#ft. hh

[abyssalthreads]

"Adam? An Archangel? No way I'll ever believe that! Even if I was flat on my tailfeathers drunk and coughing up lightning!"

[georgie-abhrams]

fuck marry kill - liam, roman, ryan

"I don't think I've played this game since high school... so this'll be fun. My instinct says to kill Ryan, but that would make Tess sad and she's my sister buuut, boy, does the thought of bein' stuck with that giraffe the rest of my life or havin' him in my bed gives me the heebie jeebies. So I'm real sorry to Tess but he's gone. As for marry... probably Liam. He knows me the best and I do love him. Despite the fact he's not talkin' to me right now... if it came down to it I bet we could be happy. Or at least content. Guess that leaves good ol' daddy Roman for the fuckin'. Can't say I'm upset about it, to be honest." ( @grangerliam @romanwagncr @ryanparrish )

[brineary]

There’s an angel in the crows nest looking mighty confused right about now. - @brokendreamscreation

"Is that a bloody Harpy?"

Stared up from the bottom, only to extend the tendrils from his cloak and effortlessly glided his way up to the crow's nest, each tendril reaching out and connecting to a pole or something as if it was some kind of Octopus.

"Ahoy mate! This isn't a roost for ye!" He paused and stared for a moment, that was no Harpy. It was one of them. His expression shifted slightly

"How did ye get here mate?" He asked stepping and walking on the rim of the crow's nest.

[hyuny-bunny]

｡⋆˚ hot springs ｡⋆˚｡⋆. HH (ft LK)

part II (under the stars one shot series)

pairing: hyunjin x fem!reader

synopsis: after last night, hyunjin decides to surprise with a hot spring! some one on one time with your completely "platonic" not-at-all-horn-dog-friend would be a great way to relax

MNDI 18+: boob play, outdoor sex, unprotected p in v, kissing, groping, cream pie, fem!reader

part i

the morning haze was bad. at first, you thought it surely must've been a dream until you could still feel the remnants of the night before stick to your underwear as you began to shift in your spot. both minho and hyunjin must've already gotten up for the day seeing as you were the only one still in the bed. you reach for your phone on the night stand only to find that it's only 8am. where could they have gone so early? your question was answered when hyunjin walked into the tent with a bowl of fruit and hot tea in hand. while he wasn't a morning person seeing him up this early and much less the smiley, was an unexpected sight.

"morning, sleeping beauty."

"morning, wasn't that your nickname?"

"i think it's much more fitting for you." he hands the bowl of fruit and hot tea to you "here, it's all we have for breakfast right now. apparently we're missing an entire cooler of food so minho and chan left to grab more before we all start to eat each other for survival."

you laugh both at thought and possible reality of it. it's still quite cold out but nearly as bad as last night.

"sleep well?" the question has you choking on the tea, both from the sip and inhalation of air. hyunjin only laughs before hand you a napkin to pat yourself dry.

"i slept just fine, you two are like heaters anyways so staying warm through the night was no problem..." you trail off not wanting to make things awkward at the mention of last night.

"oh, is that all we are now? body's to keep you warm? glad you slept well considering you knocked out like a light after you came all over my hand."

"hyunjin!" you swat a pillow at him, covering your face to hide the rising blush in your face. he laughs at your reaction before pulling your hands into his.

"relax, it's friends helping friends right? i have a surprise for you so get changed." he looks at you with sweet eyes, as much as he loved teasing, he really did care for you deep down. it was just his flirty way to make you as flustered as he could, it did wonders for his ego when it was you. "bring something you can get wet in."

you move to swat at him again.

"I didn't mean it that way ! stop being so horny for a sec, i just meant a swimsuit if you brought one," he says once more while bringing his arms up in defense.

-

it would only be the two of you as the other four opted in to stay watching the camp site for when the chan & minho returned from the store. it was about a 30 minute or so hike along the mountain, add another 15 minutes as hyunjin deemed it necessary to bring his disposable camera, capturing every sight that he wanted to have forever including a few candids of you. the hike was worth the reward once you stopped upon the surprise, a hot spring.

the trees hung low covering the hidden hot spring. it was almost like a cavern carved on the side of the mountain, another steam of water flowing by. the orange and green leaves covered the ground where you stood, moss covering the walls against the rocks that walled in the hot spring. it was truly something straight out of a fantasy book.

"how did you even find this ?!" you asked as you both began settling your things down.

"i do my research. you think i'd agree to camping without finding something mildly relaxing to do?"

"touché." you pulled your clothes in to a neat pile, sweater stacked on top of sweats and thick fluffy socks to put on top. fortunately, you did bring a swimsuit. it was a basic one piece with a v cut and spaghetti straps. it made your boobs look great and complimented your figure. you turn around just in time to see hyunjin pulling his shirt over his head already in swim trucks, it was sickening how hot he looked pulling that shirt off. he smirks at you with a raised eye brow causing you to turn away cleaning your throat.

what was there to be so shy about? you had already jerked him off now and he had returned the favor when he finger banged you. stepping into the hot spring, the water felt amazing in comparison to the cold you had just been standing in seconds before. plunging in to water neck deep you groan out a sigh, never been more thankful to have hot water.

hyunjin stepped in watching all the little movements, the way you threw your head back with eyes closed giving him the perfect view of your chest coming out from the water just enough to see the way your tits we're firmly pressed against the wet suit now. infatuated with the sight, taking mental notes of the way your breast curved across the tops, your nipples ever so slightly poking through the material. the water droplets forming across your skins as his mind danced with the idea of licking it up. wanting to pull down your top enough to relive moments of last night, feeling your tits in his hands and being able to see them in all their glory this time around.

you look at him once more, enjoying being admired under his gaze. you float, drifting around the small body of water taking in the sounds & sights of nature. eventually settling against a ledge of rocks in the water as a makeshift seat, hyunjin settling beside you breathing in the sight of both the hot spring and you. his shoulders brushes against you pulling you out of your daze to find he's already looking down at you.

"want to talk about last night? i certainly do." your eyes almost bulge out when he brings it up.

"what do you want to talk about?..." you look forward fixating on the stream of water flowing ahead.

"did you enjoy it?"

your silent, wanting to very loudly scream out how much you enjoyed it all.

"i did... did you?"

it's his turn to be quite for a moment.

"i did... i wouldn't have minded if it turned into something a little more heated... would you?"

your head whips to meet his eyes, he's staring back into your eyes, eyes darting back and forth your eyes. he searches your face for any discomfort, a sign that would make him stop instead his eyes look down at your lips to find you ever so discreetly licking your bottom lip.

"i wouldn't have minded... i wouldn't mind even now."

his hair is wet, a strand falling forward dripping ever so slightly. his cheeks are tinged with the slightest pink which could either be from this conversation or the heat of this pool. it was the former. you think about leaning forward to kiss him, his lips plumps and pouty. you remember the way they felt against your own, wondering if you'd ever get another chance to feel them the same way you had done so the night before.

that question is answered shortly when hyunjin brings his hand to back of your head to pull you in for heated kiss. just as you remembered, his lips are plush and soft against yours, a complete contrast to way he kisses. your both sliding off the ledge seat, on arm wrapping firmly around your waist as you bring your legs to wrap around his waist. you slide your own hands to his shoulders, raking nails against the skin up into his causing him to groan against the kiss. his hands slide to you waist giving your waist a squeeze before their sliding down your back once more to your ass. he takes another squeeze as he bites down on your lip as you gasp at his sudden braveness. you pull his hair a bit as he finally pulls back from the kiss, his eyes are twinkling with lust when he begins kissing down your jawline to your neck. he grinds into you as he starts kissing and sucking a hickey into spot between your neck and collarbone. he pushes you two up against a wall of the hot spring, hands wandering their way to your chest to grab your tits in his hands. overwhelmed by the feeling of his lips sucking a hickey into your neck, you feel even hotter then before.

you're on cloud 9, hands tugging at his hair as he paws at your chest, feeling the his hard cock pressing snugly against where you need him most. he pushes the straps of your swim suit down and begins kissing down your chest to your tits, massaging one his hand as he firmly grasps the other pinching the nipple gently. he leaves another hickey at the top of your tit. after a few pinches, moans spilling from you, his lips and tongues attach to your nipple. throwing your head back moaning out his name as the nipple hardens in his mouth, he returns the treatment to the other breast. he loves feeling the way you squirm under his touch and the way your nails rake and pull at his hair. hyunjin swiftly pulls you out the hot spring, laying out his towel on the ground like a gentleman to take you right here on the floor of the woods next to this hot spring. he pulls you down to lay on the towel, any thought of someone walking up on you has been suppressed by the neediness that swarms your brain.

"let's find out how this pretty pussy feels wrapped around my cock, baby."

your pulling off the wet bathing suit and he stands to rid himself of the swim trucks. it's easy to see now in daylight how big he is. he sinks back down to his knees tossing your swim suits away, hands running up and down your body while he mutters sweet words of praise against your lips. he would worship at your feet if you gave him the chance. he rubs at your clit to prep you for him, sliding his fingers in between your folds. he kisses you as he slides his middle finger inside, thrusting them in and out. your already wet from his earlier foreplay to your breasts, he was just being thorough now wanting to slide in you with as much ease. he pulls back to watch the way you face contort as he curls his fingers against your sweet spot and digging the heel of his hand perfect against your clit. your hands gripping his shoulders and biceps as he starts to build your orgasm. he pulls out after a few moments, his goal was to make you cum on his cock this time. you watch as he gives himself a few strokes, playing with your lips to align himself against you.

"let me know if you want to stop, i need to hear you say you want this." he looks at you for reassurance as nudges the tip of his cock against you entrance.

"hyunjin, i want this. i need you, please." he grabs your hand, interlocking your fingers as he slides in. you gasp at the feeling, the stretch of his tip already feeling snug against.

he holds your hand as he slowly slides himself all the way in to the hilt, you let out a shakey whine. he's so big, stretching you in a way you haven't felt before. it doesn't help that all you want is to feel him repeatedly slam into you until you can't walk. he kisses your forehead still inside you as you adjust to his size, he slowly pulls out halfway before thrusting back in.

"please, hyun." you cry out while looking up with pleading eyes.

it's all the encouragement he needs to pick up his pace. he brings a hand to your knee to lift it giving him a better angle to go in deeper. the sounds of running water masked your moans and the slapping of skin. he hovers his face above yours, lips just ghosting of yours, your nails leaving long scratches down his back. he's focused on the way your moans get higher in pitch when he lifts your leg, he lifts both legs into a matting pressing giving him the perfect angle to hear you yelp out his name. he's pulled back down to earth when he feels you grabbing his face to kiss him as he picks up speed once more. he's close to cumming but doesn't want to cut things too early with the way it all feels, the wet squelching noises, the way your walls clench and suck him in deeper every thrust.

most importantly, he wants the image of you fucked out on his cock engrained in his mind. he can't seem to focus of anything but the way you kiss him, tongues brushing against each other, the way you seem to suck all the oxygen out of him.

you're head spinning with being consumed by every part of hyunjin clouds your thoughts. the fact that you're out in the middle of the woods fucking next to a hot spring that anyone could walk up on at any moment, seems like a very distant concern. you reach between your body's to rub your clit only to be stopped by hyunjin pulling your hand above your head, his other reaches down. his thumb circling your clit, leaving you completely under his command.

"cum for me baby, cum all over this cock. i'm all yours, use me."

his soft touches to your clit in contrast to his thrust have your orgasm washing over you just moments later. your grip on his bicep, holding for dear life as you shake coming down from your high. he pulls out of you still hard, he flips you onto your stomach. you only have a moment before he's lifting your hips again, sliding his cock between your folds as your grip him tight. hyunjin drapes his entire body around, his finding its way in between your shoulder and neck. he's grunting right into your ear, panting with every thrust. the new position has another orgasm building up much stronger and quicker then the last. the combined weight of hyunjin on top of you like this and the way his body engulfs you has you clenching down on him once more. his thrusts becoming slower, he lets a whimper slip out with your name. you feel the hot spurts of cum shooting inside you, it's enough to push your own orgasm to the brink. you milk his cock for the last drops of cum, clenching as you feel it drip out of you with him still inside. he's out of breath, kissing your cheeks, jaw and shoulder blade as he slowly pulls out of you.

his jaw drops as he watches his cum drip down your pussy, wanting to push the remnants back inside you. instead, he chooses to land a smack to your ass that has you turning around in disbelief as he laughs at your reaction.

"can you stand?"

you scoff at the question, shifting to your knees to stand only to met with bambi legs. he quickly stands up to catch you, holding you against him as you both stand nude in the forrest. he walks you back into the hot spring.

"let's wait till your muscles relax again before we try to walk back."

"you're such a gentleman. taking me to the forrest to fuck me until i can't walk so we have no choice but to bathe together in a hot spring. and they say romance is dead."

he rolls his eyes holding you by the waist, your chest pressed against.

"watch your mouth before i decide round 2 is in the hot spring and you still won't be able to walk."

-

after another hour in the hot spring that led to hyunjin playing with your clit for a third orgasm, he triumphantly got you born dressed for a brisk walk back to the campsite.

as you both came into sight of the tents. you saw the van back in its spot meaning chan and minho were back already. as you approached, everyone seemed to be huddled around the bonfire pit again drinking. chan was the first to ask where you two had been.

"a hot spring-"

"YA WHY DIDN'T YOU TELL US?!" changbin yells standing up from his seat.

"i wasn't about to take you ALL. it was too small for everyone." hyunjin says as seungmin and jeongin are about to start arguing about wanting to have gone.

"so it was just big enough for two? hm? or did you just want y/n all to yourself?" han teases laughing. they all seem to laugh except hyun, you, and minho. the blush rising once again doesn't help.

hyunjin is about to throw the wet towel until your pulling it back down afraid of exposing han to any of the bodily fluids that haven't seeped into the towel yet.

minho can see the dark hickey forming on your neck. it's not one you had earlier from the night before. you sit down by felix to warm up with the fire as hyunjin heads to the off to change clothes. minho follows suit to the tent, his suspicions are confirmed once he sees the long nail marks adorning hyunjin's back when he pulls his shirt off.

hyunjin is pulling a new shirt on along with a hoodie, he turns to see minho glaring. he only offers him a smug smirk and a pat on the shoulder leaning to whisper in his ear.

"she enjoyed last night a lot more then you think. i don't think she'd mind if you offered her another taste."

-----

a/n: part 3 on sunday/monday !

minho will get his chance... part 4? with a hyunho threesome?

tags:

@tsunderelino @elizalabs3 @meilix @stelle-aka-simp @lunearta @jisuperboard @glitter-z @heeyboooo @yaorzu-blog @captainchrisstan @hyunjinhoexxx @guiltycoco @skzhyunnie @listeningtomusiclol

[abyssalthreads]

They are interactable on this account @abyssalthreads [ here ] And are HH/HB friendly. Ask if you want to interact with my Eldritch family.

[ link to pinned post + info ]

Say Hello to the 3 characters you can now interact with! Mr I [AKA Hastur] Jericho, and Lure!

If you wanna interact then DM me or drop some silly ask in the askbox? idrc. I'm doing this for funsies.

[abyssalthreads]

"..."

Yaval decided to not tie his hair up today. Totally not because he forgot and lost his Hairtie.. nope.

[georgie-abhrams]

One day you wake up to find that your closet is full of only cardigans. What do you do?

"I gather 'em up, take 'em in to the office and dump 'em right on bossman's desk. Drench those babies in some lighter fluid and hold a match book of matches. They'll go up in flames if he doesn't tell me where my actual clothes are. I figure the problem would resolve itself pretty quickly, then. Especially since he knows I mean business since it wouldn't be the first cardigan related fire I've started in the office." ( @jamesonxcarter )

[abyssalthreads]

Yaval Slowly looked upward, seeing heaven and slowly glanced back down to Hades. He listened to his words. As he did so, his eyes started 'looking' around as if thinking of what to say in return, a rebuttal, argument?. But nothing came of it. What he said? It was point-blank.

Thinking deeper, It would not been the first time he had done something without permission, since why he was in the position he was in now. Was he just lucky? Or was merely so insignificant that no one cared enough when they found out? No matter...

He looks back up at Hades again with a tilted head and a cocked brow "Even if you don't. I still consider your words as well. I would find it disrespectful to not at least hear what you have to say, no matter how cold it is. Even if you claim you have no such say in power..."

With the knowledge he knows now, he dared to slip out the words; "Then What would you do?" The Young Guardian Angel seemed so unsure if his next choice would leave him in more trouble, was he even capable to even approach on this idea? He was happy with his current position and didn't want to lose it because of his temper towards some imps. Thinking back to what he said, he felt stupid.

The Halls of the Dead may be a neutral ground for Heaven and Hell, but it was still located on the outer, frozen edge of the Pride Ring of Hell. Frozen not only from Azrael's presence, but the very River that Charon ferried souls upon to their final destination.

But it didn't mean that Hades welcome all here, even here and now, the angel before him was on thin enough ice.

He let Yaval go on, and on. Rambling, raving about things Hades already knew about. He's been in this Death game longer than Yaval's been a mere thought of existence.

After a long moment, as silence fell, Hades rose his gaze up. Unamused at Yaval's display.

"Are you done?" He huffed.

"That is not my permission to grant. The only souls I have jurisdiction over are the ones who have already passed, or those about to die. Nothing more or less. If you seek such thing as retribution, or justice, you need to go above me." He pointed at the massive, stained glass window behind him. That filtered in what little frozen light was in this dreary place. Pointing to the sparkling speck in the sky that was Heaven.

"Michael is the one you need permission from to go on such a hunt, considering Earth is involved. Or.." He reached to take hold of his mug, a sip as he let the pitch black liquid coat his mouth. Hades always smelled of freshly roasted coffee...

"You can just do it, and get no permission. It's not my position to tell you what to do."

[hyuny-bunny]

hyuny-bunny's masterlist

⟡ - smut

‪♡ - fluff

* - angst

ot8:

- cybersex | camgirl!reader x skz (ot8) au ⟡

- skz + types of p*rn they watch (hyung line) ⟡

- skz + types of p*rn they watch (maknae line) ⟡

- skz + dumb s/o (ask/request) ⟡‪♡

- skz + s/o with long nails headcanons ‪♡⟡

- seasons // omegaverse au series ‪♡⟡ *

chan:

- TBD

lee know:

- ｡⋆˚under the stars ｡⋆˚｡⋆. LK + HH ⟡‪♡

hyunjin:

- request: hold me *⟡‪♡

- baby said | Y.J. + H. H. ⟡ (groupie love pt.2)

- ｡⋆˚under the stars ｡⋆˚｡⋆. LK + HH ⟡‪♡

- hot springs ⟡‪

changbin:

- request: i'll wait | C.B. ft lino ‪♡

jisung

- TBD

felix

- rockstar bf! felix headcanons ⟡

seungmin

- TBD

jeongin

- groupie love | ft hyun ⟡

- baby said | Y.J. + H. H. ⟡ (groupie love pt.2)

- daddy jeongin (ask) ⟡

[abyssalthreads]

"You know what? I think I'm just gonna vibe on earth for a while and do some street performance stuff with my Hurdy-Gurdy. But ill be keeping my eyes out on that Trial too."

He picks up his Hurdy-Gurdy and snaps his fingers, turning himself in to his human disguise.

"Since the while issue has me unable to do my job. I might as well continue with my hobbies. for a while. Who wants to come with? We can do some shopping or hang out by the beach or whatever. Just know I'm not waiting so hurry up if you want to come. "

He slowly pauses and and points "And I don't care if you're from heaven or hell. I see no difference these days" And heads off with his Hurdy-Gurdy, all the while keeping track of the Trials on his phone..

[gizmogearszz]

Magma doodles (ft. @spidertroupeart, @kittycomet, @craicisirish and @mixing0)

+vox redesign (please don't tag as hh 🥺)

[arkham-angel23]

Okay, hear me out! Another Arkham! Jason Todd X Reader, but this time…

It’s an Arkham! Jason X Joker’s Daughter! Reader songfic

And the song is…

(This cover of ‘More than Anything is beautiful BTW…)

Basic premise:

Jason is Robin at the time he meets Reader, who is Joker’s daughter. Jason sees Reader being abused and mistreated by Joker and feels bad for her. He recognizes that she isn’t a criminal like the ones he and Batman fights, but a victim of circumstance who is just trying to survive. While Batman has tried to help Reader long before Jason became Robin, Gotham’s foster care and adoption services are shotty and difficult at best and a source for supply of merchandise or target practice for the most heinous and perverse criminals at worst… (aka human trafficking…)

So, one night, while Batman is chasing Joker, Jason, as Robin, finds Reader crying in a room after Joker locked her inside it. Jason, feeling sorry for her, comforts her and Reader is grateful for his empathy.

After that, Reader is removed from Joker’s custody and placed in Bruce Wayne’s care at his school for wayward youth and troubled kids. Her and Jason continue their friendship before venturing into dating. They, of course, hit it off very well… but then…

Jason then gets kidnapped and tortured by Joker for a year. Reader is understandably upset with Bruce about letting her father, the Joker, get to Jason and for not killing Joker sooner. She then leaves the Manor to move into an apartment that she, Jason and a few friends were eyeing for a while.

3 years later, Reader is now living alone when there’s a knock at the door… It’s Jason, alive and scarred from his torture from Joker, now deceased, three years ago…

The two immediately get to catching up, making up for lost time… and getting busy (bow-cha wow wow, as Lucifer in HH would say…)

Jason, now the Arkham Knight, and a now pregnant Reader are in the midst of the Long Halloween, created by Scarecrow and the other supervillains. Reader is afraid that Harley or some of the other supervillains will find out about her and Jason (like Joker did) and try to hurt her and their unborn child. Jason reassures her that everything will be fine and that they’ll figure it out, should things go awry…

Have fun with this one!

[witchysniffles]

new year's eve

A/gathario ft. sick A/gatha being too stubborn for her own good. 8.7k words (💀) There WILL be a part 2 to this at some point, but given how long this took it might be a minute lol.

All of this was inspired by @flutterytickles's tags on this post about the idea of a professor AU and a New Year's Eve party, and when I say I took that and ran with it...😳

I am MORE than happy to yap about this AU forever, but really all you need to know for this is that everyone's teaching at a small, liberal arts college in Boston. A/gatha was hired as an English professor, but now mostly teaches American history through literature and print culture. R/io studied environmental science with a focus in botany and also poetry in school, and she took a pay cut specifically to teach at a school that would let her do both. Other than that, I feel like it's pretty self-explanatory. Enjoy!! <3

Please don't reblog to non-kink blogs! Minors DNI.

“So it’s not going to be a party,” Rio said. “At least not according to Lilia. But Alice and Jen will be there, and a few other faculty members and some of Lilia’s grad students, and Alice assured me there will be good food, lots of drinks, and probably karaoke if they can find a way to hook it up to Lilia’s TV. Sounds like it’ll be a good time.”

“Hmm,” Agatha hummed. Rio had her on speakerphone on her desk while she was tidying up her office, using the time that barely anyone was on campus to prep for the spring semester without anyone commenting on how many empty energy drink cans she was hauling out to the recycling bin.

“Well you know how I feel about karaoke,” Agatha said. Rio thought she heard the sound of her clearing her throat, but she chalked it up to static on the line. “But is Lilia actually inviting me or is this you asking me to come with you?”

“Both,” Rio said. “Lilia doesn’t have your number and she figured you wouldn’t be checking your work email over the holidays, so she asked me to ask you. And I would like it if you came with me.” Rio paused. “You know, if you want to.”

There was another little burst of noise on the line—this time it almost sounded like a sniffle—before Agatha spoke again.

“Well, I promised Nicky I’d take him to the parade and the fireworks at the Common tomorrow, but that’ll be over and done by eight.” Agatha paused and this time Rio was sure she heard a sniffle. “Let me talk to the kid next door, see if he can sit in after I put Nicky down and I’ll…”

Agatha trailed off, and Rio frowned.

“You’ll…?”

“Hh-hold on, I n-need—”

Rio could hear Agatha’s breath stutter, and then before she could even process what was happening, she heard what sounded like a poorly-stifled sneeze from a distance like Agatha was holding the phone away from her face.

“Bless you?” Rio still wasn’t a hundred percent sure she was hearing things right, but she still spoke loud enough for Agatha to hear and—she assumed—roll her eyes at. What she wasn’t expecting, though, was Agatha’s shaky voice when she brought the phone back.

“D-don’t,” she started. “I’m not…n-nah…not…hheh’EHTtschu!”

That was definitely, for sure a sneeze that time, and though Rio couldn’t see it, she could tell by the involuntary little groan that followed that Agatha wasn’t happy about it. Whether it was about sneezing in general or about Rio acknowledging it with another, more enthusiastic “Bless you!” was anyone’s guess.

“Ugh, sorry,” Agatha said after collecting herself again. “You were saying?”

“I think you were saying something about getting a babysitter? But, if you’re not feeling well we don’t have to—”

“I’m fine,” Agatha said firmly. “It’s just some gunk Nicky picked up somewhere. It’s probably just one of those twenty-four hour things, I’m sure I’ll be fine tomorrow.”

Rio was pretty sure that wasn’t how colds worked, but Agatha’s tone told her the topic was not up for discussion, and Rio didn’t feel like pressing the issue would be helpful. This was Agatha, after all.

Last spring when they’d first gotten paired up to teach an interdisciplinary studies course on floral symbolism in classic American literature and poetry, Agatha had neglected to inform Rio that she was horribly allergic to about half the flowers they’d be talking about, so Rio hadn’t thought twice about showing up to the very first class with a fresh arrangement of native wildflowers to sit on the podium between them as they took turns going over the syllabus.

Agatha had done an admirable job downplaying her reaction for most of the hour-long class, only stifling the occasional sneeze into near-silence over her shoulder, but the second class was dismissed, she’d dissolved into the single most dramatic, drawn-out fit Rio had ever seen, blushing furiously the whole time and still insisting she was fine when she could gather enough breath to speak.

Rio had run up to her own office to grab her own bottle of Zyrtec, sure the whole time that this was going to get the whole class cancelled, and her partnership with Agatha would be over before it had even properly begun. With the meds in her system, though, Agatha had pulled herself together shockingly quickly to teach her afternoon class, and to Rio’s surprise, not only did their joint class proceed as planned (after a serious, Rio-initiated discussion of what parts of the syllabus Agatha was and wasn’t allergic to—which Agatha was also blushing furiously through—and an Agatha-initiated tacit threat to never speak of the incident again), but Agatha had been grateful enough for Rio’s help to offer to repay the favor by taking her out to dinner.

One thing led to another, and now, nearly a year later, they were dating, all because Agatha was enough of a stubborn bitch about her allergies to not keep antihistamines on her.

Rio had never actually seen Agatha sick before, but she assumed she probably wouldn’t handle that much better.

“Hh-ITSchu!”

Another sneeze from Agatha drew Rio from her thoughts.

“Ble—”

“Not yet, I…he’ETshiu! Ugh, fuck.”

“Salud,” Rio said.

“Shut up,” Agatha grumbled. “I’m fine. Just let me talk to the kid next door. I would never say this to his face, but he’s a total loser, there’s no way he’s got plans. I gotta check if Hanukkah changes anything, but I’ll text you when I know?”

“Sounds good. Love you, and get some rest!”

She could practically hear Agatha roll her eyes before she shot back a, “Love you too,” and ended the call.

Not half an hour later, Rio’s phone lit up with a text from Agatha.

Teen’s free to babysit. Pick me up at 9?

It’s a date, she replied.

~**~

Agatha was already waiting on the front steps when Rio’s overpriced Uber pulled up in front of the elegant Beacon Hill brownstone. Her hair was down, falling in loose waves over her shoulders, and she was wearing lipstick­, which wasn’t unheard of, but the deep raspberry red shade of it made something in Rio’s brain short out, and suddenly her only thought was about how badly she wanted to fuck it up at midnight.

As she drew closer, though, she realized that the lipstick was a distraction—and a damn good one at that—from the subtle little signs of illness on the rest of her face. Her makeup was impeccable, but up close, Rio could see the shadows of dark circles under her eyes, the barely-there pinkish tint at the tip of her nose, the subtle crease in her foundation that showed just how often she'd been—

Right on cue, Agatha scrunched up her nose with a small sniffle, and judging by the way her hands twitched at her sides, she was really fighting the urge not to rub it. Rio would never say it out loud, but she was pretty sure it was one of the cutest things she’d ever seen.

“Hey,” she said.

“Hey, yourself,” Agatha said. Those raspberry lips twitched upwards, as Rio wrapped an arm around her waist and kissed her lightly on the cheek. Her skin felt a little warm for someone outside in the middle of winter. Rio couldn’t be confident it was high enough to be a fever, but she filed the thought away for later.

“So…,” Rio started as she pulled out her phone to look up Lilia’s address. “How were the fireworks?”

Agatha sighed heavily. “We didn’t end up staying. Nicky didn’t sleep well last night, which meant I didn’t sleep well last night, and we only made it halfway through the parade before he decided he wanted to go home.” Agatha sniffled and scrunched up her nose again. “Poor kid was practically falling asleep on his dino nuggets. I put him to bed and hh’he was out like a li-ihh­-light.”

The slight hitch of her breath drew Rio’s gaze upwards, and out of the corner of her eye, she could see Agatha scratching the bottom of her nose with her thumbnail.

“Oh poor thing,” Rio said, definitely not talking about Agatha; that would be ridiculous. “And how are you feeling? You sure you’re up for a wild party?”

Agatha rolled her eyes and crossed her arms. “I think I can hiih-handle whatever Lilia’s got planned.”

“You sure?” Rio lowered her phone and met Agatha’s eyes. “Because we can just stay in, especially if you didn’t get much sleep last night. I hear they’re letting Andy and Anderson drink on CNN again this year, and we could do those Lego flowers from Christmas and just take it easy.”

Yeah, Rio thought to herself; that was a safe angle to approach it from. Asking outright if she was under the weather was a surefire way to get her to dig her heels in deeper, and while Rio was pretty sure that was going to happen anyway, she wanted to make sure Agatha knew she had an out if she wanted it.

As Rio had predicted though, Agatha shook her head.

“No,” she said. “I’m fine. I already missed the baby fireworks, and I don’t even remember the last time I got to go out for New Year’s, so I’m not missing this.” She punctuated her statement by audibly clearing her throat, and she glared at Rio for noticing. “And I feel fine,” she snapped. “Stop looking at me like that.”

“Ok,” Rio raised one hand in a mock surrender. “In that case, it looks like we have a choice between a pretty straightforward thirty minute walk, or we can take an Uber that’ll shave a whole five minutes off that time for…” she refreshed her app and her eyes widened in shock as she wordlessly showed Agatha the inflated price on the screen. “Suddenly I’m thinking it’s a great night for a walk. What about you?”

When she didn’t get an answer right away, Rio glanced up from her phone and took in the dazed look that had settled over Agatha’s features, the way those raspberry lips parted, one hand hovering in front of her mouth as her she scrunched up her nose once more in vain before—“hiET’SHhiew—‘ITSHhyu!” She aimed both sneezes into her elbow at the last second and then sniffled wetly as she rummaged around in her purse for…who the fuck still carried handkerchiefs in the twenty-first century?

“Bless you, bless you,” Rio said lightly, as Agatha blew her nose once, dabbing lightly at her nostrils to keep from completely destroying her foundation. Rio couldn’t help but notice that once she was done, she shoved the handkerchief in her pocket instead of putting it back in her purse.

 “Thanks,” Agatha muttered. “How long did you say the walk was?”

“Google says thirty minutes.”

Agatha gave a haughty sniff as she tossed her hair over her shoulder. “Closer to twenty if you walk like you live here,” she said. “I vote we do that.”

There was a part of Rio that thought about protesting further, but she knew it wouldn’t do any good, and besides that, Agatha was a grown woman who could listen to her own body. If she wanted to push herself for the sake of a stupid work party then who was Rio to stop her? And also, Rio selfishly really did want to mess up that lipstick against a backdrop of fireworks.

“Alright,” she sighed. “In that case, vámanos.”

With a swish of her long coat, Agatha set off down the block at such a pace that Rio had to jog to catch up.

~**~

Lilia lived on the top floor of a refurbished tenement building in the North End that was all decorative brick work and copper patina on the outside, with an interior that looked authentically pre-war. Which war exactly was anyone’s guess, but Rio was putting money on Civil.

The chilly night air had made both of their noses run, and they paused in front of the elevator to collect themselves. Rio pulled the sleeve of her sweater over her hand and swiped briefly at her nose. Agatha, on the other hand, took a bit longer to recover.

She’d been mostly alright on the walk over as far as Rio could tell—the fresh air really had seemed to be a good move—but now that they were back inside the dry heat of the building, it was clearly taking Agatha a second to gather herself. She had her handkerchief out and was running it on one finger under her eyes and around her nostrils, but her nose, it seemed had other ideas.

Her breath hitched once, twice, and she tipped her head back, her mouth just open enough that Rio could see she was pressing her tongue to the roof of her mouth to try to hold it back. It wasn’t enough, though, and Agatha let out a particularly vocal gasp right before she pitched forward with an itchy-sounding “hiih’IIShu!”

“Bless you,” Rio said.

“Ugh, thanks,” Agatha grumbled. “Must be the temperature change. I’m fine.”

She at least had the decency to flush as Rio eyed her skeptically, but before Rio could say anything else, Agatha was slipping the handkerchief back in her pocket, sliding open the metal grille in front of the elevator, and waving Rio inside.

“Can you just promise me something?” Rio asked as the elevator groaned and shuddered its way upwards. Agatha didn’t say anything, but she side-eyed Rio curiously. Rio took a deep breath and flexed her fingers at her sides as she said, “Promise me if you reach a point where you want to leave tonight for any reason you’ll tell me?”

“I’m—”

“I know you’re fine,” Rio said. “And I’ll let you be the judge of your own body. I’m just telling you that if you want an out you’ve got one, no questions asked.”

Agatha considered her words for a moment. Her lips were pressed in a thin line as she ran her tongue along the inside of her cheek, and then she sighed.

“Alright,” she said quietly. “Thank you.”

“Any time.”

The elevator jolted to a stop and they stepped out into a long hallway. There was music and laughter and a scent that Rio could only identify as ‘miscellaneous party food’ wafting from their left.

“I’m gonna take a wild guess that Lilia’s that way,” she said. She glanced over at Agatha who just tossed her hair over her shoulder, cleared her throat, and sniffed once more before nodding in the direction of the sound.

“Shall we?”

Rio hesitated for just a moment, captivated by the way Agatha’s mask slid so smoothly into place. She had hardly realized just how much she got to see when they were alone until suddenly she was faced with the Agatha that was ready to actually walk into the party.

The little signs were still there: the way that her foundation was starting to separate and smudge around the tip of her nose, the way her lips parted ever so slightly so that she could breathe without the air catching audibly on the building congestion in her sinuses.  It was an impressive performance. Frankly if Rio hadn’t seen evidence to the contrary, she might have even believed Agatha’s little act.

Of course, the fact that she had gotten to see that evidence to the contrary at all—even if Agatha was denying it the whole time—was also not lost on Rio. It made her stupid, lovesick heart flutter in her chest just realizing that Agatha trusted her that much. It was also mildly annoying knowing that it would be that much harder to tell if Agatha reached her limit tonight, but they’d cross that bridge when they came to it.

She must have lingered a bit too long, though, because Agatha noticed she wasn’t following and raised an eyebrow at her.

“Are you okay?” she asked, looking pointedly at Rio’s hands.

Rio hadn’t even noticed that she was fluttering her fingers at her sides, but the sudden awareness made her stop and flex her hands.

“Yeah,” she said. “Let’s do this.”

Rio reached the door at the end of the hall first and knocked right below the brass 4F affixed to it. When no one answered right away, Agatha tried the knob and found that it was already unlocked. She glanced at Rio with a shrug before pushing it all the way open and leading the way inside. 

Rio's first impression upon stepping into Lilia's space was that it perfectly answered the question, "What if an eccentric gender studies professor with a fortune-telling side hustle had lived in the same rent-controlled apartment since the 70s?" which wasn't a question Rio had been asking, but it was nice to have an answer nonetheless. The entry way led into a spacious living room filled with squashy, mismatched furniture. Decorative lamps on various surfaces gave the room a soft, warm glow, and there were tapestries and artwork covering nearly inch of exposed wall. It was inviting and a little overwhelming in the same way that Lilia herself could be and Rio found that she kind of liked it.

Her second impression was that she and Lilia definitely had different ideas of what "not a party" meant. There were far more people than she had expected here. She vaguely recognized some other faculty members and a few of Lilia’s grad students and TAs who hung out around her office a lot, but she was only halfway through her second year of teaching, so there were still more unfamiliar faces than familiar ones.

"Soo…," Agatha started, leaning close to Rio's ear as she slipped out of her coat, "Are we sure that Lilia understands what a party is?”

Rio bit back a laugh as the hostess in question rounded the corner. “Did I hear a knock? I thought I—oh, Rio, you came!”

Before Rio could react, Lilia swept forward and enveloped her in a brief, but warm hug that had Agatha pressing herself flat against the wall to stay out of the way.

“Oh, I’m so glad you were able to make it,” Lilia said. It wasn’t until she stepped back that she seemed to notice Agatha. Something flickered behind her eyes for a fraction of a second before her wide smile was back in place. “Agatha, it’s nice to finally see you outside of the office for a change. Did you two come together?”

“Sort of,” Agatha said at the same instant Rio said, “Kind of.”

Lilia raised an eyebrow, and Rio glanced over at Agatha who was starting to get a sort of dazed look in her eyes, so Rio quickly took over.

“We split an Uber,” she said. “Those holiday prices are crazy, but if the alternative is the green line on New Year’s…” she trailed off with a shrug and an eye roll, and that seemed to be good enough for Lilia. Or at least, if she had further suspicions, she was good enough not to voice them.

Out of the corner of her eye, Rio could see Agatha bring her hand in front of her mouth in a loose fist, her thumb resting along her jaw and her first finger pressed against the bottom of her nose. It wasn’t entirely out of the ordinary—one thing about Agatha, the woman was always touching her face—but Rio guessed from the way Agatha scrunched up her nose that it was a little more practical at the moment.

Rio was about to come up with some excuse to try to shoo Lilia away, when someone else called her name from elsewhere in the apartment. Lilia glanced in the direction of the voice and sighed.

“I suppose I should go see what all the fuss is about,” she said. "You two feel free to make yourselves at home. There's food in the dining room, drinks in the kitchen, and I think someone brought some..." she mimed smoking a joint as she trailed off, and Agatha snorted. "If you want to do that, though, just do me a favor and take it outside or on the fire escape. The scent lingers in here like nothing else.”

“Understood,” Rio said.

Lilia gave a satisfied nod before turning on her heel and disappearing back into the festivities.

Rio turned towards Agatha just in time to see her shove her face into her bunched up coat and muffle a forceful sneeze into it. She came up for air with a slightly dazed look on her face, her mouth still open in preparation, but after a long moment of anticipation, nothing else happened. Agatha exhaled with an angry huff and hung her coat up on an empty hanger.

Rio did the same after her, except she nearly dropped the hanger when Agatha suddenly swore behind her. Rio whirled around just in time to see Agatha crush her nose between her thumb and forefinger as she pitched forward with a pair of stifled sneezes that were nearly silent save for a soft, choked off little gasp.

 Rio almost felt a little guilty for it, but she couldn’t help noticing just how different these cold sneezes were from Agatha’s allergic fits. It was a strange thing to think about, but with her allergies, Agatha seemed to have some semblance of control, at least at the start. The tickle tended to be a slower, more torturous build that Agatha was shockingly good at hiding, and the sneezes themselves started off as soft, tickly little things that she was scary-good at keeping quiet. This cold, by contrast, seemed to keep her on her toes, sneaking up on her and then backing off just to come back with a vengeance, and Agatha was clearly already getting frustrated.

Agatha released her nose with a heavy sigh and a wet sniffle, and when she noticed Rio looking at her, she frowned.

“What?” she snapped.

“Nothing,” Rio said. “Bless you.”

That seemed to soften Agatha around the edges for a moment, and she muttered a quiet, “Thanks,” before she brushed past Rio into rest of the apartment. “Let’s find the kitchen,” she said. “I don’t know about you, but I could use a drink.”

Rio rolled her eyes, but followed along anyway. It was less than two and a half hours to New Year’s, but she had a feeling it was going to be a long night.

~**~

When Lilia had said there were drinks in the kitchen, Rio had expected champagne, some prosecco, maybe some kind of fancy Italian wines and some seltzers in the fridge for the grad students. What she hadn’t expected was a downright undergrad-rager amount of boxed wine and a rainbow of Jell-O shots, but now that she was looking at the spread, she realized that yeah, actually, this kind of tracked.

There was indeed an array of random seltzers and cheap beer in the fridge along with a couple of bottles of something bubbly with sticky notes on them warning that they were not to be touched until midnight. Rio grabbed a mango White Claw and turned around to see Agatha debating between the wine and the shots like it was a matter of life and death. After a moment, she reached a compromise with herself in the form of downing a purple Jell-O shot and then immediately grabbing a plastic cup to fill with room-temperature Franzia, because sure, why not?

“Hey, Rio, you made it!”

Rio spun around to see Alice approaching with a beer in hand and a bright smile on her face.

“Of course,” Rio said. “I wouldn’t miss it!” She took a sip of her seltzer and surveyed the room. “Although there are a lot more people than I expected when Lilia told me specifically that this wasn’t a party.”

“That’s Lilia for you,” Alice said. “Anything less than a full-on rager doesn’t count as a party to her. But for what it’s worth, it’ll probably start to clear out by 11:30ish. Most people just use this as a rest stop for a bit and then walk to the waterfront to catch the fireworks. But they’re missing out because that’s usually about when Lilia gets stoned enough to break out the oracle cards and that’s worth sticking around for.”

“Sounds like fun.” Rio hadn’t even heard Agatha come up behind her, but there she was eyeing Alice over the rim of her plastic cup of cheap wine. “When do we break out the Ouija board and start telling ghost stories?”

“Oh hey, Agatha,” Alice said. She shifted her weight from one foot to the other as she glanced from Rio to Agatha and back again like she was trying to connect some invisible dots. “I didn’t expect to see you here.”

“Yeah, good to see you too,” Agatha said flatly. She took a long sip of her wine, and she held her cup in front of her face a second longer than strictly necessary to block her nose from view as it twitched just the slightest bit. A tense moment passed where Rio couldn’t tell if Agatha was actually going to sneeze or not, but she recovered quickly, lowering her cup and shouldering past Rio towards the dining room. “I’m gonna get some food.”

“Ok, bye, Agatha,” Alice said drily. She shot Rio a look. “I didn’t know you two…”

She trailed off, and the implied ellipsis hanging off Alice’s words felt like a set trap for Rio to walk into. She’d had the feeling that her officemates were starting to suspect something for a while—from the sounds of it there was even a betting pool now—but Rio wasn’t going to give anyone the satisfaction of knowing that easily.

It wasn’t so much that they were trying to keep it a secret—sneaking around like teenagers wasn’t really all it cracked up to be when they were both parties involved were closer to fifty than fifteen—but with a kid in the mix, and Rio being so new, and Agatha’s…well, being Agatha, they just…never really cared to make a grand announcement to their colleagues. At some point it would come out, that much they both knew, but for now it was still sort of thrilling to have such a secret that was theirs and theirs alone.

So it was with all of that in mind, that Rio managed to say, “Lilia’s the one who invited her.” She took a swig of her seltzer and wished she had grabbed something harder. “We just split an Uber here.”

“Ah, sure,” Alice said. “It’s just funny; Lilia’s been trying to get her to come to stuff for years now, but this is the first time she’s actually shown. I wonder what changed.”

“Yeah,” Rio mused as she watched Agatha disappear around a corner. “I wonder.”

“Ok, well…” Alice bounced on the balls of her feet and clapped her hands together as she took a slow step back. “I need to track down an HDMI cord to try to set up karaoke, but I’ll be around.”

“I’ll see you,” Rio said.

She gave Alice a half-hearted wave and then followed Agatha’s trail into the cramped dining room where she found Agatha trapped in conversation with a short woman with a neat blonde bob who Rio vaguely recognized from the…admissions office? Student life? Something like that.

Whatever they were talking about, Agatha hardly seemed to be in the mood for it, but the woman clearly wasn’t taking the hint. Agatha had her hand in front of her face again, the knuckle of her first finger moving slowly back and forth under her nose as she nodded absently, her attention clearly more on her nose than her conversation partner.

If Rio had felt a little guilty about watching before, she felt downright voyeuristic now. From the corner of the doorway, Rio had a perfect view of Agatha’s profile, and she watched with rapt attention as Agatha managed to wrestle the tickle back long enough to interject.

“That sounds great, Sharon, but you see, the problem is that I don’t want to, so…” she trailed off with a contemptuous, open-handed shrug, and the woman—Sharon, apparently—just laughed.

“Oh, I’ll get you one of these days!” She wagged a finger playfully in Agatha’s direction before glancing down at her empty cup. “I’m gonna get some more wine, but I’ll email you once we get back on campus!”

“I’ll delete it,” Agatha called after her in a mocking tone.

She waited until Sharon was safely out of the room before whirling around and coughing into her elbow. She recovered quickly enough, but kept her arm in front of her face for a moment too long. Rio could see her shoulders tense and then release as she smothered a trio of sneezes against her sleeve, each tripping over the next like they had taken umbrage at being held back for so long. “Hiih’TSHh!-h’TSHh-TCHhu!”

“Bless you,” Rio said.

Agatha startled at the sound of her voice and spun around to glare at her.

“I’m fine,” Agatha said through gritted teeth.

“I didn’t even ask.”

“Well you were thinking it and that’s bad enough,” Agatha snapped.

Her voice was starting to take on a more noticeably-congested edge, and Rio found herself wondering if she’d have to put her foot down at some point. Either Agatha was a better liar than Rio had thought if she had been feeling this bad this whole time, or she was going downhill faster than Rio had assumed she would, and frankly Rio wasn’t sure which was worse.

“Is this where the…oh. I hope I’m not interrupting anything.”

Rio and Agatha both spun around to find Jennifer Kale smirking at them from the doorway like she very much hoped she was, in fact, interrupting something.

“You wish,” Agatha growled. “What do you want, Jen?”

“Maybe to socialize?” Jen said slowly like she was trying to explain the concept to a child. “At a social event? Although I can’t imagine you have much experience with those.”

“Can it, Kale,” Agatha snapped. She took a long sip of her wine and shouldered past Jen on her way back into the kitchen. “I’m not in the mood.”

“Nice to see you too, Agatha!” Jen called after her. She turned back to Rio and rolled her eyes. “You really can’t take her anywhere, can you?”

The question felt equal parts loaded and rhetorical, and given Jen’s…history with Agatha, Rio figured her safest option was to plead the fifth. She ignored Jen’s pointed smirk and took another long drink of her seltzer.

“Well, forget her,” Jen said. “I was actually hoping to run into you here. I heard back from my mother about those old Home Garden magazines we were talking about? She found some of my grandmother’s old issues, and she said she’ll send them out to me next week. I can bring them into the office when they get here if you want to go through them.”

“Oh, sweet!”  Rio had been working for most of the fall on a proposal for a class on Victory Gardens and the development of urban home gardening, and some of the earliest primary sources had proven to be a bit of a bitch to track down. “Yeah, I’ll be in and out of the office the next few weeks before the semester starts, but I’d love to get my hands on anything you’ve got.”

“Cool,” Jen said. “I’ll keep you posted.” She gave Rio a soft smile and looked like she was about to say something else, but Rio took the pause as an excuse to slip away.

“I’m gonna go mingle a bit more. You know, network or whatever, but I’ll see you around.”

“Yeah,” Jen said. “Yeah, I’ll see you.”

Rio grabbed a star-shaped sugar cookie off a platter at the end of the dining table and popped it into her mouth as she slipped out into the living room before Jen could say anything else.

Agatha was across the room, in another tense conversation with a woman Rio definitely recognized from the library, but she couldn’t quite place the name. Dottie? Sarah, maybe? Either way, Agatha saw Rio looking and shot her a sharp glare. Rio took the hint and headed over to where Alice was fussing with Lilia’s ancient CRT TV.

It turned out it didn’t even have an HDMI port, which meant the karaoke idea was getting nixed, but after a little bit of snooping in the cabinet underneath, Rio found a dusty plug-and-play joystick with a collection of old arcade games that was still in working order, and it only took a few rounds of Frogger before a full-on tournament broke out.

Rio lost sight of Agatha as a small crowd started to gather around the TV, but despite that, if she was being honest, she was kind of actually starting to have a good time. As the clock ticked ever closer to midnight, the crowd did in fact start to thin out, and those who were left were mostly reaching a pleasant state of being under their influence of choice. Conversation and laughter flowed easily, and Rio found herself suitably distracted from worrying about Agatha.

That was, at least, until she caught sight of Agatha slipping away from the rest of the party, making a beeline for the bathroom down the hall with her hand against her face.

That got Rio distracted enough that she ran Ms. Pacman straight into a pixelated ghost to a collective groan from her audience, but Rio found herself not really caring. She passed the joystick off to Alice who was going for the high score on Galaga, and picked her way out of the crowd.

“You good?” Jen asked.

“Yeah,” Rio said. “I’m just gonna grab another drink.”

She headed into the kitchen and grabbed another seltzer—a wild berry Truly this time—and made a pit stop in the dining room to grab a couple of those sugar cookies in a napkin before following Agatha’s path down the hall towards the bathroom. She was barely halfway to the door when she heard the unmistakable sounds of Agatha…well, struggling.

“Hih-TSSHhiu! Heihh-hhETshiw!” Rio heard what she assumed was a hand slamming down hard on the edge of the sink, followed by harsh fit of coughing that only seemed to feed back into the cycle as Agatha paused just long to inhale sharply before—“HHET’Sshiu! Motherfucker!”

“Agatha?” Rio knocked lightly on the door with her knuckle. “It’s just me. You ok?”

“F-fuck off,” Agatha growled. Her voice was really starting to go now—it sounded low and scratchy, cracking between syllables—and though she made a point of turning on the water in the sink, Rio could still hear her sniffling miserably.

“Agatha, come on, don’t do this to yourself.”

She got no response to that, presumably because Agatha knew that her voice wasn’t helping her case at this point. Rio checked the time on her phone; it was after eleven now. If she’d known a few hours ago that this was where they were going to end up, she’d have put her foot down at the start. She should have pushed harder when Agatha was still malleable. Now it felt like she was talking to a brick wall. Or a closed wooden door, she supposed.

Just as she was about to get up to go back to the party, she heard Agatha clear her throat.

“If I’b bothering you so mbuch you can just fucki’g leave,” she snapped.

“Agatha, that’s not…” Rio trailed off as Agatha’s words actually hit her.

Oh.

So that’s what this was all about.

“Listen,” Rio said. “I’m not leaving you. Not because of the party and definitely not because you’re sick. You’re kind of fucking stuck with me whether you like it or not, and I’ll give you space, but I’m not leaving you. Take as much time as you need. I’m heading back out to the living room, but I’ll be here for you whenever you’re ready.”

The water stopped running and Rio could hear Agatha sniffle again. She didn’t say anything, but then again, she didn’t really have to. It was enough just for Rio to know she was actually listening. As she started to turn away, she suddenly remembered the cookies in her hand.

“Oh, and I brought you a little something to eat. They’re right out here if you want them.”

There was a narrow little table with a collection of candles and crystals next to the bathroom door, and Rio set the napkin-wrapped cookies on edge before she headed back down the hallway. When she reached the end, she heard the bathroom door open and shut, and when she turned around, the cookies were gone.

~**~

By 11:30, the party was smaller, but rowdier than ever. Lilia, who had been out on the fire escape more than once, was giggling her way through a tarot reading for Jen over the arm of the other couch. There was music blasting from someone’s phone, and a cheer went up as Alice finally broke her high score. Everyone that was left was talking or laughing, and it was easy enough for Rio to slip back into the fray and plop herself on an overstuffed couch cushion without so much as a glance her way.

The minutes seemed to drag by impossibly slow. 11:45 turned to :50, turned to :55, and Rio was starting to think she might have to press her luck and check on Agatha again when she felt a hand on her shoulder, and speak of the devil, there she was. Her hair obscured most of her face so Rio couldn’t get a great look at her, but she tapped Rio’s shoulder and nodded towards the fire escape, and that was all Rio needed to scramble to her feet and follow her.

There was no one out there at this time of night; everyone left was inside, watching reluctantlyas Alice unplugged the game and tuned the TV in to the Times Square ball drop. Agatha slipped out the open window onto the metal platform, and before Rio could even process what they were doing, Agatha grabbed the railing of the narrow stairs leading up towards the roof and started to climb.

“Ok, not that I’m not glad you’re out here again, but what are the fuck are you doing?” Rio asked, trying not to notice just how high above the city streets they were.

Agatha paused and looked back at her. “I wa’t to watch the fireworks.”

She said it like it was the most obvious thing in the world, like it had been her plan this whole time, and though Rio hated the thought of setting foot on those narrow, creaking stairs, she had to admit that, yeah, she very much did want to watch the fireworks too.

She followed Agatha, and they both scrambled over the lip at the top. After the hazy warmth of Lilia’s apartment, the chill breeze was a welcome change, and Rio had to admit, the view was nice from up here. Rio checked the time on her phone. Two minutes to midnight, and she swore could feel it in the air.

“You don’t have to kiss mbe or adythi’g,” Agatha said. “I just thought this mbight be dice.”

Ninety seconds to midnight.

“Would you stop me if I did?” Rio asked.

Agatha scoffed. “You’d really risk catchi’g this?”

“What can I say?” Rio shrugged. “I’m feeling lucky this year.”

“But I’b gross.”

Rio pressed her cold hand against Agatha’s fever-warm cheek—oh yeah, she was definitely going downhill—and guided her gaze up so she could take her first good look at Agatha’s face in the moonlight.

Agatha’s bright blue eyes were watering so badly it looked like she was crying, and though her mascara had held up valiantly for the last few hours, it was starting to smudge in earnest now. The makeup around her nose was a patchy mess, clinging to the dry, reddened skin where it hadn’t been rubbed off entirely. Her lipstick had honestly held up surprisingly well, although the edges were starting to get fuzzy. All of that coupled with her irritated frown as she sniffled and wrinkled her nose again made her look so pathetically adorable that Rio could almost melt.

“See that’s the funny thing,” Rio said. “You’re saying gross, but all I’m seeing is the most beautiful woman in the world.”

Agatha blushed furiously, but she let Rio pull her closer.

Ten seconds to midnight.

The air was humming with electric energy. Rio was sure there was nowhere else on earth she’d rather be.

Five!

They could hear the countdown from all directions.

Four!

Agatha swore as her nose twitched and she aimed a loud “Hh-ITShoo!” into her shoulder.

Three!

Agatha sniffled and wiped her nose on her sleeve.

Two!

“Last cha’dce to back out.”

One!

Rio smirked. “Not on your life.”

Happy New Year!

All at once, the city erupted around them, but Rio hardly paid it any mind as her lips met Agatha’s, waiting and eager, and for a moment, they were the only two people in the world. Rio could taste the artificial vanilla of Agatha’s lipstick, could feel Agatha’s poor, abused nose against her cheek as she tangled her fingers in Agatha’s hair and savored absolutely everything about the moment.

Agatha was the first to turn away, gasping for breath that couldn’t break through the wall of congestion in her nose, but she didn’t pull away from Rio’s arms.

They stayed like that for a long moment, foreheads pressed together as the fireworks over the water lit up the night sky around them.

“Rio?” Agatha finally croaked.

“Yeah, love?”

 “I dod’t feel very well,” Agatha said. She let her shoulders drop and rested her head on Rio’s shoulder so that her next words came out even softer. “I thigk I’b ready to leave ndow.”

“Oh, you are, huh?”

Agatha nodded weakly against Rio’s neck. Rio bit back a chuckle and carded her fingers through Agatha’s hair, which just made Agatha press closer. She was for sure running a fever now, but Rio didn’t think she needed to say that part out loud.

The fireworks were starting to die down now. The city that slept by 10pm was already quieting again, and a cool breeze blew across the rooftop, making them both shiver. That was enough to finally spur Rio into action. Despite Agatha’s low whine of protest, Rio took a step back, and reached into Agatha’s pocket to find her crumpled handkerchief. She offered it to Agatha who rolled her rheumy eyes, but accepted it gratefully and set about wiping away the tear tracks and the smudged eye makeup. There wasn’t much she could do for her foundation at this point, but after a moment she managed to pull herself back to some semblance of her usual self.

“Ready?”

“H-hold on.” Agatha held up one finger as she inhaled a shaky breath. Her eyes fluttered shut, her lips parted, and she stayed like that for a long moment, before—

Fuck, I lost it.” Agatha scrubbed at her nose with the crumpled handkerchief in frustration before flipping her hair over her shoulder and following Rio to the edge of the roof to step gingerly back onto the fire escape.

The party was well and truly winding down now, but those that were left seemed occupied with champagne and company, so no one seemed to notice when Rio and Agatha slipped back inside. For a second, Rio almost thought they could make a clean break for it. They’d grab their coats and slip outside, and Rio would text Lilia a brief goodbye once they were in the Uber back to Agatha’s place.

That kind of luck didn’t seem to be on their side, though, because Lilia caught them as they passed the kitchen doorway.

“Oh, Rio, are you leaving?”

Rio stopped dead in her tracks like she’d been caught sneaking in after curfew. She could feel Agatha stiffen and clear her throat next to her.

“Oh, uh, yeah,” Rio said with a nervous glance at Agatha. “It’s getting late and—”

“I have to let the babysitter go,” Agatha chimed in. “Rio offered to split a car.”

Her voice was fading in earnest now, but Rio noticed how carefully she was choosing her words so at least she didn’t sound too congested on top of it. Her explanation seemed to be enough for Lilia, who smiled at them both.

“Well, get home safe,” she said. “Happy New Year! And Agatha, I hope you feel better soon!”

Agatha’s jaw dropped and she looked like she was contemplating homicide or suicide or both, but Rio just gave her a shove in the direction of the door and gave Lilia a soft “Happy New Year,” and a shy wave in return.

She grabbed both of their coats out of the closet with one hand while she pulled up Uber on her phone with the other. No way they were doing that walk again tonight.

“Ok, driver’ll be here in three minutes,” Rio said.

When Agatha didn’t respond right away, Rio looked up to see her frozen in pre-sneeze torture, her lips parted, eyelashes fluttering, brows knitting together as she took a breath in, and then—

“Oh fuck mbe!” Agatha scowled and pinched the bridge of her nose hard.

“Oh, pobrecita,” Rio breathed. “Let’s get you home.”

Agatha rolled her eyes, but before she could say anything, the lost sneeze snuck back up on her with a vengeance just as Jen and Alice passed by on their way to the kitchen.

“HHT’SCHiu!”

“Bless you, Agatha!”

“Fuck off, Jen!” Agatha called back.

With that, she flipped her hair over her shoulder, held her flaming cheeks high, and stalked out of Lilia’s apartment, leaving Rio to call out a soft, “Happy New Year, guys!” before jogging to catch up.

~**~

The ride back to Agatha’s place was short and quiet, and even though she hadn’t strictly been invited, Rio followed Agatha inside where Agatha paid the babysitter, kicked off her shoes, and tossed her coat in the vague direction of the coatrack before throwing herself down onto the couch in the parlor.

Rio had been in Agatha’s house more than a few times, but this—Agatha being this miserable in her own home—was new enough territory that she wasn’t quite sure what to do with herself. She shed her own coat and shoes, and picked up Agatha’s so at least they wouldn’t be a tripping hazard later, and returned to stand behind the couch.

Agatha had one hand dangling towards the floor and the other over her eyes like if she blocked her vision, she could pretend the night had gone differently.

“So,” Rio started carefully. “What are you thinking? Do you want me to stay?”

Agatha moved the hand over her face and looked up at Rio with red, watery, exhausted eyes.

“I cad take care of byself,” she said.

“I know you can. That’s not what I’m asking.” Rio leaned over the back of the couch and reached one hand down to brush a lock of hair out of Agatha’s face, curling it gently around her finger. “Do you want me to stay?”

“You’ll get sick,” Agatha whined.

“Again, not what I’m asking. And for what it’s worth, you did have your tongue in my mouth less than an hour ago, so I’m pretty sure that ship has sailed.”

Agatha started to laugh, but it quickly turned into a cough that only seemed to irritate her nose as she quickly brought her hands up to cover an itchy sneeze. “hH-IItschu!”

“Salud, baby.”

“Thagks,” Agatha grumbled. She sniffled wetly and wiped her nose roughly on her sleeve. “Ugh, feel gross! I hate bei’g sick.”

Rio bit back a laugh. “I don’t think most people really enjoy it.” She had moved from playing with Agatha’s hair to scratching lightly at her scalp. Agatha’s eyes fell closed and she moaned into Rio’s touch.

“Let me ask a different way,” Rio said. “Do you want me to leave?”

Agatha’s eyes opened again, and when she looked up at Rio with her flushed cheeks and her sniffly nose, Rio felt like she could melt into a puddle on the spot. The flush in Agatha’s cheeks deepened as she slowly shook her head no.

“Ok,” Rio said. “That wasn’t so hard, was it?”

“Shut up,” Agatha muttered without any bite.

“Ignoring that because you’re sick,” Rio said.  “Now what do you say we get you somewhere more comfortable than the couch so you can get some actual rest, hm?”

It took a few more minutes of gentle prodding from Rio to get Agatha to her feet and up the stairs, but once she was moving, she seemed to be able to handle herself. She poked her head into Nicky’s room before heading to her own room to change while Rio busied herself digging around in the bathroom medicine cabinet.

All Agatha seemed to have was a bottle of Advil, a box of Zyrtec, and a mostly-empty bottle of grape-flavored children’s cold medicine that was missing the measuring cup. Rio vowed to make a supply run in the morning, but for now, the Advil was probably better than nothing. She filled a glass with water from the sink, and then grabbed the allergy meds for good measure and headed for Agatha’s bedroom.

Agatha had already changed into an oversized t-shirt with an ambiguous number three on it, and a pair of worn flannel shorts that were practically indecent. She’d pulled her hair into a loose bun, and she was just finishing wiping off the last of her makeup with a wipe that she tossed carelessly in the direction of the trash can. It missed by a long shot, but Rio thought it was cute that she’d tried.

“Here,” Rio said, holding out the water and two ibuprofen tablets. “You didn’t have much, but this should help keep your fever down.” Agatha took the meds and washed them down without protest, and Rio offered her the box of allergy meds. “I don’t know if these’ll do much, but they might at least take the edge off until I can run out to the store tomorrow.”

Agatha’s cheeks flushed a deeper pink. “About that…”

“What are you…?” Rio trailed off as she pulled the blister pack out of the box and found it completely empty. “Why was this still in the cabinet if you knew it was empty?”

“To remind myself to buy more,” Agatha said like it was completely obvious and not actually one of the most ridiculous things Rio had ever heard.

“Ok, scratch that then.” Rio tossed the empty package into the trash can. “Do you want anything else?”

Agatha shook her head as she set her water on the nightstand.

“Just hurry up and c’mere,” she said, making grabby hands in Rio’s general direction. It was quite possibly the cutest thing Rio had ever seen, and she wiggled out of her nice jeans and into a spare set of pajamas as fast as she could so she could crawl under the covers with Agatha, who immediately attached herself to Rio’s side.

“I’b sorry I was a bitch earlier,” Agatha mumbled.

Rio chuckled as she leaned her cheek against the top of Agatha’s head. “Lucky for you, I kind of like it when you’re a bitch, because I know you don’t mean it.” Agatha grumbled something unintelligible against her neck, but Rio continued, “And because the sooner you get being a bitch out of your system, the sooner we get to do this.”

“Love you,” Agatha mumbled sleepily.

“Y yo a ti, mi amor,” Rio said. She reached back to turn off the lamp on the bedside table and then pressed her lips against Agatha’s warm forehead as she settled back down.

Agatha was already out, her breathing coming in congested little snores that made Rio’s lips twitch into a smile as she felt her own eyes growing heavy. Her last conscious thought before she slipped into sleep herself was that there was nowhere else on earth she’d rather be starting the new year.

[glitterrosesnzz]

yeah okay here's another Renard fic ft @hachiibun 's oc Vân

“Hh’NTChh!!” Renard stifled a sneeze near instantly after he’d grabbed the necklace they’d been targeting that night, holding it away from himself at arms length. “Hih- hEH- hH’NxTshh-’Tsh-’Ttchh!!” 

“Oh, that’s not a good sign.” Vân said, briefly glancing around the room for any potential pursuers, taking a step back away from Renard when the other kept stifling sneezes. “Did you just get yourself cursed?” 

Renard didn’t answer- though, Vân could make a solid guess based on how he hadn’t stopped sneezing… 

“Hih’Ntshi! ‘NtCHh!! Hh-... hihH-.... ngh…” Renard’s hitching breaths slowly slowed down, and he rubbed at his nose harshly. He made a motion as though to remove his ‘blindfold’, though his hand hesitated just before he could do so, seemingly remembering that he was still out in the open at a heist. He was still holding the necklace away from himself. 

“...Bless you. Do you want me to take that from you-” Vân didn’t particularly want to get cursed, but if it’d benefit Renard at this moment- 

Renard brought the necklace back towards himself faster than Vân could blink, clutching it against his chest as though Vân was going to attempt to steal it from him. 

“Touch it! You know what it does!” Renard said- and then immediately snapped his mouth shut, grimacing. Vân slow blinked at him. 

“No, I don’t know what it does.” Well, he had a suspicion now that Renard had said that, but still. “But isn’t it… bothering you?”

Actually, the fact Renard hadn’t fallen into another sneezing fit the instant he brought the necklace closer to him was indicative of otherwise. Before Vân could comment on it, Renard had already brought the necklace closer to his face, examining it- but notably not reacting. 

“...Huh. Multiple usages.” Renard sighed, “It has plenty of magic left.” 

Vân stared at him blankly for a few seconds. 

“You’re… saying the opposite of what you mean? Aren’t you?” He asked. Renard looked away, which was really all the affirmative answer that Vân needed. 

Before he could comment further though, there was the sound of footsteps headed their way. Renard instantly turned on his heel, taking off running, and Vân was quick to follow him. 

~

So as it turns out. Attempting to co-ordinate and improvise new plans on the spot with someone who could only say the opposite of what they mean is much harder than previously expected. 

Which, Vân supposes, is how they’ve ended up hiding together in a relatively small storage closet instead of escaping, again. 

Renard had pressed himself up against the wall as soon as the door had closed behind them, trying to keep as much space between himself and Vân as he could. Vân did his best to do the same, but while this space was slightly larger than some of the ones they’d hidden in in the past, Renard was more sensitive right now, and- 

“Hihh…” Renard’s breath hitched, and he immediately brought up his hands to cover the lower half of his face. “Hh… nn… hH’Ntch! ‘Ntsh– ‘Ttchi!!” 

Oh god, they were absolutely going to get caught. Or, well, they were going to get found at least. 

Renard quickly used a split second between sneezes to pull his scarf up over his nose and mouth, stifling into the fabric, which at the very least made him a bit quieter. Vân still remained tense though, there wasn’t exactly much he could do in this situation that wouldn’t make things worse, unless-

“Do you have a seal on you?” Vân whispered. Though, surely Renard would’ve used one already if he- 

Renard blindly held out a seal, his arm shaking slightly as he kept stifling sneezes into his scarf. Vân paused for a second in surprise before the sound of another muffled sneeze snapped him out of it, quickly grabbing the seal and applying it to his cheek. After a moment, Renard’s sneezing began to slow down… 

…but he wasn’t stopping. 

Vân was just starting to double check if he’d put the seal on correctly when Renard suddenly made a quiet, frustrated sound between hitching breaths. Before Vân could even try to ask him what was wrong, Renard had already moved forwards, burying his face into Vân’s shoulder and letting out muffled sneezes against him. 

It was, really, no quieter than if he’d just let them out into his scarf, but Vân wasn’t going to tell him that. 

Yet, even though he wasn’t stifling his sneezes anymore, Renard still wasn’t stopping. Vân somewhat absentmindedly patted Renard’s back as he mentally ran through his understanding of Renard’s allergy, wondering if it was just the curse keeping him going or- 

Oh. Wait a second- 

“I have feathers on me.” Vân breathed, and Renard stiffened. “The feathers are what’s bothering you now.” 

“Yes, they are-” Renard abruptly slammed a hand over his mouth, pulling away from Vân. “I- I mean, it’s, uh- hiH’Tshhi!! Hh’TsHh!!” 

“Bless you.” Oh, Vân was suddenly so tempted to take advantage of this curse. But Renard had already gone bright red from his attempt at denial backfiring on him, and, well, this wasn’t the most ideal place to mess around in… 

Practically as soon as he thought that, the two of them could hear footsteps approaching. They both tensed, and Renard immediately did his best to distance himself from Vân again. 

Neither of them relaxed until a handful of minutes passed after the sound of the footsteps had vanished. 

Vân slowly let out a relieved breath.

Renard let out a muffled sneeze. 

“Bless you, again. You’re still going?” Vân asked, “This must be really bothering you this time, huh.” 

Renard, at least, was smart enough to not verbally respond this time, instead pulling off his ‘blindfold’ so that he could be absolutely sure Vân knew he was glaring at him.

…Not that it had much of an effect outside of being slightly endearing. 

~

Sitting in Renard’s house, the both of them having changed back into regular clothes, Vân watched as Renard dangled the necklace in front of himself, staring it down. 

“...Sooo, do you know how to break the curse you’re under?” Vân asked. 

“No, I don’t know.” Renard sighed, and it took a moment for Vân to remember that he should be thinking of the opposite of that statement. 

“Wait, so you do know?” Oh, and would you look at that, Renard is avoiding eye contact with him again. Fascinating. “Renaaaard. It’s something embarrassing isn’t it-” 

“Keep talking.” Renard hissed, face flushed red, and Vân obediently shut up. 

An awkward silence fell over the both of them, with Renard stubbornly avoiding looking at Vân, while Vân continued to quietly stare at him. 

After a few more minutes, Renard “tch’d”, and held out his hand towards Vân. 

“Don’t give me your hand.” He said. Vân took a moment to double check that the seal was still on him before placing his hand in Renard’s, tilting his head to the side as he watched Renard’s face slowly get redder. 

“What does this have to do with breaking your-” Vân fell into stunned silence as Renard, quickly but gently kissed Vân’s hand. 

He let go almost immediately afterwards, standing up and walking away from Vân, muttering something about juice and snacks as he vanished into the kitchen, his face and ears bright red. Vân remained frozen for a few moments longer before snapping back into reality. 

“Wait- Renard! Was that how you break-” 

“Forget about it and erase it from your mind!!!”

[postsofbabel]

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[abyssalthreads]

"You know. All of this sin reminds me of a story when I was hunting down a human sinner." He paused and cleared his throat. "You see, it took me a while because apparently, he had invited his partner in crime over to a dinner, to my surprise it was a clown they were eating. I got caught because one of them stopped eating and asked the other-"

"Hey, does this taste funny to you?"

. . .

"I never claimed I was a saint, now did I?"