#sorry for the late late late update yall

[the-dangerous-mute-lunatic]

....sighs

[fictionallystable]

Rating: Mature

Fandom: Call of Duty (Video Games)

Relationship: Phillip Graves (Call of Duty)/Reader

Characters: Reader, Phillip Graves (Call of Duty), Original Male Character(s)

Additional Tags: Author Has Played Call of Duty, Childhood Friends, Miscommunication, Mutual Pining, Civilian!Reader, Pre-Canon, Jealousy, Angst, Kissing, Mild Smut, Time Skips, Brother's Best Friend, Toxic Family Dynamics, Eventual Smut, Drama, Misunderstandings, Getting Together, Minor Age Gap

Words: 9,080| Chapters: 5/6

Authors: @orphancains & @collinnmckinley

Chapter 5: Reminiscence

Chapter summery: You spend more time with Phil than you expected during your visit, and more old memories and new emotions start to surface.

A/N: Apologies for the long wait! Here is another longer chapter. Next chapter should be the final one in this story. We hope you've been enjoying it so far. ////

the fic can also be found on AO3

tags will be updated!!

When you woke up, your eyes still felt swollen from crying the night before. But you trudged out of Matty’s room, surprised to hear voices already from the kitchen of your parents’ home. You were expecting to see your mom in her same old bathrobe and your dad sipping his usual black coffee as he read the paper. But instead you saw Matty making fluffy pancakes at the stove and Elaine cutting some strawberries. 

“Mornin’, sleepy head,” Matty said when turned and saw you. “Pancakes are almost done.”

You rubbed your eyes. “Good morning,” you said to both him and Elaine, who smiled back. “Where’s mom and dad?”

Matty placed a plate with a tall stack of pancakes on the table and took a sip of his coffee before answering you. “They went to the beach house a few days early. To clear their minds a bit.”

You frowned. “What? Why? I thought they were gonna stay the day with us and catch up.”

“Because if either of them had greeted you this morning it would’ve been another shouting match.”

Elaine came up to the table and shot Matty a pointed look, as if telling him ‘You could’ve explained it a bit more gently,’ before setting down the bowl of fruit. 

You groaned and sat down at your usual seat at the kitchen table. You let out a long sigh wishing you could crawl back to bed and that this was all a nightmare you still hadn’t woken from. You weren’t sure if you were sighing from defeat, shame, or even relief from learning your parents had fled from their house because of last night. You scratched your head in frustration, remembering the furious look in your father’s eyes and the disappointing glazing your mother’s all night just a few hours prior. 

Matty shrugged but still smiled his usual relaxed smile. “It’s alright, that just means there are more pancakes for us three, so let’s dig in.” 

Elaine pursed her lips, feeling the awkwardness begin to build in the air. “Did you want coffee, [Y/N]?” Elaine asked. 

“Yes thank you, with some milk please,” you replied, and she replaced the mug with a glass instead. Usually you were excited to eat some of your brother’s famous fluffy signature pancakes, with chocolate chips throughout the soft dough. But the headache still lingered in your temples from last night and your eyes still burned from the tears. 

Above all, you felt embarrassed for what happened the night before. You knew it was neither your fault nor Matty’s. If anyone was to blame, it was your father and Richard conspiring a surprise proposal on you without any regard for your actual wishes, or Matty’s for that matter. And you knew Matty, even after all these years, was still protective over you. Still, you realized that your relationship exploding overnight had also upended and shattered a night that was supposed to be for him and Elaine. You felt like you once again felt like the little sister who brought unnecessary drama to his life.

But your family life had possibly never been this messy before. You’d bickered with your father about trying to make more friends in high school and of taking your studies beyond art more seriously. But the fury that reddened his face and made him grab and shake you was something you’d never seen. You only hoped that somehow things could get better between you all by the time you were going to meet up with them at the beach house in several days. You hoped it would just be the four of you, plus Elaine, at the beach house. You always dreaded when your social butterfly of a father would invite other families to join along during your beach trips. But for once, you prayed others would be invited to melt some of the bitterness and tension that you were confident you’d run into once you entered the house.

You pondered deeply before taking a sip of the orange juice and grabbing a few pancakes from the tower that your brother had practically constructed at the center of the table. Already he was digging in, dousing his pancakes with nutella and syrup. But he took a break from wolfing down his breakfast to continue his conversation with you.

He lifted his coffee mug with the faded maroon Texas A&M University on its side, but before he took a sip, he decided to break the silence “So…. I saw you and Phil caught up with each other a bit last night too.” He took a loud sip from the mug and peered at you over the mug.

Your fork clanked against your plate. You breathed in sharply, remembering the butterflies and emotions that flooded you when you saw him. The anger, the relief, the nostalgia, and even the old adoration you always felt for him even as a kid. Along with another emotion you still couldn’t quite put your finger on. Upon seeing your reaction, your brother tried to contain the smirk that wanted to appear on his lips. 

“Yeah, he changed a lot but also didn’t change one bit.” You bit your lip, puzzled. “How’s that even possible?”

Matty chuckles with a glint in his eye, making you raise an eyebrow. “Well, little sister, that’s what happens when boys become men .”

You shot him an unamused look, almost glaring at him. Beside him you could see Elaine rolling her eyes but also holding back a grin before she ate some of her fruit. Seeing your annoyance, Matty only laughed more. 

“Something some jackasses I know of are still struggling to do,” you muttered darkly while you stabbed one of your pancakes with your fork. 

Your brother still grinned widely. “What did you guys talk about?” 

Now it was your turn to roll your eyes. “Nothing too amazing, Matty. Probably the same as with you. His time in the Marine Corps, some of the friends he made while there.” You tried to downplay it.

“Mhmm.” he narrowed his eyes with a smirk. 

You gulped nervously. “Anyway, can we talk about something else?”

“Sure, sure…” Your brother held up his hands, feigning defense. “We can talk about whatever, as long as you're comfortable, [Y/N].”

“Thank you, Matty.”

Elaine hummed approvingly beside him, impressed with how gentle and open he seemed to be acting with you.  

Matty cleared his throat and filled his mug with more coffee. “So, what did you think of the catering? The Mediterranean food we ordered for dinner?”

You squinted trying to remember. “It was pretty good, actually.”

“Right? I thought so too! I thought it was a great idea.”

You blinked. “Yeah…” you paused. “I guess I was surprised you guys didn’t just settle for a barbeque just because it’s summer. Where was it from?”

“Oh, it was from Calypso’s Bistro, close to the plant nursery you liked as a kid.” He said with a cheeky grin.

You furrowed your brow, wondering why he was acting so oddly. “Okay… that’s nice.”

“Phil recommended it to me.” He grinned again.

You clanked your fork again against your plate as you dropped it. He was not going to drop Phil from this breakfast conversation, was he? You glowered at him and crossed your arms. From the corner of your eye, you could see Elaine shaking her head but also holding back a laugh.

“Come on, what else did you guys talk about?” He said. “I know he talked about his work, but I’m curious about what he asked you !”

Rolling your eyes, you sighed as you poured yourself some more coffee in your mug. “I dunno, Matty! I don’t know what you want to hear! I mean, he did ask me about my designs and architecture plans. He seemed curious and interested about that!” 

Matty ogled curiously. “I’d bet he’d like the designs you worked on, you know. Maybe if he gets a building of sorts for his work one day when he retires from the military, you can design it for him.”

“Okay, that’s a big if, Matty,” you grumbled back.

“But it’s possible! Good thing you guys probably exchanged numbers, right?”

You ignored him but noticed your coffee was still black. “Could you pass the milk, Elaine?”

“Remember when Phil bought you three of those little school lunch chocolate milk cartoons because you mentioned to him that you liked them? And then his mom gave him an earful for spending so much of his allowance on that?”

Elaine was starting to have enough. “Matty, give it a res—” 

But your eyes narrowing into another glare, they widened. “Yes! I think I actually drank two of them but he and I split the third one because I was starting to get full.”

“Oh yeah! That’s how he defended himself when his mom was yelling at him. ‘Ma, we drank ‘em together after school, because we both like chocolate milk. And plus she’s Matty’s little sister.’” You both chuckled together. Suddenly, you felt the pulsing tension at your temples and behind your eyes started to melt away a little. 

“Yeah, that was something I totally forgot about. I mean, last night we did talk a little bit about when we were kids. Like, I remembered how he helped carry my books when I broke my ankle and you were stuck at baseball practice.”

“Oh yeah, you could barely use your crutches.” He snickered.

You tried to ignore that. “And we did talk a little bit about when… he left for bootcamp out of nowhere.”

Matty knew that was a sensitive nerve and he grimaced slightly before looking back down at the puddle of syrup and nutella on his plate. He knew that roadblock in the conversation might pop up but he was hoping that somehow both of you had agreed to not touch that topic. But now he was worried the two of you didn’t want to face each other again.

“But… I think both of us understand we were both kids with shitty communication skills and have moved on from that.”

At this Matty perked back up. “Really? Thank God!” He paused. “I mean, I’m glad y’all have made peace over that. I’m sure it’s a weight off both of you.”

You nodded pensively, actually agreeing with him. In spite of all the discord and pain that surfaced last night. You still felt a blackhole gaping in your chest, knowing how disappointed your parents were in you. But there was also a flickering happiness and relief that you felt when you remember that you and Phil were back on speaking terms. Maybe you could even stay in touch after this vacation…

Matty continued. “See? I mean, you and him—a-and of course me and him—go so far back. I know you maybe weren’t expecting to see him last night, but I’m glad that at least I know I can invite him to Elaine’s and my wedding.”

Elaine piped up. “You sure he’d want to come?”

You stared in confusion. Elaine noticed.

“What I mean is I know it would mean a lot to you, Matty, but he’s military. I don’t know too much about those guys, but I can’t exactly picture him being excited to put himself in a suit and bowtie for a long ceremony in a church.”

Matty shook his head. “No, no no. I know, Phil. He’d be totally happy to come. He told me himself that he would also invite me to his wedding when his time comes. I mean, come on, we're practically brothers. We’d do anything for each other. We even joked about naming our kids after each other.” 

You wanted to almost scoff at that in disbelief. “Phil with kids?” 

“Oh yeah. I know for sure Phil wants a family. He said that he wanted at least three kids.” 

You nearly staggered back at this. “Three ki—What? When did he say that?” Maybe you’d gotten so used to seeing Phil as a protective friend that the thought of him being a family man himself felt foreign to you. The image of little kids running behind Phil in a Texas backyard or him cooing at a swaddled baby in his arms was one that you’d never thought about before… but it was one that for some reason made your chest clench for a split second.

“Uhh, right after graduating from high school I think. He seemed pretty dead set on it too.” Matty replied nonchalantly as he picked up his plate, heading to the sink to rinse. 

You scoffed. “Matty, that was ages ago. He was still a kid himself then! He could’ve changed his mind since then. You never know what he might’ve seen while in the Marines and it could’ve changed his perception on his family and kids.”

Matty laughed, walking back to the kitchen table to pick up Elaine’s now empty plate too. Before he returned to the sink he bent down to look at you closer. “Never underestimate a man’s dream when he’s serious about it, [Y/N].” He turned around and continued chattering on. “Plus, the military sometimes only enforces your plan of wanting a family.”

You crossed your arms over your chest again, amused with how your brother seemed to know everything about the military now because of Phil. “Oh yeah? And how in the hell would you of all people know that? Did he tell you that himself? I doubt—”

“Actually, yes he did. Last night.” Your brother smirked at you. “And that's exactly what he said to me. Because you never know what will happen and when it will happen when you’re in combat overseas.”

You sank down on your chair, feeling a little defeated from your bickering match with your brother. You were glad he was able to catch up with Phil too. But your chest continued to strangely clench at the thought of Phil looking for a wife and planning to have a big family with them. You weren’t sure what you were expecting. That he’d always be the nice guy in the neighborhood  who’d play with you and your brother, but also treat you gently and whom you could always count on to protect you when you were playing too late outside at night?

You didn’t know how to answer. “Good for Phil”? You felt at a loss for words. You were surprised too that this conversion never appeared when you were chatting with Phil last night. But you also knew it was foolish to not realize Phil was probably dating other women all the time. He was handsome, he was charismatic and smart, and he had a successful military career. He checked off all the boxes and knew he was probably a women-magnet wherever he went. 

You felt a small pool of jealousy begin to well up in your gut. But you didn’t understand why. He had every right to date other women. Just like he had every right to date girls when he was a teenager—even if it broke your heart—and to invite them to his home, and to kiss in his pool in his parents’ backyard even if you were clueless to it all. The memories of that day suddenly flashed back. You shook yourself out of it and brought a banana slice that Elaine had cut earlier to your mouth, trying to blink the memories away from your vision. 

“Soooo…. What’re your plans for the rest of the day?”

You shook out of your reverie “I’m not sure to be honest. I’m back in town after so long—but after last night I don’t feel like doing much. So I might just stay home. Plus I have a few emails from work I need to look at—”

“No, no, no, no, no. You’re here on vacation, [Y/N]. No work. No emails.”

Elaine nodded vigorously as she added the last pancake onto her plate. “Absolutely no work.”

You groaned. “Fine. What do you want me to do today then? You’re the engaged couple whom we’re meeting in honor of, after all.”

Before answering, Matty glanced over at Elaine and gave her a knowing look, one with a mischievous glint in his eye. “Oh, we’re ain’t planning to babysit you. And you’re definitely not gonna be third-wheelin’ us. You gotta get your own plans going, lil sis.” 

Once again, you groaned and rubbed your hands over your face in frustration. “Then why bother asking me?!” You really didn’t want to leave the house. Word of Richard’s horrible from last night would’ve probably traveled across your friend and family groups. The thought of them asking you about it made your stomach churn. The idea of crawling back into bed and burying yourself in blankets was the only thing that appealed to you. But you knew that you would only lie awake in bed, staring at the ceiling fan, replaying all the horrible events from the party in your head over and over again until you went insane. 

Elaine chimed in, her soft voice catching you by surprise. She was always soft-spoken and quiet, a total opposite to Matty’s outspoken and blunt nature. You were surprised she’d be offering an idea. “Honey, didn’t Phillip say that he was staying all by himself at his parents house? Maybe [Y/N] and him could keep each other company while we go visit the bakery about our wedding cake.” 

You looked at her with wide eyes, totally baffled by that suggestion. That was something you’d expect from Matty who kept on teasing you all morning about Phil. Even Matty looked at her in bewilderment. But, holding his gaze with his fianceé’s, he mouth fell ajar as if he suddenly understood what Elaine said. As quiet as Elaine was, she always paid attention and caught small cues around her. It was one of the advantages of listening instead of constantly speaking. And she definitely noticed Matty constantly bringing up Phillip Graves throughout their breakfast with his little sister.

“Oh! That’s right. Yeah, I’m sure Phil would be more than happy to catch up with you. He’s actually kind of on the same boat as you. You both have been living out-of-town for so long. Y’all would be a good pair—t-to spend the day together and see how the city’s changed.”

Elaine nodded, a small smile on her rosy lips. “I obviously didn’t grow up with y’all, so I only know anything about your past from what you’ve said, but you and him seem to still have a lot of chemistry from when you were kids.”

You wanted to blush. Maybe even disagree and meekly explain you were just making small talk and being polite with each other. Instead, your thoughts were interrupted when your brother said, “Well, we’re gonna go wash up and get ready to head out. We made an appointment with a wedding cake business the town over.”

Oh . You were hoping you could spend the day with them. You rarely got to see Matty due to your work. Usually you could only catch up during Christmas, Thanksgiving, maybe for a birthday or for a special Fourth of July party your parents would throw every couple of years when they were in the mood. You also wanted to catch up with Elaine. As a child, you always wanted a sister. And she was like the sister you never had. Growing up, you struggled making friends, sticking instead to becoming a shadow behind Matty and Phil when they would hang out after school. Usually, you watched as they played video games or played basketball, drawing in your sketchbook when they didn’t invite you to join in. As a younger girl, you did play with dolls with some girls. But it was harder to make friends once you got intensely passionate about your art. Yet, Elaine seemed sweet enough to form a friendship with. 

“Then, after that, I wanna show Elaine around town a little more. We’ll probably be home maybe for a late dinner. So until then, try to keep busy, alright? No emails! No work.”

You raised your hands up in defense. “No emails,” you repeated.

“Maybe give Phil a call. He can keep you busy while we’re out.”

You rolled your eyes, averting your eyes in embarrassment early enough to miss the smirk on Matty’s lips. It was one that made Elaine want to roll her own playfully, but she giggled quietly instead to herself. The two of them headed to their quarters to get dressed, while you trudged back to the guest room. You also needed to get washed up, but the thought of strolling through your hometown by yourself, especially after the embarrassing scene of last night that surely spread like wildfire through your family’s social circles, seemed unpleasant.

It was almost lunch time, and you still could not budge out of bed. Still in your pajamas, you were laying in bed idly, watching as the time passed as slowly as ever. You found yourself scrolling through social media, eyes scanning everyone’s elated comments under Matty and Elaine’s photos from last night’s engagement party. You were tagged in a few of them, earning you a few new friend requests from former high school classmates that you wished you could’ve forgotten entirely. 

In some photos, your eyes snapped to find Phil among the group of family friends. When you first found him smiling next to Matty in one photo, you swallowed hard and felt butterflies form in your stomach. Your eyes lingered over his photographed form longer than others. How did his smile seem to become even more handsome and radiant after all these years? You felt yourself grow tense, even while laying down, when you noticed how toned his arms looked in the shirt he wore last night. You remembered thinking the same when watching him as he talked to you in the living room after… the incident. In Matty’s room now and with the photo, you couldn’t stop staring. Your mouth grew dry when you saw there were at least four other photos of him and Matty in the collection of photos. But you found yourself disappointed to see that, no, Phil himself was not tagged. In fact, Phil didn’t have any social media accounts. Probably because of his sensitive line of work, you figured. Still, it would’ve been nice to learn more about what he was like now as an adult.

Wait , why are you thinking about him so much?! You wondered how you got to this point where you were practically drooling over photos of your brother’s best friend and staying inside all day like a hermit during your free time back home. You found yourself blushing by yourself in Matty's old bedroom, realizing what you’d spent the last ten minutes of your morning doing. You groaned as you threw your phone down against the pillow on your bed. You decided, come on, you need to get up. You need to at least get some lunch. 

Preferring not to look through the pantry of healthy, over-priced super-foods your mom kept in stock, you knew a diner or fast food joint was your best bet for something that was actually tasty. It was warm outside, but thankfully the diner you had in mind was close enough that an Uber would not cost too much to take you. It was the very same one that you and Matty would take you when you were feeling sad or discouraged from schoolwork or from drama with some of the girls in your class. He’d always buy you a milkshake and fries. That paired with a pep talk from your big brother always managed to cheer you up.

The diner hadn’t changed much. As usual, blue, red, and white jerseys of the Houston Texans football team were draped proudly on some of the walls and old photographs of the owner with other football players from the nineties were framed for visitors to marvel at while they ate. You were almost as shocked by how unchanged it was as you were by the fact it was still standing. Such an old business still managed to remain alive after all these years. The same smell of french fries and the sound of sizzling burger patties in the kitchen while old classic rock played made you feel like you were a little girl again waiting for Matty in his letterman to ask the server for a booth instead of a table. 

Milkshake and fries, you ordered by instinct when the server, a nice woman in her fifties and short cropped graying curls approached your table with her notepad. You were starving. The growling of your stomach made you add one of their new bacon-and-kimchi burgers to your order that the server had hyped up. “I’ll get that right out for you, hun,” she said with a smile and left you to your thoughts.

You felt tempted to scroll again through the photos from last night. But you tried desperately to pull yourself away from those thoughts whirling down that rabbit hole again. You played aimlessly with the paper napkin on the table in front of you and watched around you as families and couples sat together. They chattered endlessly, some even bursting out laughing in joy, as they enjoyed their lunch together. You huffed out a long sigh seeing this. You had gone out to feel less alone, to feel like you were doing something. Instead, you were reminded of how alone you were now that everyone in your hometown and your brother were busy.

You opened your phone under the table, averting your gaze from everyone else. You almost felt embarrassed by what you were about to do. Matty definitely would’ve disapproved. You pulled up the Uber app again. You would just ask for a to-go box and eat your food in peace at home without the cacophony of other people around you in your own lonely company. Next time, you would just order delivery instead of wasting money on Uber, you scolded yourself.

While you were going through the app, someone slid into the booth to sit across from you. You tensed up. Annoyed, you were prepared to tell this person that you were in fact saving that seat for someone else—a lie—and that they needed to leave you the hell alone. When you lifted your head back up to glower at the uninvited lunch guest, your mouth fell agape. 

Seeing the look of shock on your face, Phil chuckled in amusement and beamed knowingly at you. How in the hell did he end up here at the same time as you? You spent all morning thinking about him and practically studying his photos from last night, you felt like you were now simply imagining him sitting across from you. 

The almost smug look on his face told you that he knew he was confusing the hell out of you. You had a lot of questions but were left speechless at the sight of him. His hair was slightly damp, as if he’d just finished showering a while ago. He had on a plain white t-shirt and had his keys in his hands still, making you realize he had just driven and parked his car here not too many minutes ago. He also held a paper cup with no lid, revealing some black coffee he must’ve picked up before he got here. Phil himself wanted to break the ice and brush away the confusion clearly still in the air. But he couldn’t help but continue to bask in the hilarity of the baffled look on your face, like a deer stuck in headlights. Since a kid, he always loved how expressive you were with your face. But now, as an adult, he also couldn't help but admire your face for how bright and warm your eyes looked, your cheeks for how you blushed furiously at some of his comments, and your lips for how soft he imagined they could be-.

“Hi there,” he chirped.

You were still totally bewildered but slowly began to shake yourself out of it. “H-hi…”

“So, are you here to try the new burger? I heard good things about it.”

You couldn’t believe that of all things to bring up, he decided to mention the damn bacon-and-kimchi burger. “Um,”  you stammered, “yeah, Matty mentioned that they were trying new ‘experimental’ burgers now… Honestly, I intended to come here for the shake and fries.”

He hummed in understanding before taking a sip of his coffee. All you could do was stare, and he stared back at you sharply over his cup as he sipped his drink—his eyes never once leaving your face. Last night, you two never stopped chatting. Yet here, everything between you was nauseatingly silent so far, and you clicked your phone’s screen off, forgetting about your Uber plans immediately.

You studied him closely again. This time you noticed the veins running along his hands as he sipped his coffee, his rolex his father gifted him ages ago adorning his wrist too. You noticed even a small scar running across his outer forearm that you didn’t notice the night before. Then, your eyes traveled back up to glance at his neck, leading up to the curve of his jaw. You bit down hard on your lip as you began to rip away little pieces of the napkin you were toying with this whole time. You were growing frustrated by how nervous you felt around him, at how a heat seemed to rise from your skin when you noticed how his eyes didn’t leave your own form while yours couldn’t seem to stay still on him. It was like staring at the sun. You felt like you couldn’t stare too long at him, otherwise you would tread into dangerous territory. You felt your soul tremble under his eye. From your small glimpses, you could see that his eyes harbored a lot more untold memories and hardships that he’d collected over the years since he left your hometown. Still, the hardened look in his eyes made something in your stomach stir, and you felt yourself crossing your legs at your ankles nervously. 

He placed his coffee back on the table, a smile now on his face, his eyes softening once again into a much for familiar gaze. Still, you looked away frantically, studying instead now the dead ants and dust that collected in the window sill beside your booth. You took a deep breath and let it out sharply, before plucking the courage to ask Phil, “So, was it Matty? Or was it Elaine?”

He blinked, feigning ignorance. “Hm? What are you talking about?” 

He couldn’t fool you that easily. You almost rolled your eyes. Instead you gave him a pointed look, raising an unamused eyebrow at him. He was aware that you knew that him finding you eating a burger all by yourself in your favorite childhood burger joints was not simply a coincidence. And that he just happened to be going to that diner the exact same day and time? Not a chance. 

But as much as you wanted to pry the truth from him, Phil was also stubborn. Sure, it wasn’t a coincidence that you met in this diner once more, but he wanted it to be one. He wouldn’t give Matty or Elaine the credit for him running into you. Maybe Matty did send him a text this morning that you’d be spending the day alone, since Elaine and him would be in the next town over. Maybe he also did add that he suggested you try that kimchi burger from your favorite  burger joint. But it was him, Phil, that put one and two together and knew you’d probably end up here of all places for lunch.

He leaned in across the table, his eyes still locked on you sharp. “Remember what I told you last night after we exchanged contacts?”

You furrowed your brow. So many words were exchanged that night, your mind was scattered with how he was looking at you. You felt speechless, breathless.

“If you don't come by my house today, I would snatch you myself,” he quotes himself from last night with a mischievous glint now in his eyes. You, on the other hand, felt your heart start to pound in your chest. Once again, you felt something stir in your lower stomach. You didn’t know how to respond, instead staring at him like a deer caught in headlights.

The server from earlier sauntered over to your booth. You expected her to be carrying just one plate with your burger. Instead, you saw that on either hand, she had two plates with the burgers. “Here y’all are,” she said as she placed both plates in front of you and Phil. Instead of a kimchi burger, he had a classic bacon cheeseburger. You actually smiled at the sight. It was his same order from when he was a kid. Looks like his taste buds hadn’t changed too much since then.

You watched instead as Phil thanked the server, using his best southern manners.

“And that milkshake will come in a few minutes, miss,” she added before leaving once more.

Phil glanced up at you, smiling calmly. “Looks like great minds think alike, huh,” he chirped.  

You scoffed. You wanted to snap back at him, but you were starving. Both you and Phil devoured your burgers. It felt nice to just sit and have a meal with him. At first it was silent but not the awkward silence that would engulf you and make you feel small. Instead, it felt relaxing. There was little pressure to be someone you weren’t, to put on a performance or slip on a mask, when you were around Phil. But as you started to finish up your burger, he began to pipe up again. “So, how are you feeling today? After…”

“Better,” you sighed. “I mean, thankfully my brother and Elaine were okay with how the party kind of turned into a disaster. But I haven't spoken much to my parents… they’re, um, out of town already.”

This caught Phil's interest. He narrowed his eyes slightly, but nodded along as he listened. 

“Your dad was always a man with… high expectations. High standards. My dad was the same way, as you well know. No one was immune from my dad’s criticism. I think that’s why they got along so well. Because they could turn their nose up at everyone.”

You chuckled. “Right.”

“That must be why he liked Richard, too.”

You nearly choked on your water. You coughed, looking up at him in shock, but he wore the same nonchalant, innocent look on his face while he dipped the last of fries into the ketchup on his plate. “Speaking of which, have you heard anything from him? Spoken with him since?”

You couldn’t scowl as hard as you wanted to. A part of you wanted to ask Phil why it mattered to him in the first place. But another part wanted to flood him with the disappointment you were feeling in knowing that Richard had not bothered to call you, to visit you. Instead, he sent you a text message this morning with nothing more than a link and phone number of a local moving and shipping company in Seattle—as if to say, “Here, move yourself out or get someone else to do it. But don’t count on me.”

You sighed. “No, I think it’s clear he’s done with me… just like I am with him,” you confessed to Phil, who furrowed his brows as if he was in deep thought as he listened to you. In reality, gears were turning in his head. “I, um, will probably move out of his place once I return to Seattle. Honestly, with all he said to me, I’m just trying to avoid him right now, as much as I can.”

He nodded in understanding. “Well. I know your parents didn’t react in the most ideal of ways last night. But you always have Matty’s and my support, alright? How’d you even get here anyway?”

“Uber,” you admitted.

He rolled his eyes. “Well, in addition to offering you my unconditional support in this moment of your life, I will also offer to drive you anywhere you’d like while you’re in town.”

“You sure?”

He scoffed in disbelief. “Of course! An Uber? Really?”

Before you could reply, however, the same server returned with your chocolate milkshake to-go. You smiled and gave thanks. As you dug into your purse to look for your wallet, you heard Phil. 

“Oh, no, no, no. I’m covering this,” he said firmly. “You do not have to worry at all.” From his own wallet, he pulled out several bills to cover the cost and enough to give the kind server a hefty tip for her attentiveness. 

“Phil!” you hissed in panic. “You don’t have to do that!”

The server chuckled as she collected the bills. “Don’t worry, hun. You found yourself a nice gentleman with manners who knows not to let the lady pay when on a date, right?” she grinned at Phil, who only chuckled back. Of course the cocky bastard didn’t bother to correct her. With that she turned away, wishing you both a good rest of your day, and left you alone with Phil once again.

“Just being polite, huh?” you looked at him pointedly, both of you heading out the door of the diner now, getting immediately engulfed in a warm, but gentle breeze.

“Like my mother taught me,” he replied, winking at you slyly. You both walked to his car, your mind in deep thought. You had gotten snacks and lunches with Phil and Matty in the past as kids, but Phil never covered your meal for you. And you never felt the buzzing in your stomach around him with anyone else before. You swallowed hard and took a deep breath. Phil had changed a lot, hardened by the military and by life under his draconian father’s sometimes unfair expectations. And some parts of him hadn’t changed a bit, especially his boyish and sometimes cocky humor. Yet, it was undeniable this was the kid Phil that you only tagged along with sometimes. He looked at you, spoke to you differently, in ways that made your heart race, your palms sweat, and made you bite your lip in frustration. 

As he unlocked the doors to his car, he asked, “So, where’d ya wanna go?”

You shrugged. You frankly had no plans laid out for the day, other than lazing around at home waiting for Matty and Elaine.

You both slid into the car, him behind the wheel and you at shotgun. He looked over at you after starting his car, the A/C blowing gently against both of you. You sipped on your milkshake, as he lowered the music that was playing to continue chatting with you without interruption. You noticed he still liked classic rock, just like the bands you and Matty would listen to with him after school. “You wanna come by my place?”  he suggested. “I did tell you I wanted to cook you dinner at some point while we’re both here.”

You nearly gasped, but still looked at him in disbelief. But you couldn’t conceal the contagious, sheepish smile that was crawling onto your face at this offer. “Phil, you just bought me lunch, you can’t make me dinner either! What am I supposed to give you in return?”

He shrugged but shot you a cheeky grin. “I dunno. Your company?”

Again, you felt your skin start to grow hot and you bit your lip. “Phil, do you always try to charm your friends like this? Or is it just me?” you chuckled.

As he turned into a new street, he hummed as he feigned contemplation. You didn’t realize he was taking your question seriously. He glanced at you through the corner of his eye, “Maybe just the ones I really like.”

At this you blushed and toyed with the straw of your milkshake. He’s joking, maybe flirting to be funny , you thought to yourself. Nonetheless, you considered his offer to visit his home with him. “Fine,” you said in surrender. “I’ll go.”

“Attagirl,” he said cheerfully, his smiling beaming even more now.

“Just dinner, correct? It’s not like you are going to kidnap and murder me, and then have me as your dinner, are you?” you joked with a chuckle, deciding to poke back at the man who didn’t seem to know when to stop with the jests and jokes. 

But Phil didn’t laugh back. Instead, he was silent for a few seconds. You thought maybe he didn’t find it funny, offensive even. But your last sentence has brought many ideas in his head, many images that he never thought he could conjure with you. But he decided to join your banter, seeing how your laughter was beginning to nervously die down with his silence.

He leaned in, his lips inching closer to your ear. With the hazy music playing in the background and with you clutching your milkshake tighter, he muttered, “No promises.”

He pulled back and chuckled, especially seeing the way your eyes widened at this. Now your own mind was racing with thoughts and scenarios you would feel embarrassed to share with anyone. You could imagine him devouring you in more ways than one, especially the look in his eyes he’d hold as he consumed you. Before you could submerge yourself into those daydreams, you cleared your throat and fixed a strand of your hair that had fallen near your face. 

Silence fell once again between you, only the muffled sound of grainy guitar riffs and solos filling the rest of the short drive back to his house. You struggled to relax. Around Phil, you felt calm, relaxed, like you were at home. But other times like now, Phil fuckin Graves knew how to leave you utterly breathless. It always felt like that, now that you tried to reminisce on your childhood with him. Just when you were in your early teens, you thought you were going through puberty, your hormones making you think and feel things that you normally wouldn’t. Years later, you figured your feelings for him as a teen really didn’t really amount to anything other than small childhood crushes and you making sense of your sexuality for the first time. Yet, years later, here you were in his car crossing your legs nervously and squeezing them when you remembered his gravelly voice against your ear when he muttered, “No promises.”

Looking at him now as he drove, you realized how touch- and love-starved you really were, especially after such a miserable relationship with your ex. It was hard not to gawk at Phil, to study how his hands held onto the wheel as he drove, or to stare at how his arms flexed when he turned his car or shifted gears periodically. How his voice uttered your name so smoothly and how his cologne made you want to breathe him in deeply now that you were around him. It was becoming almost impossible to deny that you were feeling something serious for Phil now even as a grown woman. But you felt that if you admitted this to yourself, you would be in grave danger.

“We’re here,” he said moments before you both hopped out of his car, heading to his house’s front door. You walked in with him, and immediately noticed not much had changed, not even now that his parents had converted the place into an AirBnB rental spot. It still had some of the same white, minimalist furniture that Phil’s mother liked so much, with a sparkling chandelier hanging over the entrance. One thing you did notice was the lack of family portraits. No photos of strangers probably for the sake of whoever was renting the home for a brief stay. Still, you were flooded with memories of swimming in the backyard with Matty and Phil over many summers, of helping his mother bake cookies while he and Matty played video games, and of the time the three of you accidentally shattered one of the family vases with a baseball one day. The three of you had quickly hid the shards far from any place his parents could ever find them.   

“Not much has changed,” you noted, while he hummed in agreement. You slipped off your shoes, just as Phil did, while you remembered all of this. He placed his keys on a table and turned to look at you. 

“So, you never did mention how long you’re in town for.”

“Hm?” You suddenly remembered that, indeed, you were only here for a brief visit. Phil wanted to laugh seeing how dazed you still seemed around him even after all this time. He held back, however. “Right. Well, I’m not leaving any time soon. I Took my yearly vacation, so I have the next few weeks free from all work while I’m here.” You groaned. “And even if I wanted to, Matty and Elaine will have my head if I even try to go near my work laptop.”

He nods as he hums in thought. It felt like he was going to say something, but remained silent.

He slipped off his leather jacket he had worn this whole time. Your eyes trailed over him as he did. You couldn’t help but admit how his back’s muscles rippled as he did this, how his biceps muscles flexed through the shirt he was wearing as he bent his shoulders back to get the jacket off it. Was your staring too obvious? Was it obvious you were daydreaming of the many different ways you would hold onto his shoulders, arms, and back? You breathed out sharply and tore your eyes away.

When he finished hanging his jacket, he turned and looked at you. You both strolled to the kitchen, where the silver, shining appliances and marble counters reminded you of Phil’s father’s wealth once again. Despite how empty and sterile parts of the home now seemed, Phil seemed calmer here, his smile still warm but more relaxed and maybe less mischievous. “Did you want something to drink? Coffee? Tea?”

“Oof,” you said, “I just had that milkshake, so, um, maybe just some water to help it go down. I don’t want to have something that’ll make my stomach upset or something, you know?” you squeaked out. You didn’t know if it was because it was just you and Phil now, no passerbyers at the restaurant or anything, or because of how big his house was. But you felt small. You felt like shrinking yourself. Maybe it was a stupid idea to come here alone with Phil, you chastised yourself , especially since I’ve been acting so weird around him already today. But you glanced back up at Phil’s reassuring, calm smile with his same caring eyes he always shone at you. You felt some relief and calmness from that. 

“I do need to use the bathroom, though,” you said. “Just to wash up.”

“There’s the one attached to my room upstairs, since the AirBnB guests don’t use it.” As he spoke, he grabbed one of the expensive glass bottles of flavored water from the fridge. Even though your parents were also well-off in their own way, his family’s wealth was on a different level, one that managed to still baffle you. “Oh and I should add that my room is upstairs, just to the left as you climb. But you already know that.” He started pouring the glasses. “Just go on up, I’ll be right there.”

You left Phil in the kitchen as he continued to pull glasses from the cabinets. As you climbed the stairs, you noticed how the varnish on the wooden rail had worn from years of his family’s use. You couldn’t help but remember all the times you gripped and slid your hand down it when you dashed down the stairs, the promise of football or a relaxing drive with Matty and Phil waiting for you outside. So much had changed. The house was dimmer and quieter now than in those days. But the memories still lingered like wisps of smoke, especially once you reached the second floor.

The bathroom was unchanged. All you noticed once you used it was how flushed your cheeks were, a little bead of sweat tempting to form near your hairline. Was it from the Texas heat having an effect on you after living up North for so long, or was it because of how Phil made you feel under his gaze this afternoon? You decided to splash some water on your face after washing your hands. Maybe you should pass Phil’s offer for some drinks instead grab a cold water before you pass out in his home.

You were about to head back down the stairs to do just that. But instead you noticed how the door to one of the rooms was left ajar. You peeked inside curiously, expecting it to be a sterile, bland room you would find in any AirBnB. It was dim, the blinds shut securely, but you were still hit with a flash of nostalgia when you saw that his blue comforter and sheets in his bed were the same as the last time you were here. You were still barely a teen, just a few weeks before Phil departed for the Marine Corps without a word. Matty and him were sitting in the very same room, some slightly trashy MTV show playing low in the background while the two of them were planning to go to GameStop in a few minutes. 

Memories of that evening inundated your senses as you mindlessly stepped inside. The posters once splayed on his wall, now years later, were stripped from them. His TV with his Xbox no longer were there—you figured his parents sold both when he left for boot camp. Yet, his bed was no longer the messy pile of blankets. Instead, it was neat. The corners were tucked in sharply, and the blankets were spread as cleanly as possible so that you could practically bounce a coin on them without a problem. Yes, this was Phil’s room, the same one from years ago. Yet, the man who made the bed was not the seventeen-year-old, still immature boy you sometimes ogled at from afar. Things had changed, even if memories still clung to your mind. 

You floated over to his desk near the window, only a picture frame and a lamp sitting simply on it. You reached down, taking the photo frame in your hands . You brought it closer to your eyes, feeling your heart skip a beat at the photo. 

It was you, Matty, and Phil, of course. You had clearly taken it with an old disposable camera—you remembered you’d bought it at the drugstore. The flash made the skin on everyone’s face shine oddly, and even one of Matty’s eyes turned out red. Both of them had more flesh on their baby cheeks. Matty stood next to you, holding a football; his other hand held onto your forearm gently. He was always worried about you leaving his sight. On the other side of you was Phil, his hand resting on the top of your head, the other nestled gently on your shoulder. You could tell from the flyaways and frizz framing his hand that he had just ruffled your head full of hair, a usual trademark of his when he hung out with you. Meanwhile, you shined with a toothy grin, your eyes squinting a little at the exposure of the camera’s harsh flash hitting you all. 

“That’s my favorite picture of us, you know.”

You gasped at the sudden intrusion. Whipping around, you saw Phil standing just a few steps away from you. Relieved at seeing it was just him, the frame still in your hand. Slowly, he inched toward you with just a few steps. How long was he there? How long were you there, just snooping through his childhood bedroom? You were perplexed as to how you didn’t even notice him stepping into the room from the hall, or feel his form lingering just a few meters away from your own oblivious one. 

You felt a little nervous, embarrassed at being caught in his room. You glanced back down at the picture, noticing that he actually did take the time to encase it in a black metal frame. Even if it was just a somewhat crappy, overexposed photo you took as a little girl—he still took the time to find the right size frame for it. You had so many similar, amateurish photos from back in the day sitting—perhaps “rotting” is the best word for it—in a scrapbook somewhere in the back of your closet in Seattle. Maybe you would revisit them when you got back home… especially when you would have to pack all your things to move out and abandon Richard’s lease. 

You cracked a smile as a finger ran across the photo, brushing a few specks of old dust away. “Yeah, it’s one of my favorites too. I still remember that day a little.”

Phil stepped closer to you nonchalantly, a hand of his reaching out to touch the frame too. A this, he noticed how you stiffened just a bit. He glanced up from the frame to look closer at you. When your eyes met, he noticed how yours widened ever more slightly before you gulped. His eyes couldn’t help but notice how your throat moved. His thoughts began to wander. He blinked quickly, trying to banish the images and ideas that had formed cross currents in his mind, before his eyes returned to yours. They scanned your face slowly, like a student observing every detail and brushstroke on a painting’s canvas hanging on a museum’s walls. His hand encroached yours on the picture frame, his warm fingers making contact with your hand. They barely grazed yours, but it was enough for your heart to speed up and for it to feel as though your fingers were now tingling. 

You noticed then how his eyes strayed from yours, traveling lower. They landed on your lips, you could tell without a doubt, making you hold your breath silently. Phil noticed how pink and plush they looked. He had been admiring your beauty, realizing just how alluring you’d become in a span of years. He wanted nothing more than to lean down and taste your lips, to draw your body closer and to envelop it in his. He couldn’t help himself… he even noticed how you seemed to be relaxing, your eyes fluttering and lips slightly parted. He could swear you were leaning in too.

Yet, you flinched hard when you heard a phone start to ring out of the blue. Phil leaned back slightly with an annoyed sigh. He dug his hand into his pocket to pull out his phone. He steps away once more and answers it, greeting the person with faux amiability. You, meanwhile, took a sharp breath in and loosened your shoulders. Prudently, you placed the frame back on the nightstand, just as you had found it minutes before. 

After a “yup” an “of course,” an  “Around what time?” and a “I’ll see what if I can,” he hung up the phone. He looked at you with pursed lips before placing both his hands on your upper arms. 

“Everything okay?” you gently asked with a quirked eyebrow.

“Don’t worry about it,” he said while wrapping an arm slyly around your waist. You nearly didn’t notice. “Now, didn’t I promise you dinner?” 

You sat next to Bear and Matty in the living room of your family’s beach house, wishing you had gotten a better pedicure before this beach trip. The beach house was gorgeous, of course, just as you remember. The sofa was turquoise and the sound of the distant waves crashing onto the shore would be soothing you if it weren’t for your father sitting across from you with a grave look etched on his face. This was Elaine and Matty’s idea to mend the latest strains in your family ever since you rejected Richard’s “surprise” proposal. A few days at the beach by the Texas coast could heal your family’s freshly formed wounds, they figured. 

As much as you sometimes detested Houston, you wanted to stay. First, you didn’t have a bathing suit from Seattle packed for a beach trip. Second, you had to admit that one of the highlights of returning home was rekindling your friendship with Phil. Just two nights before, you had sat down in Phil’s home. You sat at the kitchen island, chatting idly about his life in the military and your time in university. Jokes sprinkled in the conversation kept it lively too, dissipating any awkwardness that might’ve lingered after your short conversation and moment in his bedroom upstairs. His parents’ finest wine and a home-cooked Italian meal filled your bellies while you chatted at the dining table. At one point, you nearly fainted when he did the classic “You got a little in the corner of your lip,” bit that you thought only happened in the movies. And knowing how guileful Phil was, you knew that he knew he had an effect on you and was relishing in it that night. 

You almost wanted to ask him for more nights together like that, at least until you both had to part your ways again. That was, until Matty and Elaine called you later that night insisting that you accompany them to this beach trip. “Think of it as a proper celebration of mine and Elaine’s engagement with less… interruptions from our invited guests,” Matty had spelled out for you. You groaned at this, the embarrassment of Richard ruining that night creeping back up inside you. Matty had done so much for you, and you really wanted Elaine to feel a truly warm welcome into your family as your new sister-in-law. Begrudgingly, you agreed, even if it meant that dinner in Phil’s home would be your last you could share with him until God knows when. 

You ran your hands along Bear’s thick, albeit graying, mane, while your brother and Elaine gave your mother a hand in the kitchen with the watermelon she was carving and dividing up for later. Your father, meanwhile, averted his gaze from meeting yours. He tapped his foot against the leg of his chair idly, while scrolling through his smartphone. He sipped on his black coffee as he scrolled, while you sipped on a glass of cool water. You couldn’t imagine the news was so interesting that he would suddenly be glued to his phone during a beach trip. Rolling your eyes, you focused on massaging Bear’s ears in the awkward silence of the living room. 

“Oh!” Matty suddenly exclaimed. “Finally, he’s at the door.”

You frowned. “The bell didn’t even ring.” Was there even a doorbell in this cabana?

“You messed up the food so bad that you had to order takeout?” your father grumbled, not lifting his head from his phone. You rolled your eyes at his sour comment while you sipped on your water to hide the extent of your frown.

Matty scampered excitedly to the door, his sandals squeaking as he did so. “No, I never said I ordered take out,” he said with a mischievous grin. 

Without answering, he opened the door dramatically. “PHIL! You made it!” 

You choked on your water. There he stood. You almost didn’t recognize him in the state he was in. Rather than the polo and slacks he wore the other days you met up with him, he wore a simple cotton t-shirt that hugged his body deliciously, as well as some shorts. His hair was slightly disheveled, possibly from the beachside breeze brushing through his locks. Lastly, you noticed how his eyes were covered by a pair of dark shades. His pearly white smile, radiant as ever, was too recognizable. 

“Of course, I’m not gonna let you down,” Phil said as he hugged your brother, who took Phil’s bag from him and placed it in one of the bedrooms down the hall.

You, meanwhile, were in shock. You would’ve frozen were it not for the coughing fit the water you choked on caused. Sure, just a few minutes ago you were totally downcast about how any plans—imaginary or real—with Phil in Houston had to be put away due to this beach trip. Yet, you had no clue that your conniving brother had managed to invite the man you were crushing on since you were a kid to this trip.

“Phil—” you choked out. “What are you doing here?”

“Ooh,” he said, grimacing slightly at slight shock, maybe offense, he thought he detected in your voice. He sheepishly scratched his head. “I, well—I uhh-” Phil didn’t have anything to use as an excuse, he didn’t know why he thought of making excuses to begin with.

You swore you could hear your brother snickering quietly, as he returned from putting Phil’s bag away. 

“It was actually my idea!” Elaine chimed in calmly as she sauntered in from the kitchen, too. “The fish tacos are turning out fantastic by the way. I highly recommend it.”

“I wasn’t sure if I was gonna come to be honest.”  He crossed his arms, and continued. “But Elaine here insisted very kindly so I said—why not.” he finishes with his signature grin.

You wanted nothing more than to strangle your brother. Yes, you had to admit seeing Phil here was a pleasant surprise, especially with how he looked in that shirt that you couldn’t stop your eyes from darting to. But you could swear on your life that he and Elaine were scheming this ever since that day. Of course, you had no proof of that, but you knew how cunning your brother could be. And Elaine? It seemed like they were starting to make more sense together as a couple with how devious she could be too. 

Elaine continued. “Your mom was totally okay with it too… and we could use a third party to join us to clear the, you know, the awkward fog that is hanging in the air… which clearly she was right about.” Matty and her both stole a glance toward your father who sat now with his arms crossed. You noticed, however, that he had placed his phone on the coffee table moments ago. He was now actually glancing at the three of you, the frown on his wrinkled face a little softer. 

“Phillip, it’s good to see you as always,” he said curtly with a nod. “Let me see what’s taking so long in the kitchen. I’m starved.”

Your brother and Elaine trailed after him. “It’s really not going to take much longer,” Matty said in annoyance. “We have some fruits ready to eat as well if you’re really that hungry…” 

With that, it was just you and Phil standing alone in the living room once again, save for Bear. The German Shepherd got up from the sofa and padded over to Phil. He jumped up, his two front paws landing and holding onto Phil’s hips. “Hey, buddy,” he cooed to the dog. “I missed you too, Bear.”

Once Bear landed back on the floor, Phil returned his attention to you. He stepped closer to you, you glanced around, realizing and relieved that neither your parents nor Matty and Elaine have returned from discussing lunch in the kitchen.

He placed a heavy hand on your shoulder, part of his hand just grazing part of your neck for a few moments as he did so. Once again, his eyes scanned over you, from head to toe. Anyone else whom he would’ve studied so intensely would have been shaking, but he noticed you stood , your eyes not leaving his.  He noticed how your chest rose and fell with each breath a little more rapidly than before. Seeing how you looked up at him, wordlessly, with your soft doe eyes he felt his heart flutter in his own chest as well. 

You put down your glass of water, clearing your throat one last time. “Make yourself at home, Phil. I’ll see you at dinner.” You smiled sheepishly, patting his hand on your shoulder before gently guiding it off you. And with that, you turned around, and tried to scurry to your room.

You woke up from a nap you didn’t remember deciding to take. Rubbing your eyes and feeling a headache creep into your skull, you got up from your bed in your room in the cabana to find some water. The heat of the Texas summer was getting to you, and you kept forgetting to hydrate. Your mom would scold you for that if you found out.

When you dragged your feet over to the cabana’s kitchen, you were surprised to see your parents, Matty, Elaine, and Phil also sitting in the living room together. Your mom was reading a magazine, your father a thick, hardcover biography of what was probably an unfamiliar nineteenth-century politician. Your brother, Elaine, and Phil sat around the coffee table on the floor. On it, was a messy, nearly scattered, stack of UNO cards, and each of them held small decks in their hand. 

“Oh, [Y/N], you slept through dinner,” your mother said when she noticed you walking in. “We saved you a plate covered in the kitchen. You can bring it here and join us if you’d like.”

You furrowed your brow, “What time is it?”

“9 p.m.,” your father huffed, his eyes not leaving the dense book in his hands. 

Your eyes widened, but you could feel your stomach rumbling as you could hear Elaine bickering with Matty about whether they should be stacking the cards they’re playing. You decided to take your mother up on her idea and carried the plate of dinner with you back to the living room after warming it up briefly in the microwave.

Phil smiled briefly at you as you sat beside him on the floor. You watched as the three of them played another round, Phil shrugging and accepting defeat when Matty managed to beat him and Elaine. You munched on the tacos for the next several rounds. Phil let you glance over his shoulder to peer at what cards he had in his deck. Whenever he made a shrewd play, he would look over at you with a glint in his eyes to see how you reacted. Seeing you breathe in sharply, impressed with one of his plays, made Phil’s chest swell in a form of pride. 

After you finished your dinner, you noticed that your mom and dad were yawning among themselves before heading back to their room. Your dad’s coffee didn’t seem to have helped him stay up as long as he’d hoped. You glanced down at your watch, seeing it was almost 10pm You thought that maybe you should head back to your room to wash up. 

“Oh, no. You have to join us for a few rounds,” Elaine exclaimed as she shuffled the deck. “Just for one or two. Then you can go.”

“Yeah, remember we used to play all the time with Phil?” Your brother chirped. “You always were close to beating us.”

At this you remembered indeed staying up at night during various thunderstorms and low-category hurricanes at Phil’s house when you were barely 7 or 8. Your parents, meanwhile, would usually be with Phil sharing wine downstairs discussing local politics and stocks. The windows in Phil’s bedroom would be covered with metallic shutters. The electricity and Phil’s bedroom light would have flickered and cut out hours before from Houston’s strong winds and rains. You, him, and Matty huddled in his bedroom with a flightlight weakly illuminating where the three of you sat. The sound of the howling winds, sounding almost like ghosts, would usually send chills down your spine. The thunder crashing would make you flinch.

But in the company of Matty and Phil, you would forget about the howling. By the lantern, you played Go Fish, Uno, and even Monopoly. Knowing you were scared of the thunder, Phil had the habit of draping you with one of his blankets. When thunder clapped or lightning flashed, he distracted you with the cards. Cards, something you almost never play now as an adult, was still something that you remembered fondly. Even as you got older, before Phil left for the Marines, you remembered seeing Phil go through his nightstand’s drawer to find his deck of cards if it looked like the lights might go out again. 

Memories still swirling in your mind faintly, you felt Phil shift beside you slightly. His shoulder lightly grazed yours and you felt a warm feeling blossom in your chest. You brought your hands to your face, fingers touching your cheeks, as you felt them grow warm too. You glanced at Phil tentatively and saw that he also was looking at you in anticipation for you to join in. 

You sighed in faux defeat, “Alright maybe one round. Then I’m heading back to bed.”

Next thing you knew, several rounds had passed. More than a decade after having last played against Phil and Matty, you finally managed to win. Elaine won most of the rounds, however. She teased him several times by stealing very obviously glances at his hand, making Matty dramatically call for a rematch or to disqualify Elaine. Witnessing this kind of back-and-forth bantering normally would make you feel like an awkward third wheel. But, thankfully, Phil was there to crack jokes with you about how their bickering felt like a strange sneak-peek into their future lives as a married couple.

After a few rounds, you decided to take another break and watch. You got comfortable laying down on your side on the velvety sofa behind Phil. Knowing you were behind him, Phil also felt it was hard to hide his grin, especially when he could feel you shifting and breathing while he played. After a while, he could almost hear how your breathing slowed and you seemed to sink, more relaxed, into the cushions of the sofa. He glanced back behind you, noticing your eyes were closed and how you nestled your head into the pillow shams in the shape of a beach palm tree. The corner of his mouth twitched into a soft smile at the sight. 

Your brother stretched his arms above his head and yawned, while Elaine gathered all the discarded cards and shoved them back into the main deck. “I think we’re gonna start winding down now,” Matty mumbled out. “I can’t believe it’s almost one in the morning.”

Phil checked his watch, the same watch his father gave him many years before. “Oh, shoot. Time sure flew by.”

Matty and Elaine got up. “Well, we’ll see you tomorrow morning, Phil. Hope you can get some rest,” Elaine said.

“G’night!” Matty said, his eyes noticeably growing heavier. Phil waved them goodbye with a polite smile, wishing them a good night’s rest as well.

Phil stared at them, slightly bemused, as they shuffled away from the living room toward their shared bedroom. He was shocked they didn’t bother to wake you up so you could go to your room. He turned around, noticing you were still sound asleep. He peered down, not sure how best to wake you. For a few moments, he just studied your features. At times, when you breathed out slowly it sounded like a soft, almost airy snore. Your brows were knitted, as if you were in deep concentration in whatever images were flickering in your dreams. 

Sometimes, Phil found he was still in denial of how much you had grown—how much you had changed . Of course, he still felt the same protective affection toward you, much like Matty did as your older brother. But along with that affection, he also felt new things that he couldn’t quite nail down. Sometimes, he wanted to curse himself for staring at how your hips moved when you walked or how your clothes hugged your body. When he saw that Richard was your partner, he even felt some jealousy bleeding into his thoughts. He brushed off those thoughts as him just being a man—and a brutish one at that sometimes. Still, other times he found himself growing anxious over you. He thought, yes, it was obvious you’d grown so much, but you still were better fitted with someone who understood you better, someone who would protect you rather than talk down to you, unlike Richard. He felt this inexplicable instinct to simply bring you closer to him, whether it meant embracing you in his arms, to weave his fingers with yours, to never stop talking to you or observing every one of your little movements and quirks. How he wanted to flee from his hometown of Houston during his vacation time if he meant he got to spend more time with you—and yes, your family, but especially you—at this beach house. 

Phil shook himself out of his thoughts. He glanced again at the watch on his wrist and told himself it really was getting late, and he didn’t want to end up sleeping in tomorrow if he was here as a guest. But he also didn’t know what to do with your sleeping form on the sofa. He didn’t want to wake you with how deep in slumber you seemed to be. 

Without thinking twice, he strode over to his guest room. He saw that he had about three blankets neatly folded on top of his bed. He snatched one and returned quickly to the living room to find you still there. Carefully, he draped the fuzzy blanket over your form, making sure it covered your shoulders and feet just right. You started to move, making him freeze where he stood. But his muscles relaxed in relief when he saw that you were only snuggling into the blanket more. Your brows were slightly furrowed before, but now they relaxed and you seemed truly at rest. Good . You at least seemed comfortable. 

He turned around and headed to the lightswitch. He admired your sleeping form one last time, before deciding that he too was also exhausted, especially after a day of travel. He flicked it off, and headed back to his room.

[verminsmillions]

Update: Chapter 17!

Mizu and Taigen face off once again, in an unfamiliar place, filled with unfamiliar faces, and they wind up with unexpected results…

[orgasming-caterpillar]

DOYH Chapter 20 

Ranveer's POV 

Ranveer was going to be sick. What the fuck had this day been? Not only had he surprised himself with his lack of restraint, it hadn't even earned the satisfaction from Raghav that he had expected. 

He couldn't believe he wanted to confess today.

He couldn't bring himself to do it the entire day, thumb frozen just centimeters away from the dial button. He couldn't do it in the car, when Raghav himself was mere inches away from him. He couldn't do it after beating someone up for Raghav. And now they were backstage in the auditorium and a dozen hands were on him adjusting his hair, his makeup, his clothes, and he thought��� might as well go through with the competition first. 

It had all happened too fast. One moment, Raghav's hand was on his thigh, he was nipping at his bottom lip as he tried to concentrate on the road. He thought Raghav might want to talk, sort some shit out but the exact moment he opened his mouth to speak a person threw themselves in front of the car. 

The moment Ayush slammed his fist on the car window Ranveer's vision went red. He didn't remember getting out of the car, didn't remember beating Ayush up, but he did remember that when he told Raghav how long he had wished to do that, Raghav didn't smile. 

Nor was Raghav smiling now, as he stood behind Ranveer waiting for him to get his hair done. 

Ranveer tried not to look at him. Lord knows what would happen if he let his gaze linger a bit too long. Raghav was wearing a silk maroon top of the same design as Ranveer's kurta, with a neckline stooping too low on his chest to leave any coherent thoughts in Ranveer's head. 

Raghav walked out of the room to peek at the stage, and Ranveer followed soon after. 

Lights were off. Tension was high. And only one man in the spotlight was speaking over the audience's polite claps. 

Ranveer's heart shuddered in his chest as he realized who the man was. 

He still looked the same as ever, though better groomed. There was a gray streak in his black hair that Ranveer didn't remember being there. His posture was the same, and so was his voice. 

Laxman Bhargav. One of the judges for the competition, and Ranveer's father.

There was a distant hum building inside him, growing louder with each clap from the audience, with each syllable coming out of his estranged father's mouth. It came to a point Ranveer couldn't hear anything besides the hum. And in the silence, in his chest, a pressure made its presence known like some vengeful ghost. It filled his chest, filled his eyes and filled his world, making it difficult to breathe or see. 

How could he have not expected this? Of course the college was going to invite a world known dancer for the competition, they did so every year. 

He wanted to march over and make his fists sing. He wanted to run away and be done with this awful day. He wanted to scream at his father. He wanted to cry to his mother. He wanted to hide his sister. He wanted to do all of this at once, and restraining those urges was making him shake, concerning everybody in the backstage. 

He could feel people eyeing him strangely. Fuck that. He couldn't give less of a shit. The thought of dancing in front of that monster made him queasy. 

So he won't. 

•••

“You have to!”

Raghav was banging on the door. Relentlessly. 

For fuck’s sake. Let him breathe. Breathe. Breathe.

In. Out. In. Out. In. IN. IN. IN.

He couldn't.

“DARWAZA KHOL RANVEER!”

As he did, a very rattled Raghav took him in and started a new chant of curses. He wanted to say he’s not helping, but he was too busy trying to get air in his lungs.

“Okay, shit fuck what do i do what do i do you’re clearly having a panic attack.” He looked around the cramped changing room. “Okay shit listen,” he took Ranveer by his shoulders and got into his face, “you know that grounding technique where you use your senses? We’re going to do that. Tell me the five things you can see right now.” He wanted to snap at him that he can barely discern one leg from another but he focused on Raghav’s face, then his own reflection in the full length mirror, warm coloured and textured tiles on the floor, door of the stalls and the toilets insides. “Okay good, now four things you can feel.” Raghav’s hands on his shoulders, cold floor, wall on his back, Raghav’s breath on his face. “Done? Three sounds you can hear.” Raghav’s voice, his own heart beating out of his chest, and the sickly sweet voice of his own father. 

His father was here. 

Raghav's voice was getting distant. He could no longer hear it over the beating of his own heart. 

"RANVEER!" 

His vision swam. He let Raghav pull him into a chair. His temples throbbed with pain every time he thought of his father's sickly sweet voice. 

Raghav cupped his face, making him look up into his pleading brown eyes. "What happened!?"

Ranveer swatted his hands away. His words were a sneer, "That's my fucking father, Raghav. Laxman Bhargav is my father."

Even saying the name had shame crawling in his gut. This was why his father had wanted to speak to him. He must have seen Ranveer's name in the contestants' profile. He-

His thoughts were interrupted by Raghav's hands on the back of his head, pulling him in. Before he knew it, the side of his face was pressed against the bare skin of Raghav's chest. The comforting weight of Raghav's hand was on his back and on the back of his head. 

When he inhaled, he could smell the soft floral scent of Raghav's perfume, the freshly washed fabric of his top and beneath it, a warmth that was simply Raghav. Ranveer closed his eyes.

His panic seemed muted as he placed his hands on Raghav's sides, like the memory of hunger after you're full. Then why was his heart still racing? Or rather, was it the rampant beating of his own heart that was howling in his ears or was it Raghav's? 

Dimly, he registered that this was very possibly the closest he would ever get to having Raghav in his arms.

"I'm sorry, Raghav."

A knock on the door snapped them both out of their daze.

Ranveer quickly stood up and began fixing his hair in the mirror. He couldn't bring himself to meet Raghav's gaze, even in the mirror. It didn't help that Raghav was staring at Ranveer's reflection so intently.

"Sorry for what?"

"Nothing," Ranveer replied a moment too soon. 

"Ranveer." The chill in his voice sent a tremor through Ranveer's limbs. "What were you going to say?"

"Nothing, you should probably get the door-"

"You know who's at the door. They're calling us outside. What were you going to say?"

Ranveer turned around, a dark indifference in his eyes that marked the absence of whatever affection Raghav thought might have been in the air. "Open the door, Raghav. It's our performance."

Raghav was rooted in his place. His chest heaved with shallow breaths, his expression was a hundred different emotions. "Will you dance?" was all he asked. Though Ranveer wondered there were many other questions he wanted the answers to.

"Yes," he answered, to all of them. 

[love-is-a-pearl]

Can you just Yap about pearl shipping to me. Like a google drive or something detailing everything and I mean EVERYTHING about these two idiots because I genuinely think that would be better then any fanfic out there (no offense obv I absolutely love your fics MAKE MORE PLEASE I BEG) and yeah 👍 also don’t mind my name I made it in like 2020 and I just redownloaded tumblr like a month ago, remembered you existed and re read your fic and yeah I’m completely and totally normal 🥲

ioasjdoiash I wouldn't mind sharing some stuff in private if you wanna talk about it (my discord handle is sigulary if you wanna add me by any chance :3), but I'm gonna be honest that I want to keep the details of the project to myself until I actually write the fics 🙏

I know I'm not the best writer and it would be easier/faster to just make a post infodumping about the AU as a whole but like... I dont wanna lol

There's some ideas I'm very atatched to and while I don't mind when people take inspo from my drawings, fics or the "what if's" i often talk about with Seine and Silver here; the AU, the stuff I want to explore with Ash and Dawn.. those are things i don't want to share half heartedly... Like, some ideas I have could work as oneshots or comics and the idea of someone taking those and doing it before me (or worse: with another ship) is very scary to me haha

I'm not saying I'm the most creative and specialest person in the world LMAO, but this AU is very special to me; Ash, Dawn, the anime and Pokemon are very special to me. And I want to do this properly. And I can't reiterate enough that I have anxiety and the irrational fear of someone taking ideas that i spent years on and doing it before me is very real and depressing for me

I know I have too big plans and they will take time and that I'm slow/not the best, but I really really want to do this to the best of my abilites and at my own pace (which is made even slower cause I only have 4h of daytime to work on the fics because I am working on art commissions on the rest since that is my main income)

If it's of any consolation tho, I did promise myself that if the hyperfixation ever starts to die or we get a remake of the Ashnime (which who knows, may happen next year aoisdoasjdioa), I'll just upload all the AU files into a google drive, dropbox or something for yall to see👍 so don't worry i dont plan on taking this AU with me to the grave opajsdoadojsaiodajos

[jazzzzzzhands]

Oh I got an ask!! And ohh it feels good to draw again!

It's nice to have an excuse to doodle!

Please I welcome asks of art requests during this time of art block!

(i also miss my Groovy au if someone wants to send me an ask..)

[pirateborn-a]

what do you mean Buggy's birthday was two days ago--

[princewylder]

Man I've been so sleepy

[murdervictim395]

sorry to all my friendz if i go kinda radio silent

</3 im crawling back into my cave of not talking to people again

[ankle-breaker-101]

It’s September, y’all! Aka the month of early birthday gifts. 😋 Just got some new nail polish and a hug-sized plush! <3

[lilac-melody]

Hnnn.

[hexhaywire-updates]

deleting this stream later

[cherrylight]

hi.

i guess im going through some sort of healing era because ive realised so much shit and realised why things are so hard for me

one of the main ones is actually just having fun and enjoying things again and its been one of the most hardest things to ever do because to me its hard to have fun with anything i do... which may be why selfshipping lately hasnt been fun or it feels like a complete obstacle for me because im not having fun with it, not enjoying myself

like being immersive in anything is so difficult and relearning that its ok to well enjoy things and be a part of those things (ie: fandoms, selfshipping, etc) is difficult to accept but something i know is vital to accept to enjoy yourself upon doing anything

ive started writing out just small snippets of things, maybe ill start jotting down silly hcs or something idk. i wont share it until i feel as if im able to do so without second thought until then

[m4sterofthewicket]

Me when there's a second Crack forming in my bedroom wall😍directly near my bed this time too. And my rooms the only one that does it(that i know of)

So if I pull a Tomcat Disposables that could be why

[simpingforheros]

Jason’s Wife?!

Pairing: Jason Todd X Female! Reader

Summary: Meet Mrs. Todd?! Jason got eloped and he doesn’t intend on sharing his blushing bride just yet.

Warnings: SMUT, Fluff, Established Relationship, Eloping, Jason being an ass to his family (for good reason), Jason calling Reader Ma (can’t remember who wrote about that, please tag them because I love this headcanon), P in V, unprotected sex (don’t advertise for the unsafe sex, put some breading on yalls chicken before dumping it in oil) , Oral (m receiving), Body Worship, Phone/Facetime during the deed, Exhibition Kink, Mating Press, Slight Breeding Kink, Degradation, Praise, crying kink??,TOXIC-ish And POSSESSIVE! Jason Todd is back, Traumatizing Dick again.

Author’s Note: Thank you guys so much for the praise I got on my last Jason Todd Fanfic! I didn’t know you guys would like my first smut that much so I made a part 2. Enjoy your next fix you horny bastards (jk I love you guys )

AN: This is Part 2 to Jason’s Girl??, so go read that for some context. Also a quick shout out to the mutual who started my spiraling decent into his madness, @jjenthusee , who was the main inspiration because of their amazing artwork! Also I’m sorry this was late and I don’t update as often, I’m in my second semester in a health major and I’m stumped man. I’ll update when I can I promise.

A/N: Part 3>>> Jason Broke What??

++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++

Jason Todd is a lot of things. He’s known for bad things and good things. It depends on who you ask.

A menace, a murderer, a zombie, an asshole, etc.

A son, a brother, a hero….

But there’s two things everyone can agree on.

1). He’s a good boyfriend.

For the last 6 months since Jason finally revealed his secret girlfriend of two years, the Bat Family learned just how much of a better person Jason was when (Y/N) was around.

His voice was softer and kinder to others. His temperament was more patient and his fists stayed loose. Her presence acting like a balm to sooth his soul as soon as he feels her comforting hand on his skin.

There were obvious moments of trouble, such as little squabbles or one gets snappy at the other, but normally they sort it out. Even if Bruce and the rest of the family didn’t know her for long, they knew that she had the backbone to handle Jason and give him what he needed without babying him.

Jason even shows his love for her in goofy ways, such as wearing matching shirts or color coordinated outfits. The two are now known for their Friday date nights and lazy Saturdays where they don’t wanna be disturbed. Their late night rides or their silent evenings where either a book or controller is in hand.

Red Hood is known for lingering around certain streets where she would be at when she had to work late, and he always had a bottle of water or granola bar he ‘mysteriously appeared’ out of thin air.

Jason was known for being proud of building the healthiest relationship he’s ever had with someone who didn’t fall in love with him because he was Bruce Wayne’s son, or Batman’s protege. She fell in love with Jason Peter Todd and all he was.

Which leads to the one thing that the family also knew him for.

2) Jason Todd would not tell anyone when he dropped down on one knee and asked (Y/N) to be his wife.

+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++

The proposal was a spontaneous to say the least.

Their usual Saturday routine of laying on the couch, too exhausted from the week to move. Jason laid on the opposite side as his beloved, her feet dangling off to the side of his hips as his own rested behind her shoulders. They both had a book in as they enjoyed their silence. The only noise coming from the soft patter of Frank coming over to lay on his adopted father.

The tabby cat that Jason claimed to not like despite the male cat clinging to him like glue. The cat jumped onto his stomach with a deep groan emitting from him. A soft giggle filled the room as she sets her book down and pulls the feline to her.

“I still don’t understand why my cat likes you more than me.” She comments as she strokes the tabby’s fur.

Jason scoffs as he carefully rolls off the couch and onto his feet. “Probably to spite me.”

He heads to the kitchen to grab them a drink as he hears one comment that seemed to change everything in one second.

“What’s gonna happen when we have a kid? Would you think they would prefer you over me or would we have another Frank?…”

The question was a hypothetical one, a normal one couples would ask just to make sound in the air. Jason would have probably answered light heartedly with a kiss or a smart ass comment to make her laugh, but it felt different. He felt different.

There wasn’t a ‘if’ in the question like it would or wouldn’t happen, but a definite of ‘when’ it would happen. Jason knew that he wanted to spend the rest of his life with her. Hell, he managed to not fuck up a relationship he kept hidden for 2 years. He knew he wanted to marry her the moment he decided to open up and let her into his life by moving her in and introducing her to his family.

So, even if it was on an impulse, Jason returns back into the living room and as he placed their drinks on the coffee table as he kneels on the floor beside the couch. (Y/N) sits up as she smiles at him, unaware of the decision he made.

“Penny for your thoughts, Todd?” She asked playfully as she offers him an imaginary penny in between her pinched fingers.

Jason smiles as he takes her out stretched hand before kissing the back of it.

“Marry me.”

The seriousness in his eyes made her playful attitude dissolve to disbelief.

“What?…”

“I wanna marry you, (Y/N)…You are the everything I could ever want and don’t deserve. But I can’t imagine building a life like the one we have with anyone else. You are one of the few lights this dark world has and I wanna love and protect you for the rest of our lives.” Jason explains as he nervously massages her hand as his eyes shined with deep love and affection. “Even if I don’t have a ring yet and we are in our pajamas, will you accept me and let me become yours forever?”

Tears streamed down her face as she nods frantically. Her arms quickly wrapping around Jason’s neck and pulling him into a kiss.

Jason melts into her and begins to move to be on top of her on the couch until a sharp hiss makes him stop.

“Quiet, Frank…” Jason grumbles at the cat.

“Daddy is trying get some sugar from Mama~”

+++++++++++++++++

A week later, Alfred appeared extra peppy for the day. His duties were quickly done before the family was awake and his fidgeting gotten everyone concerned. Alfred was the normally level-headed gentle hand of the house, so seeing him so giddy made everyone nervous.

It wasn’t until he surprisingly left in one of his better suits and a gift bag that the rest of the Wayne Family just decided that he may be going to an event or some kind.

“Where do you think he’s going?” Tim asks his younger brother from behind a book.

Damian shrugs as he says, “How should I know?”

The answer wouldn’t come until later that evening. Alfred came back with both the brightest smile and red swollen eyes. In his hands were a single pale pink rose and a camera as he scurries to the study.

Tim, Dick, and Damian, who were scattered around the living room, followed out of curiosity. What’s gotten Alfred this way? An old flame? The thought of Alfred getting down and dirty made the boys shudder before they continue to the study and ultimately down to the Batcave.

“Yo, Alfred.” Dick calls out as he exits the elevator.

Alfred stood by the large chair over looking the Batcomputer as Bruce’s hulking form peaked over the leather. The clicking of the mouse playing in the background as Alfred turns his head to address Dick.

“Yes, Master Richard?” He says. In his hand was the camera with cables connecting it to the computer.

“Where have you been? You kinda left in a hurry…”

Tim jumps in as he says, “I mean, we aren’t trying to be rude, but you did seem kinda jumpy this morning.”

Damian’s words cut through the other two like ice as his eyes look at the monitor.

“Did Todd and his woman get married?”

Dick and Tim look back at Damian before their shocked expressions look up to the monitor. Their eyes widen in disbelief at the image before them.

Standing in a suit was a an absolutely beeming smile was Jason Todd with his hands interlocked with (Y/N), who was wearing a white dress. The dress didn’t look like the traditional floor length gown. Instead it was a backless chic dress with a bow on the back. Her hair was down and decorated with pearl ornaments as a matching ribbon choker was around her neck with a single aged pearl on it.

In their interlocked finders, a familiar set of rings shined . Martha Wayne’s sparkling diamond engagement ring and her wedding band was on (Y/N)’s finger as a matching wedding band was on Jason’s finger.

The surroundings didn’t look like a typical wedding venue with flowers and ribbons with a crowd of people. It was a courthouse, Gotham City Courthouse. On (Y/N)’s side stood Alfred holding a pale pink bouquet that was most likely the bride’s. What surprised them the most was a smiling Bruce on Jason’s side, a look of pride on his face that he rarely shown.

The boys break out of their shell as Dick complains.

“This can’t be real… Jason and (Y/N) got married without telling any of us….AND YOU LET JASON HAVE MARTHA’S RING!!” Dick snaps as his irritation grew. “You said I was gonna have it.”

Bruce sighs as he says, “I said that before you cheated on both of your girlfriends with each other.”

Alfred chuckles as he says, “And Master Jason specifically stated that he only wanted me and Master Bruce there.”

Tim frowns as he asks, “Why weren’t we invited?”

Alfred gives the boy a sympathetic look before reciting, “Miss (Y/N) and Jason only wanted a small ceremony and off what he said, ‘Damian makes (Y/N) uncomfortable when he calls her Jason’s woman and a distraction. Dick is plain out not invited because of reasons he knows why. And Tim can’t keep his mouth shut to save his life, so he’s not invited.’”

Damian tsks as he says, “I wouldn’t have wanted to go anyways.”

Dick was flustered as the images of the incident Alfred was referring to. He still can’t get her moans out of his head…

Tim pouts and says, “I’m gonna remember this…But why was Bruce invited then?”

Bruce responds with a smirk , “Because I was asked to give away the bride.”

++++++++++++++++++++++++++++

As soon as the newly weds returned their apartment, the lust sprinkled down like hale. Her well manicured hair was now messy as his hands held her head. His mouth devouring her moans as her own lips kept up with his pace.

Her fingers desperately removing his tie as the shrilling ring of Jason’s cell phone fills the air. He ignores it in favor of trailing tongue against his bride’s as she slings off the tie.

“Gonna answer that?” She mumbles as his mouth begins to trail down her jawline. Jason doesn’t answer as his hands scoop up under her thighs to pick her up. Her giggles were music in his ears as he says,

“It’s probably just Tim or Dick. Probably bitching about the wedding…”

Jason carries his wife through the threshold of their apartment hallway as his lips remained on hers. Their vows sealed in teeth and tongues as he expertly guided them into the bedroom.

His phone finally stopped ringing as he places her on the bed. Hands groping and pulling off of clothing as he unwraps her down to her underwear and stockings. His mouth hot against her breast as she pushes his now unbuttoned shirt down his shoulders.

His other hand dipping into her underwear as he flicks her erected nipples like a guitar. Her sweet music filling the room as he’s met with a creamy cunt under her white thong.

“Fuccck, ma..” He moans against her breast. Jason pulls away with a devilish smirk as he runs his finger over her sopping folds, carefully avoiding her hole and clit. “I can’t tell what I like more…your pretty tits or your sloppy cunt…”

(Y/N) feels the wave of shameful arousal fill her stomach as she whines out, “Stop teasing me, baby. It’s our wedding day and you’re acting like a jackass…”

Her body jolts as he pinches her clit. Her hips jerking as she moans at the sensation. Jason had a look of faux sympathy before mumbling against the valley of her breasts.

“Oh, you’re right…” His voice barely audible to her as he begins to rub heart shaped patterns on her clit, making sure to dip down to her gasping pussy as he dips down. “I’m not acting like a good husband, ain’t I? Let me make it up to you, Mrs. Todd.”

His lips attached to her unabused nipple before his middle finger finally dips into her pulsing hole. His groan accentuated by the scraping of his teeth against her sensitive flesh. The feeling of her cunt sucking his one finger in making him light headed as her moans ringed out.

“Jason…stop teasing me…I want you…” She begs as her hips try to meet the thrust of his finger. He growls at her bossiness before yanking his finger out of her pulling her panties down her thighs.

Her eyes glared at him for the loss of stimulation before he quickly pops her pussy lightly. The wet slap of skin making her cringe in embarrassment before Jason begins to leave a trail of open kisses and bites down her body. Making sure to pay special attention to the matching tattoo on her hip before he mumbles to her with a lazy smile.

“Your wish is my command.”

Before he could dig into his meal, the shrill ring of his phone invades the space. He yanks his phone out of his pocket and looks at the screen before declining the call. He tosses the phone onto the bed as he glares at the offending device.

“Stupid Dick..” He groans before a soft hand on his face draws him back to her. Her gentle touch bringing peace to his mind as she pulls him up to press a soft peck to his lips.

His mind goes blank as she gently lures him to stand before she kneels down, trailing kisses down his exposed chest and his scars. Her love poured into his body as her lips traced his autopsy scars. Her eyes shining so pretty as she presses an extra long kiss to his matching tattoo on his Adonis belt.

The silent vow that was made a year and a half into dating on a drunk night out with Roy.

‘I am hers and she is mine’

“Let me be a good wife to you, Mr. Todd.” She whispers against his skin. Her breath like hot fire before her hands snake off his belt and trousers. Her mischievous eyes gleaming in lustful delight as Jason’s lip curls in between his teeth. His eyes almost glowing as she presses her warm lips against his clothed tip. His hand fisting into her hair as he hisses at her.

“Don’t you fucking tease me…”

*RING* *RING*

Jason glares at the phone before he snatches it up. He sees the familiar notification as his own image shown on the phone. FaceTime.

“Answer it.”

“What?” Jason asks in confusion before looking down to her. His surprise was suppressed with a hiss as she pulls his hard cock out of his underwear. Her hand lazyily stroking him as she gives him a look of faux innocence.

“Answer it. It’s rude to ignore family..”

Jason feels a smirk curled onto his face as he realizes what she wanted. His dick hardened to iron as he remembers why he fell for her.

She was just as fucked as he was.

With that, Jason schools his face as he answers the phone with an annoyed expression.

“What?” He says as the image of his brother appears on his phone screen.

Dick glares at Jason before snapping at him. “You got fucking married?! Without inviting any of us?!”

“Didn’t Alfred tell you why we didn’t want you guys there?” Jason asked in as much annoyance as he can muster as he felt the wet pull of lips around his cock.

His hand gripping her hair kept her from getting more than his tip in as he hides his reaction. Her tongue licking his tip like a kitten wanting milk.

“But we are family for fucks sake.”

Jason’s actual annoyance getting the best of him as he hisses,

“I’m sorry, but I recall you trying to fuck my wife.”

“THAT WAS BEFORE I KNEW YOU WERE DATING HER!!”

Jason becomes distracted as (Y/N) starts sucking him off. Her drool and his precum slowly beginning to coat her mouth and hand as it strokes what she can’t fit into her pretty mouth.

His brow furrowed as his pleasure and annoyance started to mix on his face. Jason decides to get some payback on both his wife and brother as he slyly mentions.

“Oh but you had no problem rubbing one out when I sent those videos.”

He pulls her closer to his pelvis to muffle her surprised moan. If he wasn’t on the phone, he would degrade her like a slut with how she acts when she remembers being recorded. Her cheeks hollow as Dick’s jaw drops as Jason mentions the videos.

“I-I..”

“Admit it.” Jason says, his voice grew more taunting. “You probably still jack off to the videos because you’re nothing but a loser who cheats on any good woman he gets because you’re scared of attaching to someone.”

Jason can feel her eagerness grow as she sucks harder, actually pulling him as deep into her throat as she can. He almost wanted to both laugh at how cute she was as she gagged around him and coo at how proud he was of her. Her jaw was gonna be hurting like a bitch either way.

Dick’s baffled expression almost made it better as his eyes shined with shame over what Jason knew to be true.

“That’s why Bruce gave me Martha’s ring.” Jason says as he forces (Y/N) to take him all the way down her throat. Her nose pressing into his light patch of black hair as Jason says. “fuck…I can fuck (Y/N) like I fucking hate her guts and she would take it because she knows I would rather swallow glass than fuck anyone else like I do her. To even love anyone halfway as I do her would be a sin…”

The fluttering feeling of her throat as her nails digged into his thigh affirming his conviction.

“I’m not afraid to get attached… As long as she lives, I’ll never let her go…”

He hangs up before Dick can respond as he yanks her back by her hair. Her coughing and gasping for air as she whine painfully at both the lost of his cock in her mouth and the painful grip on her scalp.

Jason releases her hair before kneeling beside her on the floor. His expression tender as he cups her face. Her light makeup look from the wedding was now smudged off with her mascara flowing down her face with her tears. Her lips puffy and wet from his assault on her mouth. Her body littered in forming bruises from his teeth. Her cunt sloppy and leaking a clear sheen down her thighs. Her cheek leaning into his palm as her eyes shined at him with nothing but love and desire.

“Fuck…” He groans before crawling inbetween her legs as he pushes her to lay down on the floor. His mouth back on hers as his throbbing erection lightly dragged against her fluttering pussy. The head catching her clit despite the watery resistance as she whimpers into his mouth.

“You look so pretty like this…” Jason says before sticking his tongue down her throats. Their tongues tangling for a moment before his hands cup her face and pull her away. “You feel it, don’t you?”

She whines as his hips rolled against hers. Her cunt angry as it fluttered around nothing. His nearly red dick twitching as it desires salvation in her temple as Jason breathlessly whimpers.

“Feel how bad I need you baby? Fuck I can’t stand it. I wanna fuck you every day so I can see you look like this.” He says as he wraps his hand his member. He slaps her pussy with it twice before dragging his head over her entrance, the heavy appendage dipping in slightly as he says.

“I wanna ruin you so good. You’re such a good pretty girl that I want to ruin and make as fucked up as me…”

Her gasps fill the room as he starts to bully his tip into her. Even though they were both well experienced with each other, every time she takes him feels like the first time with that delicious stretch.

His unusually talkative mood doesn’t let up as he pushes his hips into her, forcing her to take him.

“You’re so gorgeous…” He whispers as he pulls her legs over his shoulders as he grasps her hips, forcing them up as he starts to fill her to the hilt. “God, this pussy is unbelievable…gonna fill her up everyday and eat her out every night…”

His thrusts start off slow but hard as her hands desperately held onto what bit of Jason she could as he fucked her like a doll. Her whimpers and moans filling the air as the sticky sound of his balls smacking her ass.

His hot breath tickles her ears as his hips develop the torturous pattern of pistoling into her like a hard buck before rolling in a deep and filling thrust. Her eyes filling with tears and brain fog as he filled her lust sick brain with praise.

“Such a good little wife…a sweet little thing with a nice soft body for me…” He groans as his pace becomes brutal. His precision and memory impeccably beats anything he learned as a vigilante as he assaults her G-spot. Her eyes rolling back as lighting strikes her the brain as she begins to cry.

“Fuck. Fuck. fuck…” she sobs incoherently as Jason licks the tears off her face.

“You look so hot when your cry…” Jason moans as his thrusts start to become more sloppy. His reaches between them as he rubs tight circles on her clit as he thrusts harder into her soft cunt.

“Will you cry some more please?” He’s asked in a cruel tone. His eyes blown out with desire as he lets his full weight pin her down under him. His added weight making her pinned as she cries. Her stomach tightening at the overwhelming presence of him and his cock destroying her insides.

“I’m gonna fuck a baby into you, Ma…” He says as his own whimpers fall through. “Gonna watch you get swollen and carry a little perfect baby and know that you’re mine…that no one can love you like me… ain’t that right?”

Her impending orgasm blocking off all rational thoughts as her mouth hangs open. His hand pulls from her clit to her frustration and grabs a hold of her jaw. Forcing her to look at him as he says harshly.

“Who do you belong to ,Pretty Girl?”

Her eyes widen as she says, “You…I belong to you baby…”

Jason smirks as he starts thrusting faster. Her shrieks just music in his ears as she falls off the edge. Her vision clouded as white flashes in her vision. Her body nearly convulsing as her cunt squeezes Jason into his own orgasm. His warm seed flooding her quivering womb as he presses a kiss into her neck.

The pair remained still for a moment as they gasped for air. The natural chill of the room causing them to tremble at the stimulation. Her small hand moving first as she grabs his hand, her fingers playing with the gold band on his finger as she whispers.

“My husband…” A soft satisfied smile on her lips as Jason grins widely into her neck as he mumbles.

“All yours, Mrs. Todd.”

**********************

AN: Yea I didn’t know how to end this. 😭 I hope you guys like it because I’m not too sure if the smut is good or not. Let me know what you think as I’m trying to clear out the drafts. Again, Thank you @jjenthusee for inspiring these two fanfics and for being a great mutual.

*******************

@simpingforheros fanfic. I DO NOT CONDONE THE THEFT, COPYING, REPOSTING, AND PLAGIARISM OF MY WORK ON THIS SITE OR OTHER SITES WITHOUT CREDIT OR PERMISSION.

[mandalhoerian]

(6) 🦭 signed, sealed, delivery pending...

When a last-minute opportunity presents itself to become a distraction from the shame of not attending the reunion of your university friend group, you take it. One thing, though, yes, you might have been wrong for chickening out. But falling overboard in a storm, almost drowning, and getting saved by the biggest oddball of a skinny dipper out in the wild is a bit too much for instant karma, you think.

genre: fluff, comedy | word count: 13k | read on ao3

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note: apologizing for late chapters is getting old now i know, but i swear it would have come out earlier if it hadnt been for tumblr's ridiculous mature content label flagging issue . i've been wrestling with that bicth now ever since that update dropped on the 11h. all seal raf chapters are FLAGGED and i cant get them out of superhell. and apparently its their image recognition bot, i had to change the banner image. god if i have to deal with this bs AGAIN im crashing out i hope you enjoy the chapter

The wetsuit is half-zipped, clinging damp against your hips, something that doesn’t quite want to let go. You’re sitting on the flattest rock you can find near the lip of the cove, knees drawn up, elbows balanced on them, phone balanced precariously between your fingers. The mist is still stitched thick between the cliffs, and the morning sun hasn’t quite managed to cut through it yet. Cold air brushes against your bare arms, lifting the baby hairs, biting gently. Your knees are cold. Your mind is worse.

The group chat lights up again.

You scroll without reading at first, just watching the little cascade of names and icons — familiar and sharp-edged in ways you can't explain. It’s watching someone else’s memories keep moving while yours have stalled out in the same old frame. Same island. Same ferry. Same breath caught in your throat.

Yesterday’s conversation still occupies your mind, and you read through it once more.

"F4NT4STIC 4 REUNION ERA" (Yesterday, 13.37) [ tara ♡ ]: LADIES . YOU KNOW WHAT TIME IT ISSSSSSS [ simone (👹🤙) ]: girl i already took the days off. if yall flake i’m showing up to macie’s with a suitcase anyway [ fleetwood mac ]: LMAOO i mean my living room is still 80% cardboard boxes but sure, suffer [ simone (👹🤙) ]: if there’s karaoke i’m unplugging the speaker with my teeth [ tara ♡ ]: also HELLO??? miss ferrymaster of heartbreak bay??? [ tara ♡ ]: we see you reading and not respondingggg [ tara ♡ ]: THE WAY SHE’S STILL NOT ANSWERING [ fleetwood mac ]: come online and disappear if you're alive. don't write anything if you’re still in love with your ex [ fleetwood mac ]: you’re still in love with him???? [ fleetwood mac ]: damn it didnt work [ simone (👹🤙) ]: she’s gonna come back in like six hours and act like nothing happened [ simone (👹🤙) ]: literally text back. we're not mad you couldn't come. stop acting like this is a break-up !!!

(Yesterday, 23.35) [ you ]: sorry. alive. extremely salty. [ you ]: had to scrub barnacle residue off my soul before texting back. [ fleetwood mac ]: SYBAU girl you disappeared like a victorian child into the mist 😭 [ simone (👹🤙) ]: anyway. macie's wine count is at 3. tara made a playlist. theo hasn’t cried yet [ you ]: bold of you to assume he won’t [ fleetwood mac ]: we placed bets. i give him until desert [ tara ♡ ]: also you were right, he brought the seal mug he made in his pottery course. Unironically. [ you ]: I feel the emotional blackmail all the way from over here … [ fleetwood mac) ]: i had to leave the room. i was spiritually unprepared [ you ]: move it like half an inch every time he looks away and pretend like nothing happened to freak him out that paranormal shit is going on. for my sake. please [ tara ♡ ]: That's horrible. How do you come up with stuff like this? Do you want us to get kicked out if he makes a scene? [ tara ♡ ]: I'll send you pictures 😘 [ simone (👹🤙) ]: we set a place for you vtw. it’s got a rock on it. and a fork. [ you ]: that’s exactly how i would’ve wanted it <3

Your thumb pauses above a message. Just names. Names that once belonged to cramped dorm rooms, midnight indomie, and mutual breakdowns in libraries that smelled of old glue. The kind of friendships that were lifelines — loud and chaotic and necessary. And they still are. But you’re quieter now. Less sure what part you should play in their world.

Tara’s already published several scientific papers, both on her own and with her teacher — ResearchGate profile overflowing with content. Simone’s backpacked solo through South America and made it look unreal the entire time, every photo gold-dusted and cinematic and you’re sure she lives in an indie travel documentary. Macie just got picked up for a docuseries pilot. The one who shall not be named passed his bar exam and launched a website in his name that has to be surely coded by a tech god and branded by a Parisian design firm.

And you?

You still have this wetsuit from sophomore year. A freezer full of discount frozen meals. A collection of ferry schedules memorized down to the second.

You still work shifts that stretch into your bones. Still sleep in the room with the glow-in-the-dark stars you stuck to the ceiling at fourteen. Still get asked by tourists if you ever get tired of paradise. As if it’s not the same damn shoreline every day. They don’t know paradise comes with guilt-paid free health insurance and the inability to look into your parents' eyes without sweating through your shirt.

The museum front desk application sits untouched on your desktop. The deadline came and went while you were distracted by nothing in particular. There’s a half-written email to the local heritage center still sitting in your drafts. Volunteering was mentioned once, briefly, in passing, and never again.

You told your advisor you were taking a year. Time to figure things out. To recalibrate. To breathe.

But the year kept slipping. One month into the next. One season curling into the other. You started taking the same walk every morning. Then you stopped bothering with a route. Some days, even brushing your teeth was something that had to be earned.

You tried to make plans. Tried to start a spreadsheet. Color-coded your week and pretended it meant something. It lasted three days. Then the shame of seeing your own optimism undone by inertia sent you spiraling into the sea with your phone on do-not-disturb.

Sometimes you wake up already disappointed in yourself. Sometimes you manage to coast until lunch. The rest of the time, it sneaks up in strange places: folding laundry, stirring pasta, passing your own reflection and not recognizing anything urgent in your own eyes.

You keep saying you’ll get out. That it’s temporary. That you’re not stuck. You tell yourself that so often it’s started taking the shape of a prayer. Or a dare.

But every time you scroll, you feel it. That sharp, quiet pinch in your ribs. You're watching a starting line recede in the distance while your legs stay tangled in the sand.

A sharp twist of your mouth curls before you can stop it, too bitter to be a smile, too wry to be pain. You toss your phone a few inches further across the towel, willing the distance keep the elephant in the room away for a while longer.

And Theo. Of course he’s there.

Ha.

You sit still. A breath leaves your nose. The rock beneath you is cold, uneven, your palms flat against it. Wet grit clings to your fingers. You focus on that. The gulls loop overhead, shrieking into the pale air. Below, the tide moves against the rocks in shallow bursts, licking foam into the cracks and pulling it back again with a hiss. The world hasn't stopped, but it’s ignoring you on purpose.

No, you're ignoring it on purpose. 

A sleek head breaches the surface a few yards out, rising between two fingers of rock where kelp sways below in long green ribbons. A huff leaves him in a pfbbbth sound — short, damp, unimpressed — and he glides forward in a meandering path, stirring flecks of foam in his wake. The water around him flattens, then rolls behind his body in lazy spirals. Even the cove is used to making space for him.

You don’t smile. It almost happens, your face twitches because it wants to. But it doesn’t make it all the way. He’s watching you, waiting, head tilted just slightly.

"Someone’s a little restless today," you mutter.

He barks again. Short. With an imaginary question mark at the end of it. Surely it’s because he hasn’t received his usual cooing greetings and your, “Hi, hi, hi, my cutie pie,” — but your spirits are as gray as the weather. You can’t summon the cheerfulness.

"Yeah, yeah, I’m coming."

You slide into the water slower than usual, the cold biting at your ankles and climbing. Raf circles once, then again, but doesn’t dart off the way he normally does. He floats closer instead, trailing you as you wade out to the deeper part. When your feet finally lift from the sand, you turn toward him.

"I should’ve just gone," you say. "I don’t know why I’m so scared of a little get-together. Who cares if I’m not working yet? I should just say I’m taking a gap year… Like for uni graduates. Or say like I’m looking into Work and Travel but haven’t really liked any of the choices or something."

He tilts his head. How clueless and cute. Smooth brain. No ridges or lumps, no valleys or bumps; all ideas slide right off.

"You don’t even know what LinkedIn is," you mumble. “You’ll never have to. I’m so jealous, you don’t even know.”

Raf makes a bubbling snort.

You hate how bitter it makes you, sometimes. Hearing them talk about opportunities and networking and beautiful apartments with friends who leave them soup in the fridge. And you smile, as you’re supposed to. It’s good news. You’re proud. You are.

But it still seeps into the spaces between each of your vertebra, shapes you into a shrimp before the stateliness of ambition and purpose, making you feel small for not having more to offer, and worse for resenting even a flicker of it. There’s something sour in you that can’t be sweetened into a lemonade.

And you don’t want to be that person. You don’t. But you are. Quietly. Privately. The kind of ugly that you don't admit aloud unless you’re alone. Or talking to a seal.

"I hate that I get annoyed," you say under your breath. "Every time one of them says they’re doing great, I get that twist in my stomach like I swallowed a rock. Even when I’m proud of them. Even when I love them. What does that make me, huh?"

Raf offers no reply. Just a slow blink and inquisitive, a train’s choo-choo sounding breathing from his flaring nostrils.

"It makes me pathetic. That’s what."

Your throat tightens. You wipe your nose with the back of your glove and look up toward the cliffs, eyes still hot.

"There’s something you’re unlucky with. You know what?" you say, voice hoarse. "Of all the fish in the sea, you ended up with me. Should’ve gone for a marine biologist. Or a rich heiress with a yacht."

Raf surfaces again, blinking at you with deliberate slowness that mirrors a cat’s. Then, with a low chuff, he glides closer and presses the side of his head against your shoulder. You’re still floating when he wriggles around, flippers flopping clumsily, and half-latches onto your side, a wet, overgrown toddler trying to hug a pool noodle. His whiskers tickle through the neoprene.

You flip onto your back and float, arms out, hair fanning around your head with a seal glued to you. The sky above is pale and empty, the kind of soft gray that feels too big when you're already too full. You drift for a moment with your ears half-submerged, the world muffled except for the splash of Raf's flippers somewhere nearby. Clouds move. You don't.

"Watch. You’ll get discovered by some cute environmental documentary crew next and leave me behind. Get famous. Start an OnlyFans for your flippers."

Pause.

“OnlyFins,” you snort to yourself.

Raf lets out a long, wet blort, and disappears underwater with a cute bloop. 

You barely have time to curse before something nudges your ribs — hard. Then again. And then you’re yanked downward, the flipper hooked around your waist is basically an overly confident tugboat.

You surface with a gasp and a splash, hair in your eyes, sputtering.

Raf bobs a few feet away, grinning in the smug way only a seal can, going "AUUUUU," over and over again, following that up with a performative spin and a slap on the water.

"No more jokes, fine," you cough.

He dives again, leaving a trail of bubbles — pops up, and pauses, twisting back to look for you. His head bobs once. Twice. Then he disappears again, darting just beneath the surface, drawing a path for you to follow. A loop, a spiral, a flourish. He resurfaces ahead with a sharp snort and flicks water in your direction.

You blink water from your lashes. "Okay, okay, I get it. Impatient little show-off. Seashells aren’t going anywhere, let me go get my gear, damn."

He dunks under again, tail flippers wagging just enough to be smug about it.

And after your preparations, you follow.

Because if anything makes sense — if anything ever feels whole — it’s this. Salt in your mouth. Raf’s stupid flipper smacking water like an impatient bunny stomping his foot. A sky so wide you can’t get your arms around it.

You may not know how to move forward. But here, right now, you don’t need to.

Here, you can just be.

By the time the end of the day rolls around, the dive with Raf has dried to salt on your collar, and your limbs are already back in work-mode — anchored, alert, one hand on the wheel, the other near the comms, watching the weather shift with a sailor’s instinct and a whole life of knowing exactly when things stop making sense at sea.

The last round trip of the day is quiet in a different way today, though. No commuters or tourists, and no one but you on board.

A rare fluke of timing: your dad tied up with engine trouble on the backup skiff; the senior deckhand down for the count after slipping on ice during today's last unloading shift and sent home limping; the second deckhand called out with food poisoning from bad market shrimp; the engineer out for two weeks recovering from wrist surgery after trying to fix a rusted coupling by himself; the backup engineer already covering freight route duties on the north side; and the high schooler who usually mans the snack kiosk bailed last-minute for a school recital he 'forgot' to mention until this morning. Even the part-time lookout who mostly just watches Raf from the upper deck found a way to slip away.

You’d said yes before your dad even finished the ask instead of just cancelling the entirety of the day off — if a perfectly fine excuse for why you didn’t show up at the reunion made itself available to you, you would take it without question. It was serendipity, why let it go to waste?

And it was only one run, the weather wasn’t supposed to break yet. You knew the route. You could handle it.

Though, frankly, it felt good to be trusted with something this real and just empty your head for the rest of the day.

So it's just you, the hum of the engine, and a stretch of sea that's growing moodier by the minute.

You clock it before it starts showing.

The pitch is wrong.

Movement is expected, up-down, up-down, sometimes with more vigor and distance. No, it’s not that. It’s the angle, the timing, the tension underfoot that rolls in just a half-second too late. The swell pattern doesn’t match the forecast, the wind has teeth it wasn’t supposed to, and the gulls have gone silent over the water.

You glance up from the console, watching the sky fold itself into layers. That soft lilac haze from earlier has gone bruised at the edges. There’s a kind of waiting baked into the air now, the hush before the sky opens its mouth and howls.

You should’ve already turned back. You know the signs. You’ve trusted them before.

But the timing’s tight, and you know the shape of this route better than the lines in your palms. If you hold speed and cut between the outer channel markers, you might beat the worst of it. The system’s moving in fast — but not fast enough to make you fold early. Not if you don’t have to.

Besides, there’s only one round trip left back home. The radar isn’t red yet. The pressure’s dropping, but the water’s still got give in it. Dad made worse calls in tighter windows.

So you stay the course.

Pushing until everything starts pushing back.

The ferry bounces over a swell so hard you almost lose your grip on the wheel, rattling the life preservers along the wall with a thwack loud enough to echo inside your skull. Water sprays white across the decks, and something about the sound makes your bones ache. For a moment, you swear you can taste seaweed. Feel the drag of sea lines on your wrists, rough as rope burn.

But you catch yourself. Stabilize your footing, hands steady on the wheel, leaning into the rise and fall as they taught you in driving school all those years ago. The first day your father stood beside you and showed you how to balance the revs and the brakes on this machine, how to feel each part working together to drive, how it wasn't about forcing the craft, but guiding it with trust — it’s all muscle memory.

Trust the machine. Trust your gut. Trust your judgment.

So you do. And you guide. Until the storm arrives. Until the weather begins to roll in dark as tar — resentful black clouds, brindled with light, coiling together as if building, brewing, churning in unison above. Eerything then becomes curtained with rain and water, a shower splintering against the ferry roof. Sheets of water cut across the deck is a fog obscuring everything further than a foot away. Wind batters against the sides of the hull, shrieking louder and louder every minute, whistling shrill through every seam and corner and vent, and by now the ocean is actively trying to shove this boat off the face of the earth.

Everything turns sideways for one split second, and your heartbeat almost rips out of your throat, and when the ship steadies itself it takes several painful heartbeats of thinking I fucked up, I fucked up before you regain equilibrium and resume steering.

Everything starts to make sense. 

Raf had been strange from the moment you showed up this morning — clingy, louder than usual, almost pacing the cove. He kept making pup noises at the tide, splashed too close to shore while you suited up, and refused to go too far in the open water — his favorite thing was to drag you out further before. When you finally entered the water, he didn’t dart ahead the way he usually does. He hovered, brushed against you, circled you so tightly you had to push him off just to move forward.

You didn’t think much of it. You were too busy rereading texts, too busy spiraling over group photos and inside jokes and what-the-hell-was-he-thinking-by-showing-up.

Raf’s insistence was a complication you didn’t have room for when you’d been already feeling stifled enough. Even underwater, he kept doubling back to check on you, tapping your hip with his nose, making strange high-pitched whines that only made you more irritated.

When you got out, he followed you up the hill, paralleling you from the sea. Right up the ramp. Flopped against the loading zone and refused to budge, and not in the usual cute way. He clung to your boot when you tried to walk. Grabbed the hem of your jacket and yanked. Made noises so loud and pitiful that a couple tourists pulled out their phones to call wildlife protection. They thought he was hurt.

You shoved him back toward the cove and joked that he was a diva — a barnacle, a stage-five clinger.

He bit Elias when the poor old guy tried to help nudge him off the deck.

You didn’t look him in the eye when you closed the gate. Didn’t even wave, muttering something about spoiled animals and going inside. Because you had a job. Because you were on the schedule. Figuring out how to phrase it, how to make ferry work sound intentional, how to talk about staying without admitting you failed to leave. You practiced the words, hoping the right ones would dull the sting.

You didn’t notice how restless he went in the way he took the lead once the engine started.

You didn’t want to.

You'd practically ignored him the entire day for being annoying. To entertain the idea he was like that because he sensed the incoming weather... but you were too wrapped up in the reunion and your own spiraling thoughts to notice what he was trying to tell you. He knew something was coming — you’re sure of it now — and you hadn’t listened.

Too busy nursing your own useless grief.

And now you’re the only one out on the water when the storm decides to bite, regret and fear coiling around each other snakes in the pit of your stomach. The poor little man must be terrified wherever he's hiding. You hope he's tucked away safely somewhere sheltered and cozy, not roaming around trying to find you and ending up hurt or lost or trapped. If something horrible happened to him during this storm, it would be all your fault.

And now, as the radio crackles to life, a sharp burst splinters through the chaos, and all those words ash-scatter.

"—ayday—day—fishing boat—toward—Devil’s Teeth—repeat, Dev—no powe—can’t steer—"

It cuts out, sharp as a snapped line.

Your hand’s already moving. Mic in hand before the words even sink in. "Copy, how many aboard?"

Nothing. Just static, thin and needling, buzzing against your skin.

Your heart doesn’t lurch. It drops clean and heavy, straight into the pit of your stomach.

You flick your eyes to the GPS. The rocks are close — less than a kilometer to starboard. But you don’t need the chart to tell you that. You can already see them, those serrated black silhouettes clawing up from the water ribs punched through the ocean’s skin.

The Devil’s Teeth. The name alone carries some horror. They don’t forgive. Sharp enough to sheer a hull clean if you come at them wrong, but deceptive enough to trick even seasoned sailors into thinking they’re safe.

Above the water, they jut out like gap-toothed palisades — almost orderly, almost safe. From a distance, they seem to mark a clear path, multiple narrow channels that promise passage. But beneath the surface, the truth spreads wide and uneven, masked by the shifting tide, what looks navigable from above is a maze fanning out is a hidden reef below, disguised by the illusion of space, a trap waiting to splinter anything that trusts too easily.

Now, you watch from the waterboarded windshield as the ocean breaks against them sideways, spray exploding into the air in fractured bursts, mist swirling breath from something alive and restless. You’ve seen them before. Too close once, from a rescue boat.

You know the pattern they form, the way they beckon, offering what looks to be safe passage only to tear apart anything foolish enough to trust it. And you know the names of the people they’ve taken.

You flick the comms again, voice tighter now, a thread of instinct winding tight in your chest, tugging you toward the danger. "Any vessel transmitting, identify yourself.”

The wind shrieks through the cracks, high and thin, something caught between teeth. Water lashes the glass, streaking down in frantic rivulets as the ferry pitches harder, the deck groaning with the weight of the sea.

Your breath catches as you scan the horizon, nothing but the vertical outlines of the Devil’s Teeth. Black knives from the churn. For one terrible moment, everything slows. The sea draws back, coiling, holding its power just a beat too long. Waiting.

And then it breaks.

You move, but it’s not a choice. It’s reflex tangled with terror, the wheel wrenching in your hands as the ferry shudders beneath you. The shift is too sharp, the hull protesting with a low, gut-deep moan as it fights the turn. Your muscles burn, braced against the pull as the deck tilts hard, balance slipping for half a heartbeat. The bow dips — just a fraction — before you correct, knuckles losing color where they grip the wheel.

The spray blinds you for a moment, mist shearing across the windshield. But you blink, steady, locked on the path that doesn’t exist but has to be there. The space between those treacherous spires where, if you’re off by even a meter, the sea will swallow everything.

Raf knew. He tried to tell you. Fuck, you hope he’s not out here. He’s too much of a smart cookie for that, but still, you hope to god he’s safe.

The comms hiss softly, a broken thread of sound lost in the roar that fills the wheelhouse.

"—adrift—can’t—hold—taking on water—drifting t—engines are—"

Static. Again.

But you don’t need to hear it. The truth is already laid bare on the horizon.

Your eyes are locked on the shape just beyond, the battered fishing boat barely holding its own against the waves. A thing too small for this weather, its hull pitching wildly, the wind tossing it like it’s a toyboat in a child’s pool.

You flick the comms again, voice tight. "Vessel approaching Devil’s Teeth, do you copy? Repeat, do you copy? I need the status of anyone aboard!"

The answer is silence, thick and pressing.

But the sea answers instead.

Each wave shoves the boat closer to the rocks, their sharp edges barely visible between the peaks of the swells. You can make out three figures, barely, blurred shapes clinging to the railing, fighting against the chaos, one at the bow, steady but strained, another near the stern, slower, unsteady.

And the third—

A hollow space where someone should be.

"Shit," you breathe, throat tight.

You throttle down, the ferry groaning as the engine strains against the push of the current. The bow swings wide, cutting across the waves, too close but angled just right to shield the smaller boat from the worst of the wind. The wheel vibrates in your grip, the metal cold and damp, the pulse in your fingertips matching the beat of the sea.

The deck is bobbing harsher under your boots as you cut the engine to idle. A deep, unsettling quiet follows, the kind that means the sea is holding its breath.

You shove the throttle down, setting the engine to idle, the ferry rocking in protest as it fights against the churning sea. You can’t leave it drifting for long, but there’s no choice now.

The door to the deck slams open under your hand, wind tearing through as if the sea itself is trying to conquer its way inside. Salt spray slices across your face, cold and biting, nails and claws of an animal trying to get you. You barely register the sting. Your focus is on the deck below, where the equipment locker sits by the stairs. The rope should be there.

You swing down the short, steep steps, boots skidding slightly as the ferry shifts beneath you. The locker groans as you yank it open, cold metal biting into your fingertips. The rope’s there, coiled tight, damp and heavy.

You haul it out, the weight dragging at your arms as you push back up to the deck, boots pounding on slick metal, breath burning in your throat. The rope is rough and solid in your hands, the damp fibers biting into your palms as you step toward the railing, eyes locked on the men still fighting the sea.

"Line! Now!" Your voice barely carries, but the men on deck move. One of them, older, face lined with years of fighting the ocean, catches your eye, and you know you can trust him with this. He knows. He moves fast and nimble as you toss the line, and he hauls hard, pulling the boat closer inch by inch.

The younger man beside him fumbles, hands trembling as he secures the line, but his eyes are wide and fearful, darting between the shifting boats, the storm reflected in them. You can't have him slipping.

"Hold!" you shout, stepping to the edge.

The fishing boat rocks violently, a wild thing barely clinging to the world. But it holds. For now.

"Get them across!" You wave the first man forward, stretching your hand. His grip is iron, calloused and cold, and he hauls himself over with a grunt. The second follows, shaky but determined. His boots slip, but you grab his arm, steadying him as he clambers onto the ferry.

"One more!" The older man’s voice is barely audible over the wind. He points—

And you see him.

Near the stern. Slumped, half-draped over the edge. Too still.

"I’m going." Your words are lost in the chaos, but you’re already moving.

The wind slams into you the moment you step across, boots slipping on slick metal. You grab the railing, knuckles white, muscles straining as you pull yourself onto the listing deck. The world tilts beneath your feet, the boat rocking harder as if it knows it’s losing.

"Come on," you mutter, heart pounding.

He’s heavier than he looks. Deadweight. His clothes soaked through, dragging with seawater. Your fingers slip against the slick fabric as you grip his arm, muscles screaming as you try to pull him up.

"Help!" You barely need to say it. The older man is there, hands grabbing the man’s other arm. Together, you drag him inch by inch toward safety. The wind howls, the sea pushing harder, trying to reclaim him.

You’re so close.

"Almost there," you breathe, arms burning with the weight.

The man’s head lolls, his breath warm against your neck, but it’s faint. You brace, dragging harder, the metal beneath your boots slick and treacherous. Every muscle in your body screams for relief, but you hold on.

"You hang on, girl!" The older man shouts, his voice raw, but the younger one is there now too, reaching to grab the man’s collar and help.

"I’ve got him—" You don’t finish. The deck tilts—

The ferry shifts—

And the wave hits.

It’s not a push. It’s a blow. A force that tears you off balance, rips your grip from the man, and sends you weightless for a heartbeat before the world crashes back in. Or, you crash into the world. It resembles falling on solid ground from considerable height, except that it swallows you right up.

Cold.

Needles slip beneath your skin, knifing past layers of wool and overalls until nothing is left but frost-bright pain. Nothing blazes brighter, burns colder; the sea owns it all, every sensation, every heartbeat, every flicker of memory, snuffing them out one by one until all that remains is fear. Cold, bone-deep, blinding fear that has you kicking and flailing.

The water wants you. It pulls without pity, claws without remorse, wrenches without warning. Everything happens at once: pressure and chaos, liquid ice tearing at your lips and choking down your throat. The current twists around you, a tangle of unrelenting hands dragging you deeper even as you fight.

Down. And down. Until light bleeds away, dissolving like ink in water.

Something flashes just outside your blurring vision—

Then something else—

And another—

Infinitesimal silver glints cut through the dark. Shifting shadows dart between the pinpricks of pale light as shapes coalesce above. Thin silhouettes slice through the dark, through the gloom as you fall farther from safety. The pressure builds, crushing against your skull, a terrible humming filling your ears as if the entire ocean is singing an ode to your demise. Your chest begins convulsing fiercely, throat contracting in response as you begin thrashing around, lungs on fire and desperate for oxygen. Drowning in the sea, alone, terrified and hopeless, primal instincts demanding you do everything you can to stay alive, struggling uselessly to kick upwards towards the surface.

Wherever that is.

You reach upward desperately with a lone hand, vision having tunneled from lack of oxygen and panic combined. In that brief moment, something soft brushes the tips of your fingers. Like... fur...?

There's no way to know. Darkness has already consumed your consciousness, the struggle to survive giving away to oblivion and acceptance the moment your lungs breathe in water.

                    Singing.

Somebody has been singing to you.

Nearby. Simple, wordless, a melody winding slowly through the haze. Notes rise and fall around you — lavender smoke, crocheting your consciousness together bit by bit. You think maybe the song sounds familiar, that you could remember how it goes if only you could focus enough. As it is, your pulse stirs in time with the tune, waking limbs that were limp and numb as they thaw, muscles flexing as if remembering the shape of themselves.

Warmth comes first. Gentle heat kissing along the edges of your senses before bleeding inward in honeyed tendrils. Softness next: fur beneath your chin, blankets pulled tight across your chest.

The quiet of snowfall settles around you after that, muffling, easing, cushioning every inch of you as reality drifts into your awareness.

Everything returns in increments: salt crusted to your lips, drenched clothes wrapped around your frame, a layer of sodden clay. Beneath you: sand. Matted to the backs of your arms, your calves, the hollow of your throat. Behind your shuttered eyelids, sunlight filters softly. Red glow, distant orange. Sunglow, the color of melting copper. There is sky above you and beach below, but most importantly — there is breathing inside you again, each exhale shuddering as your pulse struggles toward normalcy, softly but surely.

Slowly, ever so gradually, you pry your eyelids open.

A canopy of branches, feather-soft green interspersed with golden brown, stretch overhead in a gentle dome. The bark glistens in the morning light, sticky still from the previous storm. Below the shelter, sand stretches outward in a sweep of endless shoreline, punctuated only by tufts of grass and gnarled driftwood that form a natural barricade from any casual passerby. The tide ebbs gently just past that barricade, washing fizzy seafoam high up the shoals before sliding back out lazily in a smooth curl, and further still, the horizon stretches — spun cotton candy, pink on blue, melted into haze at the edges, mingling seamlessly with the sky. And you're tucked carefully among the roots of one of those great trees, cradled and swaddled by the same fur-coated bundle your cheek is pillowed on, wrapped protectively in its embrace and held secure.

It takes your brain a full minute of groggily attempting to piece together these strange details before you realize there's a figure in the water, maybe twenty feet out, half-shrouded by the hush of early light.

Your brain coming back to you is akin to hitting the floor after falling for some time. You flinch. Sit up too fast.

A tangle of dark gray, thick hide spills from your shoulder, pooling in the crooks of your elbows. You shove it off with a gasp, limbs sluggish but panicked, fingers catching in the strange texture. It hits the ground with a muted thump, heavy as wet rope but somehow dry and fluffy at the same time. The cold hits you immediately then, skin pebbling beneath the cling of soaked denim and wool and the frigid touch of salt wind. A full body shudder grips you, hard, teeth rattling in your skull, blood singing through your veins faster.

But not even that kind of cold is enough to distract you from the sight before you.

There’s a person waist-deep in the shallows, facing the sun.

Long hair drips like spun violet ink down a narrow back, plastered in curling sheets to sharp, bare shoulders. You've never seen natural hair that long in your life, it trails all the way down her body to fan out against the waves, streaming in shimmering bands over the crests of each swell, lit gold in the early sun. She tilts her head back to face the dawn fully, and you can only see the barest hint of her profile from the angle, the delicate slope of nose, the lushness of parted lips. There’s something arresting about the stillness of her, the way the sea seems to hush around her body. A statue the tide forgot to reclaim.

For a breathless, silent moment, she simply stands there, perfectly balanced, completely undisturbed, arms spread at her sides as if greeting the daybreak directly, skin glittering in the light, slick with seawater and—

A scar. A slash across one side of her shoulder, pale even against her skin tone, stretched tight as though dug deep enough to make bone.

Huh, you absentmindedly think. I think it's the same side as Raf's?

You break out of your trance with a loud gasp with the thought of your seal friend, which causes her to whirl around to face you, startled and wide-eyed.

Which brings another revelation. The person in question is a man, not a woman.

Skinny dipping, at that.

Your brain catches up to your eyes in a rush of static and shock. This is a Family Feud moment.

Name something a burglar would not wanna see when he breaks into a house.

The contestant yelling it with his whole chest. Naked grandma!

Naked HUH?

The buzzer in your head goes off.

Question: What’s the last thing a girl wants to see when waking up alone on an unfamiliar beach after falling unconscious?

Answer: Naked man.

You make a strangled noise and scramble back so fast the pelt half-slides off you, and at the same time, sharp pain lances through your right side, turning the motion into more of a hunch than a duck and roll. The sudden flare knocks what little breath is left out of your lungs, knocking sense back into you in the process.

Wait, what happened? Why does it hurt?

"Easy! Easy." The naked dude darts forward through the surf without missing a beat, water splashing everywhere with his hurried strides. The sound of his approaching footsteps makes you instinctively curl inward, arms hugging tight around your midsection while wincing. You don't look up, mostly out of embarrassment, and your thoughts immediately go brrrr when you become hyper aware of the fact you're definitely going to see things you won't be able to unsee. "You'll bleed again if you keep squirming like that! All my hardwork's gonna go to waste!"

You flail one arm between the two of you in a futile barrier while the other cradles where the injury is, still keeping your face down and staring down furiously at the ground to avoid looking anywhere higher than knee level. "Ah-ah-ah! Stop, stop!”

The sloshing of jogging doesn’t stop.

“Just — man, don't charge at me, I don't know you!"

He stops short as though you've thrown a rock at him, legs cutting off mid-stride with a chaotic splash. For one blessed second, all is still again — except for the water lapping at his shins and your pulse banging against your teeth.

Then, a noise.

A half-choked sound that might be a laugh. Or a cough. He doesn’t come any closer. Just stands there, suspended mid-motion, your words having pinned him in place. The water stills around his legs. The surf hesitates, then draws back with a hush. You're still locked on a particularly blurry patch of sand wet with the red of your congealed blood like your life depends on it, but you hear the the tiny inhale that catches weird in his throat, and the breeze picks up with a stutter again.

He erupts worse than a volcano all of a sudden. “You’re joking! What? You don’t know me? You don’t know me? After everything — you just made me go through, that’s—”

“—a very reasonable response!” you shoot back, your voice high in octave, blood rushing so rapidly to your head that you’re not even comprehending properly.

“Wow,” he says, all affronted drama and wounded pride in one breath. “It's not like I'm gonna eat you. Humans aren't even safe for consumption anyway!"

"Whoa-hoh—" you start, but he steamrolls over you before you can properly get a word in.

There’s the wet slap of a foot shifting in the surf, heralding that he’s gearing up for a rant. “Most people say thank you, you know. Or ‘hey, cool of you to make sure I didn’t die horribly’—"

"You're naked, random guy!" you shout hoarsely, throwing out a pathetic arm to shield you from any and all compromising views. This is the politest way you could have put it. The next best thing was to shout, 'Don't come near me with your dick out.' Which. Yeah.

An awkward pause follows the admission, thick enough to make you glance up before thinking twice about it. You get a flash of purple before you look away once more, clutching the strange gray fur to yourself as some sort of feeble shield.

"—der why," he mumbles, more to himself than anything else.

"Excuse me?"

He deadpans, stopping just short. “I said, so now you’re body-shaming the guy who literally rescued you from certain death?”

“I’m shame-shaming the fact that you’re approaching me with your — your — entire situation out in the open!”

"You have my pelt," he says, with almost childlike seriousness, expecting you to be able to read his mind from the tone of his statement alone.

"Uh, okay?" you respond articulately, weirded out by how the conversation was lacking common sense. "What does that have to do with your clothes?"

This time, the quiet stretches out like taffy.

“I want you on the other side of this damn island if you’re an exhibitionist, I swear to god don’t think for a second I’m not capable of—”

“I am not!” The way his voice changes pitches has to be studied. “Have you lost your mind in the ocean? I can’t believe you’d suggest such a thing after everything I’ve done for you—”

You tune out his yapping. Yeah, this isn't getting anywhere. You're stranded on an island with a man you don't know, politely asking him to put his penis away, which, he won't get the hint for some reason and making it a 'I am who I am,' moment. Do you have to yell "Pervert!" at this guy for him to get a move on? Things couldn't get more absurd.

You rub your forehead wearily and groan in defeat. Is there something ironic about this exchange? Because you sure feel there should be something ironic here. There is probably supposed to be a joke somewhere here. The universe loves to deliver them in bundles.

An idea strikes you.

"Here, hold on," you say, shakily standing up while keeping your face diverted elsewhere. Your side does hurt, but the burn doesn't stretch as bad as when you felt it at first. "Just... turn around, please. No sudden moves."

"No sudden moves?" He answers with audible skepticism, the shuffling on the sand giving away his complying after a moment. The nervous waver in his words does manage to placate you somewhat. An exhibitionist wouldn't act this way. “I’m turning my back to you. How am I gonna know what you’re doing? For all I know, you could be ogling me with your squidlike human eyes, which, mind you, I wouldn’t blame you for—”

God, he loves the sound of his own voice, doesn’t he?

Muting him out once more, you pick up the fur coat blanket thing from its dropped position with an audible, "Hup!" It's bulky in your grip, almost too thick to lift, yet remarkably light at the same time — trying to pick up water without getting wet.

“—I’ve been told I’m distractingly shapely in the flesh, but I didn’t exactly wake up today planning to be admired in the wild. And it’s not even my best side, you know? My shoulders are uneven. I think. They used to be non-existent—”

You're in no position to be in awe right now though, so you brush off all possible questions concerning the bizarre phenomenon until later. With as much caution as you can muster, you raise it up like a curtain until the only part you can see of the man is his luscious hair, and start walking up to him.

“—Not that I’m implying anything. You are not the ogling type. Then again, I once trusted a cormorant and it stole my entire lunch while I was mid-swim, so what do I know? I’m just out here, my back wide open, accosted, and trying very hard not to hold a grudge—”

Then, you drape the cloak of fluffiness onto his shoulders in the gentlest manner you could possibly afford, avoiding touching his skin. The pelt closes around his back, reminiscent of the wings of a giant bird closing protectively, encasing him from neck down to calves. A gasp slips out of him. So small you might've missed it if you hadn't been holding your breath, waiting for any negative reaction.

His own hands come up to pull the flaps snugly closed, then he slowly looks over one shoulder at you with such stunned wide-eyed silence you almost want to crack a smile at him, but promptly freeze in place as soon as you lock gazes.

Not only does he have the most enticing eyes you've ever seen with vertical heterochromia transitioning from blue to pink like a bi-color tourmaline, but he has such an attractive facial structure that is both masculine and delicate all in the same breath it punches all of your buttons in one go and oh god — it is so not helping this entire situation. This stranger is the epitome of beauty. Handsome face and lovely features and soft bone structures and everything you didn't expect from a random naked dude on a beach you couldn't recognize as a local.

And the hair. You'd seen it from afar already but... it reminds you of strands of ashen lavender blossoms dripping with morning dew, wet waviness disappearing underneath the collar of the pelt. You'd kill to have this Rapunzel hair. It's unfair how a man—

You snap back to attention with a hard blink as the initial shock wears off.

"There you go, now I won’t get flashed," you exhale with obvious relief, trying to will yourself to act casually so you don't seem weird to the stranger who probably saved your life.

His head tilts, just barely. Long strands of wet hair slip over his shoulder as he stares down at the pelt wrapped around him — your handiwork. The fur shifts slightly under his touch, and he goes very still, watching it settle again. You wonder what he’s waiting for.

“You gave it back to me,” he says.

The words come out soft, a little too careful for something so simple. He looks at you, expecting the world to shift around what he just said. He’s silently saying this should mean something to you, too — but it doesn’t. And that mismatch only deepens the quiet between you.

You blink.

He lifts the edge of the fur in his hands, shaking it, then looks at you like the answer should be obvious.

A pause. “Right,” you say slowly. “And… that’s important to note because?”

He shifts his weight, brows drawing together in a look that’s too serious for the situation. “You could’ve kept it.”

"Wet as my clothes are, you need it more than I do.”

He is surprisingly docile and red in the face now that he has something on for modesty and can’t quite look you in the eye. The tips of his fingers peeking from all the fur in his grip are fidgety.

You give a wry grimace before remembering the manners Dad always told you to have around new acquaintances. "Yeah, um — uh, thanks. For saving my life.”

You tell him your name, and bow your head a bit in acknowledgment. His shoulders pull in tight at the sudden gesture of goodwill — though you aren't quite sure why — but relax after a breath as he meets your stare squarely, searching for something. The intensity throws you off balance; those odd and piercing mismatched shades fixed solely on you make the hairs on the back of your neck stand on end in both curious and fearful wonderment.

"And you are...?"

"Oh," he says, as if the question took him off guard, too. One hand comes up to brush through damp locks. Almost self-conscious, if the look on his face is anything to go by. There’s some sort of a faraway look in his eyes. "Raf — Rafayel."

"Were you the third guy on the fishing boat, Rafayel?" You recall that last crew member was slumped half overboard and passed out, prompting the rescue attempt that sent you both to sea in the first place. If Rafayel was wearing his pelt when you attempted to pull him up, the added weight could have been a factor in tipping both of you over. You find it's all a blur in your memory, though, and suppress a shudder. "Did you fall with me or—"

A shadow passes over his features as quickly as the changing tides. When he speaks, though, it's measured, almost cautious. "Yeah, I—" He pauses, shakes his head. Locks those impossibly colored eyes on you again, bright in the early morning light. "How are you feeling, though? Still hurts?"

"My side feels bruised like I was elbowed in the ribs but besides being chilled to the bone from falling into the ocean, I'm alright," you supply honestly. "I saw the blood on the sand, though. It feels unreal that I'm up and about right now. How can a scrape bleed that much?"

Rafayel's mouth goes flat as a line, looking you up and down with a concerning intensity deepening his tone. "You're lucky I was able to pull you back from the worst of it."

Shallow as it is, your wound isn't even dressed, but you decide not to engage in a conversation about the technicalities, patting him on the arm once in thanks and walking around him to get out of the forest line's shadow.

The beach stretching wide and strange before you is a postcard you don’t remember collecting. The sand is darker than you're used to, siltier, almost gray, and littered with glinting shells you don’t recognize, long and spiraled in augers, brittle as glass. Pale reeds jut from the shore at uneven angles, hissing faintly in the breeze, and the driftwood here is stripped bare, almost white, tangled in patterns that look too intentional for nature.

The water itself is clear, almost iridescent, casting strange reflections across the shallows, warped ripples that shimmer pink and green, an oil slick pretending to be pretty. And further out, offshore, strange half-drowned statue-shaped stones loom out of the surf.

You know this archipelago better than most, its coastlines and hidden inlets, the soft-bellied coves that tourists miss, having traced its map with your own hands, ferry lines, rock clusters, the way sandbanks shift after storms. Usually, it takes you seconds to place yourself. A curve in the shoreline, a type of dune grass, the slope of a treeline, something always gives it away.

But this place doesn’t register. No matter how long you stare, it refuses to sort itself into something known. The landscape’s been scrubbed clean of every tell you’re trained to read.

The most logical possibility is Seolhwine’s Hook — the island nearest to the Devil’s Teeth. That makes the most sense, right? You were heading back when the squall hit, and it’s the only one close enough for a current to drag you to overnight, and for Rafayel to be able to swim with you. But even then… even that doesn’t feel right. You’ve docked at Seolhwine’s before. This doesn’t match.

“I hate to say it but... Do you know where we are?” you ask finally, turning to him.

"My aunt's," he answers with a straight face.

You pause mid-shiver, your brain tripping over the simplicity of the statement.

You give him the flattest look you can afford, eyebrows lifting slowly. The pelt is clutched too high at his chest, his fingers wound tight in the fabric, you think he might be afraid of dropping it, though it doesn’t seem he notices he’s doing it. You can’t tell if he’s being deliberately evasive or if he genuinely thinks this is the helpful version of an answer.

"What?"

"Look, I’m all for jokes usually, but right now I need an actual place name — not just that your aunt lives here. I’m cold, I’m tired, and I just want to figure out how to get home—"

"It's my aunt's island."

You blink. Once. Twice. The explanation hangs in the air, weirdly self-satisfied. And it’s not satisfactory at all. Not even close.

What’s with the serene confidence of someone stating the color of the sky, as if “my aunt’s” is a perfectly normal answer to what island are we on? As if those two words magically orient you on a map?

You wait for more. Anything. The punchline. The name. Even a smirk. But there’s nothing.

Is he joking? Is this some elaborate bit? Or does he genuinely think that’s helpful?

The frustration in you sharpens. You’ve had to deal with flaky locals and clueless tourists and broken ferries before, but your patience is thinning by the second. You’re exhausted, still damp, still bleeding a little, and now stuck playing twenty questions with the world’s most uncooperative pretty boy.

"My aunt’s island."

He says it again, but there’s a slight shift in tone — firmer. He's correcting you. Thinks you’re the one being slow. And somehow, that makes it worse.

You stare at him. This time longer. He looks so damn earnest about it, truly believes he’s given you a helpful answer. It’s not smug. It’s not sarcastic. It’s not even deliberately vague to give away he’s fucking with you just to be a tease. It’s literal. Painfully, infuriatingly literal.

You’re trying to get directions from a very impatient child who only answers exactly what you ask and nothing else. Nuance is definitely a foreign language he never got taught.

But something tugs at the edge of your thoughts.

Because as stupid as it sounds — and it does sound stupid — it’s not impossible.

You look around again, really look this time, and you realize something’s been bothering you since you first stood up. It’s too pristine. Too quiet. There’s no old trailhead, no ferry dock, no graffiti-scuffed boulder where kids have carved hearts. No signs. No fishhooks, no cigarette butts. Just wind, tide, trees.

It clicks.

They’re marked on the maps you’ve seen, but only just. Annotated with little circles and names like SH-07 or East Ellinor. Places people like you aren’t supposed to go. Places the ferry routes steer around.

You’ve never been to one. You’ve never had a reason to. The people who owned them had their own transport, their own staff, their own little worlds with locked docks and private everything.

That’s why you didn’t recognize it. It’s not not on the map. It’s just never been part of your map.

You exhale, slow. Let the realization settle.

"So you're saying this is one of the private islands."

Rafayel’s brows lift in vague approval and he nods fervently. "Yes! That. Exactly. It's very private."

You rub your forehead, as if that’ll push the absurdity back into place.

Of course it is. Of course you almost drowned and then washed up on a privately owned island like some shipwrecked stray. Of course the first person you meet is a socially weird, mostly-naked man claiming ownership through familial inheritance like it’s a perfectly casual thing to drop.

You stare up at the sky for a moment, trying to piece together how the hell you even got here.

None of the private islands are anywhere near the Devil’s Teeth — most of them are tucked deep in the inner chain, clustered where the water’s calmer and the currents don’t rip you sideways. But this? This place isn’t close to any of that. You were unconscious, but you remember the storm. You remember going overboard, water in your lungs, panic in your throat, and then nothing. Blackout.

But you weren’t alone.

Rafayel said he pulled you out. Which means he swam you here.

You glance at him again, still draped in that ridiculous pelt and giving you weird pointed looks conveying that he wants to tell you something so bad. He doesn’t look winded enough for someone who hauled another body through open water during a storm. But if he did — if that’s how you got here — then he swam farther than you can make sense of. And maybe lost his clothes in the process. Somehow the latter makes more sense compared to the hypothetical that precedes it.

You were near open sea. This doesn’t add up. Even if he unexpectedly took you somewhere else than Seolhwine's, it just happening to be his aunt's private island is no coincidence.

You look back at him, more confused than before.

"Come," he says softly, extending his hand toward you with palm upward. "I'll take you to her. We'll help you get home. I promise."

A dozen different responses crowd your tongue as you stare down at his offered hand. All the questions rattling between your ears, each booking it for your lips faster than the next. None make it far. Suspicion should be there, but your instincts are unresponsive. They don’t find anything worth questioning about the situation despite the red flags.

Sure, maybe a weird randomly naked guy saved your life, brought you to a secret beach that doesn’t look on any travel maps, and claims to have ties with some rich aunt that owns the whole damn thing...

But he isn't dangerous.

You know that fact unequivocally. Call it a hunch, maybe? Gut intuition. It makes no sense considering your rational side has zero interest in jumping through hoops to trust the random person that literally dragged you out of the ocean to the least convenient place he ever could — but then again, life tends to toss the strangest circumstances and situations your way whenever you least expect it.

What matters most is getting back home, your parents have to be dying of worry — a search party must be out there wasting resources. Having someone who seems oddly comfortable on the island lead you directly to shelter would certainly speed things along.

"Hey," he gently adds when you're quiet for too long, breaking the train of thought running rampant inside your mind. The softness in his tone brings your attention back to him entirely, a gentle smile tugging at the corners of his mouth.

He offers his hand a little higher, which draws your focus back on it with curious clarity. How smooth it lookd, even from this distance, perfect nails without a single scratch or imperfection, fingers delicate, elegant bones visible under the pale skin. "I just want to help. You're safe with me. I won’t hurt you."

You stare at his hand, then at his face, then back again. The tone is soft, the words gentle, but something about it scratches at the back of your brain. The kind of voice usually reserved for nervous animals crouched under porches. Any second now, he might start whistling and offer a treat.

Though the weird phrasing shouldn't work its weird magic on you, it does. Maybe because it sounds so nostalgic and familiar in a way that it invokes a sense of safety in you? Or maybe because you're tired, soaked to the bone, bleeding lightly still, and sore all over and this guy seems too nice to be anything less than honest?

Perhaps both. Probably both. You really have no business trusting strangers who wear big pelt blankets instead of actual clothing and give basic information away akin to some kind of social anxiety sufferer with performance issues, yet here you are, contemplating on the idea of taking his hand.

What the hell, you think eventually. Sure. What alternative is there? If the worst comes to pass, you intend to make him have one less limb to his name — it would be his own fault for walking around like a Resident Evil nude mod. How did that one text post go? Boy put that boaner away lest a sloppy little critter grabs hold of it.

But you’re not that sure what kind of answer you expected when you ask him where you’re headed, but he doesn’t so much point as let his hand drift outward, loose and imprecise — more communion than instruction, as though the land might whisper the route if you stand still long enough. He plants himself in the emptiness with the ease of someone who’s never needed a map, naming vague landmarks with the casual grace of someone expecting the road to rise just because he’s ready to walk it.

As someone who has mastered the art of minding your own business, you don’t call out this behavior. As long as he gets you someplace you can call help from, Rafayel is free to be a weirdo.

But you do press him for information.

“She has lavender near the steps, and her door is the color of the sea,” he offers, like that narrows it down. “The path smells of sage sometimes, if the wind’s right. And there’s a stone shaped like a sleeping dog near the turn — you have to squint a little. The house groans when it’s too warm. There’s a wind chime that only rings when someone she doesn’t like shows up. And the garden gate bites if you don’t know how to open it.”

Not helpful. But then he refuses to add anything else more along the lines of fucking common sense and normal people direction-giving. What does he expect, the scent alone pulling you in the right direction if you just walk long enough?

And maybe he's right. Maybe you're the weird one for expecting something as formal as an address out here. If this really is a private island, there might only be one house. Maybe 'lavender and a blue door' is all anyone needs. Maybe people out here remember things by the curve of the land and the way the air smells after rain.

It isn’t a real plan. It’s the shape of a promise, just strange enough to follow, just vivid enough to believe in for a little while. The way he speaks about it, there’s no room for doubt, and you’ve learned to believe in the word of a local in all your years of living around the archipelago.

So you follow.

The pelt shifts when he moves, catching bits of drift and sand, trailing slightly as he walks beside you through the underbrush. He doesn’t shiver, unlike you. And that makes sense, considering how warm and cozy you were when that thing was your blanket when you first woke up.

The morning light hasn’t yet burned the fog from the trees, and the forest path ahead is dappled in grey. Your boots sink into the softened moss with a squelch. His bare feet barely make a sound, but your skin does hear something because of your wet socks.

You glance sideways at him. No wince, no flinch, not even when he steps straight on a gnarled root that would have you cursing in three languages.

“Seriously?” you mutter. “You don’t even feel that?”

“I’ve walked stranger paths,” he says. Great.

You stop walking with a groan. The wind catches your soaked clothes, cutting straight through to the bone. Your arms are already shaking.

“Okay. New plan.”

He watches as you crouch in front of him, back turned.

You look over your shoulder with an encouraging gesture for him, “Climb on.”

He tilts his head. “Huh?”

“Piggyback. You're barefoot, this path is hell, and I'm freezing. Carrying weight warms you up.”

“Absolutely not.”

“You're not that heavy, and I’ve hauled crates bigger than you off ferries for years. So. Just. Climb on.”

He makes a strangled noise. “I didn’t learn bipedalism just to be carried like a pup by you!”

Such drama. There really is no time for this and you’re not in the mood for negotiations.

You grab one of his wrists and tug it over your shoulder. His entire hand twitches in response. “If it makes you feel better, this is entirely me being selfish. I want to get warm.”

He hesitates, and it’s not pride, he keeps glancing at your side, where the torn side of your turtleneck still clings damp and darkened. His hands hover like he might stop you.

“You’re not healed,” he mutters. “Not properly.”

You hitch his arm higher on your shoulder. “It’s fine.”

“That wound’s still raw.”

“So are my fingers. Cold does that.”

He makes a frustrated noise.

“Listen, enough with courtesy stuff, okay? I don’t care, I’m freezing,” you cut in. “And you don’t have shoes. We’re both going to be miserable either way, so pick your poison.”

He sighs, dragging it out. Eventually, he caves, muttering something under his breath that could be an insult but could also be a compliment. He hoists himself up, arms settling uncertainly around your shoulders, pelt-covered legs bracketing your hips, and you make sure he won’t slip away from your grip because of the material. You’re trekking along the forest in no time, feeling pleasantly distracted from the cold.

“This is deeply undignified,” he mutters.

“And being inexplicably naked in front of a stranger isn’t? Where and why did you lose your clothes anyway? You still haven’t told.”

There’s no response, except from a huff he lets out from his nose, which fondly reminds you of Raf. It must be a tale particularly embarrassing for him to tell, and he did have the fur to make it up for, so you once again don’t pry. Master of minding your own business.

“Yeah, that’s what I thought. Get comfortable.”

He doesn’t. He sits stiffly at first, as though unsure how much weight he’s allowed to give you. Then he starts shifting. Sighing. Squirming. Grumbling under his breath about the jostling, the pace, the way your shoulder bone is probably bruising his ribs.

"You walk uneven," he complains after the first bend. "See, it hurts after all, yeah? Put me down."

"It's a forest," you grit out. "The ground walks uneven."

"I wish you would listen for once."

"That's a wasted wish on a star. You've known me for like what, fifteen minutes?"

He exhales through his nose again, slow and beleaguered. No witty answer to that one, it seems.

The longer you walk, the more he settles. His complaining slows into occasional muttering, then thoughtful silence. The forest begins to close in around you. Damp leaves brush your arms. The world smells of pine sap, wet bark, and something almost metallic beneath the rot. The silence here is dense, broken only by the soft rhythm of your boots against the ground and the occasional rustle of something unseen in the undergrowth.

Then his voice, soft and close beside your ear: “Do you name the trails you take at sea? Or are they just known to you?”

“What?”

“The water routes. The ones you steer the ferry along. Do they have names?”

He’s talking about sea lanes. You’re about to question how he doesn’t know these things, considering he’s a fisherman, but remember he might not be one. His aunt owns an island. This is a rich kid who probably wanted to fish and got the locals involved in his request.

“They’ve got designations. Letters, numbers. Eights and alphas and things like that. But most of us just… call ’em what we call ’em.”

“Like?”

You think a moment, breath fogging in the damp air. “There’s Shiverstretch. That’s the fast cold current between Dolos and Ternhook. Everyone calls it that ’cause it’s a backslap to the face, especially on the morning runs. And there’s Dead Hour Channel — no wind, no sound, just this long, empty drift. Makes you paranoid that something’s watching. I don’t like that one.”

You feel him shift slightly on your back, listening.

“There’s Longshout,” you add. “Named after a guy who tried to boat through in a storm and ended up yelling for help the whole way ‘til he ran aground on Fallow Reef.”

Rafayel snorts quietly. “That one sounds personal.”

“It is. He still works the east docks. Won’t shut up about it.”

“How do you find your way around, then? I always wondered. Do you read the water like seals do?”

“Reading the water is one way to put it, I guess. They’re charted. We use navigation systems. Landmarks. Depth markers.”

A pause. The trees rumble, disturbed by a sudden gust of wind, brittle leaves dropping pebbles onto the path in front of you. Rafayel shifts awkwardly behind you, almost toppling off to the left before righting himself with a steadying grip.

"Question," you say. "What indicators do you use? Chip on a tree or something?"

He whispers eventually, cheek lightly pressed against yours. You feel his eyes on you. "Smells."

You blink, twisting around to glance at him. He seems surprisingly somber all of a sudden. "Uhhh...."

"Just focus on the road, we're almost there. You'll see."

The path winds past the last of the scrub grass, and then it opens.

The trees fall away in a hush of damp leaves and saltlight, and there, cradled in the middle of the forest-clad small valley, is a sprawling, mansion of a house that doesn’t quite belongs to any century in particular. Can't be called old or modern. The word you’re looking for is neo-classical architecture made to be a beach house. Pale limestone, veined and sun-bitten, gleams beneath the overcast sky. Its walls are streaked with wind-carried brine, but the stone holds strong, weathered soft rather than worn down. And there is the giveaway Rafayel was talking about: blue door.

Lavender spills along the pathway in loose drifts, unruly and fragrant, tangling with sea-thrift and clover like the garden grew itself wild. Carved wooden shutters hang half-closed against the morning chill, and a curved archway frames the entry looks the part of a half-remembered temple. There’s something mythic about it, a story you were almost told once. A place that holds onto memory whether you want it to or not.

And then there’s the scent, ocean first, bright and sharp, but something warmer curling beneath it. Resin, maybe. Incense burned into the beams. Citrus oil in the wood grain.

You adjust your grip beneath Rafayel’s knees as you approach the door. Acting as a barrier between your bodies, his pelt is still slung down your back , trailing behind like a second spine, damp at the edges. He hasn’t said much since the last hill. Just rested his chin between your shoulder blades and hummed, quiet as tidewash.

You reach the first step. Hesitate. The house isn’t grand in the usual way, no columns, no gates, but there’s a heaviness to it. Not unfriendly, but expectant.

You knock.

Silence falls. The melted caramel of sunlight scatters through the dark glass in the windows. Rafayel shifts on your back, going rigid so suddenly it almost jolts you. His breath stills sharply against your spine, and in that single suspended moment, you can feel the piano wire of tension strung through his bones.

You don’t get the chance to ask why. Wood cracks loudly within the doorframe, and there's a pop, a groan, and then a soft, sweet creak as the lock disengages, allowing the door to slowly swing inward with an audible squeak.

The scent hits first, warm and strange. Spiced velvet, a whisper of cloves, dried orange peel, and something more ancient baked into the lintel wood. Then the figure behind it, unexpected.

For an “aunt,” she looks barely older than him. Mid-thirties, maybe, though it’s hard to tell. Her features are sharp, dignified, and her presence is a light cloud, wrapped in layered satin and lace shawl, white and lilac, all shot through with shimmer where the light catches on glinting jewelry. Her hair is swept back, rich violet and pinned with silver shells, and her eyes—

Dusty purple brightening with shock.

“Rafayel?” she breathes, her grip whitening on the frame. Her gaze darts down, takes in the sealskin clinging to your back, the way his taut arms still drape over your shoulders like iron bars. “Gods, is it really you? Look, look at you! Oh... oh!"

Rafayel slides off you, and she practically throws herself out the door as soon as the initial shock wears off, taking two long steps across the threshold until she's directly in front of you, cupping his cheeks with hands that only tremble the smallest bit. He meets her halfway, tilting his forehead to rest against hers as his own hands come up to gently caress her elbows, cradling them lightly. His motions are hesitant at first — touching with clear clumsiness, as if handling glass. But the moment she exhales an astonished little laugh, something changes, he pulls her close, tightening his grasp not to let her blow away on the wind. The woman leans fully against him then, looping her arms around his neck with a relieved shudder that shakes both their frames.

And you're there, a comical stick figure at the background of a well-drawn manga panel with a big arrow pointing at you.

You hope they won't hunt you for sport. Private island. Two eerily good looking family members. Girl who got deliberately delivered there when a closer island was the most blatant option. This has the potential to be a horror movie premise.

But no. Nope. Too late. She glances past his shoulder as soon as her embrace is complete and the silent reunion done with, locking eyes with you, and your soul flees your body, trying to squeeze itself back through your pores like some furtive worm to avoid the full brunt of her curious scrutiny.

She raises one perfectly shaped brow, but before either of you can exchange any words or reactions, Rafayel says something.

You say something, because it's in a language you don't know, one that doesn't bother to make itself easy, sharp at the edges, rounded at the core. It rolls out of his mouth, mist over moorland — thick, tangled, hard to follow. The stone-teeth syllables grind against each other, but every so often, they break open into something strange and sweet, the howl of a reed pipe carried on sea wind.

It just plays into the horror movie vibe because why would he blatantly switch language to probably speak about you, judging from the glance thrown your way, as if you aren't there? Probably conspiring how to eat you! You do feel like tenderized meat.

The woman hums again, a thoughtful note this time, and the conversation carries on in murmured exchanges of tone and gesture — softness here, a flicker of frustration there. And yet you can pinpoint the exact moment everything changes. Rafayel says something. But she draws back, cups his cheeks in her hands, and stares at him hard, searching. Whatever she finds isn’t enough, because she shakes her head once, firm, decisive. He asks again. Another shake, stronger this time, more insistent. Her fingers flex tight against his skin as if she means to hold him there, but he speaks again, something softer, fainter, and her hand relaxes, trembling on the edge of defeat. A faint frown crosses her face, a small downward curl that somehow turns the lines at the corner of her lips into parenthesis, closing off the shape of whatever she might have said next.

"Hey, uh," you finally intervene when their staring contest becomes too intense. They both startle, seeming to remember your existence at once. You smile nervously, holding one raised palm up in defense and nonthreatening greeting. "Sorry to interrupt, ma'am, but could I, um..." Your free hand gestures vaguely to indicate the general situation you find yourself in. "Use your phone? I don't mean to intrude or anything, I just. I got thrown over board during the storm, I don't even know if my ferry was capsized and I really, really need to get back—"

Rafayel says something else under his breath, hasty now, almost tripping over his words.

Her brows furrow in mild concern at his rambling. "Oh dear, I apologize, yes! Do forgive me for being impolite, I forgot myself for a moment there."

You nod politely in acknowledgment of her apology, lowering your arm hesitantly. "Not a problem, it happens."

"It's been so long since our house had guests," she admits candidly, placing an elegant hand over her heart in embarrassment. "Come, come in, please, you need a hot shower and change of clothes." She takes you by the arm and guides you inside. "You're drenched! Look at those goosebumps. Oh, you poor thing."

She leads you into a grand hallway filled with golden hour sunlight spilling through windows framed by sheer white curtains billowing lazily in the breeze, and it is not unlike stepping straight into the interior design section of an expensive department store. You could smell the money dripping off every nook, cranny, wall, and corner. If your wet socks were making muddy imprints on the flooring you knew you'd pass out from mortification on the spot. The floors here look pristine and polished enough for you to see your reflection clearly on its surface. Even the vase tucked neatly into the center of a glossy dark wood console table is worth more than your boat. Everything about this mansion is clean and orderly, it must be heaven on earth for a neat freak like your dad.

"He needs clothes the most, I think," you try to joke, letting her steer you through the main hall with wide curious steps and an awestruck stare. Rafayel, wherever he is behind you two, remains silent. You think he might have disappeared somewhere.

Her grip tightens around your arm like a mother hen dragging her chick into a coop to shelter from winter, her nails lightly digging into the sleeves of your sweater with a pleasant firmness that feels strangely grounding. "Don't worry about him, you focus on getting warmed up now."

"Thanks, ummm..." you begin, hoping it's polite to ask for her name while inside her home. But before you could continue, she turns to regard you with a serene smile — so gentle and graceful she could've been sculpted from marble if it weren't for her very lively personality. She smells nice, too. Floral. Very floral. The same kind of perfume bottle your aunt kept on display near her sewing machine that you stole a few sniffs of when Grandma wasn't looking.

Her attention is summer afternoon sunbeams on your chilled skin. "You can call me Talia.”