#laurel dressed like that because she wanted to

[dreammfyre]

you belong with me ⋆. 𐙚 steven conklin

❀ can't you see that i’m the one who understands you? been here all along, so why can't you see? ❀

part one, part two, part three.

summary: you've known steven conklin your whole life, always a clown ready to ruin your vacation, even though deep down they were still the same kids. one night when laurel asks you about a possible new boyfriend at dinner, steven doesn't like the answer. looks like there's one name on his list of conquests he's just never been able to cross off.

warnings: fisher!reader, steven x fem!reader, season one vibes, steven is a stupid. english is not my first language, so please be kind.

author note: I CAN'T WITH S3!STEVEN WTFFFF the summer steven conklin turned pretty or what. team steven, next question.

The dining room smells of a delicious mixture of roasted fish and garlic butter. You were the last to arrive at the table after your siblings' shouts, not because they really cared that you were coming to share with them, but the rules were clear: no one starts eating until everyone has taken their place. So your absence caused a commotion among the kids. You ran down the stairs with wet hair, wearing a short green dress and your favorite shoes that go everywhere with you.

"I'm here, I'm here," you say, taking your place next to Bells. "I'm sorry."

"Always late," Jeremiah reproaches you in a tone of voice that annoys you. You give him a rude look, causing him to giggle.

"Come on, how long can it take you to take a shower?" Now it's Conrad who's scolding you.

"You can tell me Mr. '30 Minutes under shower'." You reply, raising an eyebrow and resting both elbows on the table, looking at him expectantly, waiting for his answer. Everyone laughs, Jer slaps his brother's arm and bursts out laughing, and Steven has to laugh, hiding his face in a napkin so as not to make fun of his friend.

"Enough, boys. We haven't even started eating and you're already fighting.” Your mother scolds you and your brothers.

The years go by, and some things never change—except you.

You're eating your salad while the conversation constantly changes topics. Conrad and you team up to mock Jer, quickly forgetting your discontent, then Jeremiah and Belly tease Steven about his bad performance in sports. He's always been a video game nerd sitting on the couch. That's how it goes, nothing is personal, it's just their way of passing the time. Until the moment arrives, the same every summer but on different vacation days, Laurel leans forward with that soft, sly smile. And then she says it.

"So, honey. Do you have a boyfriend or someone we should meet?" She winks at you.

Your fork freezes halfway to your mouth with the cherry tomato about to be chewed and digested. Conrad looks at you directly as if you were about to confess to a crime, unlike Jeremiah, who shows no interest in your answer. Your mother pats you on the shoulder, encouraging you to answer confidently. Of course, you're with family, but Belly knows better than anyone else in that room what you're feeling: your heart beating fast, calculating your words so as not to say something that will really embarrass you. She sympathizes with you with her gaze and a smile that comforts you. And Steven... well, Steven practically sits up straight in his seat, attentive to what you're about to say.

It's okay. You only have one job. The same one you have every year. Don't say anything stupid.

"Maybe."

That word causes a commotion at the table. What does maybe mean? Do you have a boyfriend? Conrad's eyes widen and his appetite disappears at the mystery of who the boy is who dares to date his little sister. Belly looks at you in surprise. You hadn't said anything to her about it, and deep down she feels a little betrayed because you two tell each other everything.

"Maybe?" Your mother repeats what you said.

Your cheeks turn red, you want to disappear. Bury yourself in the sand on the beach or walk towards the sea and never turn back.

"Excuse me?" Jeremiah now seems to realize what you just said. "Who are you talking about? Do we know him?"

Belly gives you a hand and tries to calm the situation down.

"Jer, calm down." She taps his arm discreetly. She doesn't want to make you more nervous; it's not that big of a deal.

And, as expected, Steven wasted no time in opening his mouth, always with the worst possible words.

"You mean the guy who vapes and talks about saving whales all the time?" He teases, knowing exactly who you're talking about. Good heavens, the most boring person he's ever met in his entire life. "You really like him?"

"Steven," his mother warns him, pointing her fork at him. But the boys are already laughing: Jeremiah chokes on his water—and you hope he chokes so they'll stop talking about this—Conrad shakes his head without saying anything else, not wanting to contribute to your humiliation, but it won't end there.

"You don't even know him, Steven." You try to defend yourself, but he always has something to say, no matter how stupid it is.

"I've seen enough," he says in a nasty tone. "His Instagram is a real red flag. And the way he commented on your photo? ‘Cutie patootie’? Are we in kindergarten?”

Holy crap, at this point, if he kept hearing about the dude dating his sister, Conrad was gonna be the one walking straight into the sea with no return. While Laurie regrets her question and everything it was causing, your cheeks couldn't be redder, and you bite your inner cheek to not do the same with your nails.

“At least he doesn’t argue with 11-year-olds on Xbox.” This time Belly defends you.

The table breaks out in laughter again, although this time there are fewer people laughing, but you don't smile again for the rest of the dinner. You are the first to finish, and even though it was one of your favorite meals, you don't ask for seconds. You excuse yourself early, without even waiting for the dessert, murmur a polite thank you to your mother and Laurel, and disappear upstairs before Steven can make another joke at the expense of your possible boyfriend.

Nothing was personal.

That's the rule. When you were ten, you didn't understand, and when the boys bullied you, you ended up crying in your room, locked away until the next day out of embarrassment. Even though you're no longer ten, you close the door harder than usual and breathe more deeply to control yourself. But you remember that the time is approaching and you have to finish getting ready for your date. You have no choice but to look for the makeup you want to use, wondering if it's a good idea to use eyeliner, knowing that your pulse right now is not something to be proud of.

You look in the mirror and don't feel so bad. Your hair has kept its natural waves, although they're not as defined, but it doesn't bother you. You even think it suits you. True to your habits, you ask Alexa to play your playlist, you start by covering your dark circles a little and adding some color to your cheeks while applying mascara to your eyelashes—too close to the mirror—when you hear a soft knock on the door.

"It's open." You raise your voice above the music. It must be Belly because you have to give her back a pair of earrings.

You turn around excitedly, wanting to ask your friend how you look in that dress; is it too short for a date? Do the rings match, or would it be better to switch from gold to silver? Does the makeup make you look like a slut? Oh, no, how embarrassing to show up looking like you want to sleep with him.

That's why you need female advice.

However, it's not Belly who walks through your bedroom door, it's her unbearable older brother.

"Hey.” Steven says in a low voice. He stays near the door, as if you're going to throw something at him, which, to be honest, you consider doing.

You look at him with disgust and turn back to the mirror, finishing your lips. Steven won't admit it, but he likes your room. It has a scent of perfume and strawberry incense that he only gets in this place. The decor perfectly reflects your personality, with soft, pleasant colors that suit you, pictures hanging with photos of your siblings and parents, and childhood stuffed animals that are many years old. The books you read on vacation are kept here, like a personal collection. For him, there is no more comfortable place in the whole house. Perhaps it's not the decor or the furniture; it's simply that your presence improves any place.

While you're trying to decide which color goes best with your outfit, Steven lies down on your perfectly made bed.

"What are you doing?" you ask him, not particularly interested in talking to him.

“You’re mad.” He points his finger at you.

You roll your eyes and let out a sigh. "Seriously, Sherlock? How did you notice? When I left the table after being humiliated in front of everyone?"

“You said ‘maybe.’ I thought that meant he wasn’t serious!” He raised his hands, claiming innocence.

“Or maybe I just didn’t want to talk about it.” You turn to look at yourself in the reflection one last time, fixing your hair and leaving a few strands hanging forward. Steven looks at you from your bed, letting his guard down and showing you his regret; he doesn't want to spend the whole summer away from you.

“I wasn’t trying to be a dick.”

But you don't take him seriously.

“You weren’t trying not to be, either.”

You grab your purse and phone, a cardigan that belonged to your mother years ago and is now yours thanks to your insistence. As a last step, you take your favorite perfume, that scent you only wear on special occasions, and perhaps tonight is the night you've been waiting for.

"Where are you going?" Steven follows you with his gaze.

"On a date."

He doesn't like the answer, frowning and tilting his head slightly, unhappy that you're leaving tonight. Especially if it's with that man. As you walk toward the door, you almost crash into him in your attempt to leave—or rather, escape—and you look up, ready to start another discussion.

"Can you tell me what you're doing?"

"A date?" he asks you with disgust. Not if he's alive to stop it. "With that jerk?”

"You don't know him."

It wasn't the first time Steven had made that kind of joke, but this time it felt different for some reason. You can see it in his eyes, you don't know if he's serious or just trying to make you angry again as usual.

"Fine, but does your mother know you're going out all night with a stranger?" He raises an eyebrow. You're outraged by his tone of voice; that kind of threat is considered high treason. You're about to respond when your phone buzzes with a notification. You quickly read the message: it's your date annoyed because you haven't arrived yet and he's still waiting for you at the agreed place. You don't know how to explain in a text Steven is making your life hell. "Is that him? Nice! You can tell him you're not goin'.”

"You're an idiot, Steven.” You point your finger at him, too angry to hold back. “I don’t say anything when you hook up with a different girl every summer. I’ve watched you treat feelings like summer jobs — temporary, seasonal, no strings attached. And you think you get to police me?”

"It's different."

His answer is so simple that it seems ridiculous to you. You slump your shoulders. Steven can't let you go out like that, all dressed up, with that hair that makes you irresistible, that dress that accentuates your figure, and that exquisite coconut and vanilla scent that will torture him all night long until the damn summer is over, because for some reason—biology—you're much hotter than you were last year. Damn it, you don't understand, he loves you, he just doesn't want some idiot to take advantage of you. It's his way of protecting you, but he's been doing it for years without realizing that the truth is, he just wants you for himself.

"Different," you repeat with contempt. “How? Why do you even care who I go out with, Steven?”

"That idiot doesn't deserve to go out with you!" Raise your voice, it's a good thing there's no one on the other side because you're not being subtle. "None of them deserve you!"

In his head, it makes sense. They don't know which song is your favorite, nor do they make you laugh when you're about to cry during the saddest part of the movie. Steven noticed this when you were kids watching old DVDs. He always passes you a tissue before even asking, and you never have to explain why. That you love chocolates but without any kind of filling, not mint, strawberry, or Oreo. You love to read, every summer they buy you a new book, and you love to spend the afternoon with Laurel on the terrace in silence while she writes. But her favorite thing is that you talk to the sea when you're alone. Once your mother told you that the waves carry away secrets, and since then you whisper them to the sea.

Those guys only see what's on the surface: your hair, your sparkle, your soft voice, or your tight dress. You don't blame them at all; you live by stealing their attention when you walk through the kitchen. But Steven knows every detail.

Damn it. He's screwed because of you.

Silence.

Dense and unbearable.

You don't say anything. You can't, your brain is in chaos right now and you can't make sense of it. The words get stuck in your throat like a painful stone.

And suddenly, Steven seems nervous. As if he didn't want to say that last thing and regrets his decision, or maybe as if he wanted to tell you but never imagined he actually would. Just being near you confuses him, your presence upsets him in a way he thought would never happen again.

His eyes rest on the hem of your dress, your legs drive him crazy. You see his throat move as he swallows. His gaze slowly scans your body, carefully observing every part of you as if this were the first time you had met. He loves your accessories, that necklace you bought two summers ago at a fair from a guy who makes them by hand. He has no idea why he remembers those things and not Mrs. Jenkins' last class, but that's beside the point. He continues up your neck until he reaches your mouth, pausing at the gloss of your lipstick.

Your voice is barely a whisper now. “Steven, let me go.”

But you don’t sound convinced. Not even a little, you want to know how far he'll go. You want to confirm if you're going completely crazy, your heart beats too fast and you feel your legs tremble under his gaze, Steven doesn’t move. Not for a second.

Slowly, a palm rests on your waist over your dress, warm and firm. The other gently caresses your jaw, with his thumb brushing the corner of your lips, as if curious to know if they are as sweet as they seem. He looks into your eyes one last time, waiting for you to push him against the door and yell at him like you usually do, but this time you just stay silent, waiting for him to make the next move because you are not capable of doing so.

Until he kisses you.

A movement that begins gently, without shyness or insecurity, just as he is, but with a totally new care. His lips are firm but patient, tasting the watermelon flavor of your lip gloss. You tense up instinctively, nervous about everything that is happening, your fingers curled in the palm of your hand and your breath coming in short gasps.

But Steven doesn't pressure you.

His thumb caresses your cheek, slowly and reassuringly, and your muscles relax one by one.

Your lips part beneath his, and suddenly you return the kiss, with a desire you didn't know existed between you. Steven moves closer, and you let him invade your space, your slightly trembling hands sliding down his chest and your fingers clinging to the fabric of his ridiculous colorful shirt as if you needed something solid to hold on to. His body is warm and familiar, but now it feels new.

Your mouths move together now, deeper, then faster, like a rhythm you've always known but never shared. Your lip gloss smudges slightly on his lips, but he doesn't care. And you gasp softly into his mouth, and he receives it like a revealing shiver.

Steven pulls away from your wet, half-open lips, just a few inches, and you slowly open your eyes, looking at him with a lust that suits you perfectly.

But this time it is you who leans in, grabbing the front of his shirt and pulling him toward you, desperate and reckless as he never imagined you could be. Your lips meet again, now with more urgency, your tongues brush against each other, your breath mixes, and you moan softly when his hand slides down the back of your dress, dangerously close to the zipper.

You don't know where this will end. You don't care.

Finally, when they pull apart to breathe, he keeps his forehead pressed against yours. Steven takes your face in both hands, looking at you as if he wants to keep that image forever in his memory.

His voice is rough, and he whispers so close that his breath keeps hitting you.

"Good luck on your date." He whispers as if his words are painful to say. You want to respond, or rather, you have many questions swirling around in your head. Just as you're about to say something, Steven tucks your hair behind your ear, leaving those loose strands you like so much. "You look beautiful."

You can't even respond.

And when he leaves, he can't bring himself to look you in the face one last time. As he walks out the door, he wipes his mouth with the back of his arm, still dazed and breathless from the warm sensation of your soft lips on his skin. He doesn't realize it yet:

He hasn't just ruined his date.

He has no idea what he just started.

And neither do you.

He stands in the hallway for a second — just stands there, intentando entender por qué había hecho eso, his heart pounding like he just got caught stealing something sacred. Maybe he did.

Stepping out of the shower, he runs into his best friend with wet hair, wearing only a towel. Oh dear, he has no idea how he got away with it. And guilt starts to eat him alive the moment he hears Jeremiah's calm voice. He has to try twice as hard to look him in the eye after what he just did.

“You still coming tonight?”

Steven swallows hard. “Nah. I don’t feel great.”

It’s not a lie. Not really. His chest feels too full. His head too loud. His hands still shake a little, Steven has no choice but to hide them behind his back. Oh, how I'm going to miss Cousins when Jeremiah and Conrad kill him.

He walks down the hall, past the familiar creak in the floorboard, and locks himself in his room, seriously considering not leaving that place until the vacations are over . The door clicks shut like the lid on a box he doesn’t know how to open again.

He doesn’t turn on the lights.

Steven just falls onto the bed, face up, until he realizes that the ceiling doesn't have answers. But he stares at it anyway — blank and white and still, the exact opposite of his insides. His lips are still tingling, and he's afraid he'll end up forgetting the sensation. He can taste your lip gloss on the edge of his mouth. He wipes it off again, but it doesn't go away.

He replays it in his mind—the first kiss, and the second. The way you clung to his shirt like you didn't want him to stop was a reaction he didn't expect from you. In fact, he didn't expect any of this, but his impulse was stronger than his intelligence, and that's not something that happens to him often.

But you never said stay.

You didn’t cancel the date.

His stomach twists, very different from a stomachache caused by mixing too many foods, but still a pain he cannot explain in words. He feels selfish, he doesn't want you to be with someone else, but he also has no intention of asking you for anything more.

He forces himself to get out of bed, feeling his body heavy with the guilt weighing on his shoulders. He had broken the first rule of friendship: never get involved with your friend's sister, and he did it in a big way because there are two of them. He looks out the window, hoping to find nothing. Stillness. But there you are, walking down...

Hair loose. Dress hugging your hips. The phone pressed to your ear as you move your hands quickly, you seem to be arguing, you are not happy at all.

Lip gloss freshly reapplied.

His heart stops, then starts again too fast. You’re actually going.

In a horrible silence, Steven watches you disappear into the night like nothing happened between you. Like his hands weren’t just on your skin. Like his mouth wasn’t just buried in your lips. Just like no one had ever wanted more.

He wonders if your date will notice the way your lips are slightly swollen, or that your perfume is already clinging to someone else’s shirt.

He has no choice but to lean his forehead against the cold glass.

And Steven Conklin, for the first time in a long time, feels like he’s losing something he never really had.

𐙚⋆°. MASTERLIST

[amaris-whisperer]

In the Wake of Us l Conrad Fisher x Reader

Pairing: Conrad Fisher x Reader Genre: Post-Breakup, Drama, Romance Warnings: Swearing, unresolved emotional conflict, heartbreak, longing Summary: You and Conrad broke up two years ago. He’s the one that left. Now, you’re forced to see each other again at a family wedding. Old wounds resurface. So do old flames. —

The invitation came in a soft ivory envelope with gold trim. Neat script spelling out names I once used to say like second nature. Steven and Taylor. Together. Getting married.

I read it twice before tucking it under a pile of unopened mail, pretending it didn’t matter. But of course it did. Cousins Beach was stitched into the fabric of me. And weddings, no matter how detached you try to be, have a way of stirring up everything you buried.

I didn’t ask if Conrad would be there. I didn’t have to.

Two years was long enough to learn how to stop checking his name on guest lists. But not long enough to forget the sound of his voice in the dark or the look he gave when he thought I was about to walk away. Because I did. And then he did. And neither of us turned back. — I arrived the night before the rehearsal, late enough that the beach house was already humming with energy. Laurel met me at the door with a hug that lingered a little too long, the kind you give someone you haven’t seen since everything fell apart. I smiled and pretended it didn’t ache to be here again. Pretended the place didn’t still smell like summer and memory and him.

Taylor squealed when she saw me, pulled me into a spin with wine on her breath and joy in her eyes. She looked beautiful. She looked like home. And for a moment, I let myself forget.

But then I heard his name float from the hallway, and my chest seized.

He was here. Of course he was. Brother of the groom. Old flame of the ghost I used to be.

I didn’t see him that night. But I felt him. Like a current under the floorboards, waiting to pull me under.

The rehearsal was at the chapel near the water, small and white and heavy with blooming jasmine. I wore a pale blue dress that didn’t belong to any memory, hoping that would protect me. Hoping he wouldn’t recognize the girl I had become.

He did.

He walked in just before it began, and the air shifted. Not enough for anyone else to notice, but I felt it. Like something long buried waking up.

He looked the same. That was the worst part. Tousled hair, tired eyes, that familiar tension coiled behind his spine like he was bracing for impact. I watched him greet Taylor, hug his mom, nod at Steven. I waited for him to look at me.

He didn’t. Not at first.

But eventually, he did.

It wasn’t dramatic. Just a glance, a blink, a pause in his step. His gaze met mine, and the world tilted for a second. Neither of us smiled.

We hadn’t spoken in two years. Two full years since the night he told me he couldn’t keep trying. Since I told him I couldn’t keep waiting. Two years since we turned away instead of turning toward.

And now we were here. Surrounded by flowers and family and vows we never made.

I avoided him for most of the day. I stuck close to Taylor, helped with decorations, pretended not to notice when Conrad passed behind me or sat across the room. But every time he was near, the back of my neck prickled. Like my body remembered before my mind caught up.

I found him outside after dinner, leaning against the railing, cigarette lit between his fingers like he wasn’t trying to quit again. The sky was lilac and bruised, the ocean whispering things I didn’t want to hear.

“You smoke now?” I asked, stepping beside him without thinking.

He didn’t look surprised. “Only when you’re here.”

That made me pause.

“Funny,” I said, folding my arms. “I thought you quit everything when I left.”

He glanced at me then. Not all at once. Just a slow tilt of the head, eyes narrowed, like he was still trying to decide if I was real.

“I didn’t quit,” he said. “I just stopped pretending I was good at it.”

We stood there for a while, silence stretching between us like it always used to. A rope neither of us wanted to cut but couldn’t untangle.

“I didn’t think you’d come,” he said eventually.

“Neither did I.”

He nodded like he understood. Like he’d been fighting the same question.

“I almost didn’t,” I added. “But Steven means a lot to me.”

“Yeah,” he said softly. “He means a lot to me too.”

It stung, even though I knew what he meant. I turned away from the sea and looked at him.

“You look the same,” I said.

He exhaled a laugh, bitter and low. “You don’t.”

I blinked. “Is that a compliment or an insult?”

He dropped the cigarette and crushed it under his shoe. “It’s the truth.”

I wanted to ask what that meant, but I didn’t. Because I already knew. I wasn’t the same one who used to wait for his messages. I wasn’t the one who stayed up counting the hours between his replies. I wasn’t the one who thought love was supposed to hurt.

“I’m glad you’re here,” he said suddenly.

“Why?”

“Because I’ve been trying to forget you, and it’s not working.”

There it was. The thing he always did. Drop a sentence like a bomb and walk away before it explodes.

“I’m not something you forget,” I said quietly.

“No,” he said. “You’re not.”

I should have walked away. That would have been the smart thing, the strong thing, the thing I promised myself I’d do if this moment ever came. But instead, I stood there, watching him, remembering the way he used to hold me when the world felt like it was breaking.

“I loved you,” I said, just to say it. Just to remind myself that I had.

“I know,” he said. “I never stopped.”

It was too late. That was the worst part. We were two people standing in the wreckage of something we once called love, both still holding onto the pieces, not sure who they belonged to anymore.

The wedding on the next day was beautiful. The kind of beautiful that hurts a little. I watched Taylor walk down the aisle, tears in her eyes and sunlight on her shoulders, and I felt something twist in my chest.

Conrad sat two rows behind me. I could feel his eyes during the vows.

I didn’t turn around.

—

After the ceremony, people drank and danced and took pictures against the horizon. I stayed on the edge of it all, toes in the sand, dress fluttering in the wind.

He found me again. He always did.

“Dance with me,” he said.

“No.”

“Please.”

I looked up at him. At the boy I once thought I’d spend my life with. At the boy who never knew how to stay but always wanted me to wait.

“I don’t think I can survive loving you again,” I said.

“I don’t want you to.”

That stunned me.

He stepped closer. “I don’t want you to love the version of me that broke your heart. I want you to love this one. The one who learned from it.”

“You think you’ve changed?”

“I know I have.”

I looked at him for a long time. At the softness in his voice. At the way he wasn’t trying to win. Just to speak honestly.

“I’m still angry,” I said.

“Good. You should be.”

“I’m still hurt.”

“So am I.”

“And I don’t trust you.”

“I’ll wait until you do.”

I didn’t say yes. But I let him hold my hand. I let him lead me onto the sand while a slow song played behind us, while the waves kissed the shore. We swayed quietly, close but not too close, like two people learning how to stand in the same space again.

He rested his forehead against mine and breathed out my name like it was something holy.

I closed my eyes and let the moment live.

Because maybe this wasn’t the end.

Maybe it was just the first time we got it right.

[bullet-prooflove]

Champagne Gold: Jack Abbot x Reader (NSFW)

Tagging: @kmc1989 @cosmic-psychickitty @ilariyalavorowrites @spooky-librarian-ghost

Companion piece to:

The Asshole King - Jack discovers you have an unusual technique for dealing with patients.

Bob Dylan - You help Jack to relax after an incident at the hospital leaves him temporarily blind.

Because Of You - Jack realises he's starting to heal in more ways than one after you spend the day taking care of him.

Balance - Jack reveals his feelings for you but they come with complications.

Off Limits - An awkward start to the day leads Jack to make a claim on your affections.

Hawaii - Jack discovers who he really is when you book a trip to Hawaii.

Silk (NSFW) - Jack loves the sight of you in silk.

Boston - You reflect on the past after your ex-husband makes an appearance on a trying day.

This God Damn Fucking Day - Jack steps into the fray with things get messy between you and you ex-husband.

Misdemeanour - Jack's forced to step in when you get arrested because of your ex-husband.

Fishtail - Jack helps you decompress in the aftermath of your ex-husband.

Love Language (NSFW) - Jack has his own unique love language.

What Puts You On That Ledge - Jack finds away to pull you off that ledge.

After Maria died, Jack never thought he’d get married again.

He never thought he’s stand at the end of another aisle watching the most beautiful woman he’s ever laid eyes on walk towards him in a champagne gold wedding dress, one that shimmers as she walks. You look ethereal with a matching laurel wreath head piece threaded through your hair.

“Christ.” He says to Robby who stands beside him, his hands clasped together in front of him. “She’s goddamn beautiful.”

Robby doesn’t respond, he simply clears his throat because you’re already there standing in front of Jack and he’s completely in awe of you.

“You sure you wanna marry me?” He asks gruffly as you take his trembling hands in your own and you give him that sweet smile, the one he fell in love with that morning he gave you a ride home, Bob Dylan playing over the speakers in his car.

“Jack.” You say squeezing his hands lightly. “I’ve never wanted anything so badly in my life.”

***

When Jack recounts his wedding day, he tells people the reception was his favourite part. Everything from the first dance to Bob Dylan’s ‘Wedding Song’ to the casino that was hosted on the lower floor of the venue, where he won a shit load of money.

The truth is it was the wedding night. Him sitting before you on the edge of that bed in the bridal suite, watching you undress for him.

It’s as the material falls into a pile at your feet that he gets one of the biggest surprises. A tiny champagne gold G-string and the prettiest heart shaped pasties covering your nipples.

“I wanted something special for you.” You whisper as he reaches up, his thumb chasing over the tiny rhinestones that decorated them. “And I know how much you like fucking my tits.”

You are a goddamn gift from heaven, he thinks as you sink down onto your knees and help him out of his trousers. He’s already leaking by the time his cock springs free. You arch your back, thrusting your tits out, trapping his dick in the space between. That drop of pre-cum smears across the top of your breasts and his breath catches as you squeeze your tits together and start to move.

“You gonna let me have all the fun tonight?” He mutters, his palm cradling your face, his thumb tracing over the pert shape of your mouth. The light from the chandelier above glints off those rhinestones and already he can feel the ecstasy chasing through his nerve endings as he ruts against your chest. “We keep going like this we’ll be seeing fireworks before I get to enjoy the rest of you.”

“Well let’s change that up shall we?” You murmur as you shift positions, straddling his lap instead. That tiny scrap of fabric you call a G-string rubs across the tip of his cock, separating the two of you. He grabs the tiny strap in his fist, snapping it before he tosses the panties off to one side.

“Opps.” He smirks before his gaze strays to your pussy and he huffs out a laugh. He reaches between the two of you, his fingertips tracing over the gold speckles of glitter and the rhinestones that decorate your bareness. “You really are just full of surprises aren’t you?”

“Oh Jack baby.” You whisper in his ear, your teeth grazing his earlobe, tugging it lightly between your teeth. “I just wanted to make sure you remember this night for the rest of your life.”

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[ssweeterthanfiction]

Glimpse of Us

summary: routine became something finnick cherished. but course, the capitol must ruin everything, including his love. but he will still find a way to get her back.

finnick odair x fem!reader

content warnings for the whole story: descriptions of death, torture, starvation, and everything described in The Hunger Games, mentions of suicidal thoughts, implications of S/A

mood board + playlist

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Chapter VII

They don’t bring Finnick into the War Room.

Not officially, anyway.

He isn’t invited to the briefings, or given access to intel. The door shuts before he can ask questions, the conversation ends when he walks by. Everything he hears, he hears in pieces—through murmured hallway conversations, closed doors that don’t quite latch, whispered updates passed between people who seem to forget that Finnick has ears. That Finnick has stakes.

Sometimes Plutarch catches him in the hallway, offers a vague reassurance about “progress,” or “developing stages.” Haymitch mutters things here and there, never the full picture. He always ends it with the same gruff line: “You’ll know when you need to know.”

But Finnick needs to know now. Every second he doesn’t feels like a betrayal.

Still, no one looks him in the eye for too long.

He’s not stupid. He knows what they see when they look at him: someone unraveling. A liability. A ticking bomb dressed up in Victory laurels.

Maybe they’re not wrong.

Because underneath the stillness, the silence, something inside him is splintering.

The guilt is constant. All-consuming. It burrows into the cracks of every hour he’s spent here, safe, while you’re out there—Gods know where, Gods know what’s being done to you.

And the worst part is: he left you. The wire snapped. The world exploded. And he hadn’t found you in time.

You had been right there. Somewhere just beyond the trees. Just beyond the smoke. And he’d lost you.

He’d let them take you.

And now the rebellion is moving like molasses—calculating, weighing, waiting. As if there’s time.

There isn’t.

He knows the Capitol better than anyone here. He knows how fast the pain starts. How they break you without breaking the skin. How they take what you love and twist it into something unrecognizable. They don’t need months to do damage.

Just days.

Just hours.

The first time he hears your name again, it’s from behind the glass walls of the Command room.

He isn’t meant to be there. He’s just passing by, pacing like he does now—like if he stops moving for too long, he might fall apart completely.

He catches a sentence midair, Coin’s voice clipped and cool: “She’s still being held with the others. Alive. For now.”

The words hit him like a punch to the ribs.

Alive.

His legs falter mid-step. He braces a hand against the wall, barely breathing.

Alive.

But for how long?

Is anyone asking that?

Because they talk about you like you’re a box to be recovered. An asset. A symbol. Not a person. Not his person.

That night, the silence is a scream inside his head. He thinks of what it must be like for you right now. Are you cold? Are you afraid? Is someone hurting you? Are you being told he gave up on you? That he forgot?

He presses the heel of his palm into his eyes until stars bloom against his lids. Anything to stop the images from coming—your face contorted in pain, your voice crying out for help in a place where no one is listening.

He can’t sleep.

Can’t think straight.

By the time morning comes, he feels like a shell of himself.

Haymitch finds him outside the infirmary the next evening, a bottle in his hand and circles under his eyes darker than the District tunnels.

Finnick doesn’t hesitate. His voice is hoarse but sharp. “I want in.”

Haymitch lifts a brow. “You always want in.”

“I mean it this time.”

“You meant it last time.”

Finnick’s jaw tightens. “I’m not asking to be coddled. I’m not asking for sympathy. I know how the Capitol works. I survived them. That has to count for something.”

Haymitch sighs through his nose. He looks like he’s aged five years in the last five days. “You’re not sleeping,” he says instead.

“Does it matter?”

Haymitch looks at him for a long time. “You’re slipping, kid.”

“I’ll be fine when she’s back.”

“And if she isn’t?”

Finnick doesn’t answer.

Because there is no if.

Two days later, they hand him a transcript.

No context. No warning.

Just a line of garbled Capitol communications and one clear sentence, spoken in a voice that’s raw and crackling through static.

“I’m still here.”

His knees go out from under him.

He catches himself on the edge of a table before he can collapse, his breath leaving him in a broken exhale.

It’s your voice.

Real.

Weakened, but real.

Alive.

You’re alive.

Around him, the others are talking. Plutarch is analyzing the source, Coin is giving orders, and Boggs is marking something on a map. There are plans in motion. Moving pieces.

But all Finnick can hear is you.

I’m still here.

He clutches the transcript in shaking hands, presses it to his chest like a prayer.

The next morning, they call him into the War Room.

Coin. Boggs. Haymitch. A few other officials.

He walks in with a spark of hope flaring in his chest. This is it. He’ll be a part of the extraction. He’ll get to go. He’ll bring you home.

There’s a map spread across the table, zones marked in red. Timelines. Strategized entry points. Extraction windows.

And your name—written in bold above one of the sectors.

Finnick’s eyes fly to the deployment list.

His name isn’t on it.

“I want to be there,” he says immediately.

Boggs doesn’t look surprised. “You’re not on the mission.”

“I should be.”

“You’re compromised,” Coin says, her voice clipped. “Emotionally. We need clean heads on the field.”

“I know the Capitol,” Finnick argues. “Better than anyone. I know the tunnels, the scent of the air, how they manipulate their prisoners. I should be there.”

“You’re too close,” Boggs says. His tone is gentle, but firm.

“I am the mission,” Finnick grits out. “She is everything to me.”

They don’t respond.

Haymitch shifts awkwardly in the corner but doesn’t speak. He doesn’t defend him.

And Finnick feels it then—that isolation, that frozen wall they’ve all built around him. He’s not part of the team. He’s the reminder of what could be lost.

He leaves before they dismiss him, fists clenched at his sides.

That night, he doesn’t try to sleep.

He just sits on the floor of his room, knees drawn up to his chest, the transcript of your voice folded and unfolding in his hands.

I’m still here.

He repeats the words to himself like a mantra, like a lifeline, like they can hold him together.

Because everything else is pulling him apart.

They’re going to the Capitol.

They’re going to try to bring you back.

And he’s not going with them.

He’s just supposed to wait.

Sit still while the people he loves walk into fire.

Hope that you come back.

Hope that you recognize him when you do.

Hope that some part of what they had doesn’t get lost in the dark.

Finnick bows his head and presses the paper to his lips, a prayer mouthed into the quiet, desperate and aching.

“Please hold on.”

He has nothing else left to give but that.

🌊 .·:¨🌊🐚🌊¨:·. 🌊

The knots come easily to his fingers. They always have.

Finnick sits on the edge of a bench in one of the unused prep rooms, a long coil of rope in his lap. The kind the District 13 soldiers use for field drills and training maneuvers. He doesn’t remember picking it up, just that his hands needed something to do.

Anything to drown out the thoughts.

He loops and pulls and tightens without thinking. Muscle memory. Over, under, through. A perfect square knot. A fisherman's bend. A reef knot. Over and over and over.

The rhythm soothes something in him—or maybe numbs it. He isn’t sure there’s a difference anymore.

The rebellion is in final preparations. A few more days, they say. Then the rescue teams launch. You might be back by the end of the week. Or not at all.

He swallows hard against the ache that creeps into his chest every time that second possibility tries to take root. He won’t let it.

***

You were quiet that day. The waves had stilled outside the Victor's Village, the salt-slick wind curling around the porch like it didn’t quite know what to do with itself. The ocean was waiting.

So were you.

It was only a few days after your Games, and you still flinched at loud noises. Still woke up with your fists clenched and breath caught in your throat. Still walked like the arena was stitched to your shadow.

Finnick found you on the steps that morning, curled into a knit sweater two sizes too big for you — one of Mags’s old ones, he recognized. Your eyes were fixed on the water. Like you were trying to find yourself somewhere out there.

He didn’t say anything at first. Just sat down beside you, dropping a thick coil of spare fishing rope between your feet.

You glanced at it. Then at him.

“What’s this for?”

Finnick didn’t answer right away. He picked up the rope and started working it between his fingers, slow and steady. “We all need something to do with our hands,” he said eventually.

You didn’t ask what he meant. You didn’t need to.

He offered you a strand.

You hesitated. Then took it.

“Start here,” he murmured, guiding your fingers, “and twist toward you. No—yeah, that’s it. Good. Now loop over—don’t let it tangle. Try again.”

You made a face when it slipped. “I’m bad at this.”

He smiled. It was the first time either of you had smiled in days. “You just won the Hunger Games. I think you can handle some rope.”

You looked up at him, unsure whether to laugh or cry. “It doesn’t feel like I won.”

“I know,” he said quietly. And you knew he meant it.

There was a long pause, filled only by the sound of the ocean below. And then, gently, he shifted a little closer, took your hands in his to show you again.

“This is how I got through it, you know,” he said. “After. I’d come down to the docks with a line of rope and tie knots for hours. My hands would cramp. I wouldn’t stop. It was something to do. Something that stayed the same, even when everything else didn’t.”

You didn’t say anything. But your eyes softened.

You tried again.

And this time, you got it.

“Hey,” he said softly, watching the knot hold. “Look at that.”

You exhaled a shaky breath and looked up at him. “Does the pain ever stop?”

He didn’t lie. He didn’t say yes.

He just held your gaze and answered honestly. “It gets quieter. Some days.”

You nodded.

And then you tied another knot.

***

He wonders where you are right now. If your hands are shaking. If you remember that afternoon at all— he way the salt air made your hair curl, the way your laugh, small as it was, had sounded like it didn’t quite know how to exist yet, but was trying anyway.

The knot slips from his fingers.

He leans forward, elbows on his knees, rope pooling in his lap like it’s mocking him.

I'm still here. That’s what you said.

But for how much longer?

He presses the back of his hand to his mouth to muffle the sound building in his throat. It’s not a sob. Not really. Just a sound of something caving in.

You were trying.

And now he needs to try too.

Even if they won’t let him on the mission.

Even if all he can do is sit here and wait.

He picks up the rope again.

Pulls. Loops. Ties.

Something to hold onto.

Something that won’t fall apart.

🌊 .·:¨🌊🐚🌊¨:·. 🌊

Finnick sits beside Katniss in the stark studio of District 13, his body tight with nerves, a coil of rope in his hands that he works mindlessly into knots. Each twist, each pull of the rope feels like the only thing tethering him to reality. His hands move on instinct—loop, twist, pull—over and over again. It's a routine, a lifeline. Just like she used to be.

Across from him, Katniss stares at the camera, her features unreadable. She's trying to steady herself for what comes next.

“I can do it,” he hears himself say. The words come out thin, haunted. “If it'll help her. I’ll talk.”

Plutarch nods, stepping aside for the cameras.

When the red light glows and the signal goes live, Finnick lifts his eyes to the lens and begins to speak—not with the charm the Capitol once demanded of him, but with the weariness of a man hollowed out by truth.

"This is Finnick Odair, coming to you alive and well from District 13."

He tells them everything.

How President Snow sold him like a prized possession. How he wasn't the only one. How victors deemed desirable were paraded before the Capitol elite like toys. How they were threatened, controlled, used.

How she was one of them.

“She won her Games at sixteen. She didn’t know what was coming. None of us ever do.” His voice cracks slightly, but he keeps going, hands twisting the rope so tightly his knuckles go white. “She was a favorite. Beautiful, gentle. They said she had ‘softness’—like that was a gift, something they could harvest.”

Katniss glances at him, something shattering in her gaze.

He continues. Names, dates, horrors. The price of survival. The cruelty of silence.

“She was just a girl,” Finnick murmurs. “And they broke her anyway.”

The feed cuts eventually. The room is quiet again.

The mission is underway now. The rescue team is inside the Capitol. And all Finnick can do is wait.

He ties another knot.

Hours crawl by like years.

Katniss sits beside him, arms wrapped around herself. Neither of them speak. Finnick just keeps working the rope in his hands, tighter, tighter. It’s too quiet again—like the worst kind of storm is coming, and all they can do is brace for it.

Then the call comes through.

They’re back.

Katniss shoots to her feet, her face pale but hopeful. Finnick doesn’t even wait. The rope drops from his hands as he bolts from the room, heart pounding in his chest like a drumbeat of desperation.

He runs through the hallways of District 13, shoving past soldiers and medics, barely registering the people rushing the opposite direction. He rounds the corner and sees them—stretchers, gurneys, rebels swarming around figures too thin, too broken, but alive.

Alive.

His eyes scan the room frantically.

Johanna.

He stops briefly when he sees her. Her hair is gone—shaved brutally close to her skull. Her face is hollow, bruised, but her eyes are sharp. Angry. Still Johanna. She’s muttering something under her breath, spitting at a medic who tries to touch her. Still fighting.

He wants to ask if she saw you. If you were with her. But his feet are already moving again.

He hears someone say Peeta’s name.

“He tried to kill her,” someone whispers. “They hijacked him.”

Finnick’s stomach turns violently. The words barely register, swallowed by the storm brewing inside him. If they could do that to Peeta...what had they done to you?

What if you’re not the same?

What if you’re worse?

What if—

And then he sees you.

You’re standing by a doorframe, hunched in Haymitch’s coat, your arms wrapped tightly around yourself. Your skin is pale, lips dry, hair limp and tangled, but...

You’re breathing.

Talking to Haymitch in a soft, uncertain voice. You’re malnourished, gaunt, exhausted...but intact.

He exhales shakily and takes a step forward, then another.

And then you look up.

For a second—just one—he thinks you might run to him. That your eyes might fill with tears of recognition, relief, love.

But instead...

You flinch.

Your body stiffens and you move closer to Haymitch, almost hiding behind him, like you’re afraid. Your eyes are wide, uncertain, like a deer cornered in a snare.

Finnick’s heart shatters.

“Hey,” he says, holding his hands out gently. “It’s me. It’s okay. You’re safe now.”

You don’t answer right away.

Then, your voice, smaller than he’s ever heard it, lifts into the air like a tremor.

“Who are you?”

The world tilts.

“What?” he breathes.

You stare at him blankly. Like he’s a stranger. Like none of it ever happened. The beach. The nets. The whispered secrets in the dark. The stormy nights. The love.

Gone.

“I-I don’t know you,” you whisper, your voice trembling.

Behind you, a medic freezes. Haymitch’s eyes widen.

Finnick’s knees nearly give out.

“No,” he says, voice cracking as he takes a step forward. “No, it’s me. It’s Finnick. You know me. You- you-”

But your eyes only fill with fear, your body curling tighter into yourself, like he might hurt you.

And that’s when everyone realizes it.

The Capitol didn’t just take your freedom.

They took him from you too.

Your memories.

Your love.

Everything you were together.

Gone.

A/N: i want you all to remember that YOU GUYS asked for this.

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[inthedayswhenlandswerefew]

The Keys Of Heaven [Chapter 7: I Look Forward To The Resurrection]

A/N: Only 1 chapter left, besties!!! Don't forget to answer the poll pinned to my blog once you've finished Chapter 7 😘

Series summary: Three years ago, Father Aemond Targaryen performed a miracle. Now he is a cardinal, a media sensation, and a frontrunner to be elected pope. You are a nun who has been brought to Vatican City to assist with the papal conclave. But when your paths cross by happenstance, you must both reckon with your decision to join the Catholic Church…and what you want from the future.

Series warnings: Language, sexual content (18+ readers only), references to abuse and violence, volcanoes, bodily injury, death, peril, scheming, pining, some drugs/alcohol/smoking, Catholic trivia you never asked to learn, kangaroos!

Word count: 4.8k

🦘 A very special thanks to my Aussie slang consultant @bearwithegg and also her mum (any mistakes are mine) 🦘

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“What happened last night?” Rhaena asks.

You are standing in front of the mirror and affixing your veil with pins. At home in Sydney, your convent has long since done away with habits and veils. When you and Rhaena board your transcontinental flight, you’ll be dressed in ordinary jumpers and skirts and runners, and no one will know you’re nuns unless you choose to tell them. You think as you stare at your reflection, a woman you do not recognize: I’ll wear it today, and I’ll wear it tomorrow. And then I’ll never wear it again. “What do you mean?”

“I waited up for you,” Rhaena says, smiling uncertainly. “Or…I tried to. I made it twenty minutes, maybe.”

“You must have been exhausted.”

“Deadset, mate. I was flat out like a lizard drinking yesterday.” She tilts her head to the side, still smiling but increasingly puzzled. “And then you didn’t wake me when you came back, so I must have been knocked out for a while by then, you know I’m a light sleeper. What took so long?”

“Well…” You pretend to be adjusting your veil as you summon the most cavalier version of yourself. “I changed Aemo’s sheets, and then he needed some more shampoo and conditioner so I ran to fetch that, and then I bumped into Cardinal Almazan in the kitchenette and had a nice long yarn with him while he made leche flan. He said we could have some, it should be in the refrigerator. Should we go cut ourselves pieces?”

“Cardinal Targaryen,” Rhaena corrects.

You blink at her, not knowing what she means. “What?”

“Cardinal Targaryen, not Aemo. Not your friend from the beach. He’s going to be the pope soon, you’ll have to get out of the habit of acting so familiar with him.”

You are a little bewildered. It’s a catastrophically sad thought. “Well, he’ll still be the same person. Part of him will always be that boy from the beach.”

But Rhaena shakes her head. “The pope must be the Holy Father to all, which means he can’t be close friends with some nun, not even if that nun is you. No one who holds the Keys of Heaven has the luxury of being normal. And Cardinal Targaryen will be even higher above the rest of us than the last pope, because everybody knows God works miracles through him.”

You see Aemond vanishing through the doorway and into the humid nightscape of Sydney, indigo and stars and streetlights; you hear the vague disembodied echoes of a song you can’t remember. “Right,” you answer numbly.

“Come on, Mum,” Rhaena says, smiling and smoothing your white veil. “Let’s have a go at that leche flan, yeah?”

~~~~~~~~~~

You frown down at the fish pond, the sky above grey and the breeze chilly as it rocks through the laurel hedges and the stone pines and the lemon trees. There in the dark rippling water is your newest victim, a small white koi with a long wisp of a tail like an angel’s wing. It stares inanely up at you with glassy black eyes, seeing nothing now or ever again, bobbing limply on the gentle currents stirred by the trickling of the fountain in the center of the pond.

You mutter, shaking your head, confounded: “Fucking hell, what is going on?”

“You’re overfeeding them,” a loud man’s voice says, and you whirl to him. He has startled you, though not on purpose. Kazi is puffing on his vape; he uses it to gesture to the cold grey sky. “It’s not warm enough for them to need a lot of food, just a few pellets each. You’re giving them too much, so the extra breaks down and leeches the oxygen out of the water, and then they suffocate to death.”

“Oh, that’s horrible!” you cry, closing the plastic container of fish food in your grasp. “Why didn’t you tell me before? You saw me feeding them.”

Kazi smirks and shrugs, his salt-and-pepper hair ruffled by the wind, his short beard getting untidy. Perhaps he forgot his trimmer at home in Poland. “I didn’t want to embarrass you when there were other people out here. And then I kind of forgot about it. It’s been an eventful week, you know.”

“It has been,” you agree. You peer down into the pond again, repentant. You’ll have to take the white koi out and bury it with the others. “Sorry, little mates.”

Kazi grins. “You’re not very good at this nun thing, huh?”

And suddenly, you know: I’m going to leave. After a moment, you smile back, wide and radiant and warm. “No. I reckon I’m not.”

Kazi holds up his vape, white and red like the flag of his country, half like your habit, half like the cassock of a cardinal. “Would you like a hit, Sister? It’s butterscotch flavored.”

“Yeah nah, I don’t smoke. Thanks though.”

“You should reconsider,” Kazi says. “You might need something to take the edge off tomorrow.” Then he saunters off towards the Domus Sanctae Marthae, where brekkie is about to be served.

~~~~~~~~~~

In the dining hall, you pick up plates of Roman maritozzi and apple crostata and bring them to the tables of chattering cardinals, making the most of their last day of deliberation before the voting resumes. The topic of conversation you overhear most frequently is their travel plans to return home; everyone knows the conclave will soon be over. They miss their friends back in their parishes, their flocks of believers, their communities, their traditions, their gardens, their charity projects, their pets.

Cardinal Gideon Saati is telling his table how each December he bakes thousands of Sudanese kahk for local schools and orphanages. Cardinal Jacob Green is explaining how he arranges for Iranian Catholics to celebrate Christmas safely in secret. The dean Cardinal Seaborn, palpably relieved to be nearing the finish line, is floating around the room beaming and resting his hands on shoulders, saying how thankful he is that they’ll all get to be home for the holidays. For a while there, he wasn’t so sure it would turn out that way.

Home, you think wistfully, and for the first time in fifteen years that doesn’t feel like the convent.

You serve Aemond’s table, but he doesn’t say anything to you. He is conversing with Cardinal Valentino Parmigiano of Italy, who has a lot to say about prison ministry, especially concerning inmates connected to the mafia. Aemond listens, looking very tired. You keep trying to catch his eye. He keeps evading you, like he wasn’t inside you last night, like you aren’t bound together by something that is at once forbidden and corporeal and holy. And you are reminded of a homily you once heard about how the sin of sloth is not just laziness but a failure to do what is necessary, what is right; it is an alienation from God’s love and the spiritual conviction that comes with it.

“Thank you so much, Sister,” Lando says when you pass him his plate, and Kazi and Cam smile at you, and even Lucky gives you a quick nod in greeting. He has no reason to resent you now. He has won; Aemond will be the next pope, and nothing you could give him would ever be enough to change that.

Across the dining hall, Cardinal Jahoda and the occupants of his table are listless, not because they’ve lost but because Aemond has won, and he is young and revered and invincible, and he will steer the course of the Faith for the next half a century, long after they are all in their graves. Cardinal Ferrari is morosely nibbling at a maritozzi, sprinkled with powdered sugar and filled with whipped cream. Cardinal Auclair looks up from his slice of apple crostata just long enough to glare at you. You wonder what gifts he will bring his clandestine family for Christmas: toys for the children, perhaps a gold necklace for the woman who should have been his wife.

When brekkie is over and the cardinals are leaving in a red river to convene their final meetings, you find Lando still at his table gathering up the plates and glasses and silverware so they are easier for the nuns to collect. Sister Helvi playfully scolds him for this. Lando cannot be dissuaded.

You go to help him, and when Sister Helvi has skuttled off and you and Lando are alone, you ask: “Lando, did atheists really kill Cardinal Jahoda’s family?”

Lando hesitates. “It was a little more attenuated than that, I think,” he says. “The father was shot in Prague. And then after that, the mother...” He makes an apologetic gesture: What a shame. “Alcoholism or suicide, or both, they’re not always so different, you know? Then he had a brother who set himself on fire to protest authoritarianism in the Eastern Bloc. And Jahoda was the only one left. So did the Soviets murder his entire family? Perhaps not literally. But in a sense, I suppose they did. I think the effect on him was much the same.”

“That’s so awful,” you murmur as you fill your hands with metal silverware that clangs together like archaic instruments of torture.

“People do the best they can, Sister. Very few of us aspire to be villains. Jahoda, and Auclair, and Ferrari...they still remember what the wars did to Europe. They grew up drowning in the aftermath. How can we expect someone like that to know how to breathe clean air? Their experiences and their fears are legitimate. But so too are Aemo’s experiences, and Lucky’s, and Kazi’s, and Cam’s. We must sew this patchwork together somehow. We must endure as the Church always has.”

You don’t know what to say. I don’t think Aemond should be the pope. I know he doesn’t want it for the right reasons. I know I don’t want to leave him behind when I get on that plane.

Lando smiles at you, sad but kind. “I’m always praying for you, Sister.”

“Good. I defo need it.”

He chuckles, and you help each other finish cleaning up, and he doesn’t leave the dining hall until the work is done.

~~~~~~~~~~

It’s after dark, and Aemond is not in the Domus Sanctae Marthae; you know this because you have checked his bedroom, and the kitchenette, and the gym, and even the basement where the nuns do the washing and spiders stare from the corners with their myriad of lidless eyes. He’s not in the gardens either, or in Saint Peter’s Basilica when you traipse through the entire church twice over in your swishing white wool habit and matching runners, passing stone statues of saints that seem to be watching you with cold vexed judgement: You should not be wearing the gown and veil of a bride of Christ. Your passions run in other directions.

“Yeah, yeah, hold your horses,” you mutter with a wave as you pass them. “She’ll be right after tomorrow.” Then you’ll be honest. Then you’ll begin your life over again like Lazarus stumbling out of the tomb still shrouded in his grave clothes, strips of linen hanging from his outstretched arms like flayed skin.

Where is Aemond? Where the bloody hell could he be?

Then you recall the heat of red wax on your cheek and the wine on his tongue when he kissed you for the first time, and you follow that memory to the statue of Saint Andrew, who guards the entrance to the Vatican Grottoes below. He stands holding the X-shaped cross he was crucified on when he went to Greece to spread the gospel there; his blind marble eyes are turned skyward, as if he is gazing up into the dome, stucco, glass windows, mosaics, angels and saints and the faces of the sixteen Holy Fathers interred in the basilica. In a ring around the base, inscribed in Latin in blue letters on a backdrop of gold, are Christ’s words to the first pope: You are Peter and on this rock I will build my church and give you the keys to the Kingdom of Heaven.

You descend into the subterranean maze. And as you try to remember your way to the Clementine Chapel, walking through long corridors with low arched ceilings and florescent lights that are dim and yellow like the pages of old books, you study the paintings and engravings that tell the stories of martyrs, tortured here on earth by blades, flames, arrows, nails, spears, clubs, stones, the hatred of men. Suffering brings us closer to God, the Faith teaches that; and yet perhaps it can also lead us to darker places, the hollows of wounds filled in with pride or wrath or greed or envy, things that leave us hungry no matter how much we’ve devoured.

In the Clementine Chapel, Aemond is gazing at the altar behind which the bones of Saint Peter are buried. You know he’s not praying. He has never prayed, not once in his life; he has only closed his eyes and wished to escape, to climb ever-higher, to touch you as no cardinal ever should. The candles haven’t been lit. The walls and ceiling are coated with gold, setting the air on fire, a glow like the sun but without any warmth.

“I’m leaving whether you are or not,” you say. “But I think you should come with me.”

Aemond turns, a tower of red like the porphyry columns that hold up the altar. His hands are linked behind his back. His voice is sympathetic but immovable. “I can’t go.”

“But you don’t believe in any of this.” You thought you were prepared for his refusal, but you aren’t; already you can feel scalding tears in your eyes, you can feel the grief of losing him all over again, you can see yourself opening up that suitcase to find the seashells you gathered together crushed into dust. “It doesn’t mean anything to you.”

“I don’t know who I am outside of the Church.”

“You’d sort it out,” you insist. “We both would. We could help each other.”

“You’ll be alright. You aren’t like me.”

“Aemo, please listen to—”

“This has been my plan forever,” he says, he hemorrhages, he begs for you to understand. “For as long as I can remember, since, since...” He shakes his head and rakes his fingers through his hair, now blonde, one day grey, one day gone when only his skull is left, interred here with all the other dead Holy Fathers, something between a god and a man. “Since I met you on that beach and you gave me your rosary and I started going to Mass with my mother, since I was twelve years old I have fought to end up here, right here, in Rome, in the Vatican, and every bad thing that ever happened to me could be left behind because I was climbing higher, I was extraordinary, I was going someplace where no one could ever touch me. And I can’t just forget the past twenty-nine years. I can’t start over again. I’m sorry, I wish I could, but I can’t.”

“You don’t think I ever get scared?” you ask, tears flowing down your cheeks like scorching flows of lava. “You don’t think I have moments when I want to wall myself up in the convent and never leave again, not even for a day, not even for an hour, because I know that if I stay there I’ll never be hurt or alone, I’ll be safe until I die in fifty years? Of course I have moments of doubt. Of course I’m fucking scared. But sometimes the right thing to do is scary. You think Christ wasn’t scared when He went to the cross?”

“You’ll be alright out there,” Aemond says again, like he’s trying to convince both of you. “You’re...you’re real, you know? You’re kind, and you’re beautiful, and people will love you.”

“Aemo, you can have the life you want too.”

“In case you haven’t figured this out yet, I’m not a good person. But now I can do good for a lot of people.”

“And what about me?” you ask, your voice fracturing like when Saint Catherine shattered the breaking wheel; but you can’t free yourself from this. You aren’t a saint, you aren’t even a nun anymore; you’re just a woman. “You won’t miss me? You don’t want me?”

“Of course I want you,” Aemond says tenderly, like it’s a bruise that aches when it’s touched. “But my reign will be long, and the future holds so much promise. Every year more people support repealing the celibacy requirement—”

You scoff, astounded. “You’re going to be the pope and have a girlfriend?”

“Things will be possible soon that weren’t before. I’ll make them possible. And to protect my reputation, to preserve the sanctity of the Church...once I am the pope, any controversies will be neatly papered over. They concealed the late Holy Father’s mishandling of abuse allegations. Surely a consensual relationship is less damning.”

“I don’t want to be your secret girlfriend,” you hiss. “I’m not leaving the convent to be anyone’s secret. And you’re insane if you think a modern pope would be able to conceal anything resembling a functional relationship.”

“I would be above suspicion. People think I’m a saint.”

“You’re not even a Catholic.”

“No,” Aemond agrees, flat and cold like marble.

“That’s fraudulent, that’s dishonest—”

“And I am deceitful!” Aemond seethes, striking his own chest, rattling his gold cross on its chain. “I didn’t join the Church because I felt called to it, and I didn’t save those people on Nea Kameni because it was the right thing to do. I saved them because I knew it would get me made a cardinal. And when the earth split open and the lava that should have killed them poured down into the crevice, I let them tell the world it was a miracle.”

“But that’s not why you saved me from the car,” you say. “You didn’t do it to win the election, I know you didn’t. You didn’t have enough time to consider any of that. You were waiting by the gate before the crash ever happened, otherwise you wouldn’t have been able to hear it.”

“I saved you because I love you,” Aemond murmurs, almost to himself, peering vacantly at the gold on the wall. In the metallic sheen, his reflection is a vague dark silhouette like a storm cloud or a plume of ash. “And I think maybe I’ve loved you my whole life. We should have never left that beach, but we did. And now we can’t go back.”

“Yes we can, Aemo,” you plead. “You’re flawed, we all are, we’re human. We’ve all sinned. But you’re not a bad person. You don’t have to spend the rest of your life atoning.”

“I abandoned my kid, who does that?!” And now his eye is glistening like the cold ripples of the koi pond. “And if I leave the Church, what the fuck am I supposed to tell him? That I ran away, and that I kept running, and that even when I heard his mother died I never considered reaching out to him so he could have one parent left? So many people have lost children who they loved desperately, and I couldn’t get far enough away from mine.”

“You’ll tell him the truth,” you say. “That you were so young, and hurt and confused and afraid. But that now you want to make things right. And in time, he will forgive you.”

“He won’t. I wouldn’t, if I was him.”

“So you’ll keep hiding forever?” you ask, staggered, heartbroken. “Here in the marble and the gold, buried in relics, clinging to your armor, retelling the same lies over and over, wearing the name of Saint Thomas Aquinas not because of any of his good deeds but because he was what you want to be, famous, legendary, one of the smartest men who’s ever lived?”

“I’ll help people,” Aemond says, echoing the faith of better men: Lucky, Kazi, Cam, Lando. “No one else will be able to do as much as I can.”

“You think you’re the only hope for the Church?! You don’t even believe in the Church!”

“But people believe in me,” Aemond says; and suddenly in his remaining eye, a crystalline blue window to the soul, you can see only the sins that have consumed him: lust, gluttony, greed, sloth, wrath, envy, pride.

What happened to that boy from the beach?

You take a step away from him. “I’ll pray for you.”

He lashes out, fangs and venom: “I don’t need your prayers.”

“I’ll pray harder,” you say, tears shimmering on your face, molten red heat replacing the marrow of your bones. “For your conscience. For your soul.”

He severs whatever is left between you—memory and strings and gravity—and storms out of the chapel. You hear his footsteps fade as he flees from the Vatican Grottoes, their ricochets becoming whispers and then nothing at all.

You go to the altar, take a book of matches from a pocket of your white habit, and light the candles there, white and red and half-burned down by the rituals of the nights before. Then, weeping softly in the firelight, you knit your hands together and pray.

~~~~~~~~~~

He is running but getting nowhere, and he is reminded of those years he spent as an anonymous priest on Santorini, dressed in black and with two eyes that hate what they see in the mirror, a coward, a void, something that gorges itself and yet is never satisfied. He doesn’t want to be this way. Why would anybody? If he could choose to be something pure and soft and human, he would. If he could go back to that beach in Sydney, Australia and be twelve years old again, he’d sign his name on the dotted line in his own blood. But who could offer that kind of contract? There’s no such thing as resurrection.

He hears the door open and sees a shadow spill across the white tile floor of the gym, too large to be her, and the way he feels a sinking inside is sickening. He shouldn’t still want to see her; he should let her go, he should want her to be free and happy like a dove loosed from a cage.

Lucky? Kazi? Seaborn?

But no; when Aemond looks to the doorway, who he sees instead is Cardinal Matej Jahoda.

Aemond hits a button on the treadmill, and he slows from a run to a jog to a walk as the belt decelerates until it stops. His grey crewneck and sweatpants—trackies, she would call them, he thinks randomly—are damp with sweat. Salt trickles down his lips until he can taste it; salt stings in his remaining eye, and that is not the only piece of him that’s missing, it’s just the only one people can see. Now he stands motionless on the treadmill, panting with his hands gripping the foam-padded handrails, his right palm still bandaged from where he split it open to save her from the burning car. Beneath the woven cotton and a gloss of antibiotic ointment, his mending flesh is inflamed and throbbing. He popped several of his stitches last night. Aemond isn’t sure what to say to Cardinal Jahoda. He waits for the man, broad and grey-haired and old enough to be his father, to speak instead.

“There are things beyond my understanding,” Jahoda begins at last. His sturdy hands are snarled tightly together, like he doesn’t know what to do with them. His eyes are weary and downcast. He looks helpless, Aemond realizes, and feels an unexpected pang of pity for him. “Part of believing in God means that I surrender to His design, even if it is unfathomable to me.”

“How can I help you, Cardinal Jahoda?”

“You must be tough on Russia and China, and authoritarianism everywhere,” Jahoda says, and his words are commanding but his tone sounds more like a plea, something fragile, something that could easily shatter if left in the wrong hands. “I fear that in the bargains we’ve made to help the Church expand under these regimes, we have allowed ourselves to become the tools of tyrants. We legitimize them, we conceal their misdeeds.”

Aemond steps down from the treadmill, hiding his hands in the pockets of his sweatpants like he is concealing secrets. I have a responsibility to listen to him now. “Is there something specific you’d like to see done?”

“The 2018 agreement between China and the Vatican should be reassessed, and probably annulled. We are just rubber stamping priests that the Communist Party elevates because they don’t threaten the government, and in the process we have abandoned millions of the true faithful operating in secrecy there. Cardinal John Zen of China, a great champion of human rights and political freedom, has spoken to me many times about the harm this agreement has done to genuine Catholics in his country, and to the Church’s commandment to safeguard human life and liberty.”

Your concern for liberty seems at times to be somewhat selective, Cardinal Jahoda, Aemond almost replies. Instead, he makes a peace offering. If he is to be a living saint, he must learn to act like one. And who is the most saintly person he knows? What would Lando say? “I appreciate you bringing your concerns to me directly. I’ll speak to Cardinal Zen myself and look into this matter thoroughly.”

Jahoda bows his head; it’s a small victory, but it offers some consolation nonetheless. “Thank you, Your Eminence.”

“And I’ll have a committee formed to ascertain the path forward. Would you like to be on it?”

Jahoda looks up, startled. It takes him a moment to get his bearings again. “I would be honored, Cardinal Targaryen.”

Aemond smiles faintly. “We have a very long path to walk together, Brother. We must learn to coexist.”

“I know you don’t have to listen to me,” Jahoda says. “I know you don’t have to listen to anyone now. But I ask you...no, I beg you to be cautious in your progressive ambitions. The Church has endured for two thousand years, what other modern institution can claim that? The Japanese imperial family, perhaps. And who else? Scientists are using the Catholic Church as a model upon which to create an ‘atomic priesthood’ to warn future civilizations about the storage locations of nuclear waste, a threat that will exist until our planet is obliterated by the sun in five billion years. We have outlasted the Egyptians and the Greeks and the Romans, the Mongols, the Byzantines, the Ottomans, the global empires of Russia and Britain and Spain. We survived countless wars. We survived the Black Death. We survived the Nazis and the communist revolutions that killed tens of millions of people. And through all of this we preserved countless lives and artefacts and sources of knowledge. We preserved hope in the possibility of a better world. We did not last this long because we are reckless. We must not change faster than the consequences of our actions can be fully considered. If we make a misstep and crumble as all the other ancient empires did, who will fill the void we leave behind?”

Who will implore the great powers to be compassionate? Who will help rebuild after disasters? Who will provide food, shelter, schools, medicine, guidance, fellowship, hope? “I appreciate your love for the Church and your commitment to its continued longevity. I will pray on all of this, and I assure you that I too—as well as the cardinals I have worked so closely with—are guided by only the purest of intentions.”

Jahoda smirks, exhausted, wry. “Intentions are never pure. But we try not to muddy them too much.” He sighs heavily, touching the gold cross that hangs from the chain around his neck as if to give him strength. “I will see you tomorrow, Your Eminence. It will be our last day spent in the Sistine Chapel. I’ll have to remember to take a long look at Michelangelo’s fresco while I still have the chance.”

Cardinal Jahoda gives Aemond a nod of farewell and then leaves the gym, a red column of slow steps and slumped shoulders. Aemond gets back on the treadmill and resumes his running. As he does, his wounded hand begins bleeding again.

I’m not a saint, he thinks, watching the bloom of crimson spread across his bandaged palm as sweat runs down into his eye. I’m just a man.

[hotvintagepoll]

Trying to get more into old movies because of this blog (I only know about half of these people and feel like a poser) do you have good recommendations on where to start or is it just a situation where you watch stuff and find what you like as you go?

you are not a poser <3 i myself am just here for the hotties.

here is my quick and dirty list of fun films to start with if you're new to old movies. and of course if you like one of these, do try to find more stuff as you go! there's no bad way to try out old movies.

(this list is not official and is SUPER quick. i'm tagging for content warnings where I can, but if I forgot something let me know.)

"I want to watch something SILLY!"

The Court Jester (Danny Kaye, Angela Lansbury, Glynis Johns, Basil Rathbone)—everyone in this movie is hot. everyone is in fancy medieval dress, which makes them hotter. everyone here is very silly. You can stream this on Hoopla, last time i checked, so you might be able to stream it through your library!

Chitty-Chitty Bang-Bang (Dick Van Dyke, Sally Ann Howes, Lionel Jeffries, Gert Frobe)—some people hate this movie and to them I say What Is Wrong With You. dick van dyke is a hot absent minded inventor who lives in a windmill with his two adorable children, his gorgeous sheepdog, and a grandfather who is categorically useless. it feels like the two films mary poppins (1964) and willy wonka (1971) had a baby and that baby was born on roller skates singing an old broadway showtune. this one has been showing up in some odd places lately—I think you can catch it on Tubi or Hoopla? It's definitely around.

Seven Brides for Seven Brothers (Jane Powell, Julie Newmar, Howard Keel, Russ Tamblyn)—my problematic fave. everytime i watch this i change my mind whether it's a sexist pile of garbage or a feminist paean, and fellas, today we're on the feminist paean bandwagon!! jane powell's millie is truly the star of the movie, she is the hero she drives the plot the narrative is on her side, and besides all that there are seven very hot men dancing next to her and six beautiful ladies making me bisexual. (on Tubi last I checked.)

The Duke Is Tops (Lena Horne, Laurence Criner)—I get a huge kick out of watching Laurence Criner and Ralph Cooper swindle everybody while also trying to put on a show; there's just something silly and sincere here, plus you get a ~musical extravaganza~ at the end when all is right as rain again. Free on YouTube I think?

"I want to watch something DRAMATIC that may make me FEEL SOMETHING."

Witness for the Prosecution (Marlene Dietrich, Tyrone Power, Elsa Lanchester)—I love a campy twisty turny mystery, don't you? :) I'm not going to talk about this one much because it's better to go in blind, but if you like Agatha Christie stories you'll probably like this.

To Be Or Not To Be (Carole Lombard, Jack Benny)—always relevant, always makes me laugh, also makes me cry. this takes place in poland during wwii so big tw for nazi imagery and mentions. (don't worry. this movie fucking hates nazis.)

Seven Samurai (Toshiro Mifune)—this one is Great Cinema™™™™™™™™™™™ for a goddamned reason

"I want to watch some stuff with the scrungles in it!"

Mr. Washington Goes to Town (Mantan Moreland)—I've been checking out more of Mantan Moreland's stuff because every time I see him in something I think he's delightful, and I really enjoyed this silly-spooky comedy. Does this story have a brain cell? No. Are the special effects and goofy slapstick fun? Yes. This is a fun example of an all-Black cast in a film that was made for Black audiences, and is a striking counterpoint to the stereotypical representation Black actors were given in white-targeted films, showing the enormous amount of talent and artistry the racist studios missed out on by excluding these actors. This is not A Great Film™ but it's still A Fun Time,™ with a goofy Laurel and Hardy type vibe. (It's free on Youtube.)

The Red Shoes (Robert Helpmann, Leonide Massine, Marius Goring)—hey kid, you wanna watch something fucked up? This movie is so fucked up. It's about ballet, it's about art, it's about technicolor, it's about dance and toxic relationships and making theatre and nightmares and ambition and death. A lot of these recs tend on the silly side (because I tend on the silly side) but this one is actually Serious Film and will definitely help you chat up Martin Scorsese should you ever meet him. Big content warning if you can't handle dark themes right now—this movie's pretty dark, not in the gore way but in the Haunting Creepy Image way. (it's also free on Tubi and Kanopy most of the time.)

The Invisible Man (Claude Rains)—my favorite of the vintage horror flicks and a great introduction to Most Dunked On Hot Vintage Man of All Time, Claude Rains. (it helps that you barely ever see him!) Very very silly but the special effects are just plain fun. (I think this is on Internet Archive in full?)

"Can I just get more hot people please?"

Flower Drum Song (James Shigeta, Nancy Kwan, Miyoshi Umeki, Jack Soo)—there are so many unbelievably hot people in this movie which is somehow very good (thanks to its cast) and also incredibly, horrifically bad (thanks to its white team of writers, directors, and producers). on the one hand, it's a mostly Asian cast in a big budget, beautifully designed MGM style musical! there's dream sequences, lots of fun dancing, crooning Rogers & Hammerstein cabaret moments, and just charm galore. it is also freighted with so. many orientalist assumptions and stereotypes, absolutely ridiculous shit that the writers ABSOLUTELY should have known better about in the 60s and nonetheless carried into this. this is a hard one to recommend because I loved this cast, and I loved seeing them in a context beyond the usual stereotypical bit parts so many of them frequently were limited to—yet the movie itself perpetuates so many stereotypes on its own it can be a hard one to watch, and I totally understand if it does not work for most people. tl;dr watch for Shigeta, Kwan, Umeki, and the others, but content warnings galore for one (really bad) case of yellowface casting, orientalist tropes, extremely stereotypical character types, etc. (On Tubi/Kanopy last I checked.)

Charade (Cary Grant, Audrey Hepburn, James Coburn)—this movie feels like a Hitchcock movie except I had a ton of fun watching it, which I can't always say for a Hitch film. (I told you my taste was bad.) This one is free on YouTube and thank god because Audrey wears a lot of Givenchy, Cary Grant wears spectacles and keeps almost dying, it's very exciting and thrilling and funny and sexy. I don't think there are any content warnings but it's been a minute since I watched it. (I should go watch it right now.)

The Big Sleep (Humphrey Bogart, Lauren Bacall)—they're so hot askjdljhjghladkghjksahkhgslkahgshskjhgsalhgsahgjh. i like this one a lot :)

[this is NOT A FULL LIST of all the hot vintage movies to start with but it might give you some starting places! i banged this out as quick as I could at 2 am, so apologies that it's sloppy and not perfect.]

[ladamedusoif]

Laurels

(Acacius x F!Sex Worker Reader)

Pairing(s): Acacius x F!Reader; Acacius x Lucilla

Rating: Explicit; 18+ MDNI

Word Count: 13.5k

Summary: You met him as a young soldier, brought to the brothel you worked at to celebrate a victory. Now, almost two decades later, his return to Rome in triumph sparks memories of your time together - and the secrets you still hold.

Content Notes/Warnings: Explicit, 18+ MDNI - Sex worker F!Reader; no physical description of Reader except that she is curvy and has hair (but this can be taken as a wig, as was common in imperial Rome); spans events of Gladiator and parts of the sequel; canon-compliant but no spoilers for Gladiator II; we love and respect Lucilla in this house; Acacius is a lover boy; period-typical derogatory terms for sex workers; oral sex (M and F receiving); PiV sex; mutual masturbation; discussion of pregnancy; forbidden love; secret marriage; discussion of death and grief; implied character death; implied that Reader is more sexually experienced than Acacius when they meet; references to alcohol consumption; some uses of strong language

Author Note: I've been thinking about and sketching out this story since I first laid eyes on Acacius in those promotional pictures released during the summer, but wanted to wait until I'd had a chance to see Gladiator II three times before writing it up properly, to avoid any issues with characterisation. I hope you all enjoy it.

I've referred to him as Acacius throughout, as that's what Lucilla and everyone else calls him and because we have no goddamned idea what he's actually called. (I've used certain tags, though, to make sure people see this. Hopefully. Maybe.)

There are some Latin/Roman terms used throughout: lena is the madam or brothel keeper; cella is the part of a temple dedicated to a specific deity; meretrix is a Roman term for a prostitute; mercatus is a market or shopping area.

The cover image is entirely based on authentic Roman mosaics and interiors: top left is a 1st century CE mosaic; bottom right is a 4th century CE mosaic from Sicily of a sex worker with her client; and background is the interior decor of a bedroom in Pompeii.

Dividers by @saradika-graphics.

Enormous thanks to @mescalpascal for beta reading this story.

Follow my writing blog @ladameecrit and turn on notifications to stay up to date with my work.

The city has resonated to the sound of his name these past weeks. A hero of empire, of conquest; the perfect role model for Rome’s young boys, already being prepared from birth for war and glory. 

Or, more truthfully, for death. 

Today he returns to the city in glory, to be honoured with a triumph in recognition of his role in conquering the far-off lands of Northern Africa. The crowds are already thronging the streets, trying to secure their perfect vantage point to catch a glimpse of the victor en route to be crowned with laurels. 

No one notices an ordinary woman in middle age, simply but elegantly dressed in her best clothes for the occasion, discreetly slipping up the steps and onto the balcony of a tavern overlooking the triumphal route. No one pays a woman like that any mind, especially not on a day like today. 

You quietly secure your spot and slip down your veil, patting your hair to ensure the style is still in place. Why, exactly, did you go to such effort, knowing you’d be at such a distance from him? Knowing how many years it has been?

You take the cheap little metal effigy you’d purchased from a street hawker from your purse, gently rubbing your thumb over the crude rendering of his handsome face. 

You told him he would go far. You told him he would be feted like this, one day, all those years ago. You smiled as you imagined meeting him again, showing him the tiny metal version of himself. 

“See? I told you you’d be cast in bronze, didn’t I?”

A ripple of excitement courses through the crowd and it becomes apparent that the procession is near. They cheer and chant his name in unison. A mixture of excitement and fear grips you. Why had you done your hair just so, put on your best jewellery from your meagre selection?

Just in case. In case his dark eyes found yours, again, and bridged the years with a glance. 

The rumble of chariot wheels and horses’ hooves becomes more intense, the cheering of the crowd more frenzied. You grip the ledge of the balcony in nervous anticipation, the golden metal of your favourite ring glinting in the light. 

For a moment, it feels like being frozen in time. He is a god among men, the bright sun reflecting beautifully off the white and gold of his special, ceremonial armour as he receives the acclamations of the crowd. He’s uncomfortable, you can tell: that nervous wave and unsettled expression giving him away. This is not his natural environment, though you suspect he has had to get used to it since he assumed his command and since his marriage. 

You are unable to make a sound as his chariot approaches, overwhelmed by the sight of him, the sound of the crowd, the way he is received and acclaimed with more enthusiasm than any emperor you can remember. He is still beautiful . From here, you can see the streaks of grey that frame his handsome face now, making him even more distinguished than you remembered. His tanned skin only serves to make the white and gold armour gleam all the more. His beard, neatly trimmed, is more grey than dark these days, lending him an air of absolute authority. 

But you know that behind the guise of the conquering general, battle-scarred and triumphant, lies another man: strong but gentle, intelligent and kind, a man who likes to laugh and to joke and to love . 

She is a lucky woman, you muse. 

He’s almost directly in front of you now, and you can see in those soft, dark eyes the brave young man you knew so well, once upon a time. 

His gaze shifts. He finds you. 

His expression changes to one of surprise and… joy ?

The moment lasts barely a second before he has passed by in the relentless journey to his apotheosis. But you are left with his name on your lips, whispered like a prayer as your mind travels back through the years to the time you first met. 

“Acacius.”

***

War is shit. But it’s good for business when your business is your body. 

When you left your rural home for Rome as a teenager, accompanied by the man you were promised to, selling yourself was not part of the plan. But there’s little a girl can do, when her betrothed reveals himself to be a liar and a crook. He left you alone, without resource or recourse, when he was stabbed to death over an unpaid gambling debt. 

You had certainly landed on your feet, all things considered, and with the benefit of a few years’ hindsight. The lena who ran the place was kind and understanding, the other girls bright and friendly, for the most part, and the brothel itself marketed as a cut above the usual fare for the average legionary, brought to the imperial city after a stint killing Gauls or Goths or whoever the enemy was that week.

Besides, it was even fun , sometimes. You, with your curves and ample bosom, earned a reputation for kindness and understanding. Sometimes you wondered just how many nervous young men had learned how to please a woman from a night or two in your arms.

The night you met, the lena had gathered the free girls together in an excitable cluster, hissing about the arrival at the brothel of a group of young legionaries from various parts of the Empire.

“Some of them are absolutely gorgeous , girls! And they’ve had a recent victory - you know what that means.”

Catalina, who never lacked confidence, grinned. “It means big bonuses.”

The lena beamed. “Exactly. Big bonuses, big tippers… and who knows, maybe big in other ways?” The girls roared with laughter as she clapped her hands. “Alright, neaten up! Best behaviour, now. And as usual with the legions, you’re theirs for the night.”

You picked up a goblet of wine, and you and your fellow whores struck your usual enticing poses. 

“Heroes of Rome…my finest girls, for your delectation.” 

***

His eyes find yours through the slew of pairings, dark as pitch but warm as fire in the low light of the brothel’s main antechamber. He is, as your lena had suggested, gorgeous : young, beautifully handsome features, clean-shaven; the strong nose and fine jaw universally considered the epitome of male beauty, wavy dark hair curling around his brow in his neat, regulation haircut. 

And then he smiles at you. And you are lost, entirely, in the way his eyes sparkle and his open, kind face beams.

The beautiful boy would surely choose one of the more beautiful girls, as was always the way. But instead he strides through the melee, broad shoulders cutting a path with ease, and stands in front of you, a soft, nervous smile on his face. 

“Hello, soldier. Where are you from?”

His eyes are warm . He seems kind. You feel a wave of lust coursing through you: if he wants you, you thought, you might really enjoy this one.

“Hispania,” he answers. “But we were fighting tribes in Germania.”

His voice, like warm honey, sends a throb through your core. 

“And you have been rewarded with a trip to the imperial city! You must have been really brave.”

He chuckles, a half-smile on his handsome, tanned face. “I tried to be.”

His nerves are apparent in the way he carries himself, in the little glances he gives you, seeking approval. You take his hand, thumb stroking his palm gently.

“Do you want to let me reward you tonight, soldier?”

He nods enthusiastically. “Please.” He gives your hand a little squeeze. “But tell me your name, won’t you? I would like to know your name.”

You tell him with a smile. “And yours?”

His grin is warm and genuine. “Acacius.”

***

The yellow glow of the oil lamps illuminate the murals that decorate the walls of your chamber, and throw shadows from the fabrics draped over the low couch and bed. Acacius looks around, unsure where to sit, and you gesture to the couch.

“Wine, soldier?”

“Yes, wine. Please. Thank you.”

Goblets in hand, you join him and lean slightly towards him. It is impossible to miss the way Acacius’s eyes focus on your breasts, barely covered in the diaphanous folds of your pale, loose robe. 

“Do you like what you see?”

His gaze trails upwards to your eyes, and he nods: seriously, with absolute conviction. 

“Do you want to see more?” 

Another serious nod. You slip out of the dress for him, letting the thin, pleated fabric loosen around you until you are revealed, naked and soft, for his hungry eyes. 

One strong arm wraps around your waist while the other fondles handfuls of your tits. He holds you there, mouth finding your nipples, sucking and licking them until they are pert and pebbled and glossy with his saliva. 

In that instant, you close your eyes, daring to imagine that this was not a transaction but real : that the gorgeous young man worshipping at your bosom is your lover, all yours , helping himself to every inch of you before he takes you. 

 “What do you like , soldier? What do you want me to do to you?” You move to your knees before him, putting your hands on his strong, tanned thighs and lightly slipping your fingers under the hem of his short tunica .

He hesitates, breath hitching, eyes wide as he takes in the sight of you between his legs. This isn’t his first time, you suspect, but something tells you Acacius may not be as practiced as some of his comrades in the art of love. The thought of showing him, guiding him, sends a thrill through you. 

Your hands undo his undergarment and find his cock. He stammers, trying to find his words to respond. 

“Would you like my mouth, hmmm?”

He nods, eyes trained on you, mouth open as you lick your lips and wrap them around the head of his cock. You move slowly, expertly; one hand holding him in place while the other caresses his balls, the way you know men like. 

It’s not that you were forced into the profession, not like some of the girls sold into it - though Juno knows, you’d have preferred another line of work. But there, in the lamp-lit room with this big, handsome, polite young soldier falling apart at your skilled touch? It’s a fucking joy . 

He whines and gasps as you vary the speed and movement, tongue flicking over his tip before you swallow him back down again. Acacius’s broad hand holds the back of your head as you move faster, taking him deeper. You feel his balls tighten as he falls back on the low couch, moaning and grunting with pleasure. 

“I’m…oh fuck , I’m close, I’m….”

He comes in your mouth with a cry, head thrown back on the couch and beads of sweat glistening along his neck, broad chest rising and falling rapidly as he catches his breath.

A discreet spit and wipe and you tuck your naked curves against his spent body, fingertips slipping under the collar of his tunic to trace the line of his shoulders, the hollow of his throat.

He blinks his ebony-dark eyes open, apologetic. “I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to…” His exposed cock still glistens with your saliva and his come. “I didn’t mean to finish so quickly. I’m…I’m still dressed .” He grins, you giggle, and both of you burst out laughing. 

“No need to apologise, soldier. We have plenty of time, time enough to go again, surely. I’ll help.” You rise from the couch and gesture for him to follow you to the bed. 

“First things first - tunic off .”

You survey him now, naked, from your position on the bed. His body is taut and lean; too lean, perhaps, for his broad shoulders and long limbs. A few scars and bruises on his torso testify to his experiences in combat.

“Join me, won’t you?”

He settles close to your own naked form and his eyes move to your tits, pressed against the warm skin of his arm. You reach for his hand and bring the broad, calloused palm and fingertips to cup your breast.

You never forgot the fascination he seemed to have with your body. That first night, he traces the curve of your tits carefully with his fingers, playing a little with your nipples, pinching just enough to make you gasp, cupping and squeezing the soft flesh before caressing every bit of you in turn. The softness of your belly, the meat of your thick thighs and ass, the line of your hips, the flesh of your arms and neck. 

Perhaps, you think, it has been a long time since he’s been with someone. Properly, that is. Perhaps his previous encounters were a more rushed affair, skirts hitched up to fuck hastily against a wall or a tree. 

Now he can take his time with you. Wetness pools between your legs, anticipating him. You bring his hand to your pussy, guiding him to the little nub of pleasure hidden in your folds as you ride his fingers.

“You feel that?” He nods, transfixed by the way your hips roll against him, the way you pant and moan as you get closer and closer to your peak. “Find this sweet spot on a woman, and she’s all yours.”

He’s getting hard again, you notice, and starts to work you more quickly with his thick fingers. He looks to you for approval, warm eyes round and earnest, and you praise him with breathless words before coming undone on his hand.

“ Gods , that was very good, soldier.” A few strokes of your hand to his cock, and you know he’s ready. “Your turn, now.”

Acacius shifts his broad body on top of yours, using one knee to push you open a little further for him. As he breaches your pussy for the first time, he leans forward and kisses you: slow, soft, tongue slipping between your lips as you hitch your knees up and wrap your arms around his neck. 

The young Spaniard fucks you deep and slow, his plush lips brushing against yours as his kisses mingle with both of your grunts and moans of pleasure. Such a display of tenderness is unusual here, where most men have one thing and one thing only on their minds as soon as they enter your chamber. 

There have been plenty of young soldiers, plenty of officers, plenty of Rome’s heroes in your arms, in your mouth, in your cunt. Some handsome. Most not. Some respectful. Most rough.

Acacius is…different. You couldn’t explain it, not back then. Not yet. But you know in that instant, as he moves inside you and you look into his dark eyes, that there is something special about this man.

***

He comes to you every second or third night for the remainder of his furlough in the city, to the point that the lena begins to refer to Acacius as “your soldier”. You, privately, miss him on those nights that he does not visit. 

He brings you gifts: wine, flowers, little cakes and sweets wrapped in pretty cloth. “You’ll have spent all your coin,” you chide him as you sit together on the couch, drinking wine and feeding each other the treats. “What will you say, if someone asks about the money you earned on campaign?”

Acacius leans in and plots a course of kisses down your neck, culminating at the fastening of your robe on your shoulder. He unpins the brooch and watches the fabric fall with a smile.

“I will say that it was money very well spent.”

***

The lena ’s knock on your chamber door is unusually early that day - not yet noon, you estimate, as you hastily finish pinning your hair and stand to receive her.

She smiles wryly as she leans against the doorframe. “You have a visitor .”

“This early?”

“Might I remind you that I determine the opening times of this house? Yes, this early, but…he wants to take you out .” She throws up her hands in response to your confused expression. “I know, I know, but you’re paid for! Put on something respectable, I doubt he wants you to look like a whore in public.”

You dress suitably, and fix your cloak around you before emerging into the large antechamber normally reserved for meeting clients. This morning, it is silent and empty, save for a lone figure standing with his back to you in the centre of the airy room.

He was a little broader, now, than he’d been the last time you saw him, eight or nine months ago. His arms and legs had grown more muscular, his garments evidently more expensive than the simple woollen tunic and cloak he wore the first time you met.

“Acacius?” 

He wheels around and that familiar smile greets you like a beam of warm spring sunlight after the long winter. After a close embrace and a kiss, he stands back to take you in.

“How have you become more beautiful since the last time I saw you?”

You shake your head and laugh, cupping his face in your hands and rubbing your thumbs against the bristling scruff he now wears. “And you seem even more handsome and dashing, soldier. You look like the emperor now, too, with this beard.”

Acacius blushes bashfully. “Perhaps…in truth, it was my commander that inspired it, as he favours a beard too.” He smiles and winks conspiratorially. “But then maybe he wishes to resemble Aurelius, no?”

With a smile you lead him back into the main hall of the brothel and towards the door that opens onto the street. “The lena tells me you wish to take me with you into the city today.”

He offers a little bow in confirmation. “I do. I would like to walk with you, away from these four walls.” A glance over his shoulder in the direction of the lena sitting at her desk, whose all-seeing, eagle-eyed gaze bores into the two of you. He speaks a little louder, for her benefit. “And I have promised to bring you back.”

He gives you his hand, you open the door, and together you step into the bustle of the imperial city.

***

“Am I correct in thinking that isn’t a native Roman accent?”

You nod, looking at Acacius from under your lashes. “It is not. I am a country girl by birth, from a farm in the north.”

He smiles with satisfaction. “I have an ear for accents. Hard not to, when you fight for an empire as vast as ours. How did you end up here, then?”

It is as if he is speaking to a… normal woman, not a whore. You swallow hard, looking at the ground as you compose yourself to answer, not wanting to sully your relationship with this man with the painful memories of the past. 

“I…was promised to a man, and he brought me to Rome. But he lied, and he cheated, and he died over an unpaid debt, and I…”

Acacius holds you in his kind, concerned gaze as your words trail off. Enough , you muse to yourself, I have said enough . 

“And you…had to stand on your own two feet.” He gives your hand a reassuring squeeze that feels as comforting, somehow, as if it were his warm embrace.

In the mercatus adjoining the new forum, he buys little cups of wine and a jar of olives for you to share as you walk together through the packed marketplace and public squares. The tall column honouring the victories of the emperor Trajan casts its long shadow on the gleaming marble pavements below.

“Perhaps some day they will build a monument to you,” you suggest, a wry smile on your lips. “A great bronze, to the great warrior Acacius.”

He raises his eyebrows in astonishment and laughs. “A monument to an ordinary centurion? I don’t think so, somehow. Now, a statue of my commander , on the other hand, would be entirely more likely and more fitting.”

“You admire him, don’t you?”

Acacius sips his wine and nods. “He is the greatest of commanders and the bravest of men. Kind, too, away from the battlefield. I… I would die for that man.” He turns to you and grins, excited. “Have I told you that he is from Hispania, too? He tells me sometimes that we’re the finest fighters in the empire.”

You give an impressed little coo. “Have I seen this great man? Perhaps he was with the rest of you, that first night…the night we met.”

“He was not.” He takes an olive from the little clay jar, a wistful look on his face. “General Maximus has a family - a wife, a little boy - and such love he has for them as I’ve never seen. He is the emperor’s most loyal general, but in truth he would give anything to return home to them, for good.”

The two of you fall silent for a few moments, each lost in your own thoughts. You study his handsome features as you walk together: his strong, proud nose, now marked with a fresh, livid scar; his fine brow, knitted in thought; the line of his pink mouth, framed by his dark beard.

“Is that something you would like, too - a wife, a family?”

He nods and smiles as he meets your gaze. “It is something I would like very much indeed.”

***

You think of him, worry for him, miss him in the long months of campaigning in far-flung corners of the empire. Without realising, you have become part of an invisible sisterhood: yet another daughter of Rome who goes about her business and makes her living, but whose heart and mind march, always, with “her” soldier. For the first time, you really see the careworn women carrying offerings and lighting candles at the little street shrines or in the temples, muttering prayers to Juno for the safe return of a husband, a lover, a brother, a son. 

You try to listen daily for updates from the newsreaders in the public fora, steeling yourself for news of a defeat. Even your work provides opportunities to stay abreast of the progress of the northern legions, as you hone your small talk with clients to focus on questions of war. Though other men might have your body for a short time, your soul is always and only with him , longing for the day he’ll be in your arms again.

He’s gone longer, this time. In your lonelier moments you wonder if perhaps he has met someone else, someone with whom he can have the family life he dreams of. 

He is not yours , you remind yourself as you make up your face for another night’s work. He can never be yours .

A commotion coming from the direction of the entrance hall startles you: strong, confident footsteps on the marble floor; the lena ’s voice calling angrily after someone; and suddenly, a knock on your chamber door. 

“My sweet, beautiful lady.”

Acacius sweeps you into his strong arms before you have finished opening the door properly, pulling you tight to him and covering your face with kisses as you wrap your arms around his neck and giggle with joy and relief at the sight of him.

“Your soldier hasn’t paid, girl!”

The lena ’s irritation is obvious even from the other end of the hall, her arms folded and jaw set. You break Acacius’s embrace and reach for his hand to guide him into the room.

“He’ll pay, don’t worry,” you call out to her down the hallway. “He’s been away fighting for a long time and he deserves his reward, one can hardly blame the man for being impatient!” 

He’s waiting for you as soon as you close the door, cloak discarded and body poised to pin you against the wall as he holds your face in his hands and leans in for a long, slow kiss. He drops one hand and you feel your garment being lifted as his thick fingers make their way between your thighs.

“Gods, I missed you. I’m so sorry I was away for so long.” He sucks on the delicate skin of your neck as you whine with pleasure, his fingertips finding the little nub of your pussy, just like you taught him. “Did you miss me, my love?”

“Mmm, I… oh, Acacius !” First one, then two fingers slip inside you, and you struggle to form a coherent thought. “I missed you, so very much, so much.”

He fucks you with his fingers there against the wall, the sound of your wetness both lewd and erotic as it mingles with your pants and little moans. He’s still in uniform , you realise, wrapping your arm around his leather-clad torso as you pull him tighter to you. Gods, he really couldn’t wait to see you. 

“I need to have you here, now,” he hisses in your ear as you edge closer to your peak. “Need to be inside you, feel you again.”

He withdraws his hand and turns you to face the wall, bending your body forward a little and caressing your ass appreciatively. The head of his cock presses against your entrance, opening and stretching you as he slides smoothly into your cunt with a low groan.

“As good as you remember?” You turn to give him a sly look as he starts to fuck you, deep and hard.

“ Better ,” he hisses. A broad hand reaches for your breast while the other grips the meat of your hip, holding you in place. “Been thinking about this, about you …every day, every night …”

His beard bristles against your skin as he angles his lips against your neck and shoulder, sucking and kissing and nipping at you. He’ll leave marks, you know that, and you know you shouldn’t let him, not in your line of work. But instead you just twine your fingers through his dark curls and keep him there, revelling in the sensation as you start to fall apart for him. 

Acacius mutters praise and filth into your ear in equal measure: how beautiful you are, how good you feel, how tight your cunt is, how well you take him. The fastenings and metal ornaments of his uniform press into your flesh as he fucks you harder and faster against the wall.

You shouldn’t have let him leave marks on you. And you definitely shouldn’t let him finish inside you. But, more than anything else, you want him to make you his, really and truly, inside and out. As his rhythm starts to falter, a slight arch of your back and an extra tilt of your hips sends him even deeper and makes him come. His groans of ecstatic pleasure as he fills you with his seed are music to your ears.

***

You bathe together in the brothel’s small, steamy bathhouse, your fingers tracing the scars and bruises his strong, solid body had acquired since the last time you were together. Acacius hums with pleasure as you wash his hair and rub perfumed oil into his skin, pressing your lips gently to every mark and freckle.

“I love you, you know.” 

Strange, how this impressive warrior could become so vulnerable as he says the words: eyes wide, expression open and hopeful, as he reaches for your hand and kisses your palm with tender reverence.

“I love you, too.”

***

Dawn breaks over the city and the early morning light reaches through your small, high window. The night was sleepless and perfect: lovemaking punctuated by conversation, by fruits and wine, and culminating in your two bodies wrapped naked around each other in your bed.

Acacius kisses you awake, smiling as your eyes blink sleepily open.

“My love is tired, I think.”

You arch an eyebrow and smirk suggestively. “Gods, I wonder why ?”

As you cuddle against his broad chest, you spy a leather coin purse resting on the table beside the bed. The sight pierces your soft, loving cocoon like an arrow to the heart.

He pays for you. 

Before you can second-guess yourself, you speak. “You don’t have to pay any more. Unless you would rather continue to buy me…”

His expression shifts from confusion to concern. “What do you mean?”

“You pay for me, but you love me and I love you and…It was different before, but now I think our love shouldn’t be bought .”

Acacius smiles and pulls you to him, kissing your forehead. “I know, my love. And I agree, but… Don’t you think your lena would be suspicious, if I stopped paying?”

“She only gets a cut, either way.” A thought occurs to you. “Perhaps we just give her the cut she’d get anyway, for appearances’ sake? And I’ll tell her you gave the rest to me directly.”

He nods, reaching for you again and holding you close against him. 

“Perhaps you won’t need to worry about the lena at all, any more.”

It’s your turn to be confused as you pull back a little and look in his eyes. 

“I was going to ask you anyway, I’ve been thinking about this all the time I was away… I wonder, would you be - would you consider being - my wife?”

“I could pay off any debt you owe to the lena, to this place.” He hastens to reassure you, seeing the look of shock on your face. “And I have money enough to buy us a beautiful home, some land… I have been promoted again, since I saw you last, and now we have some time together until the next campaign, we…we could marry, be together. Husband and wife. What do you say?”

Your heart says yes. Yes. Forever and always, yes , thank Juno and all the gods that brought this beautiful man to you. 

But hearts don’t make the rules in Rome.

You kiss him gently, twine your fingers through his, caress the dark curls that frame his handsome face. “I would give anything to be your wife.”

He smiles sadly. “But?”

“We can’t . Even if I left this world behind for good, I still wouldn’t be allowed to marry, and -”

“I have known men whose wives were once meretrices , it’s not always so strict,” Acacius interjects.

“Were these men imperial officers with a bright future ahead of them?” you ask, as kindly as you can. “At best, I could be a mistress.”

He frowns and shakes his head. “I don’t have to be an officer forever. I don’t want to do this forever, to wage war forever. So I’ll give it up, find another occupation, use my savings…I just want you , my love.”

His thumb wipes away the tears glistening on your face as you fight the sob rising in your throat. “I want you too, I love you too, but…you are under oath, under contract, are you not? They would come after you if you broke it, I would rather die than see you hurt on my account.”

Those beautiful dark eyes are resigned now, full of pain and all too aware that there is no way for this dream to become a reality. Acacius puts his arms around you and holds you tight to his chest, silently kissing the top of your head.

When he leaves you a couple of hours later, to attend to business elsewhere in the city, you turn over and weep, sure that you will never see him again.

***

Catalina knocks on your chamber door a couple of days later, anxiously looking around her, as if afraid she might be seen.

“I don’t think there’s a rule against visiting each other in our rooms, you know.”

“Can’t be too careful, now, can we?” She lowers her voice and beckons for you to come closer. “I’ve been given a message for you. From your soldier boy.”

You move quickly to sit on the couch, afraid that your legs might give way. “He…he came to you ?”

Catalina laughs a little too loudly, and claps her hand to her mouth. “No, he did not - sent one of the other legionaries to me, just so he could get word to you. Well, not just that, we did have a good time, me and young Sextus…” A knowing smile spreads across her face.

“The message . What was the message?”

She snaps out of her reverie and sits beside you. “Tomorrow, noon. The big temple on the Capitoline, at Juno’s cella .”

You nod, taking in the information and already plotting your excuse for the lena . “Catalina, why didn’t he come directly to me?”

“Apparently he was afraid you wouldn’t see him. He’s got it bad for you, according to his pal.” She turns and pulls you into a warm hug, leaning in to whisper in your ear. “Good luck. I’ll make an offering for you.”

***

He’s already there when you arrive, standing at the entrance to the main cella and dressed simply but beautifully in a tunic, belt, and dark green cloak that only serves to emphasise his strong, broad build. You cross the marble floor to join him and he immediately reaches for your hand.

“I am so glad to see you, my love.”

You smile and squeeze his hand. “But why here?”

“I wanted to talk to you, and I needed courage - so I have made some offerings to the goddess.” Acacius nods towards the doors that lead to the cella of Juno, where priests busied themselves with candles, incense, and laying worshippers’ offerings on the goddess’s altar. “I hope she looks favourably upon me.”

“And me,” you add, and he grins. “Come, tell me. What is it that is so important?”

He leads you away from the cella and guides you through the throngs of people making their way to the great temple until you reach a quieter spot under a small portico.

“I meant what I asked you. I want to marry you, more than anything. I know, too, that the rules of this empire won’t allow it.” He takes both of your hands in his. “But I wondered if we could make our own rules.”

“Our own rules?”

He reaches into the leather purse hanging from his belt, and produces a small gold ring set with a polished garnet stone. 

“If we cannot marry by law, then perhaps we might marry in spirit.” He places the ring in your palm, wrapping his hand around yours.

The bustle of the city fades far into the distance. In that moment, it is just you and him.

“You wish this, even though I cannot tend your home, be a real wife to you? In spite of my… work ?”

Acacius nods, hand still cupped around yours. “You will be a real wife, in all the ways that matter to me. And in time I will find a way for us to make a home together.” He looks into your eyes and smiles that hopeful smile you love so much. “And, perhaps, to raise our children there.”

“My work, Acacius. I would still be doing…what I do, at least until then. This does not concern you?”

He shakes his head. “It is a profession, it is not you, no matter what the law says. You do not mind that I fight and kill for a living, this is no different.”

You laugh and shake your head. “I don’t mind, but you are fighting for Rome , for an empire, not…selling yourself.”

“It is a profession .” Acacius reassures you, kissing you on the cheek. “And it is not forever.” He holds up the ring to you again. 

Your smile and nod is his cue to slip the gold band onto your finger, leaning in for a deep kiss as he pulls you tight to him and whispers in your ear.

“I am yours .”

A passing temple worshipper tuts loudly at the public display of affection, and you giggle. 

“And by Juno, I am all yours.”

***

The wedding feast, such as it is, is wine and sweetmeats purchased from a street vendor and consumed, picnic-style, in a quiet, secluded grove of trees near the river. He spreads his cloak on the ground, helps you down, and lays out the food before toasting you with the cup of wine he pours from a wineskin.

“You deserve a far greater feast than this, beloved.”

“This is already far more than I could ever have hoped for, my love.” You lean in and kiss him gently. “I only wish I could be a wife to you in the eyes of the law, too.”

Acacius shakes his head and strokes your cheek. “You are all I need, just as you are. Hang the law; I will find a way for us to live as man and wife. I promise.”

The dappled sunlight catches the garnet of your ring and you hold your hand up, delighted.

“It pleases you?”

“Very, very much.” You rest your head on his shoulder, both content in the quiet. Such pleasure, you think, to be here, with him - your husband , in spirit if not in law - away from the brothel, from the noise and the lena ’s eagle eye.

His hand drifts gently down your bare arm and along the line of your thigh as his lips find yours again. At your ankle, his thick fingers slip under the hem of your dress, hitching it up as his palm caresses your calf, your knee, and starts to plot a course towards your pussy.

“In public , husband?”

Acacius sighs happily at the word, encouraging you to lie back on the cloak as he moves himself between your open thighs. “There’s no one around, wife .” The bristle of his beard scratches at your neck as he nips and sucks at you, fingers already parting the lips of your cunt. “Aren’t couples supposed to consummate their marriage?”

You chuckle and writhe under his broad body as he pushes one, then two fingers into you. “Arguably we consummated this some time ago, my love,” you hiss, reaching under his tunic to undo the undergarment and stroke his cock. He whines with pleasure and fucks you a little faster as his thumb traces tight circles over that most sensitive, intimate place, smiling as you buck against him. 

“What did you tell me, that first night? Find this sweet spot and she’ll be all mine?”

“All yours.” Gods , you’re close. “And I am…I am all yours.”

You come almost as soon as his thick cock pushes inside you, unable to contain the cries of pleasure. You give no thought or care to the possibility of being discovered here, of a passerby witnessing your lovemaking. 

Let them see , you muse, as he fucks you hard and deep, fondling your tits through the fabric of your garment. Let them see how he takes me, fills me; how a man makes love to his new wife.

***

He comes to you every night, then, maintaining the fiction of a transactional relationship by having you give the lena her dues directly. She raised an eyebrow sceptically when you first explained the situation, but money is money, and if she suspects anything she does not let on.

In your chamber, you can almost pretend you are a normal couple. You dine together, bathe together, talk together. As he recounts his experiences with his legion, you realise the extent of his unassuming heroism and his nobility. Unlike many of the other soldiers you have encountered in this work, Acacius has a real sense of the human cost of war, of the humanity involved, whether Roman or barbarian. 

“It is no wonder General Maximus has sought to promote you, my love,” you tell him one evening as you pour him another goblet of wine. “You are clearly a great leader, as well as a great fighter.”

“He has trained me well.” He sips his wine and looks bashfully at the floor. “He does not seek to waste good men like some of the other commanders; he knows the value of their lives. And we look up to him, admire him, for that.”

Your private connubial bliss must, of course, play second fiddle to the demands of the empire. One night, he arrives with a dejected air, explaining sorrowfully and apologetically that his legion is returning to the northern campaign immediately - far sooner than he had anticipated. 

“I thought we had more time, my love. I am so sorry.” 

You smile, shake your head, and kiss him. “We will have plenty of time to come.”

That night, the last night together before fate would make her intervention and change the course of your lives, Acacius is content simply to wrap his arms around you and hold you close to him as he sleeps.

***

The emperor is dead, and the city mourns. In the public squares and fora the newsreaders proclaim that Marcus Aurelius, philosopher-emperor, has died on campaign with the armies of the north, and succession passed to his heir, Commodus.

The armies of the north . Your thoughts turn, as they so often do, to Acacius. His commander was close to the old emperor, you remember, and the heir had a rather more difficult reputation. You walk back to the brothel and imagine your love, clad in the fur-trimmed woollen cloak worn on campaign in the north, willing your love and strength to him across the many miles.

Emperors come and emperors go, but life goes on. A months-long series of gladiatorial games is announced, to mark the death of Aurelius and the accession of his son. The lena cheers when she hears the news, knowing that the attendant surge in visitors to the city means a boost for her business. 

You keep abreast of political and military developments, as usual, via the more informed and talkative of your clients. Severus, a senior aide to one of Rome’s senators, is always happy to oblige.

“Quite the news from the north,” he says one evening, as you help him unwrap his heavy outer toga. 

“Is that so?” Your heart is pounding in your chest, and you steady yourself on the table before pouring him a goblet of wine. “Sit, tell me.”

“A traitor general , if you’ll credit it!” He sips the wine and shakes his head in astonishment. “Cursed the new emperor, took off and left his men. They think he went south, to his homeland. A Spaniard, you know.”

Your breath catches.

“Do you - do you know the name?”

Severus chews the inside of his cheek momentarily. “Marcus? No, that’s not it, it’s…Maximus. Maximus Decimus Meridius. One of Aurelius’s best men, they say, but off he went, revealed as a traitor.” 

He puts a hand on your thigh and leans in to kiss your neck, ignorant of the stunned, horrified look on your face as you try to process this information. He does not seem to notice or care that you barely react. You move into position on the bed unthinkingly, letting him strip you and bend you over so that he can fuck you the way he likes. 

You barely hear his grunts and moans, barely feel it when he pulls out and spills his come on your back. He says something to you before he leaves, but his words are a discordant buzz. Curled up on your bed, your mind races into the small hours until you drift into a fitful sleep.

***

The weeks pass, the games begin, and the blood of men and beasts stains the sandy ground of the Colosseum day after day. The new emperor, out for blood and driven mad with power, seems to want to undo the work of his father with each passing day, starting by crippling the senate.

Information about the fate of Maximus’s legions is scant and often contradictory. Some say that a new commander has been appointed and that the campaign continues, as usual. Others tell of a mutiny in the ranks, of infighting and chaos. Still more swear that the legions will come south and unite in Rome.

“He’ll come and find you, I know he will,” Catalina whispers to you as she passes in the hallway one morning. “Don’t give up. He’ll come.”

The not knowing is unbearable. You make daily offerings at the little shrines and altars in the streets, praying that you might, at least, discover Acacius’s fate for good or ill. 

As you pass a butcher’s shop, you overhear a familiar name, and stop in your tracks to listen as the butcher and his assistant regale their customers with the story of the great general who has become a gladiator.

***

“Where are you off to?”

The lena eyes you up and down in the entrance hall, arms folded across her chest.

“I’m going out for some air and to buy some little cakes, for tonight. We’ve got a while before today’s games are over, I want to take advantage of it.”

“Fair enough. Be back in plenty of time, mind, we want you all fresh and perfumed and powdered!”

You navigate the packed streets, stopping at the baker’s shop to buy a selection of the tiny fruit and honey cakes you like to have in your chamber, before turning back in the direction of the brothel. Your route is a little quieter and you know it by heart, making use of side streets and alleys to avoid the crowds.

You do not notice the hooded man standing in one of the doorways until he steps out in front of you. The parcel of cakes falls to the ground as you cry out with fright, and the man immediately kneels to retrieve it. His fingers caress the back of your hand, and in an instant, you know him.

“You came back to me, my love.”

Acacius lowers his hood slightly, eyes sparkling but alert to his surroundings, and takes your free hand in his, kissing it repeatedly. “Of course, my beloved. I have been trying to come home to you for a while, but given…” He pauses as he searches for the right word. “Given everything , it has taken a little longer than I’d hoped.”

He keeps his hood up as you open the door into the brothel, pulling you back to whisper in your ear. “I’d rather it not be known that I’m here, my love. Not tonight. Here, take this purse, tell the lena I’m a foreign visitor.”

You don’t ask for an explanation. He follows you inside, hanging back in the entrance hallway as you tell the lena that this gentleman approached you in the street and wanted to spend the night.

“He’s a quiet one.” She surveys Acacius suspiciously, and you pray she does not recognise his broad frame.

“He’s nervous, is all,” you suggest, as lightly as you can manage. “First time in the big city, he’s come from a long way off. Best make it a special night, eh?” 

She sighs, nods, and counts the coins as you lead the way to your chamber.

***

“I can explain everything, my love, or at least as much as I’m permitted to say.” Acacius takes off his cloak and settles on your couch, pulling you to him. You press your fingers to his lips.

“After. Explain after.”

The lamps and candles cast a soft glow on the contours of your body as you slip out of your dress and gently sit on his lap, tracing the lines of his features with your fingertips as you kiss his face, featherlight. 

“I hope I’m not too heavy for you, love.” 

He smiles and shakes his head, mouth a little ajar as he takes in the sight of you. “You are perfect.” He tilts his head and sucks on each of your nipples, holding you in place around the waist, as your hand slips under his tunic. A shift of your hips and you are straddling one leg, rocking your hips back and forth against his strong thigh, gasping at the sensation as your cunt grazes against the warm skin, soft hair, and firm muscle.

He watches you, enthralled, one hand resting on your ass and the other squeezing your tits. You hold his gaze, then, caught in the dark fire of his beautiful eyes as you reach your peak and come hard on him, head thrown back and body quivering with pleasure.

“Gods, you are extraordinary.” He helps you stand up and guides you to the bed, tucking a pillow under your head before he strips off and joins you. “My extraordinary woman, I have missed you so.”

His beard scratches against your skin as he kisses your body, moving from your tits down to your soft belly and generous thighs. His lips press against your mound, your pussy, tongue diving into the slick that’s pooled between your legs. 

“You taste spectacular,” he murmurs, shifting forward. He kisses you, deep and slow, so that you can taste yourself as he pushes his cock inside you.

“See?”

You giggle as he begins to fuck you, pulling in and out slowly and deliberately, making sure you feel every inch of him and he every inch of you. 

The worries and uncertainty fade as you make love, bodies moving in perfect harmony, mingled voices gasping and moaning with pleasure, and sweat glistening on your skin. 

After . Explain after.

***

“There are legions at Ostia.”

You pop one of the little cakes into his mouth and settle against his shoulder. Ostia . You like the way he pronounces it, the inflection of his accent.

“Legions?”

He looks at you cautiously. “Legions.” His face tells you he cannot say more, and you fill in the blanks for yourself.

His legion. Maximus’s legions?

“And you rode into the city on…business?”

He nods and reaches for the cup of lemon water on the bedside table. “Business, yes. In preparation for the games to come.”

“Can you stay tonight, or must you return to…?” You daren’t name the place.

“I can stay tonight, but must leave at first light.” He puts his arm around you and lowers his voice. “My love, there may be some trouble in the days to come. I will come for you as soon as I can, but…be warned. Be ready.”

He speaks with such grave sincerity that you immediately understand the stakes involved. “I will be ready, love.”

***

The commotion outside in the streets brings you and the rest of the girls into the main antechamber, wondering what on earth is going on to cause such tumult. There is no sign of the lena , though her ledger and pen have been left in their usual places on her little table. 

Althea runs a finger along the edge of the scroll and emits a low whistle. “You don’t think she’s done a runner, do you?”

Catalina shakes her head. “She wouldn’t leave the ledger behind. Or, for that matter” - she gestures to a little box discreetly tucked between a pillar and the wall - “her petty cash.”

The sound of the main door opening hushes the gathering, and the lena strides purposefully into the room.

“Suppose you’re all wondering what’s going on, hmmm? Well, ladies, looks like we’ve got another dead emperor. No-one seems to be mourning that lunatic, though, unlike his father…Anyway!” She throws up her hands and rolls her eyes in exasperation as she seats herself at the table. “Just another ordinary, quiet day in Rome.”

You and the other girls cluster around the lena , asking question upon question as you vie for information. With a roar, she silences you again.

“All’s I know is this - he died in the arena, and it was that Merciful Maximus or Maximus the Merciful or whatever in Hades’ name they call that gladiator who did it. Commodus challenged him to a duel, didn’t he?” She sucks her teeth. “Not the brightest, that one.”

“Maximus?” Your voice cuts through the gasps and mutterings of the other girls. “Maximus defeated the emperor?”

The legions. This is why they were at Ostia, to overthrow the emperor and restore the senate. You wonder if Acacius has already entered the city - indeed, if he was there to witness the fight.

“He did,” the lena sighs. “Fat lot of good it did him, he’s dead now, too. Right! Back to your chambers, we might get a few boys in festive mood now that Commodus is gone.”

Your stomach churns as you walk silently down the hallway and back to your room. If Maximus’s legions had massed at Ostia to march on the city, and were already on the move, who knew what fate awaited them now that the general was dead, leaving a power vacuum at the very top of Rome? Or perhaps, you reason with yourself, the senate will work quickly to restore order, and will not punish the legionaries who were ready to stage a coup. After all, it was the senate they were fighting for.

One way or another, tomorrow you will begin the search for Acacius.

***

Trade was as dead as the emperor that night, much to your relief. In the early hours, you lie awake and stare at the painted ceiling, thinking over and over about the places he might be and where you should start. Sleep, eventually, finds you.

You dream that he has come to you, that he is calling you by name, over and over, shaking you by the arm until you respond.

“Please, my love, wake up.”

No dream at all. He is there, real and whole, sitting on the side of your bed. His handsome face is marked with dirt and grime, hands and knees grubby, as if he has come fresh from a long journey on horseback. 

You sit up and reach for his hand. “Acacius…husband. You’re alive, you’re safe.”

He nods in response, until he buries his face in his hands and leans forward, head between his legs, and gives a devastated, feral roar the likes of which you’ve never heard before. You tentatively move beside him, fingers working to undo his cuirass so that you can rub his back through the thin fabric of his tunic. His big, strong body shakes with fury and hurt under your gentle caress. 

Neither of you speak for some time. You try to ground and console him with your touch, your closeness; and in time his rapid breathing slows and he raises his head to speak.

“I would have come sooner.” His voice is low and croaky, worn out by a day of shouting. “I would have come…I had to help them, had to get the boy away, get him safe.” He looks at his grimy hands, as if noticing them for the first time. “The road was dusty, I’m covered in the stuff. I’m sorry, I…”

You shake your head and nod at him to continue. Acacius sighs despondently. 

“I was in the arena today. Me, a few other officers, other centurions, all loyal to Maximus, the senate, the people. We wanted to be ready, to prepare for the others.”

He reaches for your hand, cupping it in both of his and kissing it with reverent care. 

“I…we…” His voice breaks a little. “He died , there on the arena floor. Murdered by his own emperor.” He steadies himself, a note of rage entering his tone. “He was a hero of Rome. A hero of Rome . And that was how his life ended. That was his reward.”

He looks at you, features set hard, eyes burning with anger. And then his face softens, expression crumples, and he cannot hold back the tears as he buries his face against your shoulder.

***

You wash him clean of that terrible day in the baths, anointing his cuts and bruises with balms, ointments, and kisses. 

He watches as you apply the mixtures carefully to his skin. “I did not know you were a doctor, sweet lady.”

“No doctor,” you smile. “Just some knowledge passed from my mother and aunts, about healing plants and balms. I like to keep a few with me, just in case.”

“Just in case?”

“In case I marry a soldier.”

When he is clean, you dress him in a plain tunic from the linen cupboard and take him to bed.

Acacius rests his head on your bosom as you stroke his hair, his strong arm draped across your body. After a time, he breaks the silence.

“How can I keep fighting, if this is the fate of a Roman hero?” He shakes his head a little. “And yet, I am bound by my oath to serve.”

You kiss his forehead and stroke his cheek, tracing the line of a scar. “What would he say to you now?”

He looks up at you with those pitch-dark eyes, permitting himself a little smile. “Apart from ‘how did you ever manage to get a woman as lovely as her to marry you ’?”

You raise an eyebrow. “Apart from that.”

“He would probably say that the dream of Rome is worth fighting for.”

“I think you have your answer, then.”

He does not seem entirely convinced as he sits up beside you and leans in for a kiss. “Perhaps.” Another kiss. “Or perhaps only love is worth fighting for.”

You lie down and pull him to you, happy to feel his solid weight on top of you again. “Aren’t you fighting for love, though, when you fight for Rome?”

“If only she weren’t such a cruel mistress.” He kisses your neck, tugging down the neck of your robe to expose your breast. “Gods, I need you, my love.”

With your help, he discards his own tunic and takes off your dress. He sits back on his heels for a moment, running his big hands up your bare legs as he looks into your eyes.

“I am all yours, Acacius.” You extend your hand to him, guiding him into position. “Let me help you forget it all, even if just for tonight.”

He moves forward on top of you, holding your gaze for a few moments as he caresses your face and strokes your hair. His kiss is tender but urgent, his hand reaching for your breast as he starts to grind against you. 

“All yours, my love,” you repeat, watching as he moves back down your body. “Take me as you wish, as you need.”

He tries to take in every part of you with his mouth, lips moving with desperate need and grazing over your tits, your soft belly, your hips. One, two thick fingers slip between your thighs, keen to remind you what you taught him that first night together. You writhe against him as his beard scrapes against the delicate skin and curls that cover your mound, unable to stop yourself guiding him between your legs.

”Mine. Mine .” Acacius mutters the word as he hooks his arms under your thighs and buries his face against your cunt, nose rubbing against you while his tongue parts your folds. It’s as if he wants to devour you, such is the urgency with which he sucks and laps and licks. He runs his fingers over your dripping core and drops his hand to his cock, using your wetness to stroke himself as he continues to eat you out. He laps greedily at you as you come, your slick still glistening all over his face as he shifts forward and enters you.

He holds you down as he fucks you hard, fingers twined through yours, sweat dripping from his beautiful body onto your tits. There’s a desperation to his lovemaking tonight, a desire to escape his grief by losing himself in you - in your cunt, your flesh. He comes with a roar, filling you with life as he tries to rid himself of the bloody memory of death.

***

He leaves in the early morning, following military orders to assemble at the Field of Mars in spite of his misgivings and wavering loyalty. You make love before he goes: slow, soft, congress in the dawn light. 

You watch him dress, sitting up naked in bed. “Be careful, my love.”

Acacius fastens his cloak and leans in for a final kiss. “You too, love. I will come for you as soon as I can.” Before he leaves the room, he nods towards a leather pouch resting on the table.

“That isn’t payment , in case you are wondering. It is my duty as your husband - some money, should you need it urgently while I am away.” He looks as though he would rather sacrifice himself in the arena than leave. “I love you.”

That was the last time you saw him, until he appeared, a decade and a half later, as a vision in white: the triumphant hero of empire.

***

The crowds have dispersed now, the city humming with excitement at the prospect of a series of games to celebrate the feats of Acacius and his army in Numidia. 

The terracotta oil lamps cast a warm, comforting glow around your small home, nestled in a side street in a decidedly unfashionable part of the city. The brothel is firmly in the past for you now, as you earn a living making medicinal balms and ointments, using recipes learned from your mother and aunts. You prepare your simple evening meal and eat it quietly, preoccupied all the while by Acacius. 

He had seen you today, you were sure of it. What did he remember of you, of your love, of the secret “marriage” of spirit the two of you had entered into? Had he recognised you at all? He had grown even more handsome with the passing of time. You were not sure the same could be said of your beauty.

The little metal figurine lies on the table before you, your fingertips tracing over the outline of the man you had loved so much. With a gentle sigh, you move to the corner of the room and retrieve a plain, well-worn wooden box from the chest that holds your most precious possessions. He fits in well here, this Acacius, nestled among carefully-folded fabric you have preserved like a relic all these years. 

What might have been, in another world. But you have your memories, and your relics, and the comfort of having seen him one more time, after all these years.

***

A day or so later, you are about to turn in for the night when you hear the distinctive sound of a horse coming to a halt just outside your home, swiftly followed by a firm knock. A knock on your door at this hour is not usual , but neither is it unexpected or unprecedented. People have, on occasion, come in urgent circumstances, desperately seeking this balm or that ointment. 

You reach for your mantle and open the door a little. “Tell me what the problem is and I’ll get you what you need, if I have it.”

The cloaked figure at your door chuckles, turns, and takes down their hood.

"So you really do live. I am not sure one of your fine balms could fix the problems I’m facing, dear lady.”

You steady yourself on the doorframe, unsure whether to laugh, cry, or touch him to make sure he’s really there. 

“Oh, gods… Acacius .” You shake your head and correct yourself quickly. “I mean, General Acacius, I… how ?”

“Acacius, please. I’ll always just be Acacius with you.” He crosses an arm over his chest in a gesture of honourable sincerity, those dark eyes warm and oh so familiar, even after a distance of nearly twenty years. “May I come in?”

You gesture towards the table at the centre of the room and close the door, still not quite believing that he is really here , in your little home. He is no longer wearing the dress uniform, you notice, spying a simpler tunic and belt under the cloak. 

“I have some wine, if you would like? Nothing like the fine stuff you’re used to now, of course, but…”

“Anything you have is perfect.” Acacius moves closer to you and reaches for your hand, pressing his lips to it and smiling with delighted recognition when he realises you still wear the ring he gave you. He seems reluctant to let go, caressing your hand in both of his as his eyes take you in from head to toe. “I am so happy to see you…I thought I would never see you again. I…”

Before he can finish his sentence, you throw your arms around him and pull his beautiful, broad frame to you in a tight embrace.

***

The conversation is light, at first - small talk, mostly about the triumph, about the campaign in Africa, the sheer weight of the special armour and cloak he had worn for the procession, his relief in seeing his wife, Lucilla.

You smile when he mentions her. “You are both very lucky indeed, I think. She’s much loved, very beautiful, kind… maybe now you are home we will see more of her in the city? She is missed by the people.”

Acacius purses his lips. “Her movements are…not always in her own hands, these days.”

You nod in understanding as silence settles over the two of you.

He sips his wine and takes a deep breath. “I came back for you, did you know that? All those years ago. I kept my word, my vow to you. But you were gone .”

He tells his side of the story simply, though at times he struggles to keep his emotions in check. After Maximus’s death, it was well over a year before Acacius saw Rome again. In the political turmoil that followed the demise of Commodus, young officers like him were deployed to various parts of the empire to secure the Roman presence - and, he suspected, to prove their loyalty to the litany of new emperors who followed in quick succession. 

“As soon as I got back to the city, first chance I got, I went to find you. And everything was different - a new lena in the place.” He shakes his head at the memory. “When I asked about you, she…well, she said you were gone.”

You press your fingertips against the surface of the table. “I had returned to the family farm, I meant to come back, but…”

Acacius nods. “She knew you had gone to your family, but she told me you were dead . Said the news was that you’d died, a few months after you left Rome.”

He tells how he refused to accept your death. He searched for you as best he could, trying to piece together the little he knew about your life before Rome, before the brothel, before him . Dead end after dead end eventually convinced him, against his instincts, that you were really gone.

”I mourned you as a…a husband . Grew my hair for the period of mourning, didn’t trim my beard…” He smiles sadly. “I even covered my head and burned that linen tunic you’d dressed me in, that last night we spent together, in lieu of a funeral pyre. It was all I had of you.”

You reach for his hand, noticing the scars and callouses that were not there the last time you held it so tenderly. “I am so sorry, my lo-” The words came as easily as they did that last morning together. You checked yourself. “I mean, Acacius .”

He squeezes your hand and continues. “I kept telling myself I had let you down. Had I been here I could have helped you, made sure you were safe, protected you.” A sombre look darkens his features. “When I saw you up there in the crowd, for an instant I wondered if I was seeing things, if you were an apparition…reminding me that I had failed you.”

“You could never fail me, Acacius. Never. Not then, not now.” 

You sip your wine as you prepare to tell him your side of the story.

“I left Rome a couple of months after you did, and went back north to my family. I had to go but I intended to return, because I knew you would keep your word.”

Silence, again, and you know exactly what he’s going to ask you.

“Why did you leave the city…why did you have to go?”

Another sip of wine.

“I was with child.”

***

When you were absolutely certain, about two months after he left, you packed your things and made the necessary arrangements. His money helped pay your way northwards and home - and paid off your outstanding debts to the lena .

“Don’t you have siblings who can look after your ailing mother?”, she’d said, already starting to count your coin. “Can’t be doing with losing good girls like you, these days.”

“Only my brother remains on the farm, and he cannot manage it and care for my mother at the same time.” It wasn’t a lie , not really. Your sisters were scattered, and since your father’s death the farm was your brother’s responsibility. And strictly speaking, he did have to care for your mother - even if she wasn’t ailing in the way you’d described to the lena to justify your sudden departure.

You looked carefully at every soldier you saw on the road north, hoping against hope that one of them might be yours . In a roadside tavern you even asked after Acacius, after you overheard a group of legionaries talking about Maximus, but to no avail. 

At home, you were circumspect about your situation in Rome - and about the circumstances of your pregnancy. Pressed repeatedly by your mother, you told her the father was a young officer who loved you very much.

“And where is this lover boy, now that he’s got a child on you?” She surveyed your swelling belly with a mixture of irritation and resignation.

“He returned to his legion and we have had no word since.” Another not-really-a-lie. 

Your mother rolled her eyes, but could not disguise the sympathy in her tone. “Tale as old as time.”

You did whatever work you could, within the limits imposed by your condition. And one day, as you rested for a few moments in the meadow, the sun glinting off your garnet ring as your hand lay protectively across your swollen stomach, you felt the child quicken in your womb.

In your lowest moments, you worried that your certainty about paternity was misplaced, given the nature of your work. With every fibre of your being, though, you knew that this child was his. It could be no one else’s.

You planned, originally, to give birth and raise the child to the point where they could be taken care of by another while you worked. At that stage, you assumed, you and your child would return to Rome - and to Acacius.

But fate dealt a very different hand

***

There’s shock and sadness and a kind of excitement, even, in Acacius’s eyes as he listens to you tell the story. Realisation dawns: he was a father .

His voice is hushed. “A boy or a girl?”

You squeeze his hand, as much for your own comfort as for his. “A boy. And your double, from the moment he came into this world - all dark eyes and curly hair and even strange little habits and gestures that I knew were yours . I…named him for you.”

“A son .” He seems awestruck. “I have a son . Gods, I wish I had known.”

“I am so sorry, Acacius, I wish I could have found a way to tell you, for you to know…but I had no idea where you were, how I could find you or reach you.” You swallow back the tears. “Truly, please forgive me.”

He shakes his head and leans a little closer to you. “You don’t need to apologise, there’s nothing to forgive.” He kisses the back of your hand again before wiping an errant tear from your cheek. 

You look at him - really look at him, really take him in properly after all this time apart. He wears his age beautifully, from the lines on his face to the silvery strands of hair that frame his brow. Acacius has acquired more scars in his years of soldiering - across the bridge of his fine nose, a more livid, longer mark to his right cheek. But his eyes, in spite of all the terrible things he has seen and all the blood he has spilled, are as warm and kind when they look at you as they were the first night you met. 

“I always meant to come back to the city,” you continue. “I thought we’d return once he was old enough, find you again, and somehow make a life together. And then my mother died, and I couldn’t leave my brother to tend the farm alone, and my… our boy was so happy there. You were rising through the ranks, too, and a woman and child would have been the last thing you needed.”

Acacius shakes his head, regretfully, and sips his wine. 

“Did you tell him? About me?”

“As soon as he was old enough, yes. I told him all about you.” You smile at the memory of that time and tell him about your little boy’s bright eyes and dark curls, the wide smile on his face as he dashed here and there on the farm, chasing chickens and helping his uncle plant seeds. Your brother whittled him a rudimentary wooden sword, so that he could fight imaginary battles in the fields and cry out, with all the force his little voice could muster: “I am Acacius, hero of Rome.”

“He’s near a man now, I suppose?” Acacius looks around the room, as if making sure he hasn’t missed the boy somehow. 

You close your eyes as another memory casts a long, dark cloud of grief and pain: a memory of fever sweeping the countryside, of the horror as your bright, clever boy fell ill overnight, of your desperate attempts to heal him. And that indelible image, the one that still wakes you at night, sometimes: your brother, tears rolling down his weathered farmer’s face, carrying the small body in its small shroud.

***

Acacius says nothing for a long time, just holds your hand on the table and stares at his cup of wine as he tries to comprehend what you have told him. He breaks his silence with just two words.

“How old?”

“He was seven.”

You rise from the table, gently squeezing his shoulder as you cross towards your wooden chest and take out the plain wooden box where you had placed the miniature Acacius a couple of nights before. Settling back beside him at the table, you remove the lid and show him the contents.

“Is this…” He smiles wryly at the little figurine, picking it up to examine it more closely.

“I told you, didn’t I? They would cast you in bronze some day, Or, if not bronze, whatever that is.”

Carefully, you take out the rest of the items you’d stored with such love since the day you lost your beloved boy. A small tunic. A pair of his sandals, still marked with dust from the farm. A wax tablet, inscribed with his rudimentary letters and numbers. 

Acacius handles his son’s belongings as though they are the most precious objects in the world. He turns a little figurine of a soldier, carved from bone, over and over in his palm.

“He loved that one best.” 

It is strangely comforting and intimate to sit with Acacius in this shared grief, watching him somehow try to know the little boy he never met through the few belongings he left behind in the world.

“Acacius…” He looks at you, eyes glistening with tears, and you fight the urge to embrace him again. “I think you should keep that. If you wish, of course, but -”

He nods, cupping the toy in his big hand before placing it with great care and tenderness in the leather pouch on his belt.

“I can carry him with me.”

***

Before he leaves you, you give him a jar of your very best healing ointment as a parting gift. 

“For your next campaign, to help with cuts and bruises.”

He kisses you on the cheek, smiling as he opens the jar and inhales the warm, fragrant aroma of the balm. “I hope to get some respite from the battlefield for a while.”

You grin. “I’m glad to hear it. And I am so glad that you have a wonderful wife to go home to.”

His travelling cloak once more around his broad shoulders, Acacius bids you farewell and holds you in a long, tight embrace and murmurs into your ear.

“I loved you so very much. Always remember that.”

***

More games. More bloodshed. You stay at home, away from the festivities and the crowds. 

Another late-evening knock to your door, and this time you decide not to answer. The games have brought a rowdy crowd to the city, and it’s impossible to know what awaits on the other side. 

They knock again, firmly, clearly. Not the knock of a drunk, you muse.

You open the door to a young man, dressed in the typical garb of a servant, and a woman of regal bearing, dressed in a simple hooded cloak. 

“May I come in?”

She leaves the servant outside and checks that the door is firmly shut before she takes down her hood, revealing her fine features and blonde curls as you gasp in recognition - and panic.

“Gods! I mean…my lady, I…”

Lucilla smiles that sweet smile so beloved of the ordinary citizens and reaches for your hand, attempting to steady your evident nerves. “Please, don’t be alarmed. I cannot stay long, but…may we sit?”

Dumbfounded, you gesture towards your simple wooden chairs, watching in astonishment as the daughter of Marcus Aurelius seats herself at your table. She nods towards the other chair, encouraging you to join her.

“I am very sorry for arriving like this so late in the evening, unannounced. I do hope I’m not putting you out.”

You shake your head quickly, panic and terror still written all over your face, and she chuckles gently. “Please, I meant it - you have nothing to fear from me. And yes, I know my husband came to see you.” 

“He…I mean, I…I mean, we …”

Lucilla places her elegant, pale hand on the back of yours by way of reassurance. “I know. He has often spoken of you to me - and of his sorrow at not being able to protect you. When he realised you still lived, well…I simply wanted to meet the woman who meant so much to Acacius. We have a lot in common, you and I.”

For a moment, you wonder if you are dreaming. Most women would rather ignore their husband’s past loves, let alone want to visit them. 

“You didn’t mind that he came to see me?”

She shakes her head, blue eyes meeting yours. “Not at all. In fact, I encouraged him to seek you out, after he saw you during the triumph.”

“I…I’m not sure I understand, my lady.”

“We’ve lived , you and I, haven’t we? When Acacius and I met, I had already lost so many people. My husband, my father, my brother…and the man who was my first great love.”

Lucilla looks away for a moment, emotion threatening her poise. She speaks haltingly, more quietly now. “And I lost my son, too. I was very sorry to hear about your boy.” 

In that instant you forget all etiquette and protocol and extend your hand to hers, to comfort and to share the burden of your common grief. No more a former prostitute and the daughter of a great emperor - here, at your rustic table, you are simply two women united by the experience of loss.

“So we do have much in common, it seems, my lady.”

“We do. And that’s without even mentioning Acacius.” She smiles at you conspiratorially, and laughter fills the small room. 

“It haunted him, not having been able to find you again. Not getting to say goodbye, to tell you how much you meant.” She pulls her cloak more tightly around herself and rises from the table. “I was able to bid farewell to my first great love. When we realised you were alive, well…I wanted my beloved Acacius to have that chance, too.”

Before she takes her leave, Lucilla embraces you, kissing each cheek. “Thank you for loving him so well, all those years ago.”

You nod, still not quite believing that this conversation is really happening. “And thank you , for loving him now. And for encouraging him to visit me. He…he married a very good woman.”

She pulls up her hood and moves to the door, pausing for a moment. “He has always had impeccable taste, it seems.”

A final smile and nod, and she is gone, helped onto her horse by her servant before they ride away into the night, and home to the waiting arms of a hero of Rome.

[humblequestvinyl]

boston's red

BOSTON’S RED, CONRAD FISHER X FEM!READER

APART OF THE “ANOTHER ON THE WAY” SERIES

SUMMARY: conrad fisher quickly meets a girl from the bronx, and despite their rival teams she starts to fall in love with him under those fenway lights.

inspired by tennessee orange by megan moroney

◀ ⏸ ▶

lowercase is intentional! wc: 1.9k

warning: underage drinking, and swearing

a/n: so i actually had a cute little note written out about how this is so boston sports coded when i started writing this OVER A YEAR AGO. but this is actually just my boyfriend and i with our rival sports teams. anyway enjoy!

“MAMA I STILL DON’T UNDERSTAND WHY I’M HERE.”

y/n l/n spoke as she drove through massachusetts in her run down mustang, knowing this was the last place she wanted to be.

“because it’ll be good for you! you’ll be able to hang with your auntie mia, be right by the beach and maybe meet a few people this summer!’her mother told her, and y/n rolled her eyes, “i’d rather be at yankee stadium.”

“you’re right by fenway! why not go there when the yankees are in town?”her mother questioned, and y/n made a face as she passed by a sign, welcoming her into cousins beach massachusetts, knowing she was close to her aunts.

“absolutely not.”

“why not?!”her mother questioned as y/n’s gps directed her to take a left, and y/n had an absolutely disgusting feeling.

“that’s an absolute sin in new york.”the h/c cringed at the thought, “jail time, punishable by death.”

“alright i get it.”y/n’s mother chuckled, knowing how dramatic her daughter could be about her favorite sports team, “text me tonight alright?”

“will do, bye mama.”y/n spoke, and the line went completely dead with cruel summer by taylor swift starting to blast through her speakers.

it was a few minutes before she pulled into her auntie mia’s driveway, and laid on the horn to signal her arrival to her aunt’s home, only to see her walk out from the house next door with her hands in the air. 

“i thought you weren’t supposed to be here for another hour?”her aunt questioned as y/n hopped out of the car with a wide smile spread across her face, “your favorite niece is a speed demon!”

mia let out a laugh before y/n raced across the yards, tackling her aunt in a tight hug, “i’ve missed you!”

“i’ve missed you more ruthie!”mia exclaimed, before walking with the girl back towards the house she came from, and y/n threw her head back knowing her aunt was referencing her middle name.

“where are you taking me?”the h/c girl giggled as her aunt walked her inside the next door neighbors house, “i am not even properly dressed mimi.”

“oh who cares!”mia exclaimed, waving the teen girl off as the two walked inside, and y/n spotted a blonde woman walking back into the beach house that had been deemed as ‘beck’s house.’

“i thought that was you i heard!”the woman exclaimed as she walked towards the two with one of the biggest smiles spread across her face, “you must be y/n!”

“yeah.”the bronx girl smiled as she was brought into a tight embrace, and y/n chuckled a bit,

the woman pulled back, and cupped the girls' shoulders, taking in her appearance, and she saw her eyes drift back over towards mia, and y/n bit back the smile that threatened to peak out.

“she looks so much like sierra.”the woman pointed out, and y/n’s eyebrows furrowed, “you know my mom?”

“you know how mom and i always talked about laurel and beck from college?”mia questioned, and the h/c girl nodded, before mia nodded her head towards the blonde woman that stood in front of her, “this is beck.”

the girls mouth made an ‘oh’ shape, causing the older women to laugh, and ushered the l/n girl to sit down.

“where are the kids?”mia asked as beck ran around the kitchen, gathering things for the two girls.

“well, somehow laurel convinced all of them to do the grocery shopping for the week, and they’ve been gone for almost two hours.”beck explained, and a loud laugh escaped from mia’s lips before the three started to talk about anything and everything.

it felt like hours before the peace was disturbed by a loud crash as soon as the front door was opened, and yelling soon followed.

“i told you not to pack these bags heavy!” y/n’s head snapped towards the front door, silently observing the scene in front of her as the two boys struggled to pick up whatever had fallen out of the bags.

“it’s not my fault that they aren’t sturdy!”another argued, before y/n saw a beautiful girl walk through the front door, carrying another bag and a pizza in her hand.

“hi susannah!”the girl greeted beck before waving to y/n, one the new yorker returned back.

y/n continued to watch the front door as the last of the groceries came in, along with another boy, wearing a red sox cap on the top of his head.

“new york, huh?”the boy questioned as soon as he made his way into the kitchen, nodding towards the aaron judge shirt y/n had on, causing the girls cheeks to become inflamed.

“forgot i had it on.”y/n admitted, before standing up and pushing her chair in, “on that note, i have a lot of unpacking to do.”

“thank you, beck.”y/n thanked the woman, before rushing out of the house and towards her aunts, where her mustang sat with all of her luggage.

as she unraveled her luggage from the car and brought it in, her head was filled with the boy who had called her out in red sox territory. brown hair, blue eyes and the cutest dimples she had ever seen.

there was one problem throughout all of it though,

he was a red sox fan.

it was y/n’s number one rule when it came to even liking someone. if they were a red sox, islanders, or patriots fan, they were absolutely out of the question. she couldn’t stand them half the time, so how could she be in a relationship with one?

‘absolutely not.’ she thought as she placed her clothing into drawers, making the guest room feel somewhat like home, ‘you don’t even know him.’

and so that’s what y/n sat with, for days. it was all she could think about. the boy next door with brown hair and blue eyes, with that stupid red sox hat on.

it wasn’t until days later that the two met again, and when they did, it was during beck’s fourth of july party. 

y/n was already two drinks in and had kept by her aunt's side as much as she could without interacting with many people. she didn’t know anybody, and the new yorker did not want to run into the boy with the red sox hat.

but, the universe had other plans for the girl from new york.

“y/n! i forgot to introduce you to conrad the other day!”beck exclaimed, and y/n furrowed her eyebrows as she saw the woman waving over someone.

“conrad, this is y/n.”susannah introduced the two, and y/n looked up at the boy with slight confusion, “she’s staying with mia for the summer.”

“red sox boy.”y/n blurted out before she could even stop herself, and she saw a smile spread across conrads face as mia hit the girls arm, “little miss bronx.”

a scowl fell across y/n’s face as she heard mia and susannah chuckle, and y/n heard her aunt mention something about conrad taking the girl down towards the beach.

next thing she knew, she was stuck with the boy.

“so, new york?”conrad questioned as the two walked, and y/n took a sip of her drink before nodding, “what brought you up to cousins?”

“a mother who wants me to live my life outside of yankee stadium.”the girl grinned as a laugh fell out of the boys lips, “found out how much i was spending on yankees tickets and sent me here.”

“how much?”conrad questioned, and the girl shook her head, “too much.”

as the two continued to walk the beach, talking about their teams dislike for each other, what the boy had planned for the summer, and what games conrad was going to see in boston this summer.

“have you even been to fenway park?”he questioned, and y/n shook her head with a laugh.

“why would i do that?”the girl fired back as she took a sip of the water conrad had snagged for her. “i have yankee stadium at my ready whenever i want.”

conrad chuckled as the two continued to walk down, before looking down at his phone and turning to the girl with a smile, “you busy on friday?”

the h/c raised an eyebrow as she looked at the boy she was walking with, letting her curiosity get the best of her, “why?” she questioned as she watched the wheels turn within conrad’s head.

a wide grin spread across the boys face and y/n instantly knew whatever he was about to suggest would mean having to go into the city she absolutely despised.

“the sox are home.”conrad brought up, with his boston accent peeking through, something that y/n hadn’t noticed til that moment, “you could go see the oldest ballpark ever.”

“hell no.”

“why not!”the boy laughed as he threw his arms up dramatically, and y/n rolled her eyes, “you cannot tell me you have never wanted to experience sweet caroline on a friday night in early july.”

“i haven’t.”y/n reassured him as she brushed some of the hair that was stuck to her face away, “and i never will.”

“if you ever think i will end up at fenway park when the yanks aren’t playing, you’re dead wrong.”y/n continued on with her tangent, and conrad had a wide smile on his face, “especially in red sox gear.”

“keep dreaming pretty boy.”

★

SOMEHOW, ALMOST THREE DAYS LATER Y/N ENDED UP INSIDE OF FENWAY PARK.

it was the middle of the eighth inning when the opening notes to sweet caroline had started to play throughout the stadium, and conrad had a wide grin spread across his face.

“c’mon ruthie, it’s a classic!”he shouted over the music before helping the girl stand to her feet, and wrapping an arm around her shoulders.

ruthie, never did y/n think someone calling her ruthie would send butterflies throughout her entire body, especially at a stadium she thought she would hate. but yet here she was, under the lights of fenway park with sweet caroline blasting and she was quickly picking up the words to it.

she had never felt this way with anyone back home. y/n never thought that someone would be able to get her inside a rival stadium when the new york yankees weren’t the opposing team. as she looked over to the blue-eyed boy, she could feel herself quickly falling more and more for a boy she barely knew.

as sweet caroline faded out, y/n watched as conrad took the spoked b hat off of the top of his head, and place it onto the top of hers. the boston boy expected her to immediately rip it off and throw a fit, but as the first pitch was thrown, she kept in on.

in new york they’d call it a sin, but y/n l/n was wearing boston’s red for conrad fisher.

[lovingme232]

Ex-Best Friend

Conrad Fisher X Reader

//Belly cut you off after you confessed your feelings for Conrad to her//

2.6K Words

Last summer. The summer that killed any chance of having another enjoyable summer. Sure, you can admit that part of it was your fault, but not all of the blame could go to you, right? No. Belly was the one who screamed nonsense at you. Belly was the one who cut you off. Belly was the one who got mad at you for having a harmless crush on a boy. 

Okay. Yes, that crush was her crush. But to your defense, you thought Belly was over him. She stopped talking about him, or talking to him. You thought she had left her childhood love in the dust, but nope. 

And how were you supposed to know Belly would get so mad? She could have said a few simple words, “I like him, back off,” and you would have suppressed your feelings, but no, instead she screamed, and cried, and rambled on and on. You were pretty sure it was the first time she had swore.

Now, you were stuck in your room, all summer. No Jeremiah, no Steven, no Laurel, no Suzana, no Belly, and definitely no Conrad. All you got to see were the bright white walls that you stared at every day.

Truthfully, you were kinda greatful your mother hadn’t made any plans with Laural or Suszana. Despite being the third to their friend group, they hadn’t made any plans. You didn’t have the guts to look at Belly or Conrad anymore. But that didn’t matter, because Conrad was just a summer crush, a one time summer crush. 

That was when you got the worst news of your life. “Y/N! Get ready, we're having a picnic with Laura, and Suzana! You’ll get to see Belly!” Your heart dropped to the pit of your stomach. This was the worst thing that could happen to a 16 year old. 

You quickly scrambled out of your bed, throwing the many blankets and pillows onto the floor. You rushed to your door, only to find your mom standing at the bottom of the stairway. There had to be another way. There was no way you’d be able to survive the embarrassment. “I’m not feeling very good, do I have to go?” 

The face she gave you, told you she had already made up her mind. “You look fine, you need the sunlight anyways.” She turned away, mumbling something about vampires, but you were too distracted to listen. 

You wanted to fall to the group and crumble into a ball. What would you see? What if they were together? He always had a way of looking at Belly. Like she was the only girl in the world who mattered. It hurt. 

Maybe he wasn’t just a summer crush. It's just a small little crush. Of course, you did spend your free time thinking about Conrad. Where he was, how he was doing. Definitely not that small of a crush.

But this was perfect. Maybe you could truly flip this around. Dress up nice, put on some makeup, do your hair. You learned how to do it over the school year. Show them you aren't nerdy, little Y/N anymore. Show them you grew up. Show them you're mature. Show Conrad you could be just as pretty as Belly.

The next hour consisted of trying on outfits, re-doing your eyeliner; straightening, curling, straightening your hair again, and your mom moaning for you to hurry up. Finally, you looked perfect. After checking yourself in the mirror, you ran down stairs, not really ready for the adventure ahead.

The pressure in your heart grew as you got closer to the picnic spot. Your throat was tight and full of anxiety. You were scared to get out of the car, in fear of falling. But no matter how scared you were of getting a few scratches on your knees, nothing could compare to the fear of facing Belly, even if all she did was silently glare at you.

You hopped out of the car, your legs felt like jelly. Your heart pounded against your rib cage with every step you took, it felt like it would jump out of your chest. 

Soon Belly and her family came into view. But most importantly Conrad was there, sitting in between Steven and Jeremiah. Your heart jumped a beat. Then your eyes went back to Belly, she was looking in the opposite direction. She looked different. Then your eyes shifted. Great. Taylor was there too, throwing daggers at you with her eyes. Belly must have told her what happened.

Suzana ran up to your mom, and engulfed her in a hug. When she pulled away she turned to you, placing a hand on your shoulder. “You’ve grown up, Y/N, you look great.” You smiled. “Thank you.” She laughed, and wrapped her arms around both you and your mom. All three walked arm in arm, until you reached the large sprawled out blanket.

“Go sit next to Belly and Taylor.” Suzana patted me on the back and nudged me closer to my upcoming doom. I nodded, and awkwardly plopped down onto the blanket. Belly immediately shifted away from you, and turned to Taylor to create a huddle. The whispered, and many hushed laughs escaped Taylors mouth. 

You shifted uncomfortably, suddenly sitting under the weight of your own body didn’t seem so possible anymore. 

Conrad watched as you moved, your eyes shifted up to him, your breath spiked, and your cheeks turned red, as he looked at you. Maybe it was because he liked you. He quickly looked away, suddenly he was way more interested in Stevens rambling. 

You looked down, shame rushing over you. Maybe it was because you had a crush on your friend, ex-friends, crush. Or maybe it was because it was silly to think Conrad, Beck, Fisher, would ever have a crush on you. 

“Y/N you have to try the fondue, it is to die for!” Suzana spoke with her mouth full, as she tried not to lose her food. 

You nodded, and grabbed a fork stuck in some bread. You couldn’t taste it, all you could think about was getting out of there. Sure you looked good, but the way Taylor was looking at you sure made you feel otherwise.

“Y/N!” Jeremiah spoke estaticaly, as he moved over to you. “Where have you been? You haven’t come over to the house since last summer.” He wrapped his arm around my shoulder squeezing you tight. Belly didn’t tell them what happened. “I’ve been busy.” 

He nodded, and glanced over at me to get a look at me. “Wow. You’ve really grown up. You and I will have to get lunch together sometime.” You couldn’t help but laugh at his flirting. “We do. Really, I missed hanging out with you.” 

You looked over to Conrad, was he glaring at Jeremiah? Could it be? Was Conrad Jealous? That would be crazy. Conrad. Jealous because his brother was flirting with you. That would be insane.

You continued talking to Jeremiah, but you were too stuck on how Conrad kept his eyes shooting holes through Jere. It was shocking to you. Your heart skipped a beat as you watched him blink, open his eyes, and re-rarrow them. Jere seemed to notice as well, he turned his head to the side, and cocked an eyebrow at Conrad.

“You alright Con?” Jere asked, and Conrad immediately snapped out of it, he backed up and seemed a little shocked in himself. “Yeah, I’m fine.” Conrad mumbled back, you didn’t remember him being so moody. 

Suddenly Jere laughed, he rocked back and almost fell over, but managed to catch himself at the last minute. “Listen Con, we all know you’ve been crushing on Y/N, but I’m not going to take her from you.” His words processed through your brain, and your face flared a bright red. Everyone was now looking at you, and Conrad, but you didn’t care too much, you were too busy looking at conrads red cheeks. 

Was it true? Could Conrad really like you? No way. That was not possible. Right. The way he was looking at you said otherwise. Maybe he could like you. Yes. Conrad Fisher could totally like you. Not Taylor, or some random girl, or even Belly, you, he could like you. Was this how it felt to win a race?

A smile crossed over your face, and your heart pounded in your chest. The guy you had only dreamed would like you back, might actually like you back. It was a miracle! A dream came true.

“Ew, no way. She’s like family.” Suddenly your heart came crashing back to reality, and your smile was wiped off your face. Of Course he wouldn’t like you. Taylors laugh rang out from her mouth, piercing your ears like little jabs from little knives. “Are you on something, Jeremy? Why would he like Y/N?” Belly quickly hushed Taylor, and everyone laughed, and went back to their own conversations.

Blood rushed to your face, but it was for a different reason this time. Embarrassment. You wanted to run away, and hide. You looked down in shame, you couldn’t even look up to Conrad to see how he was responding.

All you did was clear your throat and give the best smile you could muster. “I’m pretty full, I’m gonna go for a walk.” Before anyone could offer to go with you, you were up and gone. You walked as quickly as you could to get away from the situation.

Tears followed soon after. Taylor didn’t even say anything that meant, it just hit you right. It made you feel ugly and gross, and nothing like you had tried to look today. Your makeup, that had taken so long to do, was ruined in seconds. Maskara ran down your face, and smudged the eyeliner that you thought you had perfected.

Ironically you still felt prettier than you did with all your makeup on. Something about all the raw emotion made you feel good. Like you had needed to cry for so long, and this was the only time you could. 

Finally you found a nice recluse place, you could sit down at. It had a log that was made to perfectly sit down and light a campfire. You sat down at the log, that looked out onto the ocean, and if it were dusk, a beautiful sunset. 

You stared out onto the ocean, and watched little fish jump out and fly through the sky for a few seconds, then fall back in. 

You hung your head down low again, and shoved it into your hands. You didn’t know what to think or feel. Well, you felt stupid that was for sure. Stupid to ever think Conrad would ever see you as anything other than a friend at most, but he clearly didn’t think that right now. 

The tears started again. It was as if your heart had been pulled out, stomped on and shoved it back into my chest. Maybe one day you would feel better, and you’d find someone else, someone better than Conrad.

What were you kidding? You had never had a crush this big. And what were the chances of you finding someone better than Conrad, someone better than Conrad that would like you? Zero.

It was always Belly and Conrad. You got ahead of yourself. You thought he looked at you the same way he looked at her, but you were wrong. So very wrong. Sure he was sending some mixed signals, but why wouldn’t he? He’s Conrad Fisher, and he does what he wants. 

Snap! Was that a branch? You flipped your head around trying to find the source of the sound. This was going to be how you died, just like all the horror movies. “Who’s there?” You called out, if you were doing horror movies, you were going to really do horror movies. 

Suddenly Conrad popped out, trying to get some leaves out of his brown hair. “Sorry, didn’t mean to scare you.” He chuckled a little. Your face stayed the same, looking at him with shock. “Can I sit?” He nodded his head towards the log. You quickly snapped out of it, and nodded. “Yes, sit!” You said a little too quickly, and sat down a little too roughly.

Conrad followed behind you, and sat down next to you, leaving only a foot in between you. “I’m sorry about what Taylor said.. and what I said.” He said sheepishly, he fidgeted his hands, rubbing them together uncomfortably. “It’s okay.” You said back, even though it didn’t feel okay. “I know you don’t like me like that.” Your voice came out a little sad sounding, more sad than you would have liked.

 He coughed, like he was choking on air. He slammed his fist into his chest, trying to loosen everything up. You looked over to him, panic already running through you. The fear of losing Conrad before you could tell him everything you felt, even if it wasn’t true, made you shake with fear. 

“Oh my God!” You grabbed onto his shoulders, and twisted him towards you. “I’m fine.” He croaked out, still trying to catch his breath. “I’m fine.” He repeated, sounding a little better. You sighed and started laughing. 

“What are you laughing at?” He quickly said, but his laughter followed soon after. “It's funny. Really.” You said, as you wiped tears away, that only came because you had laughed too hard. “I thought I wouldn’t get to tell you how I felt, just because you were choking on air.” 

Quickly, you realized your mistake. You looked up at him with wide eyes, and he looked down at you with the same expression. “How you feel?” You shook your head. “It doesn’t matter.” You awkwardly laughed. “You wouldn’t feel the same anyways.” 

It was quiet for a few, long, seconds. You looked at the water, it was just so peaceful, it's what you wanted. “Y/N I hate it when you talk about yourself like that.” You were going to say, mhm, but you didn’t know what he was saying. Your head shot up and you looked up to him. “What?”

“Y/N, I really like you. I didn’t mean what I said back there.” Your eyes widened, and your face flushed. “I really like you too.” A smile crossed over his face, the first genuine smile you had seen from him today. 

Before you knew it, his hands were on your cheeks. Was this you're actually going to be your first kiss? With Conrad Fisher? You didn’t even think about Belly, and how upset she would be if she saw this. You were too lost in the moment. 

Your lips parted slightly, your eyes flickered from his eye to his lips and back to his eyes again. This was actually happening. You were going to kiss Conrad Fisher. You put your hand on the back of his neck, each of you inching closer and closer to each other. You were so close you could feel the heat radiating from his body. Everything seemed to slow down from there. 

It was too slow for you. It made your nerves act up. It made your hands feel all sweaty. So you did as you thought was best, you pulled his face to your face, and kissed him. You kissed him! 

His lips tasted like muffins, he probably had them for breakfast. Your lips moved with one another, each of you following the other one. 

The kiss was short and sweet, but still was everything you could have ever asked for. It left you feeling left out, and wanting more. You looked at his eyes, and that was all it took to make you feel pretty. Your heart pounded in your chest, and you panted every few seconds.

“Hey, you wanna go swimming?”

Give me some request!! I have no idea what to write next :D

[peachtarto]

Now or Never

Pairing : Luke Castellan x reader

Word Count :

Summary : Luke missed his chance to ask you an important question, and is painfully unaware of it.

Warnings: mostly fluff! nothing crazy- Luke is dumb, Clarisse is an overprotective bestie, talk of self-doubt etc.

Masterlist here!

A/N : thinking of making this a little series of moments in your relationship- let me know if that’s something you guys would like!

‘Don’t you think it’s a little much?’ You questioned, eyeing your own reflection with what some might call a generous amount of scrutiny.

Silena gave no indication that she’d heard and continued talking, ‘there’ll be such good food, and wine of course, lots and lot of wine..’

The pins in your hair were already beginning to ache, and you tried not to wince as she added yet another one to the elegant braid she was painstakingly creating.

‘- imagine if we made this much fuss for our birthdays,’ she continued, ‘like, I get that he’s the god of festivity but I’ve got to question why he wants to party with a load of hormonal teenagers. Not that I’m complaining, we could all use a good party.’

Silena was already dressed: a deep purple gown of silk accented with golden cuffs, and little combs fashioned like gilded laurel leaves swept her hair away from her face. She looked beautiful, and there was not a doubt in your mind that she was the daughter of Aphrodite.

She’d picked out your dress which had been a relief, a soft chiffon that seemed to float when you moved. It was simple but elegant, she’d insisted- perfect for a daughter of Athena. She’d also said that the hair should match, but it’d been half an hour since she’d started and it was starting to feel everything but simple.

‘And can you believe we’re allowed to switch tables tonight? I can’t wait! Charles said we’d sit together obviously and I’m sure the Hermes boys will join as and..’

Her smile faltered when she saw the look on your face and she quickly halted her movements, ‘oh, don’t you like it?’

‘No no, it’s beautiful!’ You stammered quickly; she’d curled and brainded your hair back in a thick, loose plait with little gold pins shimmering throughout. Even in cabin 10, her skills were unrivalled. ‘I just- do you think it’s too much?’ You questioned again.

‘Too much?’ She scoffed, and then her full lips parted in a dazzling smile, ‘of course it’s too much, that’s the point! We want every boy in this camp on their knees! Figuratively of course.’

You tried to hide the smile that tugged on your lips, ‘You’ve already got Charles drooling after you non-stop, leave some for the rest of us.’

‘Some?’ She said and grinned rather fiendishly, ‘or do you want me to leave just a certain son of Hermes for you?’

You rolled your eyes and gave her a smooth, and rather horrible gesture as she went back to toying with your hair, giggling to herself.

Silena had been the one to introduce you to Luke two years prior. She’d gracefully swept you into her circle the moment you’d arrived in camp, convinced you would be claimed by her mother too. Had Luke not intervened and taken you to cabin 11 she probably would’ve had you sleeping top to toe in her bunk; she’d reluctantly handed you over, but not before she’d seen the look that had passed between the two of you. Love at first sight she’d insisted, and maybe she’d been mistaken on his end, but she hadn’t on yours.

‘You know, he really does like you. I can tell, and you should believe me because it’s literally my thing.’ She sighed, stepping back to admire her handiwork. She pulled and prodded at a few loose hairs until she seemed satisfied, then dragged you over to the long mirror at the back of the cabin.

You didn’t know how she’d managed it, but for once you didn’t cringe at the reflection you saw and a part of you couldn’t quite believe what stared back. There was no denying she was a master at her craft.

‘You look so beautiful!’ Silena squealed, her hands clasped together in pride. Then, without warning she pulled you into a bone-crushing hug that had the air leaving your lungs. ‘Tonight’s the night, for both of us, I can feel it!’

You hoped she was right as you followed her out of the cabin, towards the glittering lights in the pavilion.

Luke stood with Charles and Chris at the edge of the party, sipping slowly on the glass of wine in his hand. He supposed Mr D had been granted a night of reprieve.

‘Seriously man, chill out,’ he whispered over Beckendorf’s shoulder, ‘she’ll be here. Keep frowning like that and you’ll pop a blood vessel.’

He could sense Charles shifting in his feet nervously and his mouth twitched slightly, he knew the feeling all too well. He’d been on edge all day too. Chris was smirking too, but his was all smugness; he’d asked Clarisse outright to attend the party with him and much to everyone’s surprise, she’d said yes immediately, which was lucky for him because the alternative would almost certainly have been the loss of a limb.

‘How can it possibly take this long to get ready?’ Charles said, turning to face Luke. It was odd to see the son of Hephaestus so flustered when he was normally immune to the whims of teenage hormones; apparently he was not at all immune to the power Silena Beauregard seemed to hold over him. ‘Maybe she’s not coming man, we should just go before- oh..’ he trailed off. His eyes went starry and Luke whipped his head around to see what had entranced his friend.

There was Silena in her finery, tossing her hair over a shoulder as she swept into the pavilion. She threw a dangerously beautiful grin at Charles who was beginning to look a little like he might faint.

‘Hi Charles,’ she offered as she sauntered over. Anyone else might’ve missed the shake in her voice, but Luke caught the slightly nervous wobble of her tone and smiled. Good for Beckendorf.

‘You look great Silena,’ he managed to cough out. He quickly eyed Luke who gave an tiny nod of approval as if to say ‘keep going buddy!’

‘I know,’ she sighed dreamily, giving a little twirl of her dress before looping her arm through Charles’ who was now definitely holding his breath. Silena giggled and patted his chest sweetly before throwing a mischievous glare at Luke, ‘Just wait till you see her, I think you’ll get a little breathless too Castellan. Now come on Charlie, let’s get a drink.’

Luke watched her lead his friend away to where Chris stood with an arm slung around Clarisse’s waist; she’d opted for a gown of stormy grey adorned with tiny silver chains, as close to armour as she could get he guessed. She looked slightly terrifying, until Chris whispered something in her ear that had a blushing like crazy and stepping even closer into his side.

‘They make a great couple, don’t you think?’

Luke spun around quickly at the sound of your voice and cursed silently, Silena had been right. All the air left his lungs in a great breath and he was instantly lightheaded at the sight of you.

Devastating was the only word that came to his mind. Truly devastating. You could’ve walked into Olympus then and there and they probably would’ve pronounced you a goddess in an instant. He was struck dumb, and silent. He wanted to say something about how beautiful you looked, or how he’d been wrapped around your delicate finger the day you’d walked into camp; instead his frantic brain settled on, ‘nice dress, did you borrow it from Silena?’

You flinched. ‘No. We were sent a trunk to pick from from her mother.’

‘Oh.’ Was all he could reply as his gaze raked over you again. ‘That’s awfully nice of her.’

‘Very.’ You said through gritted teeth, trying to stop the scarlet blush you could feel rising to your cheeks. What was his problem? It wasn’t unusual for Luke to be blunt, he always struggled to keep his opinions to himself and it had gotten you both in hot water a hundred times before; but it was unusual for him to be blunt with you.

He’d been distant all week, he’d managed to miss three sparring sessions with you and counsellor duties on several occasions. The first few times Chris had been polite enough to make excuses for him, but when the two of you walked into the arena one morning to find Luke and Travis swinging swords at eachother, he’d stayed silent. He didn’t have to tell you what was already painfully obvious. Luke wasn’t ill, and hadn’t ’slept in late’, he’d just been avoiding spending any amount of time with you. You hadn’t had any idea why; and now, standing in the pavilion with the air thinning in between you both, you were even more confused.

He ran his eyes over your dress yet another time and something seemed to snap in your chest. ‘If you’re going to keep judging my outfit,’ you managed to spit out, ‘do it at the dinner table, I’m starving and don’t have the energy to defend myself. Let’s go sit with the others.’

You span away from him so quickly you missed him opening and closing his mouth as he tried to explain himself. As you stalked towards the table your friends had gathered around you must’ve been wearing a murderous expression, because Silena quirked her eyebrow at him with a face that said ‘what did you say?’ He responded with a small shrug before slipping into the seat opposite you.

Luke tried, and failed, to catch your eye throughout dinner. Food came and went, and glasses of a sweet amber wine refilled themselves as soon as the last drop hit the drinker’s lips. Silena had made her way through at least five glasses by his count, and was whispering something in Charles’ ear that had the man choking on his strawberry tart. You’d barely touched yours, and had politely declined his offer to get you something else to drink. You’d barely touched your dinner either, pushing things around your plate with your fork until Connor had unceremoniously dumped the contents of it onto his own. He felt he should apologise for his brother’s behaviour, but when he’d tried, you’d turned to watch the campers dancing by the fire.

The soft light from the flames flickered over the planes of your face and he knew he shouldn’t stare, but after starving himself of you for almost a week, he was finding it hard to look away. If he was honest with himself, it had been almost impossible to endure. You’d spent almost every day together for two years; a week apart had him feeling like he was missing a limb.

But a week apart was better than a week of watching male campers saunter up to you in a flurry of proposals. He’d managed to stick around long enough to see two Ares boys crash and burn and that was more than enough. If the failures were that bad, seeing you agree to attend the party with someone would probably have finished him off. He wondered which insufferable git you’d given in to, which one you’d been stood up by.

Curious, he leaned forward and asked loud enough to get your attention- ‘where’s your date?’

You slid your eyes away from the dancers and faced Luke. He was toying with the stem of his glass. Your throat tightened, and your face warmed uncomfortably. ‘I don’t have one.’

‘What?’ He asked incredulously.

‘Loads of people came alone Luke.’ You said replied quietly, keenly aware of the sudden silence of the conversations between everyone else at the table. ‘It’s not a big deal.’

‘I know, I just thought you would’ve put someone out of their misery. Every guy at camp must’ve asked you.’

‘Almost every guy.’ Chris whispered into his drink, rolling his eyes.

‘A few asked, yes.’ You murmured.

‘And you came alone anyway?’

You could’ve sworn Chris was wincing now, and Clarisse had the good sense to find the lights strung above the tables incredibly interesting all of a sudden. Silena however, looked like she was about to explode. You didn’t even know where to begin, your cheeks weren’t warm anymore, they were burning.

‘Yes.’ You ground out, hoping he’d take the hint and keep his mouth shut for once.

Luke went to speak, but Charles cut in before he could begin. ‘We should go dance!’ He declared, slapping his knees over-enthusiastically and standing so quickly he nearly toppled over his chair. The others rose with murmurs of agreement, eager to get away from what was becoming an increasingly awkward conversation.

‘You guys go ahead,’ you said, rising from your chair ‘I’m going to get some fresh air.’

You hoped no one would mention that you were already outside, surrounded by fresh air, and thankfully no one did. Silena gave you an apologetic look but you shook it off. The lights suddenly seemed much too bright, and the table of your friends was starting to feel like an audience to your embarrassment. As they all walked towards the fire you began in the opposite direction, lifting your dress slightly to allow your feet to travel quickly towards the cabins.

Luke felt Silena’s hand meet the back of his head in a swift slap before he could reach out to stop it.

‘You are as dense as old bread Castellan!’ She hissed as he cradled his neck. The boys were looking at him disapprovingly, but Clarisse was just glaring at him like she was sizing him up for a fight.

‘Chris where’s my knife?’ She asked coldly, holding her hand out in her boyfriend’s direction.

‘Woah- what did I do?’ Luke exclaimed, which earned him a hard flick right in the centre of his forehead. Whoever said Aphrodite’s children weren’t vicious fighters was beginning to sound like a goddam liar, he thought.

‘Do you know how many guys she turned down for tonight?’ Silena continued, ‘almost every guy at camp! And do you know why Captain No Clue?’

Luke just stared blankly until she let out an exasperated sigh. ‘Because she was waiting for you to ask her! I was hoping you’d pull your finger out by the end of the week but you didn’t, and you let her come alone.’

He flinched. Silena’s face tightened and her dark eyes flicked to Charles. Something unsaid flashed between them before she turned her gaze back on Luke; her anger was gone, replaced with something strangely close to pity.

‘You wanted to ask her, didn’t you?’ She asked- carefully. Her eyes were beginning to crinkle like she was about to burst into tears. She dashed forward and forced him down into a tight hug. ‘Oh Luke, I’m so stupid!’

Clarisse rolled her eyes. ‘Daughter of the goddess of love and you didn’t see this one coming? Even Chris figured this one out!’ She chided, then added sweetly in his direction, ‘no offence babe.’

He thought of every moment he’d spent with you; the hours of sparring sessions under the heat of the summer sun, the picnics out in the strawberry fields, sneaking between your cabins in the middle of the night to swap stories of your lives before all of this. He’d known the risks of falling for you, and he’d done it anyway. He’d thought about telling you a hundred times. He had thought about telling you that he didn’t want or expect anything from you in return, that he just needed you to know how he felt because it was torture to suffer it in silence. Over the months he’d managed to convince himself that you didn’t feel anything close to what he felt for you, and had resigned himself to living in the wake of your existence.

Luke’s heart stumbled, taking all the confusion and doubt with it, he blurted, ‘I should go after her,’ and started after you, his pulse pounding in his ears.

Even at a fast-paced jog, he only managed to catch up with you when you were rushing up the stairs to your cabin, the skirts of your dress billowing out behind you.

‘Wait up!’ he shouted through heavy breaths.

You didn’t let him continue and just increased your pace, rushing to get to the door. If you could make it inside and shut him out, perhaps he wouldn’t see the tears that had begun fall. A small part of you ached to stop and turn to him, but you knew what was coming. Silena would have tried to intervene once you’d left, and he was probably coming after you to let you down gently. You weren’t sure you could survive that.

‘Gods will you slow down!’ Luke yelled, ‘I want to talk to you!’

‘Don’t bother,’ you said bluntly, ‘I know what you’re going to say.’

‘Oh yeah? What am I going to say?’

He’d taken the Athena cabin steps two at a time and was right behind you now. You could hear his ragged breathing, had he ran here? He must really want to get it over with, you thought bitterly. ‘Does it matter? Just go back to the party Luke, they’ll be missing you.’

‘It matters to me. I don’t want to be there if you’re not.’ He said softly and reached out to grab your hand. His fingers grazed your own, warm and steadfast- patiently waiting for you to pull away. But you didn’t, you couldn’t bare it.

As you turned to face him fully you realised you were close enough to share breath. In other circumstances you might’ve stared up at him with longing; now all there seemed to be was the awful sinking feeling that you were about to lose him.

You opted to not meet his eyesight, and instead studied the scuffed wood of the cabin porch beneath your feet.

‘Then why didn’t you ask me to go with you?’ You managed to ask. You could feel his eyes on you, burning into your skin like a brand. ‘I thought we were friends Luke, I thought that would be enough to get you to tolerate me for one evening so neither of us had to go alone.’

‘That’s not..’ he took a deep breath before he continued. Now or never, he thought, and opted for now.

‘I didn’t ask you because I didn’t want to go as your friend. I wanted to go as your date. I knew you’d say no, because every guy here was chalking up how to ask you themselves and I couldn’t- I couldn’t stand it. I’d prepared myself to see you with someone else tonight and it caught me off guard to see you alone. I had all these things I wanted to say to you, about how beautiful you looked, but I panicked and said some really stupid stuff back there. And i’m sorry, for all of it.’

It was your turn to take a deep breath, and without thinking your fingers tightened around his own. The air was too tight, humming between your bodies, between your joined hands.

‘Ask me now then.’ You dared.

He was silent for long enough that you dared to look up and meet his eyes. You were sure your expression was mirrored on his own: shock, longing, and then something like amusement.

He was smiling like a kid on Christmas at your offer, broad and unrestrained. ‘You want me to ask you to go to the party with me? Now? After I’ve just poured my heart out?’

‘If you don’t want to that fine.’ You teased, a small smile returning to your face. ‘What was it you said about every guy at camp?’

Luke let out a laugh and took a step closer, ‘I don’t care about the party. Go on a date with me. Tomorrow, today, hell let’s go now. I don’t care. Just go out with me. I’m not waiting another two years for this chance.’

‘Of course I’ll go out with you Castellan.’ You replied softly. You didn’t even have to think about your answer, you’d been preparing it for months.

‘Really?’

‘Yes really.’ You laughed and gave his hand a gentle squeeze.

With a sudden burst of confidence, Luke leaned down to brush his mouth against your blushing cheek. You thought you might burst then and there as he pulled you into his chest to whisper in your ear, ‘you look beautiful. You are beautiful. Always. Even covered in sweat during sparring practice, or windswept from the chariot races. I can never look away from you.’

He was blushing too when he pulled away, leaving you staring up at him, breathless again. His smile was nervous as he said, ‘I want to do this properly, I’ll plan something great I promise. But for now, I would be honoured if you’d come back to the party with me, as my date.’

You quirked an eyebrow. ‘Will you dance with me?’

‘Of course I’ll dance with you,’ Luke said, wrapping an arm around your waist, ‘I plan to show you off in fact. I’m pretty sure I’ve just achieved the impossible as far as the guys here are aware. I reserve bragging rights.’

[perseephoneee]

winter ball [ficmas day 14] [kol mikaelson x f!reader] cinderella au

↳ masterlist ↳ ship exchange ↳ taglist ↳ ficmas 2024

author's note: this is less wintery than i intended (whoops) but also this might be one of my favorite things I've ever written!!! i'm literally so hyped for it!!! p.s. thanks to charmed for all the spells lol

playlist:

once upon a dream -- lana del rey

that's so true -- gracie abrams

just like christmas -- low

The floor was ashy again. 

Your sisters were horrendous with maintaining the fireplace, and always left the place filthy. Of course, it fell on you to clean up. You always had the clean up. 

You were cleaning the apothecary, brushing up all the scattered herbs and dead things that your stepsisters would drag in under the guise of 'magic.' They had no magic of their own, you knew that. Your stepmother always indulged them, always. 

They never stayed long at work, though, always finding an excuse to go somewhere else. So it was just you in the shop. 

The bells rang above your door. 

You looked up to see Prince Kol walking into your store. You straighten up immediately, dipping into a curtsy. He waved you off. 

"No pleasantries, it's pretentious, and I hate it," he drawled. He was the youngest of his three brothers, commonly known as the wily one. Also known as the devilishly handsome one. Not that you thought about it. 

"Apologies, Your Highness," you murmured, head still bowed. "Is there something I can help you with?"

"According to my network, you're the best apothecary in the kingdom," Kol shoved his hands in his pockets, rifling around until he found what he was looking for. He planted a flower on the table. "I want your help identifying this."

You picked up the flower, twirling it between your fingers. It seemed like one of the common valley flowers, but the energy of it felt off. You touched some of the petals. 

"I'd have to consult my books; I don't recognize it immediately," you hummed. 

"I need it identified sooner rather than later, and I'll pay handsomely," Kol grinned. You looked up at him. His eyes regarded you, cooly, taking into thought every detail. You felt shivers down your spine. 

"May I ask the purpose of this project?" you inquired. 

"Secrets, darling," Kol put a finger to his lips. "This is also confidential; don't mention it to anyone."

"To whom would I mention it?" you muttered. You bit the inside of your cheek to stop any more comments. He smiled gleefully. "I'll check in tomorrow."

You watched him leave the way he came, a flurry of energy here and then gone. You sat down at the desk in the back, twirling the flower stem. No one was in the shop to witness you, so you flicked your fingers and brought several books over to your table. They flipped open to the pages you needed. You were too lazy to stand up and peruse the shelf, especially after your morning. You stayed camped over your desk until your stepmother and sisters got back. They whisked through the door like a tornado. 

"We must make an appointment with the modiste to prepare," your stepmother, Ms. Laurel, said. She glanced around the store as if it personally offended her and as if it wasn't the thing that kept her finances. Your step sisters, Hana and Monet, were not much better. 

"I will have the best chance because of my lovely neck," Monet crooned. She acted like a swan. Hana nudged her over. 

"But I have the best ankles."

"He will not care if neither of you can carry a conversation," Ms. Laurel groaned, hand on her head. She finally noticed your presence. "You still need to dust."

You had, but she would never admit that. 

"What's at the modiste?" you asked, voice small. Ms. Laurel rolled her eyes. 

"Dresses, you dull girl," Ms. Laurel took a seat by the shelf, rubbing her temples. "Prince Elijah is seeking a wife before his coronation, and he's opening invitations to every eligible girl in the kingdom."

No wonder your step sisters were in a tizzy. Not that they'd have a chance. Hana could be mean, but mostly, the two of them were the product of their upbringing. Vapid and clueless to true suffering. You closed your books, hiding the flower under some papers. No, you wouldn't tell your stepmother about Kol's arrival. That was something you'd keep to yourself. 

"And before you ask, you are not attending. I'll need someone to manage the apothecary."

"Not that I wanted to go anyway," you grumbled. Her excuse was false; no one would have come to the apothecary if the crown prince had a ball. Both of you knew that. 

Ms. Laurel whisked out of the shop soon after with your sisters in tow. Some excuses are being made for their absence. Her name might've been on the lease, but it was not hers. It was yours. You waited until the last rings of the bell on the door could be heard before bothering to use magic again. Your books weren't giving you any information, so it was time to try a little trick.

Like an extension of yourself, you let your magic weave around the petals, dancing across as it sought its origin. Tastes and purposes came to your mind, and with perfect clarity, you knew the flower for what it was. You dropped it hurriedly on the table, alarmed. At least you weren't a fool and didn't ingest the flower. You'd probably be dead already. 

You were a little annoyed at the prince for just leaving it with you. 

Like clockwork, he came in again tomorrow. He was once again dressed very casually for a man of his status. He wore the same flirting grin. 

"Have you discovered its origins yet?" he asked, hands clasped behind his back. You leveled a glare at him. 

"Capriforacacus," you raised a brow. "Commonly known as the 'devil's eye,' it's a type of extremely poisonous huckleberry. It's the only one that happens to flower."

"Ah, so you are as good as they say," he purrs. The low timbre of his voice sends shivers up your spine. "Little witchling."

You bristle at the name. "I'm no witch."

"Only magic can truly identify devil's eye," Kol tsked. "That borne of magic can only be found the same ways."

"You tricked me."

"I tested you," Kol shrugged. "I'm so happy I did. You are a sight when you are angry."

Despite him being a pain in your ass, there was nothing malicious about the youngest prince. He was a trickster and annoying, but he looked at you in wonder and intrigue. This was only a witchhunt in the sense that he needed a witch. He had no intention of hurting you. It didn't do much to take away the sour taste on your tongue. 

He leaned as elbows against your table, leaning in close to you. If it were polite, you would've pushed your seat back. As it was, you didn't want to show any vulnerability. Kol grinned. 

"Now that I know I can trust you," Kol smirked. "I do have a real task for you."

"Identifying poisons?"

"Unsure," he said. He pulled out a bunch of random things from his breeches pockets. A coin from the Gulf Coast, a bird's femur, dried plants, and more. It looked like a bad collection of oddities. "This is a secret, darling, so don't utter it to anyone."

You had no one to tell, even if you wanted. 

"I shall be made Spymaster when my brother, 'Lijah, becomes king. I'm adept at sneaking around, and I have no desire to rule. Elijah, despite boring me, knows that. I've already started into my role even though coronation is not for a while."

You had the sense that Kol made a very good spy. He was charming and mischievous and didn't seem to initially come off as threatening. You got the feeling he was actually one of the most dangerous. 

"I have reason to believe that someone is making an attempt on my brother's life," Kol said delicately. Your breath caught in your throat. "We've had various dignitaries coming to stay for the ball at the end of the month, and I've been finding various totems such as these throughout the castle. I've run with enough witches in my day to sense a hex."

He wasn't wrong. Much of what was on the table were various elements in spellwork. Not necessarily evil, but it ws safer to imagine it was for nefarious reasons. You picked up one of the bird bones and grimaced. There was no 'light' spell that utilized animal bones. 

"What are you hoping I will do?" you asked, looking up at him. His dark eyes regarded you cooly. 

"Figure out the spell, figure out the caster," he grinned, the light making his teeth look as sharp as fangs. "I'll be visiting periodically to help, of course. Monitor your progress."

"Make sure I'm not spilling your secrets to the highest bidder," you answered. He quirked a brow, confirming your answer. 

"You will be paid handsomely for your task."

"I'd hope so," you answered without thinking. Curse your stupid tongue. It only spurred him on further. 

"Aren't you a firecracker? I look forward to our next meeting," Kol bowed to you, heading back out of the store. He paused at the threshold, turning to look at you. The sun from the outside gave his hair a warm glow, and he looked every part of the ruggedly handsome prince. "Till later, witchling."

You seethed at the nickname. 

~

When you weren't doing chores for Ms. Laurel, you were researching the various objects. 

The only benefit of your 'room' was that it was on the lowest form of your modest townhome. It was essentially a closet, but far away from prying eyes that allowed you to practice your magic freely. Your body grew hot and itchy when you couldn't cast, and you reveled in the times by yourself when you would conjure the elements. It served even more use now as you utilized your magic to further your research. You weren't closer to an answer, although you were eliminating options. That much was good. 

Your room was next to the kitchen, and occasionally, you had to hide what you were doing from your stepmother, who would come to berate you, and Monet, who would come to steal food. Sometimes, she asked how you were. You weren't sure if she fully meant it. 

You didn't get to see Kol until a week later. 

You had had minimal interactions with the prince, but you found that you missed his energy. You were often a footnote, nothing of importance. Your father was once a respected healer, your mother a hidden witch, and the apothecary renowned for its medicine. Witchcraft was by no means illegal, but it wasn't welcome. Your mother always managed to disguise her healing as something else, even if it was a miracle. You wished you had the same grace she did. 

Your father would've been able to help you with your research, especially before he started to lose his memory before he remarried a woman just so he wouldn't lose the shop. It's times like these you miss him the most. 

It was late afternoon when Kol arrived. He came bearing gifts. You perked up as he took out a bottle of wine and a fresh loaf of bread. 

"I thought it would be nice to have nourishment while studying."

"I think you're spoiling me," you said, mouth salivating from the scents. You hadn't had anything fresh like that loaf in a while, and the wine was way above what you could afford. Kol poured you a glass, and you took a delicate sip. It was full-bodied in a way that made your bones settle into themselves. "Thank you."

"Anything for a pretty witch," Kol winked. You wonder if he flirted with everybody. Part of you hoped it was special only to you. "What progress have you made?"

You spent hours at the shop with Kol, flipping the door sign to 'closed' to offer you some privacy. Kol was your initial assessment and so much more. He was ridiculously intelligent and very curious about the magical world. He was also a little reckless and definitely lived life hanging precariously over the edge. You wondered if he ever worried about falling. 

You conjured a little apparition of a rabbit to quell his curiosity. 

"Elijah plans to welcome magic users onto his court," Kol said, his eyes still full of wonder from the rabbit bouncing around the room. You perked up. 

"He does?"

"He feels that the stigma has gone on too long, that it's time we utilized and appreciated the gifts of witches and warlocks."

You wondered how that would go over with the general public. Kol must've seen the hesitation in your face. 

"Darling," Kol breathed. "Don't be ashamed of your talents and what talents they are." He grinned. You felt yourself grow lighter under his gaze. 

"You're not bad," you whispered, the setting sun casting the shop in tones of pink and orange.

"Did you think I was?"

"I didn't know what to think," you answered honestly. "Most people describe you as dangerous."

"Who says I'm not?"

"You're nice to me," you looked at the bread crumbs from your meal. "That isn't very dangerous."

"Ah, but I did get you wine drunk," Kol grinned, nodding towards your empty glass. He wasn't wrong; your head felt full of fluff. "So, maybe I am as dangerous as they say."

"Are you trying to make me scared of you?" you inquired.

"Is it working?" He leaned forward on the table, almost nose to nose with you. He had thick lashes that you were jealous of. 

"No," you responded. You were being truthful in your statement. He knew it, too. He looked into your eyes as if searching for more truths about you. You didn't know how to offer anything else to him. 

He came over a few more times leading up to the ball, but you were no closer to solving your mystery. One night, you figured out the exact ingredients for the spell. It would bring its target into a deep sleep. Not death, but merely a coma. It still wasn't good, though. 

"Could it be one of the female dignitaries?" you asked. "Securing an engagement so that if Prince Elijah goes into this sleep, she will have the opportunity to rule without the threat of murder?"

"Then she can con him with a fertility spell," Kol mused, tracing the rim of his wine glass with his finger. "Why a sleep spell?"

You weren't closer to figuring out who cast it. 

You did enjoy your time with Kol, though. How could you not? He supplied you with wine and food and laughter, things you rarely got yourself. Camped out in the shop at night, it was your own little world. One where he wasn't the prince, and you weren't a witch. You just were. Sometimes, you caught him looking at you, and your skin would grow hot. You dreamed once of stolen kisses and lingering touches, and the next day, when you saw him, you could barely make eye contact. You were getting into territories you could never come back from. What would happen when your mission was over?

That sadness overcame you the night of the ball. Kol had promised to pay you for your services the day afterward, but then you knew you'd never see him again. Your heart hurts because of it. 

You were sipping tea in the greeting room when your sisters whisked down in their gowns. 

"You both look lovely," you said, giving them a small smile. Monet smiled back, but Hana ignored you, checking her reflection in a mirror. 

"Of course they do; they're gorgeous," Ms. Laurel said as she came down the stairs after them. She was also dressed up, almost as flashy as them. You'd think she was also out to secure an engagement. She pointed a gloved finger at you. "We will be back by midnight. I expect you to have our rooms ready and baths drawn by then."

"Yes, mother."

"Good, we best get going. We're securing our futures!" she cheered, ushering her girls out the door. You watched them with a pang of envy. You didn't care about marrying Elijah, but you'd be a liar to say you didn't enjoy pretty things. You would've liked to wear a pretty dress and see Kol. Maybe he wouldn't have pretended you were a secret. 

You made yourself some dinner with whatever you had stored in your icebox before settling down at the table with all your books again. Something was tugging at your memory, but you couldn't think about what it was. Suddenly, it clicked. You rushed to grab all the spell elements. 

The lesson learned was that maybe you shouldn't always be wine-drunk while trying to find a potential killer. You would need magic for this secret. You whispered the words in the air, imagining each item being a tangled thread. You subtly unpicked all of them, untying the knots and moving them to the side until they formed a bigger picture. When you got to the last one, you gasped. You were an idiot to not see it before. 

If it was true, though, then the spell would be happening tonight, and everyone could see it. You needed to get to the ball. But with what? Even if you could get there, the guards would not let a simple girl like you in. You rushed towards your mother's grimoire. 

You hid it under your bed so your stepsisters couldn't ruin it or Ms. Laurel couldn't burn it. You flipped to the section about disguise spells. You thanked your mother as you found what you were looking for. 

You grabbed the necessary ingredients and laid them out in a salt circle, standing in the middle. You held some loose salt in your hand and sprinkled it over you as you recited the words:

Who you were

You're now another

Take this dress

Make it something other

Your simple clothes were reimagined into a glimmering gown. Your sleeves were gossamer incarnate, the bodice tight before flowing out into the skirt in tiers of satin and chiffon. It made you look delicate and ethereal. It was perfect. 

It came with matching sparkling slippers. They were annoyingly comfortable. 

While you solved your problem of an outfit (and hair, your mother really thought of everything), you still needed a ride. An idea came to you. You conjured a water horse, one of the spirits from the fifth element, and using another of your mother's spells made it corporeal. It was a beautiful white steed, happy to take you where you needed. It would return to its place in the spirit realm by the end of the night. 

All the magic you used made your blood sing and your vision sharper. You raced towards the castle, the wind whipping your hair in a way that made you laugh. You couldn't help it. You felt so free. You ended up at the castle in record time, and even though you were late, no one seemed to care. Everyone was invited, after all. 

You caught a few glances as you raced through the front entrance, searching for the ballroom. You came onto a large staircase in the middle of a dance. Your eyes searched the crowd for Kol, but you couldn't find him, so you started making your way down. You ignored the many eyes looking at you. 

You almost crashed into Kol at the bottom of the stairs. Where he had come from, you had no idea. 

He was dressed like a prince tonight, not like the hellion he normally was. Your breath was taken from you as you regarded him with new eyes. He was always this handsome (you knew that), but in this look, everyone could see it too. 

"Hi, witchling," Kol smiled. His eyes couldn't stop looking at you. "Care to join me?"

He offered you his hand. You heard some people start whispering to each other. You were a strange girl being asked to dance by one of the princes; you suppose it warranted some fascination. Your words were failing you, so you nodded and let him whisk you to the dance floor. He pulled you into a simple waltz. 

"Kol–"

"I resent you for coming tonight," he whispered to you. You looked at him in confusion. "You make it very hard to move on from you."

"Move on?"

"You have bewitched me, darling," he murmurs. "In body and soul."

"Kol," you breathe. You wanted to ask him why you, of all people, have caught his attention; you want to grab him by his lapels and kiss him. You want to run away with him forever. But you remember why you came, not to kiss a prince, but to save one. "Kol, I know who's behind the spell."

He froze at that, his expression becoming guarded again. You whispered into his ear, and he blanched. 

"We need to get you out of here. Now," he cursed, looking around the ballroom. 

"What? Why?"

"He knows I've been looking into it. And you're a witch," Kol said simply. "He'll pin the whole thing on you."

"Kol–" you started but were cut off by shouts of the royal guard. Kol wasn't lying. They were going to use you as a scapegoat. Kol pushed you in the direction of the exit, trying to buy you time. You ran as fast as you could in your heels, picking up your skirts so you didn't trip and tumble on the ground. People were pushed out of the way by the guards, some crying out from the intrusion. You didn't stop, though; you ran towards the entrance. 

Your feet betrayed you. You tripped on the stairs, one of your slippers falling off. You ignored it, continuing down. Several guards came out at the bottom, trapping you. You breathed heavily as you realized this was the end of the road. 

"Arrest her for conspiracy against the crown," the chilling voice of Prince Klaus, the middle brother, crooned. He came down the steps without a care in the world. His eyes were cold and distant. 

"Don't arrest her!" Kol yelled, running up behind his brother. He grabbed your shoe on the way down, almost brandishing it as a weapon as he skidded to a stop. "She's innocent. This is a ploy."

"My dear brother, so desperate for attention," Klaus drawled. "Using this poor girl as an instrument to get the crown. I suppose we'll have to arrest him too."

Kol bristled, and you could do nothing as two guards grabbed him and started to pull him away. Klaus smiled gleefully, no kindness for his brother. You felt the guards attempt to grab your arms, but you wrestled out of them, magic surging through you, providing strength. Your mind went on autopilot, the spells coming easily as you held off the guards with one hand and pointed an accusing finger at Prince Klaus. 

"For those who want the truth revealed

Open hearts and secrets unsealed

From now on, until it's now again

After which, the memory ends.

Those who are now in this place

Will hear the truths in time and space."

Klaus stumbled back, the force of your spell knocking him off his feet. You let the guards go, and the force of your suddenly removing your shield caused them to fall on the steps. You took a step towards Klaus. 

"Prince Klaus conspired to hurt Crown Prince Elijah in an effort to secure the crown for himself," you announced to the crowd. You don't remember the last time you were this brave. "He utilized witchcraft from one of the visiting nations in order to put Prince Elijah in a deep sleep. As the second eldest brother, the crown would fall to him."

The crowd gasped as Klaus' cheeks grew red, his glare focused on you. 

"But Prince Elijah is his brother; he could never kill him. This was the better option. He planned to put it on one of the visiting dignitaries to act as the dutiful brother taking over a post he didn't ask for. Prince Kol started noticing the threats and started investigating, and Prince Klaus knew he needed to pivot. So, he decided to use Prince Kol and me as scapegoats. Positioning the reckless prince and the witch as the enemies."

You took another step towards Klaus, brow raised. 

"Isn't that right, Klaus?" you murmured. 

"That is all true," Klaus said, eyes widening as he slapped a hand over his mouth. You grinned. Your truth spell would make it so he couldn't lie. 

“Niklaus, it’s true?”

Everyone turned to see Prince Elijah, face distraught. He had come out at the end of the confession. You watched Klaus struggle to stop the words from coming out. 

"It's not fair that you get to be King," Klaus seethed. You thought you imagined someone fainting. Elijah looked sad, and you felt for him. You didn't want to imagine what it would feel like to have your sibling do something like that to you. 

"Please release my brother, Kol," Elijah sighed. "And put Prince Klaus in the dungeons for sentencing. Everyone, please go back inside and enjoy the party while the night is young."

The guards took Klaus inside, the rest rounding up the rest of the guests to give Elijah some time to process. You tried to sneak back inside, but Elijah held up a hand, stopping you. 

"You helped my brother discover the spell, correct?" Elijah asked. He was much calmer than Klaus and Kol, much more methodical. You thought its why he would make a better King. 

"Yes, Your Highness," you bowed. Elijah stepped closer to you, taking your hand and kissing its back. Your cheeks flushed. 

"Thank you for saving me."

"It-It was mostly Prince Kol, Your Highness," you stumbled. "He came to me for help."

"Do not sell yourself short, miss–?" Elijah paused, tilting his head to regard you. You recognized the head tilt as something Kol did as well. 

"Y/N, Your Highness."

"Please, call me Elijah," he smiled. He turned towards Kol, who was standing to the side, attempting nonchalance. The desperate look in his eyes betrayed him. Elijah left your side to walk over to Kol's. He offered him his hand. 

"Thank you, for protecting me and your family," Elijah smiled. Kol's expression made your heart break. "You are a better Mikaelson than any of us will ever be."

Kol shook his hand, but Elijah pulled him into a hug. He released him just as quickly. He glanced between you and Kol and smiled knowingly. He whispered something to Kol, which caused him to blush. You had never seen the younger prince embarrassed, but you were lying if you said you didn't enjoy it. 

"You are welcome at the palace anytime, miss Y/N," Elijah bowed to you. "I expect to see you soon."

He left you outside with Kol. You shuffled on the steps, your bare foot cold against the marble. Kol noticed and held up your shoe. 

"May I?" he asked. You nodded, your voice caught in your throat. He kneeled before you, gently lifting up your ankle and putting the shoe back on. His touch was somehow both cold and hot, the skin on his hands rough from use. The image of him kneeling before you was enough to send your heart tumbling. He stood up, giving you a grin. 

"You saved my family."

"You say 'save' as if I singlehandedly figured this out," you said. "It was you as well."

"I provided wine," he laughed. "You provided the knowledge."

"At least Prince Klaus didn't intend to kill your brother," you shrugged. "Although, I know that doesn't truly offer any consolation."

"It doesn't," Kol agreed. "But it'll be okay. Because of you."

"You both are putting a lot of pressure on me."

"I can't help it," Kol shrugged. He took your hands in his, brushing his fingers over your knuckles. "You're a vision."

"You don't have to talk to me now that the job is done," you breathed, looking down at your hands. Your heart clenched in preparation for rejection. 

"What makes you think you aren't stuck with me?" Kol smirked. "I've spent years looking for someone like you."

"A witch?"

"A princess."

He looked at you with a molten intensity that set your insides to ash. You wondered if you were on fire with how hot he made you. You opened and closed your mouth, unable to respond. Kol lifted your hand to his lips, kissing every single finger with a determination that made you melt. 

"You can't be… I'm nobody," you stuttered, but Kol grinned, holding his hands to his chest. 

"I started to fall in love with you from the first day," Kol answered smoothly. "My brother all but begged me to propose to you. You are not a nobody to me."

“But…I…”

"Most marriages have been built on less," Kol cupped your cheek, his thumb brushing over your skin. "Gods know I would've been betrothed to some boring noble woman."

"I…" you had no words. You couldn't say you loved him yet, but you knew you were dangerously close to it. All those hours and days spent together, every conversation and stolen laughter. You felt genuine terror when they started dragging him away. You knew that by saying yes, you were all but solidifying your heart as his forever. You found you weren't afraid of it. You found it made you feel free. "...Yes."

"Yes?"

"Yes, I'll marry you," you breathed. "Kol–"

He cut you off with a kiss like he had been a starving man and you were an oasis. You had never been kissed before; your only expectations were those from the gossip you heard around the market. This was infinitely better than all of those. One hand cupped your cheek while the other gripped your waist, pulling you closer to him. You wrapped your arms around his neck, sighing. He took that opportunity to deepen the kiss. You felt like you could kiss him forever. 

He pulled away to your mild protest. "You are a vision in this dress. If I were a worse man, I'd take it off of you."

"Kol," you protested, giving him a warning glare. He just chuckled, kissing you again. 

"I'm all yours, darling. All yours."

taglist: @mayfieldss @rafecameronswhore @evasmlp @thefutureastronaut

[formosusiniquis]

Saw this today and new it had to be about Robin somehow

She always knew it was only meant to be a temporary solution to the problem.

They had cut Jason’s hours at work, they weren’t bringing in as much money, and after years of trying the Christian way they were learning how expensive IVF could be. The library hiring a part-time children’s librarian had seemed like a godsend. Sure, Jason hadn’t been happy about her getting a job. Getting her first job since they’d been married straight out of high school and her parents hadn’t wanted her working either.

She’s 36 but Chrissy feels like a child begging Jason to just let her work, to let her take this strain off of him. She calls it practice. It’s part-time, she’ll barely be out of the house, still plenty of time to keep up with the housework and have dinner ready. And they’ll be able to sleep easier, won’t have to tighten their belts so much, just because she’s reading stories to kids.

They don’t want to hire her at first, she can tell. The smiles on the faces of the women in front of her are plasticine and fake, she doesn’t have the experience and even if the job doesn’t need much of it there’s something suspicious about that. But her request to finish the interview with a tour is rewarded. Her soft, blue dress and her hair tied back in a ribbon, it takes three minutes before the first kid runs up to ask if she’s Cinderella.

She’s asking for barely more than minimum wage, they offer her the job on the way back to the front. She’ll start on Monday.

“That’s smart,” the woman at the back desk says. Her nameplate says Robin and her hair is so short Chrissy wonders if she goes to the barber instead of the salon.

“What is?”

“Letting the kids do the heavy lifting, that sounds sarcastic but I mean it. Laurel doesn’t have the sense to run this place and Diana is so miserable she spends most of her days wishing we’d all die inside of it.”

“Oh!”

Something firey and bright lights up in Robin’s eyes at the noise Chrissy makes. Something that makes her stomach swoop and squirm and her own eyes drop down to a smug grin, slashed red. Jason would say she should feel guilty, that deception was a sin. But Robin looks proud that Chrissy manipulated her way into a job she’d never done.

“Don’t worry, princess, you’ll get used to the drama if you stick around. You’ll be working with Steve, who actually runs Kids not that the terrible two would let you know it. If you have any questions you can go to reference.”

“Right, of course.” Chrissy does her best to smile, but she knows it doesn’t land. She isn’t sure what it is about Robin that makes her body flutter and clench like she’s in the locker room after cheer practice, but much like high school, she knows she’s about to go home upset and frustrated despite a good day.

Only maybe not, Robin is smiling still but not so smugly. “I’m reference. You can ask me, because I’m reference.”

She knows it’s temporary, so she tries not to like Steve. Tries to convince herself that it’s strange that a man would want to work so closely with kids because that’s the kind of thing Jason would tell her to think. But Steve is amazing, he has an effortless way with the kids that keeps their jobs busy. He lets her jump straight into storytime with the littles, with the promise that she’s doing him a favor so he can actually get things ready for the teens for once.

And she’s learning Robin and Steve are a package deal. She really wants to spend time with Robin.

Robin brings her coffee every morning.

Robin notices when she’s changed her hair.

Robin uses her 15-minute break to help with the toddler ballet class that Chrissy started.

Robin recommends books she should read and prints articles she thinks Chrissy would enjoy.

Robin makes sure their lunches sync up so they can talk about what their thinking.

Robin changed the tire on her car when she noticed it was flat in the library parking lot.

Steve jokes that she’s stealing his work wife and the first time he said that it scared her. That she might be a threat to their marriage. Jason didn’t like it when she hung out with her friends too much, that her time wasn’t his. But she’s met his boyfriend now and more importantly she’s heard Robin correct him.

“Steve is my work wife. I’m a work husband and since Eddie shares like a feral cat, I can be yours if you want, princess.”

She does want. She wants a lot of things. And it’s been a long time since she was the captain of the cheer squad but Chrissy hasn’t forgotten how to get the things that she wants when she wants them.

She wants to touch. And Robin’s hands linger as she passes Chrissy books and drinks or simply passes by her in the stacks.

She wants to talk. And Robin’s time at the reference desk shrinks and she finds more and more reasons to spend her shifts back in kids.

She wants time. And Chrissy finds reasons to extend her day at the library by hours and hours until Robin is inviting her out when the doors are locked.

She wants to taste. And Robin does what any good husband should. The nonfiction stacks bite into her back, but Chrissy doesn’t mind when it’s Robin pressing against her front. Kissing her breathless in the 800’s section, Romeo and Juliet in her hand.

It was only meant to be temporary. But the longer she’s out of the house, the longer she’s with Robin, the more she wonders if she needs to change what she has been thinking of as permanent.

[sualocin]

"I wasn't lying when I said that I loved you." Ch. 2 - Untold Feelings

Emp!Commodus x reader

summary: commodus needs to know what was said earlier, so he goes to the one person who would willingly tell him.

content warning: angst, hurt / comfort, commodus being angry and intimidating

word count: 2.6k

a/n: i have too much time in my hands so i legit just wrote away because i could. Your name finally gets used this chapter ahhh! also forgive me for i have been going back and forth for years editing this chapter so ignore plot holes lmao

no beta reader we die like [insert reference here]

blog dividers by @cafekitsune!

masterlist . . . read it on ao3 . . .

Watching you leave in such a hurry with confusion, Commodus returned to cooling down and re-dressing. After he was fully dressed in his clean white tunic, he strapped on his dark brown leather armor with his matching white cape above it. He also sheathed his personal sword and his spare dagger that hides in his leather greaves. Finally, he places his crown of laurels back atop his head, the bronze leaves shining in the light of the sun. Standing in the courtyard, he steeled himself for whatever supposed royal annoyances were going to come his way soon now that he was done. Surprisingly, not one skittish scribe nor irritating member of senate rushed towards him as he made his way inside, they all avoided him and his gaze. Maybe it was the fierce glare he had plastered on his face from possibly letting a few hits get through his block, or maybe it was the conversation between you and Lucilla that he couldn’t quite make out that was bothering him. After all, at least from the corner of his view, you appeared to be concentrated on him, and only him, for the longest while. Until Lucilla showed up and stole your attention that is. He didn’t even register it within his mind that part of his attention was derived towards you and not towards the fight he was in. He reasoned that maybe today was just going to be one of those days, but the lack of people scampering toward him with arms full of scrolls indicated that it was in fact not one of those days. 

Commodus walked by the open doors to his sister’s chambers, hands folded behind his back., and caught sight of Lucilla conversing with Lucius. Desiring to ask her about what was said in that unheard conversation that took place just a short time ago, he slowly waltzed into the room with his jaw set and eyes focused. He wanted to know everything.

“-on’t want to be married?” was the first thing Commodus heard coming from his nephew’s mouth. As he approached the back of Lucilla’s chair, Lucius immediately shot up to greet his uncle. 

“D-” Lucilla started to say, but was interrupted by Lucius’ sudden movement and Commodus, who had placed his left hand on her right shoulder.

“It is a duty that must be done my dearest nephew, whether you want it or not, whether you are in love or not,” Lucilla glanced up towards her brother at his words, who glanced down at her in return as he took a breath.

“As the Emperor of Rome, it is my responsibility to marry and produce heirs so that our family’s bloodline can continue to reign,” Commodus said, looking straight at Lucius when he finished. Lucius just nodded his head at his uncle's words and ran over to give him a hug. Commodus accepted the hug with open arms, kneeling down to be closer to Lucius’ height. Even though his own father neglected to hug or praise him, Commodus was not going to let the same mistake happen to his nephew. No, he would at least make sure the boy grew up knowing he was loved and cherished always.

“But didn’t mother love father? Wasn’t their marriage arranged?” Lucius mumbles  quietly into Commodus’ leather chest plate. Commodus, not knowing how to reply to his nephew, just holds him closer and tighter for a second more before releasing him. Lucilla is the first to speak up after that.

“I did grow to love your father over time, even though it was arranged,” She says, eyes taking on a distant gaze as she thinks back to the past and everything she went through during those formative years. Lucius, caring deeply for his mother, moves to be by her side in order to comfort her with a hand on her leg and his head resting on her shoulder.

“Thank you my sweet Lucius,” She says as she runs her fingers through his long blonde hair and kisses the crown of his forehead softly.

“Now run along, I’m sure your uncle wanted to speak to me about something,” Lucilla pats his back and sends him on his merry way, most likely he was going to cause trouble among his tutors if anything. She then gets up from her chair and turns to face Commodus, seeing his jaw set back into that oh so familiar ‘Tell me all you know’ look.

“What is so important that you just had to disturb my time with Lucius? I was telling him about our family,” She almost scolds Commodus, eyes searching his face to try and find what this is all about. She finds nothing telling. Perhaps her ability to read through his mask is fading.

“What were you talking to Y/N about?” There is a slight desperation in Commodus’ voice, a clear telling that whatever was discussed between them had a tight hold on his mind.

It took Lucilla a couple seconds to respond, as she was deciding how she should go about this line of questioning. Commodus in the meanwhile was growing steadily more anxious while she collected her thoughts, his hands moving to twist and turn his rings.

“Why are you asking?” Is the only thing Lucilla could say at first. She herself did not know if he had overheard anything, and was concerned at his need to know about what you most likely considered a private conversation. 

Commodus took an immediate dislike to the tone he had perceived in his sister’s voice. Stepping closer into her personal space in an effort to almost intimidate her, he gazed down and furrowed his brows.

“Is that a tone of disrespect I hear dearest sister? Do you need me as the Emperor to command you to tell me? Or will you spill to your brother willingly?” He remarked, anxiety slipping from his form and rage replacing it as he was denied what he asked for so far. 

Unsettled with his fast change in being, Lucilla did what she does best. Calming her brother and spinning a story that will appease him. Taking a deep breath, she began her slightly modified, slightly true retelling of what happened.

“I noticed she was observing your little sparring session, and went over to engage her in conversation,” She said, eyes drilling into Commodus’, wanting him to fully understand her every word.

“She confessed to me that she is worried that you dislike her,” Commodus huffed at the words, unknowing that what she said so far is true (even if it is a tad bit under-exaggerated).  

“And she also confided in me that she is falling for you,” It was at these words that Commodus’ lips pulled back into a sneer.

“Do not lie to me sister,” He growled out, refusing to believe that you would say that after everything he has done to alienate and distance himself from you. Lucilla simply laughed before she continued on.

“I do not lie about this dear brother!” She exclaims before gazing upon Commodus with slanted eyes.

“If only you had seen the way she gazed upon your being. She looked at you as if you were a God,” She said, pausing to let him hear her words fully, hoping and praying to get him to understand that you aren’t so bad. That you aren’t so untrustworthy. That you look at him in a different light than he thinks.

“She is more caring and interested in you then she lets on,” Lucilla finished, inhaling sharply when Commodus’ eyes narrowed at her. Hopefully he had believed her, as what she said was in no part a whole lie, but simply based on observations she made.

Hearing the confession that you do indeed care for him had thrown him off guard. No one in his life had cared for him fully. Certainly not his father, who sought only to scold him, lecture him, and ignore him. Nor his sister, who was married off at a young age and had focused on other more important (to her) things. His mother, even though she had died when he was young, seemed somehow even less loving than his father, more placated to hand him off to various servants and tutors, than have anything to do with him. Truly, no one in his life had desired to care for him. Until you did. 

It was Lucilla’s words that hung around screaming in his skull. Commodus’ face fell as the realization finally hit him. His mind reeling at the notion that someone else cares about him. Him! The child no one had desired and left loveless. It was overwhelming almost to know your feelings of him, yet he had characteristically driven you away with his actions. He’d rather distance himself before the hurt could ever come. Feeling his eyes mist over, he sharply turned and started to walk out of the room. Only to be stopped by Lucilla’s voice.

“If you also truly care about her feelings, why do you push her away? I can see the affection for her in your eyes brother. Even if you try to hide it.”

Commodus took in a shuddering breath, forcing himself to remain composed. His fists clenched and unclenched in the process of willing the tears to go away. 

“I do not deserve someone like her,” Is all he said before he continued on.

Lucilla’s mouth dropped open in shock. To hear such words come from her own brother’s mouth? Unthinkable. No, impossible. He would never admit to a thought like that out loud. Not even in her presence. Closing her mouth, Lucilla thanked the Gods that you had not come when she asked, for now she had gotten to gather such amazing information to share with you.

Even though Lucilla asked you to come by after you were finished up in the courtyard, your embarrassed state chained you to your chambers. It was the fear of making a fool of yourself in front of everyone, which would have been even more embarrassing than earlier, that confined you from leaving for dinner. Gods, you don’t think you could even look at Commodus now without seeing him tunic-less, sweaty, and radiating like a god. If you had to sit near him at dinner? You’d simply spontaneously combust, which you personally did not enjoy the thought of doing. Even now, trying to not think about how divine Commodus looked earlier was failing. Your cheeks felt like they were on fire from thinking about it so often. At least you weren’t bothered while you passed the time by being lost in your thoughts. 

The moon was shining its light through the open windows when you had enough of sitting around thinking. Finally you had begun to shuffle out to go talk with Lucilla, greeting the soldiers standing guard outside your door as you did. (You were the betrothed of the Emperor after all, why shouldn't you have guards outside your door?) 

The halls were empty at this time of night, thank the Gods, since most people would be in their own rooms winding down from the day. The journey to her chambers was silent for the most part, just the sounds of your sandals on the polished floor and the occasional muted sounds behind closed doors. Stopping in front of the doors to her chambers, you nodded towards the guards, who in return, opened up a door for you.

In Lucilla’s chambers, moonlight was stretched across the floor below the windows and balcony. Dancing flames were doing their best to light up the rest of the room, only dimming slightly when a gentle breeze swept its way through the room. The coolness of the breeze caused you to pull your jade (picked out by Lucius this time, as it was his favorite color at the moment) palla closer around your shoulders to conserve some of your warmth. Lucilla, having heard the door open, turned around and greeted you with a gentle smile as you walked in. 

“Good evening Y/N, Lucius missed your presence at dinner,” She spoke softly, wanting you to know that your absence was noticed and that you had an eager future nephew to see tomorrow.

You gave her a small smile at her words, and walked toward her to give her a hug. Which she accepted readily, seeing as you were going to be considered sisters in a short time.

“Good evening Lucilla. I’ll tell Lucius I’m sorry the next time I see him, I just needed some time to myself is all,” You say still wrapped up in the hug.

Lucilla pulls back to have a good look at your face, eyes searching for something that she seemingly does not find. She closes her eyes and sighs, then motions for you to sit down somewhere. You sat in the chair closest to you, while Lucilla sat in one directly across from it. She seems to have something she needs to say, as she fidgets with the skirt of her beautiful turquoise stola. You exhale and then shut your eyes.

“You seem to have something to say to me, you have never fidgeted in front of me,”  You say, opening your eyes and observing her face as you finish.

She takes a deep breath before speaking, wanting to find the right words in her head for what she had learned from the conversation with Commodus earlier.

“Commodus came to speak with me after he was done. He wanted to know what we were speaking about,” Lucilla says slowly, hoping that you don’t immediately freak out. She thanks the Gods when you seem to still be calm. She didn’t know just how badly you were freaking out internally.

“Wha-? Why… Why did he want to know?” You question, not liking where this conversation is heading one bit. Out of habit, you begin to bounce your leg up and down to maintain your aura of calm. It doesn’t work at this point, you’re too anxious at what Lucilla has to say, but you can feel your heart racing. You feel like you could scream, but you will yourself to remain seated. You had to hear what she told him.

“I cannot honestly say why he did my dear, but I was at the very least truthful with him,” She confessed, eyes clenching shut at the memory of being almost threatened by her brother earlier. It is her admission that she was truthful that sends you spiraling. He knows now that you think he hates you. Maybe he celebrated at the revelation. Or maybe he thinks that you’re too sensitive. Your thoughts continue to circle down into a deep hole of worry and anxiety in the mere seconds it takes for Lucilla to breathe. She continues on, unaware of your declining thoughts.

“He seemed surprised that you would care for someone like him. So surprised in fact, that he sounded close to tears when he left. He even told me that he didn’t feel like he deserved someone like you,” She exposed that information like it was just some common knowledge. Her words didn’t hit you until midway through your own response.

“Lucilla! Why would you be truth-Oh… Oh Gods,” You stuttered, head falling into your hands and eyes getting misty. Your mind was racing to digest what she had just spoken to you. He knows you care for him now, she told him that. You caring for him, the great Emperor of Rome, brought him close to tears. And he felt like he didn’t deserve you? This has to be a lie, it has to be some funny made-up story. Whatever it is, it is not reality. 

heheheheh slight cliffhanger lmao

let me know if you want to be tagged on future chapters! and as always, thank you for reading :)

[eden-falls]

3 rings for the elven-kings

design notes below!

annatar (sauron)

• ok i know the eye motifs are over the top. i like them

• the shade of gold at his neck is the same as galadriel's headdress, as are his flowing white sleeves of the same material as her dress. weird freak who i HATE (get a job!)

• the only one not in direct profile; he looks towards the rings rather than the people who oppose him. i originally thought about having him looking out at us but i changed my mind because his one goal is power and that's in the rings, not in us measly humans

• ears resemble wings

celembrimbor

• silver jewellery rather than gold like the others. something something inferiority complex

• blue overcoat of his own design; orange tunic to represent annatar's influence

• tassels!!! i love tassels. thats all really. i am guilty of loving witch hat atelier (best manga ever)

• he also looks down at the rings rather than the others, but with a different kind of feeling than annatar's

galadriel

• pure white dress to signify her strength and purity in the face of evil (that never sways her bless up) as well as her birthplace

• her hand is poised as if she rests it on a sword hilt, but what need is there for one when presented with ultimate power?

gil-galad

• she looks past celembrimbor and the rings at annatar

• headdress a little inspired by ancient egyptian designs because im writing about hatshepsut for one of my university modules rn and like aside from the half brother marrying im kind of obsessed with her whole deal and i think her and gal would be friends. so.

• his crown is inspired by a laurel wreath. a lot of the time i see him depicted with some kind of crazy gravity defying be-not-afraid type of headdress and while aesthetically i am obsessed with the idea i have some personal qualms with the practicality of it. also i didn't want to draw something like that because im a lazy perfectionist which is a terrible terrible combination especially for an artist. so i just did a simple little crown

• dressed in all gold and rich patterns because. u know. king and stuff

• he too is entranced by the rings. boy look up for a second!! watch out!!!

elrond (side note: i know he's not an original ring bearer. however i like him)

• slightly different look from my third age elrond design but with the same colour scheme. theres more gold detailing on his tunic

• sorry ROP fans i don't like the short hair on him or brimby. short as i'll go with the elves is shoulder length (again refer to my third age elrond)

• i tried to make an arc with the ear shapes of the three on the right. it doesn't mean much i just think it's neat

• even here his clothing style is slightly different from the others' because he is one of those darn youths.

• i like to think he stays the same height though even if tolkien describes him as tall because tolkien describes all the elves and men as tall so he can still be like 5'10 and count as tall

final note: still havent read the silm; gathered knowledge from the internet. i don't think theres any insane errors. i know better than to trust rings of power with more than a base storyline (as much as i like it. no egregious ROP slander will happen here)

[sourcherryandsprinkles]

conrad thanksgiving fic please!!

This has been in my drafts for a long time...sorry. I might delete later, I don't really like it. It's not giving what I wanted it to...

Request: You’ve done Conrad dating a Haley James type of character, what about a Blair Waldorf type character? Old money, fiercely strong, rich, and outspoken. She and Belly would NOT get along, at all. He takes her to Thanksgiving dinner and Susannah is still there and she loves her

my taglists are here + you can send requests here at any time

—

Thanksgiving had always been a massive celebration in your family. Every year, your parents would go all out and host a dinner with their closest friends and their families. Your mother would direct the caterer team and make sure everything was perfect before the guests’ arrival. At the end the meal by having a slice of your father’s infamous pumpkin pie — which was your personal favorite part. 

This year, Thanksgiving was going to be different. Your father was in Paris for business and your mother somewhere in Europe, expanding her collection of vintage designer handbags. Had you not been in college, you would have happily joined her.

‘’Why don’t you come with me to Boston?’’ Conrad asked as you watched him pack a bag for the weekend.  ‘’My mom keeps asking me when she’ll get to meet you.’’ 

The thought of spending Thanksgiving alone had been looming over you, and Conrad's invitation was like a ray of light. 

A small smile tugged at the corners of your lips. ‘’You told your mother about me?’’

‘’Not really,’’ Conrad explained, picking another sweater and adding it into his bag. ‘’She heard your voice when she called the other day and Jeremiah told her all about you. He’s such a big mouth...’’ He shook his head, wishing his brother could hold his tongue sometimes. 

Susannah was ecstatic to have another guest for dinner. It was on very short notice and most of the preparations were already done when Conrad informed her of your addition to the table, but she would never pass up an opportunity to meet her Connie’s new girlfriend.  

When you and Conrad walked in, Susannah was all over you, complimenting your dress and how gorgeous you looked. You were quick to return her compliments, pointing out how her eyes looked exactly like Conrad's.

You met the other guests — Conrad’s father and brother, then Laurel and her kids —, and all were surprised by who Conrad had brought home. No one ever expected him to date someone born of old money. He’s dated Nicole, but she was nowhere as rich as your family. 

‘’Look at this amazing table,’’ Susannah said as she brought in the turkey, looking very proud of herself. ‘’Martha Stewart can kiss my ass!’’

Your eyes went wide for a short second, not expecting such words from her. She looked so sweet and delicate. 

Conrad shook his head at his mother, happy to see her being herself again. 

Everyone got seated, then Susannah spoke again. ‘’Before we eat, let’s go around the table and say one thing that we’re thankful for. Jere Bear, you can start.’’  

You lifted your eyes at Jeremiah across the table, who looked nothing like his brother. If you hadn’t known, you would never have guessed they were related. 

‘’I’m thankful for my mom,’’ the younger Fisher began, ‘’who reconsidered trying this new treatment for us. I don’t know what I would do without you, Mom.’’ He glanced at his mother, his eyes shiny with unshed tears. 

Susannah squeezed his hand over the table while everyone was trying to not get emotional. 

Conrad had told you about his mother’s breast cancer having come back in the spring. He tried to hide her sickness from you, but when you found him crying in his dorm on a Saturday afternoon, you knew something wasn’t okay. It was a tough subject for the entire family — especially since it was the second time she was going through this. For that, Susannah didn’t like to talk about cancer. She didn’t want her whole life to revolve around it just because a nasty tumor had returned in her body. She wanted to live her life the way it’s always been…and take a few more sitting breaks when needed.

In turn, the other guests said what they were thankful for. It went from Steven getting a car for his birthday to Belly becoming captain of her school’s volley-ball team and Laurel being a typical mom and being thankful for her children. 

‘’Connie, it’s your turn,’’ Susannah said, motioning to her eldest son.

Conrad nodded at his mom, then cleared his throat. ‘’Jeremiah took the words out of my mouth, so I’ll say something else I’m equally thankful for.’’ His lips tugged up into a little half smile and he reached over the table to take your hand in his. ‘’I’m thankful for meeting my amazing girlfriend, who came into my life at the most unexpected, yet perfect moment.’’ 

You smiled back at Conrad, giving his fingers a little squeeze. 

Seated before you, Belly snickered lightly. ‘’Can we eat now? Mom didn't want us to get snacks on the way here and I’m starving.’’ 

Laurel gave her daughter a pointed glare, wishing she would behave. 

Although the pumpkin pie didn’t come close to your father’s recipe, you made sure to tell Susannah it reminded you of home. 

‘’I hope your parents are not too sad that you came to Boston instead,’’ Susannah said, incapable of imagining spending Thanksgiving without her family — especially her boys. 

‘’Not at all, Mrs. Fisher,’’ you politely replied. ‘’My parents were both out of the country this Thanksgiving. Business related travel.’’

Susannah raised an eyebrow. ‘’Oh? What is it that they do?’’ 

You didn’t mean to brag, but she had asked. ‘’My mother is a fashion designer and my father is a lawyer at my grandfather’s firm.’’ 

You caught Belly rolling her eyes and muttering something. You didn’t care what she thought of you, you were the one who got to share Conrad’s bed at the end of the day. Ignoring her childish reactions, you continued talking to Susannah about your parents. She was very interested in your mother’s designs.

When dinner was officially over, you all vacated the table. Jeremiah and Steven went to the living room to set up a game for the five of you to play — another family tradition. You had never played cards against humanity before, but you’ll give it a try. 

Before you reached the living room, Conrad pulled you in a corner near the stairs, wanting some time alone with you. 

‘’Belly despises me,’’ you pointed to him, keeping your voice down so no one would hear.

Conrad rolled his eyes as he curled an arm around you, knowing how you had the tendency to exaggerate things. ‘’She does not. She’s just…having difficulty accepting that I moved on.’’

You made a face at him. ‘’Don’t you defend her. Have you seen all the sour looks she gave me during dinner? Your eyes might be the most beautiful shade of blue, my love, but I believe they are in need of a visual acuity test. You should schedule one when we get back to Palo Alto.’’ 

Conrad chuckled, amused by your theatrics. 

‘’Belly is going to be tougher to win with your charm. Like every ex-girlfriend, she’s gonna try to paint you as a mean girl, so you just have to show her that you’re the opposite. Compliment her. Tell her you like her sweater.’’

‘’But it looks itchy. It’s probably polyester.’’ 

The corner of Conrad’s lips turned into a smile.

—

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[tryandbehappy]

🎬 Storytelling Breakdown: Why tv Belly’s Love for Jere Feels Real

You know how much I love analyzing storytelling, and I wonder here - do the writers realize they actually wrote real love?

Let’s start with the context.

📖 In the books, Jeremiah is more of a life raft. He begs Belly to marry him, buys a ring in a desperate attempt to patch things up. Belly’s uncertain, constantly swaying between him and Conrad.

🎥 In the show, it’s the opposite. Belly is the one who desperately wants to be with Jere. She practically forces the proposal. She screams with joy when she gets engaged not doubting it a second. She constantly expresses how much she wants to be with him. She wants him all, sexually, emotionally, always. After 4 years of being inseparable with him. she’s glowing.

And with Conrad? Just glances. Slow-mo. Symbols. No physical or emotional expressions of love. Not even empathy, really.

Even with the wedding announcement—she didn’t think about him at all (and I think she should have if she loved him)

💥 Now that’s a move and it’s important:

At dinner, they weren’t planning to announce the wedding. Belly and Jere had agreed to tell Conrad beforehand. That would’ve been respectful. The right thing.

But when Adam insulted Jere, Belly jumped up like a tigress. Jere even tried to stop her (=it’s okay, don’t worry, I’m used to it, you don’t need to step up for me 🥹)

⚡ She stood up for her man and announced to everyone that they’re getting married.

It was like “You know what? Fuck all of you. He’s the best thing that’s ever happened to me and I love him. I’m choosing him, no matter what crap you say about him.”

That’s a choice. That’s love. At the cost of fighting with her mom. At the cost of not caring how Conrad would react. She didn’t hesitate. She said so fiercely I LOVE HIM HE’S MY FAMILY right in front of Conrad.

Because real love is about that overwhelming feeling. The kind that makes you act before you think.

This speaks louder than all the glances, the flashbacks, the Casablanca door symbols. It’s not symbolic love. It’s real action. With consequences.

In just this one episode, she shows love for Jere in every way:

• she supports him with his speech: “you’ll do great, you don’t need Conrad’s notes”;

• she beams with pride when he speaks;

• she shaves her legs (in the books, that kind of detail was reserved for Conrad—which speaks volumes) and dresses up, because she wants to look beautiful to announce she’s marrying Jere

• she can’t wait to tell the world: she’s Jere’s fiancée.

‼️Some might say she’s delusional, as Laurel claims.

But that’s gaslighting 101—discredit her feelings just because they don’t fit your agenda. Thinking like that it’s like people question her sanity and her feelings 🚩.

She’s a freak

She’s crazy

They’re basically calling her stupid and crazy — and it’s her own mother doing it. But this girl has been proving her love for four years now — and even before that, she fought like hell to make Jeremiah hers.

Belly proves her love through actions.

Real love. Yeah. With reckless choices and unstoppable desire. (Funny enough, the word real was actually used about Jelly — in contrast to Bonrad, which was framed as a fantasy)

– she was supposed to “belong” to Conrad — he was her “destiny,” the one Susannah dreamed for her, the perfect choice on paper: a future doctor, smart, blah blah. but she chooses Jeremiah — even when he doesn’t believe she truly could.

– she was supposed to never forgive him after the “cheating” — but she does.

and honestly? she probably wouldn’t have forgiven anyone else.

(she didn’t forgive Conrad just for grieving and shutting down emotionally.)

– her parents are against it — and that only makes her more sure.

– Jeremiah is framed as the “screw-up” — and she sees that he’s the best

And it’s gross to gaslight her

And maybe, in trying to complicate the plot and set up obstacles for bonrad, the writers accidentally wrote real love 🤷‍♀️

The kind that doesn’t come from your head—but your gut idk

I know they’re not gonna get married, that much is clear. But what is the show doing?

Why are they showing that she loves him this much — even rewriting the books to make it louder? I don’t know the answer to that.

But one thing’s for sure: show!Jelly is eating so good