#codrequest

[gremlinmodetweeker]

hiii >< I see you're still taking request so maybe can you write about how könig would confort his insecure s/o? not just about her weight but also her ability to do things? like "oh no I'm not good and pretty enough"

I'm going through a hard time right now so it'd help a lot T.T

(also can I slide into your dm? I want to make friend and talk about könig but I'm scared you might be uncomfortable)

Okay so thank you so so much for this ask? It genuinely warms my heart. I had an idea of writing a prompt for König comforting an insecure reader, but I didn’t really know how to start. This really helped! I do not know if I perfectly got what you wanted, but I hope it’s okay? Sometimes I am not very good at interpreting others, I admit. Also, my dms are always open (and I especially like making new friends in this community). I hope to hear from you soon, and I hope you like this story!

So, just under 2.1k words, all soft and sweet. Total fluff. TW for insecurities and self hatred, but it gets talked over. Story below the cut.

Faker

König sat on your bed behind you, watching you with patient eyes. You’d just come home from an outing, and though you had put on an act for others, he could see how it had worn on you. He knew that you couldn’t do it forever, but he didn’t blame you in the slightest. Nobody could do what you tried to do.

 You looked in the mirror, staring with blank eyes at your persecutor.

These hands, they made so many mistakes… These lips have uttered so many lies… These eyes have seen truth and beauty and joy, but now they see nothing but a hollow shell. Who is this empty vessel that stands before you? Did you ever really know who they were?

König stands up and steps forward, gently resting his hands on your shoulders, on the vessel’s shoulders.

“What do you see?” König asked softly, taking one hand to brush away tears you had not noticed.

“I see…” you paused, “Myself.”

König rested his head over you, watching you with his ice blue eyes. They looked at you, tried to hold your gaze, but the cold was too much for you to bear.

“Do you?” he whispered.

You blinked, taking a moment to sniff and recompose your dignity. Tears welled up further, but you held to them tightly, refusing to let them drop. But unfortunately, you are no God, you can defy no calling such as this. Emotions control your very being, and so you cry.

“I don’t know,” you admitted.

König let you cry. It would be cruel to stop you at this point. You tried to fight back, doing your best to build your sandcastle against the ocean, but with every hiccup you suppressed and every sniff you held back, the waves would wash over you again. And eventually, you gave up. You followed the siren’s song and drowned in your sorrows.

“I hate myself,” you finally were able to say.

König pressed a kiss to your temple and dropped his chin to your shoulder, “Why?”

“I… I don’t have enough time to go into all the reasons,” your voice cracked and warbled like a strangled seabird.

“I have time,” König replied.

“I don’t,” you said, your tone cold as the ice that he held in his eyes.

König nodded and wrapped his hands over your shoulders.

“You do not have to explain if you do not want to,” he said, his words like down on your ears, “sometimes, words are not enough.”

“It feels like they’re never enough,” you closed your eyes, unable to endure his watchful eyes any longer.

“When are they ever?” König hummed, “english is not a good language to express yourself, anyways.”

“Is it easier in German?” you asked hopefully.

You could feel König shaking his head, “Nein.”

You sniffled and opened your eyes again. You hated what you saw. You hated the kindness in his cold blue eyes. You hated the hollowness in your warm body more. Ice and fire, freezing and burning. What would be the best way to die? In your own selfish inferno, or would you let the ice of your lover’s touch shock you to reality? Or would that make you numb, too? Was it better to be numb because you had killed your cells through burning yourself alive, or through ice turning your boiling blood into nothing but a muddy sludge through your veins?

“I don’t want to be like this,” you could see yourself frown more than feel it.

“You do not have to be,” König reminded you.

“I don’t know how to change,” you replied dryly.

“Do you have to change to learn to love who you are?” König asked, taking a moment to brush his cheek over yours, water lapping over a sandy beach, “or is there something here worthy of love?”

“I don’t think so,” you muttered and turned to hide your face into his putrid mask, right where you belonged.

“Do you not think you are worthy of love as you are?” he asked.

“Why would I be?” you scrunched your eyes tight, tight enough to hear the water washing through you.

König carefully pried your face away from his mask, kindly not commenting on the mucus you’d left behind. Instead, he gently turned your chin to look back into the mirror. You groaned as he did so and tried to turn back, but such gentle hands became firm as ice.

“Maybe you should try to look at what is worth loving?” he whispered, “just try.”

“What is there to love?” you cried.

“So much,” he told you, “so much.”

You opened your eyes to see yourself. What you saw was worse than before. Red-rimmed eyes, runny nose, flushing skin. You really were a mess, weren’t you? You looked like you’d been drowned and then revived, cursed to walk the earth once more.

König cut off your spiraling thoughts with a piercing, “When I look in this mirror, I see someone who has been hurt for too long.”

“Nobody hurt me,” you protest meekly.

“You did,” his words gored into you like ice picks, “maybe, someone a long time ago said something to you. Maybe you made a mistake and it never left you. I do not know. I do know that whatever led you to think that you are nothing worth loving is wrong. It is not what you are. You are more than the past.”

“How would you know that?” you scoffed meanly.

König shrugged.

“Maybe because I know what it feels like to look in a mirror and see something I do not like.”

You turned and looked at him briefly before he redirected your gaze to the mirror, the ice in his eyes thawing with fear and insecurities you saw within yourself.

“I ask myself, what is there to love? How could anyone care about me? Surely, nobody loves me,” he said, “but I am wrong. There are people who care, they just do not say it out loud. Maybe it is because they are scared.”

“Scared of what?” you asked.

“Scared of being… Ah, what is the word… Scared of being vulnerable, I think,” König shrugged half heartedly, “but I think that vulnerability is how we grow. You cannot be strong by hurting yourself. Strength does not come from nothingness.”

“But you’re so strong,” you sniffled.

“I am strong because I saw my weakness, and I saw something lovable inside. So I worked to make what was lovable more important than what was not,” König replied, “I was afraid, small, and vulnerable. But by being vulnerable, I learned I could grow.”

“So then what does that mean for me?” you asked.

“I think it means that it is okay to hurt, but you can’t let that hurt define how you see yourself,” König hummed.

“What do you mean?” you asked timidly.

“I think that it is easy to think only of weakness. However, there is more to that weakness. I think sometimes, we need to be weak to be strong. You might be weak now,” König lay his head against yours, “and I think you can become strong.”

“As strong as you?” you tried to say playfully, but it came out grating like a gull’s cry.

“You do not need to be as strong as me,” you could see his face soften behind his mask, “you need to be strong enough for yourself. You cannot let anyone else define strength for you.”

“Do I need to be strong to be loved?” you thought aloud.

“Nein,” König’s voice hardened, then softened when he continued, “love is strength itself. To love and to be loved is to be strong. To love yourself is the strongest thing you can do.”

You pursed your lips into a line. Finally, you asked, “So do you love yourself?”

König’s eyes crinkled at the corners, “Sometimes. Sometimes it is hard. Do you not think so?”

You frown, “I don’t know. I haven’t loved myself too much lately.”

“I think you must find something to love in yourself,” König replied, “but that might take searching. You cannot let someone else tell you what is worth loving. I know it is hard, but once you find something, hold onto it. And keep holding on.”

“How can you be so sure that there’s something I can love?” you asked.

“There is always something. Even the blackest hearts can love the soot that coats them,” König mused.

You looked at yourself. You frowned, and then locked your eyes on his.

“What if I can’t find something to love?” you asked nervously.

“Then you must do the hardest thing of all,” König furrowed his brows, “you must fake it. You must tell yourself you love something, even if you do not believe it.”

You scoffed, “But why? That’s so stupid.”

“It is in the beginning,” König admitted, “but it is not stupid always. It gets better, but you have to do it every day. That is the hardest part, you know? Doing it every day. But if you keep doing it, it gets better.”

You look at yourself. Your eyes are not so red, your breathing has steadied. You look a bit better, but you don’t quite know if the word ‘better’ is the word you’d choose.

“So, if I have to lie to myself, what should I lie about?” you ask.

“Well, if it helps, whenever I see myself in a mirror, I smile at myself,” König says, “but I do not always feel it inside. But I keep doing it. I want to get to a point where I can smile in a mirror, and I can feel myself smiling back.”

“How did you decide that?” you asked.

“Everyone likes a good smile, ja?” König chuckled, “so why not have a nice smile? I think your smile is very pretty, ja, but do you?”

You cast your eyes down, looking into the deep abyss of your feet, then replied, “I don’t know.”

“Then maybe that is a place to start. Tell yourself that you have a pretty smile.”

“It sounds so stupid though,” you snort.

“It does sound stupid! But that is why you must do it. And anyways, is it not nice to smile? A smile is a powerful thing,” König smiled under his mask, “it is a tool. You need to care for your tools. So love your smile. It is, if nothing else, a good place to start.”

“And if I trick myself into loving my smile?” you laugh.

“Then find something else to love,” König determined, “there is always more to love, especially with you.”

“You really think there’s always more to love in me?” you shook your head in disbelief.

“I do not think,” König said sternly, “I know. There is a very important difference between those words. You should remember that.”

“Well, I believe you’re being stupid,” you snort.

“Believe what you want, but I will still have my beliefs. And my belief is that you have so much to love,” König wrapped his arms around you in a reassuring hug, “I see so much to love, so much I want to show you about yourself. You are so wonderful. Yet you cannot see that? I do not understand, but I think you think that there is something worth loving in me. And if you can see something worth loving in others, why should there not be something worth loving in you?”

“I don’t know,”  you admitted.

“I think it is silly to say everyone deserves love and then remove yourself from your own statement,” König ducked his head down, “and if nothing else, let me find something in you to love. If nobody else will say it, then let me say that you have so much in you that is worthy of love. All of you is worthy of love. You may not think so, but I love you regardless of whatever you think you are.”

“Even when I do things you don’t like?” you cup his head in one hand.

“Especially when you do things I do not like,” König affirmed, “because to love all of you I must love your flaws. To love someone conditionally like that is to not love at all. So I love all parts of you, regardless of what you may think of those.”

“You’re being too nice,” you dismiss him gently.

“I think ‘too nice’ is not real,” König retorted, “I think that is a stupid thing people say to avoid feeling. I am not afraid of my feelings, and so I am proud to say I love you for you. I just hope that one day, you can love yourself like I love you.”

“You really think I can do that?” you ask.

“I do not think, I believe.