and he had sneered at the implication that he couldn’t manage a child for a mere seven days.

but now he finds himself cursing you as he stares down the wide-eyed girl standing in the middle of the courtyard.

she’s clutching her favorite stuffed fox, her tiny fingers squeezing the fabric tightly as if it’s her only anchor in the world.

her big eyes flit up to him and then dart away just as quickly, cheeks pinkening as she retreats into herself, the same way she always does when the world feels too big.

sukuna huffs, scratching the back of his head. “what?” he grumbles, his voice rough, but she doesn’t flinch.

not anymore. she’s long since grown used to his tone, his presence, his towering frame. still, she doesn’t answer, only fiddles with the hem of her little kimono.

he exhales sharply through his nose. “if you’ve got something to say, spit it out.”

her lips purse into a small pout, and her voice comes out barely above a whisper. “...hungry.”

of course.

sukuna crosses his arms, his four hands resting against his broad chest as he glances toward the kitchen.

he knows how to prepare a meal in theory—he’s watched you do it countless times—but actually doing it? for her?

“fine. sit,” he commands, gesturing toward the veranda.

she shuffles over without a word, sitting cross-legged with her fox in her lap, her gaze following his every movement like he’s some kind of unapproachable deity—which, to most, he is.

the kitchen is uncomfortably quiet without you bustling about in it.

sukuna’s hands work awkwardly, chopping vegetables with precision but lacking the rhythm you make it look so easy to achieve.

he scowls as he tastes the broth, finding it bland despite his efforts. still, he’s not about to admit defeat.

when he finally places the bowl in front of her, she looks up at him with wide, unsure eyes. “you made it?”

“who else, brat?” he snaps, though there’s no real bite to his words. he sits down beside her, his knee brushing against her tiny one as he watches her cautiously take a sip.

her lips curve into a small smile, and her voice is soft but earnest. “it’s good.”

he grunts, looking away to hide the faint twitch of his own mouth. “damn right it is.”

the next day, sukuna finds himself in the garden, sitting on the terrace with his arms crossed, watching his daughter as she toddles around, her fox clutched tightly to her chest.

she sticks close to him, circling the area but never straying far, her wariness of the world evident in her every hesitant step.

she pauses by the small patch of wildflowers, her tiny hand reaching out to pluck a bloom.

with the flower in her grasp, she shuffles over to him, her gaze flickering between the flower and her father’s intimidating figure.

“what’s that?” he asks flatly, raising a brow as she stops just short of his shadow.

“for...you,” she mumbles, her voice so soft he almost misses it.

sukuna narrows his eyes, leaning back against the wooden pillar as he watches her extend the flower toward him with trembling hands.

“what the hell am I supposed to do with that?” he scoffs, though his voice carries no malice.

her lips press into a nervous line, and she steps closer, holding it out insistently.

her little brow furrows in determination, and for a moment, she looks so much like you that it pulls a rare flicker of amusement from him.

he grunts, snatching the flower between two of his massive fingers as if it’s an inconvenience.

he twirls it once before tossing it onto the porch beside him, his crimson eyes meeting hers. “now what?”

she fidgets, her gaze darting to the ground. “it’s...pretty,” she whispers.

he leans back further, waving her off. “get out of here before you start thinking I’ll entertain you all day.”

she scurries off, her fox in one hand and her quiet laughter trailing behind her. sukuna glances at the discarded flower, its petals soft and vibrant against the wooden boards.

with a grunt, he flicks it off the edge with his finger, muttering under his breath. “ridiculous.”

the days that follow are...strange.

sukuna quickly realizes that his daughter is quiet by nature—content to play alone, to sit with her little fox and hum softly to herself.

she doesn’t demand his attention often, which leaves him both relieved and unsettled.

he’s used to people begging for his time, his favor, his mercy.

but she? she seems perfectly content with the simplest gestures—a pat on the head, a rare smile, his presence alone.

it’s on the third day, however, that she tests his patience.

the rain starts in the afternoon, a light drizzle that quickly turns into a downpour. sukuna is inside, reviewing a scroll, when he hears it—a soft, hiccuping sob from the other room.

he’s on his feet instantly, his massive frame filling the doorway as he finds her curled up in the corner, her fox clutched to her chest, her face buried in its fur.

“what the hell are you crying about?” he asks.

she sniffles, peeking up at him with tear-streaked cheeks. “it’s...loud,” she mumbles, her voice trembling.

it takes him a moment to realize she means the thunder.

he sighs, running a hand down his face before crouching down in front of her. “you’re afraid of a little noise?”

she nods hesitantly, her bottom lip quivering.

“pathetic.”

but instead of leaving her to deal with it alone, he picks her up, her tiny body fitting easily against his broad chest as he carries her to the main room.

he sits down on the tatami mat, cradling her against him as the storm rages outside.

she buries her face in his chest, her small hands clutching at his robes, and for once, he doesn’t push her away.

“you’re fine,” he mutters, his hand smoothing over her hair in an uncharacteristically gentle gesture. “it’s just noise. nothing can hurt you while I’m here.”

and somehow, she believes him.

by the time the week is up, sukuna is more than ready for you to return.

he won’t admit it, of course, but the sight of you walking through the gate fills him with an odd sense of relief.

your daughter, however, is the one who reacts most visibly.

“mama!” she cries, scrambling out of sukuna’s lap and running to you.

you scoop her up, laughing as she babbles about everything that’s happened in your absence, her words tumbling over each other in her excitement.

sukuna watches from the doorway, his arms crossed as he leans against the frame.

“well?” you tease, a playful smile tugging at your lips. “how’d it go?”

“she’s alive, isn’t she?”

you laugh, stepping closer as you shift your daughter in your arms. your free hand brushes against his arm, a small, fleeting gesture that he doesn’t pull away from.

“she is,” you reply softly, tilting your head as you study his expression.

he’s looking past you now, crimson eyes sharp but distant, his gaze lingering on the garden beyond the estate gates.

it’s quiet for a beat too long, the weight of something unsaid hanging between you.

“did you miss me?” you ask, your voice light and teasing, but there’s a genuine curiosity beneath it.

he scoffs, his lips curling into something that’s not quite a smirk.

“don’t flatter yourself,” he mutters, but he turns his back to you, and you can’t help but feel it’s to hide a specific thing.

you smile knowingly, shifting your daughter higher on your hip as she snuggles into you, her fox tucked safely in her arms. “I’ll take that as a yes.”

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copyright © tender-rosiey

do not copy or plagiarize or I will make you drink pure ginger

check out my buy me a coffee!

[oh-katsuki]

what are your thoughts on Mr. Midoriya? <3

oh god how i love him deeply. he is important to me and also is important to katsuki.

so big and strong with kind eyes and a nice smile. n as a man, he doesn't even realize the effect he has. broad shoulders and an earnest disposition. get's really bashful about things.. even the slightest innuendo or touch. not embarrassed... just bashful. yeah. he's important to me <3

[amukmuk]

From the cliche prompt list - I'm going to save you from the terrible date. (I think that one jumped out at me thanks to the most recent chapter of One Day lol)

Ahhh! I love this prompt!!

Based in the One Day AU :3

From this prompt list

Ahsoka nods along to Derek's seemingly never ending monologue. It's honestly impressive, she doesn't know if it is nerves or what, but she swears he hasn't taken a breath since they've sat down. She's trying so hard to be an attentive listener, but even then she can't help but wonder what Rex would think of the place. The ambiance is expensive in a cheap sort of way--like the owners are trying to pass off subpar Italian as the best in town.

"Here is the veggie lasagna," the waitress says politely handing Ahsoka her plate, "and the chicken parm. Anything else I can get you folks?"

"No, I think we're okay," Ahsoka smiles.

"Actually can I get some ketchup? Whenever you have a moment," Derek smiles. He has a nice smile, Ahsoka can say that much about him, but even then she can't help her own grimace. Ketchup? Really?

The waitress sweeps away and Derek offers Ahsoka a bashful smile. "I just really love chicken tenders and chicken parm the best way to get that at an Italian restaurant."

"We could have gone somewhere else," Ahsoka says and cuts into her rather small portion of vegetable lasagna. She will definitely be hitting up a drive through after this. If she does, she'll call Rex on her way home and asks what he wants from the burger joint. She checks the time on her phone carefully balanced in her lap. He should just be getting off work. "I'm sorry," Ahsoka says, cutting Derek off mid-excuse for his 'youthful palate'. "Can you excuse me for just a moment?"

"Of course. Take your time."

She gets up from the table and makes her way to the ladies room. As soon as she is locked away in a stall, she pulls up her chat with Rex.

SOS

Everything okay? His response is instant and it makes chest warm.

I'm having an awful time

... I would like to take this moment to remind you that it was your idea that we 'get back out there'

But this guy is an actual man child. He still lives with his mom.

Nothing wrong with living with your mom

Rex. He ordered the chicken parm because there weren't any chicken nuggets on the menu. Save me. Please.

What do you need?

Call me on my signal? Pretend to be my sick brother.

Copy

With a smile curving her lips for the first time this evening, Ahsoka maneuvers her way back to the table. As she sits she sends a quick message to Rex.

"Anyway, so I was saying," Derek continues, dabbing sweat from his mile-long forehead.

Ahsoka's phone rings. "Oh. I'm so sorry, I need to take this. It's my brother." She swipes 'accept' on the phone and puts it up to her ear. "Hey, everything okay?"

Rex coughs dramatically into the receiver and she has to hold her phone away a little. "Ahsoka. Help. I'm dying."

"Rex, I'm kinda on a date right now," she says and mouths an apology to Derek.

"But I'm dying. Don't let me die alone. I can see my ancestors in the light beyond." The sarcasm is dripping from his tone and she has to bite the inside of her cheek to keep from laughing out right.

"Are you sure you need me?"

"More than anything," he murmurs, tone as warm as honey.

"Okay. I'll be there as soon as I can," she pauses. "I love you."

"Love you, too. See you soon."

She puts her phone in her purse and gives Derek a small smile. "I'm so sorry, my brother."

"Sounds serious. Is he okay?"

"I'm sure he's just being dramatic, but it's best that I go and check it out." She tosses a few bills on the table. "Thanks again. It was lovely meeting you."

"Likewise," he says around a big bite of chicken.

Ahsoka doesn't look back.

~

She lets herself into Rex's house balancing a tray of drinks and two fast-food bags. Lucky, his golden retriever, bounces up to greet her. "Hey Lucky," she smiles. "Rexy home?"

"I better never hear you call me that ever again," Rex says, standing in the doorway to his kitchen, dish towel in his hands.

Ahsoka smiles at the sight of him. He's still in his uniform, a navy CFD t-shirt and navy cargo pants, but instead of his boots he wears grey knit socks. "I come baring gifts," she smiles holding up the bags.

Rex tosses the towel over his shoulder and moves to help her. "Date was really that bad, huh?"

"He wasn't a creep, thank god, but I just... I don't know, I guess I'm just looking for someone who can keep up with me." They sit on his couch and Lucky curls up on her feet.

"Sorry it didn't work out. If it's any consolation, you look great."

She smiles and tosses a braid of her shoulder. "I know."

They eat in silence and Ahsoka relishes in it. After a night of being talked at, the peaceful quiet that settles between her and Rex is like a balm. She knows no one else with whom she can share silence. In fact, she knows few people who can do anything that Rex does. He knows everything about her. He anticipates her moves before she acts. He always knows--

"Something on your mind?" he asks, balling up his napkin and tossing it in the box that held his burger.

He always knows when something is bothering her.

"Just thinking," she sighs and tosses a fry to Lucky.

"Anything I can help with?"

She looks up and over at him and it's like seeing him for the first time. His warm, honey gaze. The scar on his chin, the way his lips are held ever so slightly in a frown. His broad shoulders and narrow waist. The way his hands are folded neatly on his knees.

"I love you," she whispers.

His eyes widen and he sits back a little, no longer bending to catch her downward gaze. "I love you, too," he says. "You know that."

"No, I mean." She huffs and looks down. This is stupid. There's no way he loves her like that. She was his CO. They've been friends since they were children. He probably still sees the little girl on the playground. He probably--

"Hey, 'Soka, what's going on?" he shuffles closer and grabs her hand.

"Remember how I said we should 'get out there'?" she croaks and rubs her fingers across his knuckles, warm and rough.

"Yeah?"

"I... I don't really want to do that."

He's silent for a second and rasps. "Good... yeah, uh, that's good."

She looks up at him. "Why?"

"Because... I... Fuck I'm not good at this." And he surges forward. Her cheeks are held in his hands and his lips are on hers. He's kissing her. He's kissing her and it's amazing and she's so shocked that she's not kissing him back. He starts to pull away and she chases his embrace. She pushes forward and kisses him in earnest, eager and wanting.

They break apart when breathing becomes necessary and even then, they keep their foreheads pressed together.

"I don't want to date anyone else," Ahsoka confesses. Rex runs his hand over her braids and cups her chin. "I want you."

"Good," he whispers and presses a chaste kiss to her lips. "Because I don't want anyone else, either. Just you. Always you."

She kisses him again and again and again.

[riddlesandqueries]

Valentine’s Evening

A roleplay between @themarmaladeblog and myself, concerning the relative conditions of a civilian, a rogue, and the unspoken.

It was… a date, right?

 It’s Valentine’s day. 

Bruce waits in a small cafe he’s fond of, where he knows the food and coffee are good and the people are friendly, where there’s quiet tables, and enough interference between them for a modicum of privacy. The atmosphere is close, and… affectionate, given the day, and the other diners. 

He’s dressed in blue. Edward’s suggestion, when they first had dinner together at the manor. He said he’d look better in color, than black and white, and Bruce had taken it to heart. ….He’d accepted. Edward had accepted the invite for dinner, and Bruce stresses over this, twisting his napkin between his fingers and nervously watching the door. Of course, the word ‘date’ had never been mentioned, it was just…. dinner.  - But, it’s a date, right….?

Oh, god, is this a date? Is this what dates are like when you actually care? Edward scowled against his nausea, parking the car and giving his hair a quick comb. This is probably what Hell is like, isn’t it. Just nothing but doubt and insecurity and never getting answers. The last one was his least favourite thing in the world, and it burned in him like an ulcer. Adjusting his tie, he strolled inside despite his stomach ache. “Hello, Bruce.”

God, he’s cute. Bruce muses, through a faint and worryingly earnest smile. 

Does he… look? As smitten as he feels? Bruce hopes not. It would be a terrible idea to actually… date, Edward Nygma. 

Nygma, A man he’s personally concussed three times, and locked in the VR, who’s tried to kill him on multiple occasions. He couldn’t in good conscience date Edward Nygma. Not when he still can’t actually tell him who he god-damn is. 

(Not that Bruce’s put on the cowl in some time. His heart, just…. hasn’t been in it, lately.)

Bruce finds himself searching Edward’s face, trying to discern his expression, weigh the amount of affection he can find in the other man’s eyes, see if it matches his own. He should’ve brought flowers, god. 

No, god damn it, under no circumstances should I be buying him flowers. 

“Hey, Eddie.“ His smile, despite his better judgement, grows just a bit. "Had a good February?”

“All half of it? I’ve had worse.” Edward says, taking a seat. He’s in rich green, so dark it’s almost black, with bright accents in white and gold and purple in his details. “How about you? You’ve been quiet.”

“Heh, it’s one of those dark months, I think, that kind of… carries me off into thinking…. So, uh, lost in thought? Lots of days in the gym, staring into space.” 

Bruce pauses, as dimly it occurs to him that he should at least greet Edward properly. “…You look fantastic. Heh, no surprise, though….”

“Dark months? Do you get that seasonal affective disorder?” Edward frowns curiously. “There’s light box therapies for that, you know.”

“Oh - no, nothing like that, I just… deeply crave it to be light enough to go rock climbing. I get nostalgic for warm-weather sports as the winter drags on, but it’s not depression, I don’t think, so much as I zone out easier on exercise machines.” Bruce rubs the back of his neck, a bit. “Easy to get lost in thought on an elliptical. I mean, I guess it’s good for my creativity….”

“Bruce, that’s dangerous.” Edward gently chides. “You could mash a toe.”

The first instinct is to object, to protest that he’s done it a hundred times before, that he’s had worse, but… Bruce quashes that reflex. It’s honestly kind of nice, he decides after a half-second pause, to be worried after. By someone other than Alfred. 

In fact, it would be nice if it was anyone worrying after him, he tells himself, the fact that it’s Edward has nothing to do with it. Bruce absolutely insists upon this fact mentally, though he can’t even manage to convince himself. He smiles, sheepish. “Yeah… you’re right. Old habits aren’t easy to break, though, y'know?”

“Oh, sure.” Edward chuckles wryly, looking over the drink menu. “Even new habits are hard to break: they’re there for a reason, after all. But I hope that things lighten up for you soon.” Bruce still has a tan. Maybe he should be a snowbird.

“Yeah, soon as the sunlight lasts past when I tend to leave the office.” Bruce laughs, a cheerful sound that briefly fills the small cafe. They’re smiled at, by a waitress, though ultimately she passes them over for the nonce, as Edward is pondering the offerings – largely Greek fusion – and Bruce picks up the drink menu. 

He’s, ah, quite thirsty for some reason, and… has the sneaking suspicion that this evening will go smoother one cocktail in. Just one. Don’t want to get sloppy drunk around a crush. 

…Come off it, it’s been months. I think we’re a bit past the whole 'crush’ bit. - Bruce just about catches himself before he sighs heavily at his own thoughts. - Knock it off. Focus on the drink menu.

Edward remains oblivious. Oh, that laugh…as cheerful as ever, if maybe a bit more honest than during his usual social performances. He swallows his thoughts, and decides on a simple sangria, as well as spanakopita: he hasn’t had the latter since the summer.

“They’re supposed to be really good at uh, traditional dishes here, according to all the reviews I read.” Bruce decides, silently, on Lamb Kleftiko, and he ignores the fact that 'stolen lamb�� is weirdly thematic given his company. It prompts a quiet chuckle, under his breath. Stolen - well, that’s fine.

“I was, going to get a drink while it’s still early, did you want to look at the wine list, or…?”

Edward wiggles the drink menu he’s holding. “I’m getting the house sangria to see what all of the fuss is about.”

That begets a fond grin. “I’ve only had it once….” Bruce considers, warmly. “If you get the white wine peach version, I’ll split a pitcher with you?”

“Done deal.” Edward grins. “Have you been here before?”

“No, but I’ve poked my head in and gotten takeaway pastry a couple times on the way home from work. If the rest of the food is as good as the baklava, we’re in for a treat.” Bruce’s grin is broad and easy when he talks about food. This is, good, this is fine, this isn’t weirdly awkward or yearning, he can do this. 

It’s probably not even a date. It might be a date. Bruce might not be great at spotting a date. He could… ask Edward if it was. But that way lies danger. No, maybe he could just,  just, see if Edward seems to think it a date, that’d… - Except, we really shouldn’t be dating the Riddler.

“If we aren’t, you owe me a decent meal.” Edward teases, smirking. This if fine. What was he ever worried about? Liking Bruce’s smile too much? …That sweet, endearing, dogged smile? AUGH.

“Work’s been all right?” asks Edward lightly.

“I mean, it’s been work.” Bruce laughs, lightly, rubbing his cheek. “Not that, you know, I’m really complaining. I do, honestly… find what I do to be, fulfilling. Busy, though, pretty much… all the time. Just, you know. It’s not a vacation in Hawaii, but…” His grin is his best attempt at disarming. A joke, right? 

No harm in jokes, not even if it is the flirtatious ones.

“If only it could be, huh?” Edward grins. “What a trip that was: I still haven’t gotten all of my photos developed. Kind of makes me wish I’d brought a Polaroid.”

Bruce’s face lights up. “Oh, hey, I didn’t know you were taking that many, I got… a handful, but…Man, remember the volcano summit? At sunset? That was amazing.”

You were amazing.

God, Bruce quietly chides himself, he almost said that out loud. 

“It was beautiful, wasn’t it?” Edward hums fondly. “It makes sense that people climb mountains, when they want to be that close to the sky. Makes me feel kind of bad for being such a city boy.”

“I mean…. if you wanted to travel again, it was… it’s something I’d love to do with you in the future. Not like we wouldn’t come back.” HI, MAYBE AVOID THE ‘LOVE’ WORD, BRUCE. GET YOUR HEART OFF YOUR ARM. 

Before he can freeze up too terribly, though, the waitress swoops in.

If only we could. Edward smiles kindly to the waitress, and asks for the pitcher of white peach sangria…the spanakopita, and… ”What was it, Bruce?”

“Oh, ah, lamb kleftiko. And bread, please?”

“Pita?” asks the waitress kindly.

“Yeah, just, something to soak up any leftover sauce.”

“Sure thing. Be right back with your waters!" 

Edward waves after her. "I don’t think we could do that again, Bruce, considering your schedule.”

“…Yeah, probably not this year.” Bruce mutters, gloomy. It seemed different, out of the city, more plausible while they’re away. 

I should tell him. Bruce muses, glum. At the end of dinner, like… like ripping off a bandage. I can’t keep talking to him if he doesn’t know I’m Batman.

Edward casts Bruce a sympathetic look. “I am sorry for that fact. It’s not easy, I can tell.”

Bruce chuckles, though there’s little humor in it, rueful. “I mean, half of it is, I think I got attached to having you around.” Mumbled. That was a bit more honest than he meant to be, but… well. He lives in a big empty house, right? He has… plausible deniability behind why he would miss something like that..

Oh… Edward smiles slightly, a bit of colour in his cheeks. It’s a lopsided smile, a bit bashful, a bit bare when he’s off his rhythm. “I bet you say that to just anyone.” he chuckles, brows raised. “That’s quite a compliment.”

Bruce can’t quite hide how… pleased he is at that smile, certainly not fast enough. He does his best to quickly look off to the side, but is visibly charmed. Pink, in his ears. In a way he can’t pretend is sunburn, not now. “I dunno. Never been on vacation with anyone else, I’ll, have to get back to you on that one. If, uh, if it ever happens.”

“As long as I’m out of lockup, I suppose I’m available.” Shut up shut up shut up and STOP STARING 

 Water is brought around.

Available. God, if only that were true. Bruce takes to the water, almost… gratefully. It’s going to be a long, long dinner, huh.

Edward sips his own, taking in and letting out a slow breath. This is torment. Say something. “So, it’s Valentine’s Day, huh?” - GOD DAMN IT NOT THAT - “I expected Calendar Man to do something.”

Oh. He noticed. Of course he noticed, why the fuck wouldn’t he notice, it’s a holiday. “Yeah, uh, heh, happy, uh - happy Valentines, Eddie.” 

The quiet as Bruce fishes for something else to say nearly deafens him. “…Could I... get you dessert, maybe?”

“Pick each other’s desserts? Sure.” - I swear by all that’s holy Edward do NOT overthink this.

Bruce nods. That’s agreeable, and… segue to small talk, maybe. Just, try and talk a bit… The romantic atmosphere is not helping, not at all. He shouldn’t have asked him out, not tonight, he knows this now. Jesus, uh… “I, missed this, you know? Dinner together.”

“It’s fun, isn’t it?” Edward grins. “We should just try out restaurants, I had a few friends back home who I’d do that with. Once a month, go try somewhere new.”

If you’re willing to speak to me after tonight, that sounds like a lot of fun. That thought translates onto Bruce’s face as a somewhat unusual, wistful smile. “That sounds fantastic, honestly.”

“It’s fun! It always keeps everything fresh: no falling back on old standards, and you can’t repeat a dish.”

Bruce grins. “I take it these rules are tried and true?”

“Absolutely.” Edward affirms. “Otherwise, someone orders the same baseline dish for every kind of restaurant they go to: tacos at every Mexican place and such.”

Bruce smiles a bit, nodding. “Anything you absolutely won’t eat? Don’t want to commit some kind of faux pas.” Food. Food is a safe topic.

“Me? Not really…it’s all worth trying twice at least, just to dispel bad first impressions if any.” he hums, thinking. Is there any food I don’t like..? Edward’s successfully been derailed.

“And no allergies, then?” Bruce asks, “Because I’m up for anything, yeah?”

“None I’m aware of, but if some develop, that’s a surprise for everyone.” Edward chuckles.

“God, I hope not.” chuckles Bruce, fond.

“Me too, frankly. Do you have any allergies?”

“No, not to food! Thankfully.” Bruce waves the notion away, “I don’t always get along with, uh, some kinds of polyesters, but that’s all that comes to mind.”

“Oh, I understand. The first problem is that you were wearing polyester.” Edward smirks.

Bruce grins. “…You were right, about the blue suit.”

“Hm? Well, you look good in it.” Edward says, gesturing to Bruce. “Do you like it more?”

“I mean, yeah. Brown and black all the time is, boring. I’ve gotten a lot of compliments today, too, so… thanks.”

“You’re welcome. You look good in black, but colours are a nice indulgence against the status quo.” Edward grins.

“I mean,” Bruce hums. “You always look amazing in green. I don’t think I’ve seen that suit before?”

“No, not this one. Bright shades aren’t for winter, not for me.”

Bruce’s head cants to one side. “They aren’t? …I wish I was half as good at clothes as you are. I don’t get seasons at all.”

“Black is never wrong. The rest of it’s made up, largely, so do as you will.”

Bruce smiles faintly, nodding, as food comes around. Smelling, as predicted, fantastic. It’s easy enough to keep up… this vein of comfortable, pleasant compliments and arm’s reach affection. It’s for the best, he tells himself, as dinner wends towards dessert, and they huddle together to pick what the other is going to be eating. He expects they can probably split it between them anyway. 

It’s for the best, because Edward’s definitely never going to speak to him again.

As a surprise for one another, just for extra fun, they order one another dessert: Bruce receives a chocolate torte with strawberries, and Edward receives a chocolate baklava, which he’s very pleased to see. “Perfect…geez, maybe I should have been more on-theme.”

“Well, on the bright side, I love strawberries?” says Bruce earnestly. (You keep using the love word, Bruce.)

“Hard not to. Bon appetit!” smiles Edward.

Bruce lifts his spoon in a lazy toast, and sets into it. Quiet. Right, he’ll break the bad news any minute now. Any minute. He just, needs to bring it up, so… like ripping off a bandage. Easy.

….Bruce takes a sip of the sangria, frowning into it.

“…Does it taste wrong?” Edward frowns.

“No, I uh…” Bruce stalls. Come on, get it over with. “I need to tell you something, Eddie, it’s…. it’s important.”

“…Yes?” Edward asks carefully, raising an eyebrow.

“…You probably won’t want to hear it.” Bruce mutters to himself, unable to keep his gaze. “I, uh. I’m…. I’m, um…” 

Go on. 

“I’m… I’m kind of smitten, with you.” 

BRUCE. WAYNE. WHAT, PRECISELY, ARE YOU DOING?

“…What?” Edward utters, gobsmacked.

THAT IS NOT WHAT YOU WERE SUPPOSED TO SAY, BRUCE. Yes, well, that doesn’t make it less true!

 “I - I, yeah. I um….Look, I know it’s… stupid, of me it’s… You’ve mentioned yourself, you don’t, think of people. Not like that, and…..God, I tried, you know? To put it aside, especially after Selina, this is, I know this isn’t something you want to hear, but. …It’s valentine’s day. Lover’s day, you know? It, I’m having trouble not talking, suddenly, feel free to interrupt me at any time, just...”

I wonder if this is what a nervous breakdown feels like. What was that checklist on therapy? The fact I can’t remember offhand says everything about the situation. Edward takes a big sip of his sangria, and takes a deep breath. “We should not discuss this in a public restaurant.”

…That makes it easier. Okay. Just, smile, and, it’s fine. “Yeah, that’s… that’s probably best. Okay.” Softly. Resigned, Bruce’s eyes fall to his plate, and he grows quiet to come to terms with what is at least seems like it will be a polite rejection. What did he expect, anyway? At least you can move on, Bruce. …Just focus down dessert, and steel yourself for heartbreak.

“…” Edward picks at his dessert, then sets down his fork. “Let’s get these to go.”

“ - Yeah, okay.” Check: paid. Not like he really has his appetite, anymore.

Boxes gathered, and they’re out the door. “…Somewhere private?” Edward murmurs.

“…Your house? My, house?” Personally, Bruce would prefer Edward’s, if he’s going to be shot down, but…

“That cliff on the outskirts of town, maybe.” says Edward firmly. Neutral is best.

Jeesh, punch me in the gut while you’re at it. “Yeah, okay, I can drive.”

“I’ll need to be brought back to my car eventually.” Edward warns, following along to Bruce’s car.

Stop complaining, Bruce, the horrid little voice in his head chides, this wouldn’t be an issue if you’d just confessed what you were supposed to confess. 

“I mean, yeah, that’s - “ Bruce flounders, numbly “ - it’s just weird to head up in, two. Cars, I mean.”

“Is it? I don’t know the protocol.” Edward mutters, getting into the car.

… On the bright side, I suppose it does solve the moral dilemma of crushing on someone you’ve hurt so many times. Now he even gets to hurt you back. You deserve this, Bruce. You know that, don’t you? Even if he doesn’t know why, never knows he’s got it, at least he’ll have his revenge.

Bruce is quiet, as he drives. A bit to shake off traffic… then not much longer, once the city loses its grip. “… Sorry.” is all he can manage, in a small voice, as they park.

Edward holds his dessert in his lap, staring determinedly out the window, thoughts almost visibly ticking like clockwork around him. "Sorry?” he says, snapping out of it.

“For shoving that off on you.” Bruce mumbles, finding that he can’t, actually. Look. At Edward.

“I’m, not angry.” Edward frowns, bemused.

“… Oh.” Bruce murmurs, also bemused. “… You, um, wanted to talk.”

“Yes, just not in the restaurant. People, paparazzi, there’s nothing I hate like gossip I didn’t start personally.”

Bruce nods, mute. For want of avoiding foot in mouth disease, Bruce very carefully has nothing to say.

“You like me, as in, romantically?” Edward asks, dissecting the words carefully.

“… Yeah. I - I know it’s, you’ve said on your blog yourself, you don’t… I’m sorry for inviting you to dinner with ulterior motives.” Bruce says this all so quietly, and he stares at his own hands in guilt. “I knew all that already, but…”

“Bruce.” Edward prompts.

Ah, Bruce. Even when he’s talking about his own feelings, he’s putting other people first. He’s rationalising rejection before it’s even been delivered. Giving Eddie an out. “I know.” he says softly. “ - Sorry, yeah, go on. I’m listening, I promise.”

“First of all, there’s nothing wrong with liking me.” Edward says primly. “I’m wonderful. But I’m also a very dangerous criminal, and you should not date me under any circumstances. I’m not good for you.”

Bruce pauses, reviewing the statement. That… that isn’t, that’s not really a rejection. Is it? He blinks up at Edward, visibly confused.

Edward looks stern. Determined, even.

“… Yeah?” Bruce almost sounds, hopeful, bless him.

“I can’t be in a relationship with you.” Edward says plainly. “You’re only going to get hurt and you don’t deserve that.”

Yes I do, that’s a fucking lie, I’ve hurt you more times than I can count, thrown you in Arkham… “I don’t know, it… Can’t be much worse than friends, can it…?”

“…Can it?” he asks, wary.

“And you’re a fantastic friend.” Bruce adds.

“People are going to threaten your life over this, Bruce, it isn’t a game.” Edward says, annoyed. At least, this part isn’t, anyway.

“… No, I mean. I know.” Bruce condedes. “You’re right. You’re right, Eddie. People could try to hurt you through me, they could try to use me to get close and do terrible things to you.”

“Exactly. I’m glad you understand that.” Edward sighs.

“I know you’re right,” Bruce continues on, “But the feelings are here anyway… And I mean, it’s not like I don’t already hate to see you hurt.”

“Maybe I don’t want to see you get hurt, have you thought of that?” he snaps quietly.

Bruce rubs the back of his head, quiet. I should drop it. Drive him back to his car, and pretend this conversation never happened. 

Against all wisdom, Bruce pushes on: “… I can’t pretend it’s not a nice feeling to know that you care, either.”

“…” Edward huffs, sitting back in his seat, looking away.

“… So, um, thank you for that.”

“One of us has to keep his wits, I suppose.” Edward snips.

Bruce chuckles softly. “You always were smarter than me. … I know it’s a terrible idea. I know I shouldn’t, I know I should drop the idea and run. But I… I can’t. I’ve been trying to rationalise it away for months and, no matter which angle I look at it from, no matter how bad an idea this could be, it… I’m more attached to how, nice it might be, more than I am scared of the opposite.”

“How nice that must be.” Edward grumbles.

“… Honestly, it scares the shit out of me.”

“…” Edward looks over, incredulous. “You just said…”

Bruce rubs his nose, frowning. “… I’m not scared of being hurt, Eddie. I’m scared of… you leaving.Walking away, wanting nothing to do with me. I’m scared of, how hard it is to put this crush out of mind.”

“I’m not going to do that, Bruce.” Edward mutters, pinching the bridge of his nose between his eyes with a sigh.

“… Penny for your thoughts?” A pause. After a moment, Bruce adds,  “… You know, you haven’t actually turned me down.”

“I know.”

“.. Do you, want to talk about it...?”

Edward takes a deep breath, and slowly lets it out in a sigh. “To me, a river bed is better than water beyond grasp, and food in the air is better gone than present in despair.”

Bruce frowns at that for a moment, scratching his palm with the opposite fingernail. “… Is that…Do you mean like, Greek Mythology? Tantalus?”

Edward nods, lips pursed. It’s always so hard to speak, when it’s important.

“…All right….” Bruce mumbles, slowly. “To extend the metaphor, um… If, you do want I - I’m offering to bring you a cup. Or pick the fruit, so the trees can’t bend out of the way anymore.” Softly.

“You’d be cursed too, if you did such a thing.” mutters Edward, glancing away.

“… Yeah, maybe. It’s - I’ve been trying to tell myself this is a bad idea since the spa day, Eddie. I know this isn’t… wise. … But if it’s at least mutual, I’d… I’d prefer to, you know.” 

“… Try it with company, instead of alone.” Bruce’s laugh is tired, and hollow. “Even if it is a bad idea, at least it’s one I get to make with you, instead of in spite of you.”

Since the spa day? Geez. “What do you mean by that?”

“No matter how bad an idea it is to date you,  I still want it… And if that’s mutual, at least I wouldn’t have to navigate whatever comes next by myself. And neither would you. Which… you, implied was the case?”

Edward sighs, tired. Damn it. “Mhm.”

Bruce gives a brief nod, then stares out the windshield, frowning. You shouldn’t have brought it up.

Just because I’m struggling to communicate doesn’t mean you have to match it. Edward rolls his eyes, and grabs Bruce’s hand to hold it, chin propped in the other as he frowns out the window. Stupid crush. Stupid words, thoughts, FEELINGS.

.

… The pessimism vanishes, just… briefly, as Bruce squeezes Edward’s hand. “Let me try this again.”

“Go on.”

“I think you’re wonderful, Eddie. The smartest man I’ve ever met, fun to talk to, and company I treasure. I cannot really… put into the right words, in the right order, how glad I am to be able to call you at least my friend. I think you’re about the most attractive man I know, and I actually fancy you rather a lot. It’s a bad idea. For a lot of reasons between your… vocation, and my publicity, this could blow up in a bunch of ways that could hurt one or both of us. And despite this, I still think it’s worth it to… try. If you feel the same, I think it’s… worth being a little selfish. Just this once… but at least, I can’t just, sit on that anymore.”

“…I’m already holding your hand, Bruce.”

“Yeah, but I made a mess of the words.”

At least you can. “It doesn’t have to be perfect. It certainly won’t be,” Edward says. “But I’ve had some nagging issues on my mind myself, shall we say.”

Bruce nods, and is quiet for a moment.“… I was ready for rejection, you know.”

“What? Some genius I’d be, turning down a catch like you.”

Cautiously, Bruce shifts to lean against Edward. “… I’m not great at being selfish.”

“It’s a nice trait about you.” Eddie murmurs, leaning in a bit himself.

Faint smile. Oh, that’s all right then. Bruce settles, a bit less nervous. “Even if I treat myself, this once..?”

“…do you know who you’re talking to?” Edward grins.

“I’d hope so, or this has all been a terrible mistake.” A glib joke is a good sign.

“If you’re Clayface, you’re dead.”

Bruce has a brief flicker of existential horror. “God, I hadn’t even thought of that.”

“At this point, it’d be a hell of a long play.” Edward snickers.

With a faint grin, Bruce rests an arm around Edward’s shoulders. It’s not unlike the visits leading up to the new year, he decides, when a sleep-deprived Edward would lean on him. Except Edward’s not sleep deprived. 

You’re in trouble, Bruce, Warns the little voice at the back of his head.

Just… let me have this. Bruce pleads back at it, in turn. Let me enjoy it while it lasts. “… It’s a, a shame we missed sunset.”

“There will be others.” A promise, that. Edward’s nervous, despite the calm demeanor and measured words.

“… Eddie?”

“Hm?”

“Just…I’m here, yeah?” This is an effort to be comforting, complete with hopeful smile.

“You are, yes.”

“… I’m nervous too.”

“Why? I said yes.”

Bruce sighs, softly. “I’ve never really had a good relationship, before? Selina’s the closest thing to… and it’s not really the same. So this is all going to be new territory.”

“I’ve never had any. I’ve never had these feelings before and they’re not even slightly comfortable.”

Bruce slowly nods, taking that in. “… If I can, make that easier on you…I’ll, try. Though I don’t know how.”

“The concept as a whole is like a movie about a pandemic, such that everyone else around me always seemed to be getting infected and I was assumed immune…and the twist ending is that I’ve been a carrier, asymptomatic.” Edward shudders. "Obviously, I’ve made some degree of peace with it: I did that on the drive over, I was banking on it being one-sided, after all. It’s not all bad, it’s just a relatively immediate change after a lifetime of nothing, and it’s dreadful in every sense.“

“… I’m sorry, Eddie.” Bruce murmurs, not an apology this time at least, but compassion, emphasized by another gentle squeeze. 

Privately, he considers, yeah, it does sort of seem like a disease. It’s not like he hasn’t been arguing with his own head for months, trying to plead his way out of infatuation. Though he’s not sure he’d call it a virus; it’s not like it’s contagious. It’s more like dementia. Not the time to correct him, maybe. “I was… I assumed the same. That it’d be one sided, that… you remember in Hawaii, when you went to the porch for a bit? I thought you’d noticed, that I was too obvious, that you were upset.”

Edward had, in fact, considered it as such, but dementia was even less comforting as a prospect and he didn’t need the stress. "No…that was the time I’d realized what had changed in me, and why I kept feeling feverish with an uneasy stomach.” His analogy holds water. “I was upset, yes, but that was because I didn’t want to have a crush. I still don’t, but here I am.” Edward laughs weakly. “So what choice is there, but to pursue it?”“There’s always a choice.” says Bruce quietly. “I don’t want to make you sick.”

“I didn’t want to go through this like Tetch.” Edward frowns. “So I tried to outthink it. Like being on a diet, perhaps. But…yes, Bruce, there’s always a choice, and I made it on the drive over.” he hums, glancing over as he pats Bruce’s hand. “Keep up, I’m just monologuing a little, it’s my turn.” A half-joke, in these trying times.

He gets a quiet laugh at that, and Bruce defaults to nodding, resting against Edward’s side. God, this isn’t even a little bit comfortable with the gear shift between them, but who cares.

“But really now…a rogue and a civilian, it’s dangerous…I really don’t want to drag you into that swamp, that’s why I’ve never told you about any of it, plausible deniability and such. But now especially.”

“…Yeah, you still shouldn’t tell me any of that, I don’t think.” Bruce murmurs.

“I never will.” Edward promises. “It’s not that I don’t want to talk, it’s recognition of what I do not need to share.”

Edward is quiet for a moment, frowning. “…you’re really going to be all right with dating a super villain? I’m still doubtful about that, we’re notorious for being a handful.”

“I promise I know that already, at least. I’ve had a thing with Selina for… God, a couple years now.” Bruce replies quietly. “Different MO’s, maybe, but I’m at least, familiar with the idea of turbulence. I’m, honestly, more nervous about dating a man. You’re not the first guy I’ve had a crush on, but I’ve never actually brought it up with any of them before now.“ By this time, he’s quieted to a mumble.

"What do you think the difference will be like?”

…Softly, Bruce hums in thought. “I… have absolutely no idea.”

“…can we go somewhere that there isn’t a gear shift in my ribs?” asks Edward gently.

“Yeah, wanna go grab your car and just… head to someone’s couch or another?”

“Yes please.”

“Your place or mine?” Bruce asks as he leans away, stretches a bit, and puts the car back into gear. Seatbelts, seatbelts… “…God, that sounds like a terrible pick up line.I - I promise I don’t mean it like that.” Bruce says with a flustered chuckle.

“You, not flirting? Casanova himself?” Edward says, settling back into his seat with a grin. “Let’s do yours.”

“Yeah, all right.” Bruce grins faintly, pink in the ears, and heads back to nab Edward’s car before the lot closes. And then, off he drives for home.

Edward follows at his own pace, back to Bruce’s, pondering. This is unturned ground for him, after all. Could be gold in those hills. This could be fun, actually, couldn’t it? It’s new, It’s interesting…yeah. Yeah!

Meanwhile, Bruce takes the drive back home to overthink. God, he should’ve put on cologne. Does he need mouthwash? That wasn’t even what I was supposed to tell him in the first place fuck damn it, how long do you think you can keep it hidden now? From the smartest man in Gotham? 

You’re a fucking idiot, Bruce.

…Maybe it won’t be so bad. Bruce finds himself hoping, against all hope. Maybe he’ll forgive me. Maybe he’ll never find out. Even if it blows up, I just… I want to enjoy this while I can.  

[corellian-smuggler]

Fuck This Morning

Leia frowned outside the Falcon. As she’d left her quarters and headed across the chilly base, she’d been convinced this was unremarkable and harmless. After all, Han had told her that she could come by in the mornings for caf—in fact, he’d been telling her so for months. There was no deeper meaning to be found in her decision to take him up on the offer at last, she insisted, and surely Han wouldn’t think there was. No, it was nothing more complicated than the fact that she hadn’t slept well, and his ship was on her way to her early morning meeting, and while usually she made it a point to drink the mess hall caf like all other enlisted personnel, well, it was so early and in-between shifts anyway—was it so terrible if just once she wanted to be warm while she drank her caf? Ramshackle and temperamental though the Falcon was, the envirosystem was certainly functioning, and Leia had to admit that the ship was like heaven on Hoth. Not that Leia would ever openly acknowledge that it was the one place she found she wasn’t shivering, but it was true: Han kept the main hold so warm it was practically cozy.

Leia let out a breath that curled as a cloud before her in the icy morning. There was no one around in the hangar bay, but the Falcon’s ramp was down and light spilled from within the ship. She glanced down at her chrono—0400, and her stomach gave an odd kind of twist. Abruptly she felt like an utter fool, loitering outside Han’s living space practically in the middle of the night.

Organa, what is the matter with you?

She lifted a gloved hand to her forehead and closed her eyes in exasperation and embarrassment. Her logical argument now seemed transparent and weak. Certainly while she was brushing her teeth and tugging on her boots and convincing herself it was completely casual to go get caf on the Falcon, she was conveniently not addressing the frankly erotic dream she’d had about him the night before.

Waking on her cot in the darkness, panting and afflicted, tormented by images of Han tangled up with her in all kinds of sexual positions, had become practically a nightly occurrence since they’d set up base on Hoth. It was almost laughable—certainly ironic—that she kept waking up hot and sweaty on a planet so cold their speeders wouldn’t work. There in the frigid air, even, she felt a burst of heat, remembering how in her dream Han had smirked up at her from between her legs, gaze intense and tender, before bowing his head to resume pleasuring her with his tongue—

Horrified, Leia whirled away from the ramp as though the ship’s occupants could somehow see what she was thinking. Fool! She was a fool. Leia Organa, princess and senator, ambassador and diplomat, commander and spy, was stunned and red-faced to be confronted with the abrupt truth of it. After all these months of denying it, Leia was skulking around Han Solo’s ship at a positively indecent hour, like a teenager with a crush, because she wanted him, was hoping to see him—was entertaining, even as she stood there—all kinds of fantasies that featured a sleepy and rumpled Han Solo emerging from his cabin, pleasantly surprised to find her there, voice perhaps rough with sleep, joining her in the galley for an early caf and some tender banter laden with innuendo and feelings...

And that was how Leia knew that she wasn’t simply lusting after Han. Because surely if that were all it was, her secret hopefulness for an early morning encounter wouldn’t include that rare, treasured look he got on his face, the one that was equal parts roguish and bashful, like the other day when he’d slipped on that patch of ice in front of her and had skidded and slipped, arms flailing, before finally landing flat on his back on the ground. And Leia, through a gasp of laughter, had spoken without thinking, so charmed and enchanted by his baffled expression, as though his own feet had betrayed him, as though he couldn’t believe it of himself—cocky and sturdy Corellian balance and swagger—to fall on his ass in the hangar. She’d held out a hand to help him up, any semblance of pretense or station forgotten, and had said, ‘Knew you’d fall for me eventually, Captain Credits.’

Han had blinked in surprise, his eyes flashing to hers as though in disbelief, and then he’d grinned, lopsided and big but somehow meaningful even as he’d grasped her outstretched hand and waggled his eyebrows at her.

‘Just trying to follow protocol, Princess,’ he’d smirked, his eyes light and laughing. ‘Ain’t us peasants supposed to lie all prostrate at your royal feet?’

Now Leia winced at the memory. She wondered if it was obvious to everyone, what was developing between the two of them. Wondered if he would take her appearance on his ship at 0400 to mean what it did—that Leia Organa wanted him badly, in more ways than one.

So what if he knows how you feel? asked a voice in her head. Leia had found herself arguing with this voice often—it was the same voice that, last week, had tried to convince her after a particularly graphic dream to stay in her cot just a little bit longer, to turn off her alarm and close her eyes, pick up where her dream had left off, and slide her hand down into her standard-issue thermal leggings—

Shaking her head and smoothing her braids, Leia turned back to the ship. For once the voice in her head was in complete agreement with her own common sense. So what if Han knew how she felt? Wasn’t... wasn’t she all but certain, now, that he felt the same? And wasn’t it becoming increasingly obvious, after all their partner missions and moves from base to base, that Han wasn’t leaving anymore? In fact, as he voluntarily took on more and more responsibility with the rebellion, no longer simply smuggling supplies but running patrols, scouting perimeters, conferring with General Rieekan, and quite frankly acting alongside her as an active rebel spy, well...

She couldn’t kid herself. She was beginning to think he was planning to enlist. And if he was sticking around, if he was enlisting, if he harbored the same earnest feelings for her that she was nurturing for him...

What reason did she have to keep denying this, other than her own fear?

And Princess Leia was tired of being a prisoner of fear.

Taking a deep breath, she marched up the ramp.

She didn’t realize until she strode into the main hold and found it empty that she’d half-expected to find Han sitting at the holochess table waiting for her. Instead, though all the lights seemed to be on, neither Han nor Chewie were anywhere to be found. She paused and took off her gloves, relishing the warmth of the ship. With the ramp down and the main hold illuminated, she’d assumed Han was awake, but perhaps he was indeed still sleeping. It was three hours before the morning shift, after all... perhaps it would be best to collect her caf and go...

Reluctant all over again, Leia crept quickly and silently through the hold and headed for the galley, but rounding the bend in the corridor, she froze.

She had found Han.

She had found much more of Han than she had bargained for.

There, in the open doorway of the forward hold, across from the ship’s tiny galley, Han Solo hung from a bar with his back to her. He was naked from the waist up, his skin golden and taut over the muscles that were working beneath, contracting and bunching as he lifted his big, long body again and again, bringing his chin to the bar. He was wearing a pair of faded bloodstripes that rode low around his waist. No holster rig. No shoes or socks. Leia wasn’t aware that she was staring, incapable of any thought or observation outside of Han, absorbing and cataloguing the details of his body in a kind of stunned and ravenous daze.

The steady grip of his big, strong hands around the bar. The forearms she had so often admired. Biceps that seemed even more impressive like this, unobscured by shirt sleeves or jackets, bulging as they moved his entire frame up and down. These attached to the broad shoulders she found so attractive. Back masculine, muscular, lean. Waist and hips narrow, and accentuated by the fit of his well-worn trousers his ass firm and—

Suddenly Han let go of the bar and dropped to the deck, and Leia, startled, jumped and made a mortifying gasping sound, and Han whirled around at once.

There was a single instant of shocked eye contact, Han gaping at her in surprise, Leia pinned on the spot by the sudden, embarrassing realization that it was 0400 and she appeared by all accounts to have crept aboard to spy on Han’s shirtless exercise.

“Worship?” he blinked at last, visibly relaxing after the scare she’d given him. He reached up to prop one arm up on the bar he’d been hanging from, his posture open and nonchalant, gaze upon her curious and discerning. What Leia was discerning was his bare chest and abdomen. She opened her mouth to say something—anything. Did Han know—goddess, he—it wasn’t fair, to look like this. Always Leia had found him attractive. From the start she’d thought him handsome, thought his body perfectly proportioned. But his bare torso like this? The sight of his flesh, his physique? Lanky but muscular, lean and strong, a masculinity so overt that she was blushing, and in an instant she recalled her dream, only the details became powerfully vivid in light of this new intel, heightened and improved by the new knowledge of how Han’s bare body looked in rhythmic motion. She imagined him lifting his head from between her legs and holding himself above her, how he might look rocking over her, those bulging biceps, the broad shoulders, flat abdomen and lean hips—

“Leia?”

Never had Leia been more grateful for her diplomatic training. Never in her entire life.

“I’m sorry,” she said with such composure that she surprised even herself, although she could feel her face burning. “I’m supposed to meet General Rieekan at 0430 and since you said I could... ‘come over anytime to defrost,’ I—I thought I’d...”

Han’s eyebrows were raised with such incredulity that his forehead was rumpled, and as she trailed off his mouth slanted into a pronounced and gleeful smirk.

“You sure took that literally, Sweetheart.”

Leia flushed.

“The ramp was down and the lights were on, so I knew you were up, otherwise I—if I’m imposing I can go to the mess hall—“

Han let his hand fall from the bar and stood up straight, shaking his head. He looked suddenly earnest.

“No, I. I meant it literally. C’mon, gave you the ramp code, didn’t I?”

It was Leia’s turn to raise her eyebrows.

“I thought you gave me the ramp code for ‘emergencies’ in case we were on a mission and you were ‘captured by some kriffing Imp.’”

Han shrugged one bare shoulder.

“Yeah well, freezing your ass off on this ice ball ‘s a good enough emergency if you ask me, Highness. Can’t fight a war if you’re in the medcenter with frostbite.”

Leia smiled softly, still acutely aware of his state of undress. She was looking with determination at his face, but she knew Han had already caught her staring at his body.

She cleared her throat.

“I was just hoping to have some caf...”

Han nodded.

“Already got some going—not the instant shit though. Brewing a pot, if, uh. If you got time to wait.”

Leia nodded and they both looked at each other for a moment, and to her astonishment Han looked as shy as she suddenly felt. Not because of his nakedness—somehow she knew she could have come upon him entirely nude and he wouldn’t have been embarrassed—but something about the implications of her arrival and his invitation to stay for caf seemed to have struck him as significant.

xxx

When Han joined her in the galley, he was wearing a thin undershirt, and Leia was as relieved as she was disappointed. They leaned facing each other against the galley’s compact cooktop, waiting for the caf to finish and breathing in the aroma while it brewed. Leia looked down at her hands, feeling uncharacteristically awkward.

“Do you wake up this early every morning to... exercise?” she asked in an attempt to make conversation. She regretted it instantly. For some reason drawing attention to the fact that she’d watched him doing chin-ups felt like she was drawing attention to the powerful reaction she’d had to the sight.

Han took down two thermoses from one of the storage compartments overhead and reached for the pot of caf as the dispenser beeped and turned off.

“Sometimes,” he said gruffly. “Not usually this early.”

“Couldn’t sleep?”

Han cut his eyes to her, and Leia wasn’t sure what happened next. Sometimes she seemed to have powerful moments of intuition, but this seemed to transcend even that. Perhaps it was her imagination, ignited by the look on his face, which was at once furtive and candid, and shaded with longing, but suddenly her dream came again to her mind, their bodies writhing together, except this time they were in his bunk instead of on her standard issue cot, and this time—though she knew it was impossible—she could have sworn it was no product of her own mind.

“Something like that,” Han breathed.

As she watched he poured a measure of caf into each thermos, and before she could say a word he took creamer—real cream, not powdered—from within the cooling unit and added some to her thermos.

Just the way she liked it.

He lifted the thermos to pass to her, and when she took it from him their fingers brushed. She watched Han’s gaze focus on their hands brushing before lifting to settle on her face, his eyes greener than usual in the light of the galley.

Leia wondered if he could tell she was tempted to set the caf aside, forgotten, to run her hands up under that thin white shirt, to find out what the skin felt like there—if he was as hard and smooth and warm as he’d appeared when he’d done those merciless chin-ups.

Han turned to face the cooktop and rested both hands on it, grimacing, and then reaching to run a hand through his ruffled hair, clearly still in a disarray from the night. He lifted his thermos to his lips and took a long drink that Leia found so arousing that she was almost angry. Could she think of nothing else? The chin-ups surely were sexy, but drinking caf? Why did the sight of his lips pursing on the thermos and his throat working as he swallowed have such an effect on her?

And when had the galley gotten this small? So small they could barely fit inside together without touching.

Leia lifted her caf to take a drink, too, just for something to do, but as the steaming beverage touched her tongue she jerked away in dismay.

“Kriff!” she gasped, the scalding liquid burning her tongue. She’d become so accustomed to the lukewarm instant variety in the mess hall that she’d forgotten how hot Han’s caf could be. Some caf splashed out of her thermos and out onto her hand, and she cursed again. Leia inwardly cringed. So far she’d awoken from a sex dream about Han Solo, she had talked herself into entering his ship at 0400 and had fretted about outside for almost five minutes, she had been caught checking Han out while he exercised shirtless, she’d stood tongue-tied and nervous before him while the caf brewed, had fantasized right in front of him about having sex with him, and had spilled her drink and burned herself to boot. This was not how Leia had imagined the morning would go, and in fact she couldn’t remember ever having been so clumsy—literally or conversationally—in her life.

“I must be more tired than I thought,” she explained weakly as she reached for one of the rags Han and Chewie used to dry dishes. Han grabbed it first, though, and instead of handing it to her he took her hand in his and toweled off the caf.

“You burn yourself?” he asked, brow creasing in concern as he inspected her hand.

“Oh—no. Well—yes. My tongue, not. Not my hand. I shouldn’t have taken a sip so soon, it was hot—“

“Should’ve warned you,” Han murmured, appearing genuinely contrite. “Knew it was hot—know how sensitive your mouth is.”

They both froze and looked at each other, his hand still holding hers. While it was true that Han often joked about how long she spent blowing on her soup and tea and caf before deeming it an acceptable ingestible temperature, after a morning of starkly carnal thoughts, his words seemed explicitly provocative. He seemed to think so too, for he was staring at her, at her eyes and her lips in turn, and as before she’d imagined running her hands up under his shirt, now she imagined moving to kiss him, inviting him to discover just how sensitive her mouth might be, and other parts of her, too.

Leia moved forward as though in a trance. Han was suddenly like a ship and she was caught in a tractor beam, drawn towards him, and she didn’t fight it. He turned her hand in his so that their fingers were laced together, and just that sent a thrill through her, to feel her hand in his like that, his rougher, bigger palm against her own. He held their joint hands against his chest, against the soft fabric, and Leia actually bit her lip against her want as she leaned forward—forward—she actually went up onto her booted toes. Han’s other hand moved to rest against the side of her neck, fingers brushing her jaw, thumb against her cheek, and it was no longer true that she didn’t shiver on the Falcon, for a shiver ran all the way down her back then. Han was looking at her like he was starving, like he wanted to kiss her more than anything in the galaxy—if he had said so just then she would have believed him at once, the way he was looking at her. His gaze was sharp upon her, reading her, becoming less wary and more hopeful by the second, and it was the hope that most affected her, the way it seemed to open some secret shutters that had previously left some crucial part of him obscured. Leia had forgotten all about her dream now, for it paled in all ways in comparison to the real life man before her, jaw yet unshaven, scruffy bed hair a mess in a way that seemed to invite her to mess it up some more, undershirt taut along his shoulder and chest—over the beautiful shape of him that she had seen so gorgeously bare, and eyes that looked at her like—hot and yearning, looking at her like—

Leia tilted her face up. Han drew her towards him. She closed her eyes, breathless, ready—

Her comm blared from within her pocket, and they both jumped as though they’d been caught red-handed. Han released her at once as she fumbled to silence the alarm—the schedule reminder she’d set the day before: Taun-Taun Meeting 0430–Five Minutes

“It’s 0425,” Leia gasped.

Han looked winded. Leia felt winded. Dazed, she reached for her thermos of caf.

“I—I need to go,” she said. Apologetic. Why was she apologetic? She wasn’t rejecting him—did he think she was rejecting him? Was that something Han would feel? She suddenly realized—yes, she could do that to Han. She could make Han feel that—rejection—and she knew it instinctively, and not just because she knew he held that power over her too but because of that hopefulness he’d revealed—“I’m sorry, I—the meeting—“

“Don’t worry about it,” Han muttered, gruffer than ever before—was he blushing? she certainly was—he stepped aside to let her pass, and Leia was crestfallen, her face flaming. Was this it? Their chance ruined? What if he never tried to kiss her again? What if this whole awkward encounter put the whole thing to bed for him? Would he tease her now, about their almost-kiss? Would they pretend they hadn’t almost kissed? So long she’d awaited it and now she had to rush off to meet Carlist Rieekan to see the stupid taun-tauns that would be used in place of speeders?! Not knowing what else to do, she moved to hurry past Han.

Leia slipped with such stereotypical calamity that she could have been on a holocartoon, her boot slipping in what she instantly realized—even as she fell—must have been a puddle of caf that she’d spilled on the deck when she’d sloshed it over her hand.

But Leia didn’t wind up on her ass, because Han caught her, his hands clamping her arms like a vice. They looked at each other in mutual surprise, and somehow this was the last straw for Leia. The final embarrassment after a full morning of embarrassment.

It wasn’t princess-like but Leia was a woman, not a title, and so when she finally spoke she said exactly what she felt.

“Fuck this morning.”

That’s when it happened, just as she’d imagined. Han’s face crinkled into delight, and he grinned. The big lopsided one like when he’d slipped on the ice, the one that she imagined sometimes when she was falling asleep.

He laughed—not a moment of it at her expense—and helped her stand back up.

“Dunno,” he grinned, releasing her. “Been a pretty good morning for me. We should do it again. Tomorrow.”

Leia smiled back at him, shy but pleased, and smirking herself, too, with him, at him, at herself. She nodded.

“Tomorrow.”

Tomorrow!

With that she moved—more carefully now—to step by him and into the ring corridor.

It wasn’t until she was hurrying down the ramp, caf in tow and certainly late for her meeting, that Han called after her.

“Hey, Sweetheart!”

She glanced back to see him at the top of the ramp, in the bloodstripes and undershirt and bare feet still despite the chill that surely reached him where he stood, his expression practically ecstatic. He leaned against the hatch, as he had so many times before, and spoke.

“Who’s falling for who, now?”

So what if he knows how you feel?

Leia lifted her thermos at him in salute.

“I’ll see you tomorrow, Captain.”

“That’s Captain Credits to you, Princess.”

When Leia met Rieekan in front of the enclosure that now held several dozen of the oddest creatures she’d ever seen, she was ten minutes late, she had caf on her snowsuit, and the taun-tauns smelled like nerf manure, but Leia smiled into her thermos.

She was having a wonderful morning.

[thatsparrow]

(read on ao3)

The tears are still sticky on Caramelinda's cheeks when Amethar proposes.

"Look, I know this isn't what you wanted," he says, knelt down before her in his bloodstained armor, a messy spray of green sap drying across his breastplate. "It's not what I—" he exhales, heavy. "Fuck. I thought I'd be walking Laz down the aisle, not taking her place at the altar."

Taking her place. Caramelinda blinks her eyes closed, feeling fresh tears stinging hot against her lashes as she hides in the black behind her eyelids. Maybe if she keeps them closed long enough, she can imagine a new world where Lazuli is still alive.

"I'm sorry." Amethar's voice has gone tight and quiet. Fragile, almost. "I didn't mean it like that. I know I'm not—replacing her, or anything. No one could."

"No," Caramelinda says, opening her eyes. She's surprised at how rough the word sounds, how grief has turned her throat sandpaper-raw. "No one will ever come close."

"I know."

"I love—I loved her. I don't—" she cuts herself off, leaves him to fill in the rest. I don't love you. I don't want to marry you. I don't even know you.

"I understand." He tries out a smile, but it doesn't quite land. Falls crooked like a deflating balloon. "Believe it or not, I do have some idea of what you're going through." His expression shifts a little as he gives her a steady look, and Caramelinda sees some of the soldier in him, the steel-sharp resolve. "She may not have been my partner, but I did love her, too."

Guilt rises fast in her chest. It's so easy to linger in the shadow of her own grief that Caramelinda forgets she's not alone in her loss. "I didn't mean—"

"It's okay. You're hurting—I don't blame you for that. Hell, Laz isn't even in the ground yet and we're—" Amethar cuts off and laughs a little, harsh and humorless. "Fucking politics, you know? 'Heavens forbid we lose the alliance, too,' like that's the most important thing here." He rubs at his jaw, his hands restless. "I am sorry, though, that this is being asked of you. Bulb knows you deserve better."

Of you, he says. Not, of us. Pain aplenty weighing heavy on his own shoulders, but he won't shy away from his new role as crown prince, however chafing it might be. For all the stories she'd heard from Lazuli, the rumors that flurried through Candia like spun sugar—Amethar the reckless, Amethar the stubborn, Amethar the foolhardy—Caramelinda finds that they don't entirely square up with the man kneeling in front of her. His sister stolen from him in battle and any notions of love or romance stripped away by the obligation of an arranged marriage, and yet his main concern remains for her.

Amethar the noble, she thinks. Amethar the strong.  

"It's okay," she says, settling a hand on his shoulder and gesturing for him to stand. "It'll be okay. I always knew my marriage would likely be a political one. Falling in love with Lazuli—" she pauses, swallowing around the thorny shape of Lazuli's name in her throat, "—that was luck, more than expectation. A fluke, albeit a very beautiful one." She's still wearing Lazuli's ring, a simple silver-stone band around her finger. "Maybe I should have known better than to trust in such good fortune."  

Amethar hesitates for a moment, then reaches out a hand to take hers. His palm is warm and callused against her skin, his fingers broad and blunt where Lazuli's had been sure and slender. Still, there's a reassurance to his touch.

"I don't know how to be a husband," he says, slow. "Let alone how to be a good one, but I do promise that I'll always be loyal to you and faithful to our marriage. Whatever might happen, so long as I live, I pledge myself to you as your partner and ally." He gives her that bashful, sideways smile that she'll come to know well. "And as your friend, for whatever that's worth."

Amethar the honorable.

"I thought we were meant to exchange vows at the wedding," Caramelinda says, teasing a little if only to hide her surprise at his earnestness. "I appreciate it, but you don't have to say all that for my sake. It's a political marriage; I know what that entails."

"I said it because I meant it, Caramelinda." It's the first time he's said her name, low and warm in a way that brings a slight flush to her cheeks. "I'll say it all again up at the altar, too, but it's important to me that you know where I stand, if we're going to do this. Politics or no, I'm not going to be your husband in name only while the rest of Calorum thinks you're being played for a fool. I know I could never fill Laz's shoes, but that doesn't mean I won't try."

He runs a thumb over the back of her knuckles, pausing briefly before brushing across the ring she'd been given by Lazuli. What does he think when he sees it? There's no mistaking the sincerity of his words, but neither can Caramelinda ignore the bruising weight of Lazuli's absence between them. Him missing a sister and her missing a fiancée and what are either of them supposed to do when their very relationship is a reminder that she's gone? When she looks up from their joined hands, she sees that Amethar's cheeks are wet with tears.

"It should have been me," Amethar says when he notices her watching him. "Bulb, I wish it had been me. I don't know how to do this—any of it—without her."

"Me neither." Promise me that you'll come back, Caramelinda had said to Lazuli the last time they were together, Lazuli's armor buckled over her robes as she'd readied to leave for the front. Promise me that you'll come back, but Lazuli had just kissed her, sure and steady, and Caramelinda had taken that as its own sort of vow. She should have known better, though; Lazuli was always so careful with her words that her silence was its own answer.

Promise me that you'll come back—but she hadn't. And so now here Caramelinda is, alone for all that Amethar is with her, both of them silent in their mourning. She would offer him comfort if she had the words, but she doesn't even know what balm to apply to her own wounds. Still, if they can't absolve each other of their grief, perhaps they can lighten the burden by carrying it together.

"We don't have to decide or plan or do anything at the moment, right?" Caramelinda says. "I'm sure there will be plenty of that in the days ahead, enough so that there's no use worrying about it now. But we do have some time—maybe to talk, if you'd like?"

"Yeah," Amethar says, his voice rough and raw-edged. "That sounds alright."

It's then that Caramelinda realizes they're still holding hands. She lets go, feeling a little sheepish before reminding herself that it's nothing to feel guilty over. He is to be her husband, after all. Her tent isn't particularly large, but she leads him over to two floor cushions before pouring each of them glasses of sugared fruit wine.

"To Lazuli," she says, raising her glass in a toast.

"To Laz," Amethar echoes. They drink, Amethar nearly to the bottom of his cup. He wipes his mouth and gives her a curious look. "Is that what you wanted to talk about? Lazuli?"

Caramelinda nods and takes another careful sip. "I thought it might help, but if you don't want to—"

"No, no, it's okay. I'd like that, actually. It'd be nice to remember her, not just—what happened at the end."

The wine goes a little sour on her tongue. They hadn't wanted to let Caramelinda see her body, wouldn't even let her through into Lazuli's tent until she'd shouted and swore and vowed to call forth the power of the Bulb to blast them all into the heavens if they wouldn't let her go. Inside, Lazuli had been laid out on her bed, still as stone. They'd pulled the arrows free and done their best to patch the wounds, but lapis-blue blood had come away on Caramelinda's skin as she'd reached for Lazuli's hands, as she'd pressed her lips to Lazuli's cheeks. She doesn't remember how long she'd stayed kneeling on the floor, but she does remember that her legs were numb by the time she was helped to her feet and carried from the tent.

No, she doesn't want that moment to be all she remembers of Lazuli, either.

"What was she like when you were younger?" Caramelinda asks, taking a long pull from the glass to swallow down her pain. "I can't picture her as any age other than when we met."

Amethar smiles wide and his whole face seems to shift, turning on a coin from stoic to something easy and boyish, unreserved and sunshine-bright. "Man, she was such a big sister. You know that serious expression she used to have, but picture it on the face of a teenager. We used to joke that she was a grown-up stuck in the body of a kid, but then she'd pull some devious fucking prank out of nowhere. But that was her, you know? So fucking smart and sure of herself, and then this hidden streak of chaos running underneath. She'd tell you to learn your Candian history and meanwhile you don't notice that she'd cast an illusion switching the doors and the windows, or enchanting pieces of chalk to explode if you get the wrong answer. More of a wild card than I think she let on with most folks, but I loved that about her. A one-woman force of nature for as long as I can remember."

Caramelinda laughs a little, both at the memory and the look of nostalgia on Amethar's face. "I wish I'd known her, then. Not that she didn't have moments of levity, but I think her sense of responsibility had worn most of it out of her by the time we met."

"Well, hey, I've got plenty of stories," Amethar says. "You know, if you want."

She nods, and together, they spend the rest of the evening spinning Lazuli back to life with their words and memories, a shadow blurred a little hazy by wine, but built of too much joy and laughter for either of them to mourn.

[otherworldink]

Intro to "Woodworking"

Where do you go when you live in a tiny medieval fantasy village and need some basic sex ed? The woodshop apparently. Results may vary. Includes frank, if humorous, discussions of sexuality.

Read it below the cut, or continue reading on: Wattpad or Otherworld.Ink

Bren had never liked sharing personal information. He believed in the twin virtues of privacy and minding your own damn business, and he acted accordingly. Unfortunately, he'd come up against a problem that required advice. Expert advice.

And there was only one place in his backwater village he could get it.

The carpenter's workshop was a pleasantly open building with large windows that let in the light and broad double doors that could allow the passage of a finished table or bed frame. The scent of fresh-cut pine and the subtler scents of hardwoods permeated the air. In every corner there stood half-completed projects, from the disassembled pieces of little boxes to uncut slabs with measurements drawn in charcoal. Bren could even see a small spoked wheel, half-sanded—a spare for the wheeled chair Kole's father used.

Mercifully, the only people inside were the shop's two owners. The most conspicuous of the pair was Dorin, whose height and breadth led some to suspect he had a touch of giant blood somewhere in his ancestry. He sat hunched over a pair of carved wooden fawns, adding the last fine details with a small chisel.

Hale looked slight compared to his husband, but this was just an optical illusion. A point that was reinforced as the man casually lifted a slab of wood that must have weighed as much as Bren did. It was impressive, but not why Bren was here.

"Hi, Bren!" Hale greeted, looking up from examining the marks on the wood slab. "Did your mother change her mind on the dimensions for that shelf? I was just about to make the first cut."

"No, no. It's not about that. I just... I need some advice."

"Oh? Thinking of taking up woodworking?" Hale asked, half joking.

In his nervousness, Bren replied with a poor joke of his own.

"Different kind of 'wood' to be working with."

There was a pause as Hale processed. Then he grinned like someone had handed him a new chisel.

"I knew it! It's Kole, isn't it? That nice half-elf boy?"

Bren's ears burned, and his eyes glued themselves to the floor.

"It is!" Hale dropped the wood slab in his eagerness, shaking the ground on impact. He didn't seem to notice. "Tell me everything! What do you need to know?"

The excitement was not mutual. Bren had resolved to ask for help with the same enthusiasm one used to ask the blacksmith to pull a bad tooth. Mercifully, Dorin only looked mildly interested, sparing just a glance before continuing his carving.

"Look, I'm not here to share details. I just need to know how some things work, and I figure you two..." Bren glanced back and forth between the pair then cleared his throat. "Yeah."

"Right, right." Hale nodded with exaggerated understanding. "No need to overshare. ...Unless you want to, of course."

Hale wasn't the worst gossip Bren knew—that title went to Mrs. Fields who owned the mill—but Bren still thought he took a bit too much pleasure in having his nose in everyone's business.

"I just need to know how some things work."

"Like what?" Hale tapped his chin. "Don't tell me you need to know what goes where? I should have some blank paper around here if you need me to draw diagrams. I can think of a few positions that would be good for beginners."

"No! No, I already know about that stuff." Kind of. A bit. In any case, Bren didn't think his dignity could survive diagrams. "I just need to know about... logistics. Like how you figure out who, you know... tops."

It was hard to get the words out, and he regretted it as soon as he had. It felt like such a stupid question, like it was something he should already know instinctively. People certainly had their own ideas about how these things worked, but Bren and Kole were about the same age, height, and build so it was hard to say that any of the usual "guidelines" applied.

To his surprise, Dorin answered first.

"I wouldn't worry too much about that," he said without looking up. "Just see what feels right when you get to that point. You can take turns trying or, hells, even flip a coin for it. There's more to sex than putting your dick in a hole. Focus on making each other feel good, and the rest will sort itself out."

That... actually sounded sensible. Reassuring, even. Maybe Bren had been making a big deal out of nothing.

"No, no, no! Hold on a minute, babe." Hale quickly covered Dorin's ears. "Listen to me, Bren: you are at a crossroads right now. This is where you set the tone for your entire relationship. You have a unique chance to secure the best position all for yourself. You have to be the bottom!"

Dorin snorted, but made no move to remove the hands from his head. Hale ignored him and continued.

"Topping is a fool's game! If you want to feel something around your dick, you can have your own hand any time. But when you want to get fucked, what are you supposed to do? Oh, you can try certain vegetables, and I've certainly carved a few things in the right shape, but then you've still got to do all the work yourself, and-"

Dorin cleared his throat, interrupting the deluge of far-too-personal information. A mercy, given that Bren was on the verge of bursting into awkward flames and disintegrating into the floor.

"Hush!" Hale scolded his husband. "I'm passing on my wisdom. And you can't hear right now!"

He returned his earnest attention to Bren. "What I'm saying is, no matter what anyone tells you, it is surprisingly hard to 'go fuck yourself'. If you ever get the opportunity to have someone else do it, do not pass it up!"

"He's only saying that because he's lazy in bed," Dorin said, apparently giving up on withholding personal information. Hale made an offended noise.

"You! You can't hear, remember!"

Bren wished he couldn't hear anything.

"Is there anything useful you can tell me, or should I just leave?"

"Always use oil," Dorin said, finally brushing Hale's hands away from his ears. "More than you think you need. It makes everything more pleasant."

"Except for oral!" Hale added.

"Yeah. Except that."

"Okay, that's... good to know," Bren said. "So, like, the oil you use on tools, or...?"

"NO!" The objection came from both of them simultaneously.

Dorin cleared his throat.

"Ah, no. Different oil."

Hale grimaced.

"Otherwise you're in for an awkward trip to the healer."

Bren could tell there was a story there. A story he absolutely never needed to hear.

"Then... what kind are you supposed to use?" And where could he get it? Ideally without anyone guessing what he intended to use it for.

"We'll send you off with something," Dorin said. "It's better than you getting desperate and using whatever's on hand."

"Trust us on that," Hale added.

On this matter, Bren would.

In short order, the two set him up with a small jar of oil and instructions on where to discretely buy more. He also found himself holding the two fawns.

"You can pay us back by delivering them," Dorin explained. "They're for Leda on the other side of town."

"They're actually for her daughter," Hale added. "Leda hopes that if the kid has some nice toy fawns, she'll stop trying to bring home the real ones she finds out in the fields."

The palm-sized fawns were impressively lifelike: one curled flat and low like it was hiding in the grass, the other half-sprawled, pushing itself up on delicate forelimbs with its ears pricked alertly. Bren wasn't sure they'd be enough to persuade a determined child to give up the real thing, but they might come close.

Dorin offered some parting words.

"I don't think you have anything to worry about. Just take it slow, listen to each other, and have fun."

"And for fuck's sake, let him top!" Hale added, unable to help himself.

Bren mumbled something approaching a polite goodbye and hurriedly retreated with the fawns, the oil, the advice, and what remained of his dignity.

His initial plan had been to make the delivery and retreat home to bury his face in his pillow until the embarrassment receded, but fate was not so accommodating. Less than halfway across town, he spotted Kole at the blacksmith's shop, saying his goodbyes. Bren paused on reflex, and when Kole turned away from the workshop, he spotted him.

Kole smiled—partly bashful, entirely charming—and Bren's stomach flipped.

Kole had moved into town a few months back with his parents: an elven mother and a human father who had recently survived an unpleasant encounter with a wyvern. Years ago, Hale had made a wheeled chair for his elderly aunt, and since then, anyone within a week's travel who needed one would order from him.

The family had made the journey to have the chair properly fitted and had ended up staying. Something about wanting to live "somewhere quiet" and enjoying the "lovely pastoral scenery". Which all sounded like nice euphemisms for "boring", but Bren supposed boring might be what you wanted after getting mauled by a wyvern.

"They're cute," Kole said, nodding at the carved fawns in Bren's hands.

"They're not mine!" Bren said hastily. "I'm just delivering them."

"Right." Kole's gaze lowered. "What's that?"

Bren realized, with some alarm, that he was looking at the bottle of oil sticking out of his trouser pocket. He hadn't thought it would be a problem since there was nothing suggestive about it's appearance, but he hadn't prepared for anyone to ask about it!

"Nothing!" His voice came out slightly more panicked than intended.

Amusement flickered on Kole's face, as if he could tell Bren was hiding something but was nice enough not to call him out on it.

"Who are you delivering them to?" Kole asked, mercifully turning the conversation back to the wooden fawns.

This was why Kole was the actual best. He had the decency to let things lie. (Or, at least, to let Bren lie to save some face.)

"Leda. They're for her daughter."

"Oh yeah. The little 'fawn-napper'." Kole chuckled. "Do you need help delivering those?"

"No, they're not heavy or anything." It was only after he'd said this that he realized Kole was making an excuse to join him. "Uh... I mean, you could..."

"I could carry one? In case you need a free hand."

"Yeah. That'd be good."

Kole accepted one of the fawns and fell in step next to Bren.

The two of them had been intimate before, but always alone. Bren was too much a private person to allow anything else. But when Kole casually laid a hand on Bren's lower back, Bren really couldn't bring himself to object. It felt... nice. And it's not like anyone was paying special attention to them.

Did he mention it felt nice?

Given where Bren had just come from, it was impossible not to reflect on the recent conversation. He tried to keep his thoughts decent, out of respect for the carved fawn in his hands. It was far too innocent for anyone to be having those kinds of thoughts around it.

Still, though...

Maybe Hale had a point.

[forestwater87]

Things have been . . . weird since David visited. Like a veil's fallen that really should've stayed up.

Like it's just a matter of time before things all go to hell.

So this happened! It wouldn’t have happened if I didn’t have @raenbowsofficial​ beta-ing and @hopefullypessimistic84​ and @ciphernetics​ keeping me, as usual, from completely ripping this story into pieces and sobbing on the fragments. You have them to blame for this. (It was going to be much longer but then things got weird so I’m splitting it up. But next chapter we’re returning to camp, so yay!)

The chapter is also below the cut, in case you prefer reading stuff in Tumblr instead of AO3.

Also the title is shamelessly ripping from the Gwenniest song that has ever existed. It’s amazing and everyone should listen to it.

April 2017

"It's your birthdayyyyyy! You can't say you're just gonna do nothing!"

Gwen glanced up at Claire with a frown. She'd sort of assumed the ripped tank top and oversized boxers — as well as the fact that she was curled up in bed surrounded by two family-sized bags of Cheetos — spoke for her. "Right, but I just did."

Claire maneuvered the chaotic bedroom, plopping down on the foot of the bed (nearly squashing Platypus, who'd taken shelter under a pile of blankets). "But you're twenty-seven!"

"That's not an important year, Claire-bear. No one gives a shit about 27. Besides, I have work tomorrow."

She dismissed the thought with a wave. "It's a Thursday night, work doesn't matter." Her face turned serious, the kind of doe-eyed earnestness that reminded her painfully of David. "You've been moping ever since he left, Gwen. I just got used to seeing you happy."

Gwen rolled her eyes, trying not to be touched by her roommate's concern. "He didn't die," she muttered, "he went back home. It's fine. We're talking tonight." For like five minutes, because he had work. And that was fine, they'd planned for that, she knew he had to work himself ragged to live on his camp counselor's salary.

It didn't bother her.

"Come onnnn, Santa. Please let us take you out?" She pouted, and it was irritatingly adorable; Claire was a porcelain doll, all delicate features and fragile vulnerability that made it almost impossible to say no to her. (She never had to pay for things. It was so unfair.)

But fuck, Gwen hated socializing. "Maybe," she finally said, pulling her computer into her lap and pointedly turning her attention to Tumblr. "I'll check with David."

"I think it's a great idea!"

Gwen sighed. Of course he did. Not that he was the kind of guy who'd forbid her to go even if he didn't want her to, but that'd been her last possible excuse. "Are you sure? New York's dangerous, and I'll be drinking." She paused meaningfully. "Could be risky."

There was just the briefest hesitation. "I'm sure you'll be fine!" Another tiny pause, then David added, "You have Claire and Ana going with you, right?"

"Yeah." Not that she expected her roommates to be much help in an attempted kidnapping scenario, but if this stupid celebration bullshit was inevitable, she didn't want him worrying all night. He might accidentally get distracted and kill one of the people at the retirement home or something. "It'll be fine, I just don't wanna."

She couldn't see him, of course, but she could piece together an image: it was a Thursday afternoon, so he was probably getting ready to start his shift at the diner. Which meant he was dressed in his uniform: an ugly yellow polo and pale-green apron over his usual shorts, with the camp bandanna tied around his neck. He liked to walk when the weather was nice, and since she could hear the sounds of traffic and voices in the background she assumed he was on his way there now, bopping along through his storybook town with his goofy bounding gait.

He was smiling, of course he was smiling. He was almost always smiling.

"Well, it is your birthday, so you can do whatever you want! But . . . I don't want you to be lonely." Some of the brightness dropped out of his voice. "I'm sorry I won't be there."

Gwen snorted. "That's fucking stupid. It's just a day. You visited like two weeks ago, and you didn't even have to do that. It's fine." It was as much a reminder to herself as to him, because as selfish and unreasonable as it was to be disappointed, she couldn't help but feel a small pang that the one person she really wanted to see wouldn't be around.

God, the one person you wanna see? Melodramatic much?

Besides, he'd gotten her a present, even though they hadn't been dating long enough to warrant it. Sure, she'd given him a dorky green plaid Snuggie for his birthday, but that was a joke more than a real gift, because it was December and fit the whole weird nature-hipster vibe he had going on. (Okay, so he'd teared up and as far as she knew wore it more than any reasonable person should, but that was just how David was; she could've gotten him a $1 keychain and he would've had the same reaction.) The highlighter-pink butterfly knife he'd given her in return, besides being the single most David gift she could imagine — because what the fuck was she supposed to do with a giant-ass knife in the middle of Brooklyn? Was it in case an impromptu camping trip broke out on the subway? — was way nicer than she deserved.

"I think you'll have a lot of fun, Gwen. You should think about it." And the way he said it was so sincere and eager that she knew she had to go, because she couldn't let him down.

"I'm not promising anything," she said with a groan, kicking herself free of the mass of rumpled sheets that buried her bed and stumbling over to the closet. "Christ, now I have to find something to wear." She started rummaging through her closet, putting her phone on speaker so she could hunt. "We're looking for something that says 'I'm hot enough to be tagged in Facebook photos' but also 'if you try to touch me I'll rip your face off and use it as a cocktail umbrella.'"

David laughed, and the sound was like a burst of sunlight. "Just make sure you're safe! You have that knife —"

"What d'you think I'm using to cut off their faces?" Gwen snagged one of her what seemed like thousands of variations on the little black dress (god, she had a lot of slutwear, didn't she? Amazing how half her closet had become irrelevant now that she'd had a steady boyfriend for more than 6 months), a high-waisted flared miniskirt and a lacy black crop top. Sleeveless, but it went up to her neck and there was only a thin strip of midriff to worry about, so while it was a little light for the weather, it wasn't like she'd be spending much time outside. "There we go. Nice and skanky." She snorted and rolled her eyes, setting it aside and diving back into the mess for shoes. "I better not have to buy a single drink tonight, because I'm gonna look awesome."

"You're always beautiful!" She didn't respond, focused on finding a pair of heels that wouldn't make her want to chop her feet off by the end of the night, and after a few moments he asked, "Um . . . if — if you don't mind . . ."

"Hmm?" Gwen leaned back, inclining her ear toward the phone. David's voice had dropped, and she could barely hear him inside the closet.

"Nothing! I was . . . just wondering . . ." He chuckled awkwardly, and she could practically see him fidgeting with his bandanna. The dork. "If, well, before you go out, if you wouldn't mind t-taking a picture . . . of you, uh, all dressed up?"

Her mind filled in the blanks easily; she'd had enough practice speaking David to be pretty good at translating. "You fucking perv," she said with a laugh, grinning at his despairing squeak.

"I didn't — ! I mean, you don't ha-ave to, it's fine. Never mind." He sounded ridiculously bashful, and the image of him leaning against a streetlight or wall, bright red and stammering, was so vivid she felt a squeeze of something like homesickness constrict her chest, so intense it made her eyes sting.

"It's . . . hey, no problem, David." She cleared her throat, shaking her head to clear it. "If there's one thing I do well, it's take a hot selfie."

"You do lots of things well!"

For some reason the words, and the cheerful confidence with which he said them, made her wince. Which was obviously fucking stupid; she should just be happy someone was dumb enough to think that highly of her. "Go to work, you loser. You'll get in trouble if you're late, and I've got shit to do." She didn't, but she didn't want to be on the phone anymore either.

"Oh. Um, okay, of course!" He sounded just the tiniest bit off, just a pitch or two below his normal levels of happy, and she felt like a jackass for bumming him out like that. Why did she always have to bring the mood down with her whining? "Have a nice evening!"

"Y- . . ." Gwen paused, squeezing her eyes shut for a second and swallowing hard. "Yeah. You too. Bye."

She let the phone drop to the floor and returned to her bed.

An hour in and Gwen was convinced she should've stayed in bed. Three hours in, she started to wonder if she'd ever see her bed again.

It was around midnight, as she was considering abandoning her roommates to their own devices, that she felt a hand on her hip. It was large and warm, and for half a second she leaned into it before remembering that David was 6 hours away. "Hey." She kept her voice neutral because it was hard to tell who was just a normal creep and who was a "it puts the lotion on its skin" kinda creep, but she firmly took the stranger's wrist and plucked his hand off of her. "I have a boyfriend, but thanks."

As soon as she'd dropped his arm, shoving it toward him like pushing a boat away from the dock at camp, there was another on her shoulder, turning her to face him. He was cute, she supposed, in a very "my dad's a Republican" way, which wasn't her type: big and broad, dressed in artfully-distressed jeans, boat shoes, and a lilac button-down that matched his hair — hair that actually reminded her a little of David's, but that was where the similarities ended. This stranger was tan and muscled, with well-cared-for, uncalloused hands and thick square nails that weren't bitten short and ragged. There was none of David's nervous fluttery energy; she had a feeling this guy would never appear at the breakfast table with his shirt on inside-out because he was just too excited about starting the day to check his clothes.

He also might be an octopus. Gwen couldn't get far enough away to get a good look at his arms, but every time she moved one off of her another appeared — on her waist, in her hair, at her elbow, dangerously close to her ass. It seemed like way too many hands for one person.

"Wanna dance?" he asked, steamrollering over her. "Your boyfriend won't mind you dancing, right? We'll just dance as friends." Gwen opened her mouth to reply, but his hand planted on the small of her back in what seemed like a very unfriendly way. "You can't say no to making a new friend, right?"

"Hey." The voice came from behind her, deep enough to rumble in her chest, and the next thing she knew there was yet another hand on her, pulling her against his side. "Thought I'd lost you, babe." The stranger pecked her on top of the head, a quick kiss and a squeeze around her shoulders, then turned to the lavender bro and said, "See ya around" before dragging her toward the bar.

She wriggled free of the heavy arm constricting her neck. "The fuck're you doing?"

He smirked, leaning against the bar and ordering with just the lift of two fingers. "Saving you from that guy." He shrugged, gesturing to the stool next to him. "Never done the fake-boyfriend thing before, but I figured you'd appreciate being rescued."

Gwen paused. On the one hand, she'd most certainly wanted to get away, and there was something strangely romantic about someone swooping in and pretending to be her boyfriend like that. On the other hand, she was now with another total stranger, one who was showing no signs of helping her get a ride home, or find her friends, or . . . well, anything she'd expect from someone truly interested in aiding a drunk woman in distress. Things, she realized with a pang, David would do in a heartbeat. "Listen, that was . . . uh, nice of you, but I —"

"Have a boyfriend. I heard," he replied, sounding bored. As two beers were set in front of him, he pushed one of them in her direction without looking over. "They're craft, local. Only shit worth drinking." He glanced at her sideways, a dismissive flick of his eyes before returning to the dance floor. "Everywhere else serves cheap manufactured shit thinking the sorority girls buying it on their daddy's credit card are too dumb or wasted to know the difference. No offense."

She bristled, taking the drink. It tasted exactly like every other mediocre beer she'd had in a club, but she tried to look vaguely impressed, like she knew what he was talking about. "I'm twenty-seven," she muttered into the bottle. "I'm not a sorority girl. Not dumb either," she added belatedly, wincing at her own painful lack of cool. Not that it mattered if some douchebag with a bad haircut and thick-rimmed glasses thought she was cool, but it was . . . kind of a habit at this point, to try and prove herself.

"Huh. You seemed like the type, with that whole —" He gestured at her vaguely, "hot bimbo look. Trying to recapture the glory days?"

"No. I was never into that kinda thing." And she didn't know why she felt compelled to keep talking, except that something about being underestimated by this guy felt strangely familiar, and it really, really bothered her. "My friends dragged me here."

"Some friends." He snorted. "But yeah, same. Roommate's bachelor party. I've been reading out of protest." He reached into his pocket and pulled out a small, worn paperback copy of Breakfast of Champions. "Vonnegut. Recommendation: read the book, don't watch the movie."

Swoon. There was a part of Gwen that was very susceptible to this, a guy reading in a bar, noticing she was in distress and sweeping her away, all condescending half-compliments and a weird inexplicable magnetism.

He was her type, definitely. And yet . . .

She glanced away, biting back a giggle. Because the first thing that entered her mind was David's voice, concerned and alarmed and unintentionally devastating: "He shouldn't read in a place like this! He'll strain his eyes!" And the image of David, walking up to this stranger and accidentally ruining his bad-boy-intellectual persona by offering the flashlight he always kept on his keyring . . . well, it was ridiculous.

Almost as ridiculous as trying to read in the middle of a club. "I wrote my thesis on American satire." (Okay, no she hadn't, but "I took a class on it once" didn't sound as good. And for whatever stupid reason, she wanted to sound good.) "So thanks, I'll take that under consideration."

Gwen wasn't sure if she'd said that to make him leave or prolong the conversation, so she didn't know how to feel when his eyebrows flicked up, impressed. "No kidding? Did you notice how the story's structure mirrors the emptiness of human existe —"

"Sure did," she grumbled, taking another sip of her syrupy beer and trying to figure out what she was still doing in this conversation. She wasn't enjoying herself, and wasn't that the entire fucking point of a birthday? "Listen, thanks for the beer and everything, but . . ."

"The boyfriend." He rolled his eyes, leaning against the bar with a dramatic sigh. "You know, you're really not my type. I haven't been flirting with you at all, in fact." He peered at her over his thick glasses, a shock of floppy black hair falling into his reddish eyes. "Maybe I'm not the one you keep reminding."

"I —" That wasn't fair, she'd only mentioned David once. And what kind of arrogant jerk assumed someone was into them mid-rejection? But something about his tone of voice, his indifferent confidence despite being completely wrong, was oddly attractive. Like she'd been here before.

Like she'd be here again.

He was familiar, that was the thing. Almost comforting, the way Camp Campbell was comforting in its predictable shittiness. It wasn't new, it wasn't scary. If she kept flirting with him she could more or less see where it'd go — plus or minus the random fluttering hope that this one would work out, that she could change him, that she could save him. That he could save her.

He leaned in, tucking a strand of hair behind her ears, a move she'd considered romantic up until this second. But if he was bothered by the way she jerked away he didn't show it, taking a sip from his beer with a bored shrug. "Just seems like you wouldn't be here talking to me if you were happy." He glanced at her sideways. "Let me guess, he's really nice."

The way he said that, sneered it like it was something to be embarrassed about, made her skin prickle. "Fuck off," she snarled, pushing away from the bar finally.

"Knew it." And he was so smug, in a way she would've melted for this time last year but now made her seriously tempted to deck him. "Some friendly advice, not-sorority girl: consider finding someone you deserve." He set his drink down, cupped her cheek with one hand. "Why waste a nice guy's time?"

And like he'd choreographed it his mouth was on hers before she could respond, and first she was just shocked but then she felt sick because he was right, he was an unwashed prick too stupid to know it was a bad idea to try and read in a dimly-lit bar but he'd nailed her relationship to the detail. He was wrong about the conclusion — he wanted her to think she was too good for David but it was the opposite, David was too good for her.

And . . . now he knew it.

David had visited her home, he'd met her family and seen her life and gotten front-row seats to what a disaster she was, so much of a mess she couldn't even make people related to her love her, and he knew how much work she'd be — and all of that was two weeks ago but for those two weeks she'd been waiting for the other shoe to drop, to pick up the phone and hear "maybe you shouldn't come back to camp this summer." Every time he had to work or call Julia or visit his mom it felt like an excuse to avoid her.

But that wasn't fair. If anything she was avoiding him: letting texts go unanswered, not picking up the phone immediately, looking for shifts when she knew he was free because if he couldn't talk to her he couldn't leave her. It was dumb, it was crazy and dumb and cruel but she was scared okay, guys like David scared her and guys who read in bars didn't. She wasn't afraid of guys who kissed her like they knew they were good at it, kissed her like they owned her instead of shaking from nerves or want or whatever it was that made David fall apart when she touched him. She wasn't afraid of guys who liked to watch her scramble to impress them because they were prepared to be disappointed, they looked forward to it because it proved them right, they didn't have expectations for her to fall short of they didn't put her on a pedestal they didn't have a look in their eyes, like she was special and beautiful and worthwhile, that she was so afraid to lose it kept her up at night. She didn't have to be afraid of guys who looked down on her because she knew what she was getting, and so did they: they expected an insecure defensive girl who sometimes cried for no reason and sometimes couldn't force herself out of bed, and so she didn't have to lie and pretend to keep it together, because if she did those things she wasn't letting them down, she was just doing what they expected and they'd respond the way she expected and nobody was unpleasantly surprised.

And if she was going to fail David, if eventually he'd just come to see what her parents did and her brothers did and Campbell did and everyone who'd ever dated her did . . . then what was the point in wasting his time?

"See what I mean?" he whispered, pulling back just far enough to move his lips. His breath smelled like beer with an undertone of cigarette smoke, acrid and familiar. One hand traced up her thigh, stopping at the hem of her skirt.

She smiled, because she did.

"Gwen?" Audree's voice was bleary, sleep-sluggish; of course it was, Gwen was on her doorstep at one in the morning and Audree worked insane hours, she was a professional, she didn't have time for stupid childish relationship bullshit.

But here she was, shivering in the unseasonably cold weather with her numb lips nearly kissing a small black intercom. Because she didn't have any close friends and her roommates were too drunk and her mom would never understand and David — she couldn't talk to David.

Like always, Gwen needed her big sister.

"I . . ." She paused, trying to figure out how to explain herself. "Audree, I . . ."

That was as far as she got before she started crying.

"Fuck, Gwennie, hold on." There was a shrill, unpleasant buzzing at her ear, and she'd barely pushed open the door to the apartment building when Audree burst into view, careening around the stairs and nearly knocking Gwen down. "Are you okay?" Audree asked, taking her by the shoulders and looking her up and down. Her jaw tightened; Gwen didn't know what she looked like, but after 45 minutes of sobbing in the back of an Uber it probably wasn't pretty. "What happened? Who —"

"S'fine," she choked out, pushing Audree away and wiping at her face. "No one — it was me, I . . ."

Audree led her up to the apartment, settling her down on the couch before taking a seat in the chair opposite, putting her chin in her hands and watching Gwen with a laser-focused intensity that would've been unnerving if she wasn't used to it. (Her sister's resting expression went beyond "bitch face" into "American Psycho face," which made her a great lawyer and a terrible comforter.) She didn't say anything, just waited with those searching teal eyes cataloging everything about her, like she was already preparing her testimony against whoever'd hurt her baby sister. "Yes, Your Honor, she arrived at exactly 1:15 am. She didn't seem to have any visible bruises but she was crying . . ."

"Nobody hurt me," she finally muttered, staring down at her stupid slutty shoes, shoes she'd only worn because she'd once bullied David into admitting he had a thing for red heels. All that effort for a stupid fucking picture. "I'm just . . . shitty." Audree made a soft encouraging sound, a quiet noncommittal hum, a "I minored in social work and want you to open up at your own pace" noise that worked on witnesses and it worked on her. "I, uh, kissed this guy. I mean, he kissed me but I kinda knew he would and he was a dick and I probably could've, like, stopped him but I didn't." Her fingers were shaking. Why were her fingers shaking? "He, he w-wanted to — I mean he didn't ask but I could tell he was gonna and I was scared of what I'd say because what if I said yes? And I freaked out and left and I di- hhhidn't know where to go so I came here." She winced, realizing how selfish that was. "Sorry to wake you up."

For a minute Audree was quiet. "So do you like this guy or . . ."

Gwen made a sound that was somewhere between a scoff and a sob. "What? No."

"So you feel guilty because you didn't successfully fend off a creep before he assaulted you?" Almost immediately she added, "Fuck, sorry Gwennie, I promise I'm not lawyering you, I'm just a cunt sometimes. I didn't mean it like that, lemme try again." She took an exaggerated deep breath. "You were talking to a guy, and you think he was hitting on you and you . . . flirted back?"

"Not really." Sure, it was sometimes hard to tell where the line between "go fuck yourself tee hee" and "go fuck yourself before I stab you in the eye with this straw" was, but she had trouble imagining how (outside a bad romance novel) she could've been flirting. "I told him I had a boyfriend. But he said — he said I shouldn't be with a guy like David!"

"Riiiiiight, but this guy was an asshole. And he was wrong about you wanting him to kiss you."

"Well . . ." Audree was mostly right. What Gwen wanted was to be in David's ridiculously grandmotherly apartment, curled up under the bright pink blanket he'd knitted in high school and listening to him try to teach her Pokémon. Yet that didn't explain the strange attraction she'd had to the arrogant creep, the familiarity.

She hadn't wanted that stranger to kiss her, not exactly. But something about it had felt right.

"Listen, Gwen, there's nothing wrong with wanting to kiss someone, because, y'know, you're not dead." She leaned forward, fixing her with that iron stare that was half "trust me, I'm your sister and I love you" and half "eagle watching a mouse." (Great lawyer. Terrible comforter.) "Hell, there's nothing wrong with flirting either. What I don't get is why some douchebag's opinion matters so much."

Neither did she, exactly. "He reminded me of . . ." Well jeez, she could start listing names but they'd be there all night, "of some of the guys I've dated."

Audree quirked one eyebrow. "Even more reason not to listen to him."

"I know, but —" Audree's apartment was warm, she could afford real heat. It was warm and comforting and she was safe, so why were her fingers still shaking? "He was my type."

She pressed her lips together. "You know what I think about your type, Gwennie." This was a conversation they'd had a few (hundred) times before. "You deserve better."

"Why?"

And there it was. Like something in her chest had snapped, words came spilling out in a rush. "I'm not a good person, Dree. I don't have anything going for me, so in what fucking universe do I deserve better? And okay, maybe I could find a nice guy, but not David. He . . . he deserves someone sweet and pretty and h-happy and not . . ."

Broken.

It sounded so melodramatic, but she was. Because whole people weren't paralyzed by their own self-loathing, they didn't try ruin things before they could even get started, they didn't kiss smoke-flavored strangers in bars because they loved their boyfriend too much and were terrified of that.

"He loves kids, and I don't. We don't — don't have anything in common, and sometimes . . . I don't know what we have going for us except, y'know, stuff he doesn't have to get from me."

Audree wrinkled her nose. "Not an image I needed, sis." She grimaced and said, "Fuck, I'm being an asshole again, sorry," moving so she was sitting on the couch next to her and pulling her into an awkward half-hug. (None of the Santos clan were very good at hugging, something Gwen hadn't really noticed until she'd gotten used to David's.) "You don't think you're right for him?"

Gwen didn't think she was right, period. "I just think he . . . if he knew better, he wouldn't waste his time on me."

"Isn't that kinda his decision?"

She shrugged, leaning her head into the soft black cloud of Audree's hair. "But he's new to all this. Isn't my terrible dating experience good for something?"

"Yes," Audree said firmly. "It means you know what not to do. You know how people can make each other feel like shit, and you can do the opposite."

Gwen made a face. "I'm not . . . good at that kinda thing. The being-nice thing."

"Look who you're fucking talking to. But don't you wanna try?" She pulled back, her expression expectant and pitying. "It seems like you think he deserves that."

She couldn't meet her sister's eyes, so she picked at the carpet's upholstery. "You sound like David's mom. She's all smart and has her shit together too."

"Oh?" Audree's eyes lit up, a sly grin spreading across her face. "Single mother, right? Bit of a cougar?"

Gwen picked up a pillow and hit her with a snort of disgust. "No, you don't get to hit on his mom! I mean, you're probably never gonna meet her, because shit'll go wrong way before then, but still. Leave her alone."

"Oh, Gwen." Her smile softened, and she snuggled closer to slip an arm around Gwen's shoulders. "Someday you're gonna believe you deserve the good things that happen to you. And I'm gonna be there to say I told you so."

She laughed, the sound weak and hollow even to her. "Well now it has to happen, because you're never wrong." She sighed, adjusting Audree's arm so it was less stiff and uncomfortable. "He should be with someone like you," she muttered finally. "Someone hotter and without all the, like, bitterness and failure."

"Nuh-uh. David's cute, but have you seen women?" Gwen tried to smile, but she was exhausted all of a sudden. "You need to talk to him, y'know, about all this shit. Because I mean, I don't know the guy, but he didn't look like he has a fucking clue you're thinking any of this."

Audree was probably right. She usually was. But the last thing Gwen wanted to do was explain to David in painstaking detail all the reasons he deserved so much better than her, especially when he was probably already beginning to put the pieces together himself. (How could he not, after seeing how she lived?) "Yeah, probably."

"That's the best I'm getting, huh?" Audree ruffled her hair and climbed to her feet, stretching. "It's way too late for you to go home. Your room's waiting for you."

"It's not my room," Gwen grumbled, following Audree into the guest room and accepting the pajamas her sister found for her.

She grinned. "It could be." When Gwen didn't respond, she frowned and leaned against the wall. "Come on, at least think about moving in."

"I told you, I can't afford this. I couldn't even pay a quarter of the rent, so I dunno why you're even bothering." She did, of course; her sister was a good person, and she worried.

"I pay full rent on this place anyway, I don't need you chipping in anything. And it's not charity," she added as Gwen opened her mouth, "I wanna live with you."

She knew better than to ask why (no one needed a middle-of-the-night lecture on self-esteem), but they both knew she was thinking it. "I have Platypus, though."

"I love that little fucker, so don't even try to use him against me." Giving up, she pecked Gwen on the temple. "Fine, go to sleep. Just . . . I want you to move in because I like spending time with you. I think David does, too. It's okay if you're all you have to offer, all right? It's good enough."

Gwen was going to make fun of her, ask her what stupid self-help book she'd found that in. But her throat was a little tight, so she just nodded. "Thanks, Dree. Night."

"Night, Gwennie. It's gonna be fine, okay?"

She wanted to believe that.

[khemi]

Losing Count

@ghostpressure asked:  on this day of days im gonna be cliche and ask for jaderose maybe?? of the first kiss variety??

How could I ever say no to some sweet jaderose content? Lil non-Sburb AU, Rose POV!

Send me 413 Drabble Requests!

You lose count of all the ways Jade Harley is perfect every time you sit and try to name them.

You start with the single bit of hair that falls out of place no matter how many times she tucks it behind her ear, carry on past the way she plucks the bands on her fingers in a way you’re sure echoes some song played on a bass, and around the time you’re settling on the way she smiles with full lips and a fuller heart that shows in the dimples in her cheeks and the shine in her eye, there’s far too many things to keep hold of and they all escape in a dreamy sigh.

She is far too lovely for this world. Were you a traditional romantic you might call her an angel, or a flower in bloom. As it is, your diary is full of neatly transcribed descriptions of the finest of Lythalia’s daughters, wound in vines and tempting you with every look that lures you closer to her, yet able to crush you easily with a single dismissal if she desired. You describe yourself in less glowing terms in such entries, the groveling spawn of Th'rygh, a thing of ugly flesh and dirt not worth being the ground she walks on.

(When marking your diary, Mother gave you a high mark for dramatics, but a low mark for rationale. You’ll take what you can get from the privacy invading witch.)

Still, somehow Jade has not grown tired of your company, and allowed you to continue basking in her glow, which you do without even a modicum of restraint. She foolishly inquired about your home and you responded as if you hadn’t had a handwritten invitation to afternoon tea sitting in your purse for weeks, slightly dog-eared from all the times you’d hesitantly grasped it with intent to present it and then rapidly changed your mind. But no- she asked, and how could you not respond to such an earnest request, such bright eyes and such a broad smile and such glowing cheeks and such a melodious voice and-

You lost count of the ways she’s perfect, and gave her the invitation, and now here you are in your own bedroom, diary kicked firmly under your bed and Jade sitting opposite you in the most garishly beautiful combination of a neon green summer dress and yellow tracksuit pants. She’s folded her long legs into a knot and clasped her hands around her bare ankles, watching with open interest as you carefully mix a pot of tea with little preserved rosebuds all held in an octopus strainer.

“Those are so pretty,” she hums, rocking forward to peer at them closer, eyes blown up big and vibrant through her oversized glasses.

So are you, you think in a swift cliche, before battering it down with a metaphorical broom and smiling shyly instead. “I’m glad you think so.”

“I do! I’ve never had flower tea before... I’ve had normal tea, and green tea, and even a purple tea once... Will this one be pink?” Jade gasps, her rainbow tinted mental voyage leading her to a place that makes her whole face light up and leaves your heart aflutter. “Do you think we could make a whole tea spectrum? That would be so cool...”

“I can’t promise you a spectrum, but this will indeed be rosé.” You’ll leave it to brew a little longer than intended, just to make sure.

Jade giggles, bouncing herself closer across the bed, the only person in the world who can make the gesture graceful. “Do you drink this a lot?”

“Not often, no. Now and then, when the mood takes me. Special occasions.” Your cheeks are racing the tea for pinkness, and you bite back an explanation that you bought it especially for her. “It feels like it should be treasured, doesn’t it?”

“All roses should be treasured,” Jade replies solemnly, and your thoughts hitch on if a capital could possibly be applied, fingers lurching on their way to the honey. You cover it with a cough, poorly, a scoop up the dipper with a delicate twirl to catch some amber across it. She’s watching you, just as closely, and your face has now surpassed the entire pink family and entered into the nether-realms of red. “You know... it’s funny, isn’t it?”

“What is?” Did you miss a joke? Some ironic twist of fate? Please just be about Rose drinking rose tea, how amusing, not some greater embarrassment you’ll have to live with the burden of for all eternity.

“Well.” Jade twiddles her thumbs against each other, rubbing them over the skin of her leg. “I was hoping for flowers, but I didn’t think you’d make me drink them!”

Your mind does what your brother would call the one record scratch sound thats in everything rose come on you know the one its like the wilhelm scream of oh shit waddup moments and if you pretend you dont know it im calling bullshit just like the time you said you didnt know what a flashback was looking youre having one right the fuck now while potential macking material is next to you will you get off this train of thought and get on that.

You get off that train of thought.

“You were hoping for flowers?”

“Maybe.” Jade’s confidence gutters and she stares at her feet, wiggling her exposed toes. “I sort of thought- You know! With how things are, I thought maybe if I asked to come over it’d be like...”

“Like what.” Your mind appears to have ceased functioning.

“Like a date, oh my God! You’re worse than John!” She puffs up her cheeks behind a pout. “What are you gonna wear, Jade, are you going to do your makeup Jade, do you have any idea how gay this is Jade, maybe you should take her flowers and be the one who makes all the ladies swoon Jade.”

The only thing you can actively draw from anything she just said is that she does an impeccable impression of John.

Jade’s eyes flick up to you, back to the tea, and then with a fresh wave of resolve fix on your face with adamantine strength, narrowing behind her glasses to a determined edge.

“Is this a date?” She asks it with each syllable crisp and clear, her teeth leaving marks in her lip with how hard she bites it after. The words finally break through to you, fire behind the already intense burn in your cheeks, and you expect you’re red enough to live up to your namesake.

“It...” Oh dear. You hadn’t prepared for the scenario in which there was any actual interest, as ridiculous a prospect as it had always seemed. “It...” Your gears are caught and grinding, hitched in place, and you swallow hard to dampen your tongue so you can wet your lips before managing to finish- “It could be?”

Somewhere, your Mother is likely laughing at you.

Here and now, Jade’s eyes go big, and then bigger, and her lip pops out from beneath her front teeth with such speed it makes a sound.

“It could be?” She slams her hands to the bed between you and makes you jump, heart already pounding. “That’s not a no!”

“It’s... It’s not.” What’s happening and how do you get off this ride before it starts to plummet.

“That’s not a no!” She repeats it gleefully, smile returning as she reaches out a hand to pat hopefully at your knee. “So- So, maybe it could be a yes?”

You have lost control of your life, and the tea is likely so strong by now you may as well have shoved a whole flower in your mouth.

“It- I suppose it-” You can hear how flustered you are, and do your best to exert some kind of damage control that just makes you feel more ridiculous. “Are you- Are you asking me for it to be?”

“Duh,” Jade huffs like it’s obvious, which is terribly presumptuous of her, given the current disarray you find your mind in. “So what do you say? What... do you say?”

And once more, the sweet flower wilts beneath the pressure of self-doubt, and your hands move without informing your brain of their decision, finding her fingers and tangling with them in a silent but informative gesture that’s pulling more conversational weight than your entire vocal system.

Jade stares at your fingers for a moment, and this time the light that spreads through her is a sunrise, slow and creeping and inescapable, blinding to watch too closely but something you find difficult to tear your gaze from. It illuminates her moles and freckles, the way her muscles move as she tightens her grip on yours, the fabric of her dress shivering with her excited breaths and splaying perfectly over her pants.

You lose count of the ways she’s perfect even as her joy runs like molten gold between each one and highlights it for you so brightly you can’t possibly miss it.

It occurs to you, as a very distant dream, surreal and hardly possible in this reality, that you are apparently on a date with Jade Harley.

Jade seems more settled into the concept, hurriedly closing the gap between your legs with a few more bounces so your linked hands sit on the boundary between laps, crossing the great divide with a bridge that feels sturdy enough to weather many storms. She wiggles, a tremble of her shoulders that washes all the way down to her waist, and then leans towards you, slowly, a falling tree you should run from but find yourself watching and waiting for the impact instead.

Her lips purse, then pucker, and you realise what’s going to happen with just enough time left for klaxons to start blaring in your mind at the fact you’ve clearly lost all grip on the realms of the possible and in some kind of fantasy from which you’ll wake the moment you let yourself believe in it.

And yet.

Jade kisses you like snow melting on a fingertip, light and fleeting and possibly imagined were it not for the ghost it leaves behind. She stays close, eyelids fluttering in nervous blinks, and you have a moment in which you can reclaim your rational mind and pull away, a moment to possibly escape the fairy-tale you are about to leap into and pray it won’t be Grimm.

Instead you press forward, too fast, bump your mouths together in a way that isn’t so much romantic as it is slapstick, and Jade giggles and leans back enough to rub her lips and cover up a bashful smile.

She tries again, before you have time to admonish yourself, tipping her head and letting her lips meet yours all silk to skin and lingering, pressure and warmth and stillness that’s somehow still overwhelming despite how slowly it arrives.

You have found another way she’s perfect. The soft fragrance of grass and perfume on her skin when she’s so close, the gentleness with which she kisses you despite how strong you know her to be.

Limitless perfections, even in such a small action, and no hope of counting even one when all your thoughts are consumed by the fact her lips are on yours.

When Jade does pull back, it’s slowly, careful, hands still locked and her face still close and red and beautiful. You have many things you could say, about finally, or why, or beauty and perfection and so many emotions beating frantic in your chest.

You chase her, and kiss her again, and hold her hands tighter, and you hope that in the taste of your lips she finds everything you’ve never been able to say.

[topinforma]

New Post has been published on Mortgage News

New Post has been published on http://bit.ly/2j5Be0H

Op-Ed: Well, that was fast. Why Wall Street's honeymoon with Trump is over

During the 2016 campaign Wall Street and Donald Trump had an on again off again type of relationship.

And then he got elected and the buying began. Trump was always known for big rallies. He packed large venues across the country while leaving thousands of ticketless cheerleaders on the outside. But now he’s got different kind of rally going on.

The Trump rally, what it’s being called, in the stock market began almost immediately following the November 8th election. It’s been a honeymoon phase for the markets for the last two and half months. It’s been a period in which the problems known to exist have greatly been ignored – until Trump held his first press conference in six months on Wednesday.

That may have been a wake up call for Wall Street. The President-elect bashed Big Pharma, and failed to provide clarity on the details or timing of policies like infrastructure spending, tax reform and other measures dear to traders’ hearts.

The major concerns for the markets regarding a Trump presidency before the election was the uncertainty he brought to the table, lack of experience and impeding rate hikes. Investors were giving him a pass, but why?

The sales traders, traders and portfolio managers I spoke with said it was out of necessity. They needed to have long exposure to the equity markets. The real risk was missing a big move. If there’s going to be a huge rally nobody can afford to be on the sidelines. Let’s call it FOMO.

But now, is the selling about to begin in earnest? “Buy the rumor, sell the news,” Steven, a portfolio manager said. And he’s not the only person I spoke with who shared the same sentiment. “And right now the rumors are still swirling.”

The rumors are Trump brings a pro-business agenda, infrastructure spending, potential growth and of course the proposed tax cuts. All of which Wall Street loves to hear.

“He seems quite proud of himself for the recent rally,” Amy, a sales trader said. “Trump is wearing it like a badge of honor, so I suspect he’ll do whatever it takes to keep it going.”

But the rally is based on voodoo magic. It’s all sentiment and confidence. The markets have surged higher on hope, optimism and the prospects of an America First economy. Mix that in with promised job creation, tax cuts and the rhetoric of deregulation and it seems the markets are poised to continue moving higher.

“He’s made it so obvious to American companies,” Brian, a sell side analyst said. “If you play by his rules—then you’re rewarded. And I promise you every large company in the country is having Trump strategy sessions behind closed doors—how to deal with him. And in the short term it should fuel the market higher.”

But the downside is also becoming apparent – especially to companies that don’t play by his rules. Wall Street may finally be getting worried that reality will not meet expectations.

How to Trade Trump

It’s a bull market until it’s not. So there are a few basic rules you need to follow:

Don’t be the first one to leave the party, but get out right before the cops are called.

Stay long and buy disaster insurance because when it goes—it’s gonna go.

Trump doesn’t like to be wrong so if he’s digging his heels into the ground on a particular industry or company—trade it that way because he’s not going to stop.

So far, traders and portfolio managers have been willing to go along for the ride. A ride in which could result in breakouts to new highs in all of the major indexes. But it’s not without fear. There are signs of the rally losing steam, and broad strength has begun to thin which is resulting in some players to be cautiously optimistic and others starting to give in to that fear. Only time will tell if the honeymoon will blossom into a long lasting marriage or a nasty divorce.