#if only i knew this would break the dam

[oddinary-cat]

Reposting my first ever bang chan doodle i did back in 2023...

[sillyquzes]

you always die before i can say it

cw- Alternate universe!!, hurt/comfort, arranged marriage, some spoilers, tension and angst (?), unprotected sex, manhandling, fingering, cunnilungus, missionary, tummy bulge, aftercare and not proof-read Nd this the first time I'm writing smut 😭

The wedding veil is woven from the highest quality silk, threads harvested from the holy hands of the demigod of romance herself. The gown, ceremonial and stiff, is stitched with prayers in golden ink, the same shade of the chrysos blood.

They say marriage in Amphoreus is sacred, but rarely because of love though. most marriages in Amphoreus are about contracts and mutual gain.

You were chosen to be wed to Phainon, the world-bearing chrysos heir. Your name is etched onto some marble slab right after your birth.

Phainon.

Of course, you have heard of him. Everyone has. Charming, Strong, , Gold-blooded or Cold-blooded, who knows?

And now that man is your damn husband

The word tastes foreign. You’re not afraid. But you are… unsettled. Not because you’re marrying a stranger. That much was always expected. You trained for this, studied noble etiquette, practiced how to kneel without wrinkling your gown. You recited the vows until they bled from your mouth like scripture.

What unsettles you is the way he looked at you when you entered the chamber, like he knew you too well.

Not in the vague, political way nobles know each other through connections and rumors.

But intimately, like he’s seen you smile in private. Heard you whisper. Heard your soft pleas.

You try not to shudder as the officiant begins speaking in the tongue of the sacred titans, and you force yourself to look at Phainon again.

He stands unnaturally still, hands folded behind his back, clad in the suit which complements him a little all too well—obsidian and silver. His eyes, a dull ocean blue lacking the shine of the moonlit waters which you adored, do not move from yours. One can not deny that he is certainly fine asf

You wonder if he’s even listening

Then his gaze lowers to your hands.

You immediately freeze up, feeling the hair on your body stand up and your ears heaten up.

There’s heat there. Brief, scorching. Something in his eyes breaks for a fraction of a second, like a tidal wave threatening to breach a dam.

You remind yourself that this is routine. This marriage is simply contractual. You’re not meant to feel anything.

“Do you accept the terms of this union?” the officiant asks.

You swallow your saliva before finally speaking, “I do.”

Phainon doesn't respond right away. He just stared at you. someone give him brown contact lenses im shivering my timbers

And then, in a voice too soft to belong in a room like this: “I do.”

The officiant nods. Seals it. The pricked golden blood of your now beloved on the contract complements the deep red of yours

(One week after the ceremony)

You hadn’t expected much of him.

No one had told you that outright, of course, but the message had been clear enough in the way your tutors glossed over his personality and emphasized your posture instead. Your instructors spoke of duty, of expectation, of Chrysos' legacy. But never of warmth. Never of affection. And from the few conversations you’d had with Phainon in the first three days of your shared existence when you were teenagers, it had seemed like he was perfectly happy to uphold that cold, crystalline distance.

So you had made peace with it. You’d built the polite mask. The one that bowed and smiled and listened, and never expected him to ask you how your day had been

And for a while, he didn’t.

In those first days, he was distant. Not unkind, but cold in that chillingly efficient way Amphorean nobility mastered before they could walk. He would speak to you only when it was required. Your attempts at conversation—small things, really, like “Do you always rise before the second sun?” or “Do you like this blend of tea?” were often met with vague nods, faint grunts, or complete silence. He wasn’t cruel in those terms. But he wasn’t there. That was even more cruel.

And then suddenly one day, he was.

It began subtly. You nearly missed it, actually.

At breakfast, you reached for the honey spoon and noticed his gaze flick toward your wrist with concern. You thought you imagined it—until he spoke, in the awfully high tone of his

“You’re favoring your left hand. What happened??” You blinked at him, caught off guard. “…I burned my right last night. Just a little. I didn’t think you noticed.”

Well, you accidentally injured your hand by punching the wall in anger, but not that you would ever admit it. The second came later that evening. You were walking through the golden-lit halls toward the library when he appeared beside you—not from the opposite corridor, but from the shadows of a stone pillar. Like he had been waiting, sort of like a puppy waiting for their owner to return.

“I thought you were in the training grounds,” you said, voice kept carefully neutral.

“I was,” he replied. “But then what's the point if I can't flex to my dear wife :(”

You didn’t know what to say to that other than to just stare wide-eyed, feeling the tip of your ears burn and redden up.

But it only got stranger from there.

By the fourth day, you’d stopped being able to move freely through the palace without eventually encountering him. Not in an overt way. He never imposed himself or forced himself on you. But he was there. When you turned down a hall. When you stepped into the balcony garden. When you brushed your hair back and thought about the sun, it was as if the thought itself summoned him. When you briefly mentioned the fact that you like sun, a sun tattoo which you never knew of had been exposed on the crook of his neck with his shirt exposing his well-built collarbones.

You try to rationalize it.

Maybe this was just… politeness. Maybe you had been misled by his initial coldness, and this was the true Phainon. Perhaps, now that the marriage was finalized, he was merely making the effort to play the part of a proper husband.

Maybe. But then you’d wake in the morning to find the curtains already drawn—not by the servants, no, they would never touch your private quarters. It was him. You knew it was him. You could smell his cologne lingering too faintly in the air, like crushed vanilla and sweet tea leaves.

Another time, you mentioned missing the old garden that your childhood estate once had. The next morning, you looked out your chamber window and the entire palace greenhouse had been refitted with the exact same floral arrangements. The blue hydrangeas. The delicate roses. Even the silverleaf vines braided around the arch.

Next morning he greeted you at breakfast now, every morning, with a radiant sort of cheer that felt jarringly out of place in a palace built from marble and duty.

“Did you sleep well?” he’d ask, eyes crinkling as he leaned forward across the table, like you were a childhood friend he hadn’t seen in ages. His tone was lilting, almost teasing. “I heard the second moon stayed full all night. Maybe it blessed your dreams? Or was it the sun that blessed you? :D ”

You nodded, tentatively, unsure how to respond.

He didn’t stop smiling.

Sometimes you caught him just… looking.

You’d be walking through the hall, pacing out your next speech for the council, when you’d glance sideways and see him leaning against a stone column, arms crossed, hair tied back messily like he hadn’t bothered fixing it since sparring with Lord Mydeimos.

He didn’t say a word.

Just watched you. Head tilted. Like you were art worth billions

And then, when you paused, when you opened your mouth to say something, anything—he’d flash that infuriatingly lovely smile and say something stupid like, “Your left shoe’s a bit loose.”

You would blink. Look down. See that, indeed, it was. No wonder you were walking clumsily today. You bend down to remove the unfit shoes from your feet, and then suddenly, he had scooped you up like you weighed nothing at all—like a prince from some ridiculous, overly saccharine romance novel that your childhood handmaid used to smuggle under your pillows in hopes for you to try those tactics with the child Phainon.

“What are you—?! Phainon!”

“Can’t have my wife tripping and faceplanting before council,” he grinned, his voice a mockingly exaggerated whisper as he cradled you in his arms. “That’d be bad for image. What would the old geezers think?” “That I’ve married a lunatic,” you snapped, flustered beyond comprehension. “Put me down.”

“Sure,” he chirped cheerfully, “right after I carry you to the sitting room and get you a new pair of shoes.”

“You’re impossible,” you muttered.

“You’re pretty light,” he countered, and you swore to the titans that if he wasn’t your legally-bound husband with an entire planet at his back, you would’ve smacked the smug grin off his face.

well... who says you can't? Your hand pitifully punches his chest, but the only reaction you got was a huge grin from your husband and a sudden reddening of embarrassment from yourself. Your traitorous hands gripped the front of his training shirt, trying to stabilize yourself as you felt the warmth of his body, the strength of his arms. One was wrapped firmly around your back and the other curled under your knees. His skin was sun-warmed, faintly smelling of steel and faint vanilla now.

His muscles flexed with each step. He was so warm, but not in an overwhelming way like the spring sunshine, and strong. Filthy thoughts clouding your mind on what he could do to you with that strength and-

You bit down on your cheek hard. Just to focus on the sting, to stop the swirl of confusion and butterflies and every other damn thing his nearness ignited in you.

“Where did you even come from?” you mumbled, unable to help yourself as your eyes flicked toward the corridor behind you. “You weren’t at my side five minutes ago.”

Phainon just laughed, his stupidly lovely ocean eyes crinkling at the corners. “I’m the world-bearer, wife. I show up wherever I’m needed.”

“You’re ridiculous.”

“I’m your husband.”

That word again.

It didn’t taste so foreign this time.

When he finally set you down gently, like you were carved from glass, he knelt in front of you and began adjusting the fit of your shoes. His fingers were sure, calloused, and surprisingly gentle. He didn’t meet your eyes this time, just focused on the buckle, humming softly to himself. Something old. A lullaby, maybe. One that prickled at the edges of your memory, it felt very similar.

When he was done, he looked up at you, still crouched low.

“There,” he said. “Fit for council now.”

You stared down at him. This strange, strange man. Phainon the golden heir. Phainon the storm-fisted warrior. Phainon your absurd, ridiculous, soft-handed husband.

“…Why are you doing this?” you whispered, voice more fragile than you meant it to be.

“Doing what?”

“This. All of it.” You gestured vaguely at the air between you, secretly hoping that his response would explain and calm the heat pooling down your body. “You never acted like this before. Not when we were younger. Not when we first met.”

His expression changed. Just slightly. The edges of his smile curled inward, softened.

"People change."

He definitely had an ulterior motive.

No one becomes this devoted in a week. Not when, for years, he looked at you like one more duty to be managed. Not when, as a boy, he’d barely spared you more than a nod. People change, yes—but not like this. Not overnight. Not with this intensity. Not with this… unspoken ache.

You narrow your eyes.

He stood slowly, and for once, he didn’t flash that mocking grin. He didn’t deflect. He didn’t tease. He simply looked at you and flashed you a smile again. That same smile that he uses to escape something, how do you know? He would always attempt to use that infamous smile of his on Professor Anaxagoras, but it never worked.

Your throat felt tight. Not from sadness—no, you’d learned long ago how to school that away. But from the quiet, dull ache of inevitability. Of disappointment. Of waking up from a dream you didn’t realize you were having.

“…Right,” you said after a beat. You smiled, small, polite. The kind of smile you’d give a visiting noble who asked too many questions, or a war general trying to barter peace with veiled threats from the other side. A smile that meant nothing but silence. “Of course.”

Phainon tilted his head slightly, as if waiting for more. As if he hadn’t quite expected you to drop it so quickly.

But you did. You had to.

Because asking again would mean hoping. And hope, for you, had always been a mistake.

He didn’t move right away. Just stood there, watching. The shadows of the hall fell soft against his cheekbones, painting him in that same eerie glow the temple’s moons always cast. He looked like a statue. The one whom you wanted to worship.

And still, he tried to soften it. That stupid, lovely smile.

“Sleep early tonight,” he said eventually, stepping back into the corridor. “Council starts at dawn, and you need the energy to deal with that Wench Caenis.”

You only nodded. You didn’t watch him leave. You didn’t have to. You knew the sound of his footsteps now. The way his boots pressed against the marble. The shift of his weight when he turned. The subtle creak of the door as it closed behind him.

Only after he was gone did you let out a long, shaky breath.

You had hoped for more. That was the truth of it. You sank into the stone bench by the window, watching the wind ripple the garden leaves outside. You stayed there long after the moons had fully risen. Long after the last torch had been extinguished in the main halls.

Not crying. Not thinking. Just waiting for the ache in your chest to pass.

It didn’t.

Because what was more painful than hatred, more confusing than love… was being wanted for the wrong reasons. Being kissed with an agenda.

He knew he shouldn’t touch you. Not yet. Not like that.

Not until the world turned once more, not until he was sure this time would be different.

But Phainon had always been selfish.

That was the truth of it. For all the people who called him the golden heir, the world-bearer, the man of law and legacy, none of them had ever seen the core of him—dark and clawing and desperate. Desperate in a way that didn’t match the cold angles of his public mask, in a way he had buried lifetimes ago.

And yet, there he was again. Standing just beyond the threshold of the corridor, hidden by shadow, watching you sit by the window, arms curled around yourself as if your own skin couldn’t be trusted to hold you. Moonlight wove silver threads through your hair. Your expression was unreadable. You didn’t cry.

You never cried.

Even in death, you never made a sound. Phainon’s jaw clenched. In one life, you had died in an assassination by that wench Caenis. In another, it was that damn black-cloaked moon bastard. And once—once, it had been him. Not directly. But with silence. With neglect. With the hope of avoiding, you would keep you safe. You had died in that life not with blood, but with resignation. With your back turned to him, staring out a window just like this one.

You had always loved windows.

In every life, no matter what, you always stare at the sky.

And he always ended up watching you.

Phainon pressed his back to the wall and exhaled, slow and quiet. His hand drifted to the sun-shaped tattoo at the crook of his neck, hidden once more beneath his collar. He hadn’t intended for you to see it so early. But the moment you smiled faintly at that flower arrangement in the garden, the same ones you used to plant in the old timeline when your hands were still callused and he was too much of a coward to say your name

He showed the sun tattoo to you, for you, it seemed like he showed it to the world. In a way, he is right, though, after all. You are his world

"This time, I’ll keep her alive."

Even if he had to fake the marriage. Even if he had to pretend to fall slowly, like a fool playing at affection.

But it wasn’t pretend, was it?

He was already too far gone.

Even now, he wanted to go back into the chamber. To kneel beside you, brush your hair back, tell you everything—that he had loved you in every cycle, that this life, this union, was the only one he had dared to interfere with directly. That every part of this palace had been reshaped to your tastes because he knew them.

He only wanted to kiss those sweet lips of yours; he wanted to kneel and kiss the inside of your thighs, he wanted to suckle on your clit, he wanted his saliva and your essence mixed all over his face and your thighs, he wanted your thighs to shake, he wanted to suck up all your sounds, all your sweet whimpers and moans and to feel your fingers in his scalp screaming his name.

He wanted to say, "I love you so much, my dear beloved."

But you had always died before he could say it.

But this time, you wouldn’t lift a finger.

This time, he would bear the world so you could rest.

He liked seeing you tired. Not from fear or grief or survival. But from things like reading too long, or laughing too hard. He liked how you tucked your feet under you on the garden bench, how your hair always curled slightly at the temple when you were exhausted, how you never finished your second cup of tea no matter how much you insisted you could.

He liked watching your shadow move through the halls. His hand would twitch toward you when you passed—wanting to reach, to hold, to kiss, and how he wished that those hands would cup the tainted face of his.

You’d been burned before. By versions of him and by his incompotency.

But this him… this one would be perfect for you.

A husband worthy of your trust. A man so attentive, so devoted, that your heart would melt without realizing it. He’d make it seem effortless, so that when you fell in love with him, you’d think it was your choice. Your will. Not something he carved into fate with the blood of a titan. He was patient now.

He collected your empty teacups, examined the pattern of your lipstick against the porcelain, and chose your favorite blend before you could even think of it. When you spoke, he listened. Not just to the words, but the way you breathed between them. The way your fingers fidgeted, the curve of your lips when you were holding back a lie.

He even learned to do that darn puppy plead, just the way you liked. He practiced in front of the mirror.

Because gods, he wanted you happy.

Happy. His happy little wife.

He wanted to see you glow. In this life, he would give you everything that every other life denied you. A garden full of your favorite flowers. Silk bedsheets in your favorite hue. A husband who memorized every line of your face and made you laugh at breakfast and stayed awake through the night just to make sure no bad dream ever reached you.

Phainon had once been a soldier, a role-model, a god-kissed heir of the Chrysos. But all of that meant nothing. Because in every timeline, the only title he ever wanted, the only one that mattered—was yours.

Yours to call. Yours to curse. Yours to kiss. Yours to fuck.

He had lived lifetimes without your love. This one, he would not.

This time, he would coax it gently, sweetly. He would cradle your heart like glass in his hands.

Tomorrow, he’d surprise you with pastries from your childhood province. He knew the exact ones you liked. The honey lemon-soaked marble cake your late aunt used to bake.

Tomorrow, he’d smile again. Tease you. Maybe carry you down another hallway, just to hear you swear at him with fire in your voice and a blush on your face.

You skipped breakfast.

You told yourself it wasn’t deliberate—that you were just tired, that the meetings had run late, that you hadn’t been hungry. But when you passed the dining hall and saw him already seated, waiting and fidgeting with his fingers with a lovesick smile on his face, your heart curled into itself like a fist. And instead of entering, you turned away with your head down, pretending you hadn’t seen.

You still smiled. Of course you smiled. It wasn’t like you wanted a war in the house—gods knew how fragile everything was already—but that smile never reached your eyes anymore. Not the way it did on the wedding day, when everything was still so bright and confusing and painfully hopeful.

No, now it was just… easier. Easier to pretend, easier to nod and say “thank you” when he pulled out your chair or handed you your favorite tea, easier to swallow the sudden knot in your throat when he looked at you like you were the only thing anchoring him to this world.

Because that couldn’t be true. It shouldn’t be true.

Phainon didn’t look at you that way before the wedding. You remembered. You knew. Back then, every conversation was clipped and careful, formal even in private. He rarely asked about your day. Never touched you if he didn’t have to. He was dutiful, at best. Indifferent, most days. Cold, sometimes. A contract, after all, didn’t require affection. Just presence. Just heirs.

So what changed?

That question haunted you more than you cared to admit.

Because no one changed this quickly. No one woke up one morning and decided to act like they were in love. Especially not him.

You could see it in the way he lingered near doorways, hesitating like a man too afraid to knock. You could hear it in his voice, softer than silk when he asked if you needed anything. You could feel it when his fingers brushed yours and lingered—just a moment too long to be innocent.

It terrified you.

You’d never been loved like that before. Not truly. And certainly not by someone who had once treated you like another duty, another requirement.

So you did what you always did when something became too fragile. You retreated.

Your walks in the garden changed hours. He’d arrive with that little hopeful gleam in his eye, only to find empty benches and untouched tea. You took to eating dinner in your study under the excuse of paperwork. You made sure your warded doors were properly sealed before bed, a ritual you hadn’t kept up since the first week of marriage.

You didn’t hate him. That was the worst part. If you hated him, it would be simple.

No, it was the not knowing that broke you.

You didn’t want to be a fool who reached out, only to find out later that the warmth was just a tool. That it was manipulation dressed up in affection. That maybe, just maybe, this too was part of the contract—something he was fulfilling for the sake of reputation, or power, or something even worse.

It had to be something like that.

So you started saying less. Moving quieter. Laughing less.

And Phainon… he noticed.

He didn’t push, not at first. He remained gentle. Almost painfully so. Still pulled your chair out. Still offered your favorite cloak when it rained. Still watched you from across the hallway with that same haunted look, like he was holding something in his chest that was too heavy for words.

But he didn’t say anything.

Until one morning, as you passed him in the hallway and offered your usual strained, polite smile, he caught your wrist. Gently. Carefully.

“Are you angry with me?” he asked, voice low and far too sincere.

You blinked, startled. “No. Of course not.”

“Then why are you avoiding me?”

You swallowed. Your throat felt tight. “I’m not.”

“Don’t lie.” His fingers didn’t tighten, but his gaze sharpened. “You haven’t looked at me in a week.”

You pulled your hand free, stepping back a little too fast. “I’ve just been busy. There’s nothing wrong.”

“Nothing wrong,” he echoed, voice flat now. His face gave nothing away, but his eyes..they looked like something was splintering beneath the surface.

You couldn’t do this.

You weren’t strong enough to ask what he wanted. Weren’t brave enough to hear him confirm that yes, he was just doing his part. That all of this. this closeness, this softness was just another act to maintain the illusion of a happy union.

So instead, you did the cowardly thing, which Phainon would always do.

You smiled again. And said, “Don’t worry about me.”

Then turned and walked away before he could say anything else.

Phainon didn’t move from the corridor for a long time.

He stood still, hand limp at his side where your wrist had just been. The emptiness there felt sharper than it should have. His shoulders were too tense, chest hollow like a bell that had never been rung. He should’ve expected this..gods, why didn’t he expect this? People don’t forget how they were treated. And he hadn’t exactly been kind, hadn’t been present, hadn’t even been human to you during those earlier years.

And now?

Now he was trying too late. Giving too much, too fast. Like pouring water into a cracked cup, hoping it’d hold.

Of course you were pulling away. Of course you didn’t trust him.

And he didn’t blame you.

But knowing that didn’t make the ache stop gnawing at the edges of his chest, didn’t make the silence at dinner any less crushing, didn’t make the distant smile on your lips feel any less like a dagger stuck under his ribs.

He ended up at the training grounds of Castrum Kremnos. It was empty. Saved for the half-curled figure already there, manspreading in a chair like he’d been expecting him all along. Mydeimos didn’t even glance up from the book he was pretending to read.

"You can read?"

“…You look like a kicked puppy,” Mydeimos grunted, before shutting the book and keeping it on the chair beside him.

Phainon didn’t answer. Just dragged a chair back with a hollow scrape and dropped into it.

The silence stretched between them like a storm cloud. It was ridiculous—Mydeimos wasn’t exactly the ideal confidant. He didn’t provide emotional support. But he was a good advisor.

“She’s avoiding me,” Phainon murmured finally, staring up at the arc of the stars through the skylight.

Mydeimos gave a long sigh through his nose. “Gee. I wonder why.”

“…I don’t know what I did wrong.”

This time, Mydeimos did look over. His eyes narrowed. “You mean besides the years of emotional negligence and emotional distance ?”

Phainon flinched.

“…I didn’t mean to treat her like that. Back then.” He rubbed his face with both hands, voice thick. “I thought… if I kept things distant, it would be easier. For her. For both of us.”

“Easier to keep her from hurting you, you mean.”

Phainon went silent.

“Easier to keep you from feeling anything real,” Mydeimos muttered. “Until you woke up one morning after the wedding and realized you loved her. Congratulations, by the way. That realization only took, what, ten years?”

“I do love her,” Phainon snapped, softer than anger but too raw to be anything else. “I—I love her, I do. It’s not just the contract. Not anymore. I just… I don’t know how to show her. I’m trying. Titans, I’m trying.”

His voice cracked.

And then, quietly, Mydeimos barely caught it—

“…Why won’t she look at me?”

It was pathetic. He knew it was. The great and noble Phainon, reduced to trembling fingertips and broken breath because the woman he loved wouldn’t meet his gaze. Because the only person who had ever made him feel tethered to this world now drifted further away with each day, and he was too late to stop it.

He buried his face in his hands.

“Why did I wait so long?” His shoulders shook. “Why didn’t I say something sooner—before the wedding..before all this, why did I wait until she already stopped believing me?”

For once, Mydeimos didn’t make an immediate retort.

He let Phainon’s sobs and breath escape without mockery.

Then, slowly, gruffly, he reached over and gave Phainon’s arm a small, awkward pat.

“…She probably thinks it’s not real,” Mydeimos muttered, voice lower. “That you’re only acting sweet because it’s convenient. Because the contract’s signed now.”

“I don’t want convenience,” Phainon whispered. “I want her.”

“Then stop treating her like someone you’re trying to win back and start treating her like someone who already matters.”

Phainon wiped his eyes.

“…Do you think she’ll ever believe me?”

Mydeimos sighed again and leaned back in the chair. “You’re gonna have to earn that. Every damn day.”

♥ ♥ ♥ ♥

Well, Phainon was now drunk.

Very drunk.

The type of drunk that made his usually elegant speech slur into incomprehensible, soggy babbles. The kind that replaced his usual gliding footsteps with staggering shuffles and dramatic floor collapses. He was lying in the middle of the training grounds now—shirt half untucked, hair a wind-blown disaster, one shoe missing—and loudly reciting what Mydeimos could only assume was meant to be a love poem.

“…And I said—hic—my wife—my beautiful, ghosting wife—she smells like spring and vanillaa!—she—she gives me so mcuh pain :(”

He attempted to sit up dramatically to emphasize the word pain, but gravity had different ideas. His arm flailed out in a sweeping arc and he toppled back onto the ground like a fallen tree. A very sad, very loud, very dumb tree.

Mydeimos stood nearby with his arms crossed, a twitch in his jaw, looking one step away from calling pest control.

“You’re lucky I don’t just bury you in this training pit and call it fertilizer, HKS.” he muttered.

Phainon sniffled. “I tried to write her a letter. A letter, Mydeimos. With calligraphy and metaphors. I rhymed ‘love’ with ‘dove.’ I’m not okay.”

“Clearly.”

“I think—hic—I think she hates me.”

“She doesn’t hate you,” Mydeimos muttered, pinching the bridge of his nose. “She’s just smarter than you and has a memory longer than a week.”

Phainon lay still for a beat. Then, with the solemn dignity of a man who’d had six glasses of wine and no sense of shame, he whispered, “What if I duel the sun for her affection?”

“You duel the sun, and I’m going to marry her,” Mydeimos snapped.

Phainon gasped. “You wouldn’t!”

“I absolutely would. Out of spite.”

Phainon dramatically flopped again and groaned into the dirt. “She won’t even look at me…” “Because you’re in the dirt. And drunk.” “She’s my moon!” Mydeimos kicked some dust toward him. “And you’re a dumbass.” There was a long silence. Then a quiet, pitiful whimper. “…Do you think she’d at least come to my funeral?” Mydeimos turned, fully done. “I’m going to get a bucket of water and a shovel. If you’re still like this in ten minutes, I’m planting you next to the cabbages.”Phainon wept. Louder.

Dragging Phainon was like hauling a wet velvet curtain that wouldn’t shut up. He clung to Mydeimos’s shoulder like a damsel in distress, rambling into his ear the entire way about how your voice made flowers bloom, how he should’ve memorized every word you ever said like sacred scripture.

“Mydeimos, wait—wait—I forgot her favorite tea,” Phainon whimpered mid-step, only to be yanked forward with zero grace.

“She doesn’t want your goddamn tea. She wants space,” Mydeimos snapped, gripping him by the back of the collar like an unruly pup.

“But I made her a poem, should I recite it again? You didn’t let me finish earlier. ‘Her silence is a blade that cuts my soul—’”

“I will literally hurl you into a lake,” Mydeimos growled, kicking open the gate to your residence.

Phainon gasped. “You wouldn’t. This outfit is imported silk.”

“You’re covered in dirt, Phainon. Shut. The. Fuck. Up.”

Despite his weight and whining, Mydeimos manhandled him up the steps, muttering curses in three dead languages including Kremnoan, occasionally giving Phainon a little jostle when he tried to slump dramatically against every column, sighing like a tragic widow.

At one point, Phainon tried to claw at the ivy near your window and whisper, “Do you think she’s watching me suffer? Maybe she likes it. Maybe she’s a sadist—”

Mydeimos didn’t even hesitate. He grabbed a broom resting near the door and whacked him with it.

“OW—WHY—”

By the time they reached your door, Phainon had managed to tangle himself in Mydeimos’s cape, sob three more times, and threaten to write you another letter “in blood, if necessary.” Mydeimos dropped him on your doorstep like a sack of emotional garbage and knocked, hard.

You opened it a moment later, blinking at the sight—Phainon half-collapsed on your doormat, cheeks flushed from wine and crying, mumbling your name like it was both an oath and a prayer. You sighed tiredly but you were shocked aswell.

“…What happened!?” you asked in shock, gaze flicking from your drunk husband to the thoroughly unamused man beside him.

Mydeimos adjusted his gloves, tone the picture of politeness despite the vein twitching near his temple. “Your husband drank an entire bottle of Okheman wine, and tried to fight..dromas."

“…Right.”

You crouched and started dragging Phainon in by his wrists, ignoring his dramatic attempts to cling to the doorframe like he was being separated from his soulmate.

“I said I was sorry!” he sniffled. “Don’t avoid me again, wife—please, I’ll give you my sword, my titles, my soul—”

You would be lying if you said you weren't amused and flustered but you could only mutter, “You tripped over your own feet and cried on a marble bust, calm down"

Phainon whimpered and rolled over onto your hallway rug like a wilted flower.

Mydeimos raised an eyebrow. “You’re…surprisingly good at handling him without violence.”

“I’ve dealt with an unreasonable grandmother,” you replied, brushing hair from your face. “This is marginally worse.”

He huffed—something nearly like a laugh. “He’s been miserable,” Mydeimos said after a beat, voice quieter. “Hasn’t trained properly in a week. Barely eats. Keeps talking about how you won’t look him in the eye.”

You glanced in your room where Phainon had successfully face-planted into a pile of your clothes. “…I see.”

He looked at you, arms crossed, expression softer than you’d expected. “But for what it’s worth—he’s not faking this. He’s a pathetic actor.”

You didn’t answer right away. Just leaned against the doorframe, rubbing your temple.

“Thank you,” you said eventually. “For bringing him back. For not throwing him into the sea.”

“Wasn’t for his sake,” Mydeimos muttered, before turning away with a wave. “Get some rest. Both of you.”

"Thank you..Lord?"

"Mydei."

"Thank you, Mydei"

“I was going to leave you a letter,” he mumbled, voice thick, slurred. “But Mydeimos said that’s what cowards do.”

“I would’ve preferred the letter,” you muttered under your breath.

You grabbed a blanket. Not out of compassion—at least that’s what you told yourself—but because the idiot was shivering.

“Why are you avoiding me?” Phainon slurred suddenly. You froze. One hand still caught in the blanket.

He blinked at you, eyes glassy and half-lidded, but there was something underneath—something old and heavy and hurting. Something that cut too deep for alcohol to dull out.

“…You don’t need to pretend like you care,” you said quietly. “I know what this marriage is.”

Phainon didn’t laugh. Not this time. He looked at you like you’d struck him.

“You think I’m pretending?”

You said nothing. Pulled the blanket over him and moved to stand, but his hand caught your wrist—clumsy, but desperate.

“You don’t get it,” he whispered.

“Let go—”

“No.” His grip tightened. “You don’t understand. I—I've watched you die.”

You went still, your breath stopped and you swear your hair stood up.

“…You should sleep,” you said, voice barely a whisper.

"Please...(Y/N) p-please... don't leave, you're the reason I'm here, you're the reason I can keep hope in these painful fucking cycles...please.."

And though your heart ached and your throat burned with all the words you didn’t know how to say—you simply pat his back as he falls asleep and walk away to the couch to fall asleep.

♥ ♥ ♥ ♥

When you opened your eyes, it was morning.

And your first thought was: Why does my pillow feel like it breathes?

Your eyes fluttered open fully, lashes brushing the softness of something warm. The light was gentle, soft gold through half-drawn curtains. There was a weight wrapped around your waist. Another draped over your thigh. And something..no, someone was pressed against your chest, face buried there like you were the safest thing in the world.

“…Phainon?” you croaked.

He didn’t respond. Only burrowed in deeper.

His silver hair tickled your collarbone, messy and unstyled, a far cry from his usual immaculate self. Just the soft, rhythmic puff of breath against your skin and the occasional, sleepy twitch of his fingers curled into your shirt.

You blinked at the ceiling, completely and utterly paralyzed. Not because he was heavy. Not because you didn’t want to move.

But because you didn’t know why he was here. How you ended up in bed with him when you’d fallen asleep on the couch.

You shifted slowly in attempt to leave.

He made a sound. A low, almost pitiful whine

You swallowed hard.

Your fingers twitched where they hovered over his shoulder. You didn’t touch him. Not yet. You didn’t know what this meant.But gods, how easy it would be to give in. To sink back into the warmth. To pretend, just for a moment, that everything he said last night was real. That he wasn't drunk. That this wasn’t something born out of fear of losing you again.

Your heart thudded against your ribs as he breathed in deeper, chest rising against yours, arms tightening.

And all you could do was lie there, trapped in his arms and your own racing thoughts.

Phainon stirred with a soft groan, brow twitching as sunlight nudged at his eyelids. His mouth tasted like regret and cheap wine. His head ached like a bitch because of the Hangover.

But none of that mattered.Because the warmth he’d clung to—the softness pressed against him all night—was gone.

His eyes shot open.

The bed was half-empty. Sheets still creased where your body had been. Still warm.

His heart dropped. His hands clenched the blanket for a breath too long before he sat up, rubbing a hand down his face. He scanned the room like you might be hiding in the drapes or behind the fireplace, and when you weren’t, something ugly and raw twisted in his chest.

Of course. Avoiding him again.

You always leave.

It took him barely a minute to find you.

You were in the study, curled on the couch again with a half-read report in your lap, eyes stubbornly refusing to look his way.

“Why,” he said sharply, standing in the doorway, “are you doing this again?”

You stiffened. Didn't answer. Just kept reading, even though your hands trembled slightly at the edges.

His gaze darkened and something finally snapped.

“I am trying for you..” he said sternly in anger, striding across the room, “and you keep running like I’m some kind of curse.”

“Phainon—” you started, already standing, but too late.

He reached you in three steps and lifted you clean off the floor.

“Put me down,” you snapped, swatting at his shoulder—but it was like hitting a wall of sculpted granite. Infuriatingly warm, shirt slightly wrinkled from sleep, and entirely unmoved by your struggle.

“No,” he said flatly, voice low and tense. “We’re not doing this anymore.”

When he kicked open the door to his room, he didn’t drop you.

Just strode inside, closed the door behind him with a deliberate click, and finally, finally set you down on the edge of his bed like you were the most delicate thing in the world.

But his eyes? They weren’t gentle at all

They were hurt and bloodshot

“You don’t get to vanish on me,” he said, softer now, as if the rage had drained into something heavier. “Not after last night. Not after what I said. You don’t get to pretend you didn’t hear it.”

Your throat tightened.

“I watched you die,” he spat, voice cracking, “burning, bleeding, crushed, cursed—every fucking version of you, I buried. Again and again. And this time—this time I thought if I could just—just be better—you’d stay.”

He turned, finally meeting your gaze.

“I love you.”

That broke something in you.

You stood, shaky, hands clenched by your sides. “And what am I supposed to do with that, Phainon?”

“Do you even see how insane this sounds?” your voice wavered, rising, trembling with something you’d buried so long it came out all at once. “You never gave a damn about me before. I was just your responsibility. another name on your list. You barely even looked at me.”

Phainon’s mouth parted, eyes widening. “That’s not—”

“—And now you love me?” you laughed, wet and sharp. “Now you start smiling and acting gentle and calling it love? You expect me to believe that after years of treating me like a ghost in your house?”

Tears burned your eyes before you could stop them.

“I thought—I thought maybe I was just unlikable. Maybe I was the problem. And then you come back from the dead or the past or whatever the hell this is and suddenly you’re devoted and soft and… obsessed. Like you’re playing a part.”

You choked on your breath, finally breaking.

“What do you want from me, Phainon?” you whispered. “Is that it? Is that why you’re acting like this now? Because you want something?”

Silence. Thick. Suffocating.

Phainon just stood there.Frozen. Pale.

His eyes were wide. His hands had fallen limp at his sides. And for once—once—that storm of intensity in him didn’t crackle with rage or passion or conviction.It shattered.And all that was left was guilt. Just Hollow guilt.

“…I didn’t know,” he breathed. “I didn’t know you felt like that.”

You said nothing. Couldn’t. You just sank back down to sit on the edge of the bed, trembling, your tears hot and silent.

You didn’t mean to hit him.

But your fists were balled up and shaking and they found their way to his chest anyway, weak and desperate. Not hard enough to hurt, not really—but enough to demand he feel something.

Anything.

He didn’t stop you.

Didn’t flinch, didn’t raise a hand to block, didn’t try to calm you down.

He just let you. And you broke apart there, sobbing into his chest, fists pounding once twice, before they faltered and gripped the fabric of his shirt, clutching it like it was the only solid thing left in a world that wouldn’t stop spinning.

“I hate you,” you cried into him, voice wrecked. “I hate you, I hate that you ignored me for so long and now—now—you’re just this, like it means nothing. I hate that I want to believe you but I can’t.”

His arms wrapped around you so gently it nearly shattered you all over again.

“I know,” Phainon whispered. “I know. Titans, I know.”

You felt his chin rest lightly on the crown of your head, his breath shaky.

“You don’t have to forgive me,” he murmured, words quiet and thick with guilt. “But I need you to know. You deserve that much.”

You just shook your head into his chest, clinging to him harder. You didn’t know if it was to hear the truth or to stop yourself from slipping away again.

“I’ve regressed over a million times,” he said. “Some lives, I remembered everything. Some I didn’t. But the constant. The only constant—was you.”

You stiffened.

"...And you kept dying."

He pulled back, cupping your face in his trembling hands, forcing you to look at him. His eyes were shining—deep, cerulean blue and glassy with unshed tears.

“I didn’t talk to you after the wedding because I was scared,” he admitted, voice raw.

“Scared I’d fuck it up again. Scared if I said the wrong thing, you’d leave. Or die. Or disappear before I got the chance to… to love you right.”

Your lip quivered, a sob caught in your throat.

“I didn’t ignore you because I didn’t care,” he said, firmer now. “I ignored you because I cared too much. And I thought I could wait. Thought I had more time to… ease into it. To prove myself slowly. But then I saw you giving up on me. And I panicked. I panicked.”

He pressed his forehead to yours, breath shaking, close enough for your tears to fall onto his cheek.

"I don’t want anything from you,” he whispered. “I don’t want your power, your title, your kingdom—nothing. Just you. I want to learn your favorite songs. I want to know how you take your tea. I want to be the one you go to when your hands are cold or when you can’t sleep.”

You choked on a sound. Something between a sob and a laugh.

"I’m sorry,” Phainon said again, softer now. “For all the times I failed you. For all the lives I was too late. For this life, where I was too scared to look you in the eyes.”

Your breath caught. His eyes searched yours, desperate—like he was trying to memorize this exact moment, like he was afraid you’d vanish between one blink and the next.

And then—Then you surged forward and kissed him

It wasn’t soft, it wasn’t chaste—it was years of grief and longing and anger and guilt, poured into the press of mouths and the clash of teeth. His breath hitched sharply, like he couldn’t believe it was happening. And then Phainon melted.

He groaned low in his throat like a man starved, and his hands slid from your cheeks to your waist, tugging you closer like he physically couldn’t handle the distance anymore. Like he needed you now, in his arms, against his chest, lips bruising his in the best possible way.

"Titans, finally,” he breathed, breaking just for a second before diving back in, hungrier this time. His mouth was hot and urgent and desperate, like he was trying to make up for every stolen second he’d ever lost with you. His tongue slid against yours and you swore you felt him shudder.

He kissed like he was drowning. Like you were air. Like he was the damned luckiest man to ever live because you were here, still here, kissing him back.

You tugged his hair—he gasped into your mouth.

And he just whined.

Don’t leave,” he murmured between kisses, voice cracked open and boyish. “Don’t..don’t ever—”

“I’m not going anywhere,” you whispered back, breathless.

And now you seriously aren't going anywhere

Now you're on your back, thighs trembling and chest heaving up and down trying to breathe when you can as he suckles on your clit, sucking sounds making you whine in embarassment as you feel your cunt getting wetter and wetter.

He pulls away from your sweet cunt to look at you up, and god he looked filthy, your essence mixed with his saliva all over his mouth as he dives in again-

Your fingers pull at his soft silver hair resulting in him whining into your you, the vibrations of his voice making you squeal and shake even more

"Ph-Phai-!" before you could even cry out to him to slow down, he licks a broad stripe up your slit and slides it right back inside where it belongs.

"C'mon baby you can squeal louder than that cant cha?" He says looking up at you from between your thighs maintaining eye contact as his eyebrows as furrowed, god that fuckign tease.

"P-Phainon-?! O-oh Fuc-"

His tongue flexes a little before licking a straight line up your clit and then a Curve similar to that of an opposite c.

P

And then his rough, calloused thumb meets your pretty little bud before rubbing on it and licking your pussy at the same time. Making you shriek out and both hands fly to your mouth in order to muffle your cries.

H

You babble out incomprehensible nonsense begging for him to stop being a tease but then this poor guy was too busy between your legs spelling out his name on your swollen little clit :(

Then followed by he spells more letters but you are too drunk on pleasure to even differentiate and identify the letters, and then he ends it with a harsh suck on your clit and leaves it with a pop sound! Causing your gummy walls to clench at the emptiness begging for more stimulation from your husband.

"Good little girl, Tell me baby who's name did i spell out on his pretty cunt?" phainon whispers huskily, voice thick with lust before lightly slapping your abused pussy, looking at you with a nasty smirk.

"Y-yours!..P-Phai!~" Before you could even complete your incomprehensible sentence, he pulls your hips closer to his face and starts sucking on your clit harshly and one finger into your gummy walls

"phai- oh~!! i-i'm sho sensitive!!"

he hushes you and pecks the inside of your thighs before another finger enters inside you and then starts to move in a scissoring motion, making your already shaking thighs to shake even more and clamp shut around his face. Whining and crying out in pleasure

"Such a sweet voice you have beloved" phainon mutters into your cunt, pussydrunk on your slick and scent then reluctantly leaves before kissing your clit goodbye

You cry out at the sudden loss of contact and especially when your were so close, but phainon crashes his lips onto yours and starts to undress himself, first the shirt and then the pants.

He leans in peppering kisses all over your thigh to your belly and then leading upwards as his large calloused hands find the swell of your breasts before starting to play with them, rolling the hard buds of your nipples and then a soft wet muscle wraps around one of them.

Making you arch your back in sudden contact and then feeling the tip of his wet cock slobbering all over your swollen clit.

"C'mon baby you gotta stop moving around, gotta taste you and worship you"

Too bad you can't even protest to that because you're mewling at the nipple assault and your clit getting stimulated at the same time! :( and plus this meanie held your hands up your body, he's too strong.

He watches with dark and heavy-lidded eyes, sucking on your breasts, oh god your belly felt weird- and then right before the climax he pulled away with a cocky fucking grin on his face

"Aw I'm sorry baby were you close?"

You whine out by shaking your legs only to feel a thick sticky head at the entrance of your cunt

"So responsive baby, ahh.. you're dripping all over my cock too?" He pulled away his cock from your entrance and pressed two of his thick fingers back inside, stretching you open as he moved with a devastatingly slow rhythm inside you

"Come for me pretty,, fuckkk" he murmured against your skin before popping a nipple inside his mouth sucking with greed as you finally squeal and cum around his fingers, tears forming at the corner of your eyes with your tongue lolled out and chest breathing raggedy.

"Look at you my pretty little wife...all mine aintcha?~"

He kisses you fiercely without a warning and finally you felt his cock enter you slowly, it felt so good in a painful way

"N-no-!! Phaii..t-too b-BiG~!!"

You mewl out weakly clawing at his chest but he only chuckles before whispering soft nothing's in your ear talkin your through it.

And then he thrusts inside you, making you bounce up and both your legs rest on your husbands shoulder,

"Y-You're too deep in..." You mewl out completely senseless as your breasts and body shake with every thrust this man does. His hips slapping against yours as he lazily smiles at you.

"yeah baby?"

You weakly eagerly nod and then his mouth meets yours, kissing you with need and then

"N-ngh~?!!"

You scream out feeling a hand on your belly, a bulge going in and out of your tummy, your soppy wet cunt making sounds which make you squeal in embarassment but titans... he's huge..

You yelped, as you suddenly were being lifted into his strong muscular arms with ease, his fingers digging into your thighs as you babble and cry whole your back is against his chest.

He pushes you up and down at such a speed that it surprises you and you pathetically clas onto his biceps in a failed attempt to make him to slower. This man is rearranging your insides as you are completely helpless to do anything but to whine, cry and moan out his name. That's your job as his pretty little wife <3 just to feel good for him and let the husband do all the work.

"My pretty wife enjoying herself" you nod instantly ad your eyes were stuck at the back of your eyes and tongue lolled out with a bulge popping up your tummy with each thrust. You look so delirious and hazed being bent in half with your huge, strong husband seems like you didn't mind at all !!

With a loud groan, Phainon let's put of your cunt and releases all over stomach and guides you through your orgasm and lies you down. Kissing your temple, your vision was blank white completely empty before feeling two arms wrap around your waist and a glass of water next to your lips.

You sip the cold water and catch your breath after god knows how long, and look to your left to see a cocky in love phainon staring at you...and the marks which you clawed on him everywhere.

You flush up and hide your face in the crook of his neck before he giggles and carries you to the tub

"You did wonderful baby <3"

[ddarker-dreams]

As Above, So Below.

Yan Anaxagoras x Reader

Warnings: Yandere themes, unhealthy relationships, power imbalances, some co-dependency and emotional manipulation. Word count: 2.2k.

Anaxagoras is a polarizing figure. 

It’s to be expected, considering his lack of propriety. He cares little for respecting age-old traditions, observing social customs, or sugar coating his words. This has earned him no shortage of detractors. While they might label him a heretic or lob other accusations, even his most ardent opponents can’t deny that he’s brilliant. 

You’re no stranger to his eccentricity. His teaching style fluctuated between the routine and the sublime, you never knew what to expect. Nonetheless, you’ve always felt he takes his students’ edification seriously, hence his extreme tactics. Upon reflection, you concluded that this distinct pedagogy molded your mind into its current shape. Curiosity, drive, and a will to question the supposedly infallible have become your core tenets, courtesy of your professor. 

Who would’ve thought the very skepticism he instilled in you would one day be directed towards him? 

Ever since your most damning accusation left your lips, silence has reigned in his office. You projected a semblance of confidence for most of your exchange, but that façade has long since dissipated. You’re fidgeting, nervous energy building inside like a dam ready to burst. You regret doing this in his office, but the conversation necessitated privacy. The room has always left a strange impression on you. One glance at the notes strewn about his desk confirms the immeasurable gap in your intellect, how he’s discovering answers to questions you’d never think to ask. It’s both awe-inspiring and demoralizing. 

You can feel how he’s observing you, mentally breaking you down to your base components. There are only so many ways one can respond to the charges you’ve presented. Denial is by far the likeliest, followed up by indignation or disbelief. You’d run through this scenario hundreds of times in your head. Each time, he’d said something by now, constructing a meticulous defense. This silence denies you the catharsis rage would allow. Instead, you’re made to sit in a limbo of your own creation, replaying each element of this confrontation. 

Was your evidence lacking? Did your emotions seep through too much, discrediting your logic? Or are you not right in the head, having imagined everything in some paranoia-fuelled haze? 

Gathering your courage, you look up, steeling yourself for whatever stares back.

Anaxa’s composure is striking. He’s smiling, a sentiment akin to fondness softening the lines around his eye. If that wasn’t disconcerting enough, he chuckles, quietly at first, but ending in a hearty diapason. You drop all pretense and openly gawk at him. This goes beyond a few character quirks, this is madness. Righteous fury sends your blood boiling. You stand up, ready to storm out, when he raises his hand, a motion that keeps you in place. 

“Please, sit,” he supplicates. No vestige of his former derangement remains; regardless, it isn’t so easily erased from your memory. Sensing your apprehension, he continues, “Haven’t I taught you to always finish what you’ve started?” 

You part your lips, ready to insist that this is different, but the argument dies on your tongue. He has a way of making you doubt yourself without doing anything. Even now, you’re plagued by an impulse not to disappoint him. Feeling defeated, you return to your seat.

He leans back, crosses his legs, and rests his folded hands on his knee. “How long have you held these suspicions?” 

“I don’t know.” 

“Untrue. Try again.” 

“... Since the Month of Gate.” 

“That long, hm?” Anaxa muses. He leans closer, his gracile form hunched forward, like when he’s on the precipice of a great revelation. “We’re in the Six Month now; why wait as long as you did?” 

“Because I couldn’t believe it!” 

He clicks his tongue. “Willful ignorance, then? That’s unbecoming of you.” 

Your heart plummets at his reprimand. Memories of your first few one-on-one oral tests come flooding back, pelting your psyche. He accepted nothing less than your absolute best. You used to think he purposefully set you up for failure, demanding the impossible, but the results proved otherwise. He saw potential in areas you were too frightened to spare a glance. He encouraged — no, demanded — that you face them head-on. Consequently, you discovered yourself capable of feats previously unthinkable. 

That habit of his must extend beyond the lectern. 

“You come to me presenting vague, disconnected data, without the resolve to say what it is I stand accused of.” 

Something in you snaps. “How about falsifying my grades, coercion, bribery, and stalking, to name a few?” 

“An excellent start!” he asserts, slightly breathless from exhilaration. “Finally, we’re getting to the heart of the matter. Your reasoning is solid, if lacking in scope. Expand on your argument.” 

“This— this isn’t a learning exercise. If you don’t take me seriously, I’ll…” 

You trail off, fully aware you lack the means to substantiate a threat. Scowling, you internally berate yourself. He’s successfully stirred up your temper. Who could blame you, though? His disregard is baffling! You know him to be insensitive, sure, but never purposefully cruel. A lump forms in the back of your throat. You fight it with all your might, not wanting to add to your humiliation. He hadn’t made you cry in ages. The last time would’ve been his scathing critique of your first assignment, many years ago. You swore never to endure that again. 

“Don’t look at me like that, my dear,” Anaxa sighs. “I am taking you seriously. Forgive my excitement; I’ve been awaiting this conversation. Now, I know you’re thinking, ‘he’s lost it,’ or something to that effect. Let me reassure you — I’m perfectly sane. How else could I have accomplished what you’ve accused me of?” 

You eye him warily. “So you’re admitting to it?” 

“Not everything. I never tampered with your grades.” 

He’s focusing on the least egregious charge? Wouldn’t anyone else refute stalking or coercion first? You almost left out the dubious grades, it paled so greatly compared to the other accusations. 

“You never told me I failed after an oral test.” 

“I never said you passed, either.” 

“But you looked pleased!”

“Does that translate to a high grade?” 

“It’s disingenuous!” 

“Disingenuous, yes, but falsification? Hardly.” 

“Why is that what you’re caught up on?” you demand, your voice rising in pitch. “The point is, you’re keeping me from graduating. That’s the issue here.” 

“Is it not up to the professor whether their student should graduate or not?” 

Anaxa’s acting facetious to get under your skin and it’s working. You take a moment to gather your thoughts, recalling his lessons about the advantages of preying on your opponent’s emotions in a debate. Is that what this is? Had that been the case, you’d expect a more subtle approach. All this ambiguity is doing you a disservice. He claimed you ‘lacked scope,’ so you opt for a shift in tactics. 

“Why don’t you want me to graduate?” 

“An improvement over your earlier questions,” he notes, nodding in approval. “Still, you should know I dislike giving answers you’ve arrived at yourself.” 

“I haven’t—” 

He interrupts you by speaking your name, his tone low and chill-inducing. Shudders travel along your body. His disappointment reaches into your chest cavity and steals your oxygen. It shouldn’t sting, but it does. This ever-present desire to make him proud has twisted your priorities. Despite yourself, his earlier praise, meager as it was, sent your heart soaring. The acknowledgment of a genius is titillating. 

… Maybe you’re not right in the head either. 

“You’re attracted to me.” 

“A shallow description, albeit accurate.” 

“You don’t want me to leave The Grove.” 

“And why is that?” 

“Some warped sense of attachment, if I had to guess.” 

“Hmph. I wouldn’t call it warped,” Anaxa replies. “The ethics, perhaps, but my intentions aren’t so nefarious. Your talent would be wasted in Okhema. Should you stay, I’d have you as my assistant, a position you’d find challenging and rewarding. Is that not a tempting offer?” 

Your mouth goes dry. 

Tempting? Life-altering would be a better description. The role of assistant to a Sage is enviable for its benefits, monetarily, but more vital, academically. Other scholars are more willing to collaborate, you have access to any materials you research necessitates, and you’re welcomed into previously inaccessible circles. It’s a chance your younger self would’ve killed for. 

However… 

“My intention has always been to return home and apply what I’ve learned. Okhema’s one of the last standing city-states, I want to contribute what I can.”

Anaxa pinches the bridge of his nose. “You’re still clinging to those fantasies? Leave that city to the Goldweaver. She has her shortcomings, but when it comes to ruling, she maintains order.” 

“We can’t rely solely on Aglaea. Common people should do their part,” you insist. “I want to see my home prosper, not limp from crisis to crisis.” 

“Such are the times we live in.” 

“So I should just give up, then?” 

“If you have any sense.” 

“Whatever happened to ‘finish what you start?’” 

“We aren’t finished yet,” Anaxa responds, unusually harsh. “Focus on that. Everything else is secondary, a distraction.” 

Your eye twitches. 

“What about what I want?” 

“You want to stay. It’s a misguided civil duty fooling you into believing otherwise.” 

Anaxa’s speaking like he’s objectively correct, as if any claims to the contrary are insipient, a waste of his time. It’s equal parts fascinating and infuriating. You’re reminded of the countless hours spent in this room, passionately defending your rationale against his methodical deconstructions. Except now, it isn’t a theory or method you’re debating, it’s your future. Ultimately, no one aside from you has the final say. His claim that you’re deluded by sentimentality is projection. He’s acting absurd here, not you. 

“I’ve always had great respect for you, professor,” you admit, ignoring a terrible ache in your chest. “You’ve never been afraid to question the status quo, even if it meant challenging the gods. That’s why… that’s why I struggled to believe you’d sabotage me. Call it ‘willful ignorance,’ or whatever, but was it so wrong of me to have faith in my mentor?” 

Anaxa’s eyelashes flutter shut and he smiles. “An appeal to pathos, is it?” 

“It’s called being human, Anaxa.” 

That gets under his skin. His eye is hooded when it reopens, belying irritation. 

“Anaxagoras,” he dryly corrects. 

“Your priorities are a mess.” 

“Insolence should never be tolerated,” he asserts. “I commend your rhetoric. Need I remind you, however, that I’m not to blame for the image you’ve formed of me?” 

You exhale sharply through your nose. So that’s the angle he’s deciding to take? He’s willing to desecrate a shrine you dedicated to him, built with precious memories and experiences?

While studying his physiognomy, you note how stoic he’s become. He’s toned down his usual theatrics. There’s a solemn nature to his gaze, his eyebrow slightly upturned and jaw set firmly. Through his outerwear, you can make out the alchemical symbols inked into his arm. When it comes to pursuing his ambitions, he’s like a man possessed. Nothing is too sacred, not even his own flesh. 

What chance do you have against such determination? 

“You must be lonely, professor.” 

He runs a hand through his hair. “Resorting to insults now, are we?”

“It’s just an observation,” you say. Then, a prolonged pause. “One that you aren’t denying.” 

Anaxa reclines in his seat and clears his throat. “Your company… isn’t unwelcome.” 

It could be your imagination, but you swear there’s a light dusting of pink over his cheeks. He fiddles with the cuffs of his outer garment. Out of all the dubious comments he’s made, that’s what made him self-conscious? The absurdity takes you a few moments to recover from. Anaxa leverages the opportunity, bringing your hands into his. You try pulling away out of instinct, only for him to exert surprising strength. 

Effectively trapped, you cease your futile struggle. 

“Stay,” his voice is so soft, it almost fails to reach your ears. “I’m not above begging, if that’s what it requires.” 

He lowers his head, seeking to propitiate you, as if golden ichor didn’t flow through his veins, denoting his supernal status. He who scorns the divine has taken on the posture of an acolyte. An act befitting a lifelong blasphemer, you suppose. 

Anaxa speaks your full name, each syllable rolling off his tongue like honey. 

“Should you leave, I’ll hasten the eschaton of this world by aiding the black tide.” 

“... And you claim you haven’t ‘lost it?’” 

“Not yet,” he murmurs against your inner wrist. “You’re still here.” 

“What you said could warrant execution.” 

“I prefer to die having had you for myself than to live apart.” 

“You’re mad.” 

“As the progenitor, can a malady fault its symptoms for existing?” 

“Casuistry at its finest.” 

Anaxa finally relinquishes his hold, but not without kissing your racing pulse. 

“Be critical of me all your days, I’ll delight in the offense.” 

You bring your hands to your chest, the skin he lavished in affection tingling. Your head is spinning, like he shifted the world on its axis. His eye scalds you, his magenta pupil burning hot with unrestrained fervor. There's no room for compromise. He will see his designs made manifest or immolate this dying world to punish your rejection.

"What will it be?" he asks.

You close your eyes, unable to withstand his smoldering gaze any longer.

"... My place is by your side, professor."

[obxsummer]

leave me again // jj maybank

pairing: ex!jj maybank x routledge!reader

request: Routledge reader and JJ broke up during the 18 months and now she watches him with Kie? 🫢👀

summary: based on the song by kelsea ballerini; after two years together, you return to outer banks only to lose jj to kiara in a blink of an eye.

warnings: minor szn 4 spoilers, angst hehehe

navigation

--

You didn’t understand. You really didn’t. 

How could you go from such a beautiful relationship and one of the happiest times of your life to watching your best friend get together with your ex-boyfriend? It seemed like such a cruel joke to watch people who had been with you your entire life turn against you in this way. 

It took less than a week for JJ to cut things off after everyone came back from El Dorado, claiming he needed to reevaluate everything and take time for himself. Apparently, that didn’t last long, because three days later, you caught Kiara sharing his bed in Sarah’s rental condo, looking like the happiest he’d ever been.

"I can explain, just-"

The scene in front of you was sick. You'd heard JJ yell out in his sleep, something that was more common than not with his nightmares. Instincts had you in front of his door before you knew it, wanting to comfort him in case he needed someone. You didn't expect to find this.

JJ, shirtless, next to Kiara, of all people, who was wearing the boy's shirt. In bed. Together.

Whatever JJ wanted to say, you didn't give him a chance to hear it. Lips tucked in a thin line, you gave a nod. "Sorry for interrupting, hope everything's okay."

And with a smile on your face and no room for explanations, you closed the door.

“Are you still avoiding them?” Sarah’s voice came from behind as you watched JJ and Kie prep the boat for the upcoming dive. 

You huffed, “Do you blame me?”

She stopped to stand beside you, her eyes watching the duo on the boat move together. “There’s no chemistry.”

“Not a bit.”

Sarah watched you carefully as if she was waiting for the dam to break. In the almost three weeks JJ and Kie had been ‘together’, you hadn’t cried and you hadn’t lashed out. You’d told her the second you found them in bed and they started spewing excuses, you just apologized for interrupting and dismissed yourself with a smile.

John B was concerned. As your older brother, it was his job to defend you and watch out for you, no matter the circumstance. When the two of you first got together, John B made JJ swear that he wouldn’t do anything to hurt you, swearing there would be consequences. While you’d kept your cool, he did not and JJ managed to catch himself a black eye and swollen cheek as a result. 

“Has John B talked to them?”

“Has John B what?” Your brother interrupted your question as he joined the two of you in the shop, hauling a hefty backpack. He reached out to grab your shoulder and squeezed it lightly. “You okay?”

You nodded in response, clamping your mouth shut and looking back at the water. Kiara was going down on the dive with JJ, something about not leaving him alone which made your eyes roll. Pope and John B were going on the boat, leaving you, Sarah, and Cleo on shore to be lookout. 

“Are you lying to me?”

You’d lost so many pieces of yourself in the moments shared with JJ, allowing the vulnerability you had believed he would never take advantage of.  It was no surprise John B could see through the cracks you’d inevitably let form. You sighed, head dropping between your shoulder blades as you let out a steady breath. “I’m fine, Bee. Promise.”

John B was unconvinced by your words but didn’t push. He heard your almost silent crying at night. It was obvious you were hurting by the way you closed yourself off and hid in your skin. He hated that his so-called best friend was the one to treat you this way and cause you to feel like this. 

“You can take a break,” He reassured as his backpack dropped to the ground as he pulled you into a full hug and placed a kiss on your head. “Nobody would blame you.”

You hugged him back and fought off the tears that burned your eyes. There would be a point and time to talk about all of this, but it wasn’t here and now. If you were being honest, there was nothing you’d rather do than run away from Kildare right now, but it wouldn’t be the best option by any means.

“You guys ready up there?” JJ’s voice echoed around the morning air as he called out to John B. 

You hugged your brother tighter before letting go, forcing a smile on your lips. “Be careful, please?”

He rubbed your head lovingly, smiling when you tried to shove him away. “Always.”

You stepped away to give him time with Sarah and started to head back toward the house when someone called your name. JJ’s shoes stomped against the new wooden deck, the sound getting louder as he got closer. You froze in your spot as he rounded to stop you from walking away. “Can we talk?”

You stared at him for a moment, wondering how someone you loved so incredibly much could make you feel this way. “There’s nothing to talk about.”

When you moved to pass him, he grabbed your elbow gently to prevent it. “Please, I just want to get this out before… in case I don’t-”

“You’ll be back.” It was hard to avoid the instinct of reassuring him. He swallowed thickly and met your gaze. He would be back, you just didn't know if you'd be here to see it. The two of you hadn’t been alone since everything went down and there was plenty of awkwardness to show. 

“I just… I’m sorry. About everything. I should’ve told you, but it all happened so fast and-”

“Did you ever love me?” The question came out of your mouth before you could think about it. You wanted to ask it for a while, to find out exactly what went through his head when he let Kiara climb in bed with him that night.

The opening and closing of his mouth was enough of a response to shatter you. Tears formed faster than you liked as you nodded.

“Figured," You breathed out, "Goodbye, JJ.”

You left him on the dock and didn’t look back as you walked away. From him, from Kie, from the friends you considered family until they made you feel like anything but. You swore then and there that you would never fall for someone in that way again. 

After all, staying only made you get real good at pretend.

--

Coming back from the dive had been a mess of chaos. Kie and JJ were at the hospital recovering from nitrogen in their blood while the remainder of the group came back to the house with the amulet, hoping to figure out what was inscribed inside. 

John B called your name as he entered the house, practically bouncing in excitement to tell you what they’d found. You’d opted to stay back after speaking to JJ on the dock, which they didn’t fault you for, knowing you needed time alone.

When silence followed JB’s call, he frowned. Something wasn’t right. The main floor was empty, not a sign of you or your relative presence in the area. Room empty too, leaving John B to question where the hell you went. They had the Twinkie and the dirt bikes were outside which meant if you went anywhere it would be on your own two feet.

“John B.”

The tone in Sarah’s voice told him his intuition was right. She met him in the doorway of your room with a piece of paper in hand, holding it in his direction. He didn’t even need to read it to know the answer to his question.

You were gone. And you weren’t coming back any time soon.

--

part two here :)

a/n: i hate this i'm so sorry

navigation

[makeyuomine]

everybody's lover

Summary: He always comes back. After every tour, every tabloid headline, every other girl—Harry always finds his way back to your doorstep. Will this night be the same?

Type: Blurb

Author’s Note: Hiiii! A few of you have been requesting to be added to my tag list. I’m going to be so honest with yall, I don’t have one and IDK how to make one?! Can someone please help/DM I’d really appreciate it!!

♡ ♡ ♡ ♡ ♡ ♡ ♡ ♡

Harry’s the kind of man who makes you feel like you’re the only girl in the room—until he leaves and proves you weren’t.

It's so easy for him.

The way he walks into a room like it belongs to him, the way strangers lean in just to hear him laugh. He is the kind of beautiful that doesn't try too hard, and the kind you don't forget.

Harry had just completed his European leg of the tour, fresh off the success of his fourth album. Although he wanted me to tag along for this half of the tour, I couldn't join. So I received most of my news of him via social media, like everybody else. So when the tabloids started posting photos of him with different women across Europe, I wasn’t surprised. I’d almost seen it coming. He did this every tour.

Somehow, he always found a way to pull me back in—soft words, tender promises, the kind that made you believe them without question.

He had a way of looking at me that made it feel like we were the only two people in the world, like we belonged to each other and no one else. And for a while, we really were. During his hiatus, when the world wasn’t pulling him in a thousand directions, we carved out something real.

"I miss you."

"Tour isn't the same without you."

"Baby, I need you."

He always knew just what to say during our regular calls—calm, reassuring, like nothing had changed. And I believed him. Because more than anything, I loved him—and he knew that. He held onto me just tightly enough to keep me there, using up every bit of my love until I was drained. As long as he got what he needed, that was enough for him.

Now that he was home on a break, the calls wouldn’t stop. Morning, night, in between—his name lighting up my screen like it never left. At first, I ignored them. I had to. I knew how this story went. But he was persistent, like always, wearing me down with sweet words and half-truths wrapped in that voice I could never fully shut out.

And then he showed up—unannounced, like he had every right to. Standing at my door with that look in his eyes, the one that always made my resolve slip.

There he was—tall, golden, eyes softer than they had any right to be. Like he wasn’t the one who left me behind. Like he hadn’t broken me again.

“You shouldn’t be here,” I said, but it came out cracked. My voice betrayed me before I could find my anger.

He stepped forward. “I had to see you.”

That was all it took. The dam burst.

“You’re a liar,” I snapped, shoving at his chest with both hands. “A liar and a fucking cheater—”

He didn’t flinch. He just let me hit him, barely moving as my fists landed weakly against him.

“You told me I was the only one—every time, you say that—and then I have to see you in someone else’s bed halfway across the world like I don’t exist!”

Tears blurred my vision, hot and unrelenting, and I kept pushing him even as my strength gave out. “You use me. You always use me.”

That’s when he caught my wrists—not hard, not rough. Just enough to stop me, to still me. His fingers curled around mine with infuriating gentleness.

I broke then, the fight falling out of me as sobs racked through my chest. And he pulled me into him like nothing had changed, like he had every right to hold me together when he was the one who tore me apart.

For a moment, I let myself melt into him. Just a moment.

His hand moved up to the back of my head, cradling it gently as I cried into his chest. He whispered something soft I couldn’t make out, but it didn’t matter. I knew the script. I knew where this would lead.

And still, for a few seconds, I let him hold me. Because it was easier than facing the truth. Easier than admitting I still wanted to believe him.

But then I felt it—the ache shifting into something sharper. My body remembered the nights I stared at my phone, waiting. The mornings I saw his face next to someone else’s in headlines. The way he always came back like nothing had happened.

I pulled back suddenly, shoving against his chest.

“Don’t,” I said, my voice low but shaking with fury. “Don’t fucking touch me.”

His brows drew together, but I didn’t let him speak.

“You think you can just show up and hold me for a few seconds and everything goes away?” I wiped at my cheeks angrily. “You lied to me. You made me feel like I was the only one, like I mattered."

He opened his mouth, but I cut him off again. “No. I hate you, Harry. I hate you for making me love you like this.”

My voice broke, but I stood my ground. “Get out. Get out of my apartment. Now.”

He stared at me, eyes searching mine for a sliver of softness. But I had none left to give.

He didn’t move.

I stood there, fists clenched, chest heaving, waiting for him to walk out like he always did. But this time, he didn’t.

“No,” he said quietly.

I blinked. “What?”

“I’m not leaving,” he repeated, stronger this time. “Not this time.”

My heart pounded in my ears. “Harry—”

“I thought about you every single time,” he said, stepping toward me, his voice shaking. “Every time I was with someone else, I saw your face. Every kiss, every empty night, I thought about you. And I hated myself for it. I need you.”

His words hung in the air like a storm waiting to break.

My lips trembled, fury and heartbreak tangled in my throat.

“You need me?” I snapped. “You need me—but you sleep with women whose names you don’t even remember? You flirt with the world and then come running back here like I’m your shelter?”

His eyes flickered with pain, but I didn’t stop.

“I’m yours, Harry,” I whispered. “God, I’ve always been yours. But you… you’re everybody’s. You give pieces of yourself away like it means nothing. Like I mean nothing.”

He took another step toward me, slowly, like I might shatter. “It wasn’t nothing,” he said. “None of it was ever nothing. I was just—lost.”

He flinched. Just barely. But I saw it.

“You don’t get to stand here and act like you’re some heartbroken romantic who just made a mistake,” I snapped, stepping forward. “You knew what you were doing. Every night. Every kiss. Every photo. You knew it would hurt me.”

“I did,” he said quickly, almost desperate now. “I knew it and I hated it. I hated myself for it. Every time I touched someone else, I wanted it to be you. I’d close my eyes and pretend it was you. That it was your skin, your voice, your mouth…”

I shook my head, trying to block him out, but he kept going.

His voice cracked, full of something between apology and pleading. “I don’t want anyone else. I never did—not really. It was always you.”

I felt the tears welling up again. I shut my eyes.

He stepped closer, I could hear it. I didn't stop him. I felt so overwhelmed in this self-deprecating pit.

His arms wrapped around me, pulling me in again.

My forehead pressed against his chest, and I let out a soft breath, almost a sigh of surrender. He kissed the top of my head, eyes closed, holding me.

“I’m sorry,” he murmured over and over.

I look up. His hands moved with that familiar ease, tracing the curve of my back. The way he looked at me made my pulse quicken, and for a moment, I almost forgot all the promises he’d broken.

I looked at him standing there—the same boy who had broken me, held me, and broken me again. My chest tightened, the fight and the love tangled so deep it hurt to breathe.

“I’m done,” I said finally, voice steady but soft. “Done with the waiting. Done with the lies. Done with being nobody's when I wanted to be just yours.”

His eyes searched mine, dark and pleading. For a second, I thought he might say something to change my mind.

But I wasn’t here to change it. I was here for one last thing.

I looked up at him, my voice trembling but fierce. “I want you to fuck me,” I said, barely able to hold back the tears pooling in my eyes. I could hear myself sniffle, the raw ache in my chest breaking through the walls I’d built, but I meant every word.

His eyes darkened with a mix of hunger and something softer, almost regret. He didn’t say a word, just closed the distance between us like he needed this as much as I did.

His hands were rough and sure, sliding over my skin with a desperate tenderness that made me shiver. Every touch was electric, igniting all the places that had gone numb. I could feel the tension between us—the ache of all the broken promises, the fire of every stolen moment—wrapping tight around us.

When his lips found mine, it wasn’t gentle. It was fierce, demanding, as if trying to burn away the past and leave only this moment. I clung to him, biting back a sob as his hands roamed like he was memorizing every curve.

The way he groaned low in his throat, the way his breath hitched as he pressed into me, it drove me crazy. I found myself moaning right back at him, unable to hold back, caught up in the storm of sensation and emotion crashing between us.

It was messy and fierce and perfect in all the ways a goodbye should never be. The heat of his hands, the roughness of his kisses, the way his body moved with mine—it was almost too sexy, too raw, for a goodbye.

This was breakup sex—full of anger and longing and everything we couldn’t say out loud.

We moved together with a frantic urgency, a wild, aching need that felt like both punishment and salvation. I let go of the fight inside me, letting the rawness of his touch pull me under, even though I knew it would break me all over again.

♡ ♡ ♡ ♡ ♡ ♡ ♡ ♡

[kxsagi]

“𝐢 𝐟𝐚𝐥𝐥 𝐚𝐩𝐚𝐫𝐭, 𝐲𝐨𝐮 𝐟𝐢𝐥𝐥 𝐮𝐩 𝐭𝐡𝐞 𝐞𝐦𝐩𝐭𝐲 𝐬𝐩𝐚𝐜𝐞𝐬”

a/n: for my pretty @iqxatlantic ❤️🌹

suggestive content inside 🌚

you didn’t expect him to answer when you knocked. 

not because he was ignoring you, but because you weren’t even sure he was really there anymore. 

you hadn’t seen kaiser in a month. not really. he’d ghosted practice, interviews, friends, everyone. and as much as you tried to reason with yourself that it wasn’t your responsibility, your heart didn’t agree. because even when he pushed you away, you knew something in him was breaking. and you didn’t want to be the last person who gave up on him. 

the door finally creaked open. 

and there he was. 

shirtless to reveal the bit of weight he lost. eyes dark. hair disheveled like he hadn’t touched it in days. 

you forgot how pretty he was beneath all that ego. but now? stripped down and tired? he just looked human. 

“… you,” he said, blinking slowly, voice rasped like he hadn’t spoken aloud in days. 

you offered a weak smile. “hey.” 

he didn’t move. didn’t invite you in. just stared, like he was trying to figure out whether you were real or just another dream his sleep-deprived brain had conjured. 

“i brought food,” you added, lifting the bag slightly. “well, just bread. and tea. that weird brand you said tasted like grass. it’s good for you though and you know it.” 

something flickered in his eyes. a ghost of a smile. he stepped aside wordlessly, letting you in. 

his apartment was dark. blinds drawn. lights off. the only illumination came from the bluish flicker of the TV, paused on a screen you didn’t recognize. 

it was too quiet. even his footsteps didn’t echo. he’d filled every room with silence. 

“you should sit,” you said gently, setting the food on the table. “you look like you’re about to fall over.” 

“i feel like it,” he muttered, voice low, broken. 

you watched him collapse into the bed like gravity had tripled just for him. elbows on knees, hands covering his face. 

“everyone thinks i’m on vacation or something,” he murmured. “like i needed a break.” 

he laughed. it wasn’t a happy sound. “but it’s not that. i just… couldn’t leave. couldn’t move. like the second i stepped outside, it would all come crashing down.” 

you sat beside him. not too close. just enough to be there if he reached out. he didn’t. 

“and inside,” he added, voice quieter, “it’s worse.” 

you were silent. not because you didn’t know what to say, but because you knew sometimes, silence said more. 

“i haven’t slept,” he continued, as if the words had been dammed up inside him, bursting out now. “not really. i close my eyes and it’s just… thoughts. voices. things i should’ve done. said. you.” 

you looked over at him. “me?” 

he dragged a hand through his hair, fingers trembling. “you always made things feel less... heavy. i didn’t even notice it until you left. and now, every room feels too big. every night’s too quiet. i didn’t want you to see me like this.” 

“like what?” you asked softly. 

“like this,” he snapped, motioning to himself – dark circles, empty eyes, a body half-swallowed by a bed he hadn’t moved from in days. “pathetic. weak. all that stuff i never let anyone see.” 

your chest ached. “you think i only cared about the version of you that had it all together?” 

he looked at you like that thought had never even occurred to him. 

you scooted closer, knees brushing his. “you don’t have to pretend with me.” 

his throat bobbed with a swallow. he still didn’t look at you. 

“you always act like being vulnerable means being powerless,” you said. “but look at you, mihya. you’re still here. still breathing. even if you think you’re falling apart.” 

“i am falling apart,” he admitted, finally meeting your eyes. “and i don’t know how to fix it.” 

“you don’t have to fix it alone.” 

he blinked. like that simple sentence hit him harder than anything. 

his hand hovered between you, unsure. so you took it, fingers threading through his. 

for the first time since you’d walked in, you saw something soften in him. like the sharp edges had dulled just enough for you to squeeze through. 

“i kept the mug you gave me,” he said suddenly, voice quiet. 

you tilted your head. “what mug?” 

“the stupid one with the cat dressed like napoleon. i thought it was ugly.” he looked down at your intertwined hands. “but i couldn’t throw it away. it reminded me of you.” 

your lips curved into a smile. “wow. that’s almost romantic.” 

he scoffed lightly, gaze dropping again. “i don’t know how to be romantic. or stable. or... not a mess.” 

“you don’t have to be perfect,” you murmured. “just... don’t push me away.” 

he hesitated, then leaned forward, forehead resting against your shoulder. “i missed you.” 

your hand moved instinctively to his hair, gently combing through it. “i missed you too.” 

the quiet wasn’t heavy anymore. it felt like a shared breath. a soft pause. a promise. 

he let himself fall into you, every inch of him sinking into the warmth he’d been starving for. 

he smelled like sleep deprivation and comfort and something sharp beneath the surface, something that said, i’m trying. i want to be better. 

your fingers never stopped moving through his hair. 

“you don’t have to go yet,” he whispered, almost like a prayer. “just... stay. please.” 

you curled your legs beneath you and leaned your head against his. “i was never planning to leave.” 

and in that moment, against the weight of all the things unsaid, he felt the emptiness inside him shift. like maybe, just maybe, you were filling in the spaces he thought would always stay hollow. 

for a while, neither of you moved. he stayed pressed against your shoulder, like if he let go, the floor might open beneath him. your fingers didn’t stop threading through his hair. the silence wasn’t tense. it was warm. like the static before a storm – soft, charged, inevitable. 

“you know,” you murmured, “you could’ve called. texted. anything.” 

“i didn’t know if i wanted to be seen.” 

you pulled back just enough to look at him. “you mean you didn’t know if i would still want to see you like this.” 

he looked away, shame burning behind his lashes. “yeah.” 

“and?” 

you tilted his chin back to face you. his breath hitched. 

“i want to see you,” you said, voice low, honest. “not the version you polish up for cameras. not the one who pretends nothing ever touches him.” 

his gaze dropped to your lips, then back to your eyes. “... you’re really not gonna run, huh?” 

you leaned in, just a breath apart. “you’d have to do a lot worse to get rid of me.” 

his hand came up slowly, fingers brushing your jaw like he didn’t trust the moment to stay. like it might vanish if he held it too tightly. 

“i thought i was okay being alone,” he whispered. 

“you’re not.” 

“i’m not.” 

and then he kissed you. 

not with the arrogance you’d always associated with him. not with the cocky smirk or the biting charm. no, this kiss was different. raw. desperate. the kind of kiss that says i’m still here, but only because you are, too. 

his hands slid to your waist, holding you like something precious, something breakable. you let him pull you closer, straddling his lap, noses bumping as he kissed you again, deeper this time. it wasn’t about lust, it was about need. 

about making sure this was real. that you were warm and solid in his arms and not something his exhausted mind had created. 

you felt him sigh into your mouth, tension bleeding from his shoulders as your hands found his neck, his jaw, the sharp curve of his cheekbone. 

he pulled back, just slightly. “i’m not good at this.” 

“yes, you are,” you whispered, pressing your forehead to his. “you’re just used to pretending you’re not.” 

he laughed a breathy, half-broken thing, then kissed you again. slower this time. like he wanted to memorize the taste of you. like this was the first time he’d truly let himself feel anything in weeks. 

your fingers toyed with the hem of his shirt, and when you looked down at him, there was no hesitation in your eyes – just soft, steady affection. 

“can i…?” you asked, voice delicate. 

he nodded. 

you lifted the shirt over his head, letting your palms run over the ridges of muscle and the goosebumps rising in your wake. he didn’t flinch. didn’t cover up. just let you look. let you see. 

you leaned down, lips brushing the skin just above his heart. 

“you’re safe,” you said softly. 

his hands gripped your hips like he was anchoring himself. “then don’t leave me.” 

“i won’t.” 

when he kissed you again, it was different. there was no fear left in it. just warmth and trust and a soft surrender that he’d never allowed anyone else. your mouths moved together in a rhythm that felt like belonging, like finding your way back after being lost in the dark. 

his hands explored slowly, reverently, like he didn’t want to miss a single inch of you. and when you tugged your own shirt over your head, revealing yourself to him, you saw something flicker in his eyes. 

not lust. 

adoration. 

he touched you like he was afraid he’d break you, and you kissed him like he deserved softness, too. 

clothes melted away between kisses and whispered promises. you found yourselves tangled in each other on the couch, your body flush against his, hearts pounding in sync. every movement was unhurried. intentional. like you had all the time in the world to rebuild him piece by piece. 

his lips found your neck, your collarbone, the dip between your ribs. and when he whispered your name against your skin, it wasn’t teasing or playful – it was a prayer. a vow. a quiet thank you for not walking away. 

when you finally came together, it wasn’t frantic or messy – it was grounding. every breath shared, every movement mirrored, every inch of skin pressed together like two puzzle pieces that had always belonged. 

his forehead stayed pressed to yours the entire time. like he didn’t want to lose you in the haze. like you were the one thread keeping him from unraveling. 

after, the world felt still. 

your fingers traced patterns over his bare chest as he lay beneath you, chest rising and falling in slow, steady rhythm. it was the first time in weeks he looked at peace. 

he reached for your hand, lacing your fingers together. “you know,” he murmured, eyes half-lidded, “it’s still dark in here.” 

you smiled. “yeah. but it doesn’t feel like it anymore.” 

he turned his head to look at you. his lips curved. not into a smirk. not a performance. just a real, quiet smile. “i fall apart too easily.” 

you leaned in and kissed him one more time. “and i’ll keep filling up the empty spaces.” 

© 𝐤𝐱𝐬𝐚𝐠𝐢

[flowergirl1243]

i miss it, i miss you

SUMMARY: Facing terminal illness, you and Oscar chase one last bittersweet adventure together, holding onto love, loss, and the fragile hope written across the sky.

PAIRING: oscar piastri x reader

WARNINGS: major character illness (terminal cancer), death, grief, mentions of hospitals/medical treatment

NOTE: I was listening to chemtrails by Lizzy Mcalpine, and oh my gosh, that song makes me feel so ill, I cannot.

You didn’t cry when they told you.

You watched the doctor’s mouth move like it was underwater, slow and rounded, clinical and soft. Every word landed like a feather, and still, somehow, each one managed to bruise.

Stage four. Aggressive. Unlikely to respond. Best to prepare.

She didn’t meet your eyes. She looked just past your shoulder, the way people do when they’re afraid of becoming part of the story. Like if she made it impersonal enough, you’d stay a statistic and not a person unraveling right in front of her.

You didn’t cry.

You just stared at the wall behind her, at the framed photo of two golden retrievers chasing a tennis ball down a sunlit stretch of sand. The ocean was bright and endless behind them. You wondered if they were still alive. If they still ran like that. If she knew what it felt like to say terminal to someone and keep breathing like she hadn’t just stolen the air out of the room.

You nodded politely. Like she was explaining a cracked pipe or an insurance clause. Like this wasn’t your body she was talking about, your life, your time, now mapped out in clinical estimates and worst-case timelines.

Oscar didn’t cry either.

He sat to your left, knuckles pressed white against his knee, jaw so tight you thought it might shatter if he moved. He didn’t speak. Didn’t blink. Just stared at the floor like if he could burn a hole through it, maybe he’d fall through to some version of the world where this wasn’t happening. Where you were okay.

He helped you out of the chair when the appointment ended, though neither of you could say what had really been said. His hand hovered near your back the whole walk to the elevator, not quite touching, but close enough that you felt the heat of it. The way it shook.

You walked in silence through the lobby. Past people laughing at the café. Past a little girl with a sticker on her cheek and an ice cream in her hand. Past the parking meter that wouldn’t print receipts.

Everything felt normal. Ordinary. Unbearably so.

In the car, you buckled your seatbelt with hands that didn’t feel like yours. The air was too still. Oscar didn’t start the engine. He just sat there, eyes forward, like he wasn’t ready to move. Like if he turned the key, the world would keep going, and you weren’t sure either of you could handle that.

You reached for the AUX cord.

You weren’t even sure why. Habit, maybe. Instinct. You fumbled it between your fingers, like you’d forgotten how it worked, like maybe music could press rewind on the day and take you both somewhere simpler.

“Let’s just go home,” you said.

The words felt weightless coming out of your mouth, not empty, exactly, but hollowed out. Like they had once meant something and now they were only shape and sound. You barely recognised your own voice. It didn’t tremble or shake. It didn’t beg or break.

It just…floated.

Oscar turned toward you slowly, eyes rimmed red, lips parted like he wanted to say something but didn’t know where to begin. Then he broke.

No warning. No drama. No sound, not at first.

Just a sharp inhale. A full-body wince. Then the dam cracked.

He folded forward over the steering wheel like someone had taken the ground out from underneath him. His whole body shook, silent at first, then loud, gulping sobs that scraped their way out of his throat like they’d been waiting all day to be let out.

He cried like he was trying to reverse time. Like if he said your name enough, over and over again, soft and desperate, like a question and a prayer, the story might change.

“Hey,” you whispered, reaching across the console. Your fingers curled around his hand. His knuckles were ice. “I’m still here.”

He gripped your hand like it was the only thing keeping him tethered. His head turned just enough to press into your palm. He didn’t say anything, couldn’t, but he nodded once, a jerky, broken thing that made your chest ache.

You didn’t cry then, either.

Not because you weren’t sad. Not because you were strong.

But because somewhere, deep down, you knew if you started, you wouldn’t stop. And you had to stay in the moment, had to hold him there, keep both of you from falling off the edge of it.

“I’m not gone yet,” you said, softer this time.

But the yet hung in the air between you, louder than anything else. It wrapped itself around your words like smoke. It curled into the corners of the car. It pressed itself into Oscar’s lungs until he was crying again, quietly now, the kind of grief that lingers after the first wave crashes and recedes.

You rested your forehead to the window and closed your eyes. The silence wasn’t comforting, but it was honest. And for now, that was enough.

That night, the house was too quiet. Not peaceful, hollow. Even the hum of the fridge felt loud, intrusive. The shadows on the walls stretched longer than they used to, like time had started pooling in the corners.

You lay curled on the couch, your body tucked into Oscar’s like you were trying to disappear inside him. Or maybe he was trying to pull you in. His arms were wrapped around you tight, chest pressed to your back, one leg hooked around yours as if anchoring you there. Like if he stopped touching you, even for a second, you might evaporate.

His hand rested at your waist, fingers spread like he was trying to memorise the rise and fall of your breathing. His nose was buried in the curve of your neck, his lips brushing skin every time he exhaled. He hadn’t said much since the hospital, just stayed close, unbearably close, like he could feel the clock ticking and was trying to run out the timer by holding you still.

You both stared at the ceiling, eyes tracing the familiar cracks and shadows like they might suddenly shift into answers. A message. A reason. Something. Answers written in the cracks you’d never noticed before. A message only meant for the dying. Or the ones they’d leave behind.

You were the one to break the silence, your voice soft and steady, like a confession whispered into a pillow. “Is it weird,” you said, “that I feel more sorry for you than for me?”

Oscar flinched like the words physically hit him. His arm tightened instinctively around your middle. “Don’t,” he said, rough and quiet. “Please don’t say that.”

“But it’s true.” You shifted just enough to look back at him, your cheek brushing his. “I wish I could… make this easier for you.”

He shook his head once, sharply, jaw clenched like he was chewing glass. “You’re the one—”

“I know.” Your voice cracked just a little. A beat passed. Then another.

You reached up, covering the hand he had on your waist with your own. “But I’m not the one who has to stay behind.”

Oscar’s breath hitched.

And then he did what he’d been holding back from all day — he pulled you in tighter, impossibly so. One arm wrapped around your shoulders now, his hand flat against your chest, feeling the thrum of your heartbeat like he was afraid it might stop mid-beat if he let go.

“Don’t say that,” he whispered again, voice breaking apart on the edges. “Please don’t.”

So you didn’t.

But the truth settled into the space between you anyway — undeniable and brutal. You were going. Not today. Not yet. But soon. And he would be the one left behind.

You felt his lips press against the back of your shoulder, lingering like a goodbye he wasn’t ready to say. His hand gripped yours like it was the only thing keeping him afloat.

You turned your head and leaned into him, until your forehead touched his, until your noses brushed, until the space between your breaths disappeared completely.

“I’m still here,” you whispered. “Right now, I’m still here.”

Oscar closed his eyes. Let out a shaky breath. “I know,” he said. But he didn’t loosen his hold. Not even a little.

Because the truth was still there, heavy and quiet and cruel.

You were still here.

But not for long.

The first thing you lost was your appetite. It didn’t happen all at once. Not like flipping a switch, but like the slow dimming of a light you didn’t know was fading until the room was almost dark. Meals became chores, not comforts. You’d pick at food, a bite here, a bite there, but the taste wasn’t there anymore. The flavours felt muted, as if everything you put in your mouth was wrapped in cotton. Even the smell of cooking, once a signal of warmth and home, turned sour, twisting in your stomach before you could swallow. Oscar watched you shrink away from the dinner table, but he still made your favourite meals. Sometimes he even sat with you, trying to force the ordinary back into the day. He’d laugh quietly, sharing some dumb meme on his phone, the glow of the screen illuminating his hopeful smile. But the meals grew colder. The laughter faded. And you stopped pretending to be hungry.

The second thing you lost was your mornings. Not just the hour when the sun climbed over the horizon, but the feeling mornings used to bring, the soft promise of a new day, wrapped in sunlight and warmth and slow sips of coffee. You used to wake with a smile half-formed on your lips, a tangle of sheets and hair and quiet contentment. Now, you woke with a weight in your chest that pressed you back into the mattress, breath shallow, muscles heavy. Oscar learned to keep the room dark. He’d draw the curtains tight to keep the early light from cutting through your closed eyelids. He’d sit beside you, gently tugging socks over your cold feet, the touch light as a feather but filled with the fierce love of someone trying to protect a fading flame. Sometimes, when he thought you were asleep, you’d hear him whisper your name like a prayer, or feel the brush of his lips on your temple as if saying goodbye just in case.

The third was the ordinary, the everyday moments that used to fill your life with quiet joy. The small rituals you never noticed until they stopped: the way your fingers tapped rhythmically on the edge of a table when you were lost in thought; the stacks of books gathering dust beside your bed; the music that once wove through your days now silenced or forgotten. You stopped caring about the little things. The routines that made life feel safe, predictable, yours, unravelled thread by thread. Oscar saw the spaces widen between who you were and who you were becoming. He tried to hold onto those fragments, a laugh, a glance, a sigh, as if gathering pieces of you might keep you whole.

He tried so hard to pretend everything was normal. He still made you tea, even when you couldn’t bring yourself to drink it. He still sent you ridiculous memes from across the room, knowing you’d smile, even if only for a second. He kissed the top of your head every time he passed, pressing his lips like he was trying to seal a promise into your skin. Every touch was a silent vow to stay, even as the world slipped away.

But you knew. You saw it in the way his eyes searched your face when you thought he wasn’t looking, desperate to memorise every line, every flicker of emotion. You felt it in the way his thumb brushed the nape of your neck when he tucked you beneath the blankets, as if trying to imprint himself on you. You heard it in the quiet shudder of his shoulders when he thought you were asleep, the weight of a grief too big to carry.

He was memorising you. Not just the person you were now, but every version of you he’d ever known. Every laugh, every softness, every half-smile held like a secret treasure. He was folding your voice into the quiet spaces of his heart, turning moments into keepsakes, laughter into lasting echoes. He was grieving you already, before the world had even finished telling the story.

It wasn’t fair. None of it was. But it was happening anyway. And some days, the only thing you could offer him was a smile, small, fragile, fading, that said I’m still here. For now.

One day, you found him sitting on the cold tile floor of the shower.

Fully clothed.

Silent.

The water ran relentlessly over him, a steady, unyielding torrent that blurred the hard edges of the world and washed away everything but the weight in his chest. His clothes clung to his skin, soaked through, heavy like the grief pressing him down, pinning him to the floor. His head lolled forward, chin nearly resting on his chest, eyes closed tight against the flood inside.

You didn’t say anything.

You just stepped in, the water immediately soaking your pajamas, plastering your hair to your scalp, chilling your skin in contrast to the hot cascade. You moved slowly, as if afraid your presence might shatter the fragile moment, and curled into his lap, folding your body against his like two pieces desperate not to lose their shape.

Your arms wrapped around him, trembling but fierce, as if your hold could keep him anchored to the world. His breath hitched in his throat, shaky and uneven, a broken sound swallowed beneath the steady rush of water.

“I can’t do this,” he whispered, voice cracked and raw, like he was admitting defeat for the first time.

“Yes, you can,” you said, though your own voice shook with the weight of the truth you wished wasn’t real.

He shook his head slowly, barely audible. “Why do I have to?”

You didn’t have an answer. There was no reason that could fill that hole. No explanation to soften the unbearable.

Just the two of you.

Just the warmth of your skin against his, the soft pulse of your heartbeat beneath his ear, a quiet, steady drum in the silence.

I’m still here. I’m still here. I’m still—

The words caught in the thick wet air between you, unfinished and fragile, the ache of everything left unsaid hanging heavy.

He pressed his face into your shoulder, the tremor of his body slowly loosening in your arms. You could feel the heat of his tears mixing with the cool water, hear the soft hitch of his breath as the grief broke through his walls at last.

And in that moment, in the quiet surrender of everything he’d been holding inside, you both felt the full weight of what was coming.

The terrifying, endless stretch of days where time would slip away like water through your fingers. The nights stretched wide and empty, echoing with the absence of what could not be fixed. The slow fading, piece by piece, of everything you loved about each other.

And still, you held on.

Not because you had strength left to fight.

But because you couldn’t let go.

Because the last thing you could do was be there, raw and broken and real.

Together.

Even as the water ran cold and the world narrowed to the two of you, clinging to the fragile hope woven between whispered promises and shared silence.

I’m still here.

And sometimes, sometimes, that was enough.

The decision was sudden but not surprising. After weeks of drifting through hospital visits, scans that blurred into one another, and tired days that felt longer than nights, you looked at Oscar with a spark of something almost like rebellion in your tired eyes.

“Let’s get out of here. Just for a little while.”

His eyebrows knitted together, like he was trying to puzzle out if you were serious, or if this was just another passing daydream you might let go of by morning. His eyes searched yours, wary but hopeful, like he was trying to catch a glimpse of the ‘you’ that existed before the hospital rooms and the whispered diagnoses.

“Where do you want to go?” he asked, voice low and careful, as if afraid the walls might hear and pull you back.

“Anywhere but here,” you said, the corners of your mouth twitching into a small, tired smile. “Somewhere I can feel the sky.”

Oscar blinked, a slow smile breaking through the tension. “The sky, huh? That sounds good.”

You both knew it wasn’t about the place. It never was. It was about a break from the endless waiting rooms and the smell of antiseptic. About breathing air that didn’t taste like fear. About catching a few stolen moments where the future wasn’t hanging over your heads like a storm cloud.

Packing was quick, no big plans, no suitcases, just whatever fit in a bag tossed on the passenger seat. You slipped into your favourite jacket, the one with the worn cuffs and the scent of home, and Oscar tossed you the keys with a grin that was equal parts nervous and excited.

The car hummed to life and pulled away from the hospital’s heavy gates, leaving behind the relentless buzz of machines and hushed voices.

Windows down, wind tangled in your hair, you felt something flicker inside — a small pulse of freedom, fragile and bright.

Oscar glanced over, catching the light in your eyes, and reached out to squeeze your hand.

“Where to?” he asked, grinning like a kid about to take you on an adventure.

You laughed, soft, real, and a little breathless. “Anywhere that feels like we can just be. No doctors, no tests. Just us and the sky.”

He nodded. “Let’s find it.”

And with that, the road stretched ahead, endless and wide, and for the first time in a long time, it felt like maybe, just maybe, the weight could lift for a little while.

One evening, you sat on the balcony, the sky a wild canvas bleeding orange and pink into the horizon, the sun slipping slow and stubborn toward the edge of the world. The air was salty and heavy with the smell of the sea, thick with the gentle lull of waves crashing far below.

Oscar’s hand found yours, fingers curling around yours like he was afraid you might slip away if he didn’t hold tight enough. His squeeze was gentle, careful, a silent question, an anchor.

“You look happy,” he said softly, voice low as if he didn’t want to disturb the delicate peace.

“I am,” you whispered, leaning your head against his shoulder, feeling the steady beat of his heart beneath your ear — something solid in a world that felt like it was tilting.

He kissed the top of your hair, the touch feather-light but full of everything words couldn’t hold. For a moment, time folded in on itself, past, present, future blurring into a quiet, sacred now. There was no illness, no prognosis, no shadow looming over what came next. There was only this, this fragile, perfect breath of life.

You breathed it in, the salt in the air, the distant cry of a gull, the rough grain of the balcony railing beneath your fingers, and the warmth of his body curled close beside you.

“Dance with me?” he murmured, voice rough with everything he was holding in.

You nodded, unable to find words that could hold the weight of the moment.

There was no music except the distant crash of waves and the whisper of the night breeze, but it didn’t matter. He moved with a careful grace, one hand on your waist, the other holding yours like it was the most precious thing in the world.

Your bodies swayed together, slow, unsteady, but sure, like the world had paused just for this. Your head rested against his chest, feeling the pulse of his heart under your ear, steady and real. You closed your eyes, letting the rhythm of him, of the night, of the fragile life between you, carry you.

His breath warmed your skin as he whispered, “I don’t want to let go.”

You pressed a soft kiss to his collarbone, voice barely above a whisper. “Then don’t.”

And for those quiet, suspended moments, with the sky fading from gold to ink, and the stars just beginning to blink awake, you danced.

Not because the future was promised, But because right now, this was enough.

On the last night, the world outside faded until it was just the two of you, the quiet hum of the night air, the whisper of the ocean, and the soft rhythm of your voices.

You stayed up late, tangled in blankets and memories, talking about everything you’d never made time for, dreams you’d dared to whisper in the dark, regrets folded tight inside your chest, the little things that made your life yours.

Oscar pulled you close, his breath catching as he spoke. “I don’t want this to be goodbye.”

“Neither do I,” you said, voice thick but steady, every word wrapped in the weight of love and loss tangled together.

“But if it is…” His voice cracked, raw and broken.

“You’ll carry me,” you promised, pressing your hand over his heart. “In the sky, in your heart, in everything.”

He nodded, tears glistening in the corners of his eyes, held back by sheer will. He held you tighter, like if he let go, you might really disappear.

And under that vast sky, with the world so wide and quiet around you, the two of you held on, to each other, to the moments, to the fierce, impossible hope that love could outlast even the darkest nights.

You slipped away on a morning so soft it almost felt like a dream, a quiet that wasn’t quiet, a stillness so delicate it threatened to break under the weight of all that had come before.

Oscar was right there beside you, his fingers intertwined with yours like they were trying to hold your soul tethered to the world. His thumb traced small, endless circles on your skin, slow, steady, a silent rhythm meant to steady the breaking. “I’m here. I’m here,” he whispered, over and over, like those words could pull you back, could slow the slipping, could make the unbearable pause just a little longer.

The room was hushed, the kind of hush that presses into your chest, heavier than silence. The only sound was the slow, steady beeping of machines, heart monitors and oxygen levels, a mechanical heartbeat echoing in the stillness. A lifeline counting down seconds neither of you dared to measure.

And then, suddenly, the beeping stopped.

The world tilted on an invisible axis, time fracturing in that fragile space between breaths.

Oscar’s hands, so full of trembling life, moved instinctively to close your eyes, his fingertips brushing the long lashes as if afraid the faintest touch might shatter the fragile peace.

He bent forward slowly, pressing a kiss to your forehead, soft and broken and sacred. The same kiss he had given you a thousand times before, but now it held the weight of a thousand goodbyes. It was a thank you for every smile, every whispered secret, every brush of fingers in the dark. A goodbye without words, heavier than anything either of you could say. And an I love you, fierce, fragile, and absolute, folded into the quiet spaces between them.

His breath hitched, a soft, broken sound swallowed quickly, but the tremble in his body betrayed him. The weight of everything, loss, love, fear, pressed down like an ocean, and for the first time, he let himself collapse into it.

The room felt colder now, emptier. The light slipping through the window seemed too bright, too sharp, cutting through the haze of grief that wrapped around him like a shroud.

He stayed there, holding your hand long after the machines went silent, as if by holding on, he could keep you from truly leaving.

Minutes passed, hours maybe. Time blurred and folded in on itself.

He whispered your name, again and again, like a prayer, a plea, a thread back to you.

And in that fragile, aching dawn, all that was left was the echo of your touch, a whisper on his skin, a ghost of warmth he could never quite forget.

The plane’s wheels hit the tarmac in Australia, but Oscar felt like he was still falling, endlessly, spiralling through a darkness he couldn’t escape. His chest was tight, his lungs gasping for air as if the very atmosphere was too heavy to breathe.

His hands clenched so tight around the strap of his bag that his knuckles blazed white, fingers digging into the worn leather as if it were the only thing tethering him to reality. Around him, the airport hummed and buzzed, people rushing past, rolling suitcases and distant chatter swirling in a chaotic current, but it all felt muffled, as if he was submerged underwater, watching the world drift farther away.

He moved forward with a hollow weight, stepping through the sliding glass doors, and was immediately hit by the thick, humid air of the late afternoon. It wrapped around him like a damp blanket, sticky against his skin, carrying the sharp scent of eucalyptus and salt from the nearby sea. The sounds of cicadas droned in the background, persistent and relentless, but the familiar noises, the calling birds, the rustling leaves, felt foreign, distant, like fragments of a dream he couldn’t quite reach.

Everything that should have felt like home, the sky stretched wide and heavy, the heat clinging to his clothes, instead sliced through him like shards of glass. The ache inside twisted deeper, sharper.

When he finally reached his mum’s front door, his hand hovered over the handle, trembling. His heart pounded fiercely, a wild, desperate drumbeat that threatened to shatter his ribs from the inside. The silence around him pressed in, thick and suffocating, broken only by the faint creak of the wooden porch beneath his feet.

Before he could knock, the door swung open.

His mum stood there, her face a mix of surprise and dread. The usual warmth in her eyes flickered and faltered when she saw the hollow emptiness in his gaze, the way his shoulders slumped, carrying invisible burdens too heavy for words.

“Oscar,” she breathed, voice soft and catching somewhere between heartbreak and fear.

He didn’t answer. He barely nodded, stepping inside like a ghost crossing the threshold of a place that should have been sanctuary but felt more like a tomb. The door closed behind him with a hollow, final thud, the sound echoing in the sudden, suffocating quiet.

The walls were lined with photos, frozen smiles from holidays long past, birthday candles flickering in bright colours, moments captured in laughter that felt impossibly distant now. He barely glanced at them, his eyes glazed over, as if the memories pressed too close, too sharp.

And then, without warning, he broke.

Tears spilled free, hot and unrelenting, streaming down his face in thick rivers of grief. He sank to the floor, collapsing into himself, shaking violently as sobs tore through his chest like knives. The sound was raw and ragged, a primal cry of loss and desperation that filled the empty room.

His hands covered his face, fingers digging into his skin as if trying to hold the pieces together, but the weight of everything shattered him again and again.

His voice came out as a broken whisper, ragged and pained, repeating you name like a fragile lifeline, a mantra to keep you near.

“I’m so sorry. I’m so sorry.”

His mum was there in an instant, sitting down beside him, arms wrapping around his shaking shoulders like a fragile shield. Her own tears fell silently, wetting his hair, and in that moment, two broken souls found solace in their shared grief.

They stayed like that, locked together in the unbearable silence that screamed everything they couldn’t say aloud. Minutes stretched into hours, time bending under the weight of sorrow and the fragile thread of comfort between them.

Oscar didn’t know how to move forward, how to find air again in a world that had suddenly stopped breathing with him. He didn’t know how to live without you.

All he knew, in that quiet, shattering moment, was that here, in this room filled with memories and loss, he could finally fall apart.

Because if he didn’t break, completely and utterly, he wasn’t sure how he’d survive at all.

The cheers still echoed around him like a distant storm as Oscar stepped away from the podium, trophy cradled awkwardly in his arms. The flashes of cameras burned behind his eyelids, but his vision felt blurred, not from sweat or adrenaline, but from the tight knot of something raw and hollow inside.

Out there, under the dazzling lights and roaring applause, he was the champion. The winner. The man who had crossed the finish line first.

But here, in the quiet of the cramped, dimly lit corridor behind the scenes, the victory felt fragile, a beautiful mask stretched thin over the ache in his chest.

He sank down onto the cold floor, back pressed against the rough concrete wall, the trophy resting beside him like a cold, distant relic. His hands trembled as they unfolded from his lap, and the weight of the moment finally crashed down, the victory and the loss tangled impossibly together.

His breath hitched as the tears came, slow at first, then spilling free like a broken dam. No one saw. No one could see the way his body shook with grief, how every sob was a quiet scream for you.

He whispered you name into the silence, a fragile prayer, a desperate call across the distance between now and then.

I did it. I’m here. But I wish you were too.

The memory of you smile, soft and steady, flared through the dark like a candle flickering against a storm. The way your hand felt in his, the warmth of your voice in the quiet moments, the laughter they’d shared in those impossible, beautiful times.

He pressed his forehead against the wall, breath shallow, heart breaking in slow, jagged pieces.

There was no crowd here. No cameras. Just the quiet, the unbearable stillness that screamed louder than any cheer.

And in that stillness, he allowed himself to grieve. To miss you. To feel the weight of the empty space beside him that no trophy could ever fill.

Because winning without you was its own kind of loss, a victory marked by absence.

Slowly, painfully, Oscar wiped the tears from his face. He picked up the trophy, fingers curling around the cold metal, and for the first time, he let the grief and pride coexist, two halves of the same fragile truth.

He wasn’t just racing against others now. He was racing against the shadow of what had been taken.

And maybe, just maybe, holding onto that ache was the only way to keep running.

Late at night, when the world finally softened and the noise of the day fell away, Oscar sat alone in the quiet of his room. The darkness pressed close, swallowing everything but the small, smooth stone resting heavy in his palm, cold and unyielding, a cruel reminder of all he had lost.

He traced its worn edges, fingertips lingering over scratches carved by time, each one a ghost of a memory, a fragment of a past he could never reclaim.

His mind drifted to mornings they’d never have again. The way sunlight once spilled warm and golden across the sheets, catching the dust in lazy beams. The soft weight of your head against his shoulder, the quiet rhythm of breath mingling in the stillness before the world woke.

He missed that lightness. The effortless comfort of ordinary days where love was as simple as a shared smile or a hand held tight.

He thought about the laughter that once filled rooms, bright and unrestrained, now only an echo in the hollow chambers of his heart.

The ache was sharp and raw, a jagged pain that settled deep and refused to fade. It twisted through his chest like a slow, relentless burn, hollow and heavy all at once.

He swallowed hard, his throat tight with the weight of unshed tears, and whispered into the silence, to the shadows, to the empty space beside him, to the ghost of a voice that had once been his world —

“I miss it. I miss it so much. The way things were, the way you were. I miss every quiet morning, every stolen moment. The way love felt like breathing, easy, natural, endless. I miss you. More than words can hold. More than I can bear. Sometimes it feels like my heart is breaking all over again, a thousand small fractures in the same place. I want to hold onto it, this ache, because it’s all that keeps you alive inside me. But God, it hurts. It hurts like hell.”

His breath hitched, tears spilling slow and steady down his cheeks, soaking into the dark fabric of his shirt.

He closed his eyes and let the grief wash over him, fierce, unyielding, endless, because in that brokenness, in that aching longing, there was still love.

And love, even when it’s pain, is never truly gone.

Every race day, before the engines roared and the world blurred into a frenzy of speed and adrenaline, Oscar found a moment of sacred stillness.

In the dim light of the garage, surrounded by the hum of preparation, he’d reach for his helmet.

On its sleek, polished surface, tucked near the visor, was a small but unmistakable mark: a delicate symbol, something only he truly understood. It was his homage to you, a silent thread connecting him to the memory that fuelled every lap, every corner, every heart-pounding moment on the track.

Before pulling the helmet down over his head, he’d press a soft kiss against that mark, his eyes closing for a brief, trembling second. A whisper in the chaos. A promise carried in the brush of his lips.

“I’m here. I’m racing for you.”

And after the race, whether triumph or struggle, when he peeled off the helmet and the roar of the crowd faded into distant echoes, he’d bring it back to his lips again.

That kiss was a benediction, a thank you, a quiet “I miss you” folded into the space where words failed.

Those around him began to notice the ritual, the way his eyes lingered on that mark, the gentle reverence in his touch. They understood, without needing explanation, that behind every fearless driver is a story of love, loss, and the rituals that keep us grounded.

And for Oscar, that small, sacred mark on his helmet was the tether to a love that still raced beside him, lap after lap.

Life moved forward, slow, uneven, and beautifully imperfect. It wasn’t a sudden leap or a sharp turn, but a gradual unfolding, like a sunrise pushing through the horizon after a long, dark night. Each day brought new colours, new sounds, new moments that slipped quietly into the spaces left behind.

Oscar met new people, strangers who became friends, conversations that blossomed into laughter, and faces that softened the edges of his loneliness. He learned to smile again, not because the pain had vanished, but because it had found its place beside something hopeful, something gentle.

He laughed, sometimes unexpectedly, a lightness that surprised him. He loved again, too, though not the same way, not the way he once had. It was quieter now, slower, a love shaped by loss and tempered with gratitude for every small connection.

But beneath all of this, beneath the smiles, the new beginnings, the growing light, there was always a space in his heart that belonged only to you.

A soft, sacred corner, untouched and unwavering. No matter how full his life became, that space remained, a silent sanctuary where your memory lived on, tender and alive.

Sometimes, in the stillness of evening, when the sky faded to gentle shades of lavender and gold, Oscar would find himself pausing. He’d look out at the vast expanse above and feel a quiet presence, as if you were there, watching, whispering in the soft rustle of leaves or the warm brush of a summer breeze.

You weren’t gone.

You had simply changed form, no longer beside him in the way he wished, but woven into the very fabric of the world around him.

A part of the light that filtered through the trees, the warmth that lingered long after the sun had set, the hush of night folding gently over everything.

In that knowing, there was comfort, a subtle, enduring truth that love doesn’t vanish. It shifts, it transforms, but it never truly leaves.

And so life moved on. Not perfect, never easy, but filled with the quiet grace of memories carried softly, like whispers carried on the wind.

Because love, real, lasting love, holds a space for forever.

And in that space, you remained.

Always.

Um, I think I'm evil what the actual heck did I write. Anyway, I hope you enjoyed. As always, I am always open to suggestions and thanks for all the support!

[kuttesandknives]

warning(s): SMUT. jax in a fractured emotional state, parental death mention. 18+ readers ONLY. words: 2.3k a/n: set smack dab in the middle of season two, so spoilers are within. truthfully, this is my first x reader fic, so go easy on me with the reviews. 🥺✨

The clubhouse still smelled like stale beer when Jax stormed out, jaw tight, rings and fingers stained with blood, knuckles raw. The fight with Clay wasn’t just another blow up over miscommunication. It’d been building for months now, ever since Donna. Jax had been extra volatile lately, more so since Tara left Charming again. He saw that coming, as much as it rested bitterly on his tongue and ached in his chest. It was almost worse the second time around.

“You wanna lead, son? Start actin’ like it. Stop hiding behind your dead daddy’s words.”

That was the last thing Clay said before Jax swung. Now, those words echoed at the forefront of his mind, incapacitating any other possible thought to come to the forefront.

By the time he showed up at your place, it was well past midnight. You recognized the distant growl of his bike pulling into the parking space outside your apartment's patio–surely Patty next door would complain to the landlord about that. Not that you gave a damn.

“Can I come in?” Jax asked, his voice low and hoarse.

You stepped aside to let him inside, the porch light highlighting the raw knuckles and split lip, but you didn’t ask. Not yet. And just like that, you became the one person he could run to when shit got too damn chaotic.

The door clicked softly behind him. He was quiet for the first thirty seconds, removing his kutte and putting it on the back of your dining chair. You watched him cross the room again, taking in the blood dotted along the front of his white shirt. He plopped down on the couch and leaned back, closing his eyes as his head was facing upward.

Silence stretched between you two again as you walked into the kitchen, clicked on the dim light above the stove, and grabbed the ice pack you kept in the freezer. Part of you hated how automatic it had become, tending to Jax’s wounds like this. But tonight felt different. The fight had dug deeper.

You returned into the living room, crouching in front of him as he leaned forward now with his forearms resting on his knees, pressing the ice pack against his jaw and giving him a soft smile of reassurance. He flinched slightly, not from the cold but from the touch, like he wasn’t used to something so domestic such as this.

“You gonna tell me what happened?” You finally asked, holding the ice pack firmly against his jaw.

He didn’t look at you. Just past your shoulder, like if he’d meet your eyes, the dam would break.

“Clay.” One word. Heavy and unmistaken.

You nodded. “That bad?”

“Worse,” he muttered, finally sparing you a glance with that signature smirk for just a second.

You moved the ice pack a little, brushing his blond hair back with your free hand to get a better look at the cut on his brow. It had stopped bleeding, but it’d bruise considerably by morning. You could already see the purple blooming beneath his skin.

“Did he say something, or did you finally throw the first punch?”

A dry, humorless laugh escaped him. “Both.”

He went quiet after that. You knew better than to push. You just stayed close and allowed the silence to seep in between the two of you again. Your hand brushed against his knee as you adjusted your knelt position a fraction, your head cocking to the side ever so slightly.

He leaned back against the couch now, taking control of the ice pack with his own hand and holding it there. He looked at you–really looked.  “He said I was weak. That if I wanted the goddamn gavel, I needed to grow some balls first.”

You could see his jaw tick, like he was holding something back on purpose. “Well… did you?”

Jax’s tongue darted over his split lip. “Yeah. I swung. First time in front of the table. I knocked him on his ass.”

You let out a slow breath. “Jesus…”

He shook his head, tossing the ice pack on the side table. “He deserved it. He’s been throwing his weight around, becoming so goddamn full of himself and his vision–” His jaw ticked once again, like he wanted to elaborate but knew he couldn’t, nor would he. “Greed. Power. Lies. Everything that SAMCRO is supposed to be against, he’s gunning for everything that’s in the wrong direction on purpose.” You took his hand and held it, noticing the smear of Clay’s blood under his fingernails. “I’m scared I’m gonna become him. Or worse. I feel like everything is falling apart and I can’t get a fuckin’ grip on any of it.”

You felt your chest tighten. “You won’t.” He looked at you like he wanted to believe you if just for a second. “Every time you’ve come here, Jax, bleeding or not, you’re still fighting to be something better.”

He let out a shaky breath and leaned forward, the hand that you were holding coming up to cup your face as he spoke, “This is the only place I can breathe.” Jax’s thumb grazed against your cheek a few times as he held it while your hand came up to gently brush his hair back.

“I don’t know who the hell I am anymore,” he admitted, and it came out like a confession. “I thought I did. I thought the manuscript, my dad’s vision, all that… thought it would show me the way, but every time I try to steer this thing differently, I end up right back where he was. Drowning in the same fuckin’ shit.”

You reached up, fingers brushing against the bruise above his eye, “He didn’t drown, Jax. He was pulled under. There’s a difference.”

One hand rested on your wrist now while the other cupped the back of your neck. His touch wasn’t rough, but it held a considerable amount of weight. The pad of his thumb traced your skin, like he was trying to ground himself and like your heartbeat was the only constant left. The only thing that grounded him, tethering him to reality.

“I didn’t come here for this.” Jax admitted, his forehead resting against yours now. “I just–I couldn’t go home, you know? Not right now.”

“I know.” You reassured him in a whisper. “You don’t have to elaborate if you don’t want to.”

“But I want to.” His voice cracked on the edge of it. “You’re the only person who doesn’t look at me like I’m supposed to have all the answers. Like I’m not already burning at both ends.”

You forced down the knot rising in your throat, your gaze undeniably locking with Jax’s, quietly pleading, quietly saying all the things you couldn’t put into words. He looked back, his eyes never moving from your face; they never did, even if he’d deny it.

He moved first, deliberate and slow as he leaned in, like he was expecting you to back out but you didn’t. His lips captured yours as your breath was caught, but not out of surprise but rather relief. The kiss started carefully, loaded with a question he wasn’t sure neither of you wanted answered.

Still, you answered without hesitation, returning the same urgency.

Jax kissed you like a man starved, like he was desperate to feel something that didn’t rip him apart. His hand slid to the back of your neck, fingers tangling in your hair as he deepened the kiss. Your mouth opened for him, lips parting, and he groaned low and guttural, like the sound had been stuck under lock and key for days.

You climbed into his lap without asking, straddling him where he sat on the couch. Your knees bracketed his hips as your fingers traced up under his shirt, feeling the warmth of his chest, tracing warm skin and hard muscle. Jax’s breath hitched when your hands rested against the top of his chest, fingers curling into soft fists.

“Jesus.” He murmured against your mouth, his forehead resting against yours, “You sure about this?”

“Yes.” You whispered faintly, “I want this.” A beat of silence filled the void and then, “I want you, Jax.”

That did it, snapping the lingering tension like a bowstring.

He surged up, wrapping your legs around his waist, carrying you toward the bedroom like he couldn’t bear to waste another second. Your fingers fumbled with his shirt the second the door shut, but he beat you to it. He set you down right in front of the side of your bed, removing his own shirt as you undid his belt and zipper, letting each item fall to his ankles. He stepped out of them as he kissed you and helped you out of your sleepwear, conveniently a pair of shorts and a threadbare t-shirt far too baggy.

He gently held you in his arms and guided you onto the bed, gently laying your back against the mattress like you were something sacred; like this wasn’t just about fucking anymore, no, this was about remember what it felt like to just be human.

When Jax’s body lowered onto yours, his left hand trailed against your sides while his right held your face. His lips found yours again, his teeth gently nipping at your bottom lip. Then he pulled away just enough to study you despite the darkness in the room, as the only light that was present was the streetlight outside your bedroom window.

“You always look at me like that.” He hissed out in a hushed tone, now lapping his tongue against your neck.

“Like what?”

“Like I’m not me. Like… I’m worth a damn.” Like I’m not just another fuck, he thought.

“Because you are.” You declared once his eyes met yours seconds later.

He didn’t respond with words, but he did kiss you again. This time more urgent. Rougher, to the point where his scruff scraped against your skin with every pass. He cupped your breast, and his thumb brushed against your nipple, causing it to pebble underneath, and your back arched into him. You felt his cock against your thigh as he ground his hips into you, but he didn’t rush. He took his time, savoring the feel of your tongue against his.

Your hands explored him in return, grazing fingertips along his shoulders and cupping around his biceps with one hand while the other dipped low, gliding against the low dip of his spine.

Jax pulled back just enough to look at you, his blue eyes soft, “I need you to see me tonight. Not the kutte. Not the club. Just… me, babe, can you do that for me?” God, the way he looked at you sent a shudder down your spine. He was the farthest thing from innocent, but that look could feed patrons for hundreds of years.

You reached up, cupping his jaw, “I already do, Jackson.”

He pressed his forehead against yours with a ragged breath. Then, slowly, he reached between you and guided himself to your entrance. He slid in with a quiet groan against your lips as your walls stretched to welcome him.

Fuck. You gasped at the feel of him; heavy, warm, perfect.

He didn’t move right away once he was fully sheathed. He bracketed both his forearms beside your head to hold himself up as your body fully adjusted. He made sure to study each subtle micro expression and leaned down to kiss you again, more meaningful and sweeter, a far cry from the first batch of kisses you’d shared tonight.

He started to move now, slow and steady, hips rolling against yours in a rhythm that was all need and reverence. Every thrust was deliberate, dragging across your walls and pushing you toward something deeper than just pleasure. You clung to him, your legs wrapping around his waist to keep him close and unambiguously inside.

“Fuck.” He cursed against your lips.

“Jax–,” you sighed in a whisper. He buried his face in your neck in almost a pathetic attempt to keep it together. You felt him tremble, his biceps twitching as you held him there and the unmistakably twitch of his jaw. He was close. “Jax, baby, you can fall apart here. It’s okay.”

That cracked something open.

His thrusts became uneven now, heavier, as if your permission had granted him the space to unravel. He held you tighter, his fingers digging into your hips and his breath turned ragged.

The build in your core grew hot and insistent. Each grind of his hips pulled a breathless moan from your lips. The weight of him, the way he moved inside you, the emotion… it was too much and not enough all at once.

Your climax crept in slowly, like a tide rising. Your body tensed under him, and he felt it, slipping a hand between your legs to circle your clit with practiced fingers. “Come for me.” He muttered against your ear, “Come while I’m inside you.”

Your mind protested for a moment before caving, your body obeying after the third pass of his cock following his request. Your walls clenched around him as your release hit. You cried out his name, fingers splaying his shoulder blades as you clung to him as he wrung out every bit of what you could give him.

“Shit,” he groaned, his hips sputtering. “You feel so fuckin’ good.”

He came with a broken sound, burying himself deep one last time, his whole body going rigid for a few seconds before he slumped over you, chest heaving.

For a long moment, neither of you moved. You just held each other, hearts thudding in sync, sweat cooling on your skin. Eventually, he rolled onto his side, pulling you into him so you were tucked against his chest. He wrapped an arm around you, his thumb tracing circles on your back.

“I didn’t come here to do this.” Jax admitted, staring at the ceiling like he regretted what transpired. He didn’t, but he did at the same time.

“I know.” You said in a whisper.

Then… “But I’m glad I did.”

You tilted your head upward and smiled, pressing a kiss to his collarbone. “Me too.”

He didn’t say anything else. He just held you closer, tightening his arms around your frame.

[greengoblinswifey]

Fatal Attraction II

pairing— The Salesman x Recruiter!Reader

summary— You and the Salesman navigate your undeniable attraction that has boiled over despite the consequences. You soon discover the reason for dread consuming you since the moment you decided to break the rules with the Salesman.

warnings— sexual tension, flirting, manipulation, nipple play, choking, fingering, hair pulling, oral(f&m receiving), praise kink, fluff, L bombs, death, mentions of blood, grief, angst.

a/n— last part! hope you guys enjoyed this, ik I did!

Part I

Dread and Desire. It seemed as though those two words were all that you knew the last few days. The last few days after your—interesting encounter with the Salesman. An encounter that had been building until the dam burst and would surely burst again. Just like the before, it was only a matter of time. His desire coupled with yours would fuel you but your dread overpowered all else.

It was no wonder there were studies showing women had more survival instincts than men. That women had deep intuition you believed was never wrong. You should’ve known something like this would happen—you knew you would pay the consequences but not like this.

Your curls cascading down your back flowed in the wind as you toyed with the expensive gold ring on your index finger. It was the first piece of jewelry the Salesman had ever gifted you. It signified the first time you had gotten recruits for the Squid Game. Gifting you the ring was his way of showing his appreciation and admiration, but now—it signified everything that terrified you.

An old and poorly clothed man groaning on a nearby park bench snapped you out of your deep thought. You needed to stay focused. That was the entire reason you opted to go about your recruitments in a different location than the Salesman. He took the subway station while you took the park. The sun was good for you anyway, it made you stay positive and highlighted the mahogany of your skin, capturing potential recruits’ attention.

The tight dressed hugged your figure as your hips swayed when you walked over to the man. He immediately shot up from the bench, your presence certainly commanding attention. You didn’t even need to speak first, he was already serving himself on a silver platter.

He looked you up and down, eyes roaming over your stocking-clad feet then coming back up to rest on your chest. “Well, hello gorgeous,” he said, his tone making you roll your eyes internally.

“Good morning sir. I couldn’t help but notice you sitting here all alone on this bench. Life hasn’t been treating you well, has it?” you asked.

A smirk tugged at his dry lips and he stared up at you as though your presence single-handedly turned his life around. “It hasn’t, but I bet it’ll get a whole lot better with you in it.”

You chuckled, strained but sweetly. This was too easy. “Partially. Here, take this card and your life will transform.”

He held on to every word as you manipulatively explained the game and the possibility of a hefty prize fund. As soon as you were finished, he thanked you profusely, even having the audacity to ask you for your number. Did he even have a phone?

By then, you had gotten enough recruits to call it a day. Sighing, you pulled out your phone to text the Salesman to inform him to pick you up as the day’s recruitment concluded. Within a few minutes, you exited the park and he pulled up at your feet.

This was another thing you dreaded—being alone in the car with him. The enclosed space made the tension even more palpable and you would try your best to avoid looking at him but each time you saw him out of the corner of your eye—he was already staring. His desire ran deep—fuck the rules. He needed you. You were his dream woman.

You buckled your seatbelt and kept your head straight, staring out the windshield as the car peeled away. You could sense he wanted to say something but he held back. Knowing you, you would’ve crashed the car killing you both to avoid any further discussion about the incident.

God—the incident. No matter how much you dreaded the consequences, you hadn’t stop thinking about it. Hadn’t stopped desiring more. The way he held your hips as you slowly moved back and forth on his thigh. The way his fingers tangled in your curls as you kissed ferociously. The way he called you a good girl as you slowly moved on his thigh. Your legs clenched instinctively—you needed more.

Maybe if you had gone all the way, had him fuck you right then and there, you wouldn’t be this needy. Maybe then the desire would fade away as the intensity of your connection finally reached its peak. It was probably delusion, you knew you’d end up desiring even more, and then if anyone found out, if the Front Man found out—

You gasped at the thought and the Salesman darted his gaze to you. “Are you okay?” he asked.

Still staring straight ahead you cleared your throat and nodded, though it wasn’t convincing.

He sighed, taking a hand off the steering wheel and running it through his silky hair. God—his hair. The same hair your fingers tangled in as he kissed you like you were the oxygen he needed to breathe.

“You’re still thinking about it aren’t you? And don’t lie, I know you are.” His grip on the steering wheel tightened as you approached your destination. “I told you I wouldn’t let anything happen to you and he won’t find out. Believe me.”

You wanted to believe him, you really did—hell maybe you did believe him. It was just that pang of dread you couldn’t shake, no matter how you tried.

“I’ve never seen you like this. I’ve never seen us like this. Please just believe me,” he pleaded, driving into the parking lot.

“You know what, you’re right.” You turned to look at him—actually look at him for the first time in a couple days. He looked as handsome as the day you met. Tailored suit fitting his large frame, dark hair tousled and that chiseled face you’d give anything to have between your legs.

“There she is,” a smiled tugged at the corner of his lips. A smile that could drop anyone’s panties.

“I’m not a woman of fear. I go after what I want and I always get what I want,” you murmured, your usual confidence laced in your tone.

“And what you want is me,” he interjected.

“Don’t flatter yourself. And let’s just sleep on this,” you retorted.

He opened the apartment door trailing behind you. You could feel his eyes on your ass as you slipped off your red bottoms. As you reached down to remove the other shoe, you felt his hands on your waist roaming until he reached down to your feet. Against your better judgment, you leaned into his touch and allowed him to slip off the other shoe.

His nose nuzzled in your neck, inhaling slowly and humming in content. “You always smell so good.”

Your eyes fluttered shut as his nose was replaced with his lips, pressing small kisses against your neck. You melted into his touch, small whimpers leaving your lips as he began sucking on the sensitive skin.

“God. I missed those moans.” His praise snapped you out of your trance and you pushed him away.

“Well, keep missing them.” You rolled your eyes and pulled away from him leaving him shaking his head.

“And she’s back,” he said trailing behind you.

His breath hitched watching intently as you slipped off your dress, leaving you in your matching bra and thong and the stocking gracing your long legs. Reaching behind, you unclasped your bra turned only your head. “Take a picture, it’ll last longer.”

He was a flustered mess, cheeks growing a rosy red. His eyes were still trained on you, enveloped in the same trance potential recruits would be caught up in. His eyes roamed your back, capturing a mental picture of how your ass moved, the way your curls bounced and the delicate angel wings tattoo on your lower back.

“You’re stunning,” he whispered, now behind you.

You didn’t even turn to look at him, instead, you pulled him by his tie, bringing him into the bathroom and locking the door behind you.

“You’re just torturing me at this point,” he huffed.

You finally turned around, your hard nipples on display. Looking down, you could see his prominent bulge. Hard and surely painful.

“What do you mean? I’m just saving water,” You shrugged him off and bent over, your pussy on full display as you took off your thong. You heard him gasp, his breath caught in his throat at the sight before him.

“Fucking hell. You’re such a temptress, so beautiful,” he ragged, trying to catch his breath.

You made your way into the shower before turning to look at him. “Aren’t you going to join me? I don’t usually give these offers out just like that.”

He nodded frantically, hurriedly stripping himself of his suit and undergarments.

There stood before you in all his glory was the Salesman. His body was toned, just as you expected but as your eyes trailed down, you caught sight of the deep V line followed by his very hard length. You could see the pre cum glistening from the pink tip and the long vein bulging from the light colored shaft.

He was everything you expected and more.

“See something you like?” His deep voice finally broke the silence and you just rolled your eyes, gesturing for him to accompany you in the shower.

The warm water reflected the heat between you and a content sigh left your lips as the water soaked your body. He was tense behind you, unsure of how to proceed, watching intently as you used your soapy rag to scour yourself.

You turned to face him, his cheeks heating up and he bit his lip, watching as you fondled your soapy tits. Your hands trailed down, covering your pelvis in soap then back up to your tits, groping them seductively.

“I’ve had enough of your shit.” The Salesman held your throat firmly but gently, pushing you against the shower wall. Your chest heaved as his eyes raked over you like a man possessed. “I’m sick of your games. I need you Y/N. I fucking need you. Get it through that pretty little that head I don’t care about whatever rules were issued to us—whatever consequences. All I care about is you. Having you in my arms, feeling your body against mine.”

You were speechless, the same way he had you before. It was as though he put his own spell on you. “I’m in love with you. No rules, no consequences, nothing will come between that.”

He was in love with you. Your heart beat faster, threatening to tear away from your chest. No one had ever felt so deeply about you before. So deeply that they could care less about their potential demise.

Dread was at the forefront of your thoughts but desire consumed you. Your lips crashed together in a steamy kiss filled with emotion. His fingers tangled in your curls and yours in his damp silky hair, pulling each other closer than you already were. His body was now soapy as you ground against him, teeth clashing in the deep kiss and tongues battling for dominance.

When he finally pulled away he cupped your cheeks, staring into your eyes. “I can’t resist you any longer. Your very being consumes me. Please, let me have you.” The look in his eyes, pleading, told you everything you needed to know if his words hadn’t already.

“Take me.” At the sound of your voice the Salesman’s lips pressed against yours once more, this kiss somehow deeper than the last. His lips traveled down, nipping at the sensitive skin on your neck, hands groping your soapy tits, tugging at your nipples that were hardened.

“Every inch of you is beautiful.” He used the rag soaked with water to wash the soap from your chest before his tongue slid across your nipples. He suckled and bit down gently making your back arch from the wall and your knees wobble. His lips traveled lower, kissing your abdomen, licking your pelvis then he he fell to his knees.

“Can I taste you sweetheart?”

You slowly nodded your head, breath heaving at the sight of him on his knees for you.

“Use your words,” he said.

“Taste me. Please.” Your voice was thick with desire and you had no intention of hiding it any longer.

With your permission, the Salesman spread your legs apart, dipping his head into your pussy. His lips captured your clit, sucking and flicking as you tried to remain composed. “You—fuck, you taste better than I could ever imagine.” His praises somehow made you even wetter and he continued lapping at your juices like a man starved.

He was relentless, tongue flattening against your pussy before it slipped inside your hole. You clamped around it, your head falling against the shower walls. His hands were firm on your thigh, holding you steady as your legs shook. “You’re so wet, sweetheart, really enjoying this aren’t you?” he muttered, staring up at you.

“So so much, don’t stop.” His movements increased and he buried his face into your pussy, savoring your taste as you squirmed above him and moaned loudly. He moaned feeling your pussy clench around his tongue, the vibration sending ripples of pleasure throughout your body.

“That’s it. Cum for me, cum on my tongue,” he growled.

Your back arched off the wall and you squirmed above him as your juices spurted from your pussy and onto his tongue.

“Good girl, that’s it baby,” he cooed, drawing the last bit of liquid from you.

He stood up and you leaned against him, your legs turning to jelly after the ordeal. A smug smirk plastered on his face and seeing as you were practically helpless, he finished bathing you. His touch was gentle—intimate, as he washed every inch of your body thoroughly. When he finished, he planted a kiss on your forehead before wrapping you in a towel and carrying you to the bedroom.

“You really didn’t have to,” you murmured, watching intently as he gathered the products he knew you used on your skin.

He squeezed some cocoa butter in his hands, lathering your damp skin with it and inhaling the pleasant scent. “I like taking care of you, just in case you hadn’t noticed.”

It was refreshing to be taken care of. To be seen. Having spent so much time together, he knew the minuscule things about you, like the products you used after a shower. It was so intimate and made you feel actually loved. For the first time you let your walls down, you were still that seductress, but with him, you were just you. Not putting on a show to recruit players. He saw you for who you truly were.

All those days spent recruiting together built to this—it was unexpected, in the best way possible.

You wrapped your arms around his neck, pulling him in for a slow kiss. It was tentative then he moved against your lips like you were something fragile. “I need you,” you pleaded, pulling back just enough to stare into his eyes.

He smiled at you, rubbing your thigh before his fingers found your dripping pussy. “Wet again, sweetheart? Fine, I’ll give my good girl what she’s been craving.” His lips found yours again and he slipped two fingers inside your pussy. You moaned into the kiss as he pumped his fingers steadily, curling them until they found the spot that made you squirm.

“You’re so tight baby. You really needed this.” You certainly did. As his fingers thrusted inside your heat, a thumb began rubbing rough circles on your clit and that was enough to have you convulsing.

Your fingers clawed his back as an intense orgasm washed over you, loud whimpers leaving your lips. “Good girl. Such a good fucking girl soaking my fingers like that.” He brought his fingers up to your mouth and you slowly took them in. Your tongue swirled around them, your eyes half lidded and bobbing your head as you seductively sucked.

“That fucking mouth, wow,” he breathed, “does that mean—”

His words were cut off by you sliding down the bed and taking ahold of his hard, long cock. Your hands almost looked small compared to it. He whimpered as you stroked him slowly before moving lower to cup and caress his balls.

“No teasing baby, please. I’ve waited too long for this,” he rasped.

“Yeah? Well beg me to suck your cock.” You were taking control again.

Without missing a beat, he did as he was told. “Please suck my cock, sweetheart. I need that pretty little mouth wrapped around me.”

You chuckled softly, leaning forward to press a kiss to his tip before taking him into your mouth. The size of him stretched your lips as you moved down slowly, letting him feel everything. His breath caught, and when you glanced up at him through your long lashes, his eyes were locked on yours. His mouth hung open, and your curls framing your face made the sight of you almost too much for him to handle.

You took his cock out with a pop before taking him deeper, your pace quickening as you worked him over. His hips bucked slightly, his whimpers turning into loud moans. “Oh, God—baby, you’re so good at this. I won’t last,” he stammered, his body trembling as you deep throated him. Your hand moved in sync with your mouth, your fingers grazing his sensitive skin.

You felt his balls tighten so you pushed the tip to the back of your throat and finally, he shuddered, releasing in a rush. He practically exploded in your mouth, ropes of cum going down your throat and as you eased him out of your mouth, he spurted all over your chest. His body trembled as he murmured soft, almost dazed thanks. You leaned up to kiss him, your hand in his hair as he whispered, “Thank you sweetheart. You’re fucking amazing.”

He kissed you once more relishing in the taste of his cum on your tongue before he flipped you so he was on top.

“Now, it’s your turn to beg. Beg me to fuck you.” If it was any other man you would’ve cursed him out and left but the Salesman had a strong hold on you.

“Please fuck me. Hard. I need your cock so bad.” Your pleads made him hard again and he used the tip to drag along your puffy lips. Slowly, he sank into you, but halted, allowing your tight pussy to adjust to his size.

“Oh God,” you gasped, as he took your breath away. “You’re so big.”

“I know baby, I know. But you can take it, you were made for my cock.”

Hs slammed into you, his pace steady as you adjusted and he buried his cock to the hilt. Your moans filled the room as he then began moving with a pace that had your toes curling and your red nails digging into his muscular back.

He pounded into you as though he was proving a point, your pussy was sure to remember the shape of his cock. You could feel him deep inside your cervix and as you looked down, you saw the faint outline of his cock moving inside you. His large hand snaked around your neck as your foreheads touched, small trickles of sweat mingling. He worked his hips into you, your mouth in an ‘O’ as you breathlessly moaned with him slamming into you.

“You feel so fucking good. So tight. So perfect. I fucking love you and this pussy,” he panted.

You cried out in response and he pulled out his cock, slapping the heavy tip on your clit making you jolt. As soon as it made contact with your clit, you squirted, your juices spurting all over his cock and abdomen.

“Good fucking girl,” he praised, leaning down to kiss you and then your tits.

He didn’t give you time to breathe. Instead, he flipped your almost limp body onto your back then brought your ass up to him. You arched your back, and gasped as you felt his cock probe your quivering pussy. You were so sensitive.

He sank into you from behind and slapped your ass making you moan.

“Oh my God,” he gasped, snapping his hips against you. “You should see how fucking beautiful you look from this angle. This ass, that tattoo, your pussy just clenching around my cock. Wow.”

You whimpered loudly at his praises and did your best to please him, slamming your ass back against him, his cock brushing that sweet spot deep inside you.

“Just like that baby, you’re doing so well,” he groaned. His fingers tangled gently in your curls, bringing you back so you were arching off him.

“Feels so fucking good. You’re so deep, m’gonna cum,” you cried out.

He reached in front, rubbing your clit and sending bolts of pleasure through you. “Cum for me then, squirt on my cock.”

Your body sagged against him and you cried out as you shuddered, squirting around him, your arousal dripping down to the sheets. His pace faltered and his own release washed over him. You were still cumming as you felt his hot load fill you up and he collapsed onto the bed with his arms around you.

As the high faded, exhaustion washed over you. He retreated to the bathroom then brought a towel to clean you up. He cleaned between your legs and chest with precision then lay beside you, pulling you into his big arms.

“That was amazing,” he beamed.

You snuggled into him and smiled, though the feeling of dread came once more. What was wrong with you?

“You’re amazing,” you said, kissing his chest.

You melted into him, savoring the moment as he held you close as though you would slip away. You had never felt this way about anyone—much less have them feel that way about you too. Soon, you drifted off to sleep, another day of recruiting was on the horizon.

The next morning, you woke up content, though the feeling of dread felt even closer now but you brushed it off. You and the Salesman got ready with him unable to keep his hands off you the entire morning.

“We have to be out soon, mm—calm down,” you giggled, the Salesman pressing kisses on your neck from behind.

He held his hands up defensively then laughed, lacing your hands with his as you exited the apartment.

As he locked the door behind him, there was a card with the Squid Game logo on it. At first, you thought a recruit had stalked you to give you back the card but as you both read what was on it, your heart fell.

“You didn’t think I’d find out, did you? There will be dire consequences for your actions. You have been eliminated.”

The last words sent a ripple through you. Those were the exact words that would be uttered to players before they were killed. The Salesman sensed your fear and wrapped his arms around you, your face burying into his chest.

“It’s okay. It’s gonna be okay, I promise. I won’t let anything happen to you.” The sentiment calmed you down and you nodded allowing him to comfort you.

The day was nothing short of chaotic with the Salesman switching it up a bit. You were still on edge so you allowed him to be in his element. He baited vagrants with lottery tickets and bread, giving them the choice to choose either, not both. When the majority of the vagrants choose the lottery tickets and then lost, he destroyed the bread they rejected, stomping all over them like he had lost his mind.

You held back a giggle at the horrified faces of the potential recruits, sitting perched on a park bench watching the entertaining scene unfold. After a partially successful recruitment session, you decided to call it a day. Your contentment for the day’s activities didn’t last long as you couldn’t shake the feeling of being followed.

“Stay at the apartment. I have something I need to deal with,” the Salesman said sternly as you relayed your concerns to him.

His tone left no room for defiance so you obediently went into the apartment, tossing the card that was still pasted on the door into the trash.

There it was again. That feeling of dread, and maybe now, it was impending doom. Something was seriously wrong and all you could do was pace the apartment trying to ease the feeling.

Hours passed with no word from the Salesman until a message was sent. A simple location. You sighed in relief, wondering what was going on but decided to ask all the questions when you arrived. You drove there, punching in the address of a shabby hotel you wouldn’t be caught dead in under any other circumstance.

Your legs shook as you slowly made your way up the dark stairwell. The Salesman had made sure to give you the room number. You wondered why he hadn’t just come out to meet you. All this was unlike him but he wouldn’t lead you in any danger. If anything, he probably had a few recruits lined up.

Your heels clicked softly as you walked through the hallway then came to a halt in front of the door. As you entered, you caught the end of a conversation.

“We'll take turns pulling the trigger without spinning the culinder again. The bullet will be fired within six attempts, and the game will be over. What do you say?”

Your heart dropped. You bent the corner, eyes wide.

A slightly older, tired looking man turned around just as the Salesman looked up at you.

“Who the hell are you?” the man asked, expression unreadable.

“What are you doing here?” the Salesman added, and you opted to answer him.

“I- I got your message to come here. What’s going on?”

The look on the Salesman’s face made fear course through your veins. He was horrified. He looked down at the gun, hands slightly shaking but his expression was replaced with a sly smile. Inside though, he was crumbling. This was all part of the grand plan. A sick plan orchestrated by his superiors—by the Front man.

Gi-Hun might’ve thought he was slick but he was a pawn in this game. You all were. This was the consequence and he couldn’t back down.

He mouthed an “I love you”, one that you caught and it left you terrified. Why was he telling you that he loved you like it was the last time? Why would he tell you that in the middle of a game? And why was the game involving a loaded gun? Who had sent the message, because it clearly wasn’t him.

You watched in horror as both men survived the game twice during which the Salesman sadistically toyed with the man. Before he shot the fifth round which you realized left him only a 50% chance of surviving, the Salesman taunted the man, baiting him to cheat and shoot him instead. Your mind was clouded, words and comprehension leaving you as you watched the twisted scene unfold.

This was it. This was the consequence, and the dread you felt reached an all time high.

The older man didn’t take the bait and put the gun to his own head, and to yours and the Salesman’s shock, he survived when he pulled the trigger. Your heart thumped loudly in your chest, your palms growing sweaty as you came to a sudden realization. But there was nothing you could do. This was ordained the moment the organizers found out you had broken the one rule you were given.

“Any and all relations between recruiters are strictly prohibited. If breached there will be dire consequences—elimination.”

The man then repeated the Salesman’s haunting words to him, challenging him to cheat and shoot him dead—just as he was taunted before. He lost—the Salesman had lost the game and there was nothing either of you could do.

With shaky hands, he held the gun under his chin and tears flooded your eyes. You stood frozen in place, hand covering your mouth unable to move or speak. His gaze darted to yours, a look in his eyes you didn’t recognize and then he pulled the trigger.

Your blood curdling scream was almost as loud as the gun. The Salesman’s blood splattered across the wall as he shot a hole in his head. You fell to your knees, crawling over to him, clutching and shaking his already dead body.

You didn’t care that the other man was staring at you as you screamed and sobbed.

“No! No, please no!” you cried, your hands shaking the Salesman’s lifeless body. “No! No!”

You buried your face in his thigh, your usually freshly done makeup streaming down your cheeks with your tears. Your heart ached—he was the only one that made you remember you had a heart. The only one that made you feel loved and cared for. The only man to ever tell you he loved you and mean it. You hadn’t even said it back.

“I love you! There, I said it! Please, no! No!” you sobbed.

You chanted I love you like those were the only three words you knew. But no amount of declaring your love for him would bring him back. His consequence was death, an eternity without you. And yours was witnessing his demise and a lifetime without him.

This was your consequence. Dread had consumed desire and death reigned supreme.

[uravitypng]

𝐲𝐨𝐮𝐫 𝐠𝐢𝐫𝐥𝐟𝐫𝐢𝐞𝐧𝐝'𝐬 𝐚 𝐛𝐢𝐭𝐜𝐡

pairing: denki kaminari x reader

word count: 4.8k words

a/n: i'm so glad i finished this and i hope you all like this because i loved writing this. denki's girlfriend is possibly one of the worst people ever...

content warnings: cheating(denki cheats on his girlfriend with reader), praise, unprotected sex, creamie/coming inside, body worship, denki's girlfriend is the absolute worst, multiple orgasms, pining, reader has some self esteem issues and self doubts but denki shows her how perfect she is, oral(f!recieving), denki calls condoms rubber, reader is in denial, petnames, reader is hinted to be chubby, - mdni/18+

you didn't even want to be here... you always got a bad vibe off of them. you're 'friends' with mina but just barely, yet somehow she's dragged you to a party with people who you're definitely not 'friends' with.

at least kaminari is here, he always smiles at you and makes conversation with you even if his girlfriend is a total bitch and probably is the worst out of all of them.

you miss the time before you knew they were dating. somehow after finding that out his girlfriend seemed even worse and more entitled.

you walk into the kitchen in hopes to get another drink but instead you hear that bitch and you had a feeling she was originally talking about you and it was confirmed when she said your name. "i don't know why she's even here. the only reason mina invited her was out of pity." she says spitefully. your eyes well up with tears, maybe you did get invited out of pity, mina is someone who would do that, she knows you don't have many friends.

this whole time you don't realise kaminari is behind you hearing the same thing you are and his face twists in disgust as he hears his girlfriend carry on speaking, "she's just so boring, it's no wonder she's single." your heart fills heavy, it's not your fault that you're single you've just never found someone you clicked with, you blame it on all the fictional characters you like and you often compared them to all your potential relationships. "she's ugly. it's almost a crime that she's at a party with us, that she's in hinami's home. when i started dating kami i met some of his other friends from school when he was younger, that's when i met mineta. the really short one y'know? short, pervy and unattractive, all around terrible guy. he's probably going to be single for the rest of his life, the only way he's not is if he dates her and even then it'll be him who's the more better looking one." they laugh.

why, why, why? what did you ever do to them?

you know you're not the most interesting or the most attractive but you don't deserve this- no one does. you don't want to make a scene but you have to leave, you can't stay here any longer. you wish you could speak up for yourself but you can't and even if you could what good would it do? so you decide to leave before you start hyperventilating, before saying goodbye to mina. turning around to leave when you literally bump into kaminari and there's an expression on his face that you've never seen before and he doesn't even try to hide it.

he looks angry. more than angry, he looks pissed. he's gripping hold of the beer he's drinking so hard that his hands are becoming white around the bottle, his jaw is clenched and his stare is hard but when he feels you bump into him his eyes soften when he looks at you and takes you in. you're biting your lip trying not to sob and tears are filling your waterline. as you see him you can't stop the dam from breaking as the tears heavily stream down your face. as you push past him you hope to never see him again- any of them.

that doesn't happen though. denki has made it a point to wiggle himself into your life, inserting himself there. it happened that very night after you left the party, about half an hour after you arrived home and changed into comfy clothes he came knocking on you door. "kaminari? how... how do you know where i live? wait, what- hold up, what are you even doing here?"

why is he wet, has it been raining? he smiles genuinely at you, even though he's soaked to the bone, freezing from the rain and so very irate with his girlfriend just seeing you cheers him up. he's never seen you in a comfortable setting before, a setting where you're not dressing up from anyone, you look even cuter than normal...

"can i come in?" he asks you and you blink slowly and heavily a few times, processing the question. it relaxes you because the way he says it sounds like a sincere questions. sometimes when people ask a question you know you have to answer a certain way, you know there is a right way.

sometimes when someone asks "can i...?" you have to say yes because saying no isn't really an option, they're not really asking you. but when you heard denki say, "can i come in?" you relax because you know you could just say no and that would be okay, he would be okay with that. if you told him no he 'can't come in' he'd just leave and won't push you to say yes or try to make you feel guilty. sometimes questions like "can i come in?" or a "can we go here?" are almost rhetorical question.

he makes you feel safe.

you nod your head and step aside letting him through. "okay," you reply softly and a little hoarsely, slightly annoyed at yourself for not speaking more louder and assertively.

"how are you feeling?"

the tether that's keeping you from becoming frustrated feels like it starts fraying "how do you think i'm feeling?" beginning to get annoyed at him because why is he even here talking to you, shouldn't he still be at hinema's house with his girlfriend?

"yeah... that's a stupid question, sorry." denki rubs the back of his head with hand and steps a little bit closer to you. "let me make you feel better," he blurts out.

"huh?"

denki steps even closer to you and gently holds onto your hand, clasping it in his. "let me... let me make you feel better. let me apologise on my girlfriends behalf..." your eyes go wide starting to have an idea about what he means but not wanting to verbalise it and jump to conclusions, worrying to get the wrong idea. "let me... show you- show you how beautiful you are, how wonderful you are." he squeezes your hand momentarily and says quietly, almost begging, "please."

"what about your girlfriend?" you say girlfriend with disdain.

"what about her? she doesn't matter. let me show you how pretty you are love."

your heartbeat increases at the nickname and your face heats up. "i- i don't know kaminari."

"denki." he says gently but authoritatively.

"what?"

"please, please call me denki." he pleads, squeezing your hand again.

"okay, denki..." you test his name on your tongue and it sounds right, like you should always be saying it.

even now you're still not sure to what compelled you to say, "please show me denki." you never regretted your answer.

it starts slowly, gently, tenderly. denki cups your cheek in his palm and kisses you, placing his other hand on your hip keeping you close to him. the longer you kiss the more hungry it becomes and you're not really sure if it was you or him that deepened the kiss and pressed your bodies up against each other.

"can i love?" he gestures to your top that he's currently fiddling with the hem of, wanting to lift it up so he can touch you properly and get a good look at you.

you hum in affirmation and keep your lips attached to his, not wanting to separate. denki slivers your top up and puts his hand where it used to be, now on your exposed supple flesh, his cold hands stroking your skin delicately. as you feel his hands you shudder remembering now about how drenched he is. "you must be freezing denki." you finally move away from his lips and see his clothes covered in rain with rain drops dripping down his hair landing on his shoulders.

"it's okay. completely worth it." denki grins at you and you suddenly feel shy by the way he's looking at you. you definitely feel pretty by his gaze, it's electrifying and makes you feel bashful all at once.

"do- do you want a towel to dry yourself off with?" denki kisses your jaw and smiles, distracting you.

"don't worry about it love." his breathe against your neck making you shiver. you pout even though he can't see you and you still worry, not wanting him to get a cold. "you keep me warm."

"but-"

denki presses his lips against yours and wraps both his arms around your waist. you moan quietly and he lifts your top up over your head. "is this okay?"

"yes please," you respond, hoping not to sound too needy.

he smirks at your tone and takes off the rest of your clothes. "jesus, you look even more beautiful than i imagined," he says quietly to himself, you're not sure if you were suppose to hear it or if he even meant to say it out loud. denki runs his hands along the curves of your body.

"you imagined me?" you match his volume and he looks startled at your question, obviously surprised that you heard what he said, you come to the conclusion that he thought he was thinking but he actually said out loud

"who wouldn't? you're beautiful." denki kisses your shoulder and holds one of your breasts in his large hands, stroking your nipple as you bite your lip to stop any embarrassing noises spilling out. you're already feeling shy as it is after denki has said such nice things about you.

after realising what you were doing he takes your chin in his hand and tilts you to look at him so you're making eye contact. "look at me. you don't need to do that. not with me. i want to see you. i want to hear all the noises you make, i want you."

denki grazes his teeth along your neck and you gasp. "those are the noises i wanted." you press your lips together trying not to smile, denki grins at how adorable you look.

he moves to take off his shirt and you thought he looked good beforehand in a casual black button up shirt but god does he look even better with it off. you thought he'd be kind of skinny but he's actually lean and a little slim. you can see some defining muscle, his arms are just the same. a couple of moles on his forearms and faint freckles dust his shoulders and upper chest. you wonder if he has light freckles on his face too because you've never once seen them but maybe you haven't looked hard enough.

you know you're probably staring a tiny bit too much at his slender waist and yellow happy trail that matches the colour of his hair and he doesn't mind one bit, happy that you like what you see and fond of your attention.

"like what you see?" he chuckles. you go to hide your face behind your hand after being caught but denki catches your wrist. "what did i tell you? i want to see you sweetheart." you have the urge to bury your face against his chest, hiding away from his gaze but you resist the urge.

everything became a little hazy after that for the next ten minutes, denki has manoeuvred you into your bedroom onto your bed, hovering over you, and keeping you in between his two arms. you pull denki down by wrapping your arms around his neck so you can kiss him again. the kiss begins slow and sweet before denki runs his tongue against your bottom lip, silently asking for access into your mouth and you grant him it. your tongues intertwine and you can still taste that cheap beer he's been drinking that's still lingering even though you've already been kissing previously.

you could kiss denki all night but he has other plans as he starts touching your breasts again and moves his hand down your body to get you ready for his cock, surprised to find that you're already wet. "wet from just a little kissing? that's so cute." he kisses your cheek and whispers against your ear.

"denki," you whine, "don't tease me."

he has to take a deep breath after hearing you whine, not wanting to let you know how bad you affect him because if you keep making noises like that he'll come in his boxers before he gets inside you. "it's okay love." he grinds himself against your thigh, groaning at the contact, letting you feel how hard he is. "i'm just the same." he says deeply and you shiver at the knowledge that denki is just as turned on as you. he's turned on by you.

his dick is almost painful with being contained in his jeans so he rushes to take them off. precome stains his grey boxers turning the area black and he takes them off too, grinning at you. the one way you would describe denki's dick is pretty, just like him so it makes sense. he's a little longer than average, circumcised and pubes trimmed. you want him inside you. now.

"do you have a- you know?" denki asks, gesturing to your bedside cabinet. he regrets not carrying any condoms in his pocket or wallet but his girlfriend only likes having sex in ones of their bedrooms. she's not a fan of spontaneous sex.

"oh, um, maybe? in the bathroom. i wasn't really expecting this and i don't- don't do this a lot... at all really." you admit, while trying to think about where you keep condoms because you must have them somewhere but you keep coming up a blank. the entire time denki's thinking about how you never do this, it makes him feel special, special that you're letting him make you feel good.

you want him... all of him. "i um-i-i'm on the pill." denki's eyes snap up to look at you.

"holy shit are you serious right now?" he asks automatically and enthusiastically, his face lighting up.

you start regretting your suggestion and denki can tell by the look on your face, he thinks he probably spooked you. "we don't need to do anything like that if you don't want to love. i can eat you out for hours. i mean hell, that sounds like at absolute dream." you giggle after hearing that. "sorry i was a bit quick and excited there, i've just never had sex without any rubber on."

you're surprised after hearing that, thinking that he's the type to go without and you tell him just that. "i think that was why i was so excited, i've always wanted too. it's always been a dream of mine and i don't like using them but i've never brought it up with any of the girls i've been with."

"well.. is it okay that i brought it up?" you ask more confident seeing that denki is delighted with the idea.

"fuck yeah. i trust you like crazy. if it was going to be anyone i'd want it to be you." he tells you, grinning. he trusts you. if he had the opportunity with anyone he'd choose you? your heart flutters.

"i don't really like condoms either and i want you, all of you." you tell him shyly and denki's heart misses a beat after your confession.

next thing you know denki is pushing his cock into, inch by inch. even though denki has already prepped you and has been touching you there is still a slight stretch. both you and denki groan simultaneously. your velvet, warm, wet walls welcome him without any barrier.

what comes out of denki next is a mixture of moans, groans, swearing and praising with each thrust. "fucking hell, holy shit sweetheart. you're fucking beautiful, most beautiful girl in the world, so pretty." with each praise and compliment every slight doubt that lingers in the back of your mind disappears, your sole focus being on the man above you. "you feel so good, lovely." he holds your hands in his, enlacing your fingers, that seems far too intimate for a supposedly one night stand to make you feel better.

he catches on to how to please you best with every gasp, noise and shake, and only after a couple minutes he seems to know your body better than you do. with every thrust he's rubbing against your g-spot, drawing circles over your clit and taking your nipple in his mouth.

you came harder than you ever came that night, multiple times with your ears going fuzzy and eyes going blurry. denki doesn't let you know but he's in the same boat, his come spilling into you, the warmth making you shudder and arch your back, grabbing onto him tightly. he's never came as much as he did and he knows that it's all because of you.

you don't know how it happened but denki ended up staying the night and leaving in the early hours of the morning. this wasn't how your night was suppose to go but you don't regret it. he did what he said he would when he arrived on your doorstep, he did make you feel better and he did make sure you didn't spend the night upset and feeling insecure and alone. that night was so shitty, his girlfriend was so shitty yet he succeeded in making it a good night.

when he came to your door you thought there was a silent understanding, a one night stand and after this he'll go back to his girlfriend. for that one night he'll be making up for what his girlfriend said but it didn't turn out like that.

you expected to not see denki for months, that is if you ever see him again. you expected to go back to calling him by his last name and trying to forget what he looks like nude and how his stomach went taunt as he was about to climax but instead you saw him a week after when he knocked on your door, slamming his lips against yours and pushing you against your wall. at least once a week for months now you would see him, you know you should feel bad for his girlfriend, he is cheating on her with you, but you don't, not in the slightest.

after the first few times denki came by again you slipped in some questions afterwards, wanting to know if he was doing this with other girls. he isn't.

wanting to know if you're still the only person he's slept with without wearing a condom. yes you are and he has no intention of changing that.

you've never asked him any questions involving morality like if he feels guilty or if he loves his girlfriend. it doesn't involve you.

you're aware now your relationship has developed more than it once was, the closest label you have would be friends with benefits. some nights denki knocks on your door unannounced, like always, with a bag of popcorn and your favourite snacks ready to watch a new film that has just come out on netflix. he's probably the closest friend you have, you stay clear of his girlfriend though, she isn't even aware that you and denki are close now. hopefully the last time she's spoken about you or thought about you was at that dreadful party and hopefully it stays that way.

denki likes his girlfriend... he does... if he was quoting mean girls he'd say something along the lines of - there's good and bad to everybody. but his girlfriend is just more upfront about it.

that would be a lie though. there are some things he likes about his girlfriend and when they're alone together it can be really good but he then remembers about how awful her attitude is towards other people. towards you. sneaking around and cheating on her is honestly rather thrilling for him and he likes the idea of silently letting you get your own back.

sometimes he'll rationalise it in his own head while he's drunk. cheating on her is okay because he's always wanted to sleep with you. it's okay because ever since you first met, denki wished you were his girlfriend.

he could never end it with his current girlfriend, his parents always ask about her and it would cause a rift in their friend group. near the beginning of their relationship his girlfriend brought herself a dog but he prefers denki over her, opting to want his attention over hers. if they did break up he knows he'd never see that dog again, he's grown to love it. it's just as much of his than it is hers but he knows that that won't matter and he'll never see him again if they broke up. they work next to each other and they go to all the same places.

he could never break up with her, he'd never hear the end of it with his parents.

so for now he gets to have some joy from getting to see you and kiss you and lay his head on your lap while you watch television together. if he tries hard enough he can almost imagine you're his girlfriend instead.

one night denki's at yours, you're not doing any explicit but you're just enjoying your night together, that is until she spoils it. denki's ringtone going off disrupts hot fuzz and he takes the call not even bothering to pause the movie. you decide to turn it down though. "kamiiiii, where are?" god her voice is grating. once a voice that spewed such nasty things about you now just sounds annoying. "i came by yours and you're not here."

denki closes his eyes shut tight, it looks to you that he's annoyed too. "sorry, i'm out tonight." he lies and know what is about to happen next.

"don't you want to see me. c'mon home, we can spend the night together." she giggles into the phone. you knew it. you knew what would happen when he answered that call from her.

denki knows he does't really have a choice without explaining where he is so he agrees to come see her. "okay, i'll be there soon." you both stay silent for a moment not talking before he breaks the silence. "i'm sorry love, we didn't even get to finish the film. i swear we can finish it next time." he apologises.

he thought he saw disappointment on your face for a second but he knows that he's just seeing things, you wouldn't be disappointed for him to go, you're not like that, he knows to you that he's just someone to fuck. he knows that you're using him to get back at his girlfriend. he doesn't mind that one bit though, as long as you're in his life.

"you can watch the rest without me if you wanted to." he tells you getting up from the sofa.

you shake your head, "no, no, it's fine. we can watch it next time. bye kaminari."

'oh no she's annoyed at me, she called me kaminari. she hasn't called me that in months. maybe she wanted to have sex tonight and i've ruined her plans. i can't stay now though, i'm already leaving. i'll have to make it up to her.'

you don't know why you called him kaminari, you knew it was petty but that didn't stop you from saying it. sometimes you get so caught up with denki you forget that outside of your home he isn't yours and he never will be. you're just sleeping together, that's all, and you don't want anything more than that... you don't...

denki thought about you all night, you never left his mind. he hates that he left you but he felt like he had no option. if he was anyone else he would have enough sense to distance himself from you but when it comes to you his judgement gets cloudy and he'll do whatever he can to be in your life, even if that involves lying through his teeth to everyone about where he is.

two nights after denki left after the phone call he came to yours with a takeaway in his hand and a grin on his face. he doesn't actually say the word 'sorry,' he doesn't acknowledge that he left abruptly, he just grins and asks "hot fuzz?"

you match his grin and let him in. you thought maybe you would be a little annoyed with denki after seeing him in your doorway but you realised that you had no right to be annoyed. you're not his girlfriend.

one takeaway and half a film after you're playing with denki's hair and he hums in happiness and gratitude. "i could have you play with my hair all night but do you want to take this to the bedroom love? i'm still pretty hungry." he takes your hands away from his head so he can kiss your wrist and winks at you. you roll your eyes and call him an idiot. "just for you sweetheart." it just came out and both of you heard. denki splutters and tries to backtrack what he said but it's too late, his whole entire face is red and his eyes are wide and you're doing no better. you haven't fully processed the words yet but you're sure it was accidental, it's just denki being denki. you turn your head away from him, nervous and embarrassed. your cheeks feel like they're on fire and you don't think you have the courage to look at him in the eye. even though you've talked yourself into how it was denki just being denki you still can't look at him.

the implications that he's yours makes you incredibly happy but you don't even want to accept that, after all you just see him as a friend. he's a good fuck. you're absolutely in denial. at least he isn't. he knows he wants you to be his, fully, completely, body and mind.

you both end up trying to ignore what he said, haphazardly but relatively successful, pivoting back to denki's offer of going to the bedroom. "denks are we taking this to the bedroom or not?"

'god she's amazing.' he's so glad you aren't acting weird.

denki's got his head between your plush thighs, he's holding onto them keeping them open so you don't close them and stop him. licking a strip along your pussy, before flicking your clit a few times with his tongue and then lapping up your juices as he plays with your breast and moaning at your taste. "denki, don't do that, it's embarrassing."

he looks up from where he's laying to see you, "what? enjoy myself. don't complain or i won't let you come."

the threat of not being allowed an orgasm shuts you up, knowing that denki will absolutely deliver on that threat if he wants to. you know that he would eat you out for hours not letting your come once.

you loose track of time, your hips start rolling uncontrollably and you grab hold of his hair. "don't get greedy sweetheart, you'll come when i say you can." he holds down your thighs to stop you from moving and kisses your hip, sucking to form a mark on your soft skin. his mark.

for all his threats he does let you come. "you've been so behaved. so good sweetheart," he mumbles against your skin. you come again and again. he finally lets up and you watch him lick his lips and wink at you. you turn your head away from him and he chuckles. his erection is visible even with his jeans on and denki flops down on the bed next to you, drawing you closer so you're laying next to each other, his arm under you.

reaching down to his jeans you start stroking him through his clothes. "don't worry about that, not tonight. i just wanted to look after you, make you feel good." he places a chaste kiss on you forehead.

"you always make me feel good," you tell him honestly and his heart feels like it's beating out of his chest.

"then my work here is done." he replies and you giggle. he is completely and utterly in love with you.

he can't tell you, no matter how much he wants to. you don't feel the same way and he can't lose you.

how much longer will you stay in denial for?

will his girlfriend ever find out about you two? maybe that will be your tipping point. maybe her finding out will make you realise that you want denki more than a quick fuck or a friend. maybe her finding out will be what you need. you're in love with denki.

[darkmatilda]

𝐜𝐡𝐫𝐲𝐬𝐚𝐥𝐢𝐬 | 𝐬.𝐫𝐞𝐢𝐝

𝐬𝐮𝐦𝐦𝐚𝐫𝐲: there’s a stranger living in your body. after a traumatic experience, you shed your own identity and adopt another—one that belongs to the sister of your captor. while spencer fights desperately to restore your lost memories, the rest of the team decides to use the piece of a person that lives within you to catch the unsub.

𝐜𝐨𝐧𝐭𝐞𝐧𝐭𝐬/𝐭𝐰: continuation of metamorphosis, spencer reid x fem!bau reader, split narrative, amnesia and loss of identity, cult, hotch acts like a total bitch but it is explained later, a vague, even imprecise description of a psychiatric facility, forgive me for all the inconsistencies and plot simplifications because there are plenty of them lol (same goes for those few corny moments)

𝐰𝐨𝐫𝐝𝐬: 15k

𝐚/𝐧: sorry it took e so long to write the second part—it required a lot of planning. to make your reading more fun, you can use my reading game and see if you manage to get bingo <33 the biggest thanks to my dear @angellic4l not only coming up with this title but also for the overall help with planning, and to @mggslover for holding my hand during this difficult labour...

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/ˈkrɪs.əl.ɪs/ a moth or butterfly at the stage of development when it is covered by a hard case before it becomes an adult insect with wings or the case itself

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I am Lydia.

The cardboard box landed on the counter, accidentally knocking over a piece of paper, which Spencer didn’t even notice. Instead, he began placing the first items inside—items he honestly hadn’t expected to be so numerous. Choosing the first one proved immensely difficult. He paced the walls of his apartment, feeling as if his feet weren’t even touching the floor.

I am Lydia.

Bringing small, personal items is a therapeutic practice often used in cases of amnesia or identity disorders. Their presence, touch, and smell can sometimes break through the walls built in the mind of a person suffering from memory loss, shattering them and allowing everything that had once been separated to flood in like water through a broken dam. In theory, it sounded logical, even simple. In practice, someone had to choose the right items.

I am Lydia.

Even though days had passed since he saw her empty gaze settle on his face and her lips form that sentence, so certain of its truth, it still haunted him.

The kidnapping, the torture, the pretending—it had all completely broken her mentally, causing her to truly adopt the identity of her captors’ sister. She genuinely believed she had become her. First, she spent some time in the hospital to regain her strength, but very quickly—in fact, it was only the fourth day since her escape—she was transferred to a specialized psychiatric facility for federal agents.

And now he was about to visit her for the first time.

Reid spent the most time choosing the first item. Well, initially, he had only planned to bring one. One small thing—something that wouldn’t overwhelm her. He settled on her badge.

The moment his fingers gently lifted it, opened it, and his gaze fell on her expressionless face in the photo, he seemed to slip into a trance. She didn’t remember who she was, for heaven’s sake. The badge itself wasn’t a talisman that would magically restore all the lost years, names, faces, and relationships. So he decided to take something else too.

The earrings Penelope had given her for her birthday—her favorites, though their shape and color meant she never wore them to work, not wanting them to clash with her professional demeanor.

An old, used ticket to a musical she had already seen, still pinned to her fridge.

A handmade card from their godson, Henry. 

A book he had given her, its pages filled with two distinct handwritings—their separate annotations intertwining between the lines, overlapping at times like strands of hair in a braid.

Photos—all the photos he could find.

Before he knew it, he needed a box to take everything with him.

"Seriously, Spence?" JJ’s eyes widened in surprise as he slid into her car and set the box on the floor, reaching for his seatbelt. He avoided her gaze—just a little. "I’m not even sure they’ll let you in with that much stuff."

He shrugged. It was morning; they had arranged the day before to go together. Actually, it was JJ who had offered. Not only did she not want either of them to face this alone, but she also still seemed to feel a bit guilty for blaming him for her abduction.

He wasn’t offended. Not because he thought she didn’t have the right to blame him, but more because his mind was currently consumed by a much greater worry.

"Well, as long as I’m not bringing anything dangerous."

"They still might say it’s too much," she said, glancing at him from the corner of her eye. She took in his hunched, exhausted shoulders, the tension in his body—like he was bracing for a blow, caught in a state of perpetual waiting. For things to get better. Or worse.

She didn’t look much better herself, deep shadows under her eyes, but she was holding it together. JJ always held it together. Spencer sometimes caught himself wondering what it would take to truly break her—then immediately shut the thought down the moment he reached the obvious answer. It made him feel sick, and he refused to go there.

Suddenly, she pressed her lips together. "At least, I think so. I’ve never been there. Never..."

Her eyes fixed on the road. She had never had a reason to go.

When they finally pulled up to the facility and Spencer grabbed the box, JJ hesitated for a moment before stepping out of the car.

"We only have thirty minutes," she announced.

Spencer’s brows shot up in surprise, his mouth opening in protest, but she pressed her lips together—almost apologetically.

"I know it’s basically nothing," she admitted, "but Hotch wants us back at the office after. We’re starting a new case."

He already knew that.

Which didn’t mean it didn’t feel like a fucking joke.

After they got her out of the oil rig, the surviving kidnapper—Lavinia—had escaped. She reached a boat before the police helicopter hovered over the scene, something they hadn't been aware of at the time. After that, she vanished without a trace.

They should have been looking for her. She was a serial abductor, a murderer. She had nearly drained her of blood—had done it to other women before. But the official stance was that, after losing both her siblings—including her sister’s body—Lavinia had also lost whatever force had been driving her crimes. She wasn’t a danger to civilians, they said. She would rather disappear than strike again.

And in the meantime, there were other cases, more urgent ones. People abducted, children held captive—where hours, even minutes, could tip the scales between life and death. That was the nature of the job. Priorities. Because they couldn’t save everyone.

Spencer understood that. But he couldn’t just let her stay free. Neither could the rest of the BAU.

So they worked the case after hours, burning through sleepless nights.

It wasn’t like the FBI had entirely abandoned the search. Lavinia was a wanted fugitive. The first day after her escape, dozens of roads had been shut down, the entire country put on high alert. Airports had been monitored, all the usual places checked.

But Reid had a feeling it wouldn’t matter.

She was too smart. Too careful. Too experienced at running.

They wouldn’t find her in a location.

They had to find that location in her mind.

"Are you sure you can handle this?" she asked quietly as they got out of the car. She looked at him carefully her expression gentle, almost cautious. "You know, going in there, seeing her..."

"JJ, I could ask you the same thing," he cut in dryly. He didn’t like the way she was treating him like someone who needed to be handled with care. "Even if I'm not ready, it doesn’t matter. If she’s going to get her memories back, she needs to see the people she knew."

"I know. Her therapist said the same thing. I just want to make sure you're okay."

"Let's just go."

She gave him a long look, sighed, and let it go.

The moment he stepped over the threshold, a strange feeling washed over him. It didn’t surprise him—he even knew its name, which, given how common the term had become, wasn’t exactly impressive. Just a déjà vu. Recognition without recollection.

Just like JJ, he had never been to this place before. But his brain still reached for a memory that felt almost identical, if he really thought about it. Someone close to him, memory loss, hospital visits—the more he let his mind go down that path, the less prepared he felt, which was completely irrational.

And Spencer deeply hated when things in his life didn’t fit within his personal definition of logic. He felt uneasy dealing with things beyond its reach. He felt uneasy then. 

But he was already standing right in front of her door, which was slowly opening before them, and there was no turning back.

"Lydia, like I told you, you have visitors," the facility worker announced.

JJ looked at him, pale. His jaw also tensed when he heard the name the worker had used.

“It’s meant to reach her and gain her trust,” he explained to his friend in a whisper, the words barely making it past his clenched teeth.

He already knew he would simply speak to her without using any name at all. Nothing else would physically make it past his lips—more likely, it would get stuck in his throat and choke him first.

He adjusted his grip on the box. The room didn’t resemble a hospital ward; in fact, it was a rather cozy space with large windows and an abundance of flowers. Soft turquoise walls, dark flooring, a wooden floor lamp with a slightly old-fashioned shade adding a touch of character, and a small bookshelf filled with books. Spencer felt relieved that she hadn’t been placed in a setting that visually resembled the one where she had been held captive.

Before he managed to find her with his gaze, he exchanged one last glance with JJ. He gave her a small nod. It was okay. She nodded back.

The woman standing by the window turned to face her visitors. She was already dressed in casual, comfortable clothes instead of the ones she had been given at the hospital. Because of that, and the cozy decor of the room, she could have passed for an ordinary person, surprised by friends dropping by unannounced. For a brief moment Spencer felt exactly that way—like it was their day off, and he had just stopped by without warning, only for her to open the door with a pleasantly surprised expression, happy to see him, glad she had no other plans.

Recognition without recollection.

He had to shake off that feeling. But he didn't do it himself—her face did it for him. Marked by healing wounds and entirely indifferent to the sight of her friends. In fact, her gaze barely lingered on them before shifting uncertainly toward her therapist, thumb brushing against her lips. She lightly bit down on her nail—a reaction to stress.

She never used to bite her nails.

"These are your friends," the therapist informed her, stepping slightly to the side as if to encourage her to focus on Spencer and JJ. "You might not remember them. They just dropped by to talk, to see you."

Slowly, she looked at JJ first, then at him.

He caught himself overanalyzing her every smallest gesture and movement, searching for something familiar. If she were herself, her eyes would have gone to the box first. A foreign object, yes, but held by someone she knew, someone she was friends with, someone she saw almost every day—the box would have instinctively drawn her gaze.

But instead, she looked at him first. A stranger standing in her room. Only then did she glance at what he was holding.

"I can stay if you feel like you need me to," he continued. "But if you'd rather I leave..."

"Stay," she finally spoke.

Though her voice was quiet, Spencer heard her with an almost heightened frequency. Each syllable distinct, separate, rather than a fluid sound.

The therapist nodded but subtly shifted into the corner, giving them space to talk.

Spencer met her gaze and tried to speak, but no words came out.

"I'm JJ," his friend finally said, stepping forward toward the woman she used to greet with a hug and a kiss on the cheek on various occasions.

This time, she extended a stiff hand instead.

"Jennifer Jareau, actually. Or maybe...maybe you know who I am?"

She didn't answer. And by not answering, she didn't deny it either. And so, Spencer felt a surge of a naive hope.

"Should I?" she asked.

JJ closed her eyes longer than a normal blink, trying not to show how much it affected her. Meanwhile, Spencer was staring at the box—at a pair of colorful earrings lying on the cover of the book he had picked up. Only then did he notice its title. A Case of Identity by Arthur Conan Doyle.

Oh, fuck you, coincidence. Do you always have to mock everything?

"And I'm Spencer Reid," he replied after a brief silence from all sides. He tucked the box under his arm so he could also shake her hand. That seemed like the right thing to do—touch from familiar people might help her remember them.

Her hand wrapped around his uncertainly, lightly, as if testing the waters.

"These are, um, things that might interest you. They..." He hesitated, unsure if he should phrase it that way. But pretending she truly wasn’t herself didn’t seem particularly helpful in the process of recovering her memory.

She was herself—just buried deep within.

And they had to reach for her slowly, subtly.

"They belong to you."

Her lips parted in surprise.

He handed her the box, and she stared at it, bewildered, yet drawn to it.

His heart pounded faster, and he struggled to swallow, his throat suddenly tight.

Unmoving, he watched—along with JJ and the therapist—as she sat down on the bed and silently examined the items.

Each of them, in their own way, hoped for a breakthrough.

The musical tickets confused her. The earrings, she simply called pretty. When she picked up the book, she only glanced at the cover before setting it aside without a trace of interest.

“Where did you get these?” she asked. “You said they were mine, but that’s not true. I’ve never seen them before.”

Before anyone could respond, her fingers caught one of the many photographs.

“Oh, that’s you. Oh, this boy…” she sighed, surprised at the sight of Henry’s picture.

JJ shifted uneasily, her face lighting up with something close to hope.

“He looks just like my brother when we were kids. Same hair.” She let out a quiet chuckle before tossing the photos back into the box.

"You don’t—" Spencer started, his tone almost sharp, surprising even himself.

He had meant to say You don’t have a brother, but he managed to stop himself. So did JJ’s hand, gently reaching for his forearm in a subtle gesture of restraint.

He drew in a deep breath, wincing slightly.

"You have no idea what a smart kid he is. His name is Henry."

She nodded, her gaze drifting between him and JJ.

"Your son?"

"My son," JJ corrected gently.

She let go of his forearm, but before she did, her eyes flicked to his watch. And the time.

"Spence, we have to go," she murmured.

He looked at her in surprise, then at his watch.

She was right—the small window of time allotted for their visit was nearly up.

He couldn’t even begin to articulate how deeply disappointed he felt. He hadn’t expected her to recognize them immediately, but he had hoped for something—some flicker of familiarity. A gesture, an expression, a phrase she used to say. Or at the very least, some tension, some sign that deep down, something inside her was fighting to surface.

Instead, she acted like a stranger who had stolen his friend’s face.

After they said their goodbyes—or rather, after JJ said goodbye, because he hadn’t managed to—they walked out into the hallway in silence.

He was too shaken, too numb. His body felt disconnected from his mind, moving only out of ingrained habit. If his muscles hadn’t carried him forward automatically, he might have collapsed face-first onto the floor.

“It was the first meeting,” JJ said after a long moment. “With time…with time, it’ll get better.”

Spencer only looked at her, wanting nothing more than to believe that.

ʚଓ

He wanted to visit her the next day, and the one after that, but something always got in the way.

Specifically, work.

Over twenty-four hours on high alert during an attempt to rescue a kidnapped child—an attempt that not only failed but ended in tragedy, with the unsub still at large. His eyes burned from exhaustion, and the edges of objects blurred if he stared at one spot for too long. When he finally decided he couldn't push through any longer (the first of his three standard milestones before completely collapsing), Hotch assigned him to an interrogation.

They had managed to track down several people from whom Lavinia and Leon had been acquiring medications and medical equipment. Spencer personally considered it a waste of time; he was convinced that no one knew where the woman they were searching for was—except for herself, of course. But he couldn’t exactly refuse an order, so he headed to the dimly lit interrogation room, feeling as though his tie was slowly strangling him.

During the questioning, he inadvertently managed to extract a piece of information from one of the men. It didn't necessarily bring them closer to catching Lavinia, but it was something that absolutely warranted FBI follow-up. That alone took hours, and in the meantime, at least twice, the rest of the team consulted him about their current unsub’s profile (the second of his three standard milestones before completely collapsing).

And when it was already late at night, there was still the report.

Hotch had made it clear that he wanted to see it on his desk before either of them left the office.

So, Spencer hovered over the documents, their pages tinted yellow under the glow of the desk lamp. The ticking of the clock filled the silence, and in his exhaustion—pushed to the point of absurdity—his brain started generating the sound of a cricket chirping, as if bitterly and ironically emphasizing its opinion on this amount of work and staying this late.

He was dangerously close to the third milestone, so he took a detour around logic.

Instead of finishing the report and going home, he started procrastinating—his chin resting on his hand, a pen in his fingers feeling as heavy as a barbell. They always had packed schedules, but this was starting to get excessive. Suspiciously excessive.

There was a high probability that exhaustion alone was making him unusually receptive to conspiracy theories, but that didn’t change the fact that one had started to take shape in his mind— as if it didn’t already have enough to deal with.

Either he was imagining it, or the boss showed up with another task at the exact moment he finally managed to finish the last one.

He didn’t suspect Hotch of plotting to work him to death. But he did suspect—just a little—that he wanted to keep him at the office as long as possible.

And that’s where the conspiracy part began.

It crept into his mind hesitantly, uncertainly, suggesting that maybe—just maybe—this was meant to keep him from visiting her again.

Why?

Well, no logical explanation came to mind, though he tried hard to find one. He clung to the thought. It wouldn’t leave him alone. Was it just a tool to stretch out this hazy, half-dreaming moment of procrastination, or was there actually something to it?

He never answered that question because then, someone knocked on his office door. 

He quickly pulled the barely started report closer and pretended to be engrossed in it as Rossi walked in, a leather jacket slung over his shoulder.

"Have you even eaten anything today?" Rossi asked.

"Nice to see you too.

The older man stepped closer to his desk and placed a triangular sandwich in a plastic container on it. Spencer regarded it with mild surprise, but before he could thank him, Rossi spoke again.

"You've been here way too long," he noted. "I know you're using work to avoid thinking about everything that's going on. I get it, really, but you're going to burn yourself out, Reid."

Spencer gave a small shake of his head—not an energetic denial, just the barest movement.

"It's not like that," he refuted. "Not this time. I want to go home, but Hotch told me to finish this report."

"He could've had anyone else do it, seeing the state you're in."

"I'm not in any—"

Rossi cut him off with a sharp scoff.

"Have you seen yourself in a mirror lately?"

For a moment, Spencer just stared at him, exhausted eyes dull and unblinking. Then, without a word, he reached for the sandwich, his fingers trembling slightly from an excess of caffeine. Rossi sighed because, of course, he had noticed.

"How I look is the least of my concerns right now," Spencer muttered.

"This isn’t about anyone’s sense of aesthetics, though, forgive me for saying this—you look like hell. It’s about what’s happening to you."

He paused, waiting for Spencer to say something, but he simply stuffed his mouth with the sandwich, so Rossi decided to continue. He spared him the lecture about his health, though.

"What about her? Any progress?"

The food started to swell in his mouth, and he struggled to swallow it. The reason was simple. Guilt.

"I've only seen her once," he admitted. The thought gnawed at him. In a way, it was because of him that she had been kidnapped, he hadn’t done anything to save her, and after everything, he hadn’t even been there for her. Friend of the year, truly. The best she could have ever wished for. He felt the need to justify himself in Rossi’s eyes. To make sure he didn’t think he was avoiding her because he was too weak to face it. "But that’s only because I practically live here."

Rossi nodded, watching him analytically.

"From what I’ve heard, though, there hasn’t been any improvement," Spencer added after a moment.

"These things take time. But she’ll pull through soon, trust me."

"I don’t understand it," Reid blurted out, his voice slightly louder, shedding its usual apathetic tone. It had been festering inside him for days, growing, and he didn’t know why it chose to escalate and escape right then, in that dimly lit office—but he let it.

"She was holding up so well…I mean, what she went through was horrific, and I’d do anything to keep her from experiencing it…We watched those streams, you saw them too. She was pretending to be Lydia, I thought, No I didn't think she was actually becoming her…If that were true, she wouldn’t have done what she did then…”

"As you said, she’s been through a lot," Rossi replied, watching him with quiet concern. Because of course, Spencer’s voice had faltered as he got the words out, and with exhaustion clinging to him so completely, he must have looked like nothing more than a pathetic, broken mess. “Trauma finally caught up to her. Before, she was too focused on surviving. But now she’s safe. She has access to professional help, she has us, she has you. She’ll be okay,” he tried to reassure him. “Go home.”

“What?”

Reid froze, thinking he must have misheard.

“I said, go home. Get some rest. I’ll finish the report for you.”

“No, Rossi, you can’t—”

“As it happens, I can. I’d rather stay late for one evening than have to watch you in this state again tomorrow,” Rossi said, taking advantage of Reid’s surprise to snatch the report from right under his nose. He let out a chuckle when it became clear the report was practically blank.

At Reid’s incredulous look, he just shrugged. “What? I mean it. Go home. And tomorrow, I’ll do whatever I can to make sure you can go see her. Even if it means yelling at Hotch.”

He hesitantly rose from behind his desk, his gaze still fixed on it. He could see from Rossi’s expression that he was sincere, that he truly cared about him—and that feeling tightened something in his chest.

“I don’t know how to thank you.”

“Then don’t. Just go. Seriously, get the hell out.”

For the first time in days, a faint smile appeared on his lips. He grabbed his half-eaten sandwich and reached for the bag waiting for him beside his desk. Just as he slung it over his shoulder and cast one last grateful glance at Rossi before heading toward the door, they opened—without his doing.

In other words, they opened because someone else had stepped inside.

At the sight of Hotch, he froze, his fingers tightening anxiously around the strap of his bag.

At the sight of JJ standing behind him, his brow furrowed in deep confusion.

The two of them, here, at this hour? Right at the moment he was about to dump his responsibilities onto Rossi? Sometimes, fate really seemed to hate him.

"I need a word with you," Hotch announced, his face as unreadable as ever.

He didn’t seem surprised to see another team member there. JJ, on the other hand, was avoiding his gaze, her arms stiffly crossed over her chest. They both stepped inside, forcing Spencer to take a step back.

"Oh, Aaron, give it a rest already," Rossi sighed, rolling his eyes. "Just look at him. He looks like he’s about to drop dead any second now, and he probably will. It was cruel to make him stay in the first place—"

"Dave, this will only take a moment," Hotch cut him off.

"What is this about?" Spencer asked, his voice hoarse.

He was exhausted, desperate to go home, but he couldn't suppress his curiosity. Or the worry creeping in as he thought about it more. A chill ran down his spine, making him stand a little straighter. Had something happened? Was it about her? Had she regained her memory?No, judging by their expressions…

"I think we have an idea on how to catch Lavinia," JJ spoke up, glancing at her boss from the corner of her eye.

She seemed tense, almost hesitant, and Spencer couldn't help but wonder if this was truly a plan they had come up with together. What exactly did it entail to make her react this way?

"But it will require…uh, it will require—"

"We want her to hold a press conference," Hotch clarified for her, pausing to let the weight of his words fully register with Reid.

It didn’t.

Spencer had no idea what he meant. Neither did Rossi, who crossed his arms over his chest and silently mouthed what?

"We'll make sure it's broadcasted on every possible channel. Wherever Lavinia is, she's likely keeping track of the news and any police activity related to her," JJ continued, running her fingers through her hair in thought. "When she sees that she has her sister's identity… we're assuming she'll believe her ritual was a success, that Lydia truly has been reborn in her body."

Either due to exhaustion or because the plan simply made no sense, he struggled to follow their reasoning. But the longer he sat in silence, analyzing it, the more he started to grasp what they were trying to convey.

"But," Rossi began, crossing his arms. "Let's assume she does believe that. Then what? How exactly does that help us catch her?"

"Lavinia lost her brother and was left alone," Hotch said. "And for her, their sibling bond was always the most important thing. We believe she's delusional enough to actually believe this—more than that, to come back for someone she thinks is her sister. But she's also cautious and will likely consider the possibiity that we're setting a trap."

"Which means we need to plan this carefully. As... as Lydia, she has to be convincing. She needs to mention something only the two of them would know..."

Spencer raised his eyebrows higher and higher at the blonde woman.

"And how exactly is she supposed to do that if she's not Lydia and doesn't have that information?"

"Oh, c’mon, Garcia will definitely be able to dig up some details from their childhood. Besides, she spent some time with the twins. Leon told her a lot about them. She just needs to agree to say what we've rehearsed with her beforehand. And that's where we might have a problem—she might not want her sister, or well, someone who thinks she's her sister, to get caught” 

JJ paused for a moment, her gaze locking with his, catching his eye.

"You need to help me convince her," she asked.

For a brief moment, Spencer stood motionless, unsure of how to respond. Rossi didn’t seem to know what to say either. The two of them had managed to explain the plan reasonably well, but when he tried to imagine her in front of cameras, talking about her sister as if she truly was Lydia, as if she had really been reborn in her body, he felt a wave of nausea. He shook his head in disbelief.

“No. No, no, no way,” he started repeating, even though he wasn’t quite sure how to justify it yet. No, and that was it. “This…this is like encouraging her to stay Lydia. To stay without her true identity. What if it makes her condition worse?”

“It’s just one press conference. Alright, maybe two. Enough to gain Lavinia’s trust and suggest a place where they could meet. So far, there hasn’t been any progress, nothing we could undo or waste. At least…at least maybe we can catch the person who did this to her.”

Her words hurt because, in a way, she was right. There hadn’t been any progress they could ruin.  However, that didn’t mean he was going to agree to it. The small chance, the risky and somewhat flawed plan to catch Lavinia, shouldn’t matter more than the potential harm it could cause to her, their best friend. They should be helping her regain her memories, not feeding her head with new, false ones that didn’t belong to her and forcing her to speak of them convincingly, reinforcing the identity of an imposter.

"It will hurt her," he said quietly, trying to reach JJ, even though it was clear she had doubts too. She had to—this was about the godmother of her son. He clung to the belief that she had those doubts. He looked at both of them, including Hotch, who, it seemed, briefly lowered his gaze. "Do you really want to risk her health?"

He hesitated before responding. Spencer had long given up on deluding himself that he truly understood the emotions hidden behind that serious facade.

“We’ll consult with her therapist,” he finally decided. “But if he agrees, then that’s exactly what we’ll do. No matter your personal doubts.”

He exchanged glances with both of them before they left the room. JJ looked as though she wanted to stay and discuss it with him one more time, but his expression made it clear that he wasn't up for it, and she relented.

The only thing he wanted now was to go home. Thank goodness Rossi had agreed to finish that report for him.

ʚଓ

“She did something bad, didn’t she?” she asked. “That’s why you’re looking for her. And that’s why you want me to help you.”

She was sitting on her bed at the facility, one of the available books left open beside her when they walked in. She looked at JJ with clear distrust. The moment they brought up Lavinia, she tensed, and her responses became sharper, as if she was determined to defend her sister at all costs.

Spencer stood a few steps away, arms crossed over his chest, listening more than actively participating in the conversation. As always, he found himself staring at her. The injuries on her face were healing, and in theory, she should have been looking more familiar to him. But it was the opposite. Even in silence, she no longer resembled the person he once knew.

Missing someone who was right there beside you was something truly difficult to describe. He could say that the feeling only grew stronger the more time he spent with her, which felt almost paradoxical. When he visited her, he spoke little. He simply couldn’t bear the way she answered his questions or addressed him, treating him like a complete stranger.

He berated himself for it in his thoughts. She wouldn’t remember who she was if he didn’t communicate with her. On top of that, he was placing the entire burden of this situation on JJ. He rubbed his temples, feeling the growing pulse within them. Thanks to Rossi, he had managed to get home a little earlier, but that didn’t mean he had gotten any sleep. The thoughts and worries haunting him weren’t the kind he could simply jot down in the journal on his nightstand, pour out of himself, and empty his mind in the process. They had long since seeped into it.

He still didn’t trust the plan to capture Lavinia, even though he had agreed to go with JJ to the facility to discuss it with her. Deep down, he hoped she would refuse.

“You’re right,” JJ said after a moment of careful thought, choosing her words with great precision. “She did something wrong, something that can’t be undone. But running only makes things worse. If she comes back on her own, the consequences will be far less severe. Someone has to convince her, and we thought you would be the best person for that,” she paused, her lips trembling before she forced out the next words. “As her sister.”

He watched as the woman swallowed, hesitation nesting in the corners of her face. Spencer, looking at her, tried to pierce into her mind and decipher the inner monologue unfolding within. What did it look like from the inside? Did she truly believe she had become someone else, or was there a lingering feeling that something was off?

How far would he have to go, wander, and search to stumble upon the remnants of her true identity—something that could be rebuilt and revived?

The sound of a phone ringing broke the silence. JJ reached into her pocket and whispered a quick apology before stepping out into the hallway, leaving them alone.

For a moment, neither of them spoke. An unpleasant feeling coiled in his stomach.

"You can sit," she finally said, nodding toward the spot their friend had occupied just seconds ago. "If you want."

"I’m fine," he replied.

A moment later, he sat down.

Something strange began to weigh down the air the moment he did. Physically, he was close to her, yet for once, physical proximity did not define reality—it deceived it. They were far apart, so far that he had no idea what to say. What to talk about with her.

"If Lavinia comes back," she suddenly began, shifting her gaze to him and fixing it on his face. Did something in her subconscious recognize him? "Will I be able to see her?"

He hesitated before answering. If he denied it—if he truthfully said that if Lavinia came back, she would never leave prison again—he would likely cause her to refuse. Hotch’s entire plan would collapse before it even began because she wouldn’t agree to take part in the press conference.

“Yes,” he finally forced out, against his better judgment. He didn’t know what had tipped the scale. He had been ready to observe his team’s scheme from the sidelines, yet he couldn’t face her alone. “If it works. And she comes back.”

For a moment, her expression blurred, her gaze unfocused. She must have been lost in the vision of seeing her sister again—he could almost swear the corners of her lips lifted in a dreamy, longing way. He looked away, unable to watch as the thought of someone who had hurt her so deeply evoked a better reaction than seeing him did.

JJ still hadn’t returned—she must have received an important call. They sat in silence. His gaze landed on the cardboard box in the corner of the room, the one filled with the things he had brought her. He recalled the frantic state he had been in while packing it, grabbing item after item, hoping they would help restore her memory. They had failed. Maybe they had never had that kind of power to begin with. Maybe he should try himself instead of relying on keepsakes.

“H-how…how do you feel here?” he asked at last, hesitating. “I mean…in this place.”

She seemed surprised that he was starting a conversation with her. She studied him for a moment without saying a word, then shrugged slightly.

“It’s nice here,” she said. There was a lot of emptiness between her words. There wasn’t much more she could say when she wasn’t there entirely by choice. Or even fully understood why she was there. “Just a little boring. I mostly read.”

He felt even guiltier for not spending more time with her. He was just about to speak when she added:

“And I really miss my siblings.”

Spencer stayed silent, not knowing how to respond. He got angry every time she said something like that—not at her, of course, but at everything that had happened to her, everything that had led her to this state.

“It’s good that you have books,” he said quietly. “Have you read the one I gave you?”

She furrowed her brows before finally remembering.

“Oh, that one. No, sorry. I don’t think it’s really my thing. What about you? Do you like it?”

He nodded.

"One of my favorites."

"Maybe I should give it a chance, then," she mused.

Spencer nodded again. He remembered the annotations in it, the small pencil notes in the margins. They had both written down what they thought the solution to the mystery would be.

"I think you'll like it. It's Sherlock Holmes."

"Then no wonder it's one of your favorites. I mean, you're with the police, right?"

"With the FBI."

"And you're here, visiting me, because something happened to me."

He froze on the spot, not expecting the conversation to take this turn. Was she starting to remember something? He struggled to find words, so he just nodded again. The pressure inside him grew, tightening his chest and buzzing in his head. 

"Yeah. Yeah, that's why...Do you remember anything?"

He hoped she would hesitate, that something would start to break through the fog clouding her mind. He waited for her answer, his gaze locked onto her with quiet desperation.

She shook her head.

"Nothing at all," she said.

Spencer couldn't hold back a disappointed sigh, and at the sound of it, she flinched slightly.

"I'm sorry."

Their eyes met and held for a long moment.

He was about to say she had nothing to be sorry for—that none of this was her fault—but something in her gaze stopped him. There was sadness there, the kind you don’t direct at a stranger. Unless, of course, you're a natural-born empath. But usually, it's just a trace of pity, dusted with awkward sympathy.

With her, it was genuine sorrow. And something else.

She looked away.

"I'm back," JJ announced, stepping through the doorway and tucking her phone into the pocket of her jeans.

Her eyes landed on them, sitting side by side. It was clear what they had been talking about. For a brief second, her expression brightened—but then she caught sight of their faces and hesitated, momentarily thrown off.

"It was...a call about the conference happening tomorrow," she explained. "The one we really want you to be part of."

A moment of silence stretched between them as JJ cast a meaningful look at the woman sitting beside him.

For a second, it was impossible to tell what she was going to say. Would she refuse, realizing that their main goal was to capture her sister? Or would the need to see her again win out? And, more importantly, had she believed him earlier?

"What do you want me to say?" she asked.

Her tone sounded like agreement.

Spencer exchanged a glance with JJ, wondering if she truly believed they were doing the right thing.

"We'll give you a script and go over everything with you, so don't worry," JJ assured her. "We just need to know...hm...we need to know if you and Lavinia had any places that were important to you as siblings…”

They spent another hour at the facility, listening to her suggestions—her memories, or at least what she believed to be memories.

She knew a surprising amount.

And the worst part was that she spoke with such conviction, as if she genuinely believed she had lived through it all.

ʚଓ

You had never been in front of cameras before.

Or rather, you had once, a long time ago, but the experience was so small and insignificant that it had disappeared from your memory. You had never stood in front of cameras knowing that everything—your face, your voice, your body language, your behavior—would be broadcast on national television.

You were incredibly nervous, despite all the preparation. You didn’t have to think about what to say; you simply followed the guidelines given to you by the agents working with you. They handed you the script that you had built together. They told you that Lavinia might not believe you were really her sister, which seemed absurd to you. Why wouldn’t she believe it? You were family. You came from the same womb, and you had always, always trusted each other. No one provided you with an explanation, and eventually, you gave up on the questions, focusing on other things instead.

Your words had to be planned. They had to form a code, one that could only be understood by her, for her. There were going to be two conferences. In the first, you only had to introduce yourself. Show that you were truly yourself, whatever that meant. In the second... they hadn’t explained that to you yet. But they had asked about some place that only you two knew about. You didn’t understand why, but you felt a strange emptiness in your head when they asked. The more you thought about it, the more anxiety gripped your body. What if you couldn’t name any place? What if you never saw your sister?

Finally, you managed to force out the name of your family’s hometown. The last foster family you were sent to. You hadn’t been there long, only two years, but it was the only place that truly felt like home.

"Please, be honest with me. Did I do well?" you asked, looking at the blonde woman.

 JJ, as they called her.

She bit her lip, hesitating before answering. It was right after the conference, and she had taken you for a walk outside the center so you could clear your head a little. It was nice to finally leave that strange place. The trees were much more beautiful when you could walk past them instead of being confined to watching them through a window. Why did you have to stay there? Why couldn’t you just go back to...you didn’t even know where. To Lavinia, you could have said.

"Well, it was clear you were stressed," she started, and you frowned, so she quickly added, "But don’t worry. It’s normal, anyone would be stressed in your shoes. The important thing is that you got all the necessary information across. In two days, you'll have another conference, and I'm sure you'll do better then."

For a moment, you stared at her in silence. It seemed like she wasn’t telling you the whole truth. That, secretly, she was dissatisfied. in fact, it always felt like you weren’t getting access to the full truth. There were always these unspoken things, doubts. People even looked at you in a strange way. Her and that other agent.

Oh, especially him. Although looked was too strong a word. He avoided your gaze. Spencer, the surname slipped your mind. Spence, JJ called him.

She didn't form an opinion about either of them, but while she could say that JJ was nice and seemed to care about her, she couldn't say the same about him. He appeared less often, spoke little, and when he did, it seemed like he forced himself to say each word, holding back a grimace every time she opened her mouth. However, he stared at her when he thought she wasn't looking.

How should she interpret such behavior? The more she tried to understand it, the more she thought about him, and when she did, a buzzing filled her head, like the sound you get from awkwardly adjusting a radio dial.

JJ’s phone started ringing, and with a sigh, she reached into her jeans pocket, murmuring apologies under her breath.

You decided to focus on the walk, pushing aside thoughts of the press conference, of finding Lavinia, and of the peculiar agent for a brief moment. It wasn’t like they wouldn’t let you leave the four walls of your room entirely. You just couldn’t leave the building alone, and while someone always accompanied you, with JJ by your side, you felt much less watched. More at ease.

“What? What happened?” she asked, pressing the phone tighter to her ear. Suddenly, her eyes widened. “Oh. I understand, I understand, I’m so sorry. It’s just…Will’s not home, would you be able to...yes? Thank you...”

You watched with curiosity as she tucked the phone away. She seemed slightly shaken, but not completely rattled.

“It’s the neighbor who was supposed to take care of my little one,” she explained, noticing the look on your face. “She called because her mom was admitted to the hospital...My husband is also at work, so I asked her to drop him off here. Hope it’s not an issue if we head back a little earlier?”

You felt a bit disappointed, but understood that these things happened. You shook your head in denial and soon, you both turned back toward the center. Within minutes of walking, a car pulled up beside you, and a small boy jumped out. The woman behind the wheel offered a few more apologies before driving off.

JJ looked at her son, then at you. She swallowed and made a sound, as though searching for the right words, probably about to introduce you, but the blond-haired boy beat her to it.

In fact, he threw himself into your arms.

“Auntie!” he exclaimed joyfully, colliding with you, his little body crashing against yours.

At first, you completely froze in place, not expecting this at all. But as the initial shock passed, or rather just a fraction of a second earlier, you reacted almost instinctively, holding the boy tightly and closing your eyes with a strange feeling of relief in your chest.

When you opened your eyes, you immediately caught JJ’s gaze. 

You hold it for too long, and by then, you already knew she knew.

ʚଓ

"Are you leaving?"

Spencer didn’t freeze upon hearing his boss’s question. In fact, he was—he had finished his work and had every right to do so. He slung his bag over his shoulder and gave a confirming nod.

"As you can see."

The coldness in his tone had long since slipped out of his control. He was too tired for anger, so he stuck to his short, sharp replies and cynically thrown statements, all while ignoring the echoing question in his mind if was this behavior leading him anywhere? 

"Reid," Hotch called him back before he could take even a single step away. Lately, it seemed like he was constantly holding back a tired sigh. Well, with one of their team members suffering from memory loss, a serial killer still on the loose, and yet another case just beginning, it was taking a toll on all of them.

"I have to ask you not to visit her today."

He remained silent for a moment before letting out a short laugh. He wasn’t particularly surprised to hear something like that from Hotch. Well, he would have been once. But lately, things had changed a lot between them.

"There's another press conference tomorrow," Hotch explained, watching his reaction without so much as blinking. "She did terribly at the last one. I assume you're aware of that. If we want everything to go according to plan—"

"We have to keep letting her believe she's Lydia, resurrected through some ritual," he finished sarcastically. A surge of anger clenched his chest, but it faded quickly, replaced by nothing more than sheer disappointment. That was probably the best word for it.

"This is hurting her. What does it matter if we catch Lavinia if she ends up staying like this forever?"

His voice wavered slightly, and for a brief moment, it seemed like something close to concern flickered in Hotch’s eyes before he pushed it down.

"Recovering memories takes time, Reid. Just because she hasn’t yet—"

"Oh, I’m well aware that it takes time. You don’t need to explain that to me." He exhaled sharply, irritation laced in his tone. "What I also know is that by now, there should have been some progress. Even the smallest sign."

He took a deep breath, recalling the last time he saw her. After that conversation about books—when he thought he'd caught something strange in her expression—he had stuck to his decision and visited her as often as work allowed. He had hoped to dig down to that spark again, to turn it into something bigger. But maybe he had been wrong. Despite the few conversations they’d had since, her eyes still didn’t light up at the sight of him like they once did. There was only unfamiliarity in them.

"Don't you think it might be different if we didn't force her to pretend in front of cameras that she's someone else? Or if you didn’t keep me here until ridiculous hours, making it impossible for her to see the people she actually knows?"

"I'm only keeping you here as long as necessary. And right now, it is very necessary."

"Or," Reid lowered his voice, suddenly aware of the weight of his own words, "you're doing it on purpose, so she doesn't regain her memories too quickly."

A shadow flickered across Hotch’s face.

"Because that wouldn't be convenient for the case."

Reid swallowed. "I thought… I thought you could see us as more than just coworkers, Hotch."

His boss’s jaw tensed, but it didn’t stop him from continuing. Before he spoke again, Spencer took a deep breath, making sure his voice was even lower. If he was going to say this, he was going to be brutally honest.

"Because we’ve always seen you as more than that. As family. At least—I did."

For a moment, they remained motionless before Reid finally tore his gaze away from Hotch’s unreadable face and walked away, not giving him a chance to respond. Not that he thought Hotch would have continued the conversation anyway.

Lowering his eyes to his hands, he realized they were trembling. He clenched them into fists to stop it. He had let out a lot, but it hadn’t brought him any relief. If anything, saying it out loud had made it hurt even more.

He left the office with measured steps, his breathing slightly uneven. Despite the request that had started this conversation—this argument, or rather his own bitter monologue—he decided to go there anyway. To her.

A strange nervousness settled in his chest, a sense of foreboding he couldn’t shake. His desperation had reached its peak. He knew this visit wouldn’t be like the last ones, when he had carefully measured his words, speaking softly so as not to overwhelm or frighten her.

This time, a little turmoil—some real emotion—might be exactly what was needed.

It might be the spark.

He was afraid that Hotch might have made a call revoking his right to visit her. So, upon arriving at the facility, he tried not to draw attention to himself and slipped into her room as discreetly as possible.

She was sitting by the window, a closed book resting on her lap. She wasn’t reading, but the moment she heard the door open, she suddenly grabbed it, as if caught off guard. However, when she saw that it was him, the book fell limply in her hands.

“Um, hi,” she said, showing him the book’s cover. It wasn’t the one they had discussed. “I still haven’t started that one, I’ll admit it. But like I said, I don’t think it’s really for me…”

She trailed off, watching as he approached the small bookshelf and pulled out the book in question—the one filled with their shared notes and annotations.

Gripping it a little too tightly, he sat down across from her.

“But I think it is for you,” he said. His voice came out weak, despite his efforts to keep it steady, despite the storm of emotions raging inside him.

He handed her the book—almost pushed it into her hands.

“Open it.”

She raised her eyebrows.

“On any page. Please.”

It was clear she had no idea what he was getting at or why he was staring at her so intensely. But he wasn’t asking for the impossible—just for her to open a book—so she only sighed quietly and complied, curiosity flickering in her eyes.

She flipped to the first page and started skimming through, too fast and too carelessly.

“Read the margins,” he urged, his voice rough with something dangerously close to pleading. He swallowed hard. “D-do you recognize it?”

The woman remained still, her gaze tracing the pencil-written sentences on the pages. For a moment, Spencer could hear nothing but the pounding of his own heart, drowning out everything else.

“You wrote them.”

She let out a surprised scoff and shook her head.

“I’m seeing this for the first time in my life.”

“It’s your handwriting,” he repeated, louder this time. “Yours. Our notes. I gave you this book a while ago. Three years ago. Exactly one thousand one hundr—”

“I’m seeing this for the first time in my life!” she cut him off, raising her voice as well. She lifted her hands as if to cover her face, to steady her breath that was growing too fast, too out of control.

Spencer caught them—too abruptly. She flinched when her skin touched his.

“I’m sorry,” he whispered, loosening his grip but not letting go. He simply held her hands as gently as he could, momentarily paralyzed by the sensation. He rarely exchanged handshakes, but when he did, he remembered them vividly. This touch, this specific feeling, was the only thing about her that had remained unchanged.

He smiled faintly, in a way that was both bewildered and heartbreakingly fragile.

The woman remained silent. Her gaze was fixed on their intertwined hands, her chest rising and falling in erratic rhythm.

"Look at them again," he pleaded. "Do you recognize them? Your handwriting? Your thoughts?" He paused to swallow. "Do you recognize me?"

Their eyes met. Hers were wide, his head tilted slightly in a silent, almost prayerful gesture. And then, gently, almost imperceptibly, she nodded.

For a fleeting moment, he thought he might have imagined it. His breath halted entirely.

"You recognize me?"

"I do," she replied.

She looked down, but not at their hands this time—just away, retreating for a second.

"You're the agent working on my case. Because something happened to me. Something involving my sister. You visit me, so yes, I do recognize you."

All the hope that had begun to build within him shattered. It escaped as a short, broken sound—somewhere between a whimper and a sob of sheer helplessness.

For a moment, he thought it had worked.

That he had her.

That he had her back.

Spencer drew in a breath—he had to.

And then he did something absolutely spontaneous, reckless, unreasonable… in some way, even downright selfish.

For one last time, he lowered his gaze to their hands, shut his eyes, and leaned forward—before logic could catch up to him.

The unexpected pressure of his lips made her freeze. Shock tightened her grip on his hands, but otherwise, she barely moved. Holding her breath—just like him.

For him, it was tied to anticipation, to a foolish sliver of hope.

He had no idea why he, Dr. Spencer Reid, a devoted friend of reason, had chosen such a… fairy-tale-like gesture. Did he truly believe it would work? Some tiny part of him must have. Otherwise, he wouldn’t have done it.

And, God, he almost wanted to laugh at his own stupidity.

But then something happened that stopped him from laughing at himself.

She moved within the kiss—not to return it, but to examine it, almost as if she were testing something. He inhaled sharply through his nose, just as she jerked away from him as if burned, her eyes blazing with fury.

She said something, but he couldn’t hear it over the deafening rush in his ears. It happened. She…

"I want you to leave," the words spilled from her lips—lips he had just kissed.

It was like waking up from a trance. He shook his head.

“N-no, I— but I—”

“Before I call security.”

Spencer stared at her, his eyes wide. She looked straight into them, not avoiding him.For what felt like the thousandth time, he searched for something familiar in them. Anything.

She yanked her hands free from his grasp and nodded toward the door.

ʚଓ

two weeks earlier

Even though you had regained consciousness some time ago, you remained in a state of half-sleep for a while—where sounds around you alternated between growing louder and fading away, where your body sometimes floated on soft waves and at other times lay buried beneath tons of rubble, where your eyelids trembled against the hospital room’s light.

You forced them open with difficulty, immediately colliding with someone’s dark irises. Upon noticing your movement, they softened with fleeting relief—but only for a brief moment.

"It’s good to have you back," he said, though his voice carried no real ease. On the contrary, it was filled with an insistent tension that compelled him to speak again before you could utter a word. You were in a hospital. The events of the past few days began flashing through your mind.

“Am…I…” you started, but your weak, hoarse voice made it barely intelligible. You forced yourself to swallow. “Am I safe now?”

You needed to hear it from someone else to believe it.

Hotch didn’t answer your question. He just stared at you, motionless.

“She escaped,” he stated simply.

A crushing noise filled your ears. How was it possible that she had managed to get away? Just picturing that woman’s face, remembering the suffering she had inflicted on you, sent a jolt through your body.

You gathered every ounce of strength you had—some borrowed on credit—and pushed yourself up into a sitting position so you could look your boss in the eye.

“No.”

You shook your head, refusing to accept this reality. In truth, you wanted to scream—at Hotch, at the team, at everyone involved in the rescue mission for somehow letting this happen. At yourself, for not making sure you’d be free once and for all, the way you had with Leon. His memory flashed too vividly before your eyes—or rather the memory of his shattered skull.

You looked down at your hands. The blood had been washed away.

You almost choked on air as another wave of realization crashed over you.

“No,” you repeated. “We have to do something, Hotch. We have to catch her as soon as possible. Are there even any active searches? What about the airports and—”

“We’ve implemented all necessary procedures,” he assured you. “But keep in mind how cunning an escape artist Lavinia is. We might not be able to track her down right away. And if she refrains from further kidnappings, if she withdraws from the criminal world…”

“You’re telling me we might never catch her?”

Hotch remained silent for a long moment.

“Not exactly,” he finally said. “I’d say we might not be able to catch her using standard methods.”

He had only suggested it. The rest—the entire plan—was almost entirely your creation. The mere thought of Lavinia roaming free somewhere, even far away, made you sick to your stomach. You knew the nausea wouldn’t subside until handcuffs adorned her wrists. Just like the nightmares, the fear, and the lingering psychological terror wouldn’t fade. You were willing to sacrifice a lot.

In a way, even your own identity.

"Are you sure you want to do this?" Hotch asked, once everything had been decided. "Do you really think you can pull off being Lydia? Enough to fool her own sister?"

You nodded without hesitation.

For a moment, he just stared at you, searching for any sign of doubt. Though he was a man of reason and logic, in crisis situations, he could commit to even the most reckless plans—if he saw a glimmer of hope, even the slightest chance of success.

"Hotch," you called out just before he stepped away from your bed, before he could leave the room.

Your throat felt dry again.

This next part—this next decision—you weren’t as sure about. But there was no time for hesitation. You had to trust your instincts. They had saved your life before.

"This stays between us."

His face flickered with surprise.

"If I’m going to become her, I need to believe it, at least in part," you explained. "I have to immerse myself as fully as possible. I can’t do that if every one around me knows the truth and keeps treating me like me. That’s why you can’t tell anyone."

"Not even…?"

Alone in the room, you touched your lips.

Spencer had just left—or rather, you had made him leave.

You had to.

You couldn't allow the mask you'd so carefully crafted to slip, even a little. Yet every time you spoke to him, it loosened, piece by piece. That was why you had asked Hotch to keep him away, to make sure he wouldn’t visit you again. When he agreed, when he kept the two of you apart, you knew there was no turning back. You were fully committed to the plan now.

At some point, you caught yourself linking Lavinia with the concept of a sister, losing track of your own reality, getting tangled in the web of your own thoughts and memories.

It had gone too far.

The only thing that stopped you from completely losing yourself was the conversation you'd had a few days ago, right before your first press conference. That conversation had been both a relief and a disappointment.

Because of it, you'd faltered.

And in this plan, everything depended on you.

You couldn’t afford another mistake.

Meanwhile, tomorrow's press conference loomed, and you sat by the window, an open book resting on your lap, still feeling the ghost of his lips on yours.

Your mind was clear. Sharp.

More aware of who you were—who you really were—than ever before.

Fuck.

ʚଓ

"If Lavinia watched the last press conference—and let’s hope she did—she’ll probably watch this one too," JJ muttered, standing across from you in the room where you were getting ready. Neither of you met the other's gaze, like two bullets that would explode on impact, tearing everything apart. "She probably already suspects you’re trying to send her a message, but she won’t think the FBI is involved. You need to mention the town where she and Lydia grew up, but subtly. Don’t say the name outright, just hint at it, maybe—"

"The town where we grew up," you cut in.

The words felt strange in your mouth. Just yesterday, calling Lydia yourself had been instinctive, as natural as breathing. But then Spencer happened. Then that stupid kiss happened. And after that, nothing felt natural anymore.

JJ’s correction made her look you in the eyes for the first time since she had figured it out—since your reaction to Henry hgging you had given you away.

You knew Hotch had let her in on the plan and ordered her not to tell anyone. But that didn’t mean she supported your actions. In fact, once the initial shock and relief had passed, all that was left was anger. Until now, she hadn’t allowed herself to explode or confront you.

Until now.

“How…how can you even do this?” she snapped suddenly, shaking her head in genuine disbelief. “Lying to us like this, playing a role while we’re all worried about you. Me, Derek, Emily, Penelope…” She started listing the team membersbut the last name got caught in her throat. She didn’t say it with frustration—just a quiet, precise accusation. “Spencer. Do you even know what he’s going through? And can you imagine how he’ll react when he…”

"And do you have any idea what I’m going through?" you hissed, completely breaking character. "Knowing that the woman who kidnapped me, tortured me, made me take care of a dead body, tried to drain my blood, and nearly killed me is still out there, living free?"

You scolded yourself immediately, ordered to get back into the act. The press conference was starting in just a few minutes—you had to stay in character. But it was unbelievably difficult when your best friend didn’t even seem to try to understand your situation.

"And you really think this is the only way to catch her?" JJ pressed. "This was reckless from the start—"

"It’s not the only way, but it’s the one I chose," you cut her off. "And trusting my own plans, relying on myself and my instincts, is what saved my life. When you couldn’t. So, forgive me for sticking with what works."

Her eyes remained wide open, her chest still, as if she had forgotten how to breathe. When she finally tried to draw air into her lungs, her whole body trembled.

You wrapped your arms around yourself, trying to steady the shaking inside. You had hoped that letting out the anger—so deeply tied to who you were—would help you set it aside. At least for the duration of the press conference.

You both knew it was time to leave the room. JJ seemed to be waiting for you to turn toward the door.

"You could have at least told us," she said quietly.

Your hand closed around the doorknob, holding it too tightly, for too long.

For a moment, you were back in that small, freezing room where Lydia’s body had lain. Her hair fanned out over the pillow, the teeth of a comb gently untangling each strand. Her wrists, marked by wounds. The door that never opened. The closet where you had spent an entire day—the only way to survive the cold without freezing to death.

"No," you said simply. "I couldn’t."

ʚଓ

Spencer had a feeling that JJ had been acting strangely for a while now.

It was hard to pinpoint whether it had been like this from the very beginning. Ever since this whole thing started, they hadn’t actually spent much time together. Most hours, he was buried in work. Sure, they usually went to the facility together, but during those moments, his mind was occupied with other things—not with analyzing whatever was hidden in her expression.

They found themselves facing each other across the jet, separated only by a table and some sort of barricade that seemed to have appeared relatively recently. She avoided his gaze. Her answers were more general, but then she would almost as if reconsidering, add something after the pause. It was as though she was aware that her behavior betrayed whatever it was she was hiding, and she was desperately trying to mask it. The thing was, it was too late.

Or maybe she was just tired, like all of them, like him. Or maybe it was him slipping into paranoia again. What could she possibly be hiding from him? His gaze involuntarily shifted to Prentiss, sipping her coffee.. For a long time, he had struggled to forgive them for the lie, but eventually, he understood that it had been necessary. The circumstances had justified it. But now? What is happening now? 

He was quickly distracted by the sight of someone else. The whole team was present on the jet, including her. During the conference, she had done what they asked of her, subtly encoding the message in the meeting. They hoped that Lavinia, driven by the desire to reunite with her beloved sister—who had been brought back from the dead—would not only understand it, but also respond by showing up at the brief location mentioned.

Asheville was a city in North Carolina, where the triplets had been taken in by one of the many foster families throughout their lives. It was said to have truly been their home, the only place where they hadn’t experienced the cruelty of another human being, someone who was supposed to care for them.

Spencer watched her staring out of the window. Of course, she believed it was her first time flying on a jet. She sat directly across from Prentiss, who, by the way, had initially been against bringing her along. In the end, they hadn’t taken her for her knowledge of the area, which she clearly didn’t have, but to possibly lure Lavinia in.

"The couple that adopted them back then is no longer acting as foster parents to anyone," Morgan sat down next to them, his nose buried in the prepared files, flipping through them with little emotion. "The siblings spent exactly three years with them, from the age of fifteen to eighteen. After that, their trail goes cold until the first kidnapping. Doesn’t it make you wonder what happened to them during that time?"

Spencer shrugged. He didn’t feel very present in his body.

“Maybe they’ll answer that question for us,” JJ muttered. Of course, they had planned to interrogate them. “Assuming they know themselves. What exactly do they do, by the way?”

Mrs. Thomas opened the door for them, pressing a hand to her chest at the sight of the FBI on her doorstep. She was dressed in a brown button-up dress with a simple pattern, fastened high at the neck. She appeared outwardly elegant, but Spencer noticed that the fabric of her dress was visibly wrinkled, her eyes looked tired, and her face was gaunt.

“My husband isn’t home,” she announced almost immediately. Then, suddenly, her lips parted in alarm. “Oh, God, did something happen to him…?”

Morgan quickly reassured her with a gesture of his hand.

“This is about something else entirely. Actually, we’d just like to talk.”

They were invited inside. JJ accompanied them as well, while the rest of the team had been assigned to other tasks related to the search for Lavinia. Also, someone also had to keep an eye on her. Of course, they couldn't bring her to the Thomases. To them, she would be nothing more than a stranger claiming to be their former foster child.

When the woman was asked about the triplets, her face showed a tense expression, not entirely decipherable but clearly strained.

“Did you keep in touch after they reached adulthood?” JJ asked at one point during the conversation, as they were led into a living room filled almost entirely with dark mahogany furniture.

“Our paths diverged,” she stated curtly. Most of her responses followed the same pattern—brief and carefully measured.

"Has any of them tried to contact you recently?"

She watched Spencer closely as he glanced around the room. He wasn’t doing it out of nosiness—it was simply a profiler’s instinct. He always paid great attention to his surroundings, fully aware that clues could sometimes be found in the deepest corners of a home.

"You just asked if we kept in touch, and my answer was no. So I think it’s not hard to figure out that my answer to this question will be exactly the same."

There was no television inside. He wondered if she kept up with the news, if she had heard about the recent events and the ongoing search for Lavinia. He exchanged a meaningful glance with Morgan. She had taken on a passive-aggressive stance, seeming more than just displeased with their presence. Not even displeased—stressed.

“Mrs. Thomas, what made you decide to become foster parents all those years ago?” Reid asked, slipping his hands into the pockets of his blazer.

It wasn’t directly related to why they had come, but he needed to loosen her tongue somehow—perhaps get her to share something important, even by accident. The woman let out a short sigh before answering.

“My husband and I were never able to have children.”

“So you decided to take in three teenagers at once?”

“That’s admirable,” JJ interjected immediately, shooting him a look. “I mean, a huge responsibility, but also a beautiful gesture.”

The woman looked at her blankly.

When asked further questions about the siblings, she answered only as much as she had to, avoiding any details.

Yes, they were fifteen when they came to us. Yes, they were exceptionally close. Smart kids, always looking out for each other. Their mother died in childbirth. Their father abandoned them, as far as we know.

At that last part, her clasped hands tightened, causing her knuckles to turn slightly white.

Morgan raised his eyebrows.

JJ kept the conversation going while Spencer moved closer to a large bookshelf filled with books and what looked like typical family memorabilia. He could feel Mrs. Thomas’s gaze on his back.

His attention was drawn to a photograph of none other than the three blond-haired triplets, nearly indistinguishable from one another. Their hair fell to their shoulders, the only difference being their facial expressions. Lydia had a gentle smile, Lavinia stared straight into the camera, and Leon’s gaze wandered elsewhere.

They were all dressed in identical white garments resembling tunics and stood in front of a poster, partially obscuring a purple inscription in the background.

“They were the first children you and your husband decided to foster… and also the last,” JJ continued. “Was there a reason for that? Did they cause any issues that might have influenced your decision not to take in more children in the future…?”

Her voice faded as Spencer’s mind suddenly sharpened. A few pieces of information clawed at the edges of his memory, begging to be released from one of the countless overstuffed filing cabinets in his head.

Morgan stepped closer, intrigued by Spencer’s abrupt stillness. When he glanced at the photo, he didn’t see anything particularly noteworthy. He even picked up the frame, turning it slightly in his hands.

“It’s from a summer camp,” Mrs. Thomas explained quickly when she saw what had captured their attention. “We sent them there every year.”

“Reid?” JJ started, taking a step toward him.

Spencer looked at the photo again, at the words on the poster above the children’s heads.

“Do you guys know what The Chrysalis Fellowship was?” he asked, fixing a pointed stare on Mrs. Thomas.

He saw her inhale sharply.

Morgan shrugged.

“Never heard of it.”

“No surprise. It wasn’t exactly a big case,” Spencer replied, crossing his arms.

His friends were visibly perplexed by his reaction, but they understood that he had stumbled upon something significant. They watched him with anticipation and tension.

“But it was definitely not a summer camp,” he continued. “They presented themselves as just another religious gathering, kept a low profile…but in 2001, they drew some media attention when one of their members mysteriously ended up at the bottom of a cliff. Dead, for the record.”

JJ shook her head slightly, still not fully grasping what Spencer was trying to convey.

But Spencer wasn’t looking at her—his gaze was fixed on someone else.

“Mrs. Thomas, for what possible reason would you send the children on summer vacation to a cult?”

The woman fidgeted with the collar of her dress.

"I won't say anything else without a lawyer," she announced weakly. 

Spencer heard Morgan sigh heavily behind him. He placed the photo back on the shelf—it was no longer needed.

He was almost certain he knew where Lavinia was hiding.

ʚଓ

The terrain at the foot of the mountains was gently undulating and covered in dense trees. After a longer drive along a narrow, winding road, they reached a place that resembled something between a well-kept neighborhood of a quiet town and an abandoned campground. Seriously.

In a small area, there were a few houses with flat roofs and white walls, some of which bore the first signs of dirt and graying. However, what dominated above them, in terms of sheer numbers, were the trailers, spaced evenly apart, as if they symbolized a former order, a time of past prosperity.

In short, they quickly contacted the rest of the team to inform them of their destination. There was no time to waste. When they asked her to choose a location based on the information she had gathered during her week of being held captive by the twins, which Leon had revealed to her after she manipulated him, she pointed to this town. They assumed she was referring to the foster family's home. However, there was no sign of their missing person inside, and while Mrs. Thomas was hiding a lot, she had not reestablished contact with Lavinia.

But that didn’t mean she wasn’t in the area.

When the three of them arrived at the nearly desolate location, which in its prime had been a thriving congregation with a large number of members, a middle-aged man immediately appeared on the doorstep of one of the houses. He was wearing nothing but a loose white shirt. His light hair reached almost to his shoulder blades, and his face was covered with a few days' worth of darker stubble.

“Hello, my children,” he nodded toward them.

“David Vaughn,” Morgan identified him instantly, thanks to the information Garcia had gathered for them.

The man simply waved his hand.

“You can call me Father.”

“Hell no.”

He didn't seem offended. In fact, his face was constantly adorned with a calm, almost serene expression. Spencer glanced around at the trailers, wondering if anyone actually lived in them. No one else had come out to greet them, and in such closed communities, the arrival of outsiders usually stirred up some general curiosity.

“Let’s get to the point. Is Lavinia Schuyler hiding here?”

The man opened the door to a small white house, standing in the doorway in a welcoming gesture.

“Come in, and we’ll talk.”

Without waiting for another refusal or command to step outside, he simply turned his back and disappeared inside.

After a brief discussion, they decided to follow him. Although, it was more JJ and Morgan doing the talking. Spencer, on the other hand, was completely absorbed in scanning the surrounding trailers, almost as if his gaze could penetrate through the walls and reveal whether Lavinia was hiding inside one of them. He didn’t even realize when his legs instinctively began to follow his friends, or when he found himself inside a cramped, multi-roomed interior. A stale, unpleasant odor hung in the air, and Spencer could confidently say that the owner wasn’t a fan of the activity called cleaning.

David Vaughn, a man once known for his reputation as a spiritual guide, dropped into a chair with such ease, it was as though there weren’t three FBI agents in his home at that very moment.

“So?” he asked cheerfully. “How are we doing this? You listen and stay silent while I speak, or do I speak, but you ask your obvious questions like what were you doing at 8 p.m. on Monday…’”

“We’re here for a different kind of obvious questions,” Spencer replied dryly. “What you were doing at 8 p.m. on Monday, or any other day of the week, is the last thing we care about. Where is she? And I know you know who I’m talking about. They all used to belong to this…”

“Fellowship,” the man finished for him. He scratched under his eye with a touch of nostalgia. “Haven’t said that word out loud in a long time. Ah, the good old days. Then everyone left, and that was that. But I’m not angry. Our lives are a constant journey. We arrive at a place, replenish our supplies, set a new direction. We wander…”

“Enough,” Morgan cut him off, his face expressing deep exhaustion with this nonsensical, pseudo-spiritual babble. “We don’t want to hear your philosophies, we want your answers. Is Lavinia Schuyler hiding here? This place will be searched soon, so you could make this easier for us…”

"Let's start with the fact that there’s no one by the name of Lavinia Schuyler," he said, causing everyone to furrow their brows. He flashed them a grin. "What? As my favorite daughter, she deserves the right to carry my last name. Lavinia Vaughn. Much better."

"Your...daughter?" JJ repeated in disbelief.

Spencer gave a subtle nod, seeing some sense in it.

"Abandoned by their father."

"Abandoned? Please. Life’s a journey, didn’t I mention that? I just moved on. Honestly, I believe children don’t need a father for proper development. A mother is only needed in the very early stages…"

“Back to the point,” Morgan interrupted again, stopping him from drifting off-topic. “Let me ask the right question this time. Is Lavinia Vaughn hiding here…”

“Aren’t you curious how I managed to bring my kids here when they were grown?”

“No, we're only curious about—”

“Well, I've been thinking about it for a long time. I knew they were approaching adulthood, bouncing from one foster home to another. A journey is a journey, but blood is blood, my blood. So I thought, why not? I asked my dear friends, oh, they were so young back then, just joined us, but already showing such loyalty. They did what I asked, of course. Took them in under their roof, sent them to me whenever the chance arose, so they could learn a bit about the world…”

Spencer could tell his friends were, deep down, intrigued by the story. After all, both of them were profilers, and understanding the backstory, discovering the circumstances that shaped a killer, was essential. Even he couldn't bring himself to stop the man, falling to some degree under the sway of his gift for persuasion. He mentally pinched himself when he caught himself in that moment.

Something about this whole situation didn’t sit right with him. Sure, some people were just chatterboxes, and this guy certainly fell into that category, but everything he said felt too calculated. It was as if he knew exactly what type of story would capture their full attention, drawing it to him and away from everything else.

"...they left me when all of this happened. You know, one guy ended up at the bottom of a cliff, and the media swooped in, saying we probably killed him in some cult ritual. Years passed, and my dear Lavinia only reached out to me recently," he suddenly stopped, grinning wide, a madness in his eyes flashing. "I was watching the news, right? She did it. That woman. That woman is now Lydia. Lydia is in her body. Oh, I always knew this girl, my Lavinia, was special. Some didn’t believe me when I said the soul is like blood. That you can transfuse it into another vessel. They thought I was speaking metaphorically, but she really listened to me..."

Spencer caught something out of the corner of his eye. A flash of light in the window, a glimpse of blonde hair. David was talking and talking, distracting them, pulling their attention away from other things. Like Lavinia, who was packing in another room and making her escape through the back door. He nudged Morgan, their eyes met, and without looking out the window, he understood.

They rushed after her, the sound of the man's loud, hysterical laughter echoing in their ears, a sound that would linger long after.

Reid’s heart pounded against his chest as, for a brief moment, he feared that when they reached the outside, Lavinia would already be gone. Her trail would vanish like it had on the drilling platform, and they would never catch her again. And he would be to blame—he would always be so, so guilty.

He stopped so suddenly that his body nearly collapsed.

But contrary to his dark visions, she was there. She was there, with a backpack slung over one shoulder, her hands raised high, frozen in place as someone had her at gunpoint, preventing her from fleeing any further.

The rest of the team arrived, and the person pointing the gun at Lavinia wasn’t Rossi, Prentiss, or Hotch.

It was her.

ʚଓ

Watching the woman who had nearly taken your life—and had certainly cursed it forever—being loaded into a car with her hands cuffed behind her back was both therapeutic and surreal.

A part of you felt relief, while the other hadn’t yet grasped the reality of the situation enough to fully process it.

Something heavy slid off your chest, but instead of crashing to the ground with a deafening thud, it dissolved into quiet.

Peace.

You hadn’t known that peace, relief, and respite—these supposedly positive emotions—could be so overwhelming that they left you frozen in place.

Someone appeared at your side.

JJ offered you a small smile. There was still a trace of lingering anger in her eyes, the remnants of her inability to understand your decision, the open disapproval that hadn’t faded and wouldn’t for a long time. But in that brief moment, above all else, she was simply relieved that it was finally over.

Her touch on your arm was hesitant, as if she were testing whether you were still yourself.

You looked at her in silence for a moment—then threw your arms around her neck.

You heard her inhale sharply in surprise.

And you didn’t even focus on the gazes fixed on you—until they became unbearable.

The first one you caught.

Hotch, nodding at you gently. As if confirming that it was over.

You almost smiled.

It was true. It was over.

So why did it still feel like something was weighing on you?

Then you caught the second gaze.

Spencer looked as if staying on his feet was a struggle. And yet, he managed to move—his expression a mask of merciless emptiness—as he closed the distance between you.

You felt your body beginning to crumble in JJ’s arms.

You stepped away before you could drag her down with you.

He stopped a step away from you, at a painfully close distance—technically, you could reach out and touch him. Do something you had wanted to do every single day and night spent on the oil rig. That is—to reach for him. In a way, it symbolized an escape for you. A return to what was good, constant, and safe.

You knew, however, that he wouldn't allow it. He would reject any attempt you made, for the lies you surrounded yourself with were dangerously toxic—they could taint and damage him.

He shook his head from side to side, clearly uncertain of what to say.

"All this time," he finally began. Quiet, but not weak.

A sigh escaped JJ’s lips. Her gaze wandered between both of your faces.

"Maybe we shouldn't talk about this now. Maybe we should first—"

"And you knew too. Of course, you knew."

From the very beginning, you knew that when the moment of revealing the great truth came, looking him in the eyes again would be unimaginably difficult. You had also suspected that words would fail you, and that’s exactly what happened. Nothing seemed right. You couldn’t apologize, because you didn’t feel guilty. I mean, you did, in a way. You felt guilty for hurting him like this, but at the same time, you were ready to admit without hesitation that even if you could go back in time, you would still do the same thing, because it meant catching Lavinia.

“I had to do this,” you finally said.

Spencer opened his mouth, then closed it. He clenched his jaw. Nodded. In a way that not only showed he didn’t understand, but also that he couldn’t forgive.

ʚଓ

Twelve months had passed.

In the blink of an eye, they say. Well, if there was an opposite to that saying, it would fit your situation perfectly. Every day, week, and month carried the weight of everything that had happened since the moment the syringe with the sedative first pierced your neck. You were facing not only the trauma left by the abduction but also the consequences of pretending to be someone else and lying to those closest to you in such an elaborate way.

You got involved in Lavinia's case, making sure you'd never have to chase her again. You took temporary leave—your psyche simply needed it.

And as you began healing from within, you could reach further.

Most of the team pretended to accept what you had done, to be ready to move forward. Pretended, perhaps even wanting to believe it was truly over. But in their minds, you would always be trusted a little less. By pretending to be Lydia, you wanted them to believe you were a stranger. And in a way, that's exactly what happened. You would always remain slightly different, distant, to them.

With Spencer, things were particularly difficult. For a time, he simply cut himself off from you. When disappearing seemed like the easier option for him, you felt quite the opposite. You preferred to stay close, even if it meant hurting each other with those prolonged moments of tension, resentment, and the painful silence of unspoken accusations.

But what happened was that, for a time, you simply disappeared from each other's lives. You fell back into them by sheer accident. Well, actually, not such a clean accident. The Christmas party held at Rossi's house took you by surprise when you received the invitation. Spencer probably didn’t expect to see you there either. Ironically, you both arrived at the same time, and without a word, he held the door open for the two of you.

You didn’t talk about it, but over the next year, these small things and gestures, progressing with the passage of time, seemed to reintroduce you to each other. At one point, you were laughing together, not just the two of you, but with the whole team, yet it didn’t change the fact that the joyful sound was coming from both of you at the same time. There was a moment when you watched your godson play on the swings, and the silence between you no longer gave you that painful, guilt-ridden knot in your stomach.

Then, on your birthday, you sat side by side in the theater. A year earlier, he had given you tickets for the musical you’d always wanted to see. They had been lost, for obvious reasons.

Before it even started, you glanced at him from the corner of your eye.

"I never said sorry," you suddenly announced.

Spencer turned toward you, his gaze filled with surprise. You, too, didn’t know where that came from. Maybe it had been nesting inside you for a long time, and you chose that moment because you realized that for the next two hours, out of respect for those around you, you wouldn’t be able to talk. And the words would have to echo in the way they should.

He shook his head.

"You don’t have to."

"But I do. You can’t forgive someone if they never say they’re sorry."

A sigh escaped his lips, and after a long moment of hesitation, he reached for your hand. You flinched when it happened, so unaccustomed to his touch.

"I think I’ve already forgiven you," he finally said, turning his face slightly toward you. His gaze fell on your hands, barely visible in the dark theater. Just the faint outline of knuckles against the blackness. Somehow, you could hear him swallow.

"I’m just not sure if I’ll ever be able to trust you again."

The musical began, and your hands remained entwined until the very end.

[httpswritings]

even if we can't find heaven

wrote this during the eng/ita halftime break - short story where you take care of heartbroken ale - not proofread - friendship fic

"You know you don't have to pretend around me..."

Alexia looked at you, her face showing a defeated expression.

She never cried, well, almost never. You knew she had been crying to sleep every single night of the tournament.

Every single night you left her alone in her bed. It killed you hearing the soft and squeaky noises she made, trying not to break the peaceful atmosphere of the night, but tonight you had enough.

"Come here."

Alexia doubted for a second, but she desperately needed some comfort and you were there, always there.

She knew you had heard her, and she valued that you left her crying on her own, and not asking any questions the next morning.

The Eurocup was a short but intense tournament, and she tried to be at her best, she actually was, professionally talking.

But mentally... Her thoughts were conquered by her now ex-girlfriend.

Alexia stood up and collapsed on your arms, burying her face in your neck, and you did the best thing you always did, be present.

You caressed her still wet hair, leaving soft kisses on it and pulling her body closer to you.

It was funny to witness how things had changed in your relationship.

When you were little, Alexia would always shower you with delicate kisses and with that soft behaviour that she only had with people she truly loved.

You met her when you were eight and she was sixteen, and while you were closer with Alba, who already knew that she wanted to be a teacher and care about little kids, as you grew up, you grew very close to Alexia.

That's probably why you were such an early rising star. Alexia always said that she didn't want to be a coach, but without even planning it, she had been your mentor and that shaped you as a footballer.

You noticed Alexia's breathing got heavier, and you pulled her against your body.

"Let it out, Ale. We're alone."

The dam broke. Not aggressively but increasing the intensity little by little until her cries were audible.

"It hurts... I can't believe how bad it does..."

You hummed, not really knowing what to see. You were good with gestures, not with words, so you remained silent as you let Alexia talk.

"I miss her so bad, nena... I just... I unfollowed her out of sadness because I couldn't bear to watch her happy. I mean, she deserves it, but it hurts knowing she's... She's not going to call me and tell me how much fun she had. I miss the life I had with her."

It broke you watching Alexia so upset, but you knew you had to deal with her after breakup. She didn't want to make her family worry about her, especially Alba. Alexia had spent her life protecting her little sister from every thing in the world, including her own when it collapsed.

So there you were, holding her as if she was holding on to the only person she was letting inside her miserable state.

In front of the cameras, she was happy, focused, and angry when she needed to be. Around her teammates, everything was under control. But you were different, you were her safe place.

Her cries decreased until you only heard her deep breathing, realising she had fallen asleep.

You moved until you were both in a comfortable position and she held your body even tighter.

"I'm here. Relax, lovely girl... I'm not going anywhere."

[gh0stsp1d3r]

May I please request where I am kiaras sister and I become pregnant from rafe and my parents kick me out

I love this sm

Not under my roof

R! Is 19, mikes an asshole

The wait was suspenseful, Rafe paced the room while your leg bounced up and down, both of you staring at the test.

When the two lines appeared, Rafe threw his hands up, running a hand through his hair. Your eyes welled up.

“Rafe-“

He bit down on his lip, stopping his pacing and looking down at you and nodding, his mind running wild. He thought for a moment before speaking.

“Fuck. Alright, alright, it’s okay. We got this, we can do this shit, right?” He was mostly talking to himself, but he looked at you as he said it. Tears ran down your face and he got down to your level, sitting in front of you, cupping your face gently.

“Hey, hey, hey, hey. It’s gonna be alright, okay? ‘M gonna… figure this shit out, gonna marry you, and I’ll… clean up another room at Tannyhill. It’s gonna be fine. Okay?”

You didn’t say anything or nod, he frowned. “You heard me? I’m gonna figure things out for us.”

You nodded and he sighed, standing up and leaving the bathroom.

The one thing you were worried about? How the hell were you gonna tell your parents?

You took a deep breath, fumbling with the key in your hand and opening the front door.

“Mom? Dad?” You called out, shutting the door behind you.

“In here!” Your mom shouted from the dining room. Your heart racing as you walked over to them, plastering a fake smile on your face when you saw them.

Kiara sat, looking miserable at the edge of the table, watching as you entered. Sarah was next to her. Great.

“Sit,” your dad motioned to a plate on the other end of the table. You gave Sarah a small smile and she gave one back.

“What’s this?” You asked when you sat down, pointing to the meat on your plate.

“Swordfish.” Your mom spoke, your face fell and your heart sunk. You couldn’t eat high-mercury fish.

“Is something wrong?” Your dad asked, you swallowed and looked at them.

“Uh... No. It’s just… I can’t eat swordfish.” You said, you should have known they would pester you about why.

“Why?” Kiara asked with an attitude, everyone now staring at you.

“I… my doctor told me not to eat meat for a few days.”

“What? Why? Is something wro-“ your mom immediately started.

“Everything’s fine.” You lied with a small smile, taking a sip of the water next to the plate.

“Then why can’t you eat meat, y/n?” Your mom kept going, a warning in her tone now. She knew something was up.

“I- not here.” You told her, glancing around the table.

“Y/n, tell me right n-“

You uttered the words quietly, 'I'm... I'm pregnant.' The room fell silent as your mom's fork clattered onto her plate, your dad's knife froze in the air above the fish, and my sister's eyes widened in shock as she stared.

Her words stumbled out in disbelief. "W- you’re- what?" she stuttered. "Whose... whose is it?

You looked at Sarah, closing your eyes and sighing as you muttered Rafes name.

Sarah’s face turned into one of shock. Kiara’s one of disgust.

“You had sex with Rafe? Are you kidding me right now?!” Kiara shouted, standing up.

“Kiara! Go to your room!” Your dad shouted back, standing up as well, pointing in the direction of her room. Your sister stormed off, Sarah stumbled behind her, still in shock.

Your dad sighed heavily as he sat back down.

“What are you gonna do with it?” He asked quietly.

“I’m… keeping it.”

“Do you really want to raise a child? You’re 19.”

“I- I mean, I want this. Can’t you just be happy for me, for fucking once?”

“Do not use that language with me, young lady.” He sneered. “I can’t have this shit happening under my roof. Under my watch.”

"You only care about your reputation!" You shouted at him, the words bursting like a dam breaking after years of pent-up anger. It felt terrifying to finally release all that had been bottled up inside you for so long.

“Y/n-“ your mom started, trying her best to stop the both of you.

“Don’t ever fucking say that, I’m just trying to help you! You can’t raise a baby! Not alone-“

“I won’t be alone!”

He scoffed, “you really expect me to believe that Rafe Cameron is going to stay with you after this baby?”

“You don’t know anything about him! Dad-“

“Sweetie, I think you should just lis-“ your mom started.

“No! It is my baby and my life, and if you don’t want to be involved in their life, then so fucking be it!”

“That’s not what he mea-“

“Get out.” He said, breathing heavily as he stared at you.

“W-what?” Your mom asked, looking at him now.

“Get the fuck out of my house, y/n.” He pointed to the front door.

“What? Are you serious right now?!” You exclaimed. “You’re kicking me out?!”

He wordlessly stormed to your room, going through all your drawers and grabbing everything, ignoring your mom’s protests as you shouted at him. He went outside, throwing all your clothes outside. He saw Rafe in the car, and stormed over to the car, Rafe getting out the car and furrowing his eyebrows.

“Dad? What are you doing?!” Kiara asked, coming outside now as well. While she was mad, she still had her love for her sister.

“What the fuck, man?” Rafe pointed to the clothes on the floor and your sobbing figure at the doorway.

“I am not having this shit-“ he pointed to you and Rafe. “-Happen under my roof.”

“Seriously? You know, we shouldn’t have even told you.” Rafe scoffed, watching you gather your clothes from the ground and go into passenger seat of his car.

Mike scoffed. “Can’t believe this shit.”

“She’s an adult!”

“I fuckin’ told her time and time again to stay away from guys like you-“

“The fuck is that supposed to mean, Mike?” He sneered, already rolling up his long sleeves before you got out the car and sniffled at him.

“C’mon, please. Don’t.” You told him, not even looking at your parents. Your eyes were pleading and he just scoffed, motioning for you to get back in the car and getting back in the drivers seat.

His knuckles were white as he gripped the steering wheel.

“How’d Ward and rose take it?” You asked him quietly, interrupting the silence.

“Better than your parents.” He scoffed, making you look down in your lap.

“I’m sorry.” You mumbled to him.

“For what?” He questioned, genuinely confused as he glanced at you.

“Making you see that.”

“Hey, what did I tell you? I told you I’d be there for you, no matter what. I meant that shit, kid.“

It was silent for a little until he spoke up again.

“But, expect to be asked a million questions by Wheeze when we get back.” He said with a small smile playing on his lips.

[captainreecejames]

Pick Me Up?

Charles Leclerc imagine

summary : the four times Charles picks you up and the one time you pick him up.

pairing : Charles leclerc x fem!reader

I believe there is no mention of YN, but I'm not 100% sure.

word count : 3.5 k

warnings : none that I can think of

note : I only read over this once so if there's spelling errors or other mistakes that's what happened. Next up should either be Logan Sargeant my ex is a footballer or the social media accompanying fic. Anyways, enjoy and me if you like it!!

1. Charles picks you up from a bad date

The date had started fine.

Actually more than fine. He showed up on time, was pleasant to the waitress, and had good manners. Really, he would have even gotten a second date, if he hadn’t brought up Formula 1.

It’s a topic you tend to avoid when meeting new people, as they either tend to know a lot already and want to use you to get to Charles or they don’t know anything and assume that you are using Charles, when they know nothing about your relationship. It was a hassle you learned to shut down before it even began.

But back at the date with Vince, he had brought it up and that’s when things started to go down hill. 

Despite your best efforts, when people brought up Formula 1, you grew taller and more focused on the conversation, it’s like a switch flipped. While Charles driving for the best known team certainly helped your interest, everything about the sport was fascinating for you and you couldn’t help but geek out when the topic came up. 

Vince noticed your reaction and his casual demeanor turned critical. “You only know about it because you think the drivers are hot.” That had made your smile drop instantly, brows furrowing as you tried to respond. “Probably can’t even name all the teams.” He thinks that stumps you, but you’ve dealt with enough shitty men in this sport, you’re not taking anything more from this wanna-be investor.

“I don’t have to prove my knowledge of F1 to you,” you state, deciding that this dinner is now over.

“Oh, now I know you can’t even name five drivers.” Your frown deepens, picking up your napkin and placing it on the table next to your plate. It had gone down hill so fast, how disappointing.

“Your attempt at insulting me into submission is falling flat.” His eyes are wide at your comment, and he must not have expected you realize his move. You flag the waitress over and she walks quickly back to your table, noticing how you’re not smiling anymore. Seems like this date is a bust, so another twenty note must be added to the jar of bets amongst the staff of this restaurant.

(You and Charles visit the place often as it was the sight of your first job, but also the food and people were lovely, and bringing a first date here was the safest option.)

(So they all knew you and were betting on when the dam breaks and you two admit your feelings for each other.)

You hand Lucille enough money to cover both yours and Vince’s meals, not bothering with the change. Your goal now is to get as far away from Vince as soon as possible. He  opens his mouth to say something again, but you are already out of your seat and walking towards the front door, phone calling Charles to pick you up.

He answers on the first ring, always on alert when you go on dates.

(Not because he’s jealous or anything, but because he’s worried about you and needs to make sure that you stay safe. He’s been tempted to bribe the staff of your little restaurant for information during dates after a particularly bad one, but his mom talked him out of it.)

“Ma cherie, is everything alright?” You roll your eyes at his question, just knowing that there’s a smirk on his face right now. He didn’t have a great feeling about Vince, but he wouldn’t say I told you so.

“Can you pick me up please?” You barely need to finish your question before he answers with an ‘of course, I’m already on my way.’

“Need me to stay on the phone?” You glance back at the restaurant, looking in the window to find Vince scrolling away on his phone, oblivious to the movement around him.

“No, focus on the streets. I’ll be fine.” Charles hums his answer and hangs up, leaving you to look busy on the streets of Monte Carlo.

He pulls up not even two minutes later, stopping the car haphazardly in a tow-away zone. You rush to the side, opening the door and shimmying in as fast as you can because even though this is Charles Leclerc’s very recognizable Pista, you don’t want to risk any tickets. While he pulls away you realize how fast he showed up and a question forms on your lips, but he speaks before you have the chance to ask.

“I was only down the road at the marina.” He seems sheepish, like the answer is rehearsed, but you don’t push it because you’re still grateful that he showed up. What would you do without him to pick up after a bad date?

2. Charles picks you cause your car breaks down

This time when you call him should feel less embarrassing than other times, but really it only feels worse. How are you going to admit to him that the car you’ve been saving up for and desperately wanting since you were 7 just crapped out on you before you could even get out of the parking garage? Especially when he advised you against such car. It would be humiliating. 

Alas, you made the call, practicing in your mind what you would say to him. 

Again, he picks up on the first ring, though this time you’re not sure as to why he answered so fast.

“Is everything alright, ma cherie?” You blush, grateful he can’t see your face.

“I’m stuck,” you exhale, ready to face what ever he has in store for you.

“Stuck?”

“My car won’t start and I’m still at work, everyone else has left and I’m in need of a ride.”

“Okay,” he answers, relief filling you. “I’m leaving the gym with Andrea, I should be there in 15 minutes. Don’t talk to any strangers.”

“Love you too, Charles.” You roll your eyes, hanging up on him and sitting in the drivers seat of your beloved, but broken, car. That’s some good money about to go down the drain for the tow and mechanic fees. As you debate calling your dad to help you out with diagnosing what’s wrong with the car, a familiar rumble enters the garage, and you see the ever famous Pista pulling up next to you, a smirking Charles in the driver’s seat.

“Someone call for a pick up?” You want to roll your eyes at him, but the smile on his face makes the irritation melt away. After a long day at work, made even longer because your stupid car that you really wanted wouldn’t start, all you feel is relief and affection for the man in front of you, and it’s a little too overwhelming.

Tears pool in your eyes and Charles frowns, cutting the engine and climbing out so he can hug you. He only admits it to his mother, but holding you is just as good a driving when he’s driving on the track with a car that responds to his every command.

(And what he won’t admit to anyone is that if holding you feels like that, then kissing you must feel like he’s just won a world championship.)

“Ma cherie,” he whispers, pulling your body into his own and stroking your hair to soothe you. He doesn’t ask any questions, which you’re grateful for, you don’t actually know what’s wrong other than everything is just too much and him showing up makes you feel safe enough to let it all out.

When you’ve finally slowed your breathing and made yourself relax he pulls away, looking at you with so much love in his eyes that you’re not sure if you’re dreaming. “Now you know what it felt like to drive under Binnotto.”

The comment is a shock and it makes you snort, which is what Charles was going for. Your laugh that he thinks could make him smile even in the darkest moods. “You can’t say that Mr. Ferrari.” You smack his chest while shaking your head, but the rueful smile on your face tells him that you still haven’t gotten over the team principle screwing him over.

Then the smile eases into something much more natural, and he knows the tense moment has passed. “Takeout?” he suggests, ushering you to the passenger side of his car. You nod at him and he’s pretty sure that he would do anything to make you smile.

3. Charles picks you up for a spontaneous lunch date

The next day it’s he who calls you, but you still an answer on the first ring.

(You’ve dedicated a Måneskin song as his ringtone so you always know when he’s calling)

(He made your ringtone a Mika song after you dragged him to a concert)

“Charles,” you answer, confusion in your tone.

“Ma cherie!” he sounds excited and you can’t help but want to follow him anywhere he goes when he sounds like that.

“Is everything alright?” You ask it this time, because shouldn’t he be packing for a race now?

“I’m outside, we’re going to spend the day on the water.” After leaving your home last night, Charles decided that you needed a pick me up, and what better way but to spend a few hours lounging around on his yacht, soaking up the sun and enjoying each other’s company.

(No one else would be there, but this wasn’t a date.)

(Seriously Arthur, it wasn’t a date.)

You spare a glance around your room, laundry begging to be done and dishes waiting to be washed. Yeah, you could use a day away from chores.

“Let me grab a bag,” you tell him, already throwing more clothes around the room in search of your favorite bathing suit. He hums through the speaker and you put your phone down to keep searching for the bathing suit. It was your favorite red crossover one piece and you be damned if you didn’t wear it today, anything to manifest a Ferrari win.

When you finally manage to find it, in the pile of clean but not put away laundry, you pick your phone back up and tell Charles you’ll be right down.

In two minutes you’re out the door of apartment, eyes landing on Charles leaning against his car. He looks so handsome with the windswept hair and Ray-bans on, you really have to wonder why he’s spending the afternoon with you and not some model he met in a garage.

(He’d say it’s because it’s the weekend before a race and this is a tradition, spending the afternoon with you before he leaves is the only way to ward off bad luck.)

(Seriously, before the Netherlands race last year you'd been unable to make it because of a bad cold and he had to retire the car that race, so safe to say you were forced to the boat, or his apartment, or he came over before the plane every time after that.)

Maybe the question is what would he do without you?

4. Charles picks you up from a girl’s night

This time Charles doesn’t pick up on the first ring, in fact, he barely makes it to the phone in time to answer. That’s because it’s not you who is calling, but rather a friend.

You and few girl friends had decided on a girls night out for one of them going through a bad break up, but after a few pregame shots and then drinks at this club, you were pretty intoxicated.

Looking for your group after coming back from the bathroom and the bar, you had spotted Lando and Max across the room, which made you think about Charles.

(Not that he ever really left your mind.)

And when you think about Charles, you wonder where he is, so you went to your friends. Both their faces lit up when they saw you, indicating that they were also not sober. After a quick hug for both of them you turn to survey the rest of the bar, looking for your Monagasque. 

“He’s not here!” shouts Max, trying to be heard over the noise. Your shoulders drop, turning back to the two racers with a pout on your lips.

“Where is he?” you ask, trying to seem nonchalant, but drunk you can’t hide her feelings as easily as sober you.

(Many would argue that sober you can’t hide her feelings easily either, but all that matters is that Charles doesn’t find out. And since he’s too occupied in hiding his also obvious feelings, you’re both oblivious to the other’s pining.)

Lando says that Charles stayed at home, something about playing the piano and having an early night was more tempting than drinks. The real reason being that if Charles went out he would not have been able to stop thinking about you and your potential suitors, which would lead to him drinking to forget. He was not up for another heartbreak hangover.

Your eyes light up at the mention of Charles playing the piano, sitting down in the booth with them. “Oh! I bet it’s going to sound wonderful!” Both drivers roll their eyes, and to their disappointment, you’re not drunk enough to miss it. “You don’t like his music?” The accusation in your tone makes them readjust their face. It’s not that they don’t like his compositions, it’s just that when Charles explains them, it’s almost always about how you looked on a certain day and he just was so inspired he had to put something down. They’re really tired of the back and forth between you too.

You begin your speech on how talented Charles is at the piano, which then morphs into how talented he is as a driver, and then as a person. It all turns into a ramble about how proud you are of him, something they’ve all heard before.

When you’ve somehow made it to Leo and how Charles chose the perfect puppy, the man himself shows up.

“Ma cherie,” he interjects, placing a hand on your shoulder to get your attention. You turn towards him, and Max swears that there should be cartoon hearts in your eyes.

“Charles!” you yell, wrapping your arms around him in a tight hug. “What are you doing here?” You’re slightly too loud for being in his arms, but he doesn’t care if you yell his ear off, it’s still you.

“Max said you were ready to come home.” Your brows furrow at that, because you don’t remember ever saying that, or even Max disappearing to call Charles, but you can’t be mad at him showing up.

“One more drink?” you ask, eyes pleading with him. Charles shakes his head, he can feel how much he’s supporting your weight even while sitting and knows that any more alcohol will likely end with you tripping over yourself.

“Water,” he answers and you’ve agreed to the words coming out of his mouth because it’s Charles, and he’ll never steer you wrong.

Charles heads to the bar to grab a water, running into your group of friends there. He tells them your status and that’ll he’ll be taking you home after this drink. They all nod along, most of them predicting that the night would end like this: Charles showing up and driving you home.

When it’s finally time to leave and Charles has ushered you out of the packed club into his Pista, you remember that you came here with a completely different group. “The girls!”

“Don’t worry, ma cherie, I saw them before we left and told them I’d take you home.” The gentle smile on his face is enough to put one on yours. Where would you be without him, indeed.

+ 1. You pick Charles up from the airport

You’ve got a new car now, thanks to Charles, and since he needs to be picked up from the airport, you’ve decided to take it for a nice spin. The roads are relatively clear for the drive, and you’re there in the usual 30 minutes. That makes you early for Charles, but you take the time to work out what you’re going to say to him.

Before you get out of the car you text him your location, so that he can head right out and find you, rather than you going into the terminal to look for him. He always was better at finding you.

The last night out had not only ended with Charles taking you home, but with a revelation. You couldn’t keep living like this. Loving him so much and not telling him was suffocating. It made you feel like you were on the edge of a cliff with nothing to keep you safe, and you were tired of it. So the question was, how did you tell him.

“Charles, I’ve been in love with you for ages,” you said, but shook your head. That didn’t sound right.

“Charles, I have to tell you something really important. I think I’m in love with you.” No, you shook your head again and groaned. “I don’t think I’m in love with him, I know I am.”

“Charles, you’re the most important person in my life, I don’t know what I’d do with out you.” Okay, solid start, you might have something with that.

“Charles light of my life.” No. “That’s too cheesy.”

“God, I wish I could put into words how much you mean to me. I love you so much I don’t know what to do with myself most of the time. It’s like I need to feel you to be able to breathe properly. All I really ever need is for you to look and smile at me and I’ll know that everything will be alright. I can get through anything with you there. If you love someone else it would break my heart, but knowing that you’re happy is all I need to be okay. I’d live with the thought of you loving someone else, because if they made you as happy and good as I feel, then there’s nothing more I could ask for.” Yeah, that sounded-

“Well it’s a good thing I love you too.”

You screamed, turning around to see Charles behind you in all his glory. Black sweatshirt and baggy jeans, hair messy like he ran his hand through it multiple times.

“How long have you been there?” you asked, face turning red enough to rival Ferrari.

“At Charles, light of my life.” He shrugged, like you hadn’t just bared your soul out to him. “Though, I disagree, it’s not too cheesy.” Could you get any redder? Feels like this is as red as a human being could get before self-combusting.

He’s just standing there, with a dopey smile on his face that you want to kiss, but you can’t. Something is holding you to the spot. You force yourself to say something. “Can you say something else?”

“Like what?”

“Anything else, I feel like I’m going to explode if you don’t say something.”

“Thanks for coming to pick me up.” He adds a shrug to the end and you narrow your eyes.

“That’s not what I meant, and you know it.”

“Oh, you want me to say that I love you too.”

“I don’t want you to say it if you don’t mean it.” If you were a kid you’d add a stomp to the end, as if you were throwing a temper tantrum. He furrows his brow like he’s confused and still you want to kiss him senseless.

“Well, I mean it.”

Now you’re the one confused. “What?”

“I love you too, and I don’t think I’d be okay if you loved someone else as much as I love you. Because I’m selfish and a terrible man and I want you all to myself.” He shakes his head. “I need you all to myself,” he corrects. “You’re the love of my life and if I wasn’t yours then I don’t think I could go on. But you said you do love me, so everything is so much easier now.” Each sentence is punctuated with a step closer, until he’s just a few inches from you, like he needs you to take the last step. You do, without hesitation, because you really would do anything for him.

Eyes glancing at his lips and back, you catch him doing the same thing. “I love you more than anything in this world. I’d give up racing if you asked, I do anything for you.”

Another glance at his lips. “I’d never ask that of you, Charles. But, I love you too, and I’d do anything for you.” His smile at those words would normally catch you off guard, like you’d stop breathing at it, but somehow it just makes everything easier right now. So you kiss him.

Leaning forward those last few inches to grab his shoulders and pull him down so you can kiss him with as much love as you can muster. If words can’t explain how much you love him then maybe kissing him will convey it. That you love him more than words, actions and thoughts can combine. You love him.

(And he loves you.)

[chaacakez]

Tap Out.

Pairing: Yuji Itadori x F!Reader

Word Count: 2.6k words

Content Warnings: fingering,oral (f receiving.), creampie, mild dirty talk, emotional tension, friends-to-lovers, gym setiting, explicit sexual content, MDNI.

The gym reeked of chalk, sweat, and tension.

It was late. Everyone else had cleared out hours ago. The only lights still on were the overhead fluorescents above the sparring mats, humming quietly like they knew something was about to go down. You adjusted the wraps on your hands, your eyes flicking to the mirror across the room. He was there.

Yuji.

He was rolling out his shoulders, his tank top damp with sweat and clinging to every inch of that hard-earned body of his. His arms flexed as he twisted at the waist, abs rippling just beneath the fabric. He caught your gaze in the mirror and grinned, boyish and cocky.

"Round four?" he asked, voice teasing but edged with something deeper.

You scoffed. "You sure your pride can handle taking another L?"

He strode over, barefoot on the mat, radiating heat and playful aggression. "You saying you’re gonna take me down?..."

You shrugged, striding over to meet him at the center of the mat. “I already have.”

Something then simmered in the air between you. This was how it always went. Training, teasing, and tension. Moments being always one push away from something explosive.

He circled you slowly. You feel the drag of his eyes against your skin, you knew you had a challenge. “Come on, then. Show me.”

The first few minutes were fluid. Grunts, grapples, and laughter echoing through the space. You got in a good shoulder check, and he hooked your leg to throw you down, only you took him with you. You rolled. He landed on top.

You both were chest to chest. Breath to breath. His hands braced on either side of your head.

You stared up at him. Your thighs were open just enough to cradle his hips. You felt the heat of him. Every part of him, you remained unmoving, you could have sworn you subconsciously tightened them around his hips.

“…You’re not moving,” you whispered. Your voice small.

He didn’t move. His eyes shamelessly flickered to stare at your mouth. Looking back to your eyes next.

“You’re not telling me to,” he murmured as his gaze went back to your lips, something dark inside of them now. More wanting.

And then he leaned down. Hesitant, slow, but deliberate. It felt like a test to see how much will you had left before it was all gone due to your temptations for him going out of the building right now. You tilted your chin and kissed him first.

It started like that.

One kiss. Then another. And another. Then his hands were up your shirt, and your fingers were in his hair and all of the sparring, all of the sweat and heat and unspoken tension had burst like a dam you both knew would break eventually.

Yuji’s mouth was hot against your neck, lips dragging over your collarbone as he laid you back down against the mats again. His fingers found the hem of your sports bra and he tugged.

“Can I...?” he breathed, sounding almost breathless already, raspy but yet determined.

“Do it.”

The fabric was gone in seconds, and the chill of the gym air touched your chest and you felt your breasts nipple pebble so quickly for only a second before his warm palms replaced the coldness that came over you. Thumbs brushing over your nipples, making you shiver.

"Fuck..- Yuji..."

His mouth was there next. Hot and greedy. His tongue circled, lapped, and tasted your bud. He moaned like you were the one satisfying him.

"You always look so serious when we spar..." he said against your skin. His voice sounding muffled as his mouth was occupied latching onto your supple breasts, licking and sucking onto your buds each. “I’ve thought about this too many times.”

“Then stop thinking.”

He pulled your shorts down and his mouth followed, trailing down the path of your stomach to your lower body as he kissed and licked and nipped you. Moving his hands to your bare hips as he kissed the side of your waist and moved to kissing your inner thigh. licking the sweat off your skin like he was starved for it. His assault on your body continued, inching closer and closer... Then.

His tongue dipped further finally into the depths of your inner thighs as he found your folds and your back arched right off the mat.

“Holy sh-Yuji-!”

His hands pinned your thighs open before you could get the words out. Separating your folds for a deeper taste of your skin. His tongue slow and teasing at first, flicking circles over your clit before diving deeper. Moving himself as much as he could to get a sweeter taste of you and your sweetest insides. He moaned against you like he just couldn’t breathe without tasting you.

You tugged his hair hard, your hands digging and gripping onto his locs, ruffling them by how much you moved your hands throughout his head. And he groaned. That sound vibrated through you like electricity, sending shivers down your spine. making you squirm and arch as the sound went straight through you and right into your core.

"You're so wet," he muttered against your skin as he said looking up at you deeply, his eyes boring low and hooded with lust now. More different than the darker look you had seen earlier. Maybe even both of those looks are mixed together in this moment. “You wanted this, too, huh?”

You could only nod meekly, of course you were weak now by the way he was eating you out and tearing you apart your steady but shaky breathing turnt into huffs and panting now. One hand was over your mouth to keep the whimpers from echoing too loud off the gym walls. He noticed.

"Nuh uh," he said, pulling away just long enough to pin both your wrists above your head. “Let me hear you, baby. I need it.”

Then his fingers were inside you. two fingers at first, thick and slow. and agonizingly curling inside of you.

"Shit!" you cried out, writhing at his mercy. “Yuji....! don’t stop....don’t you dare stop!-”

“I won’t,” he said, watching your face twist in pleasure. Eyes dark with hunger. “Not until you cum on my fingers, just like this…”

You clenched around his fingers with that. He knows the power he has over you right now. He smirked. "There it is.. yeah, that's it,"

Your orgasm hit fast, You felt your head tilt backwards and fall against your shoulder as your eyes fluttered and roll back and your voice began to draw out and grow louder as you cried out in pleasure at being able to cum by his fingers, and he watched every second of it with glassy eyes and parted lips, his tongue dragging against his bottom lip. Watching closely and making sure he doesn't miss a bit of this. Watching you fall apart was better than winning any match combined. Eating his proudest victory up.

But he wasn’t done. His fingers departed form you as the glossy and dripping essence of your slickness coated against his two fingers, you gasp watching him gaze at them before he trails them up to his lips and he tastes them both right in front of you. Keeping deep and slow eye contact with you as he makes sure your eyes are on him at this very moment. Knowing you're watching him taste you on his fingers.

He drags the fingers in and pulls them out of his mouth. Leaving with a small pop noise departing his mouth, lastly only dragging this out more as torture by licking his lips as a finishing mark of the taste he savors from you.

This sight makes you clench around nothing, already missing the fullness of his fingers inside of you. Your heart running rapid as your body still twitches mindlessly from your orgasm. You do infact keep eye contact with him. It was filthy and so dirty of him to do. Yet you wanted more from him.

He came closer to you now. Keeping his eyes directly and casted down on you before him,

“I need to fuck you.” he whispered, harsh, raw and real. His voice ragged as he pulled his sweat soaked tank off, revealing every line of his sculpted body. “Right now. Right here.”

You bit your lip, feeling your breath tremble as you exhale. Trailing your eyes all over him quickly as you didn't know what to keep your eyes on. Your eyes finally darting to the mirror wall. “Someone could walk in and-”

“I don’t give a fuck.”

He kissed you hard before anymore protests left your lips. Hungry now, tasting your breath, your pleasure, your sweat. You could taste yourself on his lips, the feeling didn't stop you as you enjoyed it, and this kiss, still.

The cool vinyl of the training mats stuck to your bare back, your legs spread over the lines meant for drills and sparring. The mirrored wall reflected the both of you, a blur of flexing limbs and desperate mouths, hands over each other urgently.

Yuji broke the kiss just long enough to look down at you. Sweaty, flushed, lips bitten raw. His voice was hoarse, almost shaky, but his eyes burned with heat.

“Still think you’re gonna take me down?” He murmured, face close to yours. Foreheads pressed together as his hot breath blew against your face. His hand sliding up your thigh, gripping it lightly, fingers pressing into your skin like he was memorizing the shape and feel.

You scoffed, breathless. “If I sit on your face again, maybe.”

That cocky smirk returned. half shy, half wild. “You liked that a lot, huh?”

“Didn’t hear you complaining,” you shot back, still breathless just as much as he was.

His hands gripped your hips tighter. “I’m not. I’m fuckin’ proud.”

“Then prove it.”

He didn’t hesitate.

He quickly pulled himself away from you only to reach down and grip at his grey sweatpants that were way past tight against his skin now, sporting a bulge that only showed what these events were doing to him. Only caused by you.

Your eyes were glued to it as soon as they panned down to his pants, you knew you felt the print earlier but- Jeez... feeling your heart race and your thighs clench together, and your insides clenching around nothing as you only want the fulfilling feeling of his cock inside of you. Your thighs slippery by the slick that was leaking down your thighs as a sign of impatience.

He stood on his knees between your legs, eyes burning into yours as he hooked his fingers into his waistband and dragged his sweats down. Slow. Deliberate. Like he wanted you to feel every second of anticipation.

With one hand bracing your thigh and moving them apart, his gaze flicker to see in between your thighs a string of your slick separating in thin lines against the inside of your thigh. You were way past ready at this point.

"Keep them open,"

He frees himself, thick, hard, and already aching for you. Your breath hitched at the sight. He smirked like he knew exactly what it was doing to you.

He lined himself up, teasing your entrance with the thick head of his cock, dragging it slow and slick through your folds. You bit your lip, nearly arching off the mat as your voice came out in a whimper again.

“Yuji-”

“Shh… wanna feel you take me in,” he whispered, voice low, reverent. “Wanna watch you stretch around me...”

And he sank into you. Slow. so fucking slow. And you felt every inch stretch you open. Your head tilted back again to let out a strangled curse of a moan.

You both gasped.

The stretch made your eyes roll back, made your hips buck up involuntarily. His jaw clenched above you, brows knitting together as he fought the instinct to just thrust all the way inside of you.

“Holy fuck. you feel... fuck, baby, you feel insanely good.”

You whimpered, nails raking across the material of the training mat. “More- Yuji-please! move!-”

“Shit,” he breathed, leaning in to kiss your neck, then grinding his hips just a little deeper, bottoming out. “Don’t beg like that or I’m gonna lose it...”

"You already have," you smirked, lighly taking in your moment of pride. Still breathless. “Look at you... all that control in the ring, and now you're the one trembling.”

He laughed, but it cracked halfway through, voice unraveling as your walls clenched around him.

"That’s 'cause you feel too fuckin' good. You’re not even being fair."

And then he pulled back once from you and slammed into you this time. No more hesitation, no more restraint. Only raw, sweat slicked rhythm and the sound of skin meeting skin echoing across the empty gym.

Every thrust hit deep, perfect, powerful. Each sound, moan, gasp, slap had Reverberated off the mirror, off the mat, off the walls and into memory.

You both gasped again.

His hands braced by your hips, his pace steady, eyes locked on your expression.

"God, you feel good. So tight... fuck—you feel like you were made for this."

He began fucking you like he meant it. Like he’d earned it. Like every bruise from training was a promise to fuck you better than anyone ever had.

He pounded into you like he couldn't get deep enough, hips slamming against your thighs, hands, locked onto your hips like he was afraid you'd disappear. The sound of skin slapping, moans spilling from both of you.

It was filthy, raw, and perfect.

His abs flexed as he thrust. Your legs wrapped around his waist.

He fucked you like he had something to prove, every thrust bruising, relentless, cock hitting that perfect spot that had your legs trembling and voice breaking out with his name. Only growing louder and louder.

"You feel that?" he growled. "That's mine."

The mirror showed everything. His back muscles shifting, the way your bodies moved in perfect sync, the expressions you both wore in ecstasy, surrender and lust. You couldn’t look away.

He saw you watching from the mirror and growled, “Like seeing how good I look fucking you?”

You moaned. “Yes! yes! Yuji, fuck-”

No other words were said as he grabbed your chin and kissed you again, deeper this time. Needier and sloppier, while wet as he brushed his tongue against your bottom lip. He wanted entrance into your mouth within the kiss to be closer to you. Letting him in, he takes complete control over you and the kiss as both of your tongues mix together in a fiery dance of lust. His thrusts inside of you growing sloppy and off balanced.

He was reaching his end.

Pulling away from the kiss he spoke to you, "I’m close," he panted, voice wrecked. “Wanna cum inside. can I?” He says pressing his forehead against yours again to stare deeply into your eyes as he pants more.

You nodded. "Do it, fill me up Yuji.. please!-" You begged. whimpered, whined, pleaded at him to finish off inside of you. You wanted it more than anything. A satisfying finish.

That was all he needed.

With one final thrust and a cry of your name, he spilled inside you, warmth flooding your core, his head falls into your neck. His breath ragged in your ear. His hips twitched, riding it out, his hands that had a grip on your hips occasionally tensed at the sensation he felt while spilling inside of you. Making sure he buries every drop as deep as he could go.

You lay there under him, panting, sticky with sweat and sex, chest heaving in sync with his.

...

“…Sparring tomorrow?” you whispered after a moment of silence.

He laughed huskily, pressing a kiss to your jaw. “Only if we finish the same way.”

ahhh another finish!!! this took me hours to do😞

i wanted to make my second post special for everyone so more of my fics like this get more attention!!!

reblogs, likes, comments, any of that stuff is always appreciated...

#crackingyousoon <3

(ෆ˙ᵕ˙ෆ)♡

[joelsrose]

𝐈'𝐥𝐥 𝐁𝐞 𝐑𝐢𝐠𝐡𝐭 𝐇𝐞𝐫𝐞

⋆˙⟡♡ just fluff ⋆˙⟡♡

You knew it was coming—that inevitable crash, the quiet unraveling that came not from the cramps or the discomfort, but from something far deeper and more difficult to explain, a sadness that didn’t seem to have a reason, only weight. You were on your period and, truthfully, it wasn’t the physical pain that had you feeling off—it was the heavy ache of emotion that clung to your chest like fog, making everything feel a little too loud, a little too tender, as though your skin itself had gone thin. And so, as you rode past Joel during patrol, perched steady on your horse, you kept your gaze trained on the horizon, your inner monologue on a desperate loop—don’t cry, don’t cry, don’t cry—because if you broke, if you cracked even slightly, you knew it’d all come spilling out like water through a dam.

Still, Joel noticed. Of course he did. He always did. His brow furrowed with that familiar look of quiet concern that he never voiced but always wore when it came to you. You were usually all sunshine and spark—always quick to tease, to laugh, to poke fun at his old-man grumbling—and now you were quiet, withdrawn, barely meeting his eyes. Something about that shift had his stomach twisting in a way he didn’t like.

When you reached the safe house, the air cool and heavy with silence, you didn’t say much—you simply sank down onto the worn couch, feeling like your bones had gone soft. Joel busied himself with the fire, striking a match with the kind of practiced ease that came from years of surviving, but he kept glancing your way, that crease between his brows never smoothing out. He handed you your thermos with a gruff, “Got some coffee,” and usually, you’d grin, maybe roll your eyes and say something like you’re such a softie, Joel, but today, you just took it with a hushed, “Thanks,” your voice too small for the room.

The fire crackled gently in the hearth, warm and golden, but it didn’t reach the chill that had settled inside you. You stared at the flames until they blurred, and then, without warning, the emotion surged like a wave breaking—too big, too sudden—and you buried your face in your elbow, trying to muffle the sound of your tears, trying not to let the sobs show. But Joel had been watching. He always was, even when he pretended not to be. And though he’d told himself—again and again—to keep his distance, to not get involved, to not let his heart get tangled in the softness of you… he was in front of you in two strides, crouched low, his eyes searching your face with a kind of desperation that surprised even him.

He stopped himself from reaching for you—almost put a hand on your thigh out of instinct, like it would anchor you somehow—but instead he coaxed your arm down gently, quietly, his voice low and hoarse as he said your name like it meant something holy. You looked up, cheeks blotchy and flushed, eyes puffy and red, nose pink, your whole face scrunched in embarrassment, and Joel felt something twist painfully in his chest—like seeing you in pain opened a wound in him too.

“What’s wrong?” he asked, voice barely above a whisper. “Are you hurt?” His mind already racing, already scanning for injuries, for threats, for something he could fix.

You shook your head, sucking in a shaky breath. “No,” you whispered, voice cracking. “I’m not hurt, it’s just—” but the words tangled on your tongue, and the tears kept spilling, hot and relentless. Joel hesitated for a heartbeat, then broke his own rule, letting his big, calloused hand settle on your thigh—heavy, warm, steadying. His thumb rubbed slow circles, grounding you with that quiet, gruff tenderness he tried so hard to hide.

“What’s wrong, darlin’?” he murmured again, softer this time, like the word darlin’ might make the hurt a little easier to carry.

You shook your head again, eyes brimming. “It’s so stupid,” you said, voice barely a breath. “I don’t even know why I’m crying.”

But Joel didn’t laugh. Didn’t call you weak. Didn’t pull away. He just sat there with you, his hand on your thigh, his eyes locked on yours, like he was trying to shoulder the weight of whatever it was that had broken your heart wide open.

“C’mon,” he murmured, voice low and rumbling like distant thunder, gentle in that way Joel rarely let himself be. “You can tell me, sweetheart.”

You hesitated, biting down on your lower lip as a fresh wave of embarrassment crept up your neck and bloomed across your cheeks like heat from the fire. You didn’t want to say it, not because it was shameful, but because it felt so… small. So silly. But when you looked up at him—at his furrowed brow, the set of his mouth, the stubborn kindness written across his face—you knew there was no getting out of it. Joel didn’t let things go. Not when it came to you.

So you wiped at your eyes with the sleeve of your jacket, gaze flickering down to your boots, suddenly very interested in the floor. “I’m on my period,” you mumbled, voice soft and tight, like the words were something to apologize for.

But Joel didn’t flinch. Didn’t recoil. Didn’t even blink. He didn’t say oh, or damn, or anything stupid that men sometimes say when they don’t know what to do with a woman’s pain. Instead, his hand stayed right where it was—broad and warm, circling slow, soothing patterns on your thigh like it was second nature to comfort you. “Okay,” he said simply, his voice still soft, like the word itself was a hand cupping your jaw, steadying you.

“You hurtin’?” he asked after a moment, tipping his head slightly, concern laced into every syllable. “I got some pills in my bag—keep ‘em for my back.” His mouth twitched like he was annoyed with himself. “Should’ve told me earlier, sweetheart. Could’ve done something for you.”

You shook your head quickly, swallowing the lump in your throat, your voice barely more than a breath. “No, it’s not that—” You paused, frustrated with yourself, with your body, with everything. “I’m not even cramping that bad. I just… I don’t know. I feel emotional. Like everything’s just too much all at once and I can’t even explain why.”

Joel exhaled slowly, his eyes never leaving yours. He didn’t rush to fill the silence, didn’t try to fix what couldn’t be fixed—he just let it sit there between you, that soft, aching truth.

“It’s silly,” you managed, voice cracking as you tried to blink back another wave of tears, but they burned hot at the corners of your eyes anyway. “I don’t even have a reason to cry,” you whispered, as if saying it aloud might make the emotion stop surging like a tide inside your chest.

But Joel was already shaking his head, his expression carved from equal parts concern and fierce protectiveness. “Darlin’,” he began, and something about the way he said it—low, steady, certain—made your breath hitch. “It ain’t silly. Not at all. Now look at me.” His voice was gravel and honey, and when you finally lifted your eyes to meet his, the sight of him crouched in front of you—this man so famously gruff, so solid and unsentimental—brought a flutter to your chest that felt like it might unravel you completely.

“You don’t need a reason to feel the things you feel, y’hear me?” he said, eyes locked on yours like there was nothing else in the world worth looking at. “You let yourself cry, sweetheart. You’re allowed. You don’t gotta earn it.”

You nodded, sniffling, your whole body softening at the kindness in his words—words no one else had ever said to you quite like that. And then, as if the sight of your trembling smile shattered something in him, Joel let out a quiet sigh and sat beside you with a heaviness that felt less like weight and more like care. “Don’t like seein’ you like this,” he admitted, voice softer now, almost fragile, like it hurt him to say.

Your smile wobbled, small and wet, but real. And that was all it took.

He reached out, one arm snaking around your shoulders with a gentleness that contradicted everything he tried to be, and pulled you into his chest with a quiet, “C’mere.” You didn’t resist. How could you, when the warmth of him wrapped around you like safety itself, his flannel shirt soft beneath your cheek, the steady thump of his heart a rhythm you never knew you needed? It was intimate in a way that made your head spin—tender in a way you’d never dared to imagine with Joel Miller, the man built like a fortress who somehow always made room for you.

“This okay?” he murmured, the words barely brushing your hair.

You nodded against his chest. “Yeah,” you breathed, tears finally beginning to settle. “Thank you.”

For a moment, there was only silence, and then, without thinking, you whispered, “You don’t think it’s… gross?”

Joel pulled back just enough to tilt your chin up, eyes narrowing ever so slightly, not with judgment but with disbelief. “What is?”

“My period,” you mumbled, cheeks flushing as you glanced away.

His brows furrowed, that familiar crease deepening between them, his voice dropping to that low, gravelly tone that always seemed to wrap around you like velvet and smoke. “You serious?”

You looked away, cheeks burning, suddenly wishing you hadn’t said anything, that the moment hadn’t grown so vulnerable so quickly. But then—his voice again, softer this time, a gentle tug of warmth threading through the rough edges.

“You know I had a daughter, right?” he said, and there was the faintest smile in his voice, like he was opening a box in his mind he didn’t always let himself look into. “And a wife before that. This stuff ain’t new to me, sweetheart.”

You blinked, surprised, your gaze flicking up to find him no longer just the gruff, untouchable man with the heavy boots and the guarded eyes, but someone else too—someone who’d lived through softness, through family, through love.

“Sarah,” he continued, his tone tinged with a quiet fondness that tugged at your heart, “she used to wake me up in the middle of the night, tell me to drive her to the store ‘cause she ran outta pads, even if we already had three boxes in the cabinet.” His lips curved, just barely. “Always said the ones I bought weren’t the right kind.”

And you couldn’t help it—you laughed, the sound bubbling up out of you so suddenly and unguarded it surprised you both. Joel’s smile widened at the sound, just a little—crooked and boyish, the kind of smile that made him look years younger, like hearing you laugh had knocked the wind out of him in the best way. There was something in his eyes then, something soft and unspoken, like the echo of a memory he wasn’t quite ready to name.

Without even thinking, you leaned into him more, your shoulder brushing against his chest, your body instinctively curling toward the warmth he always carried with him. And Joel, for all his weathered composure and hardened edges, tensed for half a second—his breath hitching, barely audible, like he wasn’t used to being held onto, like your closeness stirred something tender he didn’t know where to put. But he didn’t move away. If anything, his arm only wrapped tighter around you, his palm splaying across your upper back, steady and careful, like he was holding something precious.

“Sometimes,” you whispered, the words slipping out like petals falling from your mouth, “I feel so sad. Like... this wave just crashes over me outta nowhere. Like I’m drowning in everything all at once and I can’t breathe through it.”

Joel didn’t speak right away. He just let the silence stretch, let you settle into the space where your sadness could exist without shame. His hand started moving again, slow circles over your back, and when he finally spoke, it was barely above a murmur, low and warm and safe.

“Well, then I guess we’ll just sit right here till the wave passes,” he said. “And I’ll be right here the whole time, alright? Ain’t gonna let it pull you under.”

You looked at him then, really looked—and the wave that hit this time wasn’t sadness but something quieter, gentler, something warm and confusing that settled right beneath your ribs like a secret. It was the kind of feeling you hadn’t let yourself touch in a long time, too raw and delicate to name. But it was there—in the way his eyes softened when they met yours, in the way his arm stayed around you like it belonged there, like you belonged there. And for the first time, Joel saw it in your gaze too—that flicker of something dangerously close to hope, to trust, maybe even to something deeper, something blooming slowly and quietly in the space between your sadness and his silence.

His expression shifted, just barely—a breath caught, a beat skipped, his jaw tightening like he felt it too but didn’t know what to do with it. And then he dipped his head slightly, his voice a murmur made of gravel and care. “Get some rest,” he said softly, not pulling away. “I’ll be right here.”

And somehow, those four little words—I’ll be right here—felt like a promise. Like a vow. Like a home.

So you let yourself lean fully into him, cheek resting against the solid warmth of his chest, lulled by the slow, rhythmic beat of his heart and the way his fingers absently traced over your arm like he didn’t even realize he was doing it. And just before your eyes fluttered closed, you felt it—the way he pressed the softest kiss to the top of your head, so light it almost could’ve been imagined, like a secret he didn’t know how to speak out loud.

But you felt it.

And it was everything.