#because it is technically very standalone

[javert]

He stuck his arm out through the edge of the bubble, letting the water pool on his hand. It was cold— he hadn’t thought it would be cold. The wind whipped past his head, curling through his fine hair. At the dizzying horizon, thin trees whose height he couldn’t begin to guess bent and tossed their leaves. The grey clouds above flashed with lightning, and then thunder rumbled half a second later, shaking the ground and echoing in Hail’s chest. Sandreas, distantly, watched him. A line of cars drove up through a gate and came to a stop nearby, and all of Sandreas’s staff quickly took got in, leaving just a few waiting for Sandreas himself. But he walked over to Hail, at the edge of his rain shield. “You’ve never been on a planet before,” he said. Hail’s hand was still extended out of the rain curtain, and so much water had pooled in his cupped palm that it was pouring out onto the ground. When the lightning flashed overhead again, Sandreas dropped his rain shield, and as the thunder rumbled, the water drenched them both. The ice water streamed through Hail’s hair and down his face. “Welcome to Emerri,” Sandreas said.

[cabeswaterdrowned]

top 5 books for the ask thing

top 5 standalones:

• Emma by Jane Austen

•Rebecca by Daphne Du Maurier

•Black Iris by Leah Raeder

•Plain Bad Heroines by Emily M. Danforth

•hmmm I’m struggling to decide on just one tbh but it’s either a Megan Abbott book (Give Me Your Hand + Dare Me + The Fever are the main contenders) or Blanca & Roja by Anna-Marie Mclemore or it’s My Dark Vanessa. one of those

top 5 series (I have an easier time committing to and ranking these vs the stand alones)

The Raven Cycle by Maggie Steifvater

The Diviners by Libba Bray

Daughter of Smoke and Bone by Laini Taylor

Six of Crows duology by Leigh Bardugo

The Infernal Devices trilogy by Cassandra Clare

I could go into honorable mentions for both but this post could get very long then so am keeping the lists simple <3

[soyoursoulisgreen]

15 and 32

15. Do you prefer writing one-shots or multi-chapter fics?

I tend to prefer writing one-shots! I love to read multi-chapter fics, but I always get so worried that I'll lose motivation and just, never come back to it :') My first fic on AO3 is loosely a multi-chapter, in the sense that I've left it open to return to someday, but haven't had any interest to pick it back up in years lol. There's something very punchy about one-shots as well - I have a pretty solid split between short and long one-shots, but it's so satisfying when I Finally have a long one finished!

I also like making connected one-shots, or sequential one-shots, but letting them stand on their own so?

32. What’s a fic you’d love to write, but probably never will?

I think I had a Vargas fic idea at one point that I so badly wanted to read but didn't want to write, and made some concept sketches and an outline for and everything lol - something with the Jake/Edgar/Scriabin dynamic ♥ I do know that someone made a missing scene-fic about Scriabin and Jake's first interaction that I've been quietly making eyes at - next time I'm into Vargas for sure 👀

As for love to write, hm... Probably this overly-convoluted Osmosis Jones NTR fic that I've had in my back pocket for way too long honestly lol - ever since I learned about netorare they were my first and only choice but it's so all-hurt-no-comfort and kinda dark and sad and while it sounds really fun, the self-consciousness monster in the back of my head is like "Really? The White Blood Cell Movie? For that?" lol

[alinathinkstoomuch]

1-800-CALL ME, FAKE FIANCÉ

pairing: aaron hotchner x reader (part of my fake!fiancee series, but can be read as a standalone) summary: the fbi agent you met at the bar helped you out of a jam so you decide to pay him a visit at work. warnings | a/n: unhinged reader, rossi being a lil instigator, reader has no shame in her game at ALL & makes the first move, the usual banter & chem, channelling all the rom-com feels word count: 3.3k

✧ masterlist

It had been a week since your little fake fiancé fiasco, and while it had been enough to satisfy your mob group of fake friends and stop them from asking questions, it wasn’t enough to satisfy your questions.

Because now, you were curious – dangerously so.

You couldn’t concentrate on much else. It was ridiculous. Absurd. Completely unnecessary. And yet…

You had googled him.

You had googled Aaron Hotchner.

And oh boy did you find things.

FBI Unit Chief Aaron Hotchner. Head of some ultra-serious-sounding department in behavioural analysis. There were articles. Court cases. Mentions of serial killers – plural. You even found a grainy news clip of him giving a statement outside a police station, looking all important and broody.

And as if that wasn’t enough, there were forums. Entire internet threads dedicated to the man. Debates on how often he smiled. Speculation on his past. A truly unhinged corner of the internet where a small but passionate group of people seemed convinced he had once been a male model.

You may or may not have spent a questionable amount of time scrolling through that last one.

But none of this answered the real question: why did an FBI Unit Chief go along with your ridiculous fake fiancé charade without hesitation? That was not normal federal agent behaviour. You were pretty sure actual government employees had policies against indulging unhinged strangers.

Which led you here. More specifically in the FBI headquarters parking lot.

Okay, you were actually insane. But you had good intentions. Intentions of thanking him properly for the night of madness he had endured.

So, you had baked him cookies. Because, according to your mother, the way to a man’s heart is through his stomach – which was a wildly inappropriate saying to be applying to an FBI agent, but here you were.

You took a deep breath, staring up at the intimidating glass doors, clutching your box of cookies like it was a ticking time bomb. This was fine. Completely normal. People brought cookies to law enforcement all the time… right?

Swallowing your nerves, you marched inside, heels clicking against the polished floor as you approached the receptionist’s desk. The woman behind the counter barely glanced up as she typed away at her computer.

“Hi! Uh, could you do me a favour and give these to an Aaron Hotchner?” you asked, setting the box down with a nervous smile. “He’s, um, Unit Chief of something very official and serious, which I’m sure you already know, but I just wanted to thank him because he helped me out of a situation – not like a legal situation, nothing weird, I’m not a criminal or anything – oh my God, that sounded suspicious –”

The receptionist finally looked up, blinking slowly. “Ma’am?”

You let out an awkward laugh, waving a hand. “I mean, technically, everyone is a criminal in some way, right? Like, who hasn’t jaywalked or taken a pen from a bank? Oh my God, I’m not confessing to anything, I just –”

“Ma’am,” the receptionist interrupted, her voice flat. “Are you delivering something, or…?”

“Wow, you guys are really strict on the whole professionalism thing, huh?” You huffed, then quickly corrected yourself. “Not that I’m not professional. I can be professional. I wore a blazer once.” You paused, glancing at her name badge. “Clarissa! I am delivering cookies. They are divine, you can have one if you’d like?”

Clarissa squinted at you, clearly debating whether or not to press a panic button – one that, realistically, would probably result in you being swarmed by tactical agents in full riot gear.

Was that even the FBI? Or was that, like… SWAT? Was SWAT part of the FBI? Were you about to go down for cookie-related crimes?

“Are you cleared to be here?” she asked.

“Depends on your definition of cleared –”

“Alright, sweetheart, let’s take a breath before you actually incriminate yourself.”

You spun around to find none other than David – if you recalled correctly – standing behind you, looking just as entertained as he did back at the jazz bar, his eyes bouncing between the cookies and you. “Well, well. If it isn’t Hotch’s fiancée.”

“Not his fiancée anymore!”

“Sure. And I’m not Italian.”

You shook your head, exhaling dramatically. “I just made him some cookies as a thank you. Do you mind passing them on to him, please? And then I can get out of yours and Clarissa’s hair. You have fabulous hair, both of you, by the way.”

Clarissa stared at you like you were personally responsible for every inconvenience that had ever befallen her. Rossi, on the other hand, grinned like you had just made his entire day.

“You know what? No,” he said, shaking his head. “You should give them to him yourself.”

Your stomach dropped. “Oh, no, that’s not necessary –”

“I insist.”

Clarissa folded her arms. “She’s not authorised to be here.”

Rossi rolled his eyes. “Clarissa, I’ve worked in this building longer than some agents have been alive. If I say she’s authorised, she’s authorised.”

Clarissa let out a long-suffering sigh but didn’t argue further.

“Come on, sweetheart. Let’s go surprise Hotch.”

You let out a weak laugh. “Oh. Yay.”

Rossi led you through security and about four different hallways before you found yourself in an elevator. You barely had time to process what was happening before you were stepping into a bullpen that made your brain go fuzzy. There were far too many people in suits, all looking intimidatingly competent.

A woman with blonde hair and a bright cardigan – finally someone who understood the power of colour – shot you an intrigued glance over the top of her glasses.

“I really don’t think this is necessary, David,” you whispered. “You guys look like busy, busy people, and I just wanted to bring some cookies. I don’t think Hotch will appreciate being called out of his very legitimate FBI career just for me.”

“Oh, I know he won’t.”

“Okay, now you’re making me panic, and I have a habit of jumping to conclusions when I’m under a lot of stress. Please, really, it’s no big deal –”

“Yeah, Hotch mentioned something along those lines,” Rossi hummed as the two of you came to a halt in front of a door, to which he knocked before stepping inside.

You followed hesitantly, barely making it over the threshold before you locked eyes with Hotch, who was standing behind his desk, looking very confused.

Rossi gestured at you grandly. “Look who I found wandering the FBI headquarters.”

“Okay, that makes me sound like a stalker and – wow, okay, I guess maybe I am a stalker, but the good kind, I promise! I come in peace. And with cookies… as a thank you.”

“I’ll leave you two lovebirds to it,” Rossi grinned, giving you a nudge as he sauntered out, shutting the door behind him with far too much enthusiasm.

Hotch, still staring at you like you had just crash-landed into his office from another dimension, slowly folded his arms. “Should I be concerned?”

“Not until you try one of these,” you said, flipping open the lid of the cookie box, only for your smile to falter the second you actually registered what was inside.

Heart-shaped cookies. Pink frosting. Extra sprinkles.

Oh no.

You stared at them. Then at Hotch. Then back at them.

He was still staring too, looking at the cookies like they were an active FBI case file he wasn’t quite sure how to classify.

You let out half a laugh. “Oh. Oh, boy.”

Hotch raised a brow, arms still crossed, looking every bit the intimidating federal agent he was.

“Okay, I know what this looks like,” you groaned, snapping the box shut like that would somehow undo the visual catastrophe. “I got slightly carried away – as I tend to – and my mind just kind of… took its own course when I was making them. I wasn’t thinking about you – well, I was thinking about you, but not like that, I swear. I just – ugh – I put a little bit myself into them.”

Hotch tilted his head. “Yourself?”

You nodded, slowly reopening the box as if the cookies might suddenly jump out and throw up edible glitter all over his office. “You know… they’re kind of chaotic but well-intentioned, possibly too much but ultimately harmless –”

“How did you find me here?”

“Oh. That.”

He just stared at you.

You cleared your throat, suddenly very interested in the cookie box. “Well, it’s not that hard, you know? I have a great memory, and I did get a pretty solid look at your badge – after I thought you were going to murder me, of course – so I just… searched you up.”

His brows lifted.

You panicked. “But only to figure out where you work so I could bring you cookies! That’s it! I had every intention of leaving them with Clarissa but your friend David saw me and said I should bring them up myself. And well… now I’m here.”

Hotch’s hand pinched the bridge of his nose. “Of course he did.”

You rocked on your heels, watching him carefully. “Sooo… does this mean I’m officially on an FBI watchlist, or is that, like, a separate process?”

Hotch exhaled, lowering his hand. “You’re not on a watchlist.”

“Oh.”

His brows furrowed. “Would you like to be?”

“I feel like I shouldn’t answer that without a lawyer present,” you mumbled, setting the cookies down on his desk.

“So, let me get this straight. You looked me up, managed to talk your way into a federal building without authorisation all just to bring me heart-shaped cookies?”

You lifted a finger. “Okay, first of all, let’s not make this sound like an obsession – I googled you. That’s a normal thing people do! It’s called being informed. And second, the hearts were an accident. I only had one cookie cutter. You think I wanted to show up here looking like some lovesick lunatic?”

Hotch glanced at the cookies, then back at you. “…Yes.”

“Okay, well, this has been fun,” you said, dusting your hands before adjusting your jacket. “Enjoy the cookies, and thanks again for the other night,” you continued, already backing toward the door. “I have not had my name mentioned once in the Veronica Posse group chat since, and for the first time in years, I have actually known peace.”

“Wait,” he called just as you reached for the door handle. You spun around to face him. “Why did you really come here?”

You paused before speaking.

“I need a fiancé again,” you blurted out before you could stop yourself. “Yup. Need one again, preferably the same one, but this time it’s my parents hounding me, and they’ve already arranged a dinner and everything.”

Hotch opened his mouth, then closed it. A second passed. Then another. Finally – “You’re joking, aren’t you?”

“I am,” you beamed, completely unbothered by the scowl on his face. Hotch looked like he was about to reply, but his phone began ringing. He glanced down at it on the desk.

“Alright, really leaving now. I’ll let you get back to all this serious business,” you said, but then a realization dawned, making you pause.

Hotch looked back up, brows raising slightly. “What is it?”

You shifted, glancing toward the door, then back at him. “So, funny thing… I don’t actually know how to get out of here.”

Hotch sighed, shaking his head as he pressed a button to silence his phone before slipping it into his suit jacket. “I’ll walk you out.”

“Oh, no need,” you replied quickly, waving him off. “I’ll just ask David – he loves helping me.”

Hotch gave you a flat look. “Absolutely not.”

You blinked innocently. “Why? He was so excited to see me earlier. You should have heard him, all like Oh, if it isn’t Hotch’s fiancée! He really sells it.”

“That’s exactly why,” Hotch muttered, already moving toward the door.

You followed Hotch out of his office, barely managing to keep up with his long strides. “Wow, you walk fast,” you huffed, adjusting your purse on your shoulder. “Is this an FBI thing? Do you all just power walk everywhere?”

He slowed his pace ever so slightly so you could catch up. As you glanced around, you noticed several pairs of eyes discreetly watching the two of you – one of them being David who had zero shame in making his interest known. You offered him a small wave to which he responded with a not-so-subtle wink. When your eyes landed on Hotch he was watching the exchange.

“Keep walking.”

“I am,” you whispered back, trying not to laugh. “I just happen to also be social.”

“That’s unfortunate.”

You gasped, doing a light two step jog to catch up. “Gosh, what happened to ‘Marry me, sweetheart?’”

“You called it nonsense, remember?”

“I did,” you admitted. “But that was after you said something that was incredibly true about me.”

Hotch threw you a curious glance. “And what was that?”

“That I’m too good to consider that group of women my friends, especially ones I feel the need to impress.”

Hotch didn’t say anything right away, just reached for the door, pushing it open and holding it for you. As you stepped past him, you caught the smallest trace of something in his expression, something very close to approval.

Stepping into the hallway, you glanced around, already feeling disoriented. “This place is like a maze,” you muttered, spinning in a small circle before looking back at him. “How do you manage to not get lost here?”

“Spatial awareness.”

Before you could question him further, you felt his hands on your arms, gently guiding you to the left just as you were about to head right.

“Oh. Wow. Okay.”

His lips twitched. “You were about to walk into a closet.”

You glanced back at the door you had almost pushed open. “That’s not a closet. That’s –” You squinted at the sign. “Okay, that’s definitely a closet.” You sighed dramatically, walking ahead this time – making sure to pretend like you totally knew where you were going. “See? This is why I need a fake fiancé. Navigation assistance.”

His voice followed you, dry as ever. “That’s what Google Maps is for.”

You turned, walking backwards now, arms crossed. “Yeah, well, Google Maps doesn’t have your spatial awareness, does it?”

“You’d rather rely on me for directions?”

You stopped walking, tilting your head. “Huh. Good point. Maybe I should just take my chances with the closet.”

Hotch sighed, stepping past you. “Come on. I’ll make sure you get out of here without accidentally locking yourself in a supply room.”

You grinned, following him. “See? Fake fiancé duties are still active.”

This time, you definitely didn’t miss the half-smile he tried to hide.

After what felt like literal hours of navigating the endless, identical floors and hallways of the FBI, the two of you finally stepped outside. Freedom at last, you thought, basking in the sight of the actual sun – something you’d only glimpsed through windows you were convinced had some kind of tint designed to make the inside of the building feel even duller.

“Do you know where you parked?”

You scoffed, waving a dismissive hand. “Uh, duh. What do you take me for?”

Hotch just looked at you.

You blinked.

Then, very slowly, you turned your head, scanning the parking lot.

Oh, no.

Where did you park?

You wracked your brain, desperately trying to retrace your steps, but the problem was… you hadn’t exactly been focused when you arrived. You had just parked somewhere and hoped for the best. But now, with Hotch watching you like a disapproving parent, the pressure was on.

You pointed vaguely toward a random row of cars. “It’s… that way.”

Hotch didn’t even bother looking. “No, it’s not.”

You spun back to him. “Excuse me?”

“You’re guessing.”

“I am not.”

“You’re stalling.”

“I am not!”

Hotch arched a single, knowing brow.

You huffed. “Fine. I may be stalling. But in my defence, I had a lot on my mind when I got here!”

Hotch inhaled, glancing at his watch. “Just describe what your car looks like and what you remember seeing when you got here.”

You frowned, thinking. “Okay, so, my car is… car-shaped.”

His stare was unmoving.

You cleared your throat. “It’s, uh… blue. Or, like, bluish. Depends on the lighting.”

“Anything else?”

You squinted at the parking lot, hoping for divine intervention. “I think I was near… a pole?”

“There are multiple poles.”

“A very specific pole.”

“Right.”

You groaned, rubbing your temples. “Ugh, this is so unfair. I have many talents, okay? Parking lot navigation is just not one of them.”

“Shocking,” he muttered before moving toward one section of the parking lot. “Let’s start from here.”

You followed, chewing the inside of your cheek.

A few minutes later – after much grumbling, a completely unnecessary debate about why all parking lots look the same, and one slightly humiliating moment where you tried to unlock someone else’s car – Hotch finally spotted your actual vehicle.

“Would you look at that! There she is, in all her glory!” you sang and this time, when you hit the unlock button, the lights actually flashed. Progress.

You pulled open the driver’s side door and tossed your purse inside before turning back to Hotch. “Thank you… again.” You let out a laugh. “It feels like that’s all I ever say to you.”

Hotch gave a small shrug, hands finding his pockets. “You do seem to require a lot of rescuing.”

“Alright, alright.” You pointed a manicured finger at him. “Despite what you might think, I am perfectly capable of taking care of myself. I just happen to have a mild navigational deficiency and… questionable taste in men. And friends, apparently – according to my ex fake fiancé.”

“Sounds like you’re finally learning.”

You rolled your eyes, sliding into your seat. “I hate that you’re good at this.”

“Good at what?”

“Reading people.” You gestured vaguely in his direction. “It’s very annoying.”

He smiled at you, one hand slipping from his pocket to rest against the edge of your car door. “I’ll try to be worse at my job next time.”

You leaned forward, placing your arms on the steering wheel with a playful spark in your eye. “Listen, Hotch, Hotchner, Aaron – I have a slight confession to make before I go.”

“That sentence doesn’t exactly inspire confidence.”

“This one’s harmless. Promise.”

Hotch stood there, shaking his head like he could not believe he was still standing there entertaining this conversation.

You tapped a finger against the wheel. “So, if mid-cookie bite you accidentally choke on a piece of paper, do not be alarmed – well, actually do be alarmed. I don’t want you to die before you’ve asked me out on a date.” You flashed him a pointed look. “But it’s my number – since apparently, having my address isn’t enough.”

“You hid your number in food?”

“Listen, it was either that or carve it into your desk with a knife, and I figured that would raise some concerns with your co-workers.”

Hotch pinched the bridge of his nose again, muttering something under his breath that sounded suspiciously like why me?

“But, you do have my number now, so really, the ball is in your court, Hotchner.”

“Is it?”

You nodded, sitting up straighter. “Mhm. And just so we’re clear – I expect a dramatic, over-the-top use of it. Maybe a cryptic, we need to talk text. Or a mysterious meet me at midnight type of situation.”

Hotch’s lips twitched. “You’d rather I text you about urgent matters than, say… just a normal conversation?”

“Aaron Hotchner, are you saying you want to have a normal conversation with me?”

He sighed, stepping back from your car. “Drive home, before I change my mind about letting you leave.”

You smirked, finally turning on the ignition. “Oh, so you let me leave now? That is so controlling of you.”

Hotch shook his head as he shut your door—just in time for you to lift a hand, making a finger phone gesture and mouthing Call me.

tags - @fandomscombine @dohmeti

dividers by cafekitsune

[hazbinhotei]

a little too prideful.

read part two (a semi-standalone comfort fic) here

warnings: blood, mimzy, violence & gore (alastor), injury & gun violence (you), cannabalism (alastor again), light angst w/ a happy ending

word count: 3735

summary: When Mimzy lures a group of vengeful loan sharks to the hotel, you’re left to deal with the fallout—both physically and emotionally—while Alastor is forced to realize that his pride blinded him to the one thing that truly mattered: you. (story takes place during ep. 5)

alastor x f!reader—technically gn!reader minus the ~two instances i use 'her' pronouns for clarity. whoo this one's a doozy. i'm not necessarily sure if i'm proud of how this turned out, especially since a good chunk is just taken from episode 5. i also struggle a lot with multi-character scenes like this, so please let me know if i could improve on anything. nonetheless, though, i hope you all enjoy!

Life at the Hazbin Hotel with Alastor was many things—chaotic, unconventional, but above all, it was yours. The two of you had carved out a comfortable existence amidst the madness, his constant grin and ever dramatic behavior a fixture in your day-to-day life. It was hard not to adore the way he’d hum while cooking, or the way he’d twirl you in the hallway just for the fun of it. You had accepted him despite all his flaws, including his particular flaw of being obsessive over his power. But, hey, they don’t just call it the Pride Ring for no reason.

Tonight was no different. You sat with the rest of the hotel group, half-listening as Lucifer and Alastor bickered back and forth in song, their battle of wits crescendoing in dramatic flair. It was an odd sort of game, something between posturing and genuine irritation, and though you were used to Alastor’s theatrics, the sudden appearance of Lucifer had only seemed to make him more insufferable.

And that's when she arrived.

Mimzy. A name whispered from the past, a figure Alastor knew from his time alive. She waltzed through the doors of the hotel like she owned the place, all charm and nostalgia, completely interrupting Alastor and Lucifer—the goddamned Radio Demon and the very King of Hell. Everyone else seemed bewildered by her unexpected entrance, save for you and Husk. Because unlike the others, you both recognized her. Mimzy wasn’t just another demon Alastor knew: she was perhaps the only one still lingering from his life before Hell. And that was a life he never spoke about to you.

You weren’t jealous. Of course not. That would be ridiculous. Petty, even!

Which is why you smiled and offered her a drink when she settled in like she belonged there. Even when Alastor seemed more preoccupied with his initial task of challenging Lucifer, you continued to make polite conversation, keeping Mimzy company like a good host as Alastor waltzed off with Charlie and Vaggie to show Lucifer around the hotel. You even decided not to question why exactly she was there, because you definitely weren’t someone who was even remotely bothered by the way she looked at your lover—your Alastor—like she still knew him better than anyone else in the room. You must simply be paranoid!

Thankfully, Angel Dust and Husk kept you entertained by the bar with their usual banter, sparing you from being the sole communicator with Mimzy. You were actually starting to have a decent conversation with her, listening to her talk about how she used to perform at the jazz club Alastor commonly frequented, finally excited to get a glimpse into Alastor’s life before his fall to damnation. But Mimzy had a way of causing commotion, and she knew it. She, like Al, seemed to share the same sin of pride, which resulted in her slipping a sharp, snide little comment hidden beneath her layers of old-timey charm.

"Oh, sweetheart, I do admire ya dedication. Must be so tiring, trying to keep a man like Alastor entertained. I mean, he does get bored so easily, doesn’t he? I’m even surprised he kept me along for this long!"

The words struck deeper than you wanted to admit. Her comment made Angel Dust’s amused grin falter, his mismatched eyes widening in offense for you. Even Husk paused, ears flicking at the sheer audacity.

But you? You simply smiled.

Because you weren’t petty. You were raised better than to stoop down to her level, knowing just how much she wanted to see the worst in you come out. So all you did was smile, your hand tightening on your glass imperceptibly.

“I like to think I do alright,” you replied, voice saccharine. And before she could get in another jab, you excused yourself, turning on your heel before anyone could see the way your jaw clenched just a little too tight.

You needed to find Alastor.

It took some searching, but you found him shadowing Charlie, Vaggie, and Lucifer as they walked the halls, his posture perfectly poised, his expression fixed in a grin that was just a little too flawless. Lucifer’s presence was, as expected, a threat to the power balance in the hotel, and Alastor was treating it as such.

Your feet picked up the pace, jogging up to him as you called his name. He didn’t turn.

You tried again, and this time, his head snapped toward you, his entire neck cracking with the speed of it. His smile was still there, but his eyes… they were strained.

“Dearest,” he greeted, the word drawn out with thin patience as he twisted his body to match his inhumanely turned neck. “I’m a little busy at the moment.”

You purse your lips sourly, crossing your arms as you replied. “Mimzy said something to me. Something rude. I—”

“Oh, she does that all the time,” Alastor interrupted, waving a dismissive hand. “Don’t take it so personally, cher.”

Your brows furrowed, impatience rising. “Al, she—”

“Really, must we do this now?” His voice, usually so smooth and lilting, held the barest edge of frustration. His focus was drifting back to Lucifer, and that—that stung more than it should have.

“Alastor,” you pressed, but he cut you off again, his expression flickering with exasperation.

“I’m trying to ensure Lucifer Morningstar doesn’t throw this place into absolute chaos,” he said, his usual theatrics dampened by irritation. “Forgive me if I don’t have time to entertain every little grievance.”

That was the breaking point.

Your hands curled into fists at your sides. You weren’t asking him to start a war over this, you just wanted him to listen. But apparently, his pride, his status, his stupid fixation on proving himself compared to Lucifer—that mattered more.

“Fine,” you bit out, voice tight. “Go ahead. Play your little game. I’ll be downstairs.”

And with that, you resisted the urge to bark anything else at him and left, ignoring the way his shadow frowned as you stormed away.

By the time you reached the lobby again, your anger was simmering beneath the surface, hot and unresolved. Angel Dust raised a brow as you rejoined them, Husk grunted in acknowledgment, and Mimzy?

She just smirked.

And that—oh, that just made your blood boil all the more. You bit your cheek harshly, letting the pain distract you from the way you wanted to absolutely tear your claws into her snobby little head. 

Just as you were about to say something, the hotel trembled violently, sending dust raining from the ceiling. Your eyes shot open from the interruption, the four of you jolting from the bar in surprise. Angel Dust barely had time to curse before another explosion rocked the walls, and even Sir Pentious and Niffty had rushed out into the lobby to see what was happening. Husk’s ears flicked in irritation, eyes narrowing as he downed the rest of his whiskey in a single gulp.

“What the hell is goin’ on?” Husk grumbled, pushing himself off the counter.

Niffty skittered toward the window, peeking outside. Her single eye widened, smile terrifyingly wide: "Oh, wow! Lots of company! And they don’t look very friendly!"

You pushed yourself up from the bar stool, already seething from your argument with Alastor, only for your frustration to triple when you caught sight of what was happening outside through the windows. Your hotel was under attack.

Explosions continued to pelt the exterior, fire and debris scattering across the pavement. Figures lurked in the smoke, their silhouettes illuminated by the flickering flames. Loan sharks. Armed. Dangerous. And heading straight for the entrance.

“Oh, for fuck’s sake,” you hissed, storming toward the door, ignoring Angel Dust’s warning call.

The moment you stepped outside, the gunfire ceased momentarily as the gangsters caught sight of you. Their expressions twisted into rage, and before you could say a word, one of them barked, “That must be her—Mimzy! Get her!”

You barely had time to register what they meant before pain exploded through your side. A gunshot rang in your ears, the impact knocking you backward as agony tore through you. You hit the pavement, breath wheezing from your lungs as Angel Dust and Husk shouted your name.

“Oh, hell no!” Angel snarled, grabbing you before they could get another shot off. Husk swore under his breath, hauling you back into the hotel as more bullets followed, splintering the doorframe. “What the ever-loving fuck did you do, Mimzy?!”

Inside, you gasped, hand pressing against the wound in your side as black blood seeped through your fingers. The injury wasn’t too damaging and you hardly worried since it wasn’t an angelic bullet, but your vision still swam from the sudden sting. Angel crouched beside you, protective, his face set in grim determination (and annoyance of this entire situation) as Niffty rushed off to grab medical supplies. You were too busy focusing on the teeth-clenching pain to hear Husk arguing with Mimzy over why these loan sharks had said her name, hearing her say she apparently owes them fifty grand. Before you could even respond to her words, Sir Pentious’ shouted at everyone as he dodged a fireball. “Take cover!”

You watched as the hotel descended into chaos. Angel lunged forward, yanking Niffty out of the way before another fireball could flatten her. Husk abandoned Mimzy without a second thought, his wings fluttering as he rushed to your side. He grabbed you gently, hauling you against the bar wall, out of the direct line of fire. 

Angel was back in an instant, Niffty dangling from one of his arms. The moment he drops her onto the floor, she tears through the hotel's makeshift first aid kit, muttering curses about bloodstains on her carpets.

(A passing reminder to thank Charlie for creating a first aid kit for the hotel entered your mind, the temporary thought stored in the back of your adrenaline-filled brain as you realized how genius the idea was even if you all had originally found the concept laughable.

Who knew you would need one when fighting and pain was practically a daily guarantee in Hell?)

Charlie, Lucifer, Vaggie, and Alastor descend from the staircase a minute later, their eyes scanning the chaos. But it was Alastor who froze, his entire frame going rigid as his eyes landed on you. You two locked eyes for a moment, his foot hovering mid step as he took in your pained expression.

The ever-present smile on his face faltered, just for a second.

Then his world snapped.

Alastor’s gaze darkened, his static flickering erratically as he shadowed towards you in the blink of an eye. His movements were slow, almost mechanical, as he crouched before you, reaching out to gently touch the black blood on your fingers. When he pulled back, his hand trembled, shadows pooling below his kneeling body exponentially.

You had never seen him look like this before.

Vaggie took a step forward from behind the broken front doors, holding her spear in her hands with a pissed off expression. “All of you, get a safe distance. I’ll take care of this.”

Alastor didn’t even glance at her. His voice came out in a low, sickeningly sweet purr. "No, my dear, leave it to me. It’s time I remind everyone why I am here."

Mimzy, pops up from behind the bar counter, perked up. “Oh, finally! Took ya long enough!”

Alastor didn’t react. His shadow twisted violently beneath him, tendrils stretching, shifting, writhing as an eerie green glow seeped through the cracks of the floorboards.

Outside, the gangsters were reloading their catapult and guns, laughing amongst themselves—until the air grew thick with static. A heavy, suffocating weight pressed down on the street, the distant flickering of the hotel’s neon sign the only warning before a massive tendril shot out, smashing the catapult to pieces.

The loan sharks barely had time to scream before more tendrils erupted from the ground, slicing through them like they were nothing but paper dolls.

Alastor’s laughter rang through the chaos, distorted and wrong. His body grew taller, limbs elongating unnaturally as his smile stretched too wide, his antlers curling into jagged points. His form twisted, pulsing with raw, unfiltered eldritch power as his shadow spread across the pavement. You heard Husk curse next to you in horror, your eyes glancing to the terrified bartender as he crouched beside you.

“A reminder to all,” Alastor’s voice boomed, shaking the very ground beneath them, “not to mess with the Radio Demon!”

The remaining demons screamed, scrambling to retreat, their weapons useless against something so vastly beyond them. Alastor stepped forward out of the archway of the once undamaged doors, unforgiving and unrelenting as he grew in size with every step. His eyes turn into two red radio dials floating in dark pools of shadow, his radio staff puny compared to his now gigantic form.

“I will devour each and every one of you,” he broadcasted from his unmoving smile, voice rich with unhinged delight.

You winced as you watched your lover start to swallow the mafia members whole, unleashing his stress from today as distant cries of terror fill the hotel. Unfortunately, the broken windows of the lobby did no justice in shielding any of your eyes from the chaos outside, resulting in you having to grossly look away at the gore happening in front of you.

Angel Dust watches beside you, shaking his head as he’s mesmerized by the scene. “I can’t believe you date this guy.”

Your chest huffs in an attempt to laugh, groaning softly as you hear Charlie and Lucifer arguing in the background. The hotel was filled with the sound of family drama and cannibalism, yet somehow that seemed to be even better than the sound of Mimzy’s grating voice cheering Alastor on.

After a mere few seconds, the battlefield was silent save for the faint crackling of embers and the distant, gurgling groans of the last unlucky gangsters who had met their demise at The Radio Demon’s hands. Alastor, now shrinking back into his usual form, let out a sigh of satisfaction, brushing imaginary dust from his sleeves.

“Oh, I missed getting to let off steam!” he chirped, his voice dripping with amusement.

The tension in the air hadn’t yet settled when Mimzy emerged from the hotel, peeking out to ensure the coast was clear before prancing toward Alastor with a delighted grin. “Oh, Alastor! What a fantastic show! Bravo! As always. Thanks for helpin’ lil’ old me out of a tough spot, you're always such a pal!”

Before Alastor could respond, a loud crack split the air above you.

Your head snapped up just in time to see a massive chunk of debris from the ruined floor above give way, plummeting toward you and Angel Dust.

“Move!” Angel yelped, grabbing you as the two of you dove aside. The wreckage slammed into the ground where you had been leaning on the wall just seconds before, sending a gust of dust and gravel into the air.

Your pulse pounded in your ears, adrenaline and pain mingling in your veins as you looked up, meeting Alastor’s gaze. His red eyes flickered between you and Mimzy, and for the first time since the carnage began, his smile began to wane as the static in the air crackled with unease.

You weren’t just glaring—you were seething. 

It was a rare sight to see you so angry, your emotions normally hidden well behind your mask of calm, poised indifference. Typically, Alastor would be reveling at the fire blazing within your eyes, delighted to see his darling so full of wrath it made anyone in your line of sight shake in terror. Yet in this instance, as Alastor stared a moment longer, he realized he was technically in your line of sight, along with the blonde flapper next to him who caused this whole mess.

Alastor watched as you narrowed your eyes even more at him, taking a mental picture of your fury to cherish forever. Then, with a slow turn of his head, he set his gaze upon Mimzy, his usually cheerful aura twisting into something cold. He realized Mimzy had been speaking to him, something along the lines of apologizing for the mess—really, he could care less what Mimzy was saying given the full extent of things.

“I think you should go, Mimzy.” His flat voice was devoid of amusement.

Mimzy scoffed, twirling a stray curl of hair between her fingers. “Oh pff, Alastor, you're such a kidder, you! Haha, you are so funny—”

“I mean it.” His voice sharpened, cutting through the tension like a knife. “You deliberately brought danger to this place just to have me clean up your mess. I can’t have that here.”

Mimzy’s smug expression faltered, but she quickly recovered, waving a dismissive hand. “But you love takin’ care of me! What? You don’t actually give a shit about this tacky little place, do ya? Come on. I know you.”

She took a step forward, jabbing a sharp-nailed finger into his chest with every word.

“You heartless son—” poke.

“—of a—” poke.

“—bitch!” poke.

Before she could finish, Alastor caught her wrist in midair, his grip like iron. His smile had all but disappeared.

“I do care about this place.” He let her wrist go, stepping past her to glance where you sat on the ground in the hotel, still nursing your injury. His fingers twitched, desperate to shadow next to you, but he simply clenched his twitching hand into a fist. “And more than that, I care about her.”

Mimzy’s face twisted in disbelief. “What?”

Alastor’s eyes sideglanced at Mimzy, his voice laced with something genuine. “I am madly devoted to her. And I refuse to let anyone—anyone—disrespect her. Especially under my roof.” His eyes flickered with finality as he fully turned back to Mimzy. “So unless you plan on giving a damn well and sincere apology to her, you are no longer welcome here.”

Mimzy stood there, mouth agape, before scoffing dramatically and throwing her arms up. “Well, fine! Who needs ya?! Have fun with ya little sweetheart and ya little hotel. See if I care!”

With one last huff, she stomped off, disappearing into the distance.

The moment she was gone, Alastor turned back to the hotel, his sharp gaze softening with concern as his eyes landed on you. Everyone in the lobby had seen this little fiasco unravel, Husk, Sir Pentious, and Angel all sharing snacks as they hummed in appreciation at the drama. You simply sat on the ground a few feet away as he appeared in front of you, his shadow curling around your ankle as it stared up in worry from the floor. Alastor crouched down, his fingers ghosting over your wound, his usual devil-may-care attitude completely absent.

“You should have listened to me,” you muttered, still glaring, though your voice had lost some of its edge.

Alastor winced, his breath hitching at the exhaustion laced in your voice. His fingers twitched against yours, his usual bravado faltering for just a moment. He averted his gaze, as if the sight of your pain was too much even for him, before forcing himself to meet your eyes again.

"Yes… I see that now." His hand finally rested over yours, pressing lightly against the wound as if to assure himself that you were still there. “I was wrong. I should have listened to you from the start. I was too… preoccupied.”

You raised a skeptical brow. “Too prideful.”

He let out a soft, breathy chuckle. “That, too.”

A moment of silence stretched between you before Alastor finally sighed, something deeply regretful in his expression. “I’m… truly, truly sorry, mon cœur. I should have protected you. I will make this up to you.” His voice lowered, his fingers gently lacing with yours. “Just… tell me how. Anything you ask for is yours, even though it was already yours before this whole incident occured today.”

You sighed, the tension in your body slowly easing, though not entirely. A part of you still wanted to stay angry, to let him sweat a little longer, but exhaustion tugged at your limbs. The ache in your side throbbed as if reminding you that you had bigger things to worry about. Still, you weren’t ready to let him off the hook so easily, exhaling deeply once more as you spoke. “You owe me, Al.”

His grin returned, softer this time—devoid of its usual mischief, holding only sincerity. “Then I shall spend every waking moment treating you the way you deserve. Like royalty, my love.”

You rolled your eyes but couldn't help the tiny smile tugging at the corner of your lips. “Damn right you will.”

Alastor chuckled, finally helping you to your feet as you rejoined the group. His grip was firm, steadying you a little too carefully, his fingers lingering at your waist even after you were standing upright. His usual boundless energy seemed restrained, his eyes flickering over your wounds before he forced his smile to remain in place. You could tell—he was still shaken, even if he’d never admit it.

You watched as Niffty scurried around the hotel, eager to clean up the damage. It seemed like Charlie and Lucifer had made up, your anger at today’s events lessening ever so slightly as you watched the two. Even Husk, Angel Dust, and Sir Pentious had seemed to be helping clean up, even if Vaggie was yelling at them to do it.

As Alastor wrapped a careful arm around you, leading you toward a more comfortable place to rest on one of the less damaged couches, he leaned down, whispering just for you to hear.

“I do love you, you know.”

Your heart fluttered, but you played it cool, nudging him in the ribs. “You better.”

His smile widened, his head lowering to give you a hidden kiss behind your ear as he paused for a moment. “I’m sorry you got hurt… because of me.”

You hum slightly at his display of vulnerability, your own mouth morphing into a soft smile. “You’re an idiot, but,” You pause, closing the distance between you as you rub his head with yours, “I love you as well.”

And despite the pain, despite the chaos, despite everything—you knew he would spend the rest of his afterlife making sure he never let his pride come before you again.

[sundrop-writes]

Downhill

Draco Malfoy x Fem!Reader

I’ve never spent a moment loving anyone but you.

And maybe that’s just something people say - but I hope it’s the truth.

Summary:

Draco knows his place in the world. He is a Malfoy, he is Pureblood. He is supposed to marry, carry on the Pureblood line. He is supposed to do everything that his parents would - including killing, if it's what his Dark Lord wishes.

Draco Malfoy is not supposed to hesitate. He is not supposed to feel fear. He is not supposed to have room in his heart for fondness, or even love. Not even when it comes to his bartered and bought fellow Pureblood fiancee.

Love is nothing but a weakness. And Malfoys are not weak.

Draco Malfoy x Fem!Reader. Arranged Marriage/Hesitant Lovers. Emotional Angst and Smut. Set during Half-Blood Prince.

Word Count: 20,100

Harry Potter Masterlist | AO3 Link

This is meant to be a standalone oneshot, but it was written as a prequel to the fic My Bleeding Heart. Because the other fic is chronologically second, you won't be missing anything if you read this one first, but if you have read it before, then this one ties in nicely and informs more of the emotions between the characters.

Full list of warnings and author's notes below the cut.

Warnings: this fic is equal parts smut and emotional angst; this fic does technically take place around Christmas (with the Slug Club Christmas Party being the biggest signal of that), but Christmas is not a huge overarching theme or presence in the fic if you don't celebrate or don't like Christmas; the reader uses she/her pronouns and has a vagina; implications of the reader being fat/plus-sized (which happens with a lot of my fics); it is mentioned that the reader is wearing a dress and high heels to the party; the reader is a Slytherin; the reader is a Pureblood (and for the sake of the fic, I made up a random 'important' Pureblood family that she is from, but because she wasn't raised by them, she goes by a difference surname that can just be your literal actual surname); the reader is an orphan and never actually knew her Pureblood parents; this fic DOES use Y/N; the reader is called 'brilliant' and comes off as very intelligent and skilled with magic (skilled enough to get into the Slug Club); Draco and the reader are in an arranged marriage for the sake of carrying on the Pureblood lineage, and it is discussed that the reader was 'bought' for Draco (a very large dowry was paid) (during the course of the fic, they are only engaged and not yet married); most of this is written from Draco's perspective and features self loathing, emotionally stunted Draco; jealous!Draco - Draco hears that the reader was talking to Harry and gets upset; mentions of the reader being left to the Malfoys by a neglectful godmother; I know there is debate about whether it's canon or not, but in this fic Draco's parents are abusive toward him - his father much more so and his mother is more of a neglectful bystander, and there is a lot of themes in this fic about Draco's trauma surrounding that and how he starts taking his first steps to break free from his abusers (this fic implies that Draco has been physically and emotionally abused by his father, as well as being severely emotionally neglected by both his parents); the reader character in this fic is also abused by the Malfoys when living with them - including an incident where she is hit by Lucius Malfoy and has her hand smashed into broken glass; an incident is described where Lucius casts a spell that chokes Draco (briefly) with the intention of physically punishing him, and the reader stops the spell; Lucius calls the reader 'slut' and 'whore' as insults; mentions of house elves and elf 'slavery' (feels like a warning I'm putting in here specifically for Hermione but I know people get upset about this stuff now lmao); descriptions of dead animals - a bird is killed while being transported through the not yet working Vanishing Cabinet; mentions of canon deaths (Cedric Diggory); mentions of 'Death Eater culture' - discrimination, violence against muggleborns, blood purity, etc.; discussion of Draco's mission to kill Dumbledore (and his mission to help the Death Eaters break into Hogwarts) and the stress that it causes him.

In his internal narration, Draco calls the reader 'naive' and 'innocent', but this is not a statement about the reader's level of sexual or romantic experience (the reader character is NOT A VIRGIN in this), this is a statement about the reader's level of experience with violence and death (and how Draco feels a need to protect her from being corrupted by the dark forces in his life); Draco grabs the reader's arm (in a slightly painful way, while arguing) - but they don't have a major physical confrontation and it does not escalate (their relationship has slightly toxic vibes, but they are forced to depend on each other); mention of Draco being 'thin'/losing weight due to not eating properly (due to the stress of a life or death mission hanging over his head); for the actual smut section - Draco has a kink for the reader wearing stockings/tights (don't ask me where I got this idea from, it just feels like it would fit Draco really well); the tone of the whole thing is very sweet, affectionate, passionate love-making; Draco calls the reader 'darling' and 'love'; oral - reader receiving; Draco fingers the reader while eating her out; a lot of passionate kissing and body worshipping (towards the reader); multiple orgasms/overstimulation (reader receiving); squirting (not played up as a major kink, but it does happen); Draco is anti-breeding kink (I know this is a new one, but try to stick with me) - Draco knows that the only reason for their engagement is to carry on the family blood like (to breed) and he is against that (because it means carrying out his parents' wishes and putting the reader in danger) so he refuses to fuck her because he doesn't want to get her pregnant, because he thinks that it will be cursing her with an attachment to him and he still wants to give her a chance to bail, so he specifically avoids PIV sex for this reason; the ending of the fic has some slightly dubious consent - because Draco starts thinking about the fate of the arranged marriage and feels self loathing but continues with the encounter anyway (he is romantically and sexually attracted to the reader, and there is no force, and the reader is enthusiastic about her consent the whole time, but Draco starts to withdraw his consent and is slightly unsure - it's adult and realistic and complicated); Draco masturbates while sitting on top of the reader to avoid having sex with the reader (in a way, this could be considered 'forced orgasm' because Draco is having a lot of complicated emotions and literally forces himself to orgasm to end the sexual situation); Draco cums on the reader's thighs; Draco cries after sex because of all his complicated emotions; Draco and the reader do talk about their feelings and (mostly) work things out; the ending skews toward light-hearted/sappy.

A/N: This fic is titled after the song Downhill by Lincoln - and I actually had a really hard time choosing which lyrics to go at the top, because I genuinely believe that all the lyrics from the song are so, so fitting here. So I do highly encourage you to go and listen to the song while you read this!! I actually started writing this fic many months ago when the idea came to me, and I got stalled on it, and then I randomly got inspired to finish it around mid-October, but I wanted to wait to post it until it was closer to Christmas because it is so rare for me to have a seasonally accurate fic on my hands so I actually wanted to post it during the seasonally accurate time lmao. I had a lot of fun writing this and exploring the relationship between these two characters, and I do want to write more for them in the future - especially because I am obsessed with the arranged marriage concept. (I feel like I need to write more fics with different characters that use arranged marriage as a trope because writing this just showed me how much fun it is.) Anyway, for now, I hope you enjoy this, and please let me know what you think of it in the comments.

...

Moving from the bustling atmosphere of the Slug Club Christmas Party into the cold, empty corridor was certainly a drastic shift.

It felt like stepping through a curtain that drained all happiness from you, even if that happiness was only temporary, feigned, and fueled by the jovial holiday atmosphere rather than coming from anywhere true inside of you. It was a show you had put on for the sake of the social occasion. As an automatic response, you felt the fake smile fall from your face as the last murmurs of the guests and the last echoes of Christmas music disappeared faintly behind you. You were then fully flipped from the warm, welcoming environment of the party to the cold shell that was Hogwarts in the dead of winter as the cool air coming off the stone kissed against your skin. 

You couldn’t resist the need to hug yourself in order to cover up your bare arms, sharp gooseflesh already forming there. Such an occasion insisted upon something showy rather than practical, and with the December weather, you were finding it chilly. 

As you walked a few steps down from the entrance to the party, you found that a certain cloud of darkness began to consume you - even with the Christmas trees glistening brightly at either end, reminding you of the supposedly cheerful season. 

You walked toward Draco, where he was waiting for you, just as Snape had promised when he had come up behind you like a looming storm cloud and pulled you away so suddenly, so rudely from the rousing conversation you were having with Harry and Slughorn. But you had to turn your mind off from any showmanship that you had been forced to put into those conversations, and turn your mind onto something else now - someone else. 

Draco had his hands stuffed into the pockets of his expensive suit, a stiff posture that could be seen even through the matching, all black attire. He was pacing along the mouth of the hallway rather frantically, threatening to wear holes in the soles of his custom leather shoes, muttering under his breath to himself. 

So far, this was the worst you had ever seen him. And that worried you greatly. 

“What’s wrong?” You asked, the question naturally on your tongue. 

The sound of your voice in the otherwise empty corridor pulled Draco’s eyes up from the floor, snapping his attention toward you in a way that stopped his pacing in an instant, causing his posture to stiffen up tall as he turned toward you. It was an ingrained instinct - facing someone, giving them your attention when they spoke. Well trained unconscious physical etiquette whipped into a boy who was often very rude and careless with his words. 

For a moment, his fist tightened in his pocket, and you knew that he was clutching on his wand instinctively, his eyes flickering around, looking for an intruder - so perhaps, not entirely ingrained etiquette. Perhaps quite a lot of unconscious physical panic living within those muscles as well. Fight or flight instincts that never got a chance to turn off. 

When his eyes fell on you, recognition flooded his features, and his stiffness relaxed - even if only slightly. 

“Draco, what is it? Why did you pull me out of the party?” You prodded further, your curiosity growing into annoyance when he took too long to answer you. 

“Trust me, I wouldn’t have called you out here if it wasn’t important.” Draco sighed, shifting from one foot to the other, not looking at you. 

“Well isn’t what I’m doing supposed to be important too?” You snapped back. 

Truthfully, you didn’t care about your ‘mission’. You knew that there would be consequences for you if you failed - but at this point, you weren’t all too afraid of being killed. 

When Draco’s parents had discovered that Slughorn was once again teaching at Hogwarts, they had sent you a letter asking to join his ‘Club’, telling you to get close to him. They knew that because of your brilliance, he would already be interested in you joining - and he certainly was. But you had turned him down multiple times because you found it to be an annoyance, and you didn’t want to have to worry about attending ‘club’ meetings on top of everything else going on in your chaotic life. 

Snape was the one who had explained to you why they wanted you to take him up on his nagging offer. The Dark Lord, who used to be known as Tom Riddle, was also once a part of that Club. And they needed to know how much Slughorn remembered about him, and if he was spilling any of the Dark Lord’s secrets to Harry Potter. They needed to know if Slughorn was revealing anything that might make The Dark Lord vulnerable towards Potter. 

Truthfully, you had been grateful towards Snape, and towards Draco for pulling you out of that social hell of fake laughter and performity and into the cool relief of the corridor. You had been dreading the thought of going to the party since Slughorn had first informed everyone about it, and you were grateful to escape it. Even if it gave a chance for the general darkness that Draco carried with him to begin biting at your sensitive heart. And even if it left Harry alone with Slughorn and his endless yammering in your wake. (You pitied him slightly, but you knew that he would be fine on his own.) 

You were mostly irritated with Draco because you hadn’t seen him in days. You felt that he had been strategically avoiding you. Somehow, even in the Slytherin common room or even when you looked for him in his own dorm, he never seemed to be there. And now, he was interrupting you during a crucial moment, daring to show his face when you had spent the better of the last week alone. 

You had invited him to attend the party with you. You thought that you would look like a fool, showing up without a date. And you had. Especially when nearly everyone at Hogwarts had your engagement as hot gossip on their lips just a few months prior. 

“Yes, but-” Draco began to explain himself, but you cut him off, your bubbling annoyance overtaking you in the moment. 

“I was talking to Slughorn when you so rudely interrupted me.” You said, emphasising the words in a way that made Draco childishly roll his eyes. “He was just about to invite me and Harry to look at some of shitty old mementos from previous class years when you had Snape pull me away-”

“Harry?” Draco repeated the name back, mouth gaped as his face twisted in disgust, getting far too caught up on the way you referred to his once rival - now someone who was very background to the rest of his problems. “What? Now you’re getting all cozied up with Potter, are you?” 

At the end of the day, Draco knew that you didn’t owe him anything. 

Essentially, his parents had bought you for him - just like they would have a new racing broom or a fancy set of robes. Since then, you had been nothing but kind to him. Well, aside from your mouthy attitude - which Draco actually found to be refreshing a lot of the time. And he wasn’t even sure how much of it was genuine kindness and how much of it was putting on a show for his parents in order to demonstrate to them that you were a good purchase - that you weren’t something to be disposed of. 

You had held his hand, been cozy and complimented him. He had been surprised the first time you kissed him - surprised by how genuine it felt, and how much he felt himself getting sucked into the emotions of it. But he knew that it was all just for show. 

Because at the end of the day, he knew that no amount of money could force him to own your heart. If you fell in love with someone like Potter, then he could do nothing to stop it. And frankly, he wouldn’t blame you. The heroics, and the genuine kindness, the niceties, the softness - Potter could offer you everything that he couldn’t. 

And in all honesty - something that Draco would only admit to himself deep within the confines of his own, quiet, quaking soul - that thought utterly terrified him. 

“Seriously, Draco?” You barked back, absolutely insulted at the insinuation. At the idea that you had been having fun at the party with Harry when it had been a pretty miserable time for you. “What kind of person do you think I am? I wasn’t there to flirt. Especially not with Harry Potter.”

“Yeah, that’s an awfully convenient story, love.” Draco scoffed, his voice brimming with disgust. 

When you made no further moves to defend yourself - when you didn’t beg for his affection or further insist that what you and Draco had was truly genuine and worth fighting for, it only filled Draco’s mind with more doubt. It only further inflated the idea that indeed, you liked Potter as a romantic partner. And you liked him better. 

“Fine then.” Draco sneered, turning on his heel and marching away, his shoes clacking loudly against the floor as he walked, creating an eerie echo in the empty hallway. 

You hated that your stomach curled with dread at the sight of his quickly retreating back. It had been a long, lonely week without him, and you hated to think of how much longer he would isolate himself if you didn’t take the chance to snag him now. 

“Draco, wait!” You rushed to stop him. 

He was the only person that you truly knew at Hogwarts. 

Yes, he had introduced you to his friends. Pansy Parkinson was nice enough, and she always tried to make girly small talk with you, which you usually returned. Often, her problems about which outfits to wear and how to do her makeup seemed insignificant compared to the literal life and death that Draco faced. But you could always go to her for a conversation that was distracting, a good mental escape. 

Blaise Zabini was more of the strong, silent type. Sometimes the two of you discussed books you had read (when you weren’t feeling too stressed out to read). You usually ended conversations with him early due to colliding opinions on such books. Naturally, he sided with the rich oppressors and you found yourself rooting for the underdogs in every single story. 

Somehow, out of everyone you found yourself surrounded with, Draco was someone you considered a friend. It was difficult not to after the summer the two of you had spent together. 

When your godmother had told you that some ‘old friends of your parents’ were interested in meeting you, you had been surprised. She had always been good to you - she had been friendly, always given you the basics and more in terms of what you needed. She was a very work-minded woman when it came to her job dealing with cursed objects, so she travelled often and left you to be watched over by the Muggle neighbours. Those were experiences that you treasured and often found to be fun. 

You had always grown up with the underlying knowledge that your godmother was not your ‘real’ mother. She always had you call her by her first name - never ‘Mama’, or ‘Mom’. Occasionally, you were mocked in school (because she had enrolled you in Muggle school for a basic education) because you were ‘adopted’. One day, this had led you to asking your godmother where it was that you had come from. 

She told you that your parents were from England, and they died fighting in a war against a terrible dark wizard. They had named her as the person who would take care of you in the event of their death, and though your godmother barely had any traces of an accent left, she told you that she once went to school with your parents at a place called Hogwarts in England. 

Your whole life, all you had known was Muggle New York City. When you turned ten years old, you knew Salem’s Academy for Fine Young Witches, which sometimes had social events (like Quidditch matches and weekend outings) with a brother school, Magorium’s Institute for Upcoming Magical Men. You had dated boys before, but you had never experienced anything too serious. You were a social butterfly well into your magical education who rode the subway during your summers and spent your time going to concerts, enjoying the Muggle library, watching television, going to the movie theatre. 

Even though you never knew your parents and you mourned the dreams of a life you could have had - your life was simple, and you liked it that way. 

Until your godmother took you on a trip to England, promising that it would be a pilgrimage to know more about your heritage, and nothing more. And then - over one dinner, she sold you out to the Malfoys for a dowry of two thousand Galleons. 

Apparently it was enough for her to retire so that she could write a book, as she had always dreamed of. And she was more than happy to be rid of the responsibility of a child that she did not birth. Something that you had heard her whisper to Narcissa when she thought you had not been listening. Up until that point, the only thing binding her to you had been a magical contract that she had signed with your parents before you were even born, naming her your carer in the event of their untimely death. 

The moment she signed a new contract - bidding you to the Malfoys as Draco’s future wife - she was completely free of her responsibility. The new contract that she signed dictated that the Malfoys would have to be responsible for you now. 

So - what you had thought would be a nice visit to explore more about the two dead people that you had never known quickly turned into a permanent relocation with only a small suitcase full of personal belongings, and little clue what the future held for you. Suddenly, you were in a brand new country, living with people you had never met before, betrothed to someone who seemed to hate you. 

And the more the Malfoys talked about The War and told stories of your deceased parents, the more you realised - your parents had died fighting alongside the terrible dark wizard, and not against him. But still, Narcissa and Lucius spoke about your parents as though they were heroes. Valiant heroes who had died at the hands of Aurors, protecting Voldemort’s cause. 

At first, it felt instinctive to hate Draco Malfoy. 

You wanted so badly to hate him. 

He was your betrothed, and though he was very handsome, he had been bitterly rude to you. It seemed that the forcefully polite kiss on the hand that he had given you upon first meeting - something that had given you butterflies in your stomach - had been nothing more than a front, a show he put on for his parents. Because he quickly soured towards you after that. 

He made it very clear that he was not a fan of the arranged marriage either. Even when his parents continually tried to pitch the idea to him and fluff it up for him - as much as they acted like you were a present being given to him on a silver platter (something that only made you feel more isolated and empty). 

There was a distinct point that made you come around to Draco Malfoy. 

The night when you had found out that it wasn’t just a visit, that the idea of the marriage wasn’t just being ‘floated by’ your godmother, but in fact, it was set in stone and you were being left at Malfoy Manor while she silently escaped in the middle of the night with her bag full of gold without even saying goodbye to you. You had sat on the edge of the guest bed they had you in and simply sobbed. You had never felt more alone in your life, never more abandoned, and all you could do was cry your eyes out. 

Draco’s room was across the hall from yours, so naturally, he heard this. It had been a purposeful move from his parents, putting the two of you in close quarters in the hopes that you would talk and interact more, wanting the two of you to at least like each other before getting married. After a few hours of being forced to listen to your chest-racking sobs, you heard a knock. You had been expecting it to be Draco, telling you to shut up so that he could sleep, but instead, a tiny voice asked permission to enter. 

It was one of the house elves - one you later learned was called Pippy, and when you gave her permission to come in, she shuffled along with a large tray in her hands and placed it on the nightstand. A teapot and an empty teacup. She poured you the cup of tea, and after she handed it to you, she patted you on the knee and said: 

“Mister Draco says peppermint tea is good for the bad days,” 

You took the cup in two shaking hands, thanking her meekly, enjoying it as a small comfort. When you watched the tiny elf shuffling back toward your door, you caught a glimpse of a bright blue eye peeking in through the crack, clearly trying not to be caught looking in. 

Even if he would never admit it then, he was growing soft toward you. 

And he had spent the next three months, the entirety of the summer, fighting with that softness as it grew within himself. He constantly battled between pushing you away with feigned annoyance and coldness and wrapping you in warmth, a wordless care. 

He would spend some of the nights in your bed cuddling you while you cried, staying completely silent as to dare not let any fond words slip out. He would defend you against his parents when you didn’t participate in their properly deemed etiquette (such as when you treated the house elves ‘too nicely’ or when you spoke about Muggle technology a bit too much). And yet, he never brought himself to say more than a few genuinely nice words to you. 

He was holding you at arm’s length. He was trying to be some snide, petulant boy toward you in the hopes that you wouldn’t like him. But truly, he was the only real kindness, the only real friend you had in this lonely new world. 

Draco stopped in his tracks at the sound of you calling out his name. As much as he would never admit it, he was a puppet to your call. 

He heaved out a sigh and turned back around, so utterly drawn to you. He hated to see your eyes coated in glass - fear and sadness, the ache that you had disappointed him bubbling to the surface as he stared you down with a sour face, his hands still in his pockets, his entire body still stiff. 

Even though a sad face didn’t suit you, you were still beautiful. So damn beautiful. He hated that he had been so stupid as to miss accompanying you to the party. But he likely would have just been a grey cloud hanging around you, preventing anyone from talking to you and socialising with you. He would have been a roadblock to your mission. 

You were wearing a dress made of a fabric that looked like liquid silver melted down and poured over your body, so sparkling and flowy that you looked like a star that belonged in the night sky alongside the beauty of the moon. It wrapped around your body gracefully, with a tie to emphasise your waist and a low neckline that showed off your cleavage. He was only human - he couldn’t lie in how it appealed to him. Sitting in the middle of your cleavage was a necklace - it was an ornate ruby beetle, the sigil of your Pureblood family. You were the last remaining member of the Scaraflos house. 

The necklace had been handed down to you from your mother - literally the only thing you had from your parents. You had worn it for years without ever truly knowing what it meant. You had told Draco that when Narcissa showed you pictures of his parents and your parents from their school days and pointed out how your mother was wearing the necklace in those pictures, it was the only time you had ever felt truly connected to your Pureblood heritage. And you had no clue if that was a good thing or a bad thing. 

Anytime in years previous, Draco would have jumped to say that it was a good thing. Now, though - he wasn’t entirely sure. 

You were shivering slightly due to the fact that it had such short sleeves, but you were wearing black stockings on your legs (something else that Draco found irritably sexy, even though it covered more of your skin) and you had on a pair of simple, but elegant silver heels. 

Silently, unable to stand the sight of goosenips forming on your skin, he took off his blazer and took the few steps back toward you to wrap it around your shoulders. With his thinner build, it wouldn’t fit you well - but at least, it would shield you from some of the cold air in the castle. As he draped it around you, his eyes caught a glimpse of your hand as you reached up to hold the edge of the coat on your shoulder, clutching onto the fabric so that it wouldn’t fall. 

Draco couldn’t help it when his eyes fixated terribly on it - that damn engagement ring. 

It was something his parents had purchased without him ever knowing, and they had him present it to you as a form of ceremony. As if either of you had any choice in the matter. As if it was supposed to be romantic. As if you could have said no. Later on, behind closed doors, you told him that you would wear it proudly and he scoffed. He thought that the moment the two of you got to Hogwarts, when there were no more prying eyes on the two of you (because Snape certainly didn’t care) - that you would take it off and resign it to some jewellery box, or perhaps even throw it away. 

But you kept wearing it. 

When you thought Draco wasn’t looking, he sometimes found you twisting it between two fingers, looking down at it with an odd kind of fondness - or perhaps, even love. Always a deep, dizzying array of complex thoughts floating through your mind. 

He had no clue that you wore it because you thought of Draco as your family now. He was the only person you had in the world who hadn’t done you some kind of injustice. And you wore it to show loyalty to him. You wore it because it meant that you weren’t alone. You were an abandoned orphan, sold and bartered like livestock - but as long as you wore that ring, you belonged to someone. Someone who, despite his best efforts to appear cold and uncaring, did take care of you. 

“Draco, why did you come here?” You asked again, much gentler this time, lowering your attack for now. 

You stared at him expectantly as you clutched his blazer around your shoulders, trying to steal the last bits of his warmth out of the fabric before it faded away completely. 

He sighed, hating to admit that he needed help. He was stubbornly, bitterly independent, just as his parents had taught him to be. It was one of his biggest flaws. 

“I’m having issues with the Vanishing Cabinet.” He told you quietly, hesitant to admit it. Hesitant to admit failure. 

“Show me.” You told him, and he nodded. 

He led you to the blank wall on the fifth floor that somehow caused a door to appear. The first time you had seen it, it had astounded you. Even in a world of magic, some things still managed to surprise you. 

He had originally brought you there at the beginning of the school year when he had explained to you that he had been tasked to fix up The Vanishing Cabinet. He had called it The Room of Hidden Things. He had explained to you that any time someone wanted to get rid of a dangerous object, for that object to never be found again, they disposed of it within this room. Sometimes it was also a dumping ground for common junk, he had theorised, and he heavily believed that items that were hidden within other places within the walls of Hogwarts - a book tucked away in a random cupboard, a potion bottle hidden under someone’s mattress - somehow, those items ended up here if they were hidden with the same intention of disposal. They were all pulled here by the room’s strong magic. 

You found it to be hauntingly beautiful, like many other places within Hogwarts were. You couldn’t help but to enjoy the sense of mystery as you walked through the isles of piled up furniture, seeing all the strange items that you could barely put names to - things like dragon skulls, murky old potions rotting away in dusty bottles. Even a few trolls that had been killed and stuff (taxidermy style) that had startled you upon your first visit to the room because when you had first looked at them, you thought they were alive and waiting to attack. 

Draco brought you to the back of the large room, and you saw that he had already pulled the tarp off the overwhelming tall, ornate Vanishing Cabinet, so the dusty cloth was sitting in the pile at the cabinet’s feet. Without a word, Draco walked up to the cabinet, moving in stiff mechanical motions as he pulled open the doors. You took a few steps closer to get a better look, realising that he was trying to show you whatever was inside - that must be where the primary problem was located. 

You couldn’t hold in the gasp that broke out of your throat when you saw a dead bird sitting in the bottom of the cabinet. 

A bright yellow canary laying against the dark wood, belly up and completely still with its soft feathers rustled, a few of them missing. You had seen very few dead animals in your lifetime. Aside from the occasional New York City pigeon, laying on the sidewalk in a similar fashion after running itself into one of the hyper reflective windows of the tall buildings. You couldn’t even stand to look at those for too long. You still felt the same deep heartache while looking at it that you had for the poor pigeons. 

“Oh - oh my.” You gaped quietly. 

Draco was entirely surprised when you shouldered him out of the way, letting his ill-fitting borrowed jacket drop off your shoulders onto the dusty ground without care as you crouched down in front of him. You then scooped up the small bird in your hands, cradling it gently as though it were entirely precious. 

He thought that seeing the state of things, you might start suggesting spells, telling him ways that he could fix the obvious problem. But no - you were soft-hearted. The true problem hadn’t even occurred to you yet, because you were so caught up on the sight of a dead bird. You were emotional, struck by the shock of an innocent animal having its life prematurely ended. 

Draco envied you quietly for a moment as you sat on your knees in front of the cabinet, looming in his shadow as you held the bird in your hands. He realised that in order for you to be so startled over this, so heartbroken - it must be one of the first times you had been brushed with death. Draco envied that naivety. 

He wished he could rewind to the version of himself from a few years ago. A version that thought not being able to join the Quidditch team because of an age restriction was the worst tragedy in the world. A version that thought he got everything he wanted because he was genuinely deserving of it. Someone who couldn’t see that he was simply a spoiled brat. 

He wished he could go back to a version that hadn’t seen Muggleborns slain in his family’s dining room, begging for mercy where there would be none.  

When he had first seen that bird sitting dead in the cabinet, a frighteningly still, dead body draped in yellow - for a moment, he had been reminded of Cedric Diggory. Someone so undeserving, lifeless before their time. Used up and gone. 

But now, seeing the way you cradled it, fussing over something already dead and unable to benefit from your care - Draco was distinctly reminded of himself, withering and undeserving in your arms. 

“Draco, do - do you think we should bury it?” You asked, the gentle croak of tears in your voice as you considered a pointless funeral for the small dead thing. 

You suddenly rose up to your feet then, walking around Draco to look for something among the junk in the room, something to wrap the poor bird in - some kind of cloth, or perhaps a small box to place it in. 

This caused something inside of him to snap. The way your sweet demeanour ground against his nerves - his worry, his anxiety about everything mounting suddenly as you fussed over a tiny thing that truly didn’t matter. 

Eventually, your good intentions would get you killed. That gentle touch, that willingness to help - it would get you on the wrong end of a Killing Curse one day. (Especially if he didn’t protect you.) 

“It’s not about the bloody bird, woman!” He growled out, entirely frustrated with your delicate ignorance, your lack of seeing the true point. 

Draco turned to you, and grabbed your arm so viciously that your palms jerked apart and the small, lifeless body dropped onto the floor without a single bit of grace. The bird dropped against the cold stone so carelessly, as though it were an object that had not once had any life in it at all. You let out another gasp at this, and looked from the dull tuft of yellow feathers at your feet up to Draco’s face. 

“Draco!” You cried out sharply, protesting against his careless nature toward the innocent creature. 

His fingers were gripping your forearm fiercely, blooming small bits of pain - but you didn’t care. You felt a clench in your gut, distinct guilt overwhelming you. You told yourself that his anger was misplaced. You had to guess so. You didn’t have words, especially not while he stared you down so coldly. All you could do was stand tall, and stare right back, even while tears formed in your eyes. 

He tightly clenched his jaw. 

You were surprised when he spoke again. 

“How can you be so daft?” He said, almost choking on the words. 

That was when you knew for certain that all his bubbling anger was truly misplaced. He had called you brilliant before, and often made ‘jokes’ about how much you outsmarted him. It was one of the only things he had said about you that wasn’t sarcastic or backhanded in some effort to deter you. He didn’t think that you were stupid, not one bit. 

“Look, you know if I don’t get this thing working-” Draco couldn’t even finish his sentence before his throat closed around the words, threatening harsh sobs that he was desperate to contain. 

Instead, he turned abruptly, letting go of your arm - now completely uncaring of the misplaced conflict. You felt a wave crash into your chest as you realised it. He was right - how could you have been so stupid? 

Of course, he had no care for a small animal. 

It was about what that animal represented. His failure. Death looming over his head. 

The bird had obviously died in the cabinet, which meant that a living thing had yet to survive the transition from Borgin & Burkes into Hogwarts. If Draco couldn’t fix that problem - if there was some sort of problem when the Death Eaters tried to use the cabinet to get into Hogwarts and one of them died, then Draco would be on the line for it. 

They would kill him if he couldn’t get this right. 

Draco moved slowly, putting a hand on each of the cabinet’s doors and closing them. The harsh squeak of the old hinges resonating through the otherwise silent room spoke volumes. 

Then, for a few long, painstaking moments - neither of you said a thing. 

Your chest ached. You wished that you could find something comforting to tell him. For some reason, you knew that simply telling him ‘it’s going to be okay’ wasn’t going to cut it. You muddled in the silence and you hated it. 

He stood with his back still turned to you, with his arms outstretched, leaning on the tall, imposing wooden object. It felt like a shadow of death looming over the two of you. His shoulders held nothing but pure tension, even as he used the object for support. Soon, he took on a very unnatural, un-Malfoy slouch as he allowed his head to so tiredly droop down between his spread arms. 

After a few moments of that terrible silence, with you staring at his back, tossing your mind for something helpful to say as you chewed at your own lip - Draco took in a shuddering breath. Though you knew he was trying to hide it: he began quietly sobbing. 

You couldn’t help yourself then. 

It was something you knew that he pretended to hate, but you did it anyway. He could pretend to be annoyed with you if he wanted, but you both likely needed it right now. You stepped forward, over the dead bird, your shoes quietly clacking against the stone - and you settled yourself right up against his back, tucking your body tightly against him in a hug. You nuzzled your face into the tense muscles of his shoulders, and as you wrapped your arms around his waist from behind and squeezed him tightly, you felt some of the tension melt away as he unconsciously relaxed into your touch. 

You did worry about how much thinner he felt in your arms than the last time you had done this - obviously, he hadn’t been eating properly. But you didn’t bother to bring it up, not wanting to start another argument. 

Draco felt a grateful warmth spread over him. Still, he refused to touch you back. He couldn’t. At least not yet. 

He kept his hands on the wood of the cabinet, almost like a bold surrender, silently remarking that he would give into your touch, to your softness, but he wouldn’t return it. He couldn’t. He let out another shuddering sob - a sound he couldn’t contain now with the feeling of your warmth at his back. It was something he hated himself for. 

You hushed him gently. And then, miraculously, you found words. 

“We could leave.” You said quietly, turning your head so that your cheek sat parallel with his flesh, muttering the words against the fine silk of his button up shirt. “We could just… run away together. We don’t have to stay here, Draco. We could get to a fireplace and Floo out of here, or-” 

“We can’t.” Draco easily cut you off, stamping out the idea, his voice just as quiet, throttled by tears. “You know that we can’t.” 

You wanted to argue the point more. Obviously, he didn’t hate the idea. He just thought it was illogical. Likely, he thought it was too dangerous. But what was the alternative - possibly being killed anyway? Being tortured and then killed if he failed his mission? 

“If we leave, they’ll kill my parents because I couldn’t complete my mission.��� Draco sniffled quietly. “At the very least, they’ll haul me in and have my head for being a traitor.” 

Draco straightened his stance then, taking his arms off the cabinet. You thought that he might remove your arms from his waist, finally rejecting your touch. But instead, he began tracing fingers from his right hand along the forearm of his left sleeve, almost scratching at it like it was a terrible itch. 

You had been there on the night when he had gotten the Mark. 

You had been brought into the room and forced to listen to his screams of pain before you even truly knew what was happening. When you had tried to comfort him about it, he had pushed you off so roughly that you had almost smacked your head into one of the walls - but you couldn’t bring yourself to be angry with him. You that he was taking that fear and pain out on you in that terribly misplaced way. 

Later that night, when he had been crying - sobbing harshly and running the freshly scorched skin under cool water - he let you run him a bath with soothing soaps. The two of you discussed Shakespeare’s plays (which you were surprised that he had read) while you washed his hair for him. 

“Now that I have the Mark, I can’t run anywhere.” Draco muttered quietly. “I can’t go anywhere that I won’t be found.” 

That part had never truly occurred to you before. 

You knew that the Dark Lord used the Dark Mark as a way for his followers to show their loyalty. The magic behind it also made it a way for him to summon them or even for them to summon him. Hearing his words, you guessed that Draco having it meant that he could be ‘summoned’ at any time as a part of the loyalty he had so unwillingly pledged. 

Even if he betrayed the Dark Lord morally, mentally, emotionally, and tried to do so physically by running away, as long as his arm was attached, he would still be in service to that horrible man until he and his followers decided otherwise. Especially because you couldn’t imagine Draco wanting to part with his arm anytime soon. 

“We’ll figure something out.” You told him, having little faith in those words yourself. You knew it was a truth that you had to speak into existence - otherwise, you were doomed. 

You laid a gentle kiss on his shoulder through the fabric of his shirt, spreading more warmth through him. He clenched his fists at his sides, highly resisting the urge to reach for your hands, but silently hoping that you wouldn’t pull away. 

Draco resented your sense of hope. A lot of the time, he couldn’t help but to think that it was stupid - just your naivety poking through in a different way. Though, truthfully, in a lot of ways, he knew that your hope was the bravest thing about you. And these days, that hope was the only thing keeping him afloat in the chaotic sea that his life had become. 

Draco, unlike you, was a coward. 

He could come up with all the excuses he wanted not to run away, but truthfully - he was terrified. And every single day, his fear put you more and more at risk. 

… 

Draco thought back to a night at Malfoy Manor, when you had been having dinner with him and his parents. A night when, for the first time in his life, that streak of cowardice had somehow been broken. 

“Can you believe it? It’s completely ridiculous. A proposal to convert the entire Ministry from intern-departmental memos to this - this telephone nonsense!” 

Lucius ranted on as he cut into his food, taking out his aggression on the piece of meat in front of him as he recounted something that had happened a few months previous that still brought him particular frustration whenever he remembered it. 

“That Arthur Weasley is a stupid old bat, downright mindless, but even I can’t imagine where he gets theses ideas from-” 

“Telephones can actually be quite useful.” You piped up, interrupting his father’s ranting with a quiet, but polite comment. 

Without a word, all three others at the table stared at you as you continued to mindlessly poke at your dinner. Lucius glared daggers at you, his expression full of bitter venom, while Draco and Narcissa gave you the same distinct expression of shock - deer in headlights, mirrored over both their faces. Over the years, they had learned to simply be quiet and ‘listen’ to the rantings of their patriarch, especially if it was about the goings on at the Ministry, Arthur Weasley, or any number of other subjects that he knew he was right about. 

While at his own dinner table, Lucius Malfoy was not to be interrupted - much less corrected. 

You had just broken the golden rule twice over. You had interrupted him in the middle of speaking, and you had contradicted what he was saying. 

Draco’s gut clenched as he realised that he should have warned you beforehand to avoid such a faux pas. He should have told you that the dinner table was a place for quietly eating and answering direct questions in as few words as possible - not an open forum. 

Before he could apologise on your behalf, you opened your mouth again - doubling down on this accidental, horrible mistake. 

“Do you just find it confusing because you don’t know how they work?” You posed, reaching out to grab your glass for a sip of water, looking right at Lucius as you posed the question. “I know that a lot of Wizards who were born in the magical world can find Muggle technology strange and confusing, but-” 

Before you could finish speaking, Lucius reached off to the side and grabbed his cane, and brought down onto the centre of the table with an intense silent fury. He smashed your hand down into the glass that you had been holding, shattering it to pieces underneath your palm. Draco and Narcissa flinched at the sound and Narcissa backed her chair away slightly - but neither of them dared to speak, neither of them moved to confront him. In fact, Narcissa was very intentionally looking away, her eyes now glued to the floor. 

Draco could see blood pooling against the emerald green table runner, could see your flesh quivering in pain underneath the silver snake’s maw - but you stayed completely still, your eyes coldly locked on Lucius’ glare as he hovered out of his seat. Even with tears of pain dotting your eyes, your throat trembling as you held back cries - you kept a stiff jaw and refused to back down from the confrontation. 

It was braver than Draco had ever been, and he silently admired you for it. 

“If you think that stupid, filthy Muggles are so brilliant, then you can die like one.” Lucius ground out slowly, pure rage on his breath. “While you are living in my house, you will learn your place. You filthy, blood-traitorous slut.” 

Draco held his breath. He knew that if you backed down, if you shied away and admitted your wrong doing with silence or even an apology, then his father would let you go easily and then this would all be over. 

But of course - you weren’t going to back down easily. Not you. 

“And what place is that?” You remarked, pure snark in your tone. 

Draco’s throat clenched up. His father wouldn’t like that. 

Lucius lifted the snake’s bite off your hand, only for a second, and then - after placing down the cane, he sharply backhanded you. Draco knew that he wore thick, heavy rings on his hand and he worried for you - especially when you swayed on your seat for a moment before falling to the floor. The heft of the hit was enough to dizzy you, make you unstable and send you to the ground. 

“Your place is to be silent until I call upon you.” Lucius announced, seeming very satisfied with himself. 

Narcissa refused to look in your direction, and Lucius moved to sit back in his chair. For once, going against everything he had been taught since childhood, Draco rushed to get out of his. He knew that it would have been expected for him to ignore you. For you to be isolated in your pain. But he couldn’t help himself. 

Draco rushed to your side, collapsing onto his hands and knees before you - instinctively, he sheltered you in his arms, trying to get you upright again. 

“Y/N?” He croaked out quietly, only now realising how close he was to tears. 

“I’m fine, Draco.” You quickly lied. “I’m fine.” 

“Draco.” 

Lucius’ tone was entirely dead, almost calm, and somehow menacing in the same breath. Draco looked over your head, your slouched, defeated posture making you too small in his arms as he held you against his chest, and he caught his father’s eye as the man glared at him with pure violence dancing in his cold eyes. Any other time, Draco would have folded to that silent threat so easily. But with you there - with the feeling of you quivering against him, clearly holding in sobs - it truly injected boldness into him in those moments. 

You were such a fragile thing. For once in his life - something he needed to protect. Something only he could protect. 

“Draco, sit down.” His father ordered, clearly annoyed when Draco took too long to move away from you. “You haven’t been dismissed from my table yet.” 

Draco laid a gentle kiss on your forehead, and somehow, entirely against his own will, untangled you from his arms. When he stood, everyone in the room thought for certain that it was to comply with this order. But instead, he moved toward his father’s chair with sharp footsteps, putting on his best faux confidence and standing tall as he spat out his next words. 

“I swear to Merlin, if you ever put a hand on my fiance again, I will end you.” 

Naturally, Lucius didn’t find this threat to be the slightest bit intimidating. 

His father let out a dark chuckle, clearly amused by seeing Draco posture as a man when he knew that his son was nothing more than a spoiled, cowardly child. 

“Let’s not forget who bought you the little whore.” Lucius laughed. “There’s no need to get sentimental, Draco. You should be paying attention. Learn how to train up your wife now, before she becomes a disobedient brat. You should never let anyone talk to your father like that, remember, loyalty comes-” 

Draco took out his wand then, much to his father’s surprise. With it poised in Lucius’ direction, he received a sharp glare. 

“I understand loyalty perfectly well. Father.” Draco said, his voice short. 

“Incarcerous.” Lucius hissed sharply - then, as if out of nowhere, a thin black rope appeared and whipped around the middle of Draco’s neck. In an instant, it began tightening, choking him. 

Immediately, Draco dropped his wand and fell backwards, landing beside where you were still kneeling on the floor - you panicked as you watched him choking and gasping for breath. 

“Lucius!” Narcissa cried out, begging for the end of the conflict. 

The man ignored her. 

“You will learn to respect me in my own house, so help me, if I have to-” 

“Finite.” You held your good hand above Draco’s gasping face and muttered the counter curse, releasing him from the rope, performing an impressive feat of wandless magic to get him free.

Lucius glared at you once again, locking you and Draco in a harsh stare as you helped him sit up while he struggled to catch his breath. 

Before any further words could be said, Lucius pushed out his chair and stomped out of the room like a child having a tantrum, obviously upset that his intimidation and abuse had not gotten him the result he wanted. Narcissa said nothing, only giving you the saddest eyes as you helped Draco off the floor. The two of you left to go clean the glass out of your palm, spending the rest of the night locked in Draco’s room, licking your wounds in the relative comfort of each other’s silence. 

… 

That had been the first time Draco had ever properly stood up to his father. 

Draco still wondered if that was a good thing or not. 

Before he could venture any further into that very dangerous can of worms, you pulled Draco back to the present when you stepped back from the hug. Draco resisted the urge to pull you back, to steal more of your warmth. 

You noticed something out of the corner of your eye that caught your attention. 

A mattress laid out on the floor. 

It could have just been one of those random pieces of stray ‘junk’ furniture, but something about it caught your attention. For one, the fact that it hadn’t been in that position the last time you had been in this room. And two - there were a few random, stray blankets placed on top of it in what was very clearly an improvised sleeping area. As though someone had gone through the random objects in the room in order to compose a makeshift bed. 

With Draco’s bookbag sitting beside the mattress, open - you quickly clued into the truth. It was absolutely no trouble to figure out why you hadn’t seen much of him over the past week. He had been sleeping here. 

It was a revelation that shocked you. 

Especially considering that this looked quite shabby in comparison to the comfort of the Slytherin dorms. And you knew that at home, he was used to being spoiled with a thick, three foot tall mattress on a four poster bed and goose feather down pillows. So - why would he choose to camp out here? Why would he want to be closer to The Vanishing Cabinet - something that was actively giving him stress? 

“You’ve been sleeping here.” You said, disappointment ripe in your voice as you walked over to the mattress as toed at one of the blankets with your shoe. “Why?” 

“Why does it matter?” Draco huffed, picking up his jacket that you had dropped onto the floor and tossing it into the middle of the mattress. “Can you help me with The Cabinet or not?” 

“I can help.” You answered simply. “But I want to talk about this first.” You said, motioning toward the area where he had slept. 

Draco let out a sharp breath and turned around, rubbing his hands across his face in sharp frustration. 

For a moment, you thought that he was simply going to leave again, forcing you to chase him, trying to outrun the conversation. It had been a favourite tactic of his when the two of you had been living at his parents’ sprawling estate, a place that he knew much better than you did. The second that things got a bit too personal, he would slip into some random hallway or sneak off around a private corner, and it was like he had Disapparated - with how quickly he had moved, disappearing into the bowels of the house so that he could escape talking to you. 

You wouldn’t let him escape this time. 

You stepped up to him and put your hands on either side of his face, and he closed his eyes at the gentle touch. 

“Draco, please don’t hide from me.” You told him quietly. “You don’t have to be alone in all this. I know… I know I’m just some stupid girl that your parents bought for you, but I want to be a good wife for you. I want to be the person that you can come to with your problems.” 

Draco didn’t think of you as just some ‘stupid girl’. 

He didn’t think of you as a gift, as a purchased object that he could throw away like he had with every other toy that he had carelessly broken in his life. 

Honestly - you were the first real friend he ever had. You were the first person who was truly honest with him, calling him out on his bullshit, barring any consequences of his reputation or anything that his parents might do to you. You didn’t flock to him for popularity or status. You were forced to be near him, but you didn’t always act polite toward him by force. When your sweetness came to him, it was in waves. And it came along with sour notes and rudeness and harsh honesty that he needed. 

That kind of honesty was something that he had never experienced from anyone else in his life. 

And all of it was so incredibly genuine. 

You were someone who should have hated him, but you always smiled at him; someone who said his name with nothing but pleasantness in your tone, where others said it with venom or coldness. You were one of the first people he felt like he could open up to, and that was dangerous. 

Of course he was hiding from you. He needed to hide from you. 

He was a coward. And lately, the thing he feared most, even above losing his own life - was losing you. You were probably the only good thing he had ever possessed that was actually irreplaceable. If he lost you, he knew that he would never recover. He would actually willingly fling himself off the Astronomy Tower if he was somehow responsible for getting you hurt. 

That was what kept him at a distance. Hoping that he could actually grow cold toward you. Hoping that he could learn to genuinely hate you if he escaped from your sweetness. 

He also hoped that you would grow to hate him so that you could simply detach and go off on your own. You didn’t have The Mark, you could still run. At least before making your marriage vows, you could. But no - you were too good. You were too kind hearted to truly abandon him. 

And every time Draco saw you, he only became more nauseated with the realisation that he was becoming more and more fond of you. He would always look for your face in the crowd at the Great Hall, he would always wait for that smile to come across your lips when you locked eyes with him. 

And he couldn’t handle it. He couldn’t handle you. He couldn’t handle being the one responsible for the destruction of your life. 

So he spent more nights, longer nights in the Room of Requirement, slaving over The Vanishing Cabinet, writing down increasingly stupid plans for how he could kill Dumbledore without actually waltzing up and just murdering the man. He had to complete his mission if he was going to keep you safe. 

“Draco, please-” 

He couldn’t take it anymore. He couldn’t listen to the sweet sadness in your voice curl around his name like a canary’s song, another sweet little bird ready to die by his hands. He couldn’t stand you talking to him like you actually cherished him - like he was actually something worth having. 

He reached up and gently cupped the side of your face, tucking his arm inside of yours to do so where you still held onto his cheek, the two of you becoming so entangled, just as he had feared. 

Then - he pulled you into a kiss. 

It was an addition to only about a half dozen kisses that the two of you had shared before this. And in an instant, this was the most desperate - emotions that he desperately wanted dampened off and hidden wringing through his lips and into yours. Entirely against his will, another hot tear escaped, and he let out a small gasp when you were quick to thumb it away. 

You wanted to cheer at the feeling of his lips against yours. You knew that before this, he was actively pulling away from you, putting himself in isolation, marching in his suffering alone because he thought that he had to. Or simply because he was used to it, from what you had seen of his home life. 

You knew what a horrible curse loneliness was, and you never wanted him to suffer through it. Especially not on top of everything else he was already going through. If he had to suffer through everything that his parents had put onto him, then at the very least, he didn’t have to suffer alone. 

Having his lips pressed so tightly to yours - it felt like progress. Feeling the whimper that echoed out from his throat as he held your face so delicately, like you were a perfect, soft doll - like you were something so precious - it felt like you had broken down a wall that he had been trying so hard for so many months to keep up as a barrier against you. 

This felt like saving him. 

It felt like doing what little you could within your limited power to create light in the darkness he was trudging through. Or at the very least, it felt like you could assure him that he wasn’t stuck in that darkness alone. 

After a few moments, Draco pulled away from the kiss. When he reached up to pull one of your hands away from his face, you worried that he might just shove you away and walk away altogether, finally coming to his senses against the affection. You worried that he would suddenly become cold toward you as he had done many other times, in an effort to turn you off. 

Instead - he surprised you. He did one of the most endearing, heart-melting things that he possibly could have done. 

He clasped your wrist gently between his cool fingers, thumbing along your pulse in a way that made you hold back a moan, and then he raised the heel of your palm up to his lips. With his eyes gently closed, refusing to look at you, he kissed along the fading scars that had been left there when his father had smashed your hand into a wine glass over dinner. 

The marks were something you didn’t pay much mind to these days, especially not with the ornament of your engagement ring as a much more pleasant distraction on that hand. But feeling Draco’s pillowy, light kisses grazing across your skin in the best, deepest apology he ever could have offered you - it made your stomach clench with overwhelming emotion as tears formed in your eyes. 

“Draco-” You choked on his name this time, and he moved your hand to sit on his shoulder as he turned his attention toward your face. 

Glassy, tear-kissed eyes faced your own, and you knew that there were no words for it. 

The universe had brought the two of you together in the strangest way and drowned the two of you in the most unpleasant circumstances. But you couldn’t help thinking that this is exactly where you were meant to be. 

“Hush now, darling.” He told you, his voice whisper-quiet, not daring to get much louder lest he risk breaking those tears in his throat. 

Darling. It was the first time he had ever called you that. He had thrown out the occasional snide ‘honey’ or ‘wifey’ in front of his parents or even behind closed doors, very rudely playing on the fact that he was supposed to treat you like a girlfriend, like his beloved. He thought it was amusing to taunt you with the sarcasm that he never actually would hold any true affection for you. 

This was the first pet name he had given you out of genuine affection. 

He pulled you back in for another kiss, and the moment his lips touched yours, Draco could feel himself losing it. The softness of your pillowy mouth against his, the way your fingers curled into his shirt, holding onto him like you truly needed him as an anchor. The little moan you let out - making him desperate to chase more of those sounds from you. 

All of it was slowly driving him insane, leading him further astray from his goal of detaching from you. 

He should have tossed you out into the hallway. He should have yelled at you, called you horrible names. He should have pulled out every single rude, bratty thing in his repertoire to make you absolutely hate him. Instead - he found himself getting lost in you more by the second. He found himself letting your softness roll over him in waves, turning him weak. 

Draco held the back of your head with one hand, pinning you into the kiss, holding you against his mouth like a dehydrated man would so desperately hold onto a decanter of water. You let out another sweet moan, louder this time, and he didn’t hesitate to shove his tongue past your lips, dizzy and needing to drink right from the source, wanting to devour you whole. He needed to see if he could taste the light that radiated out of you. He needed to see if he could find that fatal thing inside of you that made you have a fondness toward him. 

This was nothing like snogging random Slytherin girls out of boredom.

In that moment, Draco felt important. He felt needed. He felt like he served some grander purpose of good in the universe because you held onto him tighter, because you pulled him closer, because you kissed him back with ferocity and sucked on his tongue. Because you wanted him. He felt that if your attention shifted from him for even a moment, he would wither away and cease to exist because he only mattered under the warmth of your gaze. 

Draco felt like he was tempting fate when he moved his hands down your shoulders, down your back, daring to touch more of you - daring to ask for more. That he was playing with fire, letting his well-ingrained greed get the better of him once again. But he couldn’t help himself. 

He cradled his flat-handed touch across you with the intention to feel you in a way that he never had before. Yes, he had held you before - hugged you, pulled you close to him when he was stuck for words and wanting to comfort you, especially seeing as comforting words had never been a skill taught to him. But other than a few grazing touches against your hands or your cheeks, he had never dared to invite himself to the rest of your body. 

Before this, he had never touched you with lust on his mind. 

He had never truly thought of you as his property, something he could possess and own and take. He thought for certain, at any moment, you would push him away for being so brazen - and he would simply have to add this rejection to his pile of heartbreaks and move on. 

Instead, he felt something inside of him ease with relief when you sighed with delight - one of the most beautiful sounds he had ever heard. And then, in a moment so perfect, you leaned into his touches. You kept one hand tightly gripping the fabric of his shirt and the other reached up and wound into his neatly slicked hair, instantly messing up the tresses and making them wild at the back. 

But he couldn’t care, not for a moment - especially not when you let out another sweet moan into his mouth and leaned your whole body into him, pressing against him so that he felt every inch of your gorgeous curves through the thin fabric of your dress. 

Draco had felt you pressed this close against his body before, but it had never been like this. 

Before it had been like a delicate bird being held in a cage - like some sweet, innocent thing he was trying to protect. 

But now, it was like a man truly feeling a woman. It was a potential husband truly seeing his future wife for the first time, and his body responded in the only way he could. He let out a shuddering moan and he felt his cock hardening up. Of course, he didn’t want you to feel it. He didn’t want this to happen. He shouldn’t let this happen. 

He was supposed to be distancing himself from you, not letting you dizzy him like he was some stupid lovesick fool. He was supposed to be severing these ties, not burrowing himself further inside of you. (And just that thought sparked a certain imagery in his mind that made his cock twitch and swell to full mast. Brilliant. Just bloody brilliant. He was a fool.) 

Draco pulled back from the kiss and you let out a disappointed sound - like the creek of an old door, tired and waning. 

Draco forced his hands back to his sides, despite how fantastic the warmth of your flesh felt under his touch. 

When he tried to step back from you, you refused to let him go. The grip you had in his hair caused a small twinge of pain across his scalp, and he was forced to open his eyes. The look on your face - kiss bruised lips, eyes still closed, a quiver across your chin, filled to the brim with disappointment, likely knowing what was going through his mind - it made him weak. It gave him pause. 

He was too damn weak. 

“Y/N-” He said your name in a whisper - about to tell you that the two of you shouldn’t be doing this, but you cut him off. 

“Draco, please.” You whimpered quietly. “Please, don’t push me away right now.” 

He reached up and gently gripped your forearm. He should have used the touch to untangle you from him, but he found that he didn’t have the strength to. Whether it was a mental strength or a physical one, he wasn’t even sure. 

“I need this.” You whispered, your voice hoarse and strained, and for the first time that he had ever heard - desperate. “I think you do too. Please.” 

He was a horrible, selfish man - but he told himself that a good husband would never deny you of your needs. 

Draco swept you into another kiss, wrapping one of his arms around your back, firm and protective as he always had been, determined to serve your needs with more ferocity than ever. While you moaned into his mouth, he guided you backwards until your ankles hit the edge of that mattress. The one he had been sleeping on to flee from this big, horrible thing that had been building between the two of you that had now crashed down upon his head with inevitability. 

Even dizzy from the feeling of his lips on yours, you instantly understood the wordless signal. He laid you down on it as gently as he could, taking the gravity in slow pauses rather than simply letting you fall backwards, and as he fixed some of the blankets under your head like a makeshift pillow, you felt like a queen, being treated with the highest affection and handled with the most gentle hands that her beloved could muster. 

Part of you yearned for a rougher touch, to see Draco let loose on you - but you knew that this was what he needed. He needed to treasure something. He needed to know that he could have something good that wouldn’t end up dead or broken because of him. 

Draco paused above you for a moment, holding himself there with a hand beside your head - he felt a pure, stabbing pain in his gut when he looked down at you and all he could see reflected back up at him was pure, shining, sickening love. Your eyes practically glowed with it in the dimly lit room. He didn’t want to admit it then, but he knew he was so utterly fucked. 

He felt a curse curling up inside him - the urge to mirror that back to you but the inability to proclaim it. Feeling like he was some filthy dead thing that would never truly mean anything to you while wanting so badly to be the solid earth beneath your feet that you needed to function, he wanted to be your everything. His voice became strangled in his throat and instead of making that impossible proclamation, his body moved frantically as he began kissing down your neck. 

It was a worship - it was a proclamation in silence. It was all he could muster, but he hoped that it would please you nonetheless. 

Please. 

He whispered wordlessly against your skin, tonguing along the planes of your neck as you moaned for him so beautifully. 

Please, notice me. Find me worthy. 

After lavishing gentle attention across your neck and your clavicle, coating you in salvia that cooled across your skin and made you shiver, he reached your bust line and easily buried himself there. He nestled along the skin so tenderly that you found your heart wanting to burst out of your chest to reach his lips, your hands coming up to cradle the back of his head in what you hoped was an equally tender gesture while he laid the sweetest, simple open-mouthed kisses in your cleavage. 

This was a Draco that you had never seen before. This was not the surly-mouthed, harsh, bitter man you had come to know. And if you had fallen for glimpses of his sweetness before, then you were quickly being catapulted off the edge into full on adoration. Into something deeper and much more dangerous. 

“Draco, please.” You moaned out, pushing your chest further into his touch, somehow already breathless and beating hard between your thighs for him. 

Of course, he thought. More. 

She deserves more. 

Draco moved the hand that was supporting himself to push into the mattress beside your waist, holding his weight there now. And then, he used his other hand to reach into the front of your dress. He felt lucky when you sighed with delight rather than revoking his permission to touch you, even though his fingers were cold and icy upon your breast as he moved the fabric of your dress and the cup of your bra off to the side. 

This left the deep V of the wrap sitting at your ribs, presenting one of your breasts to the open air, an absolutely beautiful sight as your nipple pebbled up with the coolness of the room. He didn’t leave the flesh cold for long before he cupped your breast with tender fingers and fed your nipple into his hot mouth, eagerly sucking - as though he could communicate better every tangled bit of emotion he felt for you with the intricate swirls of his tongue. 

“Draco!” 

You moaned and arched up into his mouth, encouraging him further to explore the beauty of your breast with his tongue. 

You surprised him slightly when you moved underneath him, parting your legs and moving to bracket your knees around his narrow hips. He couldn’t help but to moan against your breast when he felt the overwhelming heat of your core settle against his cock. Even through his trousers, with your dress pooling up around your waist, it was like feeling the morning sun kissing your face after opening the curtains. It was a wave of warmth that threatened to overtake him. 

Draco couldn’t hold back the instinctive movement, and he ground his hips downward, seeking more of that addictive heat, needing more of it on his hard, aching cock. He felt as though he had found liquid euphoria when you let out a crackling moan in response, the sound shaking everything inside of him that made him actually feel good for once. 

The feeling was enhanced when you threaded your fingers into his hair harder, your fingernails scraping across his scalp as your body echoed a natural response to him - you clamped your thighs down on his hips, trapping him there, and you began to grind yourself into the hardness of his cock, clearly needed more for yourself. 

He knew that he shouldn’t be allowed to have this - he shouldn’t be allowed to taint something as perfect as you. But he let himself continue to selfishly take, and take, and take more. He was a greedy brat, as he always had been, and he couldn’t bear to change his ways now. 

“Oh fuck, Draco.” You moaned out so sweetly. 

Draco pulled back, and began kissing along the side of your breast. 

“Shh, darling. I’ve got you. I’ve got you.” He said quietly, swallowing sharply, desperately trying to chug in more air. 

He had no clue when he had become so light-headed, but if you were the thing making him so dizzy, so distant from reality - then you were his fondest drug, and he was never going to let you go again. 

Draco descended then - he had the utmost urge to please you, to hear more of his name on your lips. 

A near feral groan escaped him when he finally caught a glimpse between your thighs. 

With that silver skirt pooled around your waist, he could see properly now - those black stockings that he already thought were too sinful now took on a whole new meaning in his realm of fantasies. You weren’t wearing any panties beneath the semi-transparent garment - the thick seam of the stockings was stuck to your wet cunt, dipping into your pussy right where he wanted to be; your wetness leaking right through the nylon and causing it to stick to your cunt, making it shiny and utterly perfect in the dimly lit space. 

Draco groaned from deep in his chest, his voice edging on whiny, even to his own ears. But he couldn’t bring himself to care about how pathetic he must have sounded. You were just too perfect. He was drawn in by the siren call of your perfect cunt, one hand with a thumb drawing circles on your hips and the other gently skimming fingers up the back of your clothed thigh as he scooted himself further down the mattress. 

He couldn’t resist the urge, when he leaned down, he latched his mouth onto your cunt through the wet, shiny fabric, unable to resist the pure need to taste your essence without taking off the stockings first. 

“Draco! Oh-!” 

You let out a needy moan, which only spurred Draco to suck harder, even tonguing sharply against your clit through the fabric. It created a sharp itch, a raging need - it was not enough contact, tedious and harsh and something that made a vicious, rolling ache inside of your cunt. You needed more. 

“Please, more!” 

Again - he would have been cruel to deny you. And though, up until this point, he had been a reluctant and unwilling paramour, he was nothing but a slave to you and your desires in those moments. 

Acting purely upon instinct, he raised his head slightly to give himself room to work and then brought fingers to the nylon fabric, trying to tear it apart. His head was filled with nothing but animal need now, bloated and high on the affection that he had been denying himself for months he had been unwillingly engaged to you. Months of denying that you were exactly what he needed, his other half - the other half of a lonely broken person clinging on that he had been so desperately trying to shake off. 

Draco let out a growl of frustration - his nails were blunt and dull and he slipped hopelessly against the wet fabric. Before it could truly be formed as a thought inside his mind, he leaned down and pressed his teeth into the stockings against your mound, right above your clit in a way that made you whimper from the contact. Then - he bit harshly into the fabric, tearing a small hole into it that he could then rip wider with his frantic hands. 

It made you gasp, being exposed to the cold air within seconds - feeling your hot, pulsing cunt quake as the cool air licked at every single bit of your wetness. It was a shocking turn-on, feeling the seam of your tights being so easily demolished, leaving you as nothing but a wanton, exposed gash from the bit of your pubic hair sticking out to the way the new edge of the fabric rubbed against your arsehole. 

Now, instead of being a gentle thing he had to protect or some stranger that he was trying to distance himself from - you were nothing but a hole for him to fuck. And you absolutely loved it. 

“Draco, please-” You gasped out again, feeling his fingers tickling against your thigh, feeling his breath still huffing out in harsh pants over your now bare pussy, waiting for him to do something more. 

You were struck by lighting when he latched onto your cunt, moaning just as loudly as you did when he was finally able to taste you, able to feel you completely unfiltered for the first time. 

You arched up wildly and your thighs quaked against his cheeks - he made little effort to hold you down, too busy selfishly enjoying your pussy now. He took in a deep breath against you, inhaling a greedy whiff of your scent so close to his nose while he gulped down a filthy slurp of your warm, wet pussy, moaning loudly from the back of his throat the whole time. You were so hot under his tongue - you were a heartbeat, a new breath, something so alive that he certainly shouldn’t have been allowed to drink from. 

But you were now his to freely feast upon, as if he wasn’t already spoiled enough by the world, tainted by the mangled silver spoon he had been gnawing on since his birth. 

“Draco, fuck! So good!” 

You wailed out, letting out sounds that Draco had never before heard, sounds he never thought you were capable of. Back at The Manor, even when you cried, you clearly tried to be conservative, stay quiet, not to be a bother. It was only now that Draco realised he had never truly witnessed you losing control of yourself. Even when you had faced down his father’s fury, you somehow stood tall and composed, an impeccable monument to emotional control. 

It was only now that he realised how truly badly he wanted to see you lose that control. 

He never thought of you as property, of course - but if you were so stubbornly intent on owning his heart, his emotions, his vulnerability - then he would get to own yours as well. He would get to own your weakness. He would get to own the single moments in life when you truly lost your composure. 

Draco set about devouring your cunt, keeping this mission in mind. He wrapped one arm around you from underneath your ass, holding you tightly to his face while he used the other hand to prop himself up slightly, pushing closer, easily getting lost in the beautiful heat of your pussy. He moaned against you as he drank you in, lavishing his tongue up and down your folds, intently focusing on the perfect little bead of your clit while it bounced and thrummed over his tongue. 

Your body sang for more of his attention, shaking like a signal for him as you were wracked with more uncontrollable moans. He heard more distant groans in his muffled ears and hardly attributed them to himself, getting too lost in you, enjoying your taste too much. He was far too intent on burying himself in the first warmth he had felt in years, now determined to shut out the cold and make a new home for himself between these perfect thighs. Especially if it meant making you moan like this more, hearing more of his cursed name on your precious lips. 

“Draco, Draco, oh, fuck! Draco, please!” 

At this point, you weren’t even entirely sure what you were begging for - for him to bring you to orgasm, for him to stop because it was so overwhelming, or for something else entirely. His name just felt so right on your lips. Somehow, he seemed to understand better, seemed to know something that even you didn’t. 

He rumbled out a hum of acknowledgement against your cunt, and then, snuck his free hand up between your thighs. He teased two fingers against your fluttering entrance, slippery and off-target for a moment with his shaking hand - making you moan out brokenly as you felt the touches not quite where you needed them most. 

“I’ve - I’ve got you, love,” 

He said, pulling away for a moment to gulp down breaths - feeling spiteful of the air, spiteful of the minimal space between the two of you; spiteful of the fact that he felt like he was drowning and somehow forcing himself further into you wasn’t the solution. 

“I’ve got you.” 

You curled your fingers into his hair again and tugged him close, pulling him back to your pussy, and he decided that he would never breathe again if that’s what you so desired. He swept a flat tongue across your pussy, eagerly gulping down more of your wetness while he gently pushed those two slender fingers forward, finally inside of you for the first time. 

Your heat was even more evident now, even more apt to drive him insane. Your pussy surrounding him turned his cold flesh warm within seconds, causing him to drive forward without even thinking, eagerly chasing more of that warmth against his touch. Part of his mind was thankful when you let out a beautiful moan in response and wiggled your hips closer to him, rather than feeling pain at the harsh, sudden, jabbing intrusion, and the other part of him selfishly didn’t care. 

You had offered this up to him, you had begged him not to turn away - and now, you would have to face the consequences of inviting a cold, dead beast into your den to feast. He was lonely, he hungered - he would consume everything good inside of you and leave you with nothing. And it would be your own damn fault. 

Draco moaned against your cunt again, feeling that hunger now more evidently than ever, and you squeaked and choked on the air as he began fingering you harshly. He was desperate to feel more warmth, to explore more of that velvet softness inside of you that he so badly wanted wrapped around his cock (nearly forgotten, throbbing, leaking into his pants and making a mess). But he somehow couldn’t think too much about his forgotten cock when your next words overtook his mind. 

“Close-” You breathed out, and then sucked in more air. “So close - gonna cum!” 

You were going to cum. 

You were going to become unravelled on his tongue. 

Draco moaned against you fervently, now wildly eager for this to happen. He suckled against your clit and harshly rubbed his tongue over that tortured little bead even more furiously. He continued to fuck you with his fingers while your thighs clamped around his head, further shutting out the world, allowing him to have a few precious moments where all those deadly responsibilities simply didn’t exist. In those moments - it was just you and him. It was just his own carnal greed, a man fucking his wife. Just the small precious world he had balanced on his bitter tongue. 

“Draco!” You choked out his name as your orgasm overtook your body. 

You arched up again, your body practically whipping to his whims, being played like an instrument that only he knew the songs to. With your fingers entwined harshly in his hair, holding him to a place he would never want to part from while he mauled your pussy - it was perfect. 

He moaned against you and nearly choked on the juices that he eagerly drank down, pumping his fingers into you with sharp jabbing motions, any effort toward technique completely gone. His mind was nothing but a pathetic soup of desperation, an animal clawing toward your warmth, determined to suck the life out of you and have it for his own. 

Your cries of pleasure turned into sobs as you were crested over the hill into overstimulation, and when Draco pulled away for a breath, you thought perhaps he might finally let up. That he might pull his fingers out of you and the two of you would simply take a quiet moment to breathe. 

But while your thighs continued to shake and you sucked in harsh breaths, his shoulders became tight with something utterly vicious, and he continued to stare down your pussy with rapt attention, some beast inside of him screaming out for more. More of the life you could give him, more warmth, more of everything he would ever demand from you that you had been so foolish in offering up. More of everything that you would never supply enough of to meet the bounds of his already dead soul. 

“Draco-” You gasped. “Too much, too-” 

“Please,” 

Draco begged in return for the first time that night, peering up the length of your body to look into your eyes with the most utterly pathetic glassy eyes you had ever seen. The moment he met your gaze, it became too much for the both of you - like a stab through the gut, a connection that had always been there being tugged in the most painful way. He quickly dropped his head, squeezing his eyes shut to further avoid this, pressing his forehead into your thigh as he continued to sharply spear his fingers into your pussy. This created sloppier, wetter sounds with each passing movement. 

“Please, please, please, please, please-” 

He pleaded so sweetly, yet so abrasively at the same time. Begging in a chant, in a way he never had for anything else in his life. 

And just like everything else in his life - he wasn’t denied of this. 

You strangled out another sound, and then you were seizing up again, squeezing his fingers tightly as you were slammed into another orgasm all too soon. You gulped for air like a mermaid on dry land, tears leaking out of the corners of your eyes due to how overwhelming it all was, feeling as though the entire world was squeezed tight around you in those moments. 

Draco held a sob tight in his chest as the unknown ‘more’ he had been looking for flooded over his palm - more of your wetness, more of your warmth. A wonderful flood of more that soaked across your thighs and made a small puddle on the mattress beneath you. He greedily dove down to lap it up, making your thighs clench around his head as he tongued your ultra sensitive entrance and even began using his fingers to drive more of it out of you and into his waiting mouth. 

After a few moments of this, you tangled shaking fingers into his hair and did your best to force him upward. Though your body was practically jelly now, almost as if you had been jinxed, and completely devoid of any strength. He did soon get the hint, and he laid a gentle kiss on your inner thigh as he slid his fingers out of you, making an oddly loud ‘squelching’ sound in the room. 

He trailed a few more kisses across your pelvis, revisited your breast, and went up your neck with his now very wet mouth before you pulled his mouth against your own. You couldn’t help but to moan quietly in satisfaction at the taste of your pussy on his tongue. 

Draco thought this might be the end of it. His own cock was even more nagging now - rubbing against the warm, inviting plushness of your thigh through his pants. It was even more annoying now that he intimately knew the warmth and wetness of your cunt. That he could so perfectly imagine what it would be like to slide his cock inside of you and feel that perfect, hot wetness surrounding him. 

But part of him, something in the back of his mind was screaming: bad idea. Something persistent and loud was telling him that he didn’t deserve to fuck you. That this should be a worship, only about you - he’d had his selfish moment, it was over now. 

An alarming clarity was rocketing back into his head as he continued to kiss you. 

It was an alarm that blared ever louder when you reached for his belt. 

He snapped away from your lips and looked down, frozen with hesitant shock now as you slipped the belt out of the buckle and reached for the zipper on his pants. When you felt him tense up, and saw the grimace forming across his features, you paused with your fingers grazing lightly over the zipper’s teeth. 

“It’s your turn now, right?” 

You breathed lightly against his cheek, your voice so sweet, so perfect. You were too damn perfect. You snuck your hand down to grope his cock through the fabric of his pants in a way that made him shudder. Oddly enough, that selfish streak didn’t creep back in. 

“Come on, Draco. I want this too. I want your cock inside me so damn badly-” 

This was about you. Your needs. Your wants. 

Draco tried his best to push aside any hesitation, trying to push the world back out again. He wished he could just crawl back between your thighs and live there. But you wanted something different now. Something that meant a lot more. Something that might have bigger consequences than simply spilling a beautiful mess on his jacket that was crumpled beneath your perfect arse. 

He sat up on his knees, shucking away your hands and replacing them with his own, getting the zipper down by himself. Finally, he got his cock out, the hard smoothness now resting against his fingers that were still slick with you. He pumped his cock a few times, almost numb to the pleasure of it - he was supposed to be enjoying this, right? Why the hell couldn’t he? 

Because his damn mind had turned back on. 

You looked up at him with wide eyes, anticipating, your skin glistening with a slight sheen from his earlier efforts, your lips kiss-swollen. And somehow, a terrible flurry of thoughts attacked his mind like the snow storm raging outside the stone walls of the castle. Horrible things all able to get in now that he didn’t have the fatal projection of your thighs around his ears, keeping the world out. 

As you looked up at him, more angelic than ever with your kiss-bitten lips, your silver sparkle dress askew, revealing your smooth skin and your goddess-like body - Draco, with his hard cock in hand, was persistently reminded of one stupid thing. The reason that the two of you had been forced together in the first place. 

The only reason any pureblood marriage is arranged: to carry on the pureblood line. To breed - to make more pureblood babies.

Draco found himself curling in disgust at the idea that this was what he was about to do. He was about to give into their whims, about to curse you even further with the evil of his name by fucking a little Malfoy into your belly. 

Somehow, out of all the evil he had so carelessly committed himself to - this was something he just couldn’t bring himself to do. Not when he would be doing it to you. 

“Draco-” 

You breathed out his name again, concerned by the clear warring on his face. You were about to tell him that it was okay if he didn’t want to continue - and you became deeply confused by what he did next. 

He gripped his cock tightly and began rocking his arm back and forth, quickly picking up an urgent, break-neck pace as he jerked his cock - his face twisting with an expression of near pain as he circled a tight fist over his cock, urgently, again and again. 

“Draco-?” You tried to question him, but he let out a groan in response. 

“Look at me.” He choked out. 

Zapped by the electricity in the air, the sharp demanding in his words, your eyes flew right to his. You found yourself almost possessed by the emotions lingering there - lust, regret, hatred. 

You had a distinct feeling that it wasn’t directed at you. 

“It’s okay.” You breathed out, reaching out to put a gentle hand on his clothed thigh. “It’s okay, Draco.” 

These simple words - this tiny pacification that Draco had never before received - he broke. Your gentleness tore through his body like a dragon tearing into a fresh kill. It wounded him in a way that insults never could. 

He let out a strangled cry, and unexpectedly, his orgasm punched through his gut - tears flooded his eyes as weak spurts of cum flowed out of his cock, making a mess of his fist as he slowed his touch. His release dripped down to ruin his pants, and weakly splashed against the bareness of your inner thighs were the hole in your tights gaped open, smearing onto the nylon in some spots. 

When Draco was sure that he had wrung the last bits of weak pleasure from his cock, he fell on top of you. It was something entirely against his will, as he was now all too weakened by your soothing words, your soft touch, your welcoming eyes that seemed far too forgiving toward him. With his face tucked against your breast, tired and unable to hold it back any longer - he began to sob. 

It was a dam broken from months, possibly years - a mask that he had been putting on long before you had ever known him. 

It was an inherent shock to your system, going from that lustful tingle to feeling nothing but shock and pity for him. But you did the only thing you could do - you cradled the back of his head, holding him close, petting a hand down his heaving back in an attempt to comfort him while he wailed so harshly. You knew that it was what he needed. And it was what he had done for you all too many times since meeting you. 

“Hey, it’s okay.” 

You assured him, not entirely sure that he heard your gentle voice over the sound of his own sobs - your throat too sore from your own previous wrecked moaning to try and speak up any louder. 

“It’s okay. Shh. Just let it out. I’m here with you. It’s okay, Draco.” 

It went on like that for what felt like hours. Your previously sex heated skin became cold in the room once again, distinctly reminding you of every single spot that was ripped open and exposed by your already weather inappropriate outfit. But instead of getting up to attend to this, you simply laid there, soothing him, trying to comfort him as his chest-racking sobs lulled down into calmer cries and then died off into sniffles. 

You thought he might say something - thank you, apologise. 

You were even further surprised when his sounds switched again, and a low chuckle came from his throat. A small sound that quickly hitched into an epic, near maniacal laughter, puffing against your breast as he tried his hardest to heave himself up on weak arms, tearing out of your comforting touch. 

He looked utterly broken - his previously near hair a complete mess, falling across his sweat streaked forehead, his teeth bared, laughing so tiredly with tears streaking down from his now red, puffy eyes. 

“Merlin - I’m so fucking pathetic, aren’t I?” He choked out. 

“You’re not.” You argued, your voice dull and hoarse but still firm in your conviction. 

You wanted him to know that it was okay to cry. That under his circumstances, anybody would have snapped a lot sooner than he had. 

He didn’t reply, but instead moved to get off you entirely. He stumbled on his feet for a moment as he stood up and began straightening out his clothes, finding his wand and muttering some cleaning spells to deal with the mess he had left on his pants. 

You sat up then, your back now quite sore from the poor quality of the abandoned old mattress. And from having Draco stiff on top of you for so long, and you began doing the same to yourself. He watched quietly as you righted your clothes and did a few simple (talented, wandless) cleaning spells of your own, and then finally, he spoke. 

“You should leave.” 

He said quietly, moving to turn away from you completely as he tucked his shirt back into his pants. He was likely going to slip into the confusing maze of furniture that he knew better than you did in order to lose you - to avoid further conversation. 

“No.” 

You baulked out defiantly, making an effort to heave your stiff body up to standing level in order to look him in the eye. 

“You can’t keep doing that!” You shouted at his back, growing frustrated once again. “You can’t keep running away from a conversation every time it gets a little too serious for you!” 

“What do you expect that I do, then?” Draco asked, his voice strained with fatigue and heaviness, his throat worn out from the tears, his eyes still red and exhausted when he whipped around to face you. 

“Stay.” You offered weakly. 

You knew that in one simple word, you were asking too much of him. You were putting such a grand task onto him that he could barely surmount to. 

His chin quivered as he bit his lip, swallowing down the weakness of the confession: 

I can’t. 

He wanted to be good enough for you. 

But he wasn’t. He just wasn’t. 

He wasn’t some perfect harbor you could cling to in a storm. He was a heavy iron anchor sinking you to your drowning death. 

Feeling all of his bitterness swelling in the air, something truly defiant came up inside of you. A deep urge to defy everything he thought he was, everything his parents had painted into him that made him run from you the moment you treated him like a person. 

You would not have a marriage where your husband held you at arm’s length. Even if you had to strangle him, smother him with your good intentions in order to get him close. 

“Draco, please, I lov-” 

“No.” Draco choked out, cutting you off, dreading hearing those words. “Don’t.” 

It wasn’t true. 

You were tied to him by force. 

You were someone bought into his life through gold and cruelty, someone forced to be by his side. 

If you loved him, it was as a prisoner loves their cell. 

He wouldn’t let you waste those words on him. 

You let out a harsh sigh and shook your head, wanting to scream. But you knew that he was far too used to screaming - used to harshness, frustration. He wasn’t prepared for the thing you needed to give him most. You swallowed thickly around the lump in your throat, and whispered your next words as a cursed promise into the chilled air: 

“I love you, Draco.” 

He sucked in a rattling breath, and it only took him a moment to find the strength to fight back. 

“You don’t mean that.” 

He said, shaking his head forcefully at you, once again resisting the urge to turn around and slink off. He wanted to slither away and hide from you like the serpent that he was - cold blooded, alone, a creature of the shadows who previously never needed your warmth. 

“Shut up!” 

You barked back, surprising him with the passion, the fury that lit up your face as you rambled into your next declaration. 

“Draco Lucius Malfoy - you may think that you know everything, but I can assure you, you do not.” 

He wanted to argue, even opened his mouth to do so, but you rolled right over his breath, speaking in such a powerful way that demanded he quiet down and simply listen. 

“Your family may have bought me to marry you like some kind of broodmare, you may be rich and respected, you may be some fancy highborn pureblood - you can tell me what to wear, when to speak, where to go, but you certainly cannot tell me about my own thoughts and intentions. You cannot tell me what I feel.” 

You spoke sharply and firmly, your words tearing right through him, causing goosebumps to light up all over his skin. 

“You cannot tell me what I do and don’t mean. And I mean this: I love you.” 

The radical truth behind your words shook Draco to his core. 

Since he had known you, it had always been the truth. When you cried, it had always been with your own honesty. When you smiled at him, it had never been as some kind of act. When you called him an asshole during your private conversations - it was nothing but your own honest feelings coming to words. 

He could never control or dictate your feelings, and it was one of the things that he liked best about you. 

So why did he so badly want to control this? 

Perhaps because… when you said this, it sealed your fate to his in the worst of ways. 

It meant that even if you had a chance to escape this life… you wouldn’t take it. 

It was so much easier when you didn’t like him at all. 

Love was such a foolish, difficult thing to sever. 

You saw the pain and hesitation written all over his face, and you stepped toward him, putting a gentle hand on his cheek. Oh-so-gently you sealed your lips against his in a sweet kiss that evoked nothing but more tears from him. 

“I love you.” 

You whispered against his mouth, now much more certain in your declaration. 

“I love you. I love you, I love you, I love you,” 

Your throat clenched with your own tears, clearly waiting for him to say it back. 

His fingers shook as he brought a gentle touch to your cheek, wiping away a tear that had fallen. Sullenly, all he could offer you in return was: 

“Are you sure? Are you sure that you can love someone like me?” 

You were entirely certain in your answer. 

“Yes.” 

Draco itched with the urge to run away again - but instead, he leaned back in and kissed you. 

That night, the two of you fell asleep together. You were huddled into each other for warmth, cuddling on the thin old mattress that he had been sleeping on for the past week in order to escape you. It was the easiest that sleep had come to him since the days during the summer where you had crawled into his bed, looking to be just a bit less alone. 

… 

Ironically, Draco woke up alone. 

Sunshine was flooding the room - he wasn’t entirely sure how a room that technically didn’t exist within Hogwarts could have windows, but he didn’t care to think too much about it. Especially because it made him feel slightly less disoriented to have the bright morning sun flooding the room. Though the sunshine warmed up the room slightly, he still felt a bitter coldness in not having you beside him. 

Perhaps you had finally realised what a stupid mistake you had made the night before. Perhaps you had taken your own advice - taken up on your own plan and gotten to a fireplace to abandon Hogwarts altogether. With any luck, you were far away and would never be seen again. Not by him or anybody else associated with the Dark Lord. 

Draco felt a pinch of disappointment when he heard footsteps - calm, certain, someone walking a path among the furniture to be somewhere. Not someone wandering with curiosity because they had just discovered the room. It had to be you. 

He sucked in a harsh breath and let out a groan as his tired body stretched, his muscles protesting the shabby sleeping arrangements as he forced himself to sit up. Surely enough, as he blinked through the sharpness of the morning light, you rounded the corner. 

You were dressed much differently than the night before. Your previously neat hair was now a half-picked apart and messy style, your make-up mostly smeared off or intentionally wiped off in a haste. You were wearing a thick woollen jumper and a pair of comfortable looking loose pants, along with your favourite slippers - a pair of very fuzzy boots that he had laughed at you for wearing before, called them dead Puffskeins attached to your feet. 

You looked tired, but comfortable as you came to sit on the mattress at Draco’s hip. 

Somehow, with the golden light dancing on your skin, you looked more beautiful than ever. Perhaps it was a testament to the nature of your beauty, how sought after you would be if you weren’t already betrothed. Or perhaps it was that petulant withering thing inside of him that was starting to wane in the name of your death sentence of love. 

(Draco didn’t want to think about the fact that you likely were sought after, despite the fact that you were engaged and it was widely known. He just didn’t have his head in the Hogwarts gossip enough these days to notice if anybody was talking about fancying you or trying to ‘steal you away’ from him. He didn’t want to think about the prats he would have hexed to hell and back if he ever heard them daring to want you.) 

You took something out of the pocket of your jumper - a napkin, and unravelled it in your lap. Draco saw that you had come back with a couple of pumpkin tarts, likely from the breakfast table. It was only when you brought it up to your lips to take a sip that he also noticed you had also been carrying a large mug of steaming tea. 

You offered him the mug silently over your shoulder, and he couldn’t deny how appealing it was. Though he wanted to scoff at the softness, the domesticity of sharing something off your lips, he welcomed the heat and the familiarity. He couldn’t reject it in the wintery coldness of the room. 

Of course - English Breakfast Tea with just a bit of sugar. No milk. You had started drinking your tea the way he liked it. Probably because it was the way he always made it for you when you were silent and stony in your pain and he had no other choice but to be just as silent in his caring toward you. He always made tea for you this way because you never told him how you liked yours. Every cup of tea you drank at The Manor had been like this. 

It was an odd, comforting habit that you had picked up from him. 

“I fixed it.” You said quietly, nodding toward The Cabinet as you broke off a piece of one of your tarts and chewed it. 

You offered him a piece and he swapped it for the tea mug. He chewed the small piece of tart slowly while his eyes studied the tall, dark, imposing Cabinet, wondering what you had done to it. His gaze migrated over to something new in the landscape of junk - a bird cage sitting on top of a small wooden table. 

Within it, there was a live, seemingly content, purring white dove. In front of the cage, you had perched up a piece of paper. Even from a few feet away, Draco recognised the curls of the handwriting as belonging to his mother. 

‘Well done.’ 

He wanted to ask in detail about what you had done to The Cabinet in order to fix it. But he knew that would be beating a dead horse. It was another problem off his plate, and he should be relieved. 

He wouldn’t burden you with any of his other problems. 

“I miss coffee.” You remarked, looking down into the mug with a sodden kind of resentment. “British people are all about tea, tea, tea… you can’t get good coffee anywhere here.” 

Distantly, Draco was reminded that you had been cursed with more than a marriage to him when your godmother dropped you off with the Malfoys and left you without warning. Your entire life, everything you had known, everything you had grown up with - it had all been ripped away from you. He wasn’t sure what he would do if he had to be pulled away from his parents, plopped into the middle of Muggle America and forced to live there. 

He knew it wasn’t just coffee - you likely missed so much more. 

“Should we release it?” You asked, taking another sip of the tea. 

You held out another piece of the tart to him, and reluctantly, perhaps not even knowing how hungry he was, how much the anxiety and worry had blocked him from feeling it - he took it. 

“What?” He muttered out, unsure what you meant. 

“The dove.” You clarified. 

Yes. Of course. You still had pity for the small creatures. It had been meant as nothing more than a test subject for his family’s greater plans, nothing but a pawn to them. But you still saw it as a precious life. 

“No, it-” 

‘It’ll die out there in the cold.’ 

Draco cut himself off, knowing that such harsh words would have hurt you. Any time before this, he would not have cared about how his words hurt you - he would have simply told you the truth. But for some reason, now - it felt wrong to be so bluntly cruel. 

“Too cold.” He muttered, accepting the tea from you again. 

You stared him down during this passing of the mug, and he was fully able to see that pain glinting in your eyes. Clearly, you knew that ‘disposing’ of the bird might be the only humane thing to do. Draco scrambled for something more. Something to make you happy. Damn it. 

“Bring it to the giant.” He remarked, swallowing down a mouthful of the hot tea. “He’ll care for it now, and he can release it in the spring.” 

The smile that graced your lips was small, and fleeting - but it made him feel as though he had accomplished something worthwhile for the first time in a long time. 

“Do you think he will? It won’t be too much trouble?” You replied, hopeful. 

“He has to. It’s his job.” Draco bit back firmly, his voice swelling full of his usual entitlement. 

Before - when you had been helping him clean up after he had gotten The Mark, you had discovered one of the fading scars he still had from the feathered beast’s claws slashing across his arm. When you had asked him about it, you had clearly been expecting some story of his father’s abuse, or a tale of something else attributing to Draco’s twisted internal torment. 

But Draco’s father was always smart enough never to leave marks. 

When he told you what had happened - how he had rushed upon such a gentle creature, reeking of entitlement and landed on his stupid idiot brat arse - it was the first time in years that he had truly reflected on what had happened. It was the first time he had come to realize that he had gotten the beast killed. Even back then, he was unsure why his father had caused such a fuss over the accident. Someone who called Draco useless and disposable behind closed doors and publicly claimed that a single mark on his arm was a world-ending tragedy. 

At the time, it was just another thing about reputation that Draco had yet to understand. 

“And - he likes those things. He likes his little creatures.” He added on quietly. 

(And, his big awful ones - Draco resisted the urge to amend.) 

Draco couldn’t take your bird there himself. Hagrid owed him no favors, that much he knew. But the man - or, half-man - certainly wouldn’t turn you down. Nobody would say no to your sweet voice and kind eyes when you asked them for something. 

You nodded, content with this answer. You took another sip of the tea before you put the cup down on the floor beside the mattress, and shoved a large piece of the tart into your mouth before you put that aside too. 

“For now, I have to bury this one.” 

You said, your words slightly muffled as you chewed, getting up to grab a small wooden box. In a moment, Draco realised that it must have been the dead canary that you had fussed over the night before. 

Now, you were telling him that you intended to bury it, rather than asking him. 

“I’ll do it.” He said, standing up to come beside you, holding out his hand so that you might offer him the box. 

You looked him up and down with suspicion, like he was trying to trick you. Although, as much as your relationship had been filled with bickering and discontent, he had never been dishonest with you. This just seemed strangely out of character for him. Before you could fully question it, he provided an explanation. 

“You’ve been awake all night fixing my problems,” He said, motioning toward The Cabinet. “So let me help you with yours.” 

He could see that you had barely slept. It was written all over you. 

“Let me do this for you.” He insisted, holding his hand out once again. “And you go to the dorms and get some proper rest.” 

You nodded, finally surrendering the box. 

“Come find me when you’re done, alright?” You said, not entirely posing it as a question. “Don’t disappear on me again.” 

Draco nodded, and you sealed this deal with a kiss. 

…

He intended to walk you back to the Slytherin commons before he went outside, perhaps he would even get himself a thicker jacket from his dorm. Your path took the two of you past the Great Hall. 

Draco felt a pang on one of his last nerves when a very familiar voice called out your name. 

“Y/N! Hey, wait up!” 

Potter. Of course. 

You turned to meet Harry as he ran down the corridor toward you, and Draco slinked back to lean against one of the nearby walls - waiting for you. He hated that he felt the need to stick by you, to watch over you. But something nagging in him wouldn’t be satisfied until he knew that you were tucked into bed, resting. 

Potter jogged to meet you, wearing full Quidditch gear, carrying his broom - clearly set for an early morning practice. This caused an odd pang of mourning within Draco, yearning for a time when he used to be competitive, for when he used to actually care about the outcomes of school Quidditch games. Back when his life was so simple. 

“Morning, Harry.” You greeted him quietly, dully, obviously still tired. 

“Hey, good morning.” Harry said, nodding at you with a smile - a look way too fond for Draco’s liking. “You left the party so suddenly last night, and Slughorn was asking after you. Nobody knew where you went, and I was just wondering - are you alright? Did something happen?” 

Harry eyed Draco sharply, a sideways glance, just for a moment. Clearly, he was suspicious of Malfoy and his presence around you. Clearly believing that he was the problem in your life. 

Draco resisted the urge to roll his eyes. Of course. Saint Potter. Checking up on you. 

Part of Draco itched with jealousy, knowing just how utterly desirable you were, and another part of him said that it was a good thing. That you should have somewhere safe to fall when you inevitably realised a life with him was a short, unlivable one. When you wanted out, when you wanted to run. 

Hopefully, sometime soon. 

“I’m fine.” You easily lied, forcing a smile. “It’s just - um,” You struggled to think of a convenient lie for a moment, knowing that you couldn’t tell Harry the truth. “My pet canary died very suddenly. And Draco came to get me to tell me about it. And I’m sorry, I must look terrible - I’ve been up all night crying about it,” 

Draco wanted to commend you for the brilliance of your lie. Something sensitive enough that Potter wouldn’t question it - something that easily explained the small box in Draco’s hands and explained away your tired appearance. And it more than explained why you had left the party so suddenly and not cared to return. 

“Oh.” Harry said, clearly unsure how to respond. His eyes flickered from you to Draco, taking in both of your messy appearances, clearly wanting to question it as something more, but having absolutely no grounds to do so. “I’m so sorry to hear that.” 

“Thank you.” You replied quietly. “Draco actually offered to bury him for me. So, he was just going to do that.” 

“Let’s get you to bed, first, love.” Draco said, pointedly steering you away from the conversation - banishing Potter off with this final thought. 

He put a hand on your shoulder and steered you down the hall, away from Harry, and you began slowly walking away, believing that he was right behind you. But Harry stayed firm in his footing, and soon, Draco became captured in his fierce gaze, challenged in an all too familiar way that he was far too tired to truly engage with. In a kind of well practiced routine, he lingered back for a few moments. 

“Malfoy,” Potter said sharply. “If you do anything to hurt her, I will end you.” 

It was his usual hero routine. Intimidate, swell with confidence, over-inflate to seem bigger than the bad guy. It would have worked, if Draco hadn’t already been so terribly small. 

“Promise?” Draco croaked out quietly, tears dancing in his eyes. 

He could think of no better end than one of vengeance in the wake of your pain. He could only hope that if he did ever hurt you, he would be met with a clean, swift end. One where you would then get to run into the arms of a man much better than him. 

Potter gaped with confusion, and Draco turned, walking in quick steps to catch up with you. 

…

You and Draco stayed at Hogwarts that Christmas. 

On Christmas morning, you did not expect to receive anything. Pansy gifted you a set of new quills in pink with a set of pink glittering inks and a fluttering giggle about being able to write ‘proper’ love letters to Draco. Blaise gifted you a history of all the Pureblood families in Europe - for ‘proper’ education. One that you had never been ‘privileged’ to have before. 

There was another package, delivered by a gorgeous white snowy owl - a book. A basic guide to Quidditch with a handwritten note that said it was from Harry, remarking that you should come to his next game and ‘check it out’, in order to see if you truly liked the sport or not. 

At the party, you had told him that you probably didn’t like Qudditch because you didn’t understand it very well, hoping to get out of a long conversation that he and Cormac were rambling on - which only led to him trying to explain the rules to you in a toddler-like fashion. You couldn’t tell him the truth, that when you had been at Salem, the Quidditch games between the two sibling schools usually led to a lot of loud parties and drunken hook-ups that made you mourn for the simplicity of your old life now. 

Draco resisted the urge to throw the book into the fire. 

(You gladly would have let him.) 

There was a final package. One wrapped in gorgeous emerald paper - with your name on it, written in Draco’s handwriting. Oddly, not signed from him. When you opened it, you found a bag of very expensive looking coffee beans, a grinder, and a French press. Draco would forever deny that his joy was directly tied to the look of awe on your face as you discovered the gifts, and the tiny moan of pleasure you made when you sipped your first cup of freshly made coffee. 

He didn’t love you back. 

He couldn’t. 

No.

...

A/N: This is meant to be a standalone oneshot, but if you liked this, then feel free to go read the chronological sequel My Bleeding Heart. I do have more ideas to add more to this by writing more oneshots in this universe between these two characters, but this is all for now. If you are going to comment, please comment about the content that has already been written instead of asking for more. Happy reading, and Merry Christmas!

[randomusingsofalovesickgirl]

BACK TO FRIENDS: PUB QUIZ

masterlist

a/n: can be read standalone, or as a blurb prior to the back to friend series! || also not fully proofread lol

🎶 with you by aly & aj 🎶 you are in love by taylor swift

You were already two shots in, but you swore you were losing it already. 

“What do you mean we have to get someone to call us snookums?” You whispered, scandalised at the ridiculous task. Vik, Cole, and Arthur shared the horrified expression, already scheming on how to get someone–anyone–to call you that.

As the only team of four in a room full of trios, you’d been forced to take enough shots to render each of you tipsy enough prior to the game starting. It was “to level the playing field”, Simon claimed. But a secret challenge involving the word snookums? Surely, that was disadvantageous enough. No one ever said that word naturally, not even ironically. 

While the boys huddled over Plan A (which was currently convincing Chip to call Arthur snookums instead of pookie), you scanned the room in search for a Plan B. 

Becky may be down, as an act of female solidarity in a room full of men. Or maybe Harry–he was your first friend in the Sidemen, and he’d jokingly call you “sugarplum” and “babycakes” on  more than one occasion. You thought of–

“What are you thinking about?” George whispered, sliding across the bar sofa until your thighs touched. 

You lifted your chin dramatically, looking the opposite way with a faux scoff. “Sorry, I don’t fraternise with the enemy.” 

He nudged you with his shoulder, a shit-eating grin plastered all over his face. “C’mon.” 

You turned, already feeling the heat creep into your cheeks. You tried not to let your eyes wander to his bare chest and stared him down instead, raising your brows. “You’d like to know, huh?”

“Why would I ask if I didn’t want to know?”

Damn him. He was always so quick witted. It was something you admired so much, but you’ve absolutely hated being on the receiving end of it. 

He glanced at your glass, and then back at you; that same teasing grin softening into something gentler. Your face must’ve given you away; you’re very much gone right now. 

The two of you got locked into a silent and unofficial staring content, until a strand of your hair fell across your face. 

“You okay there?” He laughed, brushing the hair away without thinking. He was so close. All you had to do was lean in. But instead…you giggled. 

Too aware of the cameras around you. 

Too aware that people are watching. 

Too aware that, at this very moment, someone in a scuba suit was dropping random objects into a fish tank to see if they’d float—because this was, technically, still a game night. 

You leaned your head on his shoulder instead. His hand found your hair, patting it softly. He chuckled again, and you could feel his chest shake under you. His warmth was addictive, especially in the London winter—maybe more intoxicating than the alcohol.

“Boo!” Arthur screamed suddenly, calling attention to how close you were. Cole slid in, dragging you off George with exaggerated offense. “Stop trying to cheat, you copycat! You infiltrator!”

George, ever the performer, threw his hands up and donned a thick accent. “Alright, alright, you caught me!”

Still, his eyes lingered on you as he scooted closer to his team. And that wouldn’t be the last time your team had to intercept him. He kept trying to sneak over—whisper a joke, make a snide remark, drop a comment he just had to share. Like magnets, you found yourselves drifting closer and closer—nearly holding hands, but never quite letting ourselves go there.

Eventually, Cole gave up on separating the two of you and swapped seats with you.

An hour in, the alcohol's fog had partially lifted. “I’m going to get another drink. You guys want anything?”

You gathered orders, then slipped out of the booth—stretching with relief.

“I’ll come with,” George said casually, turning to ask his team the same.

While waiting for him, you continued to stretch your sore muscles, before a warm hand rested gently at the small of your back. “Let’s go.”

You expected him to drop his hand once he got your attention. He didn’t.

“Your usual drink?” George asked as you reached the bar.

“Do you even know it?” you teased.

He smirked, winked, and rattled off your go-to to the bartender—along with his own and your team’s. He noticed. 

You pouted. “So I didn’t need to come.”

“But I wanted you to.”

The bar was practically empty—booked out for the shoot—but the two of you were so close, almost as if a real crowd was pressing in.

You deflected. “Looks like your team’s losing.”

George rolled his eyes. “Don’t get cocky now.” He reached up to brush another stray hair from your face. “We’re only a few points behind.”

Your eyes flicked to his lips.

Part of you felt your tipsy self slowly leaning in, but the sober part of you held yourself back. 

“Call me snookums,” you blurted, grounding yourself in the stupid challenge. You leaned back against the counter. “Please.”

George’s brow rose. “Is that your challenge?” He chuckled, remembering how close Chip was to making you lose. 

You shushed him with a finger to your lips. He laughed. 

Drinks in hand, he guided you back with a steadying hand at your back. He didn’t bother sitting far from you—thanks to Cole for not reclaiming the seat closest to the other team.

“Why the fuck is Danny still shirtless?” you asked loudly, slouching onto the sofa, sipping your drink while chaos continued to unfold in the background. The other teams heard what you said, joining in. His teams only defense? “He likes it”. 

George laughed too, equally baffled. “Snookums, he just likes it!” he said, repeating the sentiment. 

Your eyes widened. Your team high-fived under the table. Simon winked at you in acknowledgement of succeeding your secret challenge. 

Once you were sure that Simon’s attention was back on the challenge at the front of the bar, where Danny was trying to get a balloon into a bucket with a spray bottle out for an extra point, you gave George a quick kiss on the cheek. “Thank you.”

“I know how competitive you are,” he said, his voice low, “and I always beat you at everything anyway… so figured I’d give you this one.”

You smiled—soft, helpless. You couldn’t help it.

“How’re you getting home?” he asked, his arm casually draped over the couch behind you.

You groaned. “Probably Uber, or something. Ysa isn’t able to pick me up. She’s at Brad’s. They’re seeing his parents tomorrow.”

“I’ll take you,” George said, like it was obvious.

You leaned into him, your head heavy with alcohol-fuelled tiredness. “Wanna stay over?”

George grinned. “Yeah. But we’re stopping at mine first to get some stuff.”

You shook your head. “Still have the extra toothbrush. Your clothes, too.” Last time he came over, he essentially created a permanent stayover bag that you stored away for safekeeping…although George has caught you borrowing the shirt he left behind a few times.

He beamed. “Movie night?”

Shaking your head, you proposed something else: “Doctor Who marathon.” 

Eventually, the pub quiz ended. People slowly started filtering out; some loudly announcing their departure, while others left without a goodbye. 

You lingered with Becky, Tobi, Ethan, and Harry around the stage. 

“Faith’s calling. I gotta go,” Ethan announced, hugging everyone. “Come by soon. Olive’s missing her godmother. She’s getting too much of her ridiculous asses of godfathers.” He eyed Tobi and Harry, who both threw their hands defensively in the air. 

You smiled, “I’ll come by sometime this next week. Sorry, work has been exhausting.” 

Becky chuckled, “How is work going though? I can’t imagine juggling all that with your content.” 

You shrugged, “Luckily, it’s marketing so my content actually gives the company more exposure.” 

You were one of the few in your group still working a 9-to-5. Your parents always said to keep something stable—and maybe they were right. It’s a contingency plan, for sure. 

“What time are you guys heading?” Tobi clapped his hands, “I think that’s my sign to go home too.” 

Harry and Becky jokingly boo-ed him. “One more drink?” Becky proposed, Harry nodding.

“I’ll stay, but I won’t drink.” Tobi gave in, turning to you to see if you were going to do the same. He secretly wanted you to say no, your ability to stand without support being questionable at the moment. 

“I’m leaving soon.” You answered, shaking your head to let them know you weren’t going to get a drink. 

“Your loss, babygirl.” Harry shrugged, making you cringe, much to his laughter.

You cringed,  “So you would call me babygirl, but not snookums?” 

“George can do that for you.” Harry winked, before Becky and him headed to get another drink. 

Your eyes flicked towards the door where George was saying goodbye to Arthur Hill, likely telling him that he’ll be home tomorrow. You dropped your head onto Tobi’s shoulder, both of you leaning against the pub stage. The two of you stayed in comfortable silence. 

“I think I like him.” You mumbled, saying the words for the second time outloud. The first was to your roommate, who gloated ‘I knew it!’ 

He didn’t say anything at first. He didn’t have to. He saw it. Everyone saw it.

“Uh huh.” 

“Like, really like him.” 

Tobi looked over, debating saying something until he realised George was on his way to you now; Arthur Hill having left with Arthur TV.  He didn’t need to hear George tell him that he liked you; that confession was in his eyes. Every time George looked at you, it was like you put the stars in the sky.

With George next to you now, you stood up to your feet. His arm snaked around your waist like it was where it belonged.

“Tobi, we need to do real trivia with these idiots,” George said. “We’ll crush them.”

“You wish,” you said, stepping back in mock offense, but he pulled you back in again.

Tobi rolled his eyes. “You two better leave now or Becky’s gonna trap you with another drink.”

You and George each gave him a quick hug goodbye before George’s arm found you again—drunk enough to drop his guard, and sober enough to mean every bit of it.

------------------------------------------------------------------------------

taglist: @rubyskies@edgyficuselastica@gmontaguesbitch@sundarksposts@canyouseethesainz@lovingaphroditesworld@maggie-readss@liz140569@lmaowhathaha @moofilms @lalisasrealwife@courtjjade@bowielovesyou@raekensluver @cuntessaii @theresglittleronthefloor@isabelle-2934@smzyyx@wroetominter@madforgeorge@megan-jane02@lottiewills@cheesystylesig@suspicious-stain-in-spain@kneelforloki@wherethezoes-at@clarkey4life

[reveluving]

till kingdom come; bucky barnes x reader

summary: the missus comes home to her two, oddly identical needy sweethearts.

warnings: implied s~mut (minors DNI!), sweet & touchy Bucky (established relationship), Reader can be an Avenger/with a Z or a standalone vigilante (also your choice if she has powers or not!), loads of Alpine moment because we love the dear girl, loads of bantering, not much Thunderbolts* spoilers I think!

a/n: brought to you by @navybrat817 because 'a kindred spirit' just warmed my soul from the inside out, and this was kinda inspired by her fic, was gonna make it a s~mut but I blanked out at the end. STILL, I am so willing to hear all the spicy details you might've imagined them doing (literally desperate), so don't be shy on me!! please enjoy, take care & don’t forget to leave some sugar! ᐠ( ᐛ )ᐟ

fancy reading something new? check out my full m.list!

» implied s~mut includes: desperate & touchy Bucky tearing your top off and touching your tits, because he needs you so :((

'The sight that never failed to cause a stutter in his heart, the butterflies in his stomach, however one could describe their beloved, even if words failed to express their very being.' ;

Seeing Alpine after a day's work, or in this case, weeks' worth of work, was always a soothing balm to your soul, and the same could be said for the white feline.

Her tail standing up straight, almost doing her little signature 'tippy-taps' on the foyer floor as she greeted you at the door, staring up at you with her bright blue eyes.

"Hello," You greeted with a lilt upon closing the door behind you, placing your bag down to lift the sweet girl in your arms, "How's my silly lil' girl?" 

Alpine let out a little 'mrrp!', kneading at your top.

“Yeah? Were you behaving for daddy dearest?” You asked with the name you knew Bucky pretended not to like, as if you wouldn't catch the little tug at the corner of his lips each time you would use it.

Alpine tilted her head, the cutie, as if taking a playful offence for even asking her that.

“You're right, you're always behaving, aren't you? Unlike him.” You teased, bringing her close to your face.

Immediately, the sweet cat nuzzled into your face like it was her only chance. Purring up a storm and tickling your nose to ensure you really had her scent, especially considering how long you have been away.

“Oh, I know, I missed you, too,” You cooed, nuzzling back and letting the ball of fluff heal you inside out with her motorboat purrs the same way you would ease her mind with your presence, “Sweet girl, best girl!”

You both are.

Bucky thought to himself, having heard your return, your little tease of calling him ‘daddy dearest’, and your little reunion of snuggles and kisses with the feline.

As much as it pained him not to move from the kitchen to shower you with all the love and yearning he had within him, no matter the number of calls you had had, Alpine was faster, taking advantage of him, also putting away the confidential documents here and there as he ate.

One could say she technically cheated, having waited in the foyer for your return after overhearing Bucky's call with you.

In her mind, Bucky's mood lifting and eyes lighting up more than the usual calls he has had equals her mother's return. 

Smart kitty, after all.

And, well, who was Bucky to get in the way of his favourite girls’ reunion?

Not especially with the airplane ears and the swipes of her paws at him at every given moment, the man she was adopted by was nowhere close to you. 

She, for the most part, was being playful, but one could also say she made a good argument with her occasional crab walking at him for ‘ruining the moment’.

“Alright, pretty girl, let's go see how he's doing. Lead the way!” You placed her down, and like a soldier on duty, she took the lead, striding into the kitchen where Bucky was.

There, entering through the doorway after the feline, was none other than the woman of his life. 

The sight that never failed to cause a stutter in his heart, the butterflies in his stomach, however one could describe their beloved, even if words failed to express their very being.

“Congressman Barnes.” You smiled in a faux sickeningly sweet manner, playfully fluttering your lashes at the man who had taken his suit and dress shirt off, leaving him in his undershirt and slacks.

He fondly scoffed, but his legs were moving, crossing the room and pulling you to his chest with his right arm.

“Hi.” You greeted once more, unable to help the chuckle that left your lips, granting you the sight of him softening more than he already had when you walked in, smiling down at you.

“Hi, yourself,” He responded, his voice low like it was intimate, and truth be told, it was. Always been, be it at home or in public. It was always just you and him, “Al first, huh?”

“She was at the door first.” You justified without missing a beat.

“Heard our call, she knew.” He argued, having the audacity to pout, even if it was subtle.

“Excuses, excuses.” You tutted, “And I called you. Guess she missed me more.”

He shut you up by latching his lips onto your neck, forcing out a giggle that bubbled in your throat shortly after a gasp.

“Buck, c’mon, I need a shower!” You wiggled, finding it impossible even for a man who didn’t have his Vibranium arm at the moment.

“Excuses, excuses.” He echoed, and you could practically feel the smile against your shoulder as he tickled your skin with his heavy stubble.

He peppered your skin with kisses, from your shoulder up to your neck and jaw, before tilting your head up, caressing your chin as he stared down at you with a loving look.

Returning the smile, you kissed his thumb, moving off his hold when he had loosened a tad despite his huff of protest. Opening the dishwasher, you reached for the Vibranium arm and then the clean kitchen cloth with the other hand.

“I sincerely hope you cleaned all the gunk or dirt out before you decided to use our dishwasher like a laundry service.” You jested, wiping off the extra condensate before helping him put it on. He let you, his heart fluttering each time you did without question, before giving the limb a good swing.

“Sounds like someone doesn’t have good faith in me.” He mused aloud, taking the opportunity to pull you in once more.

“I’m just reminding.” You shrugged, lightly drumming your fingers on his clothed chest.

Truly, besides the… Odd events with the ‘Avengerz with a Z’, there was never a dull moment with you, in or out of gear.

“Sure,” Resting his forehead against yours, one arm around you and the other rubbing up and down your back, he murmured, “And for the record, I missed you more.” 

Oh, and Alpine took offence to that. 

Clearly, given the immediate ‘airplane mode’ in her ears as she listened on and stayed around on the kitchen island near the spread of Mexican food takeaway, but the feline of mischief had a plan.

She toddled out of the kitchen, and you both knew she was up to something. You and Bucky shared a look, and while it took a moment, the second he heard a rustle of clothes in the laundry room, he stiffened.

“Al, Al–!” He began, panic beneath the firm tone, only to shut up when she returned. returned with the pristine white dress shirt he had tossed in the laundry basket after a little accident.

“Bucky! Again?” You gaped, reaching for the shirt to inspect the stain near the buttonholes, “First pizza, now, what tacos?”

He dared to give you what one would’ve described as a meek, ‘boxy’ grin.

“I–It just happened,” He reasoned lamely, though it was mostly true, “When you called.”

“Which… was an hour ago.” You raised a brow. 

Well.

“I was going to get it off, honest,�� He persisted, playfully narrowing his eyes at Alpine, who, in her feline way, looked all too proud to throw him under the bus, “And the call was forty-two minutes ago. I counted, and I got most of it off under running water.”

You weren’t sure why it dawned upon you then, but it did, adding, “Your arm’s not in the dishwasher because of work.”

But because of the damn sauce.

“Bucky!” You playfully nudged his side, your smile widening because you knew you had him figured out, all thanks to his ‘trusty sidekick’.

“I had it under control,” He groaned, but despite it all, he knew that you knew he would’ve gotten it taken care of. You just love to give him shit, the same way he loved pretending to whine and give faux, lame excuses to see you smile, and when he did see it, he squeezed you tighter, closer, “I’m doing my best ‘round here.”

You snorted, watching him reach for a nacho, loaded with proteins and fat, all the good stuff for nights like these.

“Open.” He commanded, his tone lighter, just like his demeanour since you were back home.

“Is this bribery?” You grinned.

“Would you say no to this bribery?” He argued back with an equally lighthearted tone.

Touché.

You shared a laugh, having a little dinner party with the three of you, your own family, each of you deserving one another like the next. Food was leagues better than what you had to settle for, given either a time crunch or lack of accessibility, your not-so-humble abode was still the embodiment of warmth and homey, and nothing could beat the company you could come home to.

Like Bucky, Alpine remained glued to your side, taking little chances to paw at your hand for a pat or a kiss on the head, and when the reunion dimmed down, she figured she was satisfied with all the attention she received from you, akin to making sure you were truly alive and well.

Bucky insisted on getting the dish washed and the laundry cleaned up, both his stained dress shirt and your set of clothes from your trip, considering you had just returned after a few long weeks. How you were able to convince him otherwise, opting for the laundry while he dealt with the dishes, was beyond him, but you always had a way to do so.

You carried Alpine to the cat tower in the living room, giving her a few last goodnight kisses before watching her curl up in a ball.

Not too long after, you carried your bag, along with Bucky's shirt, to the laundry room, your senses immediately met with the familiar scents lingering. The warm white light only added to the calming feeling as you separated the necessary, opting to wash the lighter ones first in hopes that the stain would be gone as much as possible.

In the midst of your little chore, you heard footsteps approaching. You weren't alarmed—they were familiar—nor did you turn around as Bucky embraced you from behind.

His hands roamed ever so slowly, nosing the sensitive area between your neck and shoulder.

“Might wanna take these off…” He murmured, tugging at the hem of your top.

You chuckled, not fully realizing the sheer desperation within him, “In a bit, Buck.”

But, oh, he was insistent.

“Take it off.” He muttered against your skin once more, his hands slipping under your top.

Your breath hitched, turning your head to see his eyes fluttering closed, breathing in the scent of you. Suddenly, you were just aware how… Needy he seemed.

When he looked up at you through lidded eyes, he slowly leaned in, capturing your lips with his for a kiss. Gentleness belied his desperation, though, in all honesty, he wanted you to know.

“Take it off.” He repeated against your lips, feeling you jump a tad when his metal arm brushed along the warmth of your tummy, and suddenly, he shoved your bra over your breasts, squeezing your tits in a way that was a shy away from being rough.

Brazen.

In need.

“Off, or I'm taking it off you.” He ordered this time, despite keeping his voice low, and that made the tension all the more heady.

But before you could even come anywhere close to your senses, you gasped at the unmistakable rip before the top lay torn on the floor. He turned you around, forcing you against the washing machine to meet his gaze once more, unyielding as though he had one thing and only one thing in mind.

Leaning once more, he brushed his stubble along your cheek, taking his time dragging his hands up your back before unhooking your bra.

“I said to take it off, didn't I?” He tutted, feigning disappointment as he tossed the undergarment to the laundry basket, “I'll get you another one. I'll get you plenty.”

He had the means for it, and God forbid he didn't because he'd still find a way to do anything for you.

“What do you say we… Turn in early tonight, get you cleaned up, changed…” His lips paused at your cheek, as if he just thought of something, “Or don't. Wouldn't mind you in nothing in bed either. Just wanna take care of you…”

You could only rest your hands on his chest, toying with the soft cotton beneath your fingers, “You want that? Take care of me?”

You could've sworn he hid a growl at that. 

Wanted? He needed to take care of you.

“I want nothing more.” He replied, his hands descending to your rear and feeling you move closer at the gesture.

And who were you to deny him that?

˚ · . f i n . · ˚

» a/n: also, i am just learning that an undershirt is more or less the US counterpart of a singlet sooo yeah ;; gorgeous divider by @firefly-graphics ♡

[feverish-dove]

Secrets in the Stone World

moments when you share a hidden language with the worlds favorite scientist (well technically he’s the only one, so does it really count?). “this is normal japanese” “this is english” Senku Ishigami x Reader warnings: oneshot, fluff word count: 1,051 cross posted on ao3 this is intended to be a sequel to my other post, Sun Kissed Science, yet can be read as a standalone work!

It had become a daily ritual.

Each morning before the village awoke you sat near the river, carefully applying Senku’s homemade sunscreen. The mixture, though slightly grainy, had saved your skin from the brutal Stone World sun, and you weren’t about to risk another burn.

Today was no different. You were finishing up, rubbing the last bit onto your arms, when a familiar voice interrupted your thoughts.

“You’re up early.”

You glanced up to see Senku standing a few feet away, arms crossed and that usual confident smirk tugging at his lips. His clothes were slightly disheveled, as always, and a few stray strands of hair fell down even more than usual.

You smiled. “I could say the same to you.”

He let out a chuckle. “Science doesn’t wait.”

You rolled your eyes but couldn’t suppress the warmth in your chest. Ever since Senku had made the sunscreen, you’d started spending more time around him—not just because of his intelligence, but because he made the Stone World feel a little less… overwhelming.

He stepped closer, eyeing your sunscreen application with an approving nod. “Looks like you’ve got it down.”

“Of course. I take my sun protection very seriously.”

He smirked. “Good. I don’t feel like making another batch every few days just because you forgot.”

You nudged him playfully, and he easily dodged, chuckling.

Then, before you could say anything else, a voice called out from the village.

“Hey! Senku! We need your help with—”

You winced, struggling to catch the rest of the sentence. The villagers spoke fast, and even though you had learned Japanese before the petrification, it still took you a few extra seconds to process what they were saying.

Senku, of course, noticed immediately.

His gaze flickered to yours, sharp and calculating. Then, in a lower voice, he said something that made your heart stop.

“Do you want me to translate?”

Your breath hitched.

English.

Your native language.

It had been so long since you’d heard it spoken fluently that for a moment, it almost didn’t register.

You stared at him, stunned, before managing a hesitant, “You… speak English?”

Senku smirked, eyes glinting. “Of course I do. I learned it when I was a kid. Comes in handy, don’t you think?”

A slow smile spread across your face. “You have no idea.”

For the first time in years, you felt a sense of ease wash over you. No struggling to find the right words, no awkward pauses while you pieced together sentences—just effortless conversation.

And judging by the look in Senku’s eyes, he understood exactly how much this meant to you.

From that day on, English became your secret language.

Whenever you got stuck in a conversation with the villagers, Senku would subtly switch to English to help you out. Whenever you were overwhelmed, he’d make an offhanded joke in English just to see you smile.

It became second nature.

The others, of course, were completely baffled.

“Why do you guys always talk in that weird code?” Kohaku had asked one day, arms crossed. “Is it some kind of secret science language?”

Senku had just smirked. “Something like that.”

You had to stifle a laugh.

The only person who caught on was Gen.

One evening, as you sat near the fire, Gen plopped down beside you with a lazy grin.

“So, you’re fluent in English, huh?”

You nearly choked on your food. “Wait—you too?”

Gen chuckled, resting his chin on his hand. “Of course~! I used to travel a lot before the petrification, so I picked it up along the way.”

You gaped at him before turning to Senku, who looked entirely unsurprised. “You knew?”

He shrugged. “Gen’s annoyingly talented. It’s not that shocking.”

Gen feigned offense. “Annoyingly? Senku, I’m hurt.”

You laughed, shaking your head. “Okay, so it’s just the three of us, then.”

Gen wiggled his eyebrows. “Ooooh, does that mean we have a secret club?”

Senku rolled his eyes. “It just means we have another way to communicate. Which, by the way, could be useful if we ever need to discuss something privately.”

You nodded, understanding immediately. Having a language that no one else knew could be an advantage—especially in situations where secrecy was necessary.

But even beyond that, it was nice.

Nice to speak without stumbling over words. Nice to feel completely understood.

Nice to share something with Senku.

One night, you found yourself sitting beside Senku near the edge of the village, watching the stars.

It had been a long day. You were tired, but your mind was too restless to sleep.

Senku seemed to notice.

“What’s on your mind?” he asked, glancing at you.

You sighed, hugging your knees. “It’s nothing. Just… thinking about the past.”

He hummed in understanding. “You miss it?”

You hesitated before nodding. “Yeah. Sometimes.”

He was quiet for a moment. Then, in a softer voice, he said, “You’ll see it again, you know. Civilization. Science. Everything we lost. I’ll bring it all back.”

You turned to him, studying his profile in the moonlight. His expression was unreadable, but there was a fire in his eyes—a determination so unwavering that you almost believed he could rebuild the world overnight.

Your heart clenched.

“I know you will.”

A smirk tugged at his lips. “Damn right I will.”

You laughed softly, shaking your head. “You’re impossible.”

“I prefer ‘brilliant.’”

You rolled your eyes, but the warmth in your chest didn’t fade.

For a while, neither of you spoke. The night air was cool, the sky endless above you, and for the first time in a long time, you felt at peace.

Then, without really thinking, you murmured, “I’m glad you’re here.”

Senku blinked, caught off guard.

You felt your face heat up. “I mean—not that I’m glad you got petrified too, but—just, if I had to be stuck in this world, I’m glad you’re part of it.”

He was silent for a long moment. Then, to your surprise, he chuckled.

“You’re such a sap.”

You huffed, nudging him with your shoulder. “Shut up.”

But as you turned away, you caught something unexpected—something rare.

A small, genuine smile.

Not his usual smug grin. Not his teasing smirk.

Just a quiet, sincere smile.

And suddenly, the Stone World didn’t feel so lonely anymore.

[consistencynevermether]

Spring Flowers (Vere x gn!reader) (Touchstarved)

content: this is technically a sequel to this post, but it can be read as a stand alone. Vere x reader, gender neutral reader, tried to write this so any origin will work, Jealous Vere, SFW, cannon typical swearing, violence, etc

(optional) part one: Winter Nights, here

summary: Vere wants to go watch the flowers bloom, and you help him out (its lightly implied Leander has a crush on MC)

word count: 3.7k

A/N: i've decided to make a series out of my first fic, each one coordinating with a different season. this is technically part 2, works as a standalone. i've also been considering maybe some Kuras writings, if anyone is interested in that, lmk! enjoy :)

The winter in Eridia was especially long this season. That's what Mhin had told you at least. Not that they minded apparently. They had no strong dislike towards the colder months, unlike Vere. You didn’t go a single day without him complaining about the weather. But finally spring had begun to take over the city. While you were walking back to your lodgings in the Wet Wick sometime earlier this month, you had even seen crocus flowers popping up early, with a light dusting of snow on their purple petals. You imagined the melting ice and sunny days would put Vere in a better mood. And they did, for a time.

One lovely day he came to the Wick in a foul mood, and as he walked past your table he oh so very rudely shut the book you were reading while he walked past. You let out an offended cry but he didn’t even stop to look at you, he simply stomped right past and sat down at the bar, ordering something strong

Rude. More rude than normal. Usually when Vere did something like that, it was to tease or get your attention. But this time he just wanted to spread his sour mood. And it was working. The book you were reading was a tome of very basic yet interesting spells, something “almost anyone could master” according to Leander, the person who lent you the book. And now your place was lost because Vere made his attitude everyone’s problem.

Luckily, you were more mature than him. And deep down you also knew better. Vere was a fickle beast, but usually his reasons for being genuinely upset were pretty valid. 

You sighed, tucked your book away in your bag, and headed over to the bar where he was sitting. Without a word you sat in the seat next to his and turned towards him, arms crossed.

Vere was already slouched over the bar, scowling into his drink. 

“Oh for the love of- what do you want?” He groaned. 

“That wasn’t very nice.” You counter dryly. 

Vere scoffed, throwing his hands over his head. 

“It’s a damn book! It is not that big of a deal. You're really upset over that? What, do you have to spend two seconds of your day looking at something other than Leander’s book? Oh what a terrible fate.” He spat, his mocking tone rising in pitch at his clear annoyance. 

Bad mood indeed.

“I’m not really upset, no.” Your even tone only makes Veres' little rant sound even more immature. “But that was rude, and it’s not my job to put up with your pettiness when you're upset. It makes me not want to be around you.”

You watched as Veres' eyes narrowed and his ears slightly flatten against his head in response.

Usually you wouldn’t let anyone get away with half the shit Vere got away with, but you were basically his only friend besides Ace. And that relationship was all kinds of complicated. Vere was great at charming people, making them fall for him, manipulating them, the whole nine yards. But he wasn’t great at keeping actual friends. It was a bit of a new concept to him, and because of that you gave him some leeway. 

Of course part of the reason you gave him that grace was because he puts up with a fair amount of your shit too. And you enjoy being friends with him of course, but you’d never tell him that. 

You continued to stare him down and he continued to glare at his drink until finally he mumbled something under his breath at you.

“I’m sorry, what was that?” You questioned.

“I SAID I’m sorry I touched your precious book ok?!” Vere snapped back. 

Vere was no longer hunched over the bar but instead had laid his head down on the counter and was glaring up at you through strands of his scarlet hair.

You smirked and laid your head down on the bar as well, now eye level with him. He rolled his eyes, but there was a slight smile behind the snark. You could tell.

“So, why are you actually upset?” you question. 

Vere let out a long suffering sigh.

“Ugh. It’s something entirely stupid. I don’t even really care.” He responded. 

“Well that’s clearly not true, you obviously care.” You countered. “But that’s fine. It’s alright to be upset over shit that doesn’t really matter. Just yesterday I dropped my slice of cheesecake and declared the Gods hated me personally. Well, even more than they clearly already do.” As you state that last part you hold up your bandaged hands, accentuating your point. 

Vere let out a quiet chuckle. Then a few moments later he sighed and began to speak. 

“There’s this festival happening that the sinobium is hosting. A viewing of some flowering trees that’ll be in full bloom. I don’t even care about the damn things, but it’s a huge social event, and you know how I thrive on those.”

It was true. Vere was like a flame to moths. People swarmed towards his charismatic personality and sharp wit. Not to mention he was probably the most beautiful person to exist. (Not that you were biased in this opinion at all).

“So why aren’t you going?” You questioned, urging him to continue. 

Vere shrugged. “No monsters allowed.” 

You were disappointed, but not surprised. This type of event definitely sounded like a gathering for the people of high town, and people like that don’t enjoy rubbing shoulders with monsters. Only the richest people in the largest city still standing had the luxury of creating a whole event out of watching flowering trees bloom. You could definitely see how this event would be right up Veres' alley. You couldn't help but feel sorry for the fox devil sitting next to you, it wasn't fair he had to miss out on some boring stupid garden party because he was a monster. He should miss out on the boring stupid garden party because he's a menace and a psychopath. 

Still, he was your menace, and you wanted to make him feel better about missing out on the stupid fruffy party. 

Then a thought came to you.

You didn’t need to comfort him for missing the party if he didn’t miss the party. 

Vere stared at you in tired amusement. He knew you well enough to know you were going to do or say something stupid, by the look on your face. He just didn’t know what yet. 

“I have a plan.” You declare. 

“Of course you do.” He took another sip of his drink, waiting for you to continue.

“Well-“ you reopen your tome as you speak. “I just happened to be reading a disguise spell before you so rudely interrupted.”

“Mhm. And can you cast said spell?” He questioned lazily. 

“Well-

-We can certainly try right? I’m sure I’ll pick it up naturally.”

“If you turn my hair green, I will kill you. I hope you know this.” Vere responded, sounding very serious.

You knew he wouldn’t, he lost interest in killing you after the first month.

Probably.

Well, you wouldn't know unless you tried. Plus you actually needed some practice to get this right. Not that you would ever use any of your friends as test subjects (or at least ever admit to it).

You didnt turn Vere’s hair green. You did however turn it purple twice by accident. You two had spent the rest of the day trying to make vere look human. It was admittedly a lot less trial and error and more just-

Error. 

It was a lot more frustrating for you than you'd assumed it would be. Which meant Vere had a lot more fun than he expected. But by the time sunset had come around, you had done it.

His scarlet hair was now a deep brown, and his magenta eyes were now a light chestnut color. The markings on his face were gone, as were his claws. The most shocking change of course was the lack of his fox ears and tail. They were still actually there of course, just invisible. After all it was a simple illusion spell, not the kind of magic that could actually change a person. 

It was…strange. You had never really thought of what Vere would ever look like as a human. His face was the same, but something about him felt like it was missing. Or incomplete. It was hard to describe the slight uncanny feeling you felt looking at this version of him.

A snap brought you out of your thoughts. 

“Hello? Still in there? You've been staring for like two minutes” Vere questioned.

“It's weird.” you defended.

“What? Why? What did you do to me?” Vere snapped as he grabbed a small silver mirror out of his pocket.

You watched as Veres eyebrows shot up at the sight of himself. He examined his reflection for a few more seconds, gingerly feeling where his ears were, and looking at the illusionary human ears that now graced the side of his head.

“That's….impressive” he finally stated. “I really look human.”  

“Which means you can go to the boring flower party!” You exclaimed, clearly delighted with your work. Oh yea, you were an incredible friend. 

“Well,-“ Vere pursed his lips. “-what if something happens to disturb the illusion? This kind of magic is easy to break. If only someone would come with me and make sure to be there so if the illusion breaks, they could recast it.” 

You felt yourself deflate slightly. A whole day of sitting around watching flowers bloom? When you could be working and making money? You hadn’t wasted time like that since before you moved to Eridia. 

But it was Vere. If he wanted you to go, you would go. And he already knew it, judging by the smirk on his face. 

You sighed, defeated.

“Fine, let’s go to the party where we all sit around and look at trees. How fun. When is it?”

“Tomorrow.”

“Fuck.”

Vere simply chuckled before looking back down at the mirror, examining his new human appearance. You could also feel him occasionally glance over at you. 

Hmph. Probably shocked you could pull off the spell. Oh he of little faith. 

Just as you were about to flick a peanut at Vere just to be annoying, a drink slid right in front of you, prompting you to look up.

You were greeted with a pair of green eyes and a wide smile. Leander. 

“You looked like you needed a drink. Make a new friend?” He questioned, eyes narrowing. 

“Huh?” You questioned. What new friend was he talking about?

Leander gestured to the now brown haired Vere, who was still looking down at his reflection.

At that moment Vere decided to stop preening and instead hopped off his own barstool, moving behind yours and resting his chin on your shoulder.

“Awe, can the great mage really be fooled so easily? Either they're better at this than I thought, or just as dense as I suspected.”

Leander’s eyebrows shot up. 

“Vere?!?”

Leander’s look of bewilderment quickly turned into realization as he looked back at you. 

“Hey, you figured out that illusion spell from the book! Aren’t you a little prodigy?” He beamed. 

“Hmm. Yes, they are.” Vere smiled, putting his hands around your shoulders.

 Though his fangs were hidden behind your illusion, it was clear he didn’t need them. There was something dangerous about that smile, like the edge of a knife. You had no idea why he had gotten so hostile all of the sudden, and how Leander was keeping such a carefree look on his face.

“Now, they're taking me to the flower festival tomorrow with this lovely disguise, and I refuse to be seen with someone who smells this bad. So how about you head up to your room and hit the showers?”

As soon as Vere finished his sentence you saw a slight twitch in Leanders eye. But you were too busy with the smell comment from Vere to really care. 

To make his point Vere twirled a lock of your hair in his fingers and lightly sniffed it. 

Fucking rude. You didn’t smell that bad! Right? Maybe you should use more shampoo though… after all you don’t need to be so conservative with your products after Vere had gifted you quite a few of his own. Or maybe this was a bit of revenge for that time you had said he smelt like a wild animal? It had been a while since that night, but you did know Vere was one to hold a grudge. 

You lightly shoved him off you and headed upstairs (yes, to take a bath). 

Leaving the boys to glare at each other or whatever they were doing, you headed up and headed to bed. 

The next day, you were up bright and early to accompany Vere to his little party.

And unfortunately, as much as you loathe to admit it, the flowers took away your breath the moment you walked in.

The tiny pink blossoms softly shed their petals, coating the ground in a pale pink haze and leaving a sweet scent in the air.

Speaking of scent, you had made 100% sure you smelt incredible for this damn event. Suck it Fox boy. 

Vere scoped out a spot and called you over, motioning you to set down the outdoor blanket you had brought under one of the trees. 

“I’ll be right back, I’m going to buy some flower oils.” Vere beamed, clearly very pleased that his human disguise was holding up so well, and he had successfully fooled the sinobium. 

You signed and waved him off, plopping down on the blanket you had just laid out. 

As Veres' form receded into the crowd of people, a tall white silhouette appeared to your left.

You gave an easy smile. It was always nice to see Kuras. 

He gave you his own small smile, and you gestured for him to sit.

Vere may have issues with Kuras, but the two of you were perfectly cordial, and you’d even consider the two of you friends.

“So, you decided to go with Vere and not Leander. That’s certainly interesting.” He stated.

You tilted your head to the side in confusion. Why would you be here with Leander?

Kuras seemed to see your confusion, and you watched a familiar mischievous glint appear in his eyes.

“Oh, maybe he didn’t get the chance to ask. How peculiar. Leander was planning to ask you to see this blossom viewing with him.” Kuras stated, calm as ever.

You knew what you wanted to ask. And clearly Kuras also knew what you wanted to ask. But he was being mischievous. And you were being stubborn.

“Well I best be going. I only stopped by for a second, but I need to get back to my clinic.” Kuras stated as he stood up and lightly brushed himself off, looking immaculate as ever. 

He took a step to leave, then looked back at you.

“Yes. Vere knew.” 

And with that, he strode off into the crowd, sparing you from the embarrassment of him seeing your reddening cheeks. 

You were so focused on figuring out if that meant anything, you hadn’t even noticed that for some reason, Kuras had immediately recognized Vere, regardless of the illusion over him. 

You were so absorbed in your own thoughts, you didn’t even notice Vere had returned until he plopped his head right in your lap.

He gave a sniff and his eyes darkened.

“You smell like the doctor.” He spat.

You just shrugged.

“He stopped by for two seconds to say hi.” 

Vere snarled in response, and you couldn’t help but snort at his unfiltered displeasure. 

You began to gently stroke his ears, his real ears, invisible to sight currently, but you knew where they were without sight. 

Ever since he allowed you to touch his fluffy ears, it was one of your favorite things to do whenever he crashed at your place. 

He huffed in displeasure, but almost immediately leaned into your touch, his eyes fluttering closed in contentment as you gently traced your fingers along the back of his ears. He burrowed his head more into your thigh, and wrapped one of his arms around your back. 

“What did he say?” Vere questioned, his eyes still mostly closed. 

Clearly he was trying very hard not to drift off. 

“He just said hi.” You fibbed.

You didn’t know how to bring up what Kuras had told you about, doing so would imply you thought Vere didn’t want you to come here with Leander. Which opens a whole new can of worms.

Seeing that that was all you were going to tell him, he pushed himself up off your lap and leaned back against the tree, scowling. He knew that wasn’t the truth. But it seemed like he didn’t feel like prying either. 

Before you could say anything to cheer him up, he grabbed a bottle from his sack of purchases and took a long swig. It was strong alcohol, you could smell it from here. 

“Do me a favor,” he seethed, glaring at you through his bangs. “Don’t talk to me. I don’t want my flower viewing ruined by you.” 

You could only sigh. If you were going to be friends with Vere, you needed thick skin. Luckily, you had dealt with him enough to expect this. He knew you were omitting some information, and was pouting.

You did feel a little guilty, he wouldn’t be moody if you didn’t hide things from him. But at the end of the day, you were entitled to private conversation with whomever you choose. Vere knew this, which was probably why he resorted to pouting instead of interrogating you for information.

You simply gave him a smile and made the motion of locking your lips shut with a key. 

Vere rolled his eyes and took another heavy swig. Though you could see the sulky look on his face after just a few more sips. He always wore his emotions more plainly when drunk. 

The two of you sat in silence, both enjoying the flowers. It was around sunset when Vere finally seemed to be over being upset with you.

Or he was too drunk to remember. 

He leaned against you, clearly unsteady from all the alcohol.

“Hey.” He slurred.

“Hey.” You responded. 

“Do-

-Do you like me like this?” He questioned. 

“What, absolutely wasted? I mean it is a little funny.” You smirked, and moved so that he could lean against your chest more fully. 

“Ugh. No. I mean human. Still beautiful, obviously, but with brown hair. Like Leanders. No fangs. No claws.”

His voice was slightly muffled as he spoke. 

“Can I be honest with you?” You asked.

“One second.” He responded.

He grabbed one of the bottles of alcohol and chugged the remains. That makes 3 bottles in under one day of some strong drink. Impressive and concerning. 

“Alright, shoot.” He grinned wildly, chuckling low to himself, Gesturing at you to continue. 

“Fuck no.” 

“What?” 

He removed his head from your chest, and leaned back on his arms, looking at you intently, the bewilderment clear on his face.

“You asked if I liked you better looking like this, the answer is fuck no I don’t. If I’m being honest it's a little unnerving. When you walked over earlier I didn’t even subconsciously realize it was you till you laid down on my leg.” You shrugged. 

“Even though my eyes are scary?” He asked.

You let out a bark of laughter.

“Your eyes are not scary.” 

“Even though my hair is blood red?”

“Why would that be a bad thing? It’s beautiful.” 

“Even though I've scratched before?”

“It didn’t even draw blood. And that was my fault. I forgot you had claws and basically rammed my shoulder into them.” 

“Even though I’ve got markings all over my face?” 

“It feels weird if you don’t have them on your face.”

Vere lapsed into silence, pointedly avoiding your gaze.

“I didn’t expect you to be the type to have insecurities.” You cautioned.

Now it was Veres' turn to laugh.

“Oh I assure you, I don’t. I find myself to be the most beautiful creature to exist. I just… wanted to know what you thought.” 

You sighed.

“I really hope you're too drunk to remember this tomorrow, but I think you're the most beautiful person I’ve ever met. Please don’t be insufferable about this.” 

Veres' face split into a lopsided wicked grin.

“Oh darling, I’m going to be so insufferable about this.” 

You just smiled and stood up, gently grabbing Veres arm and helping him stand as well.

“Alright. I need to get home before dark so I don’t get nearly eaten by a soulless. Again.” You say, worry slightly bleeding into your tone.

The sun was already starting to disappear completely from the sky, you needed to get back before the last rays faded. 

“You won’t make it in time. I’ll walk you home and crash at your place.” Vere stated, in a tone of finality.

“Sorry, no. You're far too wasted to fight anything.” You countered.

Vere let out a bitter laugh and tugged in the chain running down his chest. 

“Even with this damn thing limiting me, and 5 more bottles of that drink, I’d still be able to kill any of the pathetic soulless in eridia with one hand tied behind my back. I’m walking you back. That is final.” He declared, then looked at you as if to dare you to argue. 

Vere did a lot of shocking things, but that one motion affected you more than anything he had ever done before. He hated acknowledging the chains around his neck. No matter how much you had come to consider him a friend, you weren’t stupid enough to ever push too hard on that topic. 

You could only nod in agreement. 

“Let’s get out of here then.”

As the two of you walked out of the gates of the sinobium where the grove of flowering trees laid, you let out a sharp snap of your fingers, and the illusion surrounding Vere dropped instantly. 

“That's better.” You remarked.

“Agreed.” Vere smirked back.

The two of you walked back the wet wick in comfortable silence, arriving back well past when darkness had fallen. After all, there was no need to rush.

[mostlysignssomeportents]

Enshittification isn’t caused by venture capital

Picks and Shovels is a new, standalone technothriller starring Marty Hench, my two-fisted, hard-fighting, tech-scam-busting forensic accountant. You can pre-order it on my latest Kickstarter, which features a brilliant audiobook read by Wil Wheaton.

Many of us have left the big social media platforms; far more of us wish we could leave them; and even those of us who've escaped from Facebook/Insta and Twitter still spend a lot of time trying to figure out how to get the people we care about off of them, too.

It's lazy and easy to think that our friends who are stuck on legacy platforms run by Zuckerberg and Musk lack the self-discipline to wean themselves off of these services, or lack the perspective to understand why it's so urgent to get away from them, or that their "hacked dopamine loops" have addicted them to the zuckermusk algorithms. But if you actually listen to the people who've stayed behind, you'll learn that the main reason our friends stay on legacy platforms is that they care about the other people there more than they hate Zuck or Musk.

They rely on them because they're in a rare-disease support group; or they all coordinate their kids' little league carpools there; or that's where they stay in touch with family and friends they left behind when they emigrated; or they're customers or the audience for creative labor.

All those people might want to leave, too, but it's really hard to agree on where to go, when to go, and how to re-establish your groups when you get somewhere else. Economists call this the "collective action problem." This problem creates "switching costs" – a lot of stuff you'll have to live without if you switch from legacy platforms to new ones. The collective action problem is hard to solve and the switching costs are very high:

https://pluralistic.net/2022/10/29/how-to-leave-dying-social-media-platforms/

That's why people stay behind – not because they lack perspective, or self-discipline, or because their dopamine loops have been hacked by evil techbro sorcerers who used Big Data to fashion history's first functional mind-control ray. They are locked in by real, material things.

Big Tech critics who attribute users' moral failings or platforms' technical prowess to the legacy platforms' "stickiness" are their own worst enemies. These critics have correctly identified that legacy platforms are a serious problem, but have totally failed to understand the nature of that problem or how to fix it. Thankfully, more and more critics are coming to understand that lock-in is the root of the problem, and that anti-lock-in measures like interoperability can address it.

But there's another major gap in the mainstream critique of social media. Critics of zuckermuskian media claim those services are so terrible because they're for-profit entities, capitalist enterprises hitched to the logic of extraction and profit above all else. The problem with this claim is that it doesn't explain the changes to these services. After all, the reason so many of us got on Twitter and Facebook and Instagram is because they used to be a lot of fun. They were useful. They were even great at times.

When tech critics fail to ask why good services turn bad, that failure is just as severe as the failure to ask why people stay when the services rot.

Now, the guy who ran Facebook when it was a great way to form communities and make friends and find old friends is the same guy who who has turned Facebook into a hellscape. There's very good reason to believe that Mark Zuckerberg was always a creep, and he took investment capital very early on, long before he started fucking up the service. So what gives? Did Zuck get a brain parasite that turned him evil? Did his investors get more demanding in their clamor for dividends?

If that's what you think, you need to show your working. Again, by all accounts, Zuck was a monster from day one. Zuck's investors – both the VCs who backed him early and the gigantic institutional funds whose portfolios are stuffed with Meta stock today – are not patient sorts with a reputation for going easy on entrepreneurs who leave money on the table. They've demanded every nickel since the start.

What changed? What caused Zuck to enshittify his service? And, even more importantly for those of us who care about the people locked into Facebook's walled gardens: what stopped him from enshittifying his services in the "good old days?"

At its root, enshittification is a theory about constraints. Companies pursue profit at all costs, but while you may be tempted to focus on the "at all costs" part of that formulation, you musn't neglect the "profits" part. Companies don't pursue unprofitable actions at all costs – they only pursue the plans that they judge are likely to yield profits.

When companies face real competitors, then some enshittificatory gambits are unprofitable, because they'll drive your users to competing platforms. That's why Zuckerberg bought Instagram: he had been turning the screws on Facebook users, and when Instagram came along, millions of those users decided that they hated Zuck more than they loved their friends and so they swallowed the switching costs and defected to Instagram. In an ill-advised middle-of-the-night memo to his CFO, Zuck defended spending $1b on Instagram on the grounds that it would recapture those Facebook escapees:

https://www.theverge.com/2020/7/29/21345723/facebook-instagram-documents-emails-mark-zuckerberg-kevin-systrom-hearing

A company that neutralizes, buys or destroys its competitors can treat its users far worse – invade their privacy, cheap out on moderation and anti-spam, etc – without losing their business. That's why Zuck's motto is "it is better to buy than to compete":

https://www.trtworld.com/magazine/zuckerberg-its-better-to-buy-than-compete-is-facebook-a-monopoly-42243

Of course, as a leftist, I know better than to count on markets as a reliable source of corporate discipline. Even more important than market discipline is government discipline, in the form of regulation. If Zuckerberg feared fines for privacy violations, or moderation failures, or illegal anticompetitive mergers, or fraudulent advertising systems that rip off publishers and advertisers, or other forms of fraud (like the "pivot to video"), he would treat his users better. But Facebook's rise to power took place during the second half of the neoliberal era, when the last shreds of regulatory muscle that survived the Reagan revolution were being devoured by GW Bush and Obama (and then Trump).

As cartels and monopolies took over our economy, most government regulators were neutered and captured. Public agencies were stripped of their powers or put in harness to attack small companies, customers, and suppliers who got in the way of monopolists' rent-extraction. That meant that as Facebook grew, Zuckerberg had less and less to fear from government enforcers who might punish him for enshittification where the markets failed to do so.

But it's worse than that, because Zuckerberg and other tech monopolists figured out how to harness "IP" law to get the government to shut down third-party technology that might help users resist enshittification. IP law is why you can't make a privacy-protecting ad-blocker for an app (and why companies are so desperate to get you to use their apps rather than the open web, and why apps are so dismally enshittified). IP law is why you can't make an alternative client that blocks algorithmic recommendations. IP law is why you can't leave Facebook for a new service and run a scraper that imports your waiting Facebook messages into a different inbox. IP law is why you can't scrape Facebook to catalog the paid political disinformation the company allows on the platform:

https://locusmag.com/2020/09/cory-doctorow-ip/

IP law's growth has coincided with Facebook's ascendancy – the bigger Facebook got, the more tempting it was to interoperators who might want to plug new code into it to protect Facebook users, and the more powers Facebook had to block even the most modest improvements to its service. That meant that Facebook could enshittify even more, without worrying that it would drive users to take unilateral, permanent action that would deprive it of revenue, like blocking ads. Once ad-blocking is illegal (as it is on apps), there's no reason not to make ads as obnoxious as you want.

Of course, many Facebook employees cared about their users, and for most of the 21st century, those workers were a key asset for Facebook. Tech workers were in short supply until just a couple years ago, when the platforms started round after round of brutal layoffs – 260,000 in 2023, another 150,000+ in 2024. Facebook workers may be furious about Zuckerberg killing content moderation, but he's not worried about them quitting – not with a half-million skilled tech workers out there, hunting for jobs. Fuck 'em. Let 'em quit:

https://www.404media.co/its-total-chaos-internally-at-meta-right-now-employees-protest-zuckerbergs-anti-lgbtq-changes/

This is what changed: the collapse of market, government, and labor constraints, and IP law's criminalization of disenshittifying, interoperable add-ons. This is why Zuck, an eternal creep, is now letting his creep flag fly so proudly today. Not because he's a worse person, but because he understands that he can hurt his users and workers to benefit his shareholders without facing any consequences. Zuckerberg 2025 isn't the most evil Zuck, he's the most unconstrained Zuck.

Same goes for Twitter. I mean, obviously, there's been a change in management at Twitter – the guy who's enshittifying it today isn't the guy who enshittified it prior to last year. Musk is speedrunning the enshittification curve, and yet Twitter isn't collapsing. Why not? Because Musk is insulated from consequences for fucking up – he's got a huge cushion of wealth, he's got advertisers who are desperate to reach his users, he's got users who can't afford to leave the service, he's got IP law that he can use to block interoperators who might make it easier to migrate to a better service. He was always a greedy, sadistic asshole. Now he's an unconstrained greedy, sadistic asshole. Musk 2025 isn't a worse person than Musk 2020. He's just more free to act on his evil impulses than he was in years gone by.

These are the two factors that make services terrible: captive users, and no constraints. If your users can't leave, and if you face no consequences for making them miserable (not solely their departure to a competitor, but also fines, criminal charges, worker revolts, and guerrilla warfare with interoperators), then you have the means, motive and opportunity to turn your service into a giant pile of shit.

That's why we got Jack Welch and his acolytes when we did. There were always evil fuckers just like them hanging around, but they didn't get to run GM until Ronald Reagan took away the constraints that would have punished them for turning GE into a giant pile of shit. Every economy is forever a-crawl with parasites and monsters like these, but they don't get to burrow into the system and colonize it until policymakers create rips they can pass through.

In other words, the profit motive itself is not sufficient to cause enshittification – not even when a for-profit firm has to answer to VCs who would shut down the company or fire its leadership in the face of unsatisfactory returns. For-profit companies chase profit. The enshittifying changes to Facebook and Twitter are cruel, but the cruelty isn't the point: the point is profits. If the fines – or criminal charges – Facebook faced for invading our privacy exceeded the ad-targeting revenue it makes by doing so, it would stop spying on us. Facebook wouldn't like it. Zuck would hate it. But he'd do it, because he spies on us to make money, not because he's a voyeur.

To stop enshittification, it is not necessary to eliminate the profit motive – it is only necessary to make enshittification unprofitable.

This is not to defend capitalism. I'm not saying there's a "real capitalism" that's good, and a "crony capitalism" or "monopoly capitalism" that's bad. All flavors of capitalism harm working people and seek to shift wealth and power from the public and democratic institutions to private interests. But that doesn't change the fact that there are, indeed, different flavors of capitalism, and they have different winners and losers. Capitalists who want to sell apps on the App Store or reach customers through Facebook are technofeudalism's losers, while Apple, Facebook, Google, and other Big Tech companies are technofeudalism's great winners.

Smart leftism pays attention to these differences, because they represent the potential fault lines in capitalism's coalition. These people all call themselves capitalists, they all give money and support to political movements that seek to crush worker power and human rights – but when the platforms win, the platforms' business customers lose. They are irreconcilably on different sides of a capitalism-v-capitalism fight that is every bit as important to them as the capitalism-v-socialism fight.

I'm saying that it's good praxis to understand these divisions in capitalism, because then we can exploit those differences to make real, material gains for human thriving and worker rights. Lumping all for-profit businesses together as identical and irredeemable is bad tactics.

Legacy social media is at a turning point. Two new systems built on open standards have emerged as a credible threat to the zuckermuskian model: Mastodon (built on Activitypub) and Bluesky (built on Atproto). The former is far more mature, with a huge network of federated servers run by all different kinds of institutions, from hobbyists to corporations, and it's overseen by a nonprofit. The latter has far more users, and is a VC-backed corporate entity, and while it is hypothetically federatable, there are no Bluesky services apart from the main one that you can leave for if Bluesky starts to enshittify.

That means that Bluesky has a ton of captive users, and has the lack of constraint that characterizes the enshittified legacy platforms it has tempted tens of millions of users away from. This is not a good place to be in, because it means that if the current management choose to enshittify Bluesky, they can, and it will be profitable. It also means that the company's VCs understand that they could replace the current management and replace them with willing enshittifiers and make more money.

This is why Bluesky is in a dangerous place: not because it is backed by VCs, not because it is a for-profit entity, but because it has captive users and no constraints. It's a great party in a sealed building with no fire exits:

https://pluralistic.net/2024/12/14/fire-exits/#graceful-failure-modes

Last week, I endorsed a project called Free Our Feeds, whose goals include hacking some fire exits into Bluesky by force majeure – that is, independently standing up an alternative Bluesky server that people can retreat to if Bluesky management changes, or has a change of heart:

https://pluralistic.net/2025/01/14/contesting-popularity/#everybody-samba

For some Mastodon users, Free Our Feeds is dead on arrival – why bother trying to make a for-profit project safer for its users when Mastodon is a perfectly good nonprofit alternative? Why waste millions developing a standalone Bluesky server rather than spending that money improving things in the Fediverse.

I believe strongly in improving the Fediverse, and I believe in adding the long-overdue federation to Bluesky. That's because my goal isn't the success of the Fediverse – it's the defeat of enshtitification. My answer to "why spend money fixing Bluesky?" is "why leave 20 million people at risk of enshittification when we could not only make them safe, but also create the toolchain to allow many, many organizations to operate a whole federation of Bluesky servers?" If you care about a better internet – and not just the Fediverse – then you should share this goal, too.

Many of the Fediverse's servers are operated by for-profit entities, after all. One of the Fediverse's largest servers (Threads) is owned by Meta. Threads users who feel the bite of Zuckerberg's decision to encourage homophobic, xenophobic and transphobic hate speech will find it easy to escape from Threads: they can set up on any Fediverse server that is federated with Threads and they'll be able to maintain their connections with everyone who stays behind.

The existence of for-profit servers in the Fediverse does not ruin the Fediverse (though I wouldn't personally use one of them). The fact that multiple neo-Nazi groups run their own Mastodon servers does not ruin the Fediverse (though I certainly won't use their servers). Not even the fact that Donald Trump's Truth Social is a Mastodon server does anything to ruin the Fediverse (not using that one, either).

This is the strength of federated, federatable social media – it disciplines enshittifiers by lowering switching costs, and if enshittifiers persist, it makes it easy for users to escape unshitted, because they don't have to solve the collective action problem. Any user can go to any server at any time and stay in touch with everyone else.

Mastodon was born free: free code, with free federation as a priority. Bluesky was not: it was born within a for-profit public benefit corporation whose charter offers some defenses against enshittification, but lacks the most decisive one: the federation that would let users escape should escape become necessary.

The fact that Mastodon was born free is quite unusual in the annals of the fight for a free internet. Most of the internet was born proprietary and had freedom foisted upon it. Unix was born within Bell Labs, property of the convicted monopolist AT&T. The GNU/Linux project set it free.

SMB was born proprietary within corporate walls of Microsoft, another corporate monopolist. SAMBA set it free.

The Office file formats were also born proprietary within Microsoft's walled garden: they were set free by hacker-activists who fought through a thick bureaucratic morass and Microsoft fuckery (including literally refusing to allow chairs to be set for advocates for Open Document Format) to give us formats that underlie everything from LibreOffice to Google Docs, Office365 to your web browser.

There is nothing unusual, in other words, about hacking freedom into something that is proprietary or just insufficiently free. That's totally normal. It's how we got almost everything great about computers.

Mastodon's progenitors should be praised for ensuring their creation was born free – but the fact that Bluesky isn't free enough is no reason to turn our back on it. Our response to anything that locks in the people we care about must be to shatter those locks, not abandon the people bound by the locks because they didn't heed to our warnings.

Audre Lorde is far smarter than me, but when she wrote that "the master's tools will never dismantle the master's house," she was wrong. There is no toolset better suited to conduct an orderly dismantling of a structure than the tools that built it. You can be sure it'll have all the right screwdriver bits, wrenches, hexkeys and sockets.

Bluesky is fine. It has features I significantly prefer to Mastodon's equivalent. Composable moderation is amazing, both a technical triumph and a triumph of human-centered design:

https://bsky.social/about/blog/4-13-2023-moderation

I hope Mastodon adopts those features. If someone starts a project to copy all of Bluesky's best features over to Mastodon, I'll put my name to the crowdfunding campaign in a second.

But Mastodon has one feature that Bluesky sorely lacks – the federation that imposes antienshittificatory discipline on companies and offers an enshittification fire-exit for users if the discipline fails. It's long past time that someone copied that feature over to Bluesky.

Check out my Kickstarter to pre-order copies of my next novel, Picks and Shovels!

If you'd like an essay-formatted version of this post to read or share, here's a link to it on pluralistic.net, my surveillance-free, ad-free, tracker-free blog:

https://pluralistic.net/2025/01/20/capitalist-unrealism/#praxis

[tricksh0t]

★ the aspect of the warrior

☾ ellaria sand & oberyn martell x top m reader (+ olyvar)

𝘵𝘳𝘪𝘤𝘬𝘴𝘩0𝘵 ⛥ first threesome 😜 (technically orgy); connected to broken merchandise (petyr baelish) but can be read as a standalone. unfortunately ended up having a lot more olyvar than i intended, so take that in mind.

𝘴𝘩𝘰𝘵𝘴 ⛥ 3.25 words

cw: switch reader, top male reader, bottom oberyn, switch oberyn, blowjobs, non-descriptive cunnilingus, prostitution, use of the name whore, missionary, doggy, mentions of the Faith religion, lighthearted and humorous s*x, unfortunately rather fast paced

You've served a long variety of clientele before. Men and women, cock and cunt. You've tugged brown, black, blonde and red hair; stared lustfully into brown, onyx, green and blue eyes; kissed both rough and soft lips as well as given and taken.

You've had real warriors who played into your character or were simply too clueless.

Bastards, too. Waters, Rivers, Flowers, Hills and Stones. Maybe a Pyke and Snow or two, but never a Sand.

Nobles, as well, of many different statures. Wealthy and unfortunate, Lords and Ladies, heirs, but never a Prince.

Prince Oberyn Martell and his paramour, Ellaria Sand, were simply not an offer you could refuse; but they had come without an appointment or any notice, and so you were already caught up with another client.

You'd never miss this for the world, though.

"There he is. The Aspect of the Warrior." At the sound of Oberyn's voice, Olyvar pulls off the prince's cock with an obscene, wet pop.

Prince Oberyn looks you up and down, taking every inch of your well-oiled, famed muscles, from your neck to your calves. Eventually his eyes land on your already sweaty small clothes, and the forming bulge of your arousal. "You are very late, Ser Strong. We would have died if you had been a second too late. You come without your armor, even."

"Cut him some slack." Ellaria chimes. She pets the girl's hair who's currently eating her out absentmindedly, like it's nothing. "He was obviously previously preoccupied. Though, if you ask me, he should've cut whatever he was doing to come straight here."

Olyvar watches, both amused at your humiliation and also annoyed because you've taken his attention.

Oberyn grabs a handful of your new salesman's hair, just calling for his attention as he tugs. "How much is he, then?"

"Expensive."

"More than you?"

Olyvar scoffs, but does give in and nod.

The prince doesn't let the gesture slip by. "What is it, do you two not like each other?" He is growing more amused by the second.

Olyvar looks at you. There, beneath his glare, you catch a glint. He's just playing. While both the prince and his paramour may know your warrior reputation is only a facade, they do not know many other things about how you play. "He is distasteful. Just look at him, all that muscle and he does nothing but fuck all day."

Both Ellaria and Oberyn laugh, falling into the web of how captivating Littlefinger's whores can be.

"Let them have a go at each other, see if that settles their differences." Ellaria suggests.

Oberyn agrees by silently letting go of Olyvar's hair, but his face gives off all his excitement. He's looking for a show.

Olyvar approaches you in quick strides, then he's quickly wrapping his arms around your neck and giving you a kiss that'd steal the breath of anyone that isn't used to him. You reciprocate, roughly grabbing hold of his naked hips, shifting more towards the small of his back. You grasp, getting the bones of his hips and the meat of the top of his cheeks within your knuckles.

"Let's give them a show." Olyvar whispers as he pulls away. You can barely reply before he's pushing you, knocking you down on the bed right between Ellaria and Oberyn. The perfect spot.

He climbs onto your lap and you're back to kissing again. It's a clash of teeth this time, a methodologically feigned hunger for you and what you can bring him. Your hands quickly find his hips, and you're playing just as hungry, guiding him into a harsh, unsubtle grind over your thinly veiled cock.

You can faintly hear the other girl shifting, pulling away from Ellaria as the woman has stopped paying attention to her.

Olyvar moves and so do you, back on your elbows and lifting your hips so he can take your small clothes off. Your cock springs out and he's already grinding against it, ready to take it in in one swift go.

Before that even happens, though, Ellaria gasps a "ooh" and Oberyn wolf-whistles.

The prince's voice stops the two of you. "Now that is a cock that cannot go to waste."

You and Olyvar exchange looks. It's a quick thing, before the blonde is slipping off your lap, his job accomplished.

Oberyn gestures for you to come to him, but Ellaria grabs hold of your bicep before you do. Her hand cannot even wrap around it. "Ladies first." She says, addressing her lover with a smirk.

The prince obliges with a smile of his own, but you've long years of reading people and can see below that a slight bit of disappointment.

Ellaria lays further back onto the bed, her short hair falling behind her, splayed out like a halo. She spreads your legs as if to show herself off as your prize, that charming smirk on her face daring you to take it.

You kiss a path up her ankle. A Sand, tanned skin and dark hair yet both are smooth and shiny, unlike what Lords tell you about Dorne. They portray it as a land where the people broil miserably under the heat, causing wrinkles in the youthful. Perhaps it is that they are wrong, or perhaps it is that Ellaria Sand is a woman well taken care of, lucky to have caught the eye of a Dornish prince.

That same eye follows you as you trail up her leg and to her cunt, getting a taste of it; protective, perhaps, or otherwise jealous.

"I've had enough of tongues," Ellaria says, calling your attention. She tilts up your chin with just two finger, "'sides, that cock of yours is what we're interested in, Aspect of the Warrior."

"Nothing about my muscles?" You respond, fixing yourself up into position, kneeling between her legs.

Ellaria can admit that her eyes trail down, beginning at your shoulders and your biceps all the way down until she can't. "They are very appealing, but you must understand I often get my fill." She glances towards her lover.

Oberyn winks when you glance over.

You concede with a small laugh and the shake of your head. "Then what appeal is there to The Aspect of the Warrior?"

"Fame and reputation." Oberyn answers for the both of them. Ellaria is much too impatient on the other hand, and beckons you in by kicking your ass slightly with her foot. "You're rough, but also pliable. Headstrong, but also willing."

You'd reply, but Ellaria is staring you down with such a look of "just do it already".

You obey her, slowly pushing into her warmth. Her hand lands on your shoulder, well-kept nails digging into the flesh.

"I'm not fragile." She says confidently.

And again you obey, though you'd been cautious initially for a reason. Ellaria gasps, legs wrapping around your waist with a start. Her nails rake down your back.

"A stretch?" Oberyn asks, head propped up with his elbow, much more interested in this than the whore licking at his asshole and prepping him.

"Very." She says, almost having to choke it out. She sounds eager anyway when she continues, "Go on."

The first you give her seems to Ellaria much too boring. If you have a big cock, she expects you to know how to use it. "Is that the hardest you can go, aspect?"

You'd expected her to learn her lesson after the shock of having to take all of you in swiftly.

"The Aspect of the Warrior is also part of the Faith." You almost scold as you grab her by the lower back and hold her up, giving you a better angle to thrust into her cunt. "So, as much as strength is a part of him, the Faith cares for his subjects."

"Very charming, the way he talks in third person." Oberyn jokes, but his paramour is much too preoccupied with the cock splitting her open, the way she seems to like it.

She clenches around you, head already falling back. Her mouth splays open with mutterings of curses and moans.

She can hardly let go of you, even, the clench keeps you there, as if her legs don't do a well enough job already, and her arms are wrapped around your back.

"You must have a name, beyond Faith and Warrior. You don't expect her to scream those, do you?" Oberyn steals one of Ellaria's hands from your back to lazily intertwine his fingers with hers.

"They have been heard, around the halls." Olyvar responds for you, still servicing the prince with his tongue.

He looks amused at that, exclaiming sarcastically, "Oh, warrior! Save me, warrior."

"Yes," Ellaria moans, caught up in her own world, "yes, ser."

"Hmm." Oberyn hums, impressed. "That works."

You wonder if you're doing a better job than the prince usually does. For a couple so active, you'd imagine there's some sort of desensitization by now. There's some pride in knowing that you're making her feel this good, to lose her mind, when Oberyn might not even do the same anymore.

Speaking of, he watches in interest as you lick your thumb to press it down against his paramours clit. She keens loudly as you rub the nub in circles, prompting a quick and shuddering orgasm.

"That was fast." Oberyn teases, giving her hand a squeeze.

"Oh shut up, you." Ellaria wheezes out, regaining her breath. She squeezes back.

She gives your cock one final squeeze, like a parting gift, as you pull out. As soon as you do so, Oberyn is beckoning you over, much better at hiding his impatience and so displaying it now.

He's slower with it, though. It is merely having you that excites him already.

He parts only one leg, encasing your side with it, while he keeps the other under you so your hard lengths are not far apart. When he grabs the back of your neck to pull you down for a kiss, it is an intentional move, as you lean down towards him and your cocks press against each other.

His tongue was hot against yours, his swollen lips addictive, and so you chase him as he parts from the kiss. He grinds his cock up against yours, and so you chase that as well with your hips.

Oberyn's already got you wrapped around his finger.

You hardly notice the way Oberyn is sizing you up until Ellaria speaks up, propped up against the pillows in a heavenly kind of way in her post-orgasmic glow. "He's bigger. No use in denying that."

"I usually don't like brutes." Oberyn says, and somewhere, vaguely, you know he's playing it off by monologuing. His hand reaches down to guide your cock to his hole. "The bigger men get, the more disproportionate and ugly they become. Take the Mountain, for example. That kind of man can only be loved by his mother."

"I bet even that isn't true." Ellaria laughs.

Between the two of them, you're more preoccupied with getting your cock into the prince. For one, you've yet to orgasm, for two, he's a prince.

Maybe it's being a Prince that makes you pretty, or maybe it's being a Lord that makes you ugly, because in the hierarchy of nobility, Oberyn Martell is probably the best noble you'll ever get to fuck, and it isn't for his money or his status.

Oberyn stares you down as you push in. His stare keeps you in place, washing away any aspects of having the bigger body and muscles, of being The Aspect of the Warrior.

He's stoic, like this isn't his first time.

Olyvar speaks up, calling your attention. He's splayed out comfortably on the bed besides Oberyn, instigating, playing that game again. "Have you taken any bigger, Prince Oberyn?"

You and Oberyn turn back towards each other at the same time. The prince reaches up to cup your cheek, some form of endearment that once more keeps you submissive to him. He's inclined to say yes, to poke fun, but, "No, I have not."

"You're playing him a fool." Olyvar says. His hand is warm on the small of your back. Its thumb flicks over your spine, making you shudder.

Oberyn whistles. He felt that. "It is rather fun, you know. A brute at your heels."

Not The Aspect of the Warrior, pointedly. Oberyn sees past your act, doesn't care for it. To him, you're just a big man with a big cock and muscles you don't know how to use.

He takes the sex casually, not giving much reaction to the thrusting of your hips, however slow you're taking it right now. You can't help but take it as an offense. You've always been revered as The Aspect of the Warrior with your clients, for your strength and your build, even by Ellaria herself.

You yearn for a reaction from this tough prince.

You play into the submission, leaning down to capture Oberyn's lips in a kiss, because you want him to think you're needy for it.

He smiles into the kiss, heaving a small laugh through his nose. He finds you amusing.

Little does he know, it's only a distraction. You lift him up, causing him to gasp, then place him on his stomach. Oberyn immediately turns his head to look back at you with indignance, but his eyes shut quickly when he you thrust up to the hilt, because he gets to feel all of you.

"Does that feel good?" You lean down to whisper into his ear as you start up again, going slow just to tease him, because you know he can take more. "To feel all of me?"

He tries to keep stoic, but it's clear in the way his breaths grow ragged that the answer is a resounding yes.

"Did you prep him properly, Olyvar?" You ask just to tease the prince, feigning care.

The blonde chuckles. "Spit and tongue then oil and fingers, my love."

"My love? They've been playing us a fool, Oberyn." Ellaria jokes, but her paramour is much too preoccupied with the cock splitting him open on the more literal sense to notice.

Oberyn sucks in a gasp when you thrust up particularly harshly for the first time, then follow up with that same strength over and over, resulting in a sharp whistle-y sound. It seems to embarrass him.

Much of you embarrasses him, though it seems to please him at the same time. You're bigger than him in body and muscle, engulfing his figure as you fuck into him; you've got a bigger cock, and you pleased his paramour well with it.

There's jealousy somewhere in there, but he doesn't act on it, not when he gets to have you.

"He's good, isn't he?" Ellaria hums.

"Yes he is." Oberyn replies. His face isn't even pointed towards his paramour. It's rather amusing for you this time.

You pick up the pace, and he still doesn't break; because it's not admitting that you're good that you want, it's making him moan unabashedly.

You move his knees, propping him up on them to better fuck into him. Oberyn's breath hitches. Then you press a kiss upon his spine, and, "Oh, warrior!" How ironic.

A steady stream of groans leave Oberyn's mouth as you fuck him. You keep a hand beside his head to lean over him, and another warm hand over his cock. It wraps around the girth of it easily, and then some.

Ellaria laughs, because she of all people should know that Oberyn does not often get like this. "You're no Warrior."

"You're the Stranger." Oberyn chimes up for his part. The need for humor and the lift of his lips in an open-mouthed smile afterwards shows you just how much he likes it.

You chuckle, "Shall I be the death of you today, then, Prince Oberyn?"

"You know, at some point," He laughs too, shakily, "it gets rather fatuous."

He is right. You let your movements take over, pleasuring him. As is your job, pleasuring him, and even past the "honor" of fucking a prince, there is the pleasure of fucking Oberyn.

He's tight, but not like a virgin, you're not his first experience and you like that, because you can go as rough and fast as you like and Oberyn will take it. The pleasure is in knowing that you're the one creating the obscene slapping of skin in the room, and the eyes that watch you, the beautiful Ellaria Sand and Olyvar, your occasional lover. The pleasure is in knowing that you're making a real warrior such as Oberyn shiver and moan.

The hand you have wrapped around him begins to work him in tandem with your thrusts, and it has him spilling over.

Oberyn slumps forward with a sluggish smile, closed teeth now that he has a break. "Will it put a dent in the fortunes I have brought if I ask for another round?"

Olyvar smirks, "If you make it quick, it won't."

"And the warrior still hasn't finished." Ellaria remarks as you pull out of her lover, cock still proud and strong.

"Endurance," You reply, "a selling point."

"And here I thought we were simply not good enough for you." Oberyn turns around to lay on his back. His breaths slow as he relaxes. He nods his head between you and Olyvar, "So, you and him, history?"

"Just coworkers." Olyvar says, all business. "I'm sure you know there are certain folks that simply aren't good at this sort of thing."

"So we weren't good enough." Ellaria laughs. "I'd like to see you get the aspect off, then. If we simply aren't experienced enough."

Olyvar is more than welcome to. In fact, he seems eager to, as you fix yourself upright on the bed and he crawls towards you. Once more, you are playing a show, except this time, there is no goal except to pleasure you.

"Prince Oberyn, Lady Ellaria," Olyvar says as he nears your cock, "take pride in knowing you are simply not whores."

You feel like a King, getting to have all this: a Sand's cunt, a Prince's hole, your part-time lover's mouth. "I'm pampered." You voice.

He stares up at you as he takes you down to the base, something that causes clear surprise in the two Dornish. Olyvar's words make sense to them now, it's the experience that comes with working as a whore that allows him to do this. Or perhaps it isn't, perhaps it is your history together.

You won't voice it, but it's comforting coming back to Olyvar. The way you watch him isn't sultry, it's endearing. The way you grab a handful of his blonde hair isn't sultry, it's appreciative.

Olyvar has boundaries with his clients. He won't swallow, and he won't let them finish inside him, but you're not a client.

When you cum, you do so down his throat, and he swallows gladly.

Oberyn applauds, pulling you away from the sight of Olyvar. "And the show comes to an end."

"So it does." Ellaria sits up and leans towards you, capturing you with a much-needed kiss. She is just a good a kisser as her lover. "Whenever we find ourselves in King's Landing again, I'm sure we'll cross paths."

"I might have him brought back to Dorne, actually." Prince Oberyn jokes.

"You'd like the competition?" Ellaria teases.

Oberyn's eyebrows furrow at that, his anger at the idea almost real. "Perhaps it is a bad idea, then."

A Sand and a Prince, added to your list.

[steddieas-shegoes]

rory's dad

for @steddieholidaydrabbles prompt 'gift'

all of my holiday drabbles will be from the bear hugs universe. many of them could probably be read standalone, but will make the most sense and be enjoyed best if you read that first!

rated g | 861 words | no cw | tags: so much fluff, established relationship, gift giving

🎁🎁🎁🎁🎁🎁🎁🎁🎁🎁🎁🎁🎁

“He’s gonna love it, green bean,” Steve whispers as Rory shows him the present that finally arrived in the mail. Robin helped her order it, so this is the first Steve’s seen of it. “Do you want help wrapping it?”

She looks down at the gift, contemplating if she can handle it herself. It’s small enough that she probably could do it alone.

“No. I can do it.” She takes it and walks out of the room.

Steve barely contains a laugh as she leaves, always so independent and confident. He loves that about her.

He also loves that she did this for Eddie.

He’s gonna cry.

——-

When Christmas morning comes, Rory rushes through her stocking gifts while she sits on their bed. It’s a tradition that started the first Christmas she could really open her own presents and they’ve done it every year since.

Eddie tells her to slow down a few times, not realizing why she’s so excited. Steve knows, though. He knows it’s been killing her for the last three weeks to keep this quiet.

“I can give it to him now, right dad?” Rory is bouncing on the bed, ready to explode with excitement.

Steve considers for a minute. Technically, the rule is they eat some breakfast first and wait for Robin and Chrissy to come over. Technically, Rory has never been so excited for presents that she wants to skip breakfast.

“Fine, but just this one gift,” Steve allows.

Eddie is staring at him as Rory jumps off the bed and runs out of the room. She nearly trips on the blanket that fell on the floor in her rush, but manages to make it out unscathed.

“What’s she up to?” Eddie asks, full of suspicion.

“You’ll see,” Steve replies nonchalantly.

He won’t have to wait long; Rory’s already rushing back into the room with the very clearly wrapped by her present. She jumps onto the bed and practically throws it at him.

He catches it and then Steve makes room so she can scoot in between them. She’s squirmy, too hyped up to stay still.

Eddie tries to shake it, then pokes around the edges, even tries smelling it through the paper.

“Daddy! Open it!” Rory nudges his arm.

“Okay, okay!” Eddie pokes at her nose before he starts ripping into the paper. He tears it all away and throws it to the ground. He stares down at the cloth in his lap.

Steve’s impressed. Rory wrapped it with the name facing out.

It’s a jersey, of course. That’s most of the gifts exchanged in this house.

But it’s custom, something that Eddie would’ve never expected because Steve had to keep it a secret that they were even offering them.

Rory’s team offered jerseys for parents for a limited time, and they could pay extra to have them personalized. Steve had suggested they get one for him and one for Eddie and then Rory ran with it and made him swear he wouldn’t say anything to Eddie.

Eddie’s still staring down at the jersey, the words on the back above Rory’s number.

“RORY’S DAD” in huge block letters for everyone to see.

Steve has a matching one he’s been hiding, but now probably isn’t the time to bring it up.

Rory has thought of Eddie as her other dad for a while, but nothing is official, and sometimes he can tell Eddie still wonders if she means it. He would never ask, but Steve knows him.

“Oh! There’s a second part!” Steve’s brow furrows. Second part? He didn’t know about a second part.

She’s rushing back off the bed and out of the room before he can ask. He looks back to Eddie, who’s unfolding the jersey and letting tears pool in his eyes.

“Eds, you okay?” Steve asks. He knows he’s good, great even, but he still wants to ask.

Before Eddie can answer, Rory is rushing in wearing her own jersey. She jumps on the bed, stands, and turns.

Both of them gasp as she turns her head to look at them.

“Do you like it?” She asks.

“MUNSON” is written across her back instead of Harrington, and now Steve is experiencing something close to shock.

She’d asked once what they’d do when Eddie and Steve got married. He asked what she wanted to do. She said she wanted to be a Munson.

He didn’t think she was serious until now.

“How did you…?” Steve asks.

“When did you…?” Eddie asks.

“Aunt Robbie got it when we ordered your present!” Rory says as she sits down and moves back between them. “Do you like it?”

Eddie pulls her into his lap, hugging her close as he looks at Steve with wet eyes.

“I love it. I’m so proud to be your dad,” Eddie says shakily. Rory is burying herself into his chest the way she always does on movie nights.

“When you and dad get married, we can be Munsons and I can change my jersey for real. This is just to wear off the ice,” Rory explains. “But maybe next season.”

Steve grins at Eddie.

“Well, I’m sure we could arrange that.”

[temporarywelcome]

Turkey - Spencer Reid

Word Count: 2k

Summary: JJ's son, Henry, loves his Uncle Spencer and Spencer's girlfriend, so JJ invites the two over for some holiday crafts.

WARNINGS: some swearing? mostly just fluffyness

A/N: technically a continuation of my little "Smooth Criminal" series though this can 100% be read standalone. If you want to know why Girls' Generation is mentioned, perhaps read "Babysitting", tho you really don't need to

____

Look, she didn’t hate kids.

She just didn’t like them.

Y/N didn’t hate Henry, but she wasn’t exactly a fan either.

Spencer adored the kid to bits, being his godfather, and as Spencer’s girlfriend, Y/N saw Henry quite often. She had won JJ over, another member of the BAU that was able to look past her sketchy past as a kleptomaniac. All that was left was Rossi. 

Winning JJ over wasn’t as easy as Garcia, Morgan, or Prentiss. Hell, Y/N found getting on Hotch’s good side to be easier. She helped with a few cases using her knowledge from her life of thievery, helping them catch a few unsubs. Hotch didn’t mind her.

But with JJ? It took multiple days of babysitting. 

And Y/N didn’t like kids.

But it paid off in the end, she could assume. 

November had just arrived, and Spencer being the holiday fanatic he was, had their shared apartment decked for the season.

This was the most orange she had seen in a while. 

This was their first November living together, so she let him have his fun, just like for October. Being the sucker she was, anything he wanted, she let happen.

But this time it was JJ who had a request for her. Well, both her and Spencer.

Like most days Spencer wasn't out on a case, Y/N had driven off to the FBI building's parking garage, sitting in her usual parking space to pick him up. She was exhausted from her own responsibilities at the theatre, busy at rehearsal for hours. 

She was reviewing her lines, because she always took work home with her, tired and cranky as hell. She already knew Spencer was probably going to be equally tired and cranky as hell, and he was always annoying as fuck when he was, well, tired and cranky as hell. 

Noticing Spencer approaching from the rearview mirror, Y/N grinned. She was already excited to just go home and cuddle in bed with her man. Her smile faded when she saw JJ walking next to him. Not like she had a thing against JJ, she just wanted to be in bed already. 

Spencer slid into his designated seat in the front, but he didn’t close the door, “JJ has a proposition for us,” 

“Does it involve a bubble bath and wine and then my nice warm bed?” Y/N deadpanned. 

JJ, who was standing to the left of Spencer, answered, “Unfortunately no. However, Henry really wanted to do some holiday crafts with his Uncle Spencer this weekend but also wanted you to be there too, Y/N,”

She paused, shocked, “Me? Henry wants to do some holiday crafts with me?”

“Yes, he really likes you,” JJ replied, “And it would mean a lot to Henry and Will and I if you came.” 

“Er,” Y/N scratched the back of her neck awkwardly, “I don’t see why not,”

Spencer’s eyes brightened, “Really?” he expected her to make up some lame excuse not to go, pleasantly surprised now. “Great! I-”

“Alright, g’bye, JJ,” Y/N grumbled, reaching over Spencer and closing his door, “Sorry, I’m exhausted and ready to bite someone’s head off,”

“That someone is going to be me,” Spencer sighed, leaning back in his seat.

“Oh, please, you’re always getting pissy with me when you’re tired-”

“Okay but you get pissy even when you’re not tired-”

“So we’re lying now? Okay, fine-”

“You two have fun,” JJ muttered, leaving them to their bickering. 

It was like that for the whole car ride, which led to Y/N and Spencer grumbling to themselves and dramatically stalking off to separate rooms. Within minutes, they both felt like shit. And so Spencer scurried to run her a bath with those bubbles she wanted, and when he went to get her a glass of wine, he found her in the kitchen, making him a late-night snack. 

They made eye contact, very well aware of what the other was doing. Y/N spoke first.

“You’re so fucking annoying when you’re tired, y’know?”

“So are you.” he shot back with a huff. 

“Yeah, but you let all your crankiness pile up until you’re in my vicinity to let it all out on me,” she explained, still chopping up some fruits as she spoke, “At least I take out all my anger equally onto everyone,” 

“How nice,” he rolled his eyes, “...I ran you a bath,”

“I made you a snack,” she held up a bowl of freshly cut fruits, his favorite kinds. He slowly took it.

“...I love you.”

“Love you too, fucking pain,” she said dryly, pressing a quick kiss to his cheek before walking off for her bath, smirking slightly. That was usually how their arguments went. 

___

On Saturday, Y/N and Spencer arrived at JJ’s place at around noon. JJ was the one who answered the door, but before she could even greet them, Henry pushed past her.

“Y/N! Uncle Spencer!” He exclaimed. He was known for being extremely… loud. “You're here!”

“Hey, buddy,” Spencer grins, hugging back as Henry ran at him, “Of course we’re here,”

Once Henry was tired of Spencer’s hug he jumped on Y/N next. She choked, eyes widening before awkwardly patting the kid’s back. It was funny. She was usually the affectionate one and Spencer shied away from physical touch. But with kids, Spencer was always giving them love while Y/N was ready to jump out a window to get away. 

“Guess what, Y/N?!” Henry said in his usual annoyingly loud tone, “I’m going to be in a Thanksgiving play at my school!” 

When Spencer and Y/N had babysat Henry for the first time, Henry was a monster, and Spencer got overstimulated within the first hour. So Y/N had kept Henry distracted with her usual fix of Girls’ Generation and then put him on MTV for a while. Y/N had a career in the arts, and from what JJ has said, it seemed like Henry was becoming interested in it too. 

“Oh, really?” she asked, ruffling his hair, “I did a few when I was in elementary school,”

Henry’s eyes lit up, “REALLY?! I’m just like you!” he then skipped off inside of JJ’s home. Y/N debated running off into the street. 

“He really looks up to you,” JJ grumbled, clearly in a Don’t Mess This Up way. 

“Me? B-But I’ve only seen him a few times,” Y/N scratched the back of her neck, suddenly feeling this responsibility (that she did not even want). 

“Well, you made an impression on him,” JJ replied, “Now come on in. Will just made some lunch,”  At the word lunch, Y/N was off inside the house and Spencer went to follow, JJ stopping him, “Did you two have the talk yet?”

His brows furrowed, “Like sexual education-?”

“No,” she couldn’t help but laugh, “The whole kids thing…”

Oh. That. 

During that one babysitting adventure, Spencer had admitted to his girlfriend he had wanted kids, but didn’t think he would be a good dad. She had assured him, saying she was sure he would be a great dad and even said as a mom she would definitely pull as much of the weight as she could. 

But she doesn’t even want to be a mom.

She only said those things to calm him down.

They had agreed to discuss the whole kids thing after, something they probably should have done before they got serious with each other. But never did. He was terrified, and he was sure she was too. 

So they never did. 

“No,” he looked down, fiddling with his fingers, “We have not,” 

JJ sighed, “Reid.” Here we go. “You two have to talk about this.” 

“I know,”

“Then why haven’t you?”

“I just…” he shrugged, still not making eye contact, “I don’t want to lose her,”

“Spencer, if you guys have different wants, no matter what happens, you’re going to end up resenting each other,” 

She was right, and he knew that. He knew that if they didn’t have any kids he would probably start to resent Y/N, and if they did have kids, Y/N would probably start to resent him and the children, which he wouldn’t be able to bear. 

But he won’t be able to bear losing her either. 

“I know, I know… I’ll talk to her about it, promise,” 

“No you won’t,” JJ shook her head with a sigh, and with that, she let him in.

____

“I can feel you lookin’ at me, I know what you see. Any closer and you feel the heat,” Y/N and Henry were singing obnoxiously as they cut up little turkey body parts for a little arts and crafts project, sitting together at the kid's table.  

Spencer, JJ, and Will were seated at the “adult” table, occasionally giving each other glances as they watched the scene unfold before them. The way both Y/N and Henry looked equally concentrated on their turkeys as they cut the paper, brows furrowed with tongues sticking out in determination. 

“For someone who doesn’t like kids,” JJ mused, “She’s good with them,”

“Yeah, because she’s like one,” Spencer scoffed, sipping at his coffee, “That’s like her third turkey,” 

“He still hasn’t had the ‘kids’ talk with her yet,” JJ told Will, who tutted in disappointment. 

“Do you gossip about me?” Spencer’s mouth dropped. 

“A bit,” 

“Wow,” 

“To be fair, it was Garcia who told him about it,”

Spencer rolled his eyes with a soft chuckle, “Of course it was her. She blows up everything in my relationship,”

“She does it with love,”

“Yeah, yeah, yeah-”

“GIRLS GENERATION MAKE YOU FEEL THE HEAT-”

“-I hope it works out,” Will said, always the earnest one (also ignoring the practical karaoke in the living room), “I feel she’s good for you-”

“-AND WE’RE DOIN’ IT, WE CAN’T BE BEAT-”

“-Yeah, you need some fun in your life-,” JJ agreed with a grin. 

“-B-BRING THE BOYS OUT-”

“-Sometimes it makes me want to scoop my brain out of my skull via my nostrils,” Spencer grumbled, wincing at the loud yell-singing, “I have to deal with this pretty much every day-”

“-WE’RE BORN TO WIN, BETTER TELL ALL-” The singing suddenly stopped, and a child plus an overgrown child scampered on over, showing off their turkeys. 

“Look, Mommy!” Henry shoved one into JJ’s face, “It’s you!”

JJ surveyed the turkey with the colored in blonde hair with a smile, “Aw, it’s beautiful-” she paused, “...why does it look angry?”

“You get angry a lot,”

Will immediately covered his mouth to stifle a laugh. 

“And I did you too, Daddy!” Henry handed Will his turkey.

“Why is his smiling?” JJ grumbled before laughing softly, petting her son’s hair. 

“Because he smiles a lot,” Ah, kids with their zero filter. 

“Look,” Y/N slapped down her turkey onto the table in front of Spencer, eyes bright like the overgrown child she was. 

Spencer looked down at the turkey and grinned, already knowing exactly who it was.

“It’s you, pretty boy,” she said proudly, doing jazz hands like the theatre freak she was. 

The turkey was definitely him, with a silly hairstyle colored in and some glasses, accompanied by a sweater vest. 

“Why does my turkey have no pants on?” he asked like some art critic.

“Because it’s a turkey, I bet pants would be uncomfortable.”

“But glasses wouldn’t be?”

“The turkey won’t be able to see without glasses!” 

He laughed, looking down at the turkey again. He complained a lot, he was well aware of it, however, there was nothing in this world that could make him dislike the woman in front of him. 

And so he pulled her down, not bothering to stand, planting a kiss to her lips. 

“EWWWWW!” Henry gasped, covering his eyes, “What are you DOING?!”

When Spencer pulled his lips away, Y/N smirked, “You should totally make a turkey of me now,”

___

song is "The Boys" by Girls' Generation

[daycourtofficial]

Laborious anxieties

Eris x Rhysand’s Sister!reader

Summary: based on this request - Eris is riddled with anxiety leading up to your labor, but what happens when some of his worst fears come to fruition?

Author’s note: this is technically a follow-up to A Starfall in Autumn, but could be read as a standalone 🥰 I kinda tore through writing this. I got the request at 7:45 and finished writing at 9:30. Forgive any spelling errors, I have ✨sick brain✨

Warnings: pregnancy, labor, blood loss

The last two weeks of your pregnancy had been a time riddled with anxiety.

You were fine - it was Eris who was unable to stay calm. It felt like a stranger was consuming your mate’s body the way nervousness radiated off of him these days.

And the way he clung to you was very unlike him.

He stepped back from High Lord duties for at least a month, delegating responsibilities amongst his brothers and advisors. He receives a summary of the day’s activities during dinner, and except for a trade agreement his brother signed that was less than advantageous for Autumn, everything was running fine.

Which meant your mate could spend all of his time worrying about you, following you around. He’d gotten so absurd he began having his hounds check you for any abnormalities, doing a ‘daily check’ where they sniffed you to ensure you were okay.

The moment you had told Eris of your pregnancy, his joy was very quickly eclipsed by his very sudden interest in providing you with more security. You had been able to talk him down from the initial twelve guards he wanted trailing you at all times to two guards and at least two of the hounds.

“One hound will stay and defend me, the other one will find you,” you had argued. He relented, but as you got closer and closer to your due date, his attempts at renegotiation were increasing by the day.

You had now agreed to four guards and six hounds with you at all times, unless you were with him.

Between the massive bump on your belly that makes maneuvering around very difficult and the entourage you’d have to take, you opt more often than not to stay in your chambers for most of the day.

One of Autumn’s advisors had suggested the birth be a public spectacle, and Eris grabbed him by the back of his shirt and threw him out of the room, stating, “you’ll be allowed back in when you’ve recovered from your sudden onset stupidity.”

You were glad, because even laboring privately didn’t keep it from being quite the spectacle. Three high lords were to be in Autumn around the birth: your brother, Rhysand, and Eris’s brother, Lucien.

Lucien offered to be available to you in any way he can be, so you took him up on that offer and begged him to take your mate away for an hour or so every day.

So every day at an hour past noon, Lucien would retrieve Eris, and they would play some sporting game they invented when Lucien was a child. They tried explaining it to you, but it never made any sense to you, so you opted to just let them enjoy themselves.

Today, Eris was running through the halls of the Forest House, cursing himself for putting his chambers so deep inside. The house was more fortified the further in you went, with many foxholes that can take you throughout the court. Now it was just a pain to get back to his mate who was definitely not okay.

His fingers made quick work of ruining his hair, a light sweat coating his skin as he flung open the door, preparing for the worst.

Instead, he found his insufferable brother in law opposite you on the bed playing a card game.

“Hi Er,” you say, lighting up at the sight of him, but quickly going back to the cards in your hand, determination in your features.

Clover, the eldest hound and your personal favorite, currently had her head resting against your bump. Her eyes tracked the room, searching for any movement that could be perceived as a threat. Her tail wagged softly at Eris’s entrance, but she remained fixed, guarding your unborn babe.

“Hi Er,” Rhys offers, not glancing up from his cards, “did you run here or do you get winded from these elaborate halls?”

Eris straightens his vest, closing the door behind him as he walks further into the room. “Someone was sending some very distressed signals down the bond.”

He keeps his eyes on you as your face softens, “oops, I was so focused on our game, I didn’t mean to. It’s just not fair because he cheats!”

“I have done no such thing! How dare you accuse a high lord of such a crime?”

You stick your tongue out at him, which he immediately returns. Eris rolls his eyes, well aware of how being around your brother turns the two of you into children. He heads into your private chambers, heading towards the bathroom to bathe.

After bathing and putting on fresh clothes, Eris is about to head back to the two of you, when he hears your soft voice whisper through the door, “I miss mother.”

He’s sure you’re curled up into Rhysand, peering into the violet eyes you both inherited from her. He turns back into the chambers, allowing the two of you to share your grief. As he retreats he does hear, “but I’ll have Eris’s mother. She’s not, y’know, but she’s great. If I can’t have mother, she’s a great stand-in.”

He smiles to himself, finding the book on his bedside table, and settling into the couch, letting the two of you have your privacy.

-

Rhys travels between Autumn and Night every morning and every afternoon, keeping you company during the morning as you become more and more confined to your bedchambers.

You weren’t technically ordered for bedrest, but moving about was incredibly taxing for you, especially when trying to wrangle the large entourage Eris insisted on.

Fortunately, or unfortunately, Rhysand happened to be with you when your water broke.

Eris was at court settling a dispute between his idiotic advisors that they insisted required his input when Rhysand’s claws tapped his mind. Upon allowing him entry, he hears Rhysand’s voice trickle in.

It’s time.

-

Your contractions began, slow and unhurried, the cramping abismal. The contractions came quicker and quicker, time between shortening until your nursemaid tells you to start pushing.

You cry out as you do so, an intense pain coming from your pelvis. They tell you to stop, as they check to ensure your dilated enough to continue.

They motion for you to continue, but the pain only gets worse.

“She’s tearing dramatically,” one of the nurses says.

“What does that mean?” Rhys asks, holding your hand.

“Her circulation’s poor, likely because of the bedrest. She’s losing a lot of blood from these tears.”

Eris felt the primal rage of the mating bond heating his blood. They were talking about his mate in such a sterile, clinical way. Eris bared his teeth at them, but they did not back down, they would not back down, even to the commanding presence of multiple high lords.

“I need the two of you to leave, now. I need to focus, and I can’t do that with two high lords breathing down my neck.”

“Everyone here has her best interest at heart - I promise you, high lords, we will do our best for her,” another nursemaid says.

Eris’s eyes are fixed on your pale face, drained of any color. He doesn’t feel Rhys’s arm wrap around him, dragging him out of the room, nor does he feel the wall Rhys presses him against, giving him something to support his weight.

He can’t let that be the last memory he has of your face.

Lucien is in the hall, and Rhys is updating him on how much blood you loss. “Can’t Feyre’s blood heal? Can she come help?”

Eris snaps his eyes up to Rhysand, whose eyes have a vaguely glossy look to them.

“Please, Rhys.”

Eris did not beg. He accepted the hands he was dealt. He did not plead with his father, as the whip would strike his back. He did not plead with the Mother when he had to chase Lucien into Spring. He did not plead with the Cauldron or the stars asking for help.

But he would ask Rhysand.

“She’s on her way, she just has to get someone to care for Nyx.”

“Hel, she can bring Nyx and I can care for him,” Eris offered, reaching out to hold tightly onto that golden string connecting the two of you.

Rhys’s eyebrows raise, but Lucien cuts in, “brother, you are in no state to watch over a young child.”

“Since when have you had any experience with young children?”

Lucien balks, “the children of Spring were quite fond of me.”

Eris smirks, “pity the children of the court you preside over do not feel the same.”

Lucien is about to bite back when Rhys comes back to them.

“Okay, she’ll be here any minute now.”

Eris hated to do it, tampering with the wards of the Forest House to allow any member of your family entry in the past month.

Never has he been so grateful he did something he so staunchly opposed when Feyre appeared in front of them, a cooing Nyx in her arms that she quickly hands off to Lucien. She briefly lets her hand touch Rhys’s shoulder as she nods to Eris before running into the room.

Lucien holds Nyx, the young toddler providing amusement to the three high lords.

“Do you have a name?” Rhys asks, trying to distract Eris from the nervous meltdown he understood all too well.

“For a girl, we like Hestia Seline.”

Rhys’s eyes snap up, but Eris continues.

“Some ancient humans believed in multiple gods, one of which was the goddess of the hearth, Hestia. And Seline for..”

He gestures towards Rhys, letting his sentence finish there.

“You would allow a Vanserra to be named after my mother?”

Eris nods, “if she insisted,” a finger was pointed to the door you lay behind, in what condition Eris had no idea, “I’d let her name a Vanserra ‘Rhys Azriel Vanserra.”

Rhys grins, “but not Cassian?”

“We all must draw lines somewhere, Rhysand.”

Lucien hoists Nyx up into the air, his little wings fluttering, and Eris watches.

“I helped raise all of my brothers,” he states to no one in particular. “It would have been utter carnage if they had wings.”

“And Cassian only makes it worse.”

“Color me surprised. Don’t allow him home alone with Nyx, I’m sure he’ll throw him from your tallest balconies.”

Rhysand breathes through his nose, and Eris knows there’s a great possibility it is something that has already happened.

“What if it’s a boy?” Rhys asks, “you have Hestia Seline.”

“Jasper Camden.”

“Didn’t want another Beron around?” Lucien asks, pushing Nyx into the air on one arm.

“The day I give a child that name is the day I have been possessed.”

The conversation was helping distract Eris, but he kept a tight hold on the bond, ensuring you felt him no matter what.

Eris feels intense pain through the bond, and without thinking, he shoots up off the ground, and opens the door, promptly running into one of the nursemaids.

“High lord, she’s pushing again. The tears were healed, and she’s doing much better. I was just about to get you.”

He comes over to you, holding one of your hands. Feyre was tightly holding your other, holding a damp cloth to your forehead.

“Hello, my love.”

Eris isn’t sure when he started crying, but he knew he was when you smiled back at him, color back to your beautiful face.

“Haven’t you heard? I’m a vampire now- ah!”

You breathe out slowly, and Feyre begins whispering words of encouragement to you.

“But my dear, you love the sun too much.”

You nod as you push, and the nurse tells you you can stop for a moment. You catch your breath, looking towards your mate.

“But I would have really cool fangs. I could taste your blood.”

He strokes the back of your hand, kissing your palm. “Anything you want, my love.”

Your labor continued, much faster now as you held onto Feyre and Eris’s hands, frequently apologizing if you break any fingers.

Eris never got to be around for this part. He was always kept in front of closed doors, anxiously waiting for his next brother, uncertain as to his mother’s state. His anxiety reprieved only hours after the actual labor, when he was allowed to visit his mother and new brother.

Now he was here, the bond thrumming between you two, as he got to hear the first cries of his babe. You almost fall back in exhaustion as your babe slides out, but Eris slides behind you, allowing you to rest against his chest.

He holds your sweaty face in his hands, hair damp, kissing your forehead, telling you how proud of you he was and how incredible you were.

The two of you listen to your babe’s cries as the nursemaid brings the babe to you, placing them on your chest.

Every exhalation is accompanied by a wailing too large for the small body as they breathe air into their lungs for the first time.

Eris places a hand on the babe’s back, hoping they’ll remember his touch from the womb. The babe was covered in birth, but Eris didn’t care. He knew being around for this part was a privilege he had never been afforded before.

He kisses your head again, as the nursemaid smiles at the two of you.

“It’s a boy.”

[love-quinn]

—PEACE OF MIND

summary — when carmen finds out that you're putting yourself in danger to come in to your waitressing job at the bear, he admittedly gets pissed. he's not super proud of his reaction, but the two of you manage to work something out to ease his worries.

warnings — swearing, mentions of customers being assholes, the implication that if reader isn't being fed at the restaurant she doesn't eat due to money reasons, very brief mentions/implications of the possibility of reader being attacked at night

pairing — carmen berzatto x fem!waitress reader, not established relationship

pronouns — she/her, reader is HEAVILY implied to be female, also there's technically no pronouns in this one but i consider this to be the same waitress reader as my last one which does have pronouns

word count — 1.9k

note — this can 10000% be read as a standalone but i do have another carmy x waitress fic here that i think takes place kinda in the same universe if you wanna check that one out?? i hope u enjoy <333

If you were somebody who wasn’t a fan of the cold, then Chicago wasn’t the city for you. It’s one of your least favourite parts of living in Illinois, having to wear four layers to bed if you don't want to freeze in your sleep. Your apartment doesn’t have proper heating because proper heating is for rich people, apparently. You barely make enough to afford rent as it is. 

You’re doing fine. You make rent and utilities, you eat lunch and dinner at the restaurant most days. You’re not swimming in gold coins by no means, but you’re fine. That’s the reason you show up early to every single shift, if you’re being honest, you’re guaranteed at least a sandwich. 

The fact that it makes you look like a dedicated employee doesn’t hurt either.

Even when you have to trek from the train platform after getting off the L. You’re not the first person punching in the code to the service entrance that afternoon, but the kitchen is free of yelling. Sydney’s at the end of the line, it’s her shift for Family, and she flashes you a smile as you shove your duffel into your locker.

It’s not raining outside but the air is so cold and damp outside, and you dab your face with a towel. The kitchen is so much warmer than outside that for a moment it’s uncomfortable. Sydney watches you out of the corner of her eye as she sautes a collection of vegetables. “Are you alright? Is it wet out there?”

You shake your head, grabbing your apron and using the mirror you hung up on the back of your door to fix your appearance. “Just cold, sorry. I’ll be fine. You get in okay?”

Sydney nods, holding out a spoon for you, hand cupped to prevent anything from landing on the floor. You don’t question it, opening your mouth and accepting the sauce while trying to minimise the contact between your mouth and the spoon as much as possible. “Fuck, that’s good. Is there sesame oil in there?”

You didn’t know a whole lot about food if you were honest, there’s a reason that you’re not a member of the kitchen staff. But Sydney’s been teaching you slowly but surely how to recognise different flavours, which ones go best together, which ones don’t.

Her eyes light up. “Yes! You like it?”

You shut your locker, moving to stand right behind her. Your chin lands on her shoulder, watching the way she rotates her medley of ingredients. You and Sydney have started becoming actual friends rather than just work friends, the two of you went out to dinner last Sunday, miraculously neither of you had to work. “Love it, need any help?”

“No, you’re all good. Go find Richie, I’m sure he needs help with whatever shit he’s doing.”

You leave her alone with a squeeze on the elbow, heading out into the dining room to find Richie. Richie isn’t out there but you do find Carmen pulling the chairs off the tables. You don’t bother talking, you and Carmen both appreciate the quiet in a workplace as loud as the restaurant. The second you put the first chair down Carmen is flinching. “You’re early,” he says, trying not to show his irritation.

He’d left the kitchen to feel productive while being alone, but he doesn’t want to yell at you. You deal with that enough. Yelling in the kitchen is natural, it’s fucking loud in there. If he doesn’t yell, he doesn’t get heard. People aren’t moving fast enough, people aren’t using proper technique, they’re running out of ingredients, things are being moved. If Carmen didn’t yell in the kitchen it would probably burn down somehow.

You deal with all that and you have to keep a smile on your face. You get yelled at for mistakes that other people make, and you never yell back. You take it all and yeah, sometimes you need to step out into the kitchen with tears in your eyes, but you cop it all and you go back out there.

You don’t need Carmy yelling at you as well.

You shrug casually, smoothing the tablecloth. “I am a slave to the public transit system.” It’s less embarrassing than admitting you’re trying to save money by eating at work whenever you can. 

Carmen stops at that. He doesn’t know why that’s surprising to him. He’s always here before you and he’s always here after you leave. He assumed he’d never seen your car in the parking lot because of that, but apparently, it’s because you don’t have one. “You took the train here?”

It’s early afternoon and people are turning their headlights on already. The closest train station is a fair walk away and it’s freezing out there. 

You nod, not taking much notice of the change in tone. “Yeah, I usually do.”

Carmen’s abandoned the table he’s dressing to turn around and look at you. It’s almost completely dark outside, it’s the middle of winter. “You walk to work?”

You look up at him. “Yeah, Carm.” You’re really hoping he’ll drop it, but he doesn’t seem to pick up on the way you avoid looking at him. 

“That’s so fucking dumb,” he doesn’t mean to snap, but the mood in the room is frozen now. “It’s like two degrees out there, why the fuck would you do that?” You regret coming out to help him. Usually, this stuff is already done by the time you show up to work, early as usual. 

You put down the last chair at the table you’re working on and brush off your apron. “It’s not like I have any other choice, Carmen,” you’re trying to keep your voice even. The dining room is empty, it’s still, and it feels much more awkward than having the conversation anywhere else would’ve felt. “I don’t really have many other options.” 

You look around the dining room and decide that leaving Carmen to finish setup isn’t an awful fate. 

“Yes, you do!” He doesn’t drop it. His fists are clenched at his side to stop him from flinging his arms up in frustration. “You have so many other options! Why did you pick the fucking stupid one?” You can handle being yelled at. It’s a part of the job. It happens to you every single day without fail. You can handle it.

That doesn’t mean that you have to take it from Carmen, though.

“Stop it,” you don’t raise your voice at him, but you’re not quiet either.

“I just don’t fucking get it,” he huffs. Once he’s started he can’t make himself stop. 

You sigh, loudly. “Yeah, I’m not asking you to, Carmen. Okay, but don’t treat me like garbage because I can’t afford a car.”

That’s the final straw in the conversation with him, and you turn to go back into the kitchen. Maybe Richie will be playing Angry Birds on his phone in the office and he’ll let you watch. Carmen’s frown deepens. “What the fuck are you talking about? Who gives a shit that you can’t afford a car?” He dodges the table he was working on and rushes to follow you. He’s a lot less graceful than you always are with it and that’s without the tray of drinks. “Do you see that shit out there?” He stands in front of you now, pointing a heavy, tattooed arm out at the front window. “It’s fucking Chicago. You can’t be walking here in twenty fucking degrees, honey! Do you not get that? Look at you! If someone pulls a knife on you out there what the fuck are you gonna do?”

You’re frozen in front of him now. He’s throwing so much at you that you don’t know what to say. 

He’s going back to setting up now, but as he turns he blows out a breath. “Get that through your fucking head, yeah?”

That’s the part that frustrates you the most. He does this all the time, he presents you with ten different problems and no solutions. You don’t need Carmen to tell you how to live your life when you’re struggling as it is. “How else do you want me to get to work? It’s either that or you find a new fucking waitress, okay? So can we let it go? What the fuck do you want me to do about it, Carmen? ”

Carmen doesn’t want to let it go. You take the train in the fucking pouring rain and walk every night only to be yelled at by a bunch of assholes over steak. 

“I want you to not walk through Chicago in the middle of the night!” He’s exasperated. “Yesterday you left after eleven, do you know how fucking dangerous that is? Fucking… Fuck?” It comes out as a question. “Why the fuck have you been leaving me here at night to go walk home alone? What the fuck do you think I’m here for?”

You’re getting upset by the yelling, and now that he’s said everything he needs to say he can see that he’s making you visibly panicked. “I don’t know what you want from me!” You let out finally, words exhaling from your chest with force. “Just tell me what you want or stop fucking yelling at me!”

He says your name quietly, letting out a frustrated huff. “Fucking- Okay. Okay.” He runs a hand through his hair and has to bend at the waist, leaning on the table you just fixed up, head buried in his arms. He takes a quick three second breather, trying to force down the ugly bubble of anger that’s rising familiarly to the surface, ready to spill out of his mouth. “If we are at the restaurant together and it’s the middle of the night, and I have a car…” he pauses, trying to give you time to follow along after previously overwhelming you. “... and you don’t.” You blink over at him. “Why the fuck would you not ask me to drive you home?”

“Because you’re my boss?” The answer comes easily, and it almost startles him how quickly you respond. “What? Why are you asking me this?”

Carmen knows, deep down, that he wouldn’t offer the same courtesy to Marcus or Fak or god forbid Richie. Sydney or Tina? If they asked, sure. But he would never stand in front of them in the dining room to yell at them for not asking. He likes to think it’s because he knows you’re different. You don’t yell back, you don’t antagonise him, you don’t push like they do. You handle it, and you’re gentle and you’re soft and for some fucking reason the idea of anything happening to you makes him feel like he has just been mugged in the street. 

“Just,” he waves a hand in front of his face. He can hear Sydney calling out, probably something important knowing her. “Please, honey, promise me that you’ll let me at least drive you to the fucking train station? Okay? For my own peace of mind. How far away from the station do you live?”

You tell him and he’s immediately groaning. “No, alright. I’m driving you home.” He sounds frustrated, not mad at you, but less than pleased. You don’t take it to heart. “Now please, go back inside the kitchen and fucking eat something, you’re giving me an irregular heartbeat.”