#suck it up and learn to read already

[rhythm-of-lesbianism]

i think it’s pretty clear that the listeners/singers have far less cultural separation between genders, like as far as i can tell their malens and femalens get equal opportunities and treatment and also are physically quite similar in most forms. but instead the gender dichotomy seems to be between those in neutered forms and those in mateform. like a lot of the listeners kinda look down on mateform as a frivolous and transient form that one only takes out of necessity/brief pleasure and childbearing. idk what this means or if it means anything it’s just a thought

[sherlock-is-ace]

forcing myself to watch korean youtube without subtitles despite not being able to understand anything because I learned english this way and by god I will learn korean too

[imwritesometimes]

This is the shit democrats need to be out in the streets banging the drum over right now. You voted for him and he's already fucking you over. You rural farming voters who thought you'd be safe from his anti-woke agenda. It's already coming for your livelihoods. Can you afford 4 more years of this shit?

[enterstellars]

been reaaaaaally struggling with the whole disabled thing as of late

[godforg1veme]

Funny how JG (the epitome of sexism in all of its forms) is worse at his own job than LR (a woman)

[bitterrfruit]

milk teeth

cult leader ! price x f!reader cw: heavy smut. cult grooming. praise and punishment. lots of 'good girl' and a smidge of degradation. breeding. exhibitionism. things involving all three orifices. price is depraved. Jonathan sets his eyes on his next sacrificial lamb. This one might be his favourite. or [read on ao3]

Jonathan always had a taste for sweeter things. 

He fancied himself a collector. Some might have said the habit started when he was a young man; gathered the prettiest girls like notches on his belt, luring them with attention before moving onto the next once he inevitably grew bored of them.  

Truth was, it started long before then. Stemmed from his childhood, when he’d pilfer candies from other children and they’d cede to him without dispute, because they were frightened of him. Or perhaps from his infancy, when he’d suckle his mother dry, leaving her bruised and seeding a hatred for him deep in the pits of her. Or even from within the womb, when he hoarded all of the blood from her placenta and starved his twin of life, thus born already lavish with the greed of a victor.

He never considered himself greedy, though. 

Greed, he thought, implied an undeserving nature. One could only covet that which he didn’t have already — and Jonathan had everything. He deserved everything. 

All that he wanted already belonged to him, he needed only reach out and take it. He wanted money, so he was gifted with the charms of a salesman. He wanted women, so he was anointed with good looks that only ripened as he aged. He wanted power, so with the benisons he was born with he obtained it as easily as a river rolling downhill. What began as a runnel swelled quickly into whitewater, picking up creatures and stones as it went and carving an indelible valley into the bedrock. 

Followers flocked to him like chickens, pecking at his feet for crumbs of his attention, and he fed them just enough to keep them hungry. What started as one or two sycophants grew quickly into ten, then twenty, and soon he had a hundred-acre pasture to turn them out on and an array of hand-built coops to keep them in. A commune, as far as the rest of the world knew it, but in truth it was his abbey. Populated by disciples that worshiped him, serfs that toiled for him, pretty hens that waited on him. 

The problem with ceaseless indulgence, though, was how quickly he grew bored of it. Even the sweetest things turned sour if he sucked on them for too long. 

He was not ignorant of how spoilt he had become. So spoilt, in fact, that his flock’s willingness to appease him had turned to such cloying adulation that it made his head ache. Needy little lambs, the lot of them, scuffling for the milk of his praise, unendingly competing for a single drop of it. 

He had begun to fear that true satisfaction was impossible to attain. Nothing, nobody, would ever be enough for him. No amount of servile women could surfeit him. No amount of devotion could truly appease him.

What he really wanted was something intractable. Something to break in. Something he had to work to tame. 

Chickens and sheep were easy to herd, easy to please, easy to come by. Lions, bears, far less so. What strength was there to claim in leading livestock just as any old shepherd can? Domesticating a creature unbroken would be a true testament to his godliness, he thought. 

He had no interest in battling for dominance with an equal, though. He would never be willing to share his cathedra with someone of comparable strength or power — not to say that such a being could possibly exist, there was no one alive comparable to him. 

What he needed, he thought, was a cub. 

A callow little beast, not yet big enough to know her own strength, but coursing with a valour that his lambs seemed to lack. A creature he’d need to keep under a firm heel. One he’d need to bridle before she learned to bite. 

Such a thought ran through his mind when he saw you. 

Hadn’t caught your name yet. Hadn’t even been informed of your impending arrival, as you were shown to a seat at the other end of the vast dining table. Timid thing you were, feigning some moxie with your arms crossed, but he could smell your unease. Wide in your eyes when you caught his and he chewed hard on nothing. 

You might have thought you were only there to visit, sweet girl, but Jonathan had already decided that you were there to stay. 

Reaching out to your cousin was a last resort. 

You weren’t even sure that Freya was your cousin — perhaps a second cousin something removed, or merely a family friend — one that you didn’t remember meeting but had somehow been acquainted with since birth. You were friends with her on Facebook, and though you only hardly ever used the bot-infested website, you messaged her anyway. 

Hi Freya — this is so random and I’m so sorry to get in touch out of the blue, but I’m not sure who else to turn to!! I just lost my job and my landlord has doubled my rent and I have to move out by this weekend. I don’t mean to dump sorry, but I just remembered a while ago you said you were living on a shared farm or something? Totally understand if I can’t and literally no pressure at all, but just wondering if there might be room for me to crash for a while? I don’t want to be a burden so don’t feel like you have to say yes or reply or anything. Anyway I’m sorry it’s been so long since I reached out, I hope you’re doing well!!! xxx

You had sent the paragraph after ten p.m. on the Thursday. You dithered about it for a while before you gathered the nerve to hit send — curled up on the mattress that sat raw on the floor, snivelling quietly to yourself and nearly deliquescing into the foam out of sheer humiliation. You hated asking for favours, pathologically averse to seeking help at all costs; which, paradoxically, had landed you in this very predicament. 

The message went unopened until you fell asleep, but you woke up puffy-eyed to a reply that had been sent just after five in the morning;

Hi!! So sorry to hear about everything you’re going through, that sounds so hard. Of course, there’s always room here!! I would be soooo happy for you to stay! Do you need help moving out? My friend has a truck we can use. We can get you here before Sunday if you want. Let me know x

Freya and her friend Philip arrived the next day, tooth-achingly sweet as they helped carry boxes of your things into the back of the truck, stuffing in all the furniture that they offered to store at the Homestead, so they called it, until you found another place. All lolly-smiles and sunny pleasantries, offering you ice-cold homebrew that they kept in a cooler, wedges of a ginger slice they had packed for the ride, all homemade as Freya had beamingly told you. 

The drive to the countryside might have been awkward if it had been anyone else in the cab with you, but the two of them filled the silence with a cacophony of laughter and saccharine questions about your miserable life. You avoided real answers most of the time, but they were adept in milking honesty out of you, so painfully earnest in their responses — oh my gosh, that’s just awful, I’m so sorry. That must be so scary. You must be so lonely. 

The truck’s bench seat meant you were squished in together, Freya wedged between you and her friend — there was no space to turn your head away or quietly vacate the conversation by looking out the window. You could only sheepishly confess to everything they asked of you — that no, you weren’t seeing that guy anymore, and no, you hadn’t spoken to your parents in months, and no, you weren’t willing to admit to them how far you had fallen. 

“I’m just so happy you messaged me, it’ll do wonders for you,” Freya said loudly over the open windows, wind flipping through her sandy-brown hair, cut short just below her jaw. “Like — I was just thinking about you the other day. Isn’t that special?” 

“Yeah,” you replied, mustering as sincere a smile as you could. “I’m really grateful for your help.” 

“Of course,” she cooed, gentle hand on your shoulder. “We’re family! We’ll always be there for you.” 

Something made you uneasy about her use of we, but it was smothered by reluctant gratitude. The stars had aligned, after all; you had been granted such a stroke of luck by the powers that be that you dared not question them. You couldn’t risk Philip turning around to dump you back at your empty apartment, nor could you risk falling out of favour with Freya, who you were now completely indebted to. 

“The, um, Homestead — is it like, a village, or something?” You asked eventually, an hour or so into the drive.

Both of them giggled at that, and you did your best not to frown in bemusement. “Kind of,” Philip replied. 

“It’s just divine — paradise, really,” Freya added. “You’ll love it,” 

Not an answer. “So… like, a commune?” 

Freya gave you a thin smile. “That’s a cute word for it. Yeah, I guess it is sort of a commune. but—”

“You’ll see when we get there,” Philip interrupted. 

His tone was unthreatening though firm, and it ended the discussion. 

You asked no more questions for the remainder of the drive; most of which was rough and bouncy, trundling over dirt roads riddled with mud-filled potholes and the odd roadkill smeared over the gravel. 

It was beautiful countryside, you could admit — it had been a long while since you left the smoggy din of the inner city, and out here the air was fresh and bright, especially then in the acme of summer. The breezes were velvety, the sun-bleached trees were dense with lemon-green leaves, and the waving grass was lush and emerald. Swathes of freshly shorn sheep coated the hills, and some friesian cows shared the same fields, heads bowed as they chewed on the same pasturage they shat on. 

By the time you approached the farm the evening sun had sunk to the margins of the sky, disparate clouds catching its orange light on its way towards the horizon. Only as the hills flattened out and the truck passed a bulwark of poplar windbreaks did you finally start to see semblances of buildings.

You weren’t sure what exactly you had expected, but it wasn’t what you saw — an array of seemingly hand-built cottages, bedecked in tooth-white cladding and rectangle windows, with perfectly pointed gables and corrugated metal roofs. All of them were roughly the same size with a porch jutting out the front, lined up like barracks along a single path — hardly a road, merely a muddy track where the grass had been worn down to the rocky soil beneath it. 

“Home sweet home!” Freya crooned, as Philip pulled the truck towards some less cookie-cutter buildings — stables, or something similar, he parked beneath a large corrugated canopy under which a tractor and some hay bales had been stored. 

Freya dismissed Philip with a word and told you he would take care of your things — whatever that meant — as she scooped her arm around you and pottered towards the centre of the commune. Looking at it now, you could confidently call it such; you spotted the odd person in the distance toiling over the farmland, or hanging wet laundry over a washing line, or carrying buckets full of a liquid you couldn’t identify. No visible power lines, a functioning well, a windmill in the distance. Entirely off the grid, you presumed, and only then did the thought strike you that you might not have any phone signal out here. 

“So these are our houses,” Freya explained jubilantly as she led you down the gravelly path between the shacks. “Me and my friend Sam live in this one here.” 

“Nice,” you remarked politely, squinting to look into the windows as you followed Freya up to the porch, but they were blocked by lace blinds within. 

The flat panel door squealed on its hinges as she pushed it open, a little beaten up at the edges where it had been installed by rough tools and inexperienced hands. The interior smelt of sawdust and citrus and a faint hint of body odour — you guessed they were the kind of folk that didn’t use deodorant, and you found yourself praying they at least had running showers. 

Inside were two beds and a small kitchenette — hip-height shelves with flat surfaces for chopping vegetables, and a little gas stovetop. No fridge, no sink, no dishes. Seemed as though they didn’t even use the space for preparing food at all. 

“We can set up a bed for you in here, if you want,” Freya told you, “or otherwise there’s a bed in Philip’s cabin.” 

You frowned at that, because she said it with a little smile, and you didn’t know her well enough to decipher it. Whatever the case, it left a floury feeling in your tummy, and you nodded in place of an answer. 

“Well, you can decide later,” she said. “C’mon, you’re here in time for supper.” 

At the end of the road stood tall some kind of spire-bedecked chapel — a building Freya called the hall, and when your nose must have inadvertently scrunched at her bible-thumping description, she couched it by telling you; “no, it’s not a church. Or, it can be, if you want it to be. It’s for everybody.” 

It became abundantly clear to you that you were in over your head as you crossed the paths of other commune-dwellers venturing to the hall for supper. All dressed up in their prim and propers; every woman in flower-toned skirts of varying lengths and pleasant white blouses, men cladded in their button-ups and linen pants. 

“Looks like I’m underdressed,” you murmured to Freya, looking down at your jeans and t-shirt, infused with dry sweat worked up while lifting and hauling all your boxes and furniture. 

Freya giggled. “No, no, nobody cares about that,” she said. “It’s only because it’s the end of the week.” 

“Sunday best?” You asked with a simper, an attempt at a joke that you were well aware may not have landed. 

You could never quite get a read on her — she had the potent positivity of a bible-camp counsellor, that sort of tight-lipped smile that gave the impression she had a fragile tolerance for banter or disagreement. But that veneer didn’t crack, nor did it appear to conceal any manipulation or malicious deception — instead it seemed like that berry-jam sweetness was thick in the blood that pumped through her veins, and glowed earnestly bright and pink in her cheeks. 

“Yeah,” she chuckled, “I guess you could say that. But there’s no dress code, or… uniform, or whatever. Don’t worry. We’re not a cult or anything.” 

Preempting your burgeoning concern that the commune was a cult should not have comforted you as much as it did, but it was settling to hear some degree of self-awareness. In honesty, you hadn’t been there long enough to make a fair assumption, but the entire affair was undeniably Jonestown-esque — especially as you wandered into the gaping raw-timber hall, to find a boat-long table with a man seated at the head. 

He sucked the air out of you. 

Indescribably so. Like a black hole at the end of the room, drawing both light and oxygen into his orbit, occupying it all for himself. Palpable in the size of him — great hulking man with shoulders like an ox and arms as thick as trunks, flocked in dense hair that swept around his forearms and tufted out of the neckline of his shabby white t-shirt. The cotton was distended by bulk, pulled tight over a heavily padded chest, mucky with dust and mired by darkened patches of sweat between his pectorals and under his arms. 

You could feel his mass from where you slipped into the hall behind Freya, a weight that you felt in your stomach and it made your brows crumple up in worry you could not pin. 

Worse, when he met your eye. 

He leaned back in his seat like it was a throne. Eyes dark as cave pools that ensnared you above the brown beer bottle he tipped into a jutting jaw, hooked in a thick forefinger. They followed you sharply as you entered the room, like hooks, and you could feel where they pierced your skin. 

An ambiguous expression festered in his features; sceptical, maybe, or vaguely bitter — something fixed in it, though, an unspoken accusation that made you feel as if he had detected some wrongdoing you had yet to confess to. It compelled you to defensively wrap your arms around yourself, though you kept your eyes on him, if only to test whether he would look away. 

He didn’t. 

He was sheeny with sweat and ruddy-cheeked like he had just turned in from a day of hard labour. Decidedly underdressed compared to the residents of the commune that filed into the bench seats on either side of the table, one-by-one, well practiced; no shuffling awkwardly along to make room, no murmured sorries as knees knocked and seats bumped.

Twenty-four of them, sixteen on each side of the table. You tucked yourself awkwardly at the end of the row, next to Freya. It did not escape your notice that you had ruined their even number, clumsily jutting out of what would have been a perfectly mirrored seating arrangement. Your brows knitted together in chagrin when you got side-eye glances from the people across the table. 

It struck you that there were far more men than women seated — you and Freya were two of five — but the moment the thought gained traction you looked up to see eight women in aprons file in from a door at the back of the hall. 

Platters in tow, puffy trails of steam following them as they lay each dish down along the table. Lamb, by the looks; four great brown hocks of roast leg, charred and gritty with thick bones poking out of the slabs of meat. Accompanying those platters were large dishes of boiled potatoes, bowls of peas, a few piles of indeterminable green and brown mush. Soon the cavernous hall was filled with the thick scent of steaming meat and bone marrow, and it might have smelt appealing if you weren’t so on edge. 

On edge, not only because you felt a leech, latched on to the ankle of a community you hadn’t yet been introduced to, as though hoping they didn’t notice you there and pinch you off by the jaws — but worse, because you could feel the burning stare from the man at the head penetrating straight through you, and your skin all but bubbled and blistered under it. 

“Hungry?” Freya asked with a smile, rubbing her hands together above her empty plate. 

To face Freya meant you were facing that man, and you could see him glowering at you even out of focus, in your periphery as you addressed her. Your eyes flicked to meet him despite a concerted effort not to, so you looked at your plate instead. 

“Not really,” you murmured, though you quickly realised how rude it sounded once the words left your mouth. “Filled up on ginger slice on the drive over — but it smells delicious, so I’ll definitely have some.” 

“Good,” she says with a nod, “this is the real deal, you know. The good stuff. You could never buy food like this at a supermarket. You know Philip butchers it himself?”

You’re not sure why that comment made you swallow. “Does he?” You ask, out of polite disinterest.

“Mhm. He’s a good one, too. No gristle or anything, just you wait.” 

You nod and smile, gritting teeth, because you accidently caught his eye again when you hadn’t even tried to and it made your stomach cramp up. 

The women who brought in the food began to file into the empty sides of the benches, and one pressed up next to you as if you had taken her spot. Freya mindlessly fiddled with her fork, and suddenly you realised how quiet the hall had fallen. 

Silence settled like smoke. You suddenly had to bite down on the urge to cough. Glanced around the table, platters steaming and ready to be served with their great big spoons — and yet, nobody touched them. 

Until the man at the head leaned forward with a grunt, clunking his bottle down on the table and reaching over to grab the prongs on the platter in front of him. Pulled off a massive hunk of tender meat, stringy and dripping reddish juices along the table, before dumping it on his plate. 

The hall was suddenly alive again, then, and everybody continued their discussions as normal — a plethora of hands reaching across the table, grabbing spoons and forks, scooping and serving themselves humble helpings of meat and vegetables compared to the mountain the man had piled up for himself. 

“Here you go,” Freya said, having filled your plate for you without your noticing; a polite pile of meat, two potatoes, and a scoop of peas. 

“Oh, thank you,” you replied, with a smile, as she put it down in front of you.

It took a few turgid minutes before you could muster another word, swallowing dry mouthfuls of your meal to busy yourself while you felt those inculpatory eyes needling at the side of your head. 

“Who is that?” You asked Freya, quietly, swallowing a mouthful of potatoes. As casually as you could make your interest sound to avoid revealing how your thoughts had been invaded by him, pounding like a headache, from the moment you set foot in the hall. 

“Hm?” She hummed, mouth full, looking up and around to see who you were talking about. “Who?” 

“Him,” you said, nodding your head towards the head of the table, eyes dashing back to your plate when he met them again. 

“Oh! That’s Jonathan!” She answered you, jarring as a sudden clap. 

“Jonathan?” You probed, taking another mouthful of food to hide your scepticism. 

“Yeah, he’s the, like, founder, or something… I’m not sure what you’d call it.”

“Founder? Like, of this whole place?”

“Mhm,” she nodded, swallowing. “He brought a few of the old hands with him over from Liverpool to set up the farmland. I wanna say… ten, eleven years ago? Much longer than I’ve been here, anyway.” 

“How long have you been here?” You queried, regretful of how judgemental it sounded when you said it, but she seemed either oblivious or unflustered. 

“Over a year, I think,” she said. “Nearly two, maybe.” 

“Wow,” you said, through your food. It was actually pretty good. “Must be one hell of a farm.”

She snickered at that. “I’m not here for the farm,” she laughed, “well — it’s a bonus, of course. But, no, I stuck around for the family.” 

Family. You tried to conceal how it made you wince, but you weren’t sure how successful you were in doing so. You didn’t want to continue that line of questioning, though. It made your throat tighten up, and whatever else she might have told you, you didn’t want to know. You only needed a place to sleep, after all. Only for a week, two at most. No longer than that, you decided, repeated it firmly so that it was fixed as fact in the back of your head.

Then you caught his eye, again, and he seemed to tilt his head at you, a tug in his brow like he had read your mind and taken issue with your thought. 

“He keeps staring at me,” you muttered quietly, head tipped towards Freya so that none of the other people could hear you. 

Her head spun cartoonishly on her shoulders to look at Jonathan, and you wished you knew her well enough to elbow her for making it so painfully obvious you had been talking about him. 

He leaned back smugly in his chair. Held your gaze like a challenge. 

“I don’t think he wants me here,” you whispered edgily. 

Freya looked back at you with her brows pin straight. “He just hasn’t met you yet — you should go up and introduce yourself.” 

You frowned anxiously. “What? Right — right now?”

“Yeah, you should. He’s probably expecting you to.” 

“Expecting me?” You balked, face twisting at prospect that the man could have been audacious enough to expect anything from a stranger. 

“It’s only polite,” Freya said calmly, with an easy smile, and a gentle hand on your arm. “He’s the one who is letting you stay.” 

You chewed on that for a moment, forcing the vitriol in your mouth to slide down your throat with a hard swallow. She was right — if it was his farm, and it sounds as though it might have been — then he was the one doing you the favour. 

Before you could dither about whether you had the bravery to call across the table and say hello — which, you didn’t — he spoke. 

“Who’s this, Freya?”

His voice cut through the din of the meal like a chainsaw. 

Freya bolted upright, spine plank-straight as if called to attention, though it took her a second to register the question. 

A quirk twisted in his brow when she told him your name, and his jaw masticated on it for a moment. You prayed for the ability to curl up into yourself like a snail, because now not only was he glaring at you, so was every other pair of eyes at the table. All you could do was keep your chin high and act as if the bizarreness of the situation wasn’t eating away at you like gangrene. 

“She’s a friend,” Freya added sheepishly. 

“You didn’t tell me she was coming, did you?” He asked rigidly, and while there wasn’t anything directly accusatory in his tone, she reacted as if she had been scolded. 

“Um — well, I said that I had a friend coming, and you—”

“A friend. That’s right,” he crooned, and Freya deflated like a popped balloon at the release of blame. “C’mere, then.” 

“Me?” Freya asked tightly, and he only tilted his head condescendingly — all but saying obviously not. 

“Our new friend,” he said simply, ursine eyes fastened to you across the table. Gestured at you with a flick of his fingers. “C’mere, cub.” 

Your eyes darted abashedly around the room, unsure what you were looking for — an escape, perhaps. Maybe encouragement. You found none, so with a sharp breath you pushed yourself up to stand. Had to awkwardly clamber around Freya and the other woman next to you to step over the bench, bumping them both on your way up. All of the simmering attention in the hall was on you, and you wished you had never come to the weird fucking Homestead in the first place. 

There was no choice but to entertain it. You didn’t have your own car. You didn’t have it in you to demand to leave in front of all of these seemingly normal people. You didn’t have it in you to make a scene. 

“Bring your supper, love,” Jonathan said warmly. “Come sit.”

You sucked your lips between your teeth in reluctance, but you capitulated quickly — bending between Freya and the woman to pick up your half-empty plate, carrying it with both hands as you made your rueful way towards his end of the table. 

His head followed you as though on a stick on your approach. Gestured wordlessly at the man sitting on his left, and the entire row shuffled along the bench seat to allow you space right beside the head. It took you a moment to gather the nerve to sit, so you put your plate down first. 

“Sit down,” he said. 

Your lip curled at his patronising tone, and out of spite you remained standing for just a beat too long — until brief shadow of potent displeasure saturated his features, lips in a line under his dense umber beard. It made the back of your neck feel cold. 

The fleeting indignation was brushed off with a smirk, though, followed swiftly by a puff of laughter. Something in his air told you he’d only wait for so long, but for now he was amused by your disobedience. 

You sat yourself down, only because the awkwardness was suffocating, and your spite was quickly smothered by embarrassment when it became clear that everybody in the building was waiting for you to listen to him. 

“There you go,” he grinned, taking a sip of his beer to cut the tension, and it snapped like a rubber band. The others were abruptly busy with themselves again, chatting amongst each other and chewing away at their meals. 

Then it was only you, and the minacious beast of a man. Swallowed by the vacuum of his tunnelling attention until the rest of the room sounded hazy and indistinct. 

“What brings you all the way out here, then, sweetheart?” He asked casually, the air suddenly buzzing and warm around him. 

Eyes that you thought had been black were in fact blue as storm clouds, that creased fondly in the corners when he smiled at you. His lack of introduction felt pointed, confident that you were already well aware of who he was. 

“Um,” you bit, oddly lost for words, you poked at a pea on your plate with your fork. “It’s hard to explain.”

“Give it a go,” he pressed, scooping a mouthful of meat and potatoes into his mouth, though his eyes didn’t leave you. 

“Well, I was working at — I mean, it doesn’t matter. I was made redundant. Or, fired, or whatever. They were really vague about it, so I don’t even know,” you over-explained, suddenly regretting every word that rolled uncontrollably out of your mouth. “But then, well, I’ve been going back and forth with my landlord about rent for ages. I thought I had gotten through to him — because I told him, I made it super clear I’d have to break the lease if he increased it as much as he wanted to. But he did it anyway, bumped it to more than double what I was paying, and so—”

“So you’re homeless, are you, cub?” He interrupted, brows raised, as though summarising your rambling points for you. 

You tripped on your own voice like a raised root on a footpath, cocking your head back as you looked up at him. You weren’t sure why you were affronted by the suggestion. 

“I’m not — no, I’m not homeless,” you corrected, unconfidently, and he smiled at that. 

“Do you have a home?” He asked simply. 

A divot pulled in your brow. “Not right now, but—”

“Don’t pout, love,” he chided. “I’m not insulting you. It’s just the truth, in’t it?”

“But I’m not homeless, my parents have a house, and I—”

He seemed to stiffen at the mention of parents, and it should have alarmed you. “Parents, eh? But you’re here instead?” 

“Well, yeah, but it’s only because—”

“Easy, easy,” he cooed, voice low and gurgling. “No need to get so defensive, mh? M’only curious about you. S’not often we have urbanites like you wandering in.”

Something in his expression, in his voice, was as warm in your mouth as liquor. Eyes that earlier disquieted you were now soft, crinkled and sincere in their interest, and you could only yield with a short sigh. 

“What’s that mean?” You asked, failing to conceal your sulkiness. 

He chuckled at you, as he scooped up another mouthful of his meal onto his fork. 

“City bird,” he said frankly, through his food. “I can smell it on you.” 

You frowned, vaguely offended but with no clue what he meant by it. “Excuse me?” 

“All that perfume,” he explained disapprovingly. “Cigarettes. Car exhaust. Mh. This place’ll do y’good.” 

You resented yourself for suddenly feeling insecure. “You don’t like my perfume?” 

He shook his head once. “Bunch o’ chemicals,” he dismissed. “I bet you smell much better underneath it.” 

Couldn’t explain why that made your diaphragm seize up, and you let out a pitiful little cough on reflex. Maybe it was because he said it while he looked at you like meat, conspicuously letting his gaze rake down to your chest and linger there for a moment. You were thankful he couldn’t peer any lower by virtue of the table. 

“Probably not,” you said meekly, in an attempt to lighten the conversation. “I got all sweaty lifting all my furniture and stuff this morning.” 

He looked perturbed by that, a reproachful glance up from his plate. “Didn’t Freya bring Philip along to do the moving?”

“Yeah, he helped a lot,” you said, suddenly worried you might have gotten her in trouble — then doubled back on that thought, when you considered how vile it was that being in trouble was something the people of the commune might have had to worry about. “But, y’know. I had a lot of stuff, I wasn’t gonna make him do all the work.” 

He tutted. “Can’t have that.” 

“Can’t have what?” You asked dubiously. 

“Can’t have you doin’ hard work,” he elaborated, as though explaining something you should already have known. “Wee lambs like you should stay nice n’ soft.” 

Your lips pursed reprovingly. “I’m not a lamb,” you snapped. 

A grin dimpled his bearded cheeks. “Maybe not.”

You froze as his burly hand dragged across the table, before he brushed his thumb over the back of your wrist. The touch made your belly tense up and your hairs stand on end, and all you could do was blink at him. 

“Still nice n’ soft, though. Don’t want to ruin that, do you, cub?” 

Cub. 

His usage of it had gone unnoticed until the third time, but you quickly began to ruminate on it. An idiosyncratic term of endearment, maybe, but something in how he said it felt pointed. Knowing. Vaguely accusatory. 

His fixation on your softness should have made your hackles spike up, but his expression was almost exultory, and his touch made a shiver tingle up your arm. You were suddenly conscious of your heartbeat. 

You didn’t know how to answer him. 

“I don’t — I’m not soft—” 

“Feel bloody soft to me,” he remarked, giving your wrist a squeeze. “And m’sure you’re even softer on the inside.” 

Your stomach dropped at that, and you wore it on your face, bright and hot in the cheeks. He said it so casually, with such an earnest smile, that you chastised yourself for what must have been a wild misinterpretation. He surely meant metaphorically, commenting on your personality, your softness of nature, rather than your—

“Y’got a boy, love?” He asked candidly, returning to his meal, and the skin of your wrist felt cold once his hand retreated. 

“A boy?” 

He raised a brow at you, a silent what do you think? as he chewed his food. His use of boy felt calculated and you wondered how old he thought you were. 

“Oh — uh, no.” 

“Mh,” he mused, mouth full. “Somethin’ happen?” 

His ability to read you was uncanny, and it made you squirm. 

“Um, yeah, I came out of a relationship recently.” 

He raised his eyebrows as he swallowed. “D’he leave you?” 

That made you frown on reflex. Insulted that he had assumed it. Vexed that you were giving something away you hadn’t intended to. Troubled that you couldn’t seem to hold your cards close enough to your chest, and he was peeking at them whether you liked it or not. 

“No,” you retorted. “It was pretty mutual.” 

“Did he leave you?” He repeated, but there was no rigidity in it, no severity in his expression. It came out as naturally and calmly as small talk. 

You looked away from him, scratching the back of your hand. “Well, I — we were growing apart anyway, he just ripped the bandaid off.”  

He nodded in understanding, patently satisfied that you had capitulated. “Rubbish took itself out, eh?” 

You smiled wryly at that. Hadn’t expected him to say something in your favour after rudely assuming you must have been dumped.  

“S’pose so,” you said. “Definitely feel a bit freer without him.” 

“Good,” he chortled deeply, scooping himself another mouthful of meat. “We don’t have room for another lad livin’ here.” 

You pouted in thought — living here, he said. You worried for a moment he might have misunderstood your presence at the commune, or that Freya had not made it clear to him that your stay was temporary. 

“I’m not moving here, or anything,” you clarified hesitantly. 

“Aren’t you?”

You gave him a mild shake of your head. “No — I’m only staying for a week or so.” 

He smiled at that, letting out a gruff sigh as he leaned back in his seat, picking up his beer. “S’alright, love,” he said. “You can stay however long you like.” 

You looked askance at him. “I’m — thank you.” 

“Have you got yourself a bed?” He asked coolly. 

“Um, sounds like I’m either staying in Freya’s house or Philip’s house.” 

His jaw tightened. “No, no,” he dismissed with a scoff. “I’ll get you a proper spot.”

“What do you mean?” 

“A place with a bed just for you, love. No need to share.”

You shook your head guiltily. “Oh, no, I’m totally happy to—”

“Don’t be daft,” he grunts. “Freya already has a friend with her and Philip — well. Can’t have a thing as pretty and innocent as you sharing a bed with a man you don’t know, can I?” 

Your mouth went dry. Innocent should have been an omen to heed, but you were too busy spinning about pretty. Wanted to smack yourself for letting it get to your head, but by the time the remorse arose the seeds of flattery had already been sown. 

It crossed your mind, then, that Freya had failed to mention you’d be sharing a bed with Philip and not just a room. You remembered her little smile and wondered if it was your fault for failing to pick up on it. 

“I just — I don’t want to be an inconvenience, or anything.”

He shifted forward, then, and his immense hand travelled under the table, before fixing firmly to your thigh. 

Close enough to your knee that you would have felt unjustified in smacking him, but high enough that you felt a sudden fizzing in the base of you — a moiling, something warm and shuddering in the cradle of your pelvis, and your face burned hot. You wondered if you might have been ovulating, because that was the only justification you could muster for how your body reacted to his enormously inappropriate touch. 

“Not an inconvenience at all, cub,” he said sincerely. 

“That’s—”

Tranquilised, when his fingertips pressed just lightly enough into either side of your thigh that it could have been accidental. Sent a shock up your femoral nerve that stabbed you in the core and made you twitch. 

You attempted to finish your sentence, but your jaw was fixed, because you had short-circuited the moment he touched you. 

You had your people-pleasing tendencies, but you had never been a doormat. You knew when something was a step over the line, an affront, an action worthy of retaliation. In another setting you might have called him a pig and thrown some peas at him before storming off. That abeyant aggression had gotten you into sticky situations before, because not all men held to the moral of not hitting a woman back.  

You didn’t think he would have been the type to get violent if you were to snap at him, but there was a murkiness about him, and you could not say so confidently. Pupils somehow blacker than black, smoky within.

It wasn’t fear, though, that kept you placid. You weren’t afraid of him. Awestruck, maybe. Morbidly intrigued, like you had stumbled across a bear through the trees and despite yourself yearned for a closer look at such an elusive beast. 

It didn’t help that your thigh was dwarfed by the expanse of his hand. That his thumb grazed you up and down through the denim of your jeans. That you saw his pulse in the veins of his forearm as your stare trailed upward, fixing to the way the bands of muscle moved under his skin as he stroked your leg. 

“That’s nice of you, thank you,” you murmured, once you found your voice again. 

He nodded, satisfied, and his paw released your thigh before giving you a chaste pat on the knee. 

“Good,” he said, putting down his fork, and you realised he had already finished his mound of food. “Finish up your dinner and we’ll get you settled in, eh?”

You didn’t notice it then, but the moment his fork hit the table, so did everyone else's. 

The cabin he gave to you was another white cottage, but this one had a cariad rosebush out the front; dense with spring-bloomed flowers, tissue-paper pink, yellow anthers laden with pollen. It was also the closest cottage to the hall, the very last one at the end of the road, with no opposite cabin to mirror it. 

He had Freya show you to it. You heard him tell her under his breath to give her a proper welcome, which made your brow tight and your palms sweat. It was an uncomfortable wait as Philip brought your suitcase from wherever he had stored it, and he left it by the foot of your new bed — a narrow single, with a tartan woolen blanket and a single pillow. 

You thanked him as he left, and he rolled his eyes, responding with a curt scoff. “Yeah, you’re welcome.”

Freya leaned against the jamb of the door, giving Philip a strangely pitiful expression on his way out, before she turned her attention back to you. 

“I feel bad,” you said sheepishly, crossing your arms as you stood in the centre of your personal cabin. 

Freya sucked her teeth at that. “For what?” 

“I mean — getting a whole cabin. That feels like a bit much. I just thought I’d be—” 

She pursed her lips. “What’d he say to you?” 

“What?” 

“Jonathan,” she bit. “You were talking all supper.” 

If she was irritated at you, she concealed it well. Kept her brows high and her posture loose despite her line of questioning. 

“Um,” you started. “I dunno, he just asked me questions, I guess.” 

“Like?” 

“Like — uh, why I’m here and how long I’m staying for, and stuff.” 

She seemed to chew on that for a moment. “That all?”

“Why?” You questioned warily.

“Oh — nothing, I’m only curious. I’d just feel terrible if he interrogated you on your first night here.”

Your brows pinched together. “Um, I mean, he didn’t interrogate me or anything. He was nice enough.” 

She let out a short breath, and a smile pulled in her lips. “Yeah, he must like you.”

You only shrugged, unsure if the comment merited a response. Uneasy about the implied weight of him liking you, and you wondered what might have happened if it turned out he didn’t.��

“Anyway, I’m really glad you’re here,” she said, suddenly warming up. “You let me know if you need anything, will you?” 

You returned her smile if only out of courtesy. “Oh, thanks, I will.”

“Anything at all. Even if you only need a shoulder. We’re here for you, okay?”

It was too easy to slip into a routine. 

You had a few days of lounging — that’s what Freya called it — time spent leisurely as opposed to working like everybody else did.

The summer heat was dry but inebriating, and it sunk in through your skin like a percutaneous medicine. Soaked into your spongy brain like ether, and what was once a persistent anxiety that needled and hummed behind your forehead was numbed into a pleasant compliance. 

You had always felt that you suffered from a degree of social anxiety. A pathological fear of rejection that kept you under the heel of solitude, because being actively excluded was more painful than not including yourself at all. 

And yet, you were making friends. 

The people of the Homestead were so warm, so sunny, and so eager for your company, that any worry about not fitting in was forcibly shucked off of you like the husk of a corn. Whatever uncertainty about you that smouldered in the air during the first supper had evaporated, and suddenly those that had looked at you with suspicion were instead all agog about you. 

There was Georgie, who knocked on the door of your cabin at eight in the morning on your first full day, and offered to walk you around the farm. She told you she had never seen someone so pretty, and that she only looked funny at you at supper because she was intimidated by you. She asked you questions about yourself with such genuine intrigue that you found yourself answering in gratuitous detail, and she was fervently gracious for every word. 

There was Simon, one of the old hands, so Freya called them — who arrived at your house to set up gas-powered hot water, because he thought you might not be used to the cold showers on the commune. He told you that they couldn’t let you suffer such a shock to the system, that it was better to keep some of the things you were more familiar with, so you felt more at home. 

There was Linda, who cooked you pancakes for breakfast because you slept through their six a.m. communal one. She made you a coffee with whipped cream and told you that the vanilla syrup was homemade, and she gave you a bowl of strawberries that they had grown themselves. Only the ripest and sweetest ones, she told you, for such a ripe and sweet girl. 

By the fourth day, you were encouraged to follow their schedule. Told that you’d miss out on connections if you slept through breakfast or didn’t attend lunch. It was easy enough, when three of the women you had spoken to the evening prior came to your cabin bright and early. Gave you a little flower to wear in your hair and held your hands as they skipped with you to the hall. 

That was the next time you saw Jonathan. 

He was elusive in the daylight. More of a rumour than a man, something whispered as a deferential secret or referred to like a surveying deity that was perpetually present but just out of sight. He would appear in the hall for his lunch but would take it to go, and you could only speculate on where he spent his time in the space between dawn and dusk. 

He was frugal with his attention. You had begun to suspect his lavish interest in you on your first night was a rarity, a spotlight unique to being a new arrival — and you didn’t like that it wounded you. 

A thorn in your side, tiny but irritating, when you would sit down for dinners and he didn’t invite you to sit next to him. He would keep your gaze for bite-sized moments, ensuring you knew he was aware of your presence, but his focus would shift to somebody else just as you thought he might speak to you.  

So when he called your name after breakfast, before the prescribed cleaners began clearing the table, you perked up like a spooked cat. 

The thrill you felt when hearing his voice was sobering, and it sent a chill down your spine. 

It was subconscious, and it worried you. A latent fawnery that had germinated in your brainstem, one you were only made aware of when you hopped up too enthusiastically from your seat, and felt a swelling pride in your belly when Georgie gave you a knowing little smile. 

You could feel it there, a tooth-rotting lolly dissolving in the wet folds of your brain; you knew it was bad for you, but you couldn’t help but savour the sweetness. 

“Been missin’ you, Cub,” he said softly, when you went to stand beside him, and your tongue curled in your mouth. “Walk with me?” 

“Sure,” you said. 

He wore a faded red overshirt, rolled up to his elbows, and your eyes fixed on his thick forearms as he crossed them over his chest. Smelt of sage and sweat, the musk of labour and deer pelt, and you wondered if he had been out hunting the day before. 

“These things are no good,” he remarked, tugging at the waistband of your jeans by a belt loop, as he walked you out of the back of the hall into the blue-grey dawn. 

The air was cool but already warming with the incipient sun, and the cicadas were awake and humming long before you had been. The birdsong was almost deafening out there, mourning doves lamenting loudly from the tall pines and walnuts that dotted the acreage. 

“My jeans?” You asked, looking down at them, suddenly worried they were unflattering. 

“Mh,” he grunted. “They’re bad for you, y’know.” 

You frowned. “How?” 

He chuckled, as though the answer was so obvious that you were daft for not knowing it. “Aren’t they uncomfortable?” 

“I mean — I guess they’re a little tight,” you admitted bemusedly, running your hands over the waistband. 

He nodded. “Mh. Too tight,” he said. “You should be lettin’ her breathe.” 

You gawped at that. “Her?” 

“Your pussy, love.” 

Your heart skipped a beat when the word drawled its way out of his mouth. Tongue went wet with it, and you could only stare up at him, stupefied. 

“That denim is like sandpaper,” he continued placidly. “Too rough for such a sensitive thing.” 

You hoped he couldn’t see how flustered you were, as you broke your gaze from him and stared glassy-eyed into the gravel of the footpath he walked you down. He chuckled as he draped a heavy arm around your shoulders and gave your trapezius a squeeze, thumb pushing into a squishy knot and it sent goosebumps down the side of your neck.

“No need to get embarrassed, sweetheart,” he purred. “I just know these things.” 

You should have been humiliated by your deference, revolted that you didn’t feel compelled to shove him away and berate him for being so blatantly inappropriate — but some part of you, to your dismay, believed him. They were a little suffocating, you thought, stiff and uncomfortable to sit and walk around in. Perhaps you had become inured to the rigid seam that flossed between your legs and pressed harshly into your clitoris every time you sat down. 

“I — I only really have pants with me. Or leggings,” you quietly admitted, and his calloused hand smoothed down to your arm. 

“The girls can sew you something you’d look lovelier in,” he said. “Better than those city clothes. Wouldn’t you look pretty in something pink?” 

He was good at that, insulting and complimenting you in the same breath. Letting your insecurities fester under the surface but coating them in a thick lacquer of praise. 

“Uh, maybe,” you muttered eventually, once your bashfulness abated and you could find your breath again. 

“I don’t want to see these again,” he said, sternly this time, as his paw sank to your far hip and his thumb tucked into the waistband. 

You swallowed. You should’ve pulled away from him. 

“I… okay,” was all you said. 

You were a guest, you told yourself. He was housing and feeding you with no expectation of payment or contribution, the least you could do is abide by the dress code of his community. To heed his advice, because he seemed like an erudite man. 

He had led you to a pergola, one made of hand-chopped timber, faded grey beams, spattered in wrinkly patches of celadon lichen. Didn’t need to ask you to sit next to him on the seat beneath it, because he guided you there with his arm. 

“Settling in okay, love?” He asked you, arm hung over the back of the bench, and though he was no longer touching you, you felt the heat of his skin on the back of your neck. 

“Yeah,” you said, blinking up at him, before looking abashedly into the trees. “Everyone has been really nice.”

He raised his eyebrows. “Good,” he remarked, nodding, but his gaze continued to pry. “All been welcoming, I hope?” 

“Yeah, for the most part,” you answered, with a sedate smile. 

“Most part?” He questioned immediately, tone rigid, a dent between his brows. 

“Oh, no — I definitely feel welcome,” you stammered, suddenly worried that you’d come across as ungrateful. 

“One of ‘em hassling you?” 

You shook your head urgently. “No, no, of course not.” 

Eyes once doting had squinted in suspicion, and you felt suddenly transparent, like he could see the gears spinning beneath your skin. “I’m not stupid, cub.”

You huffed as you looked away from him, straight out into the tree line with your arms crossed, because you didn’t like the feeling of being pried open. 

“It’s not a big deal,” you said, “it’s just Philip. He just doesn’t seem like he wants me here.” 

“Philip, eh?” He droned, chewing on the name like it tasted foul in his mouth. “I’ll have a word.” 

“Don’t, please, it’s fine. He hasn’t even been rude, just a bit—”

“Enough,” he grumbled, and you bit your tongue. “Not havin’ him throw a fuss because things didn’t go his way.” 

Your brows tightened at that, mind rending itself to figure out what he might have meant by it, but any possible implication you arrived at made your guts churn with unease. 

He let out a long sigh, though, and patted your shoulder with his far hand. “Enjoying yourself otherwise, love?”

You almost jumped again to polite dishonesty, everything is lovely, rising up your throat — but you decided on frankness instead. 

“Yeah, but there’s, um, there’s not much to do,” you said. “I wondered if there might be something I can help out with?” 

He laughed, a bearish sort of chuckle, deep from the barrel of his chest.

“You’re asking for work, are you?” 

“Yeah, I guess so,” you said. “I feel bad just watching everyone else do it.”

He seemed endeared by the suggestion, grinning at you tenderly for a beat too long.  

“Aren’t you a righteous wee girl,” He crooned, large hand cupping your shoulder. “Didn’t I make it clear how I feel about you working?” 

You pouted at that, because how he felt about the matter was not law, though he evidently believed it to be. 

“It’s just — I’m a bit bored,” you said stiffly. “Wouldn’t hurt to have something to do during the day.” 

“Bored, eh?” he mused, through a wry smirk, thumb mindlessly stroking your shoulder. “Well we can’t have that, can we.” 

“I just mean—”

“Tell you what,” he declared. “You can help the girls in the kitchen. But I’m not havin’ you toiling out in the fields like a farm animal.” 

You gritted your teeth. Some sun would have been nice, you were sure, but you’ve always been a creature of comfort. Though the suggestion was patronising, you were not averse to the prospect of domestic labour, when you considered how ragged the farm-workers looked after ten hours of muddy chores. 

“Okay, sure, I can do that.” 

“Lovely,” he said. “You can bring me my coffee in the morning too, if you like. How’s that sound?” 

“Um,” you hesitated, “where… where would I bring it to?” 

“My bedroom,” he said, point-blank. 

You must have worn your stupor on your face, because he gave you a brazen smile, and he grazed your cheek with the hand hanging over your shoulders. He was only a tactile man, you told yourself. Touchy out of habit rather than lechery. That would explain why you didn’t bristle at the warmth of his skin against yours, despite the fact he was still but a stranger to you. 

“Okay,” you conceded, with a sharp exhale, because you suddenly felt as though you had agreed to something you shouldn’t have. 

He nodded, smile baring his ivory teeth, catching the light of the rising sun on a gold-capped premolar. Genuine pride in the steely eyes that gazed down at you, and you felt the warmth of it on your cheeks. You felt his fingers playing with the curls of hair by your ear, as he drew in a deep and steady breath. 

“Not wearing your perfume, mh?” He remarked, after a pregnant silence. 

You weren’t sure why the mention of it embarrassed you, that you had been caught obeying him when you didn’t think you were trying to. 

You hadn’t thought of him when you shirked your usual two-spritz routine to start the day. It wasn’t a conscious decision, you told yourself, you just hadn’t felt the need — in truth, though, you had not once used it since he mentioned it at the first supper. 

“No,” you confessed. 

You could smell the pride on him, crude and syrupy. Oozing from the smug grin that dimpled his bearded cheeks. His thumb stroked the skin of your neck, and you wondered if he could feel how fast your heart was racing. 

“Such a quick learner, cub,” he said. 

There was only one path for you from there. 

You had brought Jonathan his coffee for the first time the next morning. 

His room was in his farmhouse, a timber-cladded folk victorian with two storeys, though likely hand-built by him and his old hands. A short walk from the hall, separate from the other buildings and planted at the top of the hill. The front door was ajar when you went to visit, and you sheepishly ventured inside and went to knock on his bedroom door. End of the hall at the top of the stairs. 

Your eyes were level with his sternum when he opened his door for you, and you wore your shock like a smack to the face. 

Mountainous pectorals upholstered in bearish fur, rising and falling as he breathed you in. He was freshly showered, still damp, and you had arrived just in time to find him buckling up his belt. Hadn’t any time to put a shirt on before your arrival. 

You had never felt smaller nor more insignificant than when you stood in front of him, faced with such a mass of muscle and post-hibernation bulk that you felt drawn in by some deific gravitational pull. A mere moon in his orbit. 

“Hard at work already, lovie?” He drawled, petting the side of your head and taking the steaming mug from you. “Aren’t you a good girl?” 

He offered his praise like hard candy, and you were far too eager to suckle on it. 

He sniffed, dissatisfied, when he took his first sip. 

“I take it with cream,” he told you stiffly, and your heart dropped at the disappointment in his throat. “Next time, mh?” 

You gave him a weak frown. 

“Well you didn’t tell me that,” you retorted, probably a lick too defensive. 

He seemed amused by it, letting out a small puff of laughter and raising an eyebrow. “Now I have.” 

“Anything else I should know?”

He pursed his lips as he thought about it, you felt his eyes on your neck. “I like it sweet.” 

“Me too,” you said, holding back the smile itching in your lips.

“Bet you do, cub,” he replied, with a tepid smirk, and he shut the door.  

That was the last time you got it wrong. 

The next morning you arrived five minutes earlier, and he opened the door in his red-plaid boxers, eyes still puffy from sleep and skin radiating heady warmth from the cocoon of his bed. Unshowered. 

He caught your eyes flitting to the weight behind the buttons of his boxers; shape concealed by the wrinkling fabric, but length plain as day, reaching down the left leg of his shorts. Gave you an upbraiding glower when you swallowed the saliva that had accumulated in your mouth. A silent scolding for getting ahead of yourself with a gaze down his nose as you handed him the mug. 

“I put cream in it this time,” you said, revolted by how obsequious it sounded aloud, “and some of Linda’s vanilla syrup, I thought you might like it.” 

“Mm,” he crooned, the rumble of an engine deep in his chest as he slurped from the mug. “Tha’s lovely.”

A proud little smile curled in your lips. “Oh, good — I’m glad.”

“Know just what I like, don’t you, cubbie?” 

And what could you do but fawn at that? Get all starry-eyed and warm in the cheeks? 

You managed to barely hold on to your reservations for the first few days, keeping your appropriate distance. Dismissed his overt affection as a character quirk, and your willingness to appease him as simple politeness. 

But it was a slippery slope, and you had long since lost your footing. Tripped the very first time he called your name, and there was no climbing back up. You could only slide deeper. 

It didn’t help that all the girls were practically shoving you towards his house every morning. All giddy and fizzing to have you knock on his door, then clucking like chickens when you returned to tell them that he liked his coffee. That he said you were such a good listener, such a clever lamb, such a sweet girl. No wonder, they all told you, squealing it, you’re so lovely. You’re so kind. You’re so pretty.

How could you hold shut your doors to such generosity? Such overwhelming friendliness? 

It wasn’t long before that was your morning routine. What was a few days, became a week. Then two. 

You’d wake up at the crack of dawn, to the birdsong from either the blackbirds in the trees or the girls at your doorstep, and you’d skip to the kitchen to make Jonathan’s coffee. You’d have the mug out, cream and syrup at the ready, so that once the coffee had finished brewing you could assemble it all at once and it would still be puffing steam by the time you arrived at his house. 

Each time you visited him, you’d stand a little closer. Talk a little softer. Stay a little longer. You didn’t see him much during the day, elusory as he was, and you found yourself shamefully excited for your morning visits.

One morning, he didn’t answer his bedroom door when you knocked on it. You knocked on it twice, three times; careful not to hammer too firmly, nor so softly that he’d begrudge your toadying. You were not willing to break the routine, to fail in your fresh habit, so you gathered the nerve to open the door. Heart hammered in your ribs as the hinges creaked and the knob rattled, and the light you let in spilt into the room. 

It was warm in there, stuffy, curtains drawn and windows closed. The air was thick with him, full-bodied; it coated your tongue and filled your sinuses, made your head buzz at the temples. 

“That you, cub?” 

The growl of a sleeping grizzly as he rolled over in his bed, deep grunts and long exhales as his sleep-heavy eyes landed on you in the doorway. 

He must have been cold-blooded, you thought, because he was tucked under multiple woolen blankets even as the summer nights hit their peak temperature. You could hardly stand a single cotton sheet yourself; it was as though all the heat of the northern countryside pooled in the valley of the farm and was only augmented by his presence in it.  

“Yeah, um, I’ve got your coffee,” you whispered, waiting in the doorframe for him to welcome you deeper into his den. 

“Mh, bit early,” he grumbled, and you bit down on an apology, because it was not in fact any earlier than your usual visits. “C’mere.” 

You swallowed. Shuffled bashfully towards his bed as if you were breaking a rule just by being in his space. You were sure there would have been such a rule, too, because every day you learned of a new one. No nail polish. No mobile phones. No polyester clothes. No chore swapping. No wandering the Homestead at night. No eating before Jonathan. No unplanned visitors. No secrets.

“There was no vanilla left,” you said quietly, as you put the coffee down gently on his nightstand. “So I put maple syrup in it instead.” 

He let out a gruff sigh as though you had disturbed him, rolling onto his side to face you, and he lifted up the corner of his blankets with this forearm. 

“In y’get,” he grunted. 

You could only blink at him dazedly. 

A week or two earlier you’d have asked for some clarification, for him to repeat it, to ensure you hadn’t hallucinated such an inappropriate request from a stranger. Perhaps you had grown accustomed to it. Worse, excited by it; nobody else was allowed such visits. Nobody else magnetised such eager hands. Nobody else was invited into bed with him. You were special, and when you went back to the village to talk to the others, they’d tell you the same. 

So you sat on the edge of the bed, slipping in next to him, and he tucked you into his blankets.

You were swallowed quickly by the sweltering warmth of his body heat, heightened ten-fold by the thick cloak of his bedding, and the bulky arm that scooped you backward until your spine pressed into his sternum. 

His breath was hot against the back of your head, bleeding through your scalp like warm water. You were already sweating, because his heat was swathing and humid, and there was no slithering away now that you had put yourself there. 

“New frock, eh?” He asked hoarsely, arm shifting back until an expansive hand had settled flat on your ribcage, fingers catching in the folds of your ridden-up dress. 

“Yeah,” you murmured, “from Harriet.” 

“She’s a talent,” he hummed approvingly, as his hand edged down towards your waist, so slowly that you mightn’t have noticed if his fingertips hadn't pressed into the valleys between your ribs. 

She was, Harriet, one of two women at the Homestead who knew how to sew. She had sewn you three dresses, so far, one that was light pink, the other white. The one you wore now was a faint buttermilk linen, smocked under the bust with powder-pink embroidery. You were never much of a dress-wearer when you lived in the city, but how could you turn them down when they were custom-sewn, tailored for you? How could you return to your jeans and t-shirts when everybody told you how pretty you were in a dress? 

“Yeah,” you placidly agreed.

In a movement disguised by a shuffle and a deep breath, his hand was pawing at your hip, the skirt of your dress hiked up as if by mere accident. Little finger grazing the skin of your thigh, tingling as though static; and soon his whole palm was melded to your bare skin, and your tongue was in your teeth. 

Your thoughts were slippery and impalpable as eels, and they wriggled out of reach if you ever came close to grabbing one. Somewhere in your writhing head were the echoes of a little voice, faint and still fading; you shouldn’t be here. You shouldn’t allow this. You should tell him to stop. 

There was no rebuffing him, though. 

Not simply owing to the quiet fear of what he might do when displeased — worse, that you didn’t want to displease him. The others would have brawled among themselves to be where you were, praying that their years of devotion would pay off, that they would finally be worthy of being this close to him — but no, not one of them had lain where you now did. 

How could you squander such a privilege? 

Something else, though, something far more dangerous, was stirring and bubbling within you like poison in a cauldron. 

Beyond dismissed reservations, or the simple allure of scarcity — no, a smouldering heat between your hips, muggy and effervescent and impossible to ignore. It beat out from your heart and siphoned into the nerves between your thighs, where it cumulated until it was swollen with anticipation and twitching with every movement of his hand against your skin. 

“What’d I tell you about letting ‘er breathe,” he rumbled, when his fingers brushed the hem of your underwear on your hip, tone verging on reproach. 

You held your breath as you thought of what to say, throat kept closed when you felt a tug on the waistband of the elasticated fabric. 

“I don’t remember,” you breathed — a lie, whose motivation eluded you. You recall exactly what he said. Even how his voice sounded when he said it. Your pussy, love. 

He hadn’t mentioned underwear, though, had he?  

“Cunt shouldn’t be smothered all day,” he huffed, fisting the hip of your knickers and tugging them down to your thigh. “S’not natural.”

That little voice grew louder. You should tell him to stop. Tell him to stop. Tell him to stop. 

No, you lifted your hips so he could pull them down, and you did the rest for him — shimmying your legs so your underwear rolled down to your calves, then kicked them off your ankles into the belly of the bed. 

Another rule on the list, you thought. 

No knickers. 

You didn’t want to break his rules, because you hadn’t found a new place to live yet. Not to say you had been looking particularly hard — or, at all, since your phone only received one bar of signal if you climbed to the top of the hill, and to top it off you were actively discouraged from using it. It was a distraction from the natural splendor of the farm, they told you, and the light of your screen was bad for your eyes, and your city friends didn’t really care about you, so why text them?

Besides, he knew these things. You trusted his knowledge on the matter. You had the sense he understood your body better than you did; he was certainly more concerned with it, because it wasn’t as though you took particularly good care of it, and to him that was sacreligious. 

Such excuses flitted around in your head like butterflies in a jar when you felt his rough fingertips dig into the hollow of your hip bone, the flesh there tender enough to make you twitch. Breath caught in your chest as they crept further, closer, until the palps of his fingers brushed your mons, and he let out a dissatisfied huff into the back of your head. 

“Shouldn’t be shaving, either,” he grunted reprovingly. “Wee pussy’s too delicate for blades, mh?” 

Your tongue was wet, and your eyes had fluttered shut, and your breaths were broken and trembling. Dewy with sweat at the nape of your neck.

New rule. No shaving. 

He certainly was delicate with it. Pad of his finger tracing over your mound, light as a feather, as if to tickle you. It kind of did tickle, but the tingling sunk through the pillowy flesh and funnelled directly into your pebbled clit, until it was beating like a heart in the hope that he might deign to touch it. 

You knew in the pits of you it would be imprudent to let him have sex with you. Catastrophically so. Such a transgression would be a tipping point, one of no return. A leap off a cliff into murky depths that you knew would be impossible to climb out of. 

But his hand retreated, resolving your dilemma for you. Shame weighed in your chest. Appalled by the unjustifiable disappointment that wracked you in the wake of his touch. 

For the best that he didn’t venture any further, though, because you were on your period. Georgie had offered you tampons when you pulled her aside to ask, almost too giddy to offer them to you, telling you countless times that they were pure cotton and all natural, and to let her know when it’s over. 

He gave you an innocent pat on the hip, before peeling the blankets off of you, and the stifling air of his room was cold on your skin. 

“Need to get up and at ’em,” he grumbled. “Go join your kitchen girls.” 

You might have made a pother if you didn’t have a few remaining shreds of dignity. I don’t want to trickled down your tongue and itched at the tip, but you refused to let yourself release the words. 

You slipped out of his bed with a long sigh, wobbly as you found your footing on the hardwood. Smoothed out the wrinkled fabric of your dress, tugged the skirt down where it had ridden up. You felt on a step how slippery you were, pussy so sodden that you worried some might have soaked into the fabric of your skirt.

Jonathan sat upright with a huff, swivelled so he sat on the side of the bed and rubbed his eyes with the heels of his palms. 

“Y’alright there, cub?” He asked, when he saw you hadn’t moved from where you stood. 

You nodded winsomely. “Yeah, um — I’m just… I…” 

“All wet now, are you?” 

His voice was hoarse and slick with amusement, and it sent a shudder through you as you blinked over your shoulder at him. 

You were too timid to confess to that. “Um—” 

“S’alright, love,” he said, pushing himself to stand with a grunt, and you tried not to look at the half-hard cock in his boxers. “Tha’s normal. Don’t you go putting your fingers in yourself, though, eh?”  

“I wasn’t—” Going to went swallowed, because there was a non-zero chance it would have been a lie. “Why not?” 

Divots pulled in his temples as he clenched his jaw, aegean eyes turned black as they clawed down the length of you. 

“Because I said so,” he told you, as he ferried you along, giving you a pat on the rear to send you out his bedroom door. “You keep those fingers busy in the kitchen, yeah?” 

New rule. No masturbating.

“Okay,” you said sheepishly.

“Good girl,” he grunted, as he shut the door. 

It took you a while to confess what had happened to the girls in the kitchen, resolve only worn down by their squealing appetite for any information about your interactions with him. 

“Didn’t he like the maple syrup?” Georgie asked mournfully, evidently concerned that the reason for your silence was that you had gotten in trouble. 

You let out a little breath as you sliced up the nectarines on a wooden chopping board, fingers all sticky with the juice, distracting heat still bubbling under your skin. 

Chopping fruit and stirring batter were the only jobs you were allowed, they had said as much the first time you joined them. We’re not allowed to share chores unless he says so, they told you, and we can’t have you burning yourself. 

All so bizarrely strict about it. Even when you had asked Jonathan specifically if you could help them in the garden, just to pick the berries, you told him, he had firmly refused. Said he wouldn’t let you toil away because he needed you to nurture yourself.

Didn’t bother you too much. You were fine with your station in the kitchen because you weren’t too fond of handling all the raw meat. 

“I dunno,” you said, “he didn’t have any.” 

“Oh,” Freya blurted, cocking her head back in surprise. “That’s weird. Did he say anything?” 

You chewed on your tongue as you swiped a pile of nectarine slices into the big steel bowl beside you. “Not really.” 

“Not really?” Georgie pestered, busy stirring an enormous pot of porridge over the stove. 

“Well he, um,” you hesitated. “He asked me to get into bed with him.” 

You heard the bang of the butter churner as Freya stopped her work abruptly to gawk at you. “What?” 

Georgie was slack-jawed. “You mean—”

“Not like that,” you clarified quickly, looking at them sheepishly, as they both glared at you bulgy-eyed. Something of a lie. “Just to lie down, or whatever.” 

Freya wore an expression that made you feel a bit queasy. A little crease between her brows with her lips in a line. Not quite disapproval, not quite worry — somewhere in the middle. A crack in the fabric, a fleeting glimpse of reality that made your stomach flip, and for a moment you saw Freya the girl you knew as a child, and not Freya the bubbly kitchen maid. 

She side-eyed Georgie before she spoke. “That seems a bit—”

“Oh my God,” Georgie interrupted fervently, dropping her spoon to hurry towards you, and she took your wrists in her hands. “He must really think you’re special.” 

“I s’pose,” you answered, with a little smile, and she shook your hands in excitement.

“Did he like your dress?” She asked animatedly. 

“I think so,” you said.

Georgie tugged you towards her, then, pulling you into a hug so unexpected that you let out a gasp as she threw her arms around you. 

“We’re so lucky,” she crooned, rocking you from side to side. “So lucky, aren’t we?”

“Lucky for what?” You blurted, taken aback. 

She giggled, releasing you gently before settling two soft hands on either side of your face. 

“Lucky to have you,” she explained, eyes wide with an ardour that made your chest feel eerily warm. “Everything’lll be just perfect now that you’re here, you’ve brought life with you.” 

Whatever she meant by that utterly eluded you, but you couldn’t suppress a smile.  

The next time you spoke to Jonathan was just shy a week later. 

He wasn’t there for breakfasts, or for lunches, or for dinners. He came to collect his helpings from the kitchen when you weren’t there, and he had already left home every time you went to bring him his coffee in the mornings. 

Worry festered in the nadirs of your mind the longer that time stretched between his appearances. Riddled with a fear that you had stepped over a line. That he was done with you. That he was already bored of you. 

Nobody would elucidate where he went during the day, and you quickly learned that it was a faux pas to even ask. All you understood was that he was out with his old hands, a group of men that would disappear with him for days at a time. Maybe out building something, you guessed, or hunting — some form of manual labour, at least, because whenever you caught brief glimpses of him he was sweaty and sunburned and covered in muck.

Such was the case when he and three other men lumbered into the hall for Sunday supper, fashionably late. Everyone else already seated and awaiting his arrival before they could start. 

He fell into his empty chair at the head of the table with an exasperated huff. 

His blue plaid flannel was grimy at the cuffs, smudged with mud and speckled in shreds of tree bark. First four buttons undone, and his chest was gleamy with a drying layer of sweat, flocks of hair clumped and curled with it. You felt guilty for staring at him, heart sitting high in your chest, buzzing with nerves — his seat had sat empty for so long that you had begun to forget what it was like to have him sitting there. 

Caught your eye as he adjusted himself in his seat, pushing the cuffs of his sleeves up to his forearms, and dusting off his front. Wasted no time as he reached for the serving fork and skewered two heavy steaks with it, dumping them on his plate. You had forgotten how to act, suddenly so anxious in his presence that you immediately broke his gaze and stared down into your plate. 

As was the supper ritual, once Jonathan had served himself, the others immediately began tucking into their dinner. You were about to do the same, awaiting the spoon for the peas from the girl next to you, when his voice shot across the hall and cast silence in its wake. 

Your name hovered in the air like the smoke of a gunshot. 

It was so sudden that you felt panicked despite the lack of ire in his voice, even with the smile that bared his teeth. You perked up concernedly where you sat, obeisantly keeping his gaze from across the table, waiting for him to ask something of you. 

“Come over ‘ere,” he said, with no force in his voice, because he knew that he didn’t need to make demands of you. “Bring your plate, eh?” 

The supper mercifully returned to its noise of chatter and clinking cutlery as you pushed yourself to stand, especially convivial because it was a Sunday — heightened further by the fresh batch of pear cider that had finished brewing the day before, supplied in great glass pitchers peppered around the table. 

You stepped over the bench with your empty plate held in both hands, and wandered towards his end of the table. Waited quietly for him to order the others on the bench to move down so that there was space for you to sit. 

“C’mon,” he urged, and you frowned bemusedly — until you saw him rap his thigh with a flat hand, and you felt your tummy tighten up. 

When you dithered about it for too long, he reached out with his big arm and scooped you towards him, and in a confusion of feet and legs you were brusquely perched on his thigh. 

“There y’go,” he nodded, as he gave you a pat on the side of your thigh to settle you in. 

With his other hand he leaned across the table to scoop himself some mashed potatoes, a tower of it, before he stacked up a few scoops onto your plate, too. 

“Thank you,” was all you could say, stupidly, because your head was all rattled. 

You were potently relieved that the other people in the hall busied themselves with each other, deep in conversation or focused on sawing away at their steaks with serrated knives; because his hand was already atop your thigh, ostensibly to keep you stable, but it crept its way upward with every slight movement and it took the skirt of your dress with it. 

“Where have you been?” You asked quietly, as he continued to fill up your plate. 

He let out a puff of laughter as he impaled a steak with his fork and dropped it next to your potatoes. “Missed me, did you?” 

Yes tapped against the back of your teeth, but you subdued it with a clearing of your throat. “I’m just curious,” you said. 

He grinned, amused, arrogantly doubtful. “Been workin’ on something,” he answered, frustratingly vague. “Haven’t got long to finish it.” 

You watch as he added another scoop of peas to your plate, and you only then noticed how much food he had given you — not nearly as piled-up as his, but still far more than you would have grabbed for yourself, with a plum-sized cube of butter melting into the mash. 

“What is it?” You queried, more supplicantly than you had intended it to sound, though you now feared that any dissention would make him disappear again. 

“Don’t you worry about that yet, cub,” he grunted, yet perking your ears up, but his austerity told you not to ask anything further. “Now eat up. Not having you get bony.” 

Not the first time he had told you that — always insistent you finish your plate, that you don’t piss around with puny helpings, that you eat your pudding afterwards. He was just overly doting, you thought. 

You followed his bidding and scooped up a mouthful, chewing it quietly as you put your fork back down. It was delicious, rich and hearty, the potatoes were creamy, and the steak was tender and well seasoned. Venison, maybe, it had that gamey sort of flavour, but you thought it a little pale. Perhaps pork. 

By the time you swallowed, his hand had ridden up to where your thigh met your hip, and his thumb wedged into the crease. It didn’t escape your notice how he watched you, low-lidded, smug, ignoring his own meal as he took a sip of his cider. 

“Aren’t you going to eat any?” You questioned, eventually, as you swallowed another mouthful, and he mindlessly tapped on the neck of his bottle. 

“Might need you t’cut my steak up for me,” he commented pointedly, through the crack of a grin. “Hard to do it one-handed.” 

“I… you can just let go of me,” you replied, tight-lipped. 

The moment the words escaped your mouth, his hand pinched tight as a vice around your thigh. Thumb gouged deep into the sensitive tendons of your groin hard enough to make you chirp — not as much a pain as a shock, that bolted up your spine and turned to molasses in the cavities of your skull. A punishment for even suggesting it. 

“Why would I do that?” He murmured innocently, as if completely incognisant of the actions of his hand.  

You turned your head to look up at him beseechingly, brows knitted and lips pursed. The heat of his breath was sultry against the skin of your cheek. Goading stare a narcotic that turned your better judgement to gruel. 

What could you do but relent when he looked at you like that? 

His hand was firm around your thigh as you reached towards his plate to pick up his cutlery, but its grip loosened as you pierced the thick wad of meat with his fork. Crept up to your hip as you made the first cut, the steak not quite tender enough to give way with one saw of the knife. 

Palm was flat against your belly, then, once the first slice was severed and it flopped flat onto the plate. Lower, as you cut through the second. Masked the movements of his hands with each incision as though you might not have noticed while yours were busy. 

Lips loosened, efforts faltered, as his travelling hand nested between your thighs. 

You could only gulp at the dry air as his palm pressed firmly against your cunt, held you by it as if to keep you still. The thin cotton of your dress now the only barrier between his calluses and the fragile skin there, because you had forsaken wearing underwear, just as he had told you to. 

Acknowledging the incursion seemed to you like a fool’s errand. Fussing about it much the same. 

It was pacifying when it shouldn’t have been. Decoupled you from reality as all of the blood drained from your head and pooled between your legs. Rendered you foggy-eyed as the ball of his palm squished into your clitoris as he adjusted you on his lap, so that your arse pressed into his hip. 

“Need a bit more than that, love,” he remarked wryly, nodding at the three measly slices of steak you managed before you lost track. 

You drew in a stifled breath in an attempt to ground yourself. 

“Um — sorry,” you stammered, as you refocused your attention to his plate, reorienting his knife and fork in your slippery hands before you dropped them. 

Once again poked the meat with the fork to keep it steady, and began severing a fourth slice. Did your best to narrow your concentration into the movements of the blade — back, forth, back, forth, back, forth—

You hiccuped as he grinded his palm against your cunt, a blunt force on your clit that made your vision blurry and your jaw slack — but he released the pressure just as quickly, cupping your pussy as if it were incidental in keeping you steady on his lap. 

You knew he was testing you. Pushing at your boundaries to see how much effort it took to break them. Goading you to question him, daring you to rebuff him — and every time you didn’t, his boldness tumesced, and your resolve shrivelled. 

“You — you shouldn’t do that,” you breathed, the last of your self-preservation leaking out with it. 

You expected him to be coy about it, anticipated a provocative do what? while he continued to touch you unfettered. 

Instead, he drawled; “Why not?” 

Forcibly resisted your brows curling as his hand tightened again, as your wary eyes bolted around the hall, ensuring none of the others were looking in your direction. 

“There’s… all these people, they’ll see.”

“Who gi’s a fuck about them?” He jeered, a latent vitriol webbed in his words that before then you hadn’t heard in him. “You’re the only one in here that matters, cub.” 

What could you do but melt when he told you that? Stumble on your words like you had forgotten how to talk? 

“But — they might—”

He snorted. “Mh? What d’you think they’ll do?” 

You glanced worriedly at the people sitting next to him, who were graciously still oblivious and busy with their own conversations; but one blink in your direction would expose how flustered you were, wet-lipped and heavy-eyed, as Jonathan craned his head to speak into your ear when you failed to answer his question. 

“They’ll do what I tell them to,” he murmured. 

It sent a chill needling down your spine to hear it admitted so brazenly. A fact obvious to you from the moment you saw him seated in his throne at the head, but you never let the thought gain traction, never let the concern take root. 

You knew that it should have raised alarm in you, that he would so unabashedly admit to being an autarch that ruled over the obliging residents of the Homestead like sheep. 

It didn’t. No, it made your heart hum against your sternum, because you were his favourite. You were special. The only one that mattered. 

“Go on, then,” he prompted you. “I’m gettin’ hungry.” 

What could you do but oblige him?  

You went back to work. Held his cutlery in shaky fists and sawed off another slice of steak, and another, and another — back, forth, back, forth, back, forth. 

His hand only served to torment you. A firm grip of your cunt to keep you steady, planted there just to make you twitch every time his palm tightened, but he never offered you more than that. Didn’t move the thin cotton of your dress out of the way, didn’t dip a finger into you, didn’t stroke your clit enough to sate you. 

By the time you finished slicing up his meat for him, your cunt was molten and shuddering around nothing, and you were certain the yearning fluids he had carelessly coaxed out of you had formed a wet patch on your skirt. 

“Look a’ that,” he crooned. “You’re a natural.” 

You couldn’t muster a response to that, save for the rasping sigh that was rended from your chest as his hand slipped out from the gap between your thighs. Reached forward to take his utensils from you, arms enveloping you as he stacked up a few slices of steak on his fork and scooped some mash on top with his knife. 

You scoffed, breathless. 

“Could’ve done it yourself,” you muttered, bursting at the seams with harried frustration, thundering under your skin and steaming out your ears. 

He snickered as he shovelled his food into his mouth. 

“Wee fusspot, aren’t you?” He teased, chewing noisily on his steak, “Go’on, eat. That’ll cheer y’up.” 

You sulked for a moment, prodding at your mound of potatoes with a fork. Your body still thrummed like a revved engine and it suppressed any appetite you may have had, before he drained all of your attention into that twitching spot between your legs. 

“Not tellin’ you twice, cub,” he reiterated, distinctly unamused. 

You sighed petulantly, but as you had fallen into the habit of doing, you did as you were told. The meat was a little chewier now that it had cooled down. 

Because you helped prepare dinner — peeling and chopping up the potatoes, and shucking the peas from their pods — you were spared being on clean up duty. 

A mercy, because you hated doing the dishes. You wondered whether telling Jonathan as much would mean he would ensure you never touched a sponge again in your life; but you didn’t want to be that spoiled, for fear it would turn the others of the Homestead against you. 

It was nice, of course, made you feel all gooey and warm inside that he was so attentive to you, so concerned with you. But you didn’t particularly like the idea of being such a tall poppy that the other people around you began to despise you. They were the ones you spent all day with, the other Homesteaders, and you liked them. Most of them, anyway. They were all inordinately friendly and chatty, eager to know more about you, eager to comfort and care for you. Listened whenever you cried about where your life had come to, about your ex, about your stupid fucking boss or your evil prick landlord. Told you not to worry, because none of that mattered anymore, because only good things lay ahead of you. 

Freya had invited you to join her and some of the others around the fire pit, the one a short walk from the hall, where people would spend time socialising and drinking after their long and arduous days of working. You told her that you needed to rinse off first, because you were all sweaty from such a hot day, but that you would join them afterwards. 

It was dark by the time you left your cabin, the sky predominantly navy save for the band of teal along the horizon, turning the silhouettes of the trees against it black as pitch. It was a short walk from your front step to the fire pit, and you headed along the gravelly path around the side of the hall in your sandals. 

The first person you encountered on your way over was leaning with a flat hand against the outer cladding of the hall, facing the wall and completely hidden in the shadow. None of the orange glow of the gas-powered lanterns could reach where they stood, and your eyes were still adjusting to the darkness. You heard, though, the distinct sound of a stream of liquid splashing into the dirt, and quickly surmised from his pose that it was a man pissing on the ground. 

You had picked up the habit from the others on the farm of offering a sunshiny greeting to everyone you passed by, an expected social procedure; but now you found yourself a little lost on what to do or say. You resolved to keep walking, awkwardly meandering around him without saying a word. 

But your name flew out like a net, and his voice was ragged and heavy-tongued, so you stopped momentarily.

It was Philip. 

“Y’know — y’re not what I expected you to be,” he murmured, buttoning up his trousers, and you resentfully caught a glance of his floppy cock while he did it. He was blunderingly drunk, you could smell it from where you stood. “Y’re not what Freya said.”

You found yourself at a loss for how to deal with him. In the outside world you probably would have called him a fucking tosser and marched away unfazed, but you hadn’t encountered a single interpersonal conflict in three weeks, and it suddenly seemed like an alien concept to you. So unfamiliar, in fact, that you found your mouth shaped to form an apology, like you had been the one to stir something unpleasant. 

Philip was, unlike the others, still a stranger to you. He was overtly contemptuous for the first few days, rolling his eyes at you or turning pointedly away from you whenever you were near him. Once Jonathan had his word with him, you supposed, that outward vitriol had given way to complete and utter disinterest. Not once had he spoken more than a single word to you in the weeks you had been at the Homestead, but it didn’t bother you enough to raise it as an issue. No big deal, because everyone else was so nice, so why would it matter if one of them wasn’t? 

“What’d she say?” You asked tightly, after a beat, in some effort to avert him from stumbling any closer to you. 

“Sh’said you were a — a — a peach,” he slurred. “Sweet n’ soft, she said. Yeah. Y’know what she told me?” 

You couldn’t have curbed your scowl even if you wanted to. Storming away from him would have been the wiser thing to do, but you were suddenly charged with a galvanic curiosity — sweet and soft? Had she advertised you like food before she was allowed to bring you along? 

“What,” you muttered through your teeth, arms crossing. 

“She told me you’d be perfect for me,” he blathered, greasy with spite. “For me, she said. That’s what she brought y’ere for. Me.” 

With that, your mettle returned to you like a slap to the cheek. Swelled up quickly in your belly as you frowned at him in revulsion. 

“What do you think I am, some kind of fucking brood sow?” You barked, a growl in your voice that had been buried for a while, “Freya saying that doesn’t mean anything at all.” 

He laughed at that, but it was so rich with acrimony that you could taste it like peroxide in the air. 

“You’re right, no, you’re right, because sh’was wrong anyway,” he ranted. “Y’re not a peach, you’re — you’re — you’re a goddamn prune.”

You gawked at him in bewilderment. “What does that even mean?” 

“It means you’re a whore,” he snarled, an abrupt shift to open aggression that made you step onto your hind foot. “Y’think I didn’t see all that? Lettin’ John play with your cunt under the table?” 

Your blood plummeted to your feet all at once.

Ignominy must have plastered itself on your face — because he laughed at you, loud and haughty, as he took a step in your direction. 

“Yeah, thought you were being subtle, did ya? Puttin' on a show for the whole damn family? Just rubbin’ it in my fuckin’ face, that’s what you were doing,” he raved on, and at that point you decided it was time to leave. 

You hurried down the path with your arms tight around yourself, marching away from him with big angry strides. For a moment you were anxious that he’d pursue you, because you kept hearing his drunken rambling even as the distance grew. 

“New lamb for me, tha’s what John said — only let Freya bring you ‘ere so I’d have someone to share my damn bed with. No, no, now he wants you, eh? Pisses all over his territory like a dog and makes me fuckin’ sniff it—” 

His slurring voice drowned out as you continued your escape, striding past the firepit with enough distance that the light didn’t catch you, and the others didn’t notice you pass them by. You were all upset, now, the heat of it had risen high in your cheeks and quivered beneath your eyes. 

Instead you tramped in the direction of Jonathan’s farmhouse, and by the time you knocked on his door you had a lump in your throat and your cheeks were sticky with tears. 

You heard his heavy steps from behind the door before it opened. 

His face sunk once his glower found you. Eyes heavy with it, a simmering indignation, lips tight. His expression only elicited more globby tears, because you suddenly feared that you had made him angry just by appearing on his doorstep when you hadn’t been invited. 

Seemed he wasn’t angry at you, though, because two great big hands reached across the small distance and fixed to either cheek. 

“What’s the matter, cubbie?” He asked hoarsely, smearing your tears from your cheeks with the pads of his thumbs. 

“I just — I walked past Philip, and he—”

“C’mon,” he hushed, scooping you towards him with an arm around your shoulders before ferrying you through his door. “Tell me about it inside. I’ll make us a cuppa.” 

He led you down the hallway, past his staircase, where until then you had never dared to venture. Found yourself in a proper kitchen. You would have been more rattled by the fact he had a kitchen at all if you weren’t so troubled by other things.

You let out a little gasp as he picked you up with mammoth hands under your arms and plonked you onto his butcher block counter — he gave you a brush of his knuckle under your chin, before he went to fill up the kettle at the sink. 

“Tell me what happened,” he said, turning on the faucet. He washed his hands with soap before he went to fill up the kettle. The pressure was weak, but you didn’t expect much else from a water system reliant on rainwater. 

“Well, he — he basically — he told me Freya brought me here for him,” you answered weakly, not quite tearful enough to trip over your words, but enough for it to be wet and gulping in your throat. “And then I said it doesn’t matter what Freya said, and then he, he—”

His attention was fixed on you once he put the kettle down on the stove, and he didn’t turn on the gas. 

“He what.” 

“He called me a whore,” you snivelled, wiping your soggy cheek with the heel of your palm. “He said he saw — he saw everything at supper.” 

The look of displeasure that suffused across his features would have been enough to make you shiver if it were directed at you. He ambled towards you, then, before planting both firm hands on each of your shoulders, and your knees brushed his hips. 

“Envy is a wicked thing, cub,” he said, voice deep, a faint simmer of anger audible in the lowest frequencies. “You just ignore him, yeah?” 

“But — but — he saw,” you moaned, the embarrassment at the thought once again rearing its head and it stung like the prod of a hot brand. 

He shushed you as his hand shifted to the back of your neck, fixing under your hair, and he pulled you into his chest. Draped another arm around you to hold you in close, and your thighs had to stretch around him to accommodate him. His chest was pillowy, comfortable, and the smell of his skin through the thin cotton of his flannel made your eyes glass over. 

“Doesn’t matter what he saw,” he grumbled, lips at your temple, and the touch made your brain whir like a purring cat. 

“I’m sorry,” you mewled, because you felt as though it was your fault for getting caught — probably made a noise, or a stupid needy face, maybe a whole scene because you couldn’t ever control yourself. 

“None o’ that,” he said, reeling back from you and once again settling his hands on your cheeks. “You’ve been nothin’ but an angel. Haven’t you?” 

You sniffed, blinking at him rheumy-eyed, and when he glared at you insistently you capitulated with a weak nod. 

“Mh,” he agreed, and you felt his left thumb feather closer to the corner of your mouth. “Such a good girl.” 

Thumb brushed over your lips, then, and the tickle made your mouth water. The touch alone coaxed them to part, just slightly enough to draw in some suddenly needed air. 

“And a good wee listener, aren’t you?” He purred, pad of his fore- and middle fingers ghosting over your bottom lip. 

Pelagic eyes that had been fixed to your lips shift up to meet yours, and again you realised it was not a rhetorical question, so you answered with another feeble nod. 

“Open up, then,” he said, rumbling, low enough that you felt the vibration of it through the narrow air between you. 

You were a good listener. So you opened your mouth for him, just enough to breathe through. 

He let out a rasping breath as he sild a salty fingertip between your lips, running it along the edge of your incisors. 

“Wider,” he instructed, and you did, allowed him enough space between your jaws to fit his thick finger, and you felt the rough palp of it on the tip of your tongue. “Good.” 

The second finger joined the first, pushing deeper into your mouth until the tips of them were midway down your tongue, and a spate of saliva began dripping down your throat. You were wide-eyed, beaming at him hopelessly. Devotedly. His expression was rigid, fixed, so focused that his eyes were dark with it. 

Fingers persisted deeper, until you felt them on the back of your tongue, mouth filled with the savoury taste of his hand, and you wondered if it was the same hand he had held your pussy with. 

The thought made your eyes flutter shut, but a press of his finger at the back of your throat quickly forced you to gag. 

He shushed you immediately; “Easy, you’re fine,” he cooed, and you drew in a wet breath through your nose, swallowing the flood of viscous spit that filled your throat. 

Reeled his fingers out only slightly, as if just to feel the friction of your tastebuds beneath his fingertips, before pushed them in again, and you fought back another gag. 

“So thirsty f’me, aren’t you, cub,” he drawled, hazily, a fascinated grin twitching in the corner his lips. “Drink from me, then.” 

Your hands lifted to meet his, clutching it by the wrist with both as if holding a milk bottle, allowing his fingers to slide in to the root, and his knuckles pressed into your cheeks. 

“Suck them,” he grunted. 

And you did. Suckled on his fingers like a calf on a teat, blinking at him when the urge to gag abated, fat tears rolling from the corners of your eyes but evoked now by something entirely different. 

“Good girl,” he murmured, as his other hand released your cheek, sinking down to your chest, catching in the folds of your dress as it clawed down your stomach. 

He hiked up your skirt with intention — no longer being coy about his efforts, he was fervent in it — and in a heartbeat your frock was at your hip, and his hand ran along the inside of your thigh. 

You puffed out a whimper through your nose when he glided his fingers along your slit, base to top, only splitting it on the second swipe — smiled agape to himself when he dipped into wetness that had already leaked and accumulated there.

“Haven’t you been patient?” He hummed, smearing the tips of his fingers upward until they swiped over your clitoris, still puffy and wanting from when he worked it up at supper. “Neediest thing and still so patient. I reckon you deserve a treat for that.”

You gazed at him doe-eyed, huffing out squeaks around his fingers as he danced his others around your clit, not quite indulging it with a real touch. Your hips arched into him despite the effort to control it, and he gave you a delighted grin, fingertips remaining just agonisingly out of reach. Only when your head rocked back off your shoulders and you groaned desperately did he finally relent. 

Rested the tip of his thumb into your mons to balance his hand, as his fingers stroked your clit, languid, almost cruel in how slowly he moved them upward and down again.  

“S’this what you want?” He droned, satisfaction dripping from his grin. 

You nodded, as much as the fingers in your throat allowed you to move, brows curling up and eyes too fluttery and heavy to keep properly open. 

“Thought as much,” he muttered, smugly amused. “Could smell it on you the second you showed up. Aching little cunt with nothing to break it off on, eh?” 

You could only whine like a wounded puppy, trail of drool leaking out from the corner of your mouth where his fingers held it open — twitching as the calloused pads of his fingers cosseted the raw flesh of your clit, too swollen and sensitive to handle direct touch. 

“Mh. Yeah, I’ll take good care of ya, cubbie,” he cooed, almost pitying, as if he was enacting some great charity for the down and out girl he dragged in off the street. Not far from the truth, as you considered it. 

“Keep sucking,” he ordered when your tongue went slack, because his other fingers had shifted downward from your clit, nestling between your folds and prodding at your fluttering hole. 

He mercifully decided against two when you squeaked in fright, instead pushing a single fingertip into you. Fed it in slowly, bit by bit as if too much would spook you, until his palm was flush with your pussy. His finger was as thick as two of yours, and it might have been enough to sting if you weren’t so slick. 

It made you tipsy to feel him inside you, even only his fingers, in two places at once — his fingers, his his his — it buzzed around in your head like a caged hornet until your blood was runny and your eyes clouded over, and he hadn’t even moved it yet. And when he did, hooked his finger to push into the squishy flesh below your bladder, so tender there — you mewled loudly enough that your voice came out fractured, panting out of your nose with your eyes wrenched shut. 

“Like that, do ya?” He chuckled, watching you raptly as he curled his hand, so he could thumb at your clit while he fucked you with his finger. Dragged it out to push it back in again, slow and steady. 

Didn’t matter how slowly he did it, you had been a hair-trigger away from coming at any given moment all night, and you just might have done it fingers-free if you thought about his hand under the table for too long — this, this, was almost too much. A daunting climax loomed over you, so ruinous that your body seemed to shy away from it, too sensitive, too desperate, too—

“Mh, I feel tha’,” he goaded, rumbling deep. “Close, are ya, sweetheart?”

You nodded, tearful, whimpering, every noise muffled by the fingers in your mouth, nose runny and sniffling every time you sucked down an eager breath. Thumb rubbed your sore clit with the motion of the one inside you, and as it all began to cave in on you, your eyes shot open. 

“Easy, cub, no need to panic.” 

Acting as if you might never have had an orgasm before, soothing you like you might be afraid of the overwhelming rush of feelings he was provoking within you — it settled you despite yourself, and your shoulders sunk inward, letting out the hot air that you had been hoarding in your chest — and then it swallowed you. 

“Yeah, tha’s it,” he encouraged you, pushing his fingers deeper into your throat as your whines grew louder, and your face crumpled up, and you balanced on the summit— 

“Goooood girl,” he crooned, as you came around his finger so forcefully that your eyes just about rolled into the back of your head, clit burning so hot that it made you jolt and squeal when he touched it too firmly. Fingers pressed down on the back of your tongue right as you tumbled over the zenith, forcing out a squeaking gag and a long band of saliva that dribbled down your chin. 

Entire pussy convulsed in the aftershocks, clenching around him in pulses each time his thumb swiped gently over your clit — but he didn’t torment you for long, slid his finger out of you slowly until you were mournfully empty, and you felt a runnel of your slick drool down the cleft of you. 

Reeled his pacifying fingers out of your mouth, then, pulling a string of saliva with them and your entire skull felt hollow in their absence. You released a weak sigh as you collapsed forward, foundations crumbled, heavy head landing against his padded chest. Almost trembling with exhaustion now that every drop of energy had been siphoned from you. 

“There we go, love,” he hummed, petting your hair, letting out a ragged breath into the top of your head. “That better?” 

You were milk drunk, tongue swollen and viscid in your mouth, and forming a single word was a near impossible task. All you could muster was another nod.

“Don’t you worry about Philip,” he said calmly. “I’ll deal with him.” 

You might have thanked him if you could form the words, so you instead lay a weary hand on his stomach, bunching the fabric of his shirt between your fingers. 

“M’tired,” you slurred, breathless. 

He chuckled. “I bet.” 

“Can I sleep here?” You asked weakly, muffled by his chest. 

He tutted at you, hand settling on your shoulder. “Don’t get ahead of yourself, cub.” 

Wednesday came with the threat of rain. 

The sky was distended with rolling grey cloud by the time you were out for your mid-morning stroll, once breakfast had wrapped up, and it was still a few hours before you needed to return to the kitchen to help prepare lunch. The air was thick with it, muggy and warm, the smell of imminent summer rain was stuffy in your sinuses and it made your skin prickle up. 

It was pleasant, though, as you wended about the Homestead, strolling among the knobbly old pear trees, between the potato fields, down to the river that wound through the base of the valley, to watch the pike fingerlings swim between the reeds. 

You crossed Freya’s path on your return to your cabin, and she hauled a few large baskets with her — empty, you noticed, as she walked up to you with a weak smile. 

“Do you want to help me pull some carrots?” She asked you, after all the how are you pleasantries. “You must get bored in the kitchen.” 

You wavered for a moment, um-ing and ah-ing, because you did. 

It was the same thing every day, but for the rare occasions that Linda let you use the stove because Jonathan had disappeared and would surely never find out. Or, sometimes, you could choose how to season the vegetables when you were put in charge of preparing them. Aside from your time in the kitchen, your only other physical activities had been going for walks and attempting to learn how to sew — you had gotten slightly better at that one, and now you could hem a skirt on your own, but it hardly enraptured your attention. 

The one thing that kept you from jumping on the opportunity to do something outdoors, was the memory of how expressly Jonathan had forbidden it. More than once he had reminded you how unacceptable the notion was, of you toiling over the land, so he described it; because that was a job for rough and calloused hands, not soft and pretty ones like yours.

But he had been absent for another several days, despite how he had undone you in his house and sent you back to yours afterwards. You would have thought he had dropped off the face of the Earth if you hadn’t caught peeks of him venturing back to his house in the distance, or strolling into the hall to collect his meal and vanishing once again. 

Perhaps a touch of spite motivated your decision. “Yeah, sure,” you told her. 

The carrot crops were a far stretch from the heart of the farm, a good ten-minute walk up and over the hill, and you hadn’t ventured that far before — new trees, new bushes, new paths.  

“How big is this place?” You asked her, as you approached the emerald green field, bright tufts of carrot leaves jutting out of the ground in not-quite-straight rows. 

“Umm,” she thought aloud, “few hundred acres? I’m not sure.” 

Pulling carrots was not a great deal more thrilling than working in the kitchen or attempting to sew, but it was something different, and childishly, made you feel a little bit rebellious. You had used your hair tie to hike up your skirt and knot it at your thighs, so that it didn’t get any dirtier than it needed to. Last thing you needed was Jonathan catching you with farmy muck all over you. 

The carrots were all thick, long, and persimmon orange — Freya had instructed you to brush off some of the soil before dropping them in your basket, and to pluck off any little hair-like roots to save time in the kitchen later. You enjoyed it, getting dirt under your nails, that loamy smell of soil and geosmin emanating out of the dirt with each plucked carrot. 

The ground was dry and gravelly, and it was a little rough on your knees — but you were a big girl, not as soft a thing as Jonathan seemed to think you were, and you could prove it. 

Wasn’t long before it began to rain, those fat drops of a summer shower, slow and sparse. Not enough to saturate you, but you did shiver when a glob of lukewarm water landed on the back of your neck and rolled down your spine. 

“You spoken to John recently?” She asked you quietly, after a long duration of pleasant silence, dusting her soily hands off on her apron. 

There was a prickle of worry in her throat, something hesitant, and you might not have noticed it if you didn’t see her glance around before she spoke. 

“Not since Sunday,” you answered, failing to swallow that touch of bitterness that rose up from your belly at his mention. 

“Neither,” she said, what seemed like a hastily applied band-aid to a wound she inflicted by asking it. “You saw Philip on Sunday, right?” 

Your brows pulled together, but you focused on unearthing the next carrot. “Yeah, how come?” 

“Well I—” She hesitated, and you finally turned your attention to her when you picked up on the genuine concern in her tone. “I know he was out of line, he told me what happened. And I’m sorry about — well, it’s hard to explain.” 

“Explain what?” You asked, wiping away a dribble of rain from your forehead, the rainfall had gotten a little heavier in the few minutes since it started. 

She let out a long sigh, sweeping her hair out of her face and sitting on her heels. “I did tell Philip you’d be perfect for him. He wasn’t lying. He’s been — I mean, lots of the others are already in their pairs, and he isn’t, so he’s been lonely,” she unravelled, as though nervous to say every word. “But I never promised it, or anything. I just wanted to say that, well, I didn’t mean for all that to happen. I thought he had sorted himself out already ‘cause, I mean, you obviously had no interest in him.”  

You nodded slowly, looking at your dirty fingernails, because you weren’t sure what to say. 

“Yeah,” you started, “it’s okay, it wasn’t a big deal or anything. John said he’d deal with him so hopefully that’s the last I have to hear of it.” 

Her chary eyes flitted around again, head swinging over her shoulder as though checking for someone behind her, and it made your hackles rise just a bit — you were anxious by proxy, because Freya was always as collected and calm as any of them, and you had never seen her on edge like that. 

“That’s what I wanted to ask you about,” she whispered. 

“What?” 

She took a shaky breath. “I haven’t seen Philip since Sunday night.” 

You only looked at her, chewing on the inside of your lip, uncertain what she might have been implying. 

“You think Jonathan kicked him out?” 

“Maybe,” she said, bunching her apron in her fists. “I just — I’m sure we would have heard from him, if he was banished or whatever. He’s been here for six years. I can’t imagine that he’d just vanish… I mean, he’s American, I doubt he still has his passport — where would he even go?” 

“I dunno,” you murmured. “Maybe he just left out of spite, or something.” 

“I’m worried,” she lamented.

You were at a loss for words. Confronted by a problem you had seemingly lost the capacity to deal with. Freya was the one that had vouched for Philip, for Jonathan, for the entire farm in the first place. You had trusted and believed her. 

Now you felt peculiarly defensive. As though she might have been suggesting some greater evil within Jonathan or the Homestead that you, with every iota of your being, refused to believe was possible. 

“What are you saying?” You questioned uneasily, still hopefully she wouldn’t shift from implying to making certain accusations that would risk rattling your worldview. 

“I—”

She abruptly choked on the first syllable, eyes shooting past you— 

“Shit.” 

“What?” You gawked, cocking your head back and twisting to look behind you, as she scrambled to futilely adjust herself, wiping down her apron and aimlessly fixing the carrots in her basket. 

You saw the broad shape of him before you recognised who it was, marching up the hill with a fuming pace that made your stomach drop. Knew who it was once he got slightly closer, because you could see his expression from where you kneeled in the dirt. 

You glanced back at Freya, who looked at you so sheepishly you wondered if she might break into tears. 

“I’m sorry,” she whispered. 

“What do you—”

“Fuck d’you think you’re doing, cub?” Came a growl from behind you that made you jolt in fright, somehow having crossed the distance in the time it took you to turn around. 

“I’m — ah!” You squealed as he brusquely scruffed you by the neck, hauling you up from the dirt until the soles of your bare feet caught the ground and you wobbled before finding them. 

He craned down from behind you to speak at your level. 

“We’re gonna ‘ave a talk,” he snarled, a scalding anger in his voice that made your eyes water and your skin blister up. 

“Why,” you moaned, kept placid by the unyielding hand gripping the back of your neck, thumb and forefingers burrowing into your tendons so tight it made your legs tingle. 

“Y’know damn well,” he said, dragging you around until you faced the way you came, releasing your neck with a shove. “Walk.” 

“Where?” 

He chuffed. “Stable.” 

Didn’t take much to make you cry, and this was enough to arouse big brackish tears and a puerile sob. It wasn’t terror, though, not dread about what he might do to you — but shame, so concentrated in your blood you could feel the cold sludge of it beating through your arteries. Ignominy rooted in the crime of angering him. Terrified that you had forsaken his approval, turned his sweetness bitter, because you weren’t a good girl anymore. 

“Jonathan,” called Freya, as you stumbled forward with a nudge; you had hoped that she wouldn’t acknowledge the tiff, would stay silent and pluck her carrots, but with an active spectator of your castigation you could only shrivel up in embarrassment. 

“You keep that trap shut,” Jonathan spat, turning to address her with an accusatory finger. “You’re on thin fuckin’ ice already, girl.” 

“Where’s Philip?” She barked, with all the might and caution of an outnumbered dog. 

Jonathan didn’t acknowledge her question, instead giving you another nudge when you stopped walking to coax you down the muddy pathway, your feet squelching into the freshly sodden dirt with every step. 

“I’m gonna find him, John!” Freya yelled as the distance grew, a desperation in her voice that made your tummy ache, because the dissonance you were wracked with made you feel like a snake devouring its own tail. 

Jonathan only grumbled something under his breath, striding at your heels as you made your careful way ahead, wary of stepping on a rock or twig with your bare feet. You left your sandals by the carrot patch, but you weren’t about to ask him to turn around. 

You bleated like a goat when he suddenly hooked you by the waist, swivelling you around in a bluster and hauling you up and over his shoulder. “Useless little legs y’got.” 

You sobbed, clutching the fabric of his overshirt in claws over his back, voice strained and broken as your stomach bounced on his shoulder. The rain had only grown heavier, and it ran in rivulets around your head, dripping off your nose and into the dirt.

“I didn’t do anything,” you whined — a stupid fuss, really, because you knew well what you were in trouble for — you simply hadn’t expected to actually get in trouble.

You had admittedly seen him roar like a grizzly more than once at other Homesteaders. At one of the butchers for keeping a mobile phone stashed away in their cabin without disclosing it. At a farmhand for disobeying him and letting the bull in with the cows when he shouldn’t have. At a kitchen girl for burning enough meat to feed fifteen people because she was distracted by gossip. 

You just never imagined you’d get in trouble.

He had always been so stable, so overbearingly sweet with you. Such a good girl, he called you, an angel. A good wee listener, cub, such a quick learner. You could never have anticipated such a mutation in his treatment of you, and you felt your standing crumbling beneath your feet. Peripeteia that gave you such whiplash it made your neck ache. 

“What’d I tell you?” He grumbled, as you saw the ground beneath him gradate from muddy grass to gravel, and you knew you were approaching the stable. Heard the moaning old wheels of the sliding door as he rolled it open. “Huh?”

“Not to — to work on the farm,” you sobbed, as he ferried you inside, jostling you to keep you in place as he unlatched and opened a stall door. 

He grunted in agreement as he slid you from his shoulder like a buckshot doe and dropped you ungracefully to your feet, and you landed with a squeak in the centre of the empty horse stall. Felt the hay and shavings between your toes, shreds of it sticking to the mud that caked them. 

“Wanna be a farm animal, do you?” He snarled, rummaging through the tack hung on hooks and draped over benches. “Let’s see you act like one, then.”

You stood contritely in the centre of the stall, hands interlocked over your chest, toes curling anxiously on the floor — watched edgily as he turned to face you with something in his hand, metal and leather. 

“I’m sorry,” you snivelled. 

You hadn’t seen him so angry — not towards you, anyway — he was tumid with it, apoplectic, and it made you want to curl up on the ground like a kitten in the hopes he’d feel pity if you were smaller.  

“Not yet, you’re not,” he grumbled, as he shut the stall door behind him. “I’ve half a mind to break a crop over your arse.” 

You sniffed, blubbering, pathetic. “I just wanted something different to do.” 

Your excuses ricocheted off him. Only glowered at you fanged and sable-eyed, fiddling with whatever piece of equipment he had between his hands. 

“Dress off,” he ordered dryly, gesturing at you with a flick of his fingers. 

“But, I–”

“Do animals wear frocks?” He asked facetiously. Mockingly. “Y’seen a ewe out there with a skirt on, have you?”

“I just—”

“You really wanna make me tell you again, cub?” 

You sulked, grimacing, but obliging. Not many other options, you thought, and even if there were you had no interest in pursuing them. You could have tried to run, sure, but you bet he’d have chased you. Then what? He’d have been even angrier with you, when you didn’t want him to be angry with you at all.

Your dress was gluey with rain and it stuck to your skin, and it made sticky noises as you pulled it up your thighs — reeled it up your stomach, tugged it over your chest — and once it was off your head, it landed on the dusty floor of the stall with a squelch. 

You hadn’t been naked under his eye before, all goose-pricked and shivery, but you felt a familiarity bedded in your belly, something embryonic, because he knew your body better than you did. Understood its moving parts like he was conversant with every facet of you. 

He didn’t look impartially intrigued, though, there was no clinicality in his glare. No, it was selachian. Nostrils flared like he could scent your gamey blood from where he stood. 

“Fuckin’ filthy,” he grumbled, approaching you measuredly, unraveling the straps he held in his hand. Grabbed your forearm once he was in front of you, splayed out your hand to reveal all of the soil embedded in the creases of your palm, stuck under your fingernails. “Rollin’ around in the mud like a piglet, were you?”

“I was only pulling carrots,” you whined, stuttering, felt a hot tear dribble into the corner of your mouth. 

He chortled vindictively at that. “Piglets love their carrots, don’t they.” 

“I’m n-not a piglet.” 

“Open your mouth,” he grunted indifferently, and your brows pinched together, because the last time he had told you to do that you ended up with fingers in you, and now that was all you could think about. 

You almost let loose a why but thought better of it, holding it under your tongue as you unhinged your jaw for him. Shame rang in your ears, because you quietly hoped he’d put his fingers in your mouth again, and you wondered if they’d be salty with his sweat, or earthy and gritty from his labour. 

He held up a small metal bar with o-rings at each end, a link in the middle that allowed it to bend. Leather straps attached to its rings. 

A bridle. 

You whimpered when the steel knocked against your teeth, grating sensation of metal on bone that made your skull quake, as he pushed the bar into your mouth and wedged it behind your molars. The corners of your mouth pillowed around it, and the rings dug into your cheeks, as he pulled the leather straps behind your head, and your nose was a few inches from the valley of his pectorals. 

Must have been busy working on his something all day, because he was ripe, the air around him heady and thick with the damp of sweat, fetor of a wet dog — embarrassingly amatory when it filled your nose, when you tasted it on your tongue, and you felt it in your cunt. 

He buckled the straps at the back of your head, tightening it until the bridle cut into your cheeks enough to hurt and you bit out a pained squeak. 

“Down y’get, then,” he grunted, and your eyes flitted between his in some effort to glean what he meant by it. “Animals walk on four legs, don’t they, cub?” 

So they do. 

You lowered yourself one knee at a time, balancing yourself with a hand clutching at the fabric of his trousers, and he sucked in a hoarse breath. He took a step back as you leaned forward, flattening your hands in the wood shavings, splinters in your palms. Watched a bead of saliva land on the floor as you ran your tongue along the cold bar in your mouth. 

“This what you wanted?” He drawled, malevolently satisfied as you looked up at him through your sticky lashes. He raked his eyes over you, bare and reverent on the floor before him, and he breathed it in deep, the scent of victory. “Feel like an animal now?” 

You whimpered and returned your gaze to the floor, but you responded with a guilty nod. 

“Know what happens to animals, cub?” He grumbled, feet shifting to your left, leather boots plastered in mud. He took one step, then another, circling you like a vulture. “They get flyblown. They get glanders. They get blackleg.” 

Your elbows ached. Wobbled under the weight of you. You could only suck on the bit between your teeth. 

“They get pithed. Flayed. Butchered,” he droned, and you saw a tear land next to the puddle of your spit on the floor. “I don’t want that for you, love. You got any idea what kinds of diseases are in that soil? You want gas gangrene, love? You want listeria? Legionnaire’s?” 

You didn’t understand half the things he was saying, and that only amplified the fear it sowed in you. What didn’t he know? How couldn’t you listen to him when his plethora of wisdom seemed to you as unending? 

He was behind you, then, you saw the silhouette cast by his shadow stretch out in front of you. 

“My rules are simple, aren’t they? Or are you too stupid to understand them?” 

You shook your head, let out a mewling noise in place of a sob, and you wondered if he could see your pussy from where he stood. 

“Your body is special, cubbie, so special—” His silhouette shrunk, lowering, and you felt the floor quake beneath you as he lowered to his knees, “—n’ I’m not havin’ you ruin it just because you’re bored. Y’think you’re here to have fun, cub? S’that it?” 

You tasted iron in your mouth and you had no response to give him, because all of your focus had funneled between your legs once you felt his eyes on you, splayed open like a meal. 

“Well you’re not, even if you think you are.” 

You winced when you suddenly felt a cold finger against your pussy, just a graze of it, smearing up a drip of the slick that had escaped you as if to marvel at it. You wondered if he played with it between his fingers. Wondered if he tasted it while you weren’t in the position to see. 

Instead you heard him scoff. Not sure if in awe or disgust, but whichever the root it made you shiver crawl down your spine, because you could feel his breath on your backside. 

“Look a’ you,” he said, and it came out mangled, rumbled out from his belly like a growl. “Like a bitch in heat.” 

Those words hit you like a gunshot. Flatlined. Your eyes glassed over. Unearthed something feral and opprobrious from deep in the sticky pits of you and you weren’t sure if you liked the taste of it. 

“Wan’ me to fuck you, I bet.” 

A shock wracked through you base to crown when you felt his thumb against your puckered hole, and your entire body went stiff as wood. He only let out a chuff of laughter, biting. 

“Not this hole, though, eh?” 

You shuddered, whimpering, slavering like a rabid animal, biting down on the bridle in your jaws until it made your teeth ache. 

“Wan’ me in your cunt,” he mumbled, pressing harder, until the tight ring of muscle quivered with the touch, and your skin went cold. “Only makes sense, s’what y’were made for, mh? All stroppy ‘cause you haven’t had my cock yet?”

Then, with a grunt, he pushed in — broke past the clenching sphincter until his thumb was all the way in and his palm was flush with your rump — went in dry, and it hurt, you bleated out in shock and rocked forward on your knees, fingernails clawing into the horse bedding beneath you. 

“Y’not ready for that yet, cubbie,” he snarled, ragged. “Even if your ‘eart is, your body isn’t. Gotta time it right, cub—”

You heard the clink of his belt unbuckling. Slowly dragged his thumb out by an inch before pushing it in again, and it stung a little less.

“—won’t take otherwise, eh? Need to wait till y’ready—” 

Felt the thump of a weight on your rear. Heavy. Long. Hot and drumming like a heartbeat against your skin. 

“Know you’re desperate, cub, I do,” he rumbled, reeling out his thumb, pushing it back in. Pull, push. Pull, push. “Look a’ you, loosenin’ up — you’d even have me in this one, wouldn’t you?” 

Whatever noise tumbled out of your throat was foreign and bleating. The keen of a dying songbird. You might not have been afraid when he found you, misguidedly confident his wrathful nature would never be directed towards you — you were special, after all — but now a swirling apprehension sat low in your stomach, writhing, shuddering, with every push of his thumb; because you were wrong. 

“Too brave for your own good there, cubbie,” he hummed, and he tugged his thumb until it popped out of you, hole resisting its departure with a tight grip. “I’d break you in half.”

Felt three fingers swipe up your pussy, ladling your juices into his hand like water from a fountain — you couldn’t see what he did with them, you could only hear it. The gruff sigh he bit out, the sound of hand on skin, the slick noises of your wetness being smeared on something else. 

“An’ I need you whole,” he grunted, and you felt the smack of something heavy against the cleft of you, three firm slaps — his cock, you could tell, and you shuddered at the weight of it — his his his — “fuck, even though I’d kill to break you in, lovie—”

Cock wedged in the cleft of you, felt his steeled shaft grind against your flickering hole, squeaked like a mouse as he rutted where you split. He rocked you forward on your knees with each thrust, aching in your kneecaps, and you dropped to your elbows as he just about knocked you flat.

Dug both mammoth paws into each of your cheeks, clutching you by the meat of them, pressing them together to tighten the fissure he fucked — and he fucked in earnest, pistoning like he might if he were inside you. But he wasn’t, he deprived you of that, instead thrusting through the cleft of you like he might saw you in half. 

You groaned, sulky, needy — hungered for him to spear himself into you so desperately that your cunt ached, and you arched your spine to lean into him like you might wordlessly guide his cock where you wanted it to pierce you. 

He only chortled, breathless, because he knew your body so well — better than you — what it so palpably yearned for. What he pointedly declined you. 

“I know, cubbie, I know—” he panted, gnarled through a tight jaw, “—s’not much of a punishment if y’like it, though, is it?

You sobbed, both holes shuddering around nothing as his shaft slid against them, pitilessly taunting them with an admonition of what they could have had but were not allowed. 

You’d have begged, but the steel bit in your mouth restricted your lips from forming the words, tongue pushing against it like the bars of a cage. You could only whine and bitch while he chased his malicious end, and he only grew crueller as he came closer — his grip of your hips was malignant, fingernails boring into your skin, grunts were toothy and hateful and cut with murmuring acrimony—

Snippy little whore—wanna be an animal so bad?—I’ll fuckin’ tup you like one—

With a penultimate growl he bucked you flat and you were pinned beneath him, landing with an umph — his teeth scraped against the burning skin at the back of your neck, groaning into your flesh, ragged voice quaking through your skull like a crack of thunder — you felt the splatter of fluid over your lower back, viscid and hot, landing on your skin in spurts that dribbled down either side of your waist and pooled in the valley of your spine. 

You lay as still as you could muster underneath him, trembling as if you were cold but you were molten to your core. There wasn’t much of a reprieve before he pushed himself to stand, chuffed as stood upright, sniffed as he buckled up his belt. 

Couldn’t bring yourself to look at him, you kept your nose against the floor, wood shavings sticking to your cheeks. You felt his gaze on you, watched his shadow blanket over you like a cloak as he soaked in the aftermath of his discipline. 

“Girls’ll need an extra set o’ hands in the kitchen tonight,” he grunted coldly, adjusting the collar of his shirt. 

You said nothing. Only sipped in tiny swigs of air as if he might chastise you for breathing. Kept still as he stepped around you and unlatched the stall door.

“Y’can clean yourself up in the rain,” he murmured on his way out. “That’s what farm animals do, right, cub?” 

It was venison for supper. 

That’s what Linda told you, when she wheeled in the crate of meat fresh from the butcher, and the rusty odor of lard and myoglobin was so thick in the air that it condensed on the windows, oily beads forming on the glass.

It made you feel sick. Writhing and ferrous in your belly. You got as far as chopping all of the carrots before you had to apologise and excuse yourself. You had lingered for as long as you could muster it, out of sheer guilt, because Freya wasn’t there to bear the load of your absence.

You didn’t come back right after your punishment in the stable. You had sat in the rain for half an hour, as Jonathan had advised you to, letting the warm droplets rinse off the mud and come and drip through your scalp until you felt corporeal again. 

Corporeality was out of reach for you, though. 

You drifted back to your cottage in your sheer water-logged frock, mouth sealed shut, head throbbing, leaden — because there was something in the air. Swelling and humid. Something you could feel in your teeth, chewy and full of gristle, and its sanguine juices leaked down your throat. It tumesced in your jaws minute by minute. Not long until it was too thick to swallow.

Jonathan’s words parasitised your brain tissue until they were all you could hear, plangent ringing in your ears; need to time it right, cub, you’re not ready yet. You’re not ready yet. 

Hollowed out, he was all you could think about. Filled the empty space in your skull cavity like a new organ that only beat for him, something burgundy and parenchymal, dripping down your brainstem. 

When your cabin door opened, you didn’t shift from your bed. Stayed curled up on your side and blinking at the wall, waiting for your inauspicious nausea to abate. 

“There y’are, cubbie.” 

His voice was soft, deep, the gravel of a near whisper. 

He let out a long sigh as he shut the door behind him, and your ears perked at the slow beating of his shoes on the floor as he moseyed towards you. 

“Scoot,” he said as he approached your bed, and you pushed yourself over without question, so that he could sit on the edge. The flimsy mattress sunk under the weight of him, and he patted his thigh. “C’mon.”

You adjusted yourself so that your head lay on his lap like a pillow, tucked your hands and knees into your chest, and let out a long held breath. Relief as sweet as syrup pumped from your heart and you could finally feel your fingertips again. 

“Are you upset with me?” He asked, as characteristically gentle as you remembered it, none of the lascivious vitriol that frothed at his jaws earlier that afternoon. 

You nodded once. You were still sulking. He had left you wet and wanting, coated in his come with the bridle still strapped around your head. Your locks had knotted in the leather and it took you ten minutes to undo without scalping yourself. 

He combed his fingertips through your hair on the side of your head, soft and careful as petting a cat. Brushed a fine curl behind your ear. 

“I’m sorry, cub, I really am,” he said tenderly, “but you understand why I did it, don’t you?” 

You nodded again as he stroked you, and your lids grew heavy. 

“Mh,” he hummed, contented. “I don’t like being angry, love. But sometimes I have to be, if you don’t listen to me. There’s a reason I tell you not to do things. I don’t make up rules just for fun, do I?” 

“No,” you whispered. 

“No,” he agreed. “Rules aren’t fun. But they’re necessary. Without them this would all fall apart. You don’t want that, do you, cub?” 

“No.” 

“Course you don’t, sweetheart,” he cooed. “Now will you come join us for supper?” 

You breathed in slowly. “I’m not really hungry,” you confessed. 

“Feelin’ under the weather?” He asked, caressing hand shifting to flatten over your forehead as if to check for a fever. You probably were febrile to the touch, your blood was magmatic and only growing hotter, and it simmered in your temples. 

You shook your head gently. “No, I’m…” you eked, struggling to find the words to explain yourself. “I just feel a bit funny.” 

He exhaled languidly. “I understand, love,” he said, hand stroking to the top of your head. “Change is always hard. But you’ve been such a brave girl.” 

A warmth swelled in your tummy when he said that. Tempers settled by the wide hand petting your hair, and the softness of his lap under the side of your head. The worry that he had spurned you waned with each breath, because he was there, sweet as ever, lulling you to the brink of slumber under his doting touch. 

“You get an early night, then, cub,” he said gingerly. “Just make sure y’eat a big breakfast, yeah?” 

You only hummed, slurred and sleepy, and managed to puff out an okay before your eyes ebbed shut and your body sunk into sleep.

Your scruples had evaporated. 

There had been vestiges of your more circumspect self lingering around in your first few weeks, a careful eye kept on the farm and its esoteric leader, wits kept about you despite how often you forwent them. 

Now you looked on that scepticism as ignorance. 

A conceited belief that you had some greater understanding about the world than people who were truly connected to it, knee-deep in the ground, toiling to better themselves and the Earth. 

Besides, Jonathan’s notions were consistently proven right. Pollution, climate change, proxy wars — what else was to blame for these cataclysms but human conceit, addiction to all the noxious things created for simple convenience? 

Every time he gave his speeches to the Family as a whole, his sentiments only rang more true. 

Didn’t you feel so much better, now? 

No reliance on your phone, on plastic, on cheap and suffocating clothing. No consumption of mass-processed slop, of mind-rotting screen media, of lab-manufactured anodynes that poisoned you from the inside out. No longer reliant on friends that didn’t care about you, family that had no respect for you, a society that had utterly forsaken you. 

Why? Because you were no longer productive within it? Producing what, Jonathan would ask you, and the answer was nothing. Imaginary bullshit, he called it. Meaningless numbers that existed only on screens and in wires and yet somehow dictated the course of a sorely misguided mankind. 

These were the fragments of debris embedded within you that rotted you from the inside out. Gangrenous, necrotising every part of you they touched until you could hardly call yourself a human. 

Jonathan was the only one who could debride the wounds they left. Picked out the shards of refuse left by your dependence on the toxic and artificial. 

So much purer, they told you, they could see it in your eyes and in your skin — a glow from within, they said, because you were reviving your most natural, inborn self. Nurturing her, the most important part of you. 

Freya and Philip abandoned ship because they couldn’t handle it, the others told you. Because their dependence on the synthetic was adamantine, and their cowardice triumphed in the end.  

Not you, though. 

You were special. You were important. 

So important that over the course of the next week you were waited on hand and foot. You were brought raspberry leaf tea first thing every morning, and a mug of bone broth before you went to sleep every night. Given your own meals at John’s behest, a different meal on your plate than everybody else’s when you sat down for supper. 

Rare red meats, tender and well-salted, still juicy and dripping when you’d cut into them. Beef liver and bone marrow. Yams and boiled spinach. Eggs for breakfast every morning, dates and berries with full-fat cream for dessert. Need to keep you healthy, John would tell you, need you ready. 

Every day was a day closer, and you could feel it breathing down the back of your neck. 

Aren’t you excited? Linda would coo, and although nobody had said it outright, you felt in your belly what exactly the days were counting down to. 

Your hormones were beating and surging until they saturated every inch of you, permeating between the fibers of your muscles and coating your tongue and the walls of your cunt. A feeling you would never have noticed until it was pointed out to you, until it was all they asked about, and all you could focus on; do you feel it yet? Is your body preparing itself? Are you warmer between your legs? 

When you noticed a few specks of blood on your toilet paper, the slightest smear of pink, you told Georgie — she smiled as bright as the sun, kissed you on the lips, because how lucky, a godsend, you were finally ripe. 

The last sliver of the waning moon had vanished that night. It was as black as the rest of the sky, hung low over the hill above Jonathan’s farmhouse. 

Unseasonably warm for late summer, as though the sun was still baking in the sky, and the air was sultry with it. Formed dewdrops on your skin as you waited for the knock on your door. 

It was Georgie and Harriet that arrived on your doorstep, an hour shy of midnight, garmented in white dresses. Georgie approached you with a bloomed cariad rose pinched between her fingers, pink and fluttery, and she slid the stalk behind your ear so that it was tucked into your loose hair. 

You smiled back at her when she stroked your cheek, her enthusiasm an airborne infection that filled your lungs like steam and felt fuzzy in the centre of your forehead. Anticipation as inebriant as ethanol had been slowly accruing in your blood day by day, until your thoughts were all hazy and thrumming and the hours oozed by like honey. 

Georgie held your hand as she led you out of your door, Harriet close behind you. Out on the path waited the rest of the Family, all thirty of them, candles in hand. Your erstwhile self might have been humiliated by your stark nudity — instead you felt pride, loving warmth in your veins, because they all looked on you with pure fondness and blind devotion. 

They followed behind you like a flock of sheep, reverently silent, as Georgie led you down an unfamiliar path, illuminated only by the candlelight. Through the pear trees and over a bubbling creek; the water cool between your toes, the ground mulchy beneath your feet. 

The terminus of your journey was a pyramid. 

Hand-fashioned from timber, lacquered in ivory paint. No windows. A dormer containing a hole where a door might have been. Situated in a clearing among the oak trees, almost haunting, the tip of it just about invisible in the darkness of the night. 

Georgie let go of your hand and gave you an encouraging touch on your bare back. 

“Wait inside,” she whispered, beaming, “he won’t be long.” 

Stepping through the entrance was one of no return. 

You felt it in your chest. Smoky and heady. Dense enough that it was hard to inhale. 

The interior was unpainted, raw wood, logs recently chopped and lumbered into boards. Terpenic on your tongue. The sticky scent of balsam. Mingled with the lanolin exuded by the sheepskins carpeting every corner of the floor, warm and soft under your feet, curls of wool tufting out between your toes. 

Candles had been lit by the entrance, but those were the only sources of light within the peculiar room. You looked up to the highest point of the ceiling and saw only a void. 

Minutes passed like muggy eons and you sat yourself cross-legged on the woolly floor, facing away from the entrance. Apprehension crept up your gullet like acidic reflux, and swallowing brought you no relief. 

You heard his breathing before he spoke. 

“Stand up, cub,” he drawled, low, full-throated. You thought you might turn around and see a bear standing there opposed to a man. “Let me look at you.” 

You did as you were told. Rose up cautiously, filly-legged, wobbly as though unused to gravity. Faced him with your fingers in knots and your toes curling into the fleece of the floor. 

His eyes were stygian as he approached you. Lips tight and pensieve under his beard. Stood shirtless, but still in his trousers, belt buckled. 

“You are a lovely thing,” he murmured, lost, as he reached across the narrow gap and brushed your breast with his hand. Feathered his thumb over your nipple and watched raptly as it tightened to a point under his touch. 

You had no words to offer him. Not for a lack of trying, but every syllable that worked its way along your tongue fizzled before making its way out, because nothing you could say felt worthy of him. 

“How are you feeling,” He asked hoarsely, monotonously, running the back of his finger down the length of your belly, just light enough to tickle. 

“Nervous,” you breathed, after a sweltering pause, because his touch persisted lower even as you failed to respond. 

“No need to be nervous, cubbie,” he said. 

He craned slightly downward to slide the tip of his fingers between your folds, and you hiccuped at the touch. Bit your tongue as you felt him wipe over your hole, dipping in but not breaching, before he reeled them back out. He held up his fingers to look at your slick, attentive as if inspecting it, watching how it clung in glossy bands between his thumb and forefingers. Breathed raggedly through his nose in satisfaction. 

“It’ll only hurt for a little bit,” he explained, tone staid, but you could hear the appetite simmering in the back of his throat. “But we’ll go slow.” 

You nodded deferentially. 

“Get on your knees, cub.” 

And you did. The wool was soft underneath your kneecaps. 

“Take it out.” 

Your hands went to his belt without dispute, fishing out the tail and undoing the buckle. Moved quickly onto the buttons of his thick canvas work trousers, popping them loose one by one. 

His cock was partially soft when you pulled it out through the fly of his trousers, but you watched it grow harder the moment it was free — length doubled before your eyes, girth almost three-fold, as the veins roping under the ruddy skin thumped with blood and his foreskin peeled back from the smooth bulge of his head. 

He let out a grunt, then a sigh, when you curled your fingers around the base of it, slightly too thick to fully wrap your hand around. The sound was like liquor and you were already drunk on it. 

“Lick it,” he gritted. 

You angled his cock upright, and dragged your wet tongue from the curls above his balls to his frenulum, painting your saliva along the length of it and breathing hot air over his skin. He groaned, and your blood went runny, because the only thing you wanted was to please him — him him him — and you were high on every sound he chewed out as you did. 

His thick fingers carded through your hair, gentle at first, but as you grazed your lips against the tip of his cock his hand turned to a fist, and you chirped at the pain in your scalp. 

Must have heard you, because his grip went slack, and he clenched his jaw instead. 

“Swallow it, cub,” he grumbled, barely encouraging, “as much as you can fit.” 

Easier said than done. You unhinged your jaw to take his blunt head in your mouth, lapping at it to keep it wet, terrified you’d scrape your teeth on it — but you leaned forward, bit by bit, and his cock was heavy on your tongue. 

“Tha’s it,” he huffed, biting down on nothing. “Eyes up.” 

You blinked up at him, rheumy and upset, because soon his cock was at the back of your tongue and you were only halfway down. You did your best with what you could take — sealed your lips and suckled on him, grazing your tongue along the underside of his cock as you moved your head back, then forward again, and he let out a satisfied growl. 

“Good girl, cubbie,” he groaned, when his glans hit the back of your throat and you gagged around him. “Easy. Doin’ so good.” 

The remaining liquid in your body turned to syrup, hot and sweet in your cheeks, a treacly film over your eyes — I’m a good girl, I’m a good girl, I’m a good girl — reverberated around in your head like a bullet ricocheting off the walls of your skull. 

Went delirious with it. Mouth so slick with saliva it dripped down your chin, soaked his cock from base to tip until the curls at the bed of it were sodden and clumped together. Throat relaxed enough to take him deeper, and you gagged again, though he praised you for it. 

You’re so good for me, cubbie. My good girl. So special. Perfect girl. 

Your cunt had liquefied. Molten. Burned so hot that it throbbed between your legs and you rubbed your thighs together involuntarily. Alight with anticipation, because you knew where he’d put his cock next. 

Couldn’t stop yourself, though. Couldn’t settle your tongue. Couldn’t slow down when he told you to — a distant voice that didn’t quite break through the fog, slow down, cub, careful.  

Your fervour was only deepening, because his groans were bitten out more desperately each time you sucked his cock deeper into your throat, and you only wanted to make him happy, to be his good girl forever, to—

“Slow the fuck down.” 

Suddenly your hair was knotted in a fist and it was yanked from your scalp, and you squealed as your head was torn off his cock and your throat was violently empty. He pulled your head back off your shoulders by your hair so that you were forced to look up at the ceiling, and it hurt enough that your face crumpled up, eyes dribbling tears that trickled down over your temples. 

“Still don’t know how to fuckin’ listen, do you,” he thundered, rage flaring from an ember to a scorching flame, and you could see its red glow lambent in the hollows of his eyes. 

You yelped as he dragged you by the hair, claws scratching and grasping at his restraining wrist as you were hauled to the centre of the triangular room and thrown flat on the woollen floor. 

I’m sorry I’m sorry I’m sorry — emetic apologies spewed from your mouth like vomit as you rolled yourself onto your back, and you watched him shuck his trousers off in a single motion. 

Loomed over you like a mountain. Cock heavy, bouncing with his heartbeat, glistening with your saliva. He made the cavernous pyramid seem small, shrinking around him, like he could touch the peak of the ceiling just by reaching upward. 

You blinked and he had clambered over you, snared your ankles with massive hands — tore your legs apart and dragged you towards him until your arse was perched on his lap, and your thighs were wrapped around his waist. 

“Didn’t want it to be like this, cub,” he growled, leviathan paws on either side of your waist, and his cock nudged around between your folds for an aperture. “Thought you could control yourself. Gave you too much credit.”

You bleated as he pulled you down onto him, spearing his cock into you in a single motion, a battering ram that broke through your entrance without warning or care. A squeal ripped from your throat as his head plunged in as deep as it could go, to the hilt, pushing innards out of his way to fit, and you felt the ache in your teeth.  

“Coulda been nice n’ slow,” he snarled, tight-jawed.

He hunched over you as he pulled your hips out to unsheathe himself halfway, before yanking you back onto him, hole pulled so tight around him you could feel his heartbeat in your fragile skin. 

“Woulda got you warmed up. Nah, wanted to rush it, did you?” 

I’m sorry I’m sorry I’m sorry — babbling and tearful, slurred in panic — pleading like you had angered God, because you had. 

“S’alright, cub,” he murmured, leaning back and hucking up a lump of saliva, spitting it straight down where your cunt met the base of his cock, and it landed square on your clit. “My fault for makin’ you wait so long, eh?” 

He let go of your hips, hands sliding to the core of you — pressed his left thumb into the top of your slit and pulled the skin upward, uncovering your puffy clit and exposing it to the torrid air. 

Your head rocked back into the wool on the floor when he smeared over your vulnerable clit with the pads of two fingers, gliding frictionlessly by virtue of your slick and his spit. You exhaled with a shrill moan, and you bucked your hips to chase his touch, then yelped in pain when his cock jammed into your liver. 

“Easy,” he chuckled at you, deep and throaty, “don’t hurt yourself.” 

Your hands clutched at the wool on the floor in fists, clumps of it knotted between your fingers, as your spine arched into him — what was once a stabbing pain softened to a throb, his attention on your clit analgesic, and your pussy unwinded around the cock warming itself inside you. 

“Tha’s more like it,” he hummed, as you splayed yourself open for him, grunting as he felt your pussy fluttering around the length of him.

You were already close to the brink before he had even touched you, and it did not take him long to work you up to the edge — your moans turned shaky and high-pitched, panting, moving your hips so you could feel him skewered inside you, and everything flooded in at once—

He bit down on a groan as you came, walls of your cunt constricting around his cock, a tourniquet, tightening in the shockwaves of the orgasm that wracked through you viciously enough to leave you concussed. 

“There y’go, cubbie,” he grunted, offering you no clemency, not a beat to catch your breath as he hooked his hands under your thighs and lifted them into the air before pressing them into your chest. “That’ll make it easier.” 

You cried as he plunged his cock into you while you were still tumbling out of your climax, folding you in half until your knees touched the floor by your head, and you could feel his cock in your ribcage. 

He grunted and groaned like a bear, pulling back his hips to reel out his cock before bottoming out with a clap of his hips on your rear, reaming you open with each thrust. 

You had no room to squirm, held so firmly to the floor that you struggled to breathe, and he fucked right through you as if the head of his cock might reach your throat. You could only try and take it, biting down on pained yelps each time he pistoned into you, bludgeoning your cervix enough to bruise it.  

You were not suffering in vain, though. 

The pain was salvific, martyrdom for a cause — him. His pleasure was yours because you owed it to him. You owed him everything, your enlightenment, your happiness, your body, your soul.

Went dizzy with rapture at the thought of his cock impaling you so deeply, of him coming in the depths of you, of his seed implanting in your womb so that you could have him inside you and a part of you forever. So that you could give him the gift that nobody else was worthy of giving him, because you were special. You were important. 

He grunted as much in your ear, breathy and angry and hazy with pleasure; my special girl. Fuck, cubbie, you feel so good. Tryin’ not to break you in half, cubbie. Tryin’ so hard, my good girl, special girl. Gonna give me my baby, aren’t you, cub? I’ll fuck you like this every day until you do—

You watched him in devoted awe once you were able to keep your eyes open — vein bulging in his forehead, burning red in his cheeks, eyes a stormy grey in the darkness of the room. How his brows curled as he chased a final rut, fucking right into your diaphragm, and he pushed all the air out of you as he pressed you into the floor. 

“Fuck,” he groaned, frayed and broken as it rended from his chest, and his head tumbled from his shoulders. “Keep still, cub — fuckin’ hell.” 

You felt his cock lurching in the security of your pussy, his come pumping in surges directly against your cervix, so much of it that you could feel it in your belly and taste it on the back of your tongue. You wondered if he had injected it directly into your womb through sheer pressure alone, and you hoped it would settle there, meeting the ovum that had awaited his arrival. 

You went glassy-eyed as you imagined it, his come taking, swelling and swelling inside you until it was a baby — heaven sent, the perfect amalgamation of you and him — him him him — you couldn’t fathom something so immaculate existing in the world with you. You were sure his baby would outgrow you, viviparous, would burst through your skin and emerge a fully grown person, as deific and faultless as him. 

Selfishly, you imagined it not taking. That he had timed it incorrectly, that his sperm had hunted for your egg and was found wanting — and he’d have to fuck you again, like he promised he would. Again and again, ejaculating in the core of you until your insides had become more him than yourself, body completely usurped by him, organs and all. 

You gasped, shaken out of your come-drunk reverie when he pinned your ankles together with a single hand, straightening out your legs. 

“John, what—” You squeaked, as he pushed your knees to your chin, and he hunched over so that you could no longer see him past your thighs. 

Almost bit your tongue off when you felt him lick up your slit in a flat swipe, immediately bucking to get him away from your already aching and hypersensitive clit. 

“No, s’too much—” you bleated, whining as his tongue smeared over your clit again, and the shock made your brain short-circuit. 

“I know, I know, cubbie—” he hushed, wrangling you until you stilled, and you felt his breath on your inflamed skin, “—it’s important, helps it take, love. Won’t take long, just be a good girl—”

You cried as he sucked your clit into his mouth, knee knocking against your chin, air squished out of your lungs as he folded you in half on the sheepskins. 

But you did as he said, because you were a good girl. Let him suckle on your swollen clit until it was sore, lapping at you with the fervour of a bear hunting honey in a beehive — still felt the flood of his come sitting high in your cunt, pooling against your cervix as he held your legs in the air, and it threatened to pour out of you with every constriction of your pussy. 

“Please—” you wailed, aimless in your begging, because whatever you wanted he had given it to you and then some. 

His hands dug into the flesh of your thighs, keeping himself steady more than you, and you climbed back towards your apogee with a sob and a held breath — released it all at once as he laved his tongue over your pulsing clit, and you came hard enough that you felt yourself begin to black out, such a lack of oxygen in your brain that your vision turned glittery at the edges. 

“J-Jonathan, ah, stop!—” You begged, teary and desperate, and only when you kicked haphazardly into the air did he release the suction on your clitoris and conclude his torment with a chaste kiss on your slit. 

He straightened out with a satisfied sigh, rough and gurgling from his chest, gently lowering your legs and laying them softly on the wool beneath you. 

He planted kisses up the length of you; on your hip, on your belly, on your breast, on your collarbone; crawling up your body until he landed on his back beside you with a whumph. With his expansive hands he scooped you up, and you gave no protest, floppy and exhausted to the point of debilitation — he lay you down on his chest, head balanced between his pectorals, and you settled in with a ragged exhale. 

“Such a good girl,” he murmured into the top of your head as he draped his arms over you, petting your skin wherever his hands landed. “Brave little cub.” 

You deflated, dissolving into him with a pent breath as your eyes fluttered shut, and you could have stayed there, like that, forever. 

He pressed a loving kiss into your hair, languidly stroking your shoulder, and you wondered if your mother was looking for you. 

this fic somehow tripled in length as i was writing it lol. anyway here's the pinterest board for it. <3

[with-my-calamitous-love]

your arms are reaching / your eager heart is throbbing

k. bakugou, s. todoroki, i. midoriya x f! reader

how he reacts after learning his pretty girl struggles to get orgasms ꕥ smut 18+, timeskip characters, please read responsibly.

for the girls (like yours truly) who unfortunately struggle with this. don’t worry! communication! you deserve to cum!!!

song: couldn’t make it any harder

katsuki bakugou

- as everyone already knows, he will take any sort of test or opposition and stomp it into the ground. he’s the best, the greatest. not only is this another chance to prove how infuriatingly talented it is, but a chance to get you screaming his name and aching for him.

- the very first time he goes down on you, he’s so cocky and sure he’ll make you feel amazing. he lifts his head from your thighs and finds your face hasn’t moved an inch. “you gonna cum?” “uhm… no.” “WHAT!?”

- once you explain it to him, he’s seeing it as a challenge

- he finds communication so sexy. though 90% of the time he seems like a jackass who never listens, he’s far more perceptive than anyone could imagine. he learns not only your words but your body, the signs that you’re enjoying it or when you’re loosening up to him. as much as it is a fun challenge for him, his determination proliferates once he sees the frustrated tears boil over in your eyes.

- “calm down, babe. i’ve got you.”

he’s laying behind you, sideways on the bed while one strong arm lifts your leg up. his cock slowly pistons in and out of your pussy at a tortuous pace, his free hand rubbing circles on your clit while he has you feeling every inch of him. he’s fingered you for close to an hour before finally deciding you were wet enough to take him, all of him.

“hows this?” his voice is gruff in your ear. you know, by the scratch in his throat, that holding back is killing him. that if it were up to him, he’s have your face in the pillows wrecking your insides. but this isn’t about him. its about you, making your brain melt and toes curl from pleasure.

theres a hot coil in your stomach, about to snap at any moment. your nails dig into the sheets, clinging to anything, knowing that it could be his back you’re scratching up. you want to tell him to let go, to start fucking you rough and passionate the way he has always been, but you also know that this is the longest and most potent pleasure session you’ve had in a long time. you feel yourself gushing around his cock, sucking him in greedily. you’re buzzing, body warm with satisfaction but a lingering need to feel him ravage you.

“you can go faster.” you grit your teeth, looking back at him over shoulder. he shifts to move on top of you, placing a kiss to your cheek and forehead before reinserting himself with little resistance. your legs wrap around his legs like a magnet, whatever was left of them not reduced to jelly.

“you sure?” red eyes glint with a flicker of momentary doubt. he knows you feel good, but he’s determined to make you feel amazing. “tell me what you like, baby.”

he begins moving his hips again, faster this time, and your back arcs like the london bridge.

“like that!” you’re quick to savour it, and he fucking smirks. he feels you cumming around him, an sweet, blissful orgasm tearing through you like a bullet through paper. but he doesn’t stop, fucking you through it and promising 3 mode.

“whatever you want, baby.”

✧.* ⋆.˚ ☾ .⭒˚ ✧.* ✧.* ⋆.˚ ☾ .⭒˚ ✧.* ✧.* ⋆.˚ ☾ .⭒˚ ✧.* ✧.*

shouto todoroki

- maybe its because he knows a thing or two about the absence of love and genuineness in places it should exist, but he tends to know when you lie. especially if its to protect his feelings in the form of forced moans or highs.

- he’s only began fingering you, noticing that your moans are off, and he’ll immediately withdraw. he’ll blink, confused, before returning to his normal, blunt self: “you don’t like it, darling?”

- he’ll stare, gears turning in his head while you ramble to come up with an answer. he’s difficult to lie to, seeing the way he tilts his head like a god damn puppy when he knows something is amiss.

- after you finally tell him, he’s silent for a few moments right before: “well, why didn’t you say so?”

- “i didn’t want to be difficult.”

- “it’s difficult to not love you.”

shouto has stamina, thats a no brainer. he’s been trained since day 1 to endure most things. so staying on his knees, head buried between your thighs isn’t exactly hard for him.

one of your legs stays hooked over his shoulder while the other is pinned down by his hand. you can’t remember the last time he’s actually lifted his head to breathe. he’d find a new way to take in oxygen if it meant keeping you pink and needy for him, the way he has you know.

his tongue moves in a messy pattern, swirling around and in between your slit before his lips move up to that delicate bundle of nerves, wrapping around the bud and sucking all the sweet nectar. his eyes are closed, a sort of meditation for him while you melt into the sheets.

“shouto!” his name comes out like a mantra. he wants to smile, to respond, but his lips are preoccupied with spelling out each japanese logographic character on your pussy.

so instead, he smiles mentally while moving his head up and down. you’ve never actually squirted before, but you were pretty confident this would be the day.

✧.* ⋆.˚ ☾ .⭒˚ ✧.* ✧.* ⋆.˚ ☾ .⭒˚ ✧.* ✧.* ⋆.˚ ☾ .⭒˚ ✧.* ✧.*

izuku midoriya

- izuku possesses endless patience that extends with both his arms for you. he has only ever wanted to put a smile on your face, even if that smile is sometimes an o shape and eyes rolling back.

- he is incredibly understanding, not a trace of judgement in those green eyes. he’ll simply hold your hand, with all the respect and the world, and say: “let me help you, baby.”

- that gentleness is thrown at the window as he morphs into a complete demon, pounding into you with such force you’re sure you’ll break the bed.

“fuck! izuku! shit, uhm- you’re going so fast!” you blurt out, holding his back for stability. he’s bullying your pussy with his cock, reasoning that if he was going to make you cum, he’d do it right.

“i’ve got you, love.” he mutters into your ear, lip wrapping around your nipple while his squeezes your other tit. his pace doesn’t dare slow down, stars bursting behind your eyelids as every inch of him sends shivers of pleasure down your body. he somehow still manages to whisper the most tooth-rotting sweet nothings into your ear while he single handedly orchestrates that delicious skin slapping noise.

his pelvis rubbed against your already sensitive clit, your pussy glistening with sticky juices that he salivates just thinking about. if he wasn’t fucking you with his cock, it’d be with his mouth.

he cups your face with one hand, groaning as you squeeze even tighter. “you gonna cum, sweetheart?” unable to speak, you nod profusely. he fucks you through countless more through the rest of the night.

[iniquitousyearning]

SLYTHERINSLUT0’S KINKTOBER

october 28th. theodore nott. lorenzo berkshire — humiliation / degradation

KINKTOBER MASTERLIST. | 2024.

summary: never let enzo berkshire find out about one of your kinks. unless….

warnings: 18+, SMUT MDNI, halloween ghostface costumes, threesome, fwb!theo, bestfriend!enzo, reader is involved in a bet unbeknownst to her, mask kink, humiliation on high, degradation, fingering, denied orgasm, oral m!rec, PIV, dirty talk, manipulation.

"Black cat mask?"

You shake your head, barely sparing the thing a glance.

"Mm, no. Too unoriginal."

"Right," Enzo sucks his teeth, tossing the mask back into the bin you're both half-heartedly rifling through. "Orange cat, then? That's far more fitting for you anyways."

"Enzo—no cats, please," you mutter, running a hand through your hair, staring down at the disheveled heap of plastic. None of it catches your eye, none of it sparks anything. "It's Halloween. I want something...scarier."

"Of course. Only day of the year you get to pretend you're as terrifying as me." He croons—half-laughing through the words. The tease itches in your mind, and you're halfway to some retort when he's already holding up another mask. "How about this one?"

You glance up, ready to dismiss whatever nonsense he's holding this time, but the sight of it stills the air in your lungs. A Ghostface mask. Stark white, hollow eyes staring back at you—it's grimace cast in a faded glow under tired shop lights. It's nothing—just a mask, just a piece of cheap plastic in Enzo’s hand—but your heart skips, stumbles, clutches at your ribs, and you can't look away.

And there's no goddamn reason for it, no logic—but you're already seeing it, aren't you? Your current fwb—Theo, standing over you; his face hidden, mask in place of those half-lidded eyes that you’ve learned to read so well. And you know—you know the thought is fucking absurd—yet, it knots something in your stomach, spreading heat like a fuse just lit.

"You alright there?" Enzo's teasing pulls you out of your thoughts, and you realize he'd been staring at you that entire time. "You're looking a little...hot."

Hot. Right. Of course he'd notice—of course your best friend would notice the way you went still, frozen in place as if someone struck you with Glacius. You're no good at lying to him, not even on a good day—and right now, your mind is in shambles, already too far gone into the fantasy and—

No. No more of this.

You tear away, fumbling for the edge of a cloak that suddenly seems like the most fascinating thing you've ever seen, your fingers tracing the fabric as if it can save you.

"It's...fine—it's nice," you blurt out, too quickly, too forced, the words tumbling over themselves. "Just—no, not really my thing."

But Enzo knows better. He can spot your lies from miles away. You hear him shift, the quiet rustle of the mask in his hands—and then, he's pulling it over his face, tilting his head just to spite you.

You don't have to look to know he's smirking behind it.

"Bullshit." He steps closer, casually closing the distance, but you know it's deliberate. "You're into this, aren't you?"

The warmth on your face feels like fire now, prickling heat across your skin. He shifts closer again, and for a moment you consider jinxing him—mind scattering into dark, unbidden places—filthy, wild things, flashing behind your eyes, too real. Enzo tilts his head the other way now, letting the mask catch the light, letting it grin.

"Should I get it?" He asks, as innocent as a serial killer. "For Nott, of course."

"No."

It scrapes out of your throat, barely audible, far too small to hold truth. You’re sure he can read you right now—all your depraved thoughts in the rasp of your voice, painfully transparent.

There’s a huff, a snort of sorts. "Are you sure? I think he'd love it."

Despite his insufferableness, he’s probably right. Theo has never shied away from indulging your kinks before. That’s what no strings is about. Maybe he would love it, you know you certainly would—gods how you’d love it—even if you’d rather die before admitting it.

The cloak—you focus on the deep purple velvet, the dark lace edging. "I'm sure. Put it back."

"You don't sound so sure." Gods, he's such an asshole—point only proved further as he takes another step closer. "Does this...does this turn you on?"

"Enzo—For Godric's sake, stop." The humiliation is suffocating. This is just a glimpse at your future should you ever decide to disclose this information to him. Relentless and bloody insufferable. "Let's just—pick something and go. Please?"

A pause, then, and you don't dare look up. The mask slips from his face with another soft, satisfied hum—you don't need to see him to feel the damage done. He knows.

"Sure, angel," he says, trailing as he turns. "Whatever you want."

————

"Matt—have you seen Theo?"

"Uh—not since earlier." Mattheo replies without even looking up, his focus on pouring another dangerous looking drink rather than on you. "He's probably just out for a smoke."

Yeah. Right. Forsure—because his smoke breaks last all bloody day. Doubt twists your stomach, but you nod anyway, grabbing your own drink—something bubbling, far too bright a green to be safe, but it burns down easy all the same. The room spins in a foggy haze, lights bleeding together over costumes, wizard and Muggle and something in between—and you struggle to tell who's who.

Theo had refused to tell you what he was dressing up as—claimed he wanted it to be a surprise. Now, that surprise is nowhere to be found.

"What are you supposed to be?" You raise a brow at Mattheo's striped inmate costume. “Your future?"

Riddle's eye flash as he pretends to be offended for about two seconds until his gaze drops to your own costume and his tongue darts over his lips, taking it in. Beer-maid, tight bodice, shorter than preferred. It's not what you were going for, not in the slightest, but it's all Pansy had in her closet to save you after you and Enzo failed to find anything interesting at the shop the other day.

"Maybe. But you definitely aren't dressed as yours." His attention shifts back to the crowd, a failed attempt at hiding his grin. "Way too much fabric."

You scoff, but that's just how Mattheo is—always a sly comment, always pushing. You roll your eyes and swat at him, but he sticks his tongue out at you and steps back, slipping off into the crowd with a final goodbye wink—and just as you lose track of him, Draco saddles up next to you, prattling on about something you don't care to listen to.

Great, that’s two annoying Slytherins accounted for. Where the fuck is Theo?

Five seconds into pretending to be interested in whatever Malfoy is babbling on about, you give up, turning back to the drink table and skimming over the options when someone new brushes up behind you—

"Enzo told me," the words barely register before you feel it—a hand settling low at your hip. "About your kink."

With lightening speed you twist your neck, glancing over your shoulder—only to fucking gasp at what you find there. That mask. The mask. The Ghostface one from the shop; the one Enzo hasn't let you forget, hasn't stopped teasing you about—you blink, your heart barrelling out of the room, fingers tightening around your cup until it hurts—

The mask tilts, just slightly. "Looks like he was right."

"Theo—"

"Go." His voice is muffled, but sweet Merlin—the sound of it makes your knees threaten to buckle right then and there. His hand slips lower, teasing against the ruffles of your dress. "Run, Bella. Let's play."

Your body locks up, muscles tense and poised on the edge of something feral. You can't look away. Can't think. Can't breathe. His fingers slip lower, lower, until you feel it—cold leather against the heat of your skin and your throat tightens, words dying dead on your tongue.

Run.

A slight lean, and the mask brushes your neck. "Now."

He steps back, a slow retreat, but it feels like he's tugging you with him. You spin to face him, smirking, your voice barely above a whisper—

"And when you catch me?"

"Find out." His head tilts toward the door. It's your cue.

Your feet move before your mind even catches up, slipping through the rowdy crowd, darting through the half-drunk revelers in their costumes—everything blurring into an afterthought as you push past the cobwebs, pumpkins, fake spiders, all the other Halloween decor filling the fogged ballroom. Your fingertips buzz from the adrenaline—pulse echoing in your ears as you dart down one hall after another, not quite sure where you're going, but knowing you need to keep moving.

Theo told you to run—so you run.

You sprint through the castle, the corridors empty save for your hurried footsteps and the scattered Halloween decorations lunging at you from the shadows. You round a corner, making for the dungeons. It's as good a place as any, right? Dark, quiet, somewhere to hide.

Few more minutes and you make it, lungs burning as you stumble into the dreary main hall. You realize the detention room is empty—and it's perfect. You take two steps inside, already thinking you'll be able to catch your breath when—

You slam headlong into something solid.

Head swirling, your vision barely refocuses before you feel a grip on your wrists, pulling you forward with enough force to make you gasp. Everything happens so fast you don't have enough time to process what's occurring before you're forced to focus on the thing you're seeing—ghostface. Staring down at you with those empty, gaping eyes. Unreadable.

It's then that you realize you're caught.

Something shifts behind the mask, an almost imperceptible movement of his head. You'd almost think you imagined it but given that there's nothing else to look at you know it's impossible. The silence is ballooning and you wonder if this is part of the game, if Theo is just savouring the moment, relishing in your reaction. The way you're trembling, your breath stuttering, the way you've gone still—waiting.

You swallow, throat drier than the Sahara, but something about this has you emboldened, the fact he's playing into your fantasy like this—so you decide to tease him, breaking the silence with a soft, breathless laugh as you pull one of your hands free from his grip.

He wanted to play. It's your turn to act the part.

"Looks like you caught me...Mr. Ghostface..." you purr—the silence sticks heavy, making the space between you feel thick, electric. All you can feel are his eyes devouring you. "And now...now that you've caught me...what are you gonna' do with me...hm?"

Gods—the thrill of this is so real, one your certain is more addictive than any drug. An adrenaline rush—not knowing what he's thinking, what he's about to do. Not being able to read him like you normally could. It makes your thighs quake—and there’s half a second where you wonder how much Enzo would pay to see this, how much he’d fucking taunt you for it.

But just as quickly as it came, you shake that thought—focused on Theo, you pull your bottom lip between your teeth and sink to your knees, fingertips teasing from his chest to his abdomen, tilting your head to look up at him through your lashes.

"...please don't punish me." You giggle—and the debauched absurdity of it all makes you nearly choke. "I'll be so good—I'll do anything, Theo—"

You feel him huff, tense, and when your fingers graze the front of his pants—just barely touching his crotch— his hand snaps down like a vice, gripping your wrist, stopping you dead in your tracks.

And then, you hear it. "Salazar sakes—shit—"

Your heart plummets. That voice—it's like being thrown into ice-cold water. No, that's not—it can't be—

"Enzo?"

Your voice cracks as you all but screech, your head whipping up so fast you feel dizzy. No, no, no—

Enzo, who you previously thought was Theo, pulls the mask off and all but verbally confirms it. Your nightmare born to life. Spooling to fruition right in front of you. He smiles, lips curled into something thoroughly entertained, and gods, how his eyes glint with pure assholery—you could fucking kill him.

"Enzo—" you stammer, horror flushing through you, burning through the mortification lodged in your throat. "Gods—what the fuck—"

"Surprise," he breathes, like this is the most casual thing in the world to him.

You scramble back, knees scraping against cold stone—mind spiralling in every direction at once—shame collides with shock and it all burns under your skin, the kind of heat that never settles. You know Theo's voice. You could never mistake it. You know for a fact that was him back at the party— but this, this makes no sense.

"What...what the hell-" your voice stumbles like you're trying to outrun the words. "Why would you—what were you—"

"Relax," he is all too fucking calm. "It was a prank."

"A prank?" You're still on the floor, and for some reason that makes everything worse. "You call that a prank? A—a funny little joke?"

"That's usually the definition—"

"No." You hiss between clenched teeth, anger strangling any hope for composure. "What were you doing in here? This— this isn't—you were trying to-"

"Trying to what?" He sounds so goddamn innocent but you know better. He's toying with you, making sure you know it. He's been your best friend since you were kids but you never said it was by choice. He steps closer. "I was trying to what, angel?"

Your blood boils, the heat spreading fast—pooling low in your core against all specks of your sanity. He's relishing this, drinking in your mortification like it's fine wine—and for some reason, it makes you weak.

"You—" words die with another one of his steps, the toes of his shoes brushing against your skin as he crouches down in front of you, elbows resting casually on his knees. You sit back, ass meeting cold stone. "Enzo—"

"Yeah?" He cocks an eyebrow. "You just gonna' parrot my name all night? Maybe you're too embarrassed to speak?"

The constant mocking feels like ice and you want to slap that smug look right off his face but instead your fucking thighs tense. You have nothing to say—can only stare at him, lungs seizing further as you notice the smirk fading from his lips, something darker replacing it—

"You didn't even know who was under that mask, and you were ready to suck me off," he's whispering, but he may as well be screaming. "You'd do anything for anyone with a mask, huh? I wish I knew about this kink of yours sooner."

He leans in closer, his knees pushing yours apart—you and Enzo had never been strangers to toying the line of friendship one too many times while drunk, but this—

You blink. Staring at him. "You...you're enjoying this way too much."

"Guilty as charged." His smile spreads wider, cockier, his eyes dipping to your lips, then lower. You shiver involuntarily. "I know I should have stopped you sooner, but seeing you on your knees...in front of me...I just..."

He shakes his head before he slowly stands back up—and his eyes flicker to your chest, lingering on your fucking tits and not even trying to be subtle about it.

Then, there’s a sound—the sound of the door creaking open.

You barely hear it, the faint shuffle of footsteps, but it's enough to pull the grin from Enzo's face as he looks up. You're not sure your heart can handle anymore of this—plummeting to the stone beneath you as Theo steps into the room, dressed just like Enzo—black robes, black gloves, Ghostface mask.

"Nott." Enzo's voice is too casual, too easy. "Great timing, mate."

Theo’s silent as he takes in the scene. You—still on the floor, dress hitched up, legs spread. Enzo standing over you, smug, unbothered. Theo's presence fills the room as he shuts the door behind him and locks it, stoking your humiliation into something even hotter, something impossible to escape.

Theo's voice is flat, his tone too even. "Looks like you got caught."

Wait—

"You—" your gaze jumps between them, a wild panic bubbling up inside you. You're so fucking confused. "What is this? You two—"

"Like I said, a prank." Enzo says as he steps toward Theo, clapping a hand on his shoulder. "A bet, really.”

Theo doesn't respond. He doesn't move. He doesn't look away from you.

"A bet?" You choke out, trying to piece everything together. "What bet?"

"Well, you see, angel," Enzo pushes away from Theo and slumps down into a chair just off to the side of you. You feel the dread rolling in like a storm. "I bet big Theo here you'd get so weak in the knees over the mask, you wouldn't even notice the switch. As usual, I was right."

Andddd, there’s the dread. Yup. As expected whenever Enzo is fucking involved in anything.

"Oh, wow—" you'd laugh if you weren't this utterly mortified by the entire situation. "You guys are—gods. You’re going after a whole new high score in the prick olympics, aren't you—"

"Oh, I don't know if you believe that, topolina...I think you're just being shy." Theo cuts through your rambling and you flinch at the sound of his voice. "It's clear this is a fantasy of yours."

Your head tilts up, eyes widening as they meet the empty, hollow eyes of the mask drawing closer.

"I bet you're just embarrassed," Theo's pressing—he's fucking pressing and you don’t think you’ve breathed since he walked in. "Embarrassed that you got on your knees for your best friend...or maybe you're afraid I'd be mad." He pauses, and his gaze sweeps down over you. "Which, to that I'd have to say, I'm far from."

You swallow hard, your mouth dry. "You're...you're not mad?"

Perhaps you were afraid of that—even if you and Theo are unofficial in every aspect.

His answer is instant. "No."

He crouches in front of you, gloved fingers finding your chin, tipping your head up so he can look at you— really look at you.

"In fact...I think you should let him watch..." his thumb ghosts over your lower lip, so soft, so slow—without thinking, your tongue flicks out, barely grazing the leather covered tip, and you hear the soft exhale he releases in response. "After all, this was his idea. He deserves some fun too, don't you think?"

Heat floods your cunt, your stomach tightening at the suggestion. You glance at Enzo, sitting back now with his mask on—legs spread wide, leather hands clasped, calm—you wanted to kill him five minutes ago, but now—

Oh gods—you're really losing it.

"Yeah," you whisper, barely managing the word. "He probably does."

Theo's hand slides down to your thigh, leather fingers curling into the soft skin, pulling your legs open further.

"Mhm." He mutters. "You like being watched, don't you?"

Your breath catches, your pulse thundering in your ears as you nod, your eyes glued to Enzo. "Yes..."

"Say it." His fingers trail higher, teasing the soft skin beneath your dress, fingertips grazing closer—too close—just below the lace hem of your panties.

Salazar save you.

You bite your lip, and the air between you feels like it's thickening, growing too dense to breathe in. That fucking mask. You've fantasized over it. And now, there's two of them. Two sets of eyes—faceless, emotionless, and watching you. It's like something out of your fucking dreams.

"I—I like being watched," you manage to whisper, voice breaking between building lust.

"Louder," Theo growls this time like he's pulling it from somewhere deep in his chest—it sends liquid heat spilling through you. "Louder, topolina. He can't hear you if you're whispering."

Your heart stutters in your chest, and Enzo—gods, Enzo is still watching—stays silent, the mask concealing whatever reaction he might have, but his posture speaks volumes. Stillness, dark fabric of his trousers tight across his thighs, a coiled tension that radiates off him, permeates the space between you.

"I—fuck—" a breathless moan cracks through your words as Theo's leather-clad fingers slip under your panties, grazing your slick slit. "—love it. I love being watched."

Theo hums, the sound vibrating low in his throat, and rewards you by pushing two fingers into your dripping heat. So slow, the pace of his strokes torturous—slick sounds of leather working you open filling the room, mingling with your quiet, shuddering breaths. His thumb brushes your clit, teasing over it until you moan—hard and shameless—

"So loud," Theo mocks, your spine arching into him as his fingers curl inside you. "Eager, filthy little thing. You love being on display, don't you?"

A whimper catches in your throat, your gaze still locked on Enzo, watching him watch you.

You're shaking. You're close. Too close.

Your voice cracks again, nothing more than a whisper caught in a moan. "Theo...fuck—"

"You're so wet, bellissima," Theo breathes behind the mask. You're burning, every nerve sizzling. "You want to cum, don't you?"

You can't speak. Words don't exist anymore, only the pressure—only the way Theo's fingers curl inside you, the way your thighs tremble and ache from holding yourself open, from being watched, from being this goddamn humiliated.

"Y-yes," you choke out, desperate. "Yes, please, I—"

"Ask him." Theo's cuts you off. "Ask Enzo to let you cum."

The room spins. The air thickens into something cloying.

Ask him. Ask Enzo—

You swallow hard, your eyes darting between the two masks. Enzo is silent, still motionless, but he tilts his head slightly, the only indication that he's heard. That he's waiting.

"Please, Enzo—" the humiliation is sickening but you force past it. It’s a broken prayer, vulnerability in verbal form. "Please...let me cum—please—"

Time stretches. It feels like hours, an eternity where nothing exists but the weight of their hidden eyes on you, the way Enzo's fingers twitch, curl over the thick ridge at his crotch, leather knuckles tensing as if he's restraining himself from something primal. You're being devoured whole by this moment—by the unbearable tension, by Theo's fingers inside you, relentless in their assault, and gods—you're going to die if they don't let you—

"Yeah," Enzo finally murmurs, breaking the silence. Theo's gaze flickers to him, waiting. "Yeah, you can cum, angel…”

But as he says it, he shakes his head, and Theo—the absolute bastard—pulls his fingers out without a word.

"…just not yet." Enzo finishes.

The sound that leaves your throat isn't even human, some guttural, helpless whine torn straight from your throbbing, empty cunt. Theo shushes you.

"You'll get to cum, Bella," he coos, standing up slowly. "It'll be soon."

They're toying with you, playing you like a goddamn puppet on strings and it's infuriating in its deliciousness. You've known these men for years, yet it's almost laughable—the way they feel so foreign, so terrifyingly new.

"Oh, Enzo," you sigh, feeling your arousal cool, your body suddenly aware of the icy stone beneath you, of the wet heat slicking down your thighs. "I'm going to kill you tomorrow."

Enzo snorts. "You're welcome to try."

Theo exhales a half-chuckle, helping you off the floor and onto a desk, his hands firm on your thighs as he spreads you open like he's done a hundred times within the last few months.

A moment passes before he moves to loosen his belt and you realize just how close Enzo is now—his chair right beside the desk, his hand palming the bulge in his pants, shameless in his observation. The sight makes you fucking dizzy with filth. Surely, you've lost your mind. This is madness. Every line between friendship and lust—between restraint and indulgence—has blurred and bled into something you can't define, and the thrill of it is intoxicating.

"This is insane," you hiss, breathless, feeling the way Theo's gloves scrape over your skin, two thick digits dragging in your slick. "You're both fucking insane."

"Too much talking," Theo mutters, so infuriatingly calm, even as he drags the head of his dick over your folds, teasing your clit. "So much attitude for someone dripping down their thighs. You want to stop?" The silence stretches, your eyes locked on his, and you can feel the smirk behind the mask. He nods. "That's what I thought. Now shut up and let me fuck this wet cunt."

His hands grip either side of the desk, his body looming over you—the scene from your fantasy you've envisioned a million times. Ghostface—dominant and rough—gods, you want it. So bad it fucking hurts.

Your head lolls to the side, eyes immediately finding Enzo's again—forgetting for half a second that he was even there. His jeans are unbuttoned now, his hand moving rhythmically beneath the denim, mask locked onto you with a single-minded focus that makes your breath stutter.

"Enz-ohhh—" you go to say something to him, but then Theo pushes into you—no warning, no slow build—just a deep, unforgiving thrust that knocks the breath from your lungs, and your voice cracks on his name, the syllables lost in the moan that spills out of you.

"Shit." Enzo groans in response. "Did you just—"

"She did," Theo snarls, his grip on your hips punishing as he slams into you again, harder this time. "The little slut just moaned your name."

There's cursing, from both of them, but it's all a blur in your ears, drowned out by the sound of Theo's hips slamming into yours, the fevered slap of skin on skin, the obscene sounds you can't help but make—

"Yeah, I noticed," Enzo mutters, and fuck, he sounds ruined, completely lost in the sight of you—his best friend, getting fucked by his other best friend. "Fuck."

Theo's hand finds your jaw, forcing your head back to face him, Ghostface mask looming above you like a delicious nightmare.

"Who's fucking you?" His voice is caught somewhere between a snarl and a purr. "Is it Enzo?"

"N-no—" you manage, trembling with every thrust.

"Of course it's not," Theo hisses, driving into you with punctual thrusts to make you feel him, making you cry out when he slams your cervix. "So why'd you moan his name? When it's—fuck—my cock inside you?"

"I—I didn't mean—" you whimper, eyes squeezed shut, but there's no escape. Not from the relentless pace of Theo's dick, not from the way Enzo's eyes never leave you, burning into you like fire. You can't form words.

"Mm—don't be shy now, topolina," Theo purrs, his voice thick with effort. His hips snap forward, and your back arches, a broken sound escaping you. "I think you just love having him in your mouth—his name, his—"

"Fuck, Nott, shut up," Enzo cuts in, his head thrown back, chest tense. "I don't want to hear your voice—"

You can hear the strain, the way he's barely holding it together—

"Look at him," Theo ignores Enzo's words. He lets go of your jaw. "He wants you. He's always wanted you."

Your eyes dart between them, head spinning, unable to form a coherent thought—Theo's fucking relentless, pushing you closer and closer to the edge—and every time you glance at Enzo, you see the way he's breaking, hand moving faster, chest rising and falling with ragged breaths—

"I never knew you were such a voyeur, Nott," Enzo spits, trying to sound casual. "Never took you for being such a filthy bastard."

"What can I say?" Theo groans in response, propping your legs up over his shoulders to drive into you deeper. "Just discovered a new interest, you should try it sometime."

They're still bantering, like this is some kind of fucked-up competition, like you're not about to shatter into a million fucking pieces while your best friend watches—after he got you here and humiliated you with a fucking bet—gods, you'd laugh if you weren't so utterly lost to the pleasure ripping through you.

"And watch you get off on it?" Enzo spits back, voice rough. "I'll—"

Theo snorts, cutting him off. "I think there's more than one person getting off on—"

"Shut the-fffuck up—please-" you manage to moan, the words barely intelligible. You look to Enzo, eyes wide and pleading. "Enz...come here."

"Yeah...?" Enzo breathes out, his voice catching, tipping his head back forward to look at you. “What?”

"Come here," you moan again, trembling, fraying under the pleasure that's building inside you from Theo’s insistent dick. "Let me help you."

For a moment, he hesitates, and you can’t tell what he’s thinking because the goddamn mask hides everything. He's always been the calm one between you—always stopping your drunk kisses, always refraining from taking things too far. But tonight, there’s no more of that calm left in him—

He stands.

Each step he takes feels like a lifetime, but when he's standing next to your head on the desk, towering above where you're laid out like a feast, you don't know whether it's the mask or the situation itself that has your pulse racing. Erotic and terrifying, the not-knowing—a power exchange in its purest form. Theo growls infront of you, his thrusts growing harder, more vicious, as you reach out to pull Enzo's hips closer.

You're already eyeing the throbbing bulge in his jeans, your mouth practically watering as you stare.

"Go on," you rasp, lips parting as you look up through your lashes. "Take it out."

The breath Enzo sucks in is sharp, a hitch in the darkness. His fingers tremble, just barely, as he pushes his pants down his thighs, and the noise that escapes him when his cock slips out and smacks his stomach—low, strangled—makes you moan and clench in response—he's huge.

Your breath catches, a soft exhale of, "oh, fuck."

And the words are barely out of your mouth before both Theo and Enzo respond—low growls and breathless groans that echo in the shadowed room, vibrating through you like electricity.

"Open your pretty mouth," Enzo whispers and you obey without hesitation, tongue slipping out, wanting, eager. His breath shudders, and you wish you could see his eyes. "Good girl."

And then he's pushing into you, sliding hot and thick over your tongue, and at that exact moment, Theo thrusts harder, deeper, and suddenly you're overwhelmed—both of them inside you, filling you, consuming every breath. Moans ripple through the dungeon air, a chorus of sin, and you shake with the sheer intensity of it all.

Theo's thumb finds your clit, starts swirling over it, and you keen—eyes rolling back in your head, Enzo’s leather hands in your hair to hold you still. Tears stream down your face as you gag, spit pooling at the corners of your mouth, but neither of them stop—if anything, they're both lost in it, in the wrecked, messy beauty of it all. Your hands claw at the desk, desperate for something to hold on to as the pleasure builds, tightens, spirals out of control.

Time collapses. It's been moments—it's been hours.

And then it happens—all three of you tipping over the edge at once, crashing into a release so fierce it shatters you. Your climax rips through you, violent, leaving you shaking, milking Theo until he's spent—until he's pouring his cum deep inside your cunt at the same time Enzo groans deep and spills his own over your tongue. A moment passes, and then Theo is the first to pull away, panting, tearing off his mask and dropping into the chair beside the desk, and Enzo follows, tugging his jeans back up before slumping into another chair, mask still on—

Both of them are sprawled there, utterly spent, just as wrecked as you.

And then, after a few long, tense moments, you hear it—the clink of Galleons exchanged. You don't even need to look up for it to register. Theo tosses the coins into Enzo’s greedy palm because he was the true fucking winner here. The sound cuts through the stillness, and with it, that smug, unmistakable sneer in Enzo's voice.

"Told you she'd love it."

Asshole.

You roll your eyes. Your limbs feel like they're moving through molasses as you stand, your hands mechanically fixing your costume, adjusting the fabric against your thighs.

"You know, Enzo, if you wanted to watch Theo fuck me that bad, all you had to do was ask."

"What can I say," he shrugs, lazy, like he's discussing the weather. "I enjoy a bit of gambling."

Theo snorts, adjusting his collar, as if none of this fazes him. His eyes flick from you to Enzo. "Next time you'll be paying me."

"Next time?" You cock an eyebrow. "How generous of you."

"There will be a next time," Enzo says, flipping one of the Galleons between his fingers, that same smirk playing on his lips. "And I'll get my turn."

Your pulse quickens at the sheer arrogance of it, the way he says it like it's not even up for debate. You hate how much you like this side of him.

"Maybe next time you should."

They nod, both of them wearing their smirks like crowns. "Until next time, then."

[straylightdream]

how quiet can you be?

𝐩𝐚𝐢𝐫𝐢𝐧𝐠: choi seungcheol x afb.reader

You’re not worried about Jeonghan seeing you, more so you’re worried he’ll hear. You and Seungcheol have an issue trying to stay quiet. More than once, Joshua and Jeonghan have complained about your noise level. It turns out, you’re so loud that Joshua had invested in noise-canceling headphones.

𝐠𝐞𝐧𝐫𝐞(𝐬): established relationship, smut with a little plot

𝐚𝐮(𝐬): nonidol au

𝐰𝐨𝐫𝐝 𝐜𝐨𝐮𝐧𝐭: 1.2k

𝐭𝐫𝐢𝐠𝐠𝐞𝐫 𝐰𝐚𝐫𝐧𝐢𝐧𝐠𝐬: lots of teasing

𝐬𝐦𝐮𝐭 𝐰𝐚𝐫𝐧𝐢𝐧𝐠𝐬: unprotect p in v, clit play, creampie, sex while people can hear from the other room, these two are known to be loud, sex while staying as quiet as possible, marking, mentions of Jeonghan walking in on them in the past.

𝐫𝐚𝐭𝐢𝐧𝐠: 18+ nsfw

𝐚𝐧: thank you to these lovely humans @facethesunflower , @kwanisms & @supi-wupi for beta reading

𝐟𝐞𝐞𝐝𝐛𝐚𝐜𝐤 𝐚𝐧𝐝 𝐫𝐞𝐛𝐥𝐨𝐠 𝐰𝐢𝐭𝐡 𝐭𝐚𝐠𝐬 𝐚𝐫𝐞 𝐠𝐫𝐞𝐚𝐭𝐥𝐲 𝐚𝐩𝐩𝐫𝐞𝐜𝐢𝐚𝐭𝐞 𝐰𝐡𝐞𝐧 𝐲𝐨𝐮 𝐫𝐞𝐚𝐝 𝐨𝐧𝐞 𝐨𝐟 𝐦𝐲 𝐟𝐢𝐜𝐬.

Laying on his soft bed, his toned body is pressed up against your back. His lips are sucking on the sensitive skin on your neck as his large hand is massaging your breast, sending shivers down your spine. He runs his tongue along your skin, knowing exactly what to do to drive you wild. In all the time he’s been with you, he’s learned all the ways to turn you on with little to no effort.

Slowly, you roll your body back against his, earning a sinful moan from him. He rolls his hips against your butt as his length already starts to harden.

“Aren’t we supposed to be going to sleep?” you whisper. You know how this is going to end.

“I would rather do more than sleep,” he rasps, rolling his hips again.

“Jeonghan is going to come home any minute,” you moan as he gently nips at your skin.

“He knows you’re staying the night. He’ll knock before entering.” Jeonghan has a habit of bursting into Seungcheol’s room without asking.

His large hand grips your hip, pulling you closer to his hardened length. You’re not worried about Jeonghan seeing you, more so you’re worried he’ll hear. You and Seungcheol have an issue trying to stay quiet. More than once, Joshua and Jeonghan have complained about your noise level. It turns out, you’re so loud that Joshua had invested in noise-canceling headphones.

“You can’t promise that.” You wiggle your butt against him. You’re playing with fire right now. You know Seungcheol would have no problem having sex with you right now. The thought of Jeonghan accidentally walking in won’t stop him, or even the idea of one of his roommates hearing you.

Seungcheol used to get embarrassed when Jeonghan or Joshua would catch you making out on the living room couch, but you've been walked in on too many times to count. It's at the point where he literally doesn’t care. He’s not the type that wants to have sex out in the living room where his roommates could see, but if they’re stupid enough not to knock and barge into his room, he won’t get embarrassed. There have been a handful of times when Jeonghan has burst into the room and found you fully naked while your boyfriend fucked the living daylights out of you.

“I would prefer that Jeonghan doesn’t see me naked again,” you say, biting back a smile.

“You don’t have to be naked for us to have sex.” His lips brush your neck, sending a shiver down your spine. You know if you say no right now he won’t push the issue anymore. The thing is, he’s got you so turned on at this point that you aren’t even sure if you care if Jeonghan walks in or hears you having sex.

“You win. But we have to stay under the covers, and we’re staying in this position.” You can’t help but smile. Having sex while spooning is one of your favorite positions. Seungcheol has not only a long cock, but it’s also thick. When he fucks you from behind, he’s able to hit places and make your brain turn to mush.

He wastes no time pulling off your underwear and pushing his boxers down his thick thighs. His hand reaches over you. His fingers start toying with your sensitive clit. Biting your lip, you try your hardest to hold back your moans.

“Is my baby trying to stay quiet?” He loves to tease you while having sex.

“Cheol—“ you quietly whimper.

“Baby, Shua is in his room. Are you scared he’ll hear you?” His fingers dip down and slowly start pumping in and out of you.

“Um—“

Pulling his finger from your core, he presses his lips to your shoulder. “Lift your leg a little for me baby.” Without a word, you follow his request. Slowly, he pushes in, giving you a moment to adjust to his size. It doesn’t matter that you’ve done this over one hundred times; your body is never fully used to the sheer size of him.

Filled to the brim, his hand rests on your stomach. His lips are kissing anywhere they can reach. Your bottom lip is captured between your teeth.

“Let’s see how quiet you can be,” he teases.

He starts at a slow and deep pace. His hand has moved down so it rests on your mound. His fingers draw slow, lazy circles on your clit. It's clear he’s not trying to make this a quick romp. He intends on dragging this out for you.

One hand grips the sheets below you, while the other holds on to his arm. He’s hitting so deep you feel like you’re seeing stars. The room is filled with the soft sound of his hips hitting your butt and silent gasps. He moans softly in your ear.

Squeezing your eyes shut, you try to focus on staying silent.

His fingers playing with your clit pick up the pace. He’s trying to push you over the edge. Tilting your head to the side, he leaves a trail of open-mouthed kisses. There is no way he’s not leaving behind marks.

Pushing your hips back, you try to meet his thrusts. Quiet gasps keep passing your lips. It’s taking everything in you not to whine and whimper loudly.

“Such a good girl,” he whispers against your ear.

“Fuck—“ you whisper.

“Come for me, baby.” A tidal wave washes over you. Squeezing your eyes closed, you whisper his name like a sinful prayer.

His large hands grab your hips, holding you still. His thrusts become firm as you ride out your high. The low groans passing his lips let you know he’s on the edge of the cliff.

As your high fades away, you focus on helping him find his release by squeezing your walls around him.

“Baby—“ His grip on your hips tightens and he moans your name in your ear. He paints your walls with his milky release.

He’s snug inside you for a long moment before he pulls out. He crawls off the bed and you lay on your back, staring at the ceiling. He helps clean up his sticky cum that’s already starting to leak out.

He sits next to you, smiling gently while rubbing your thigh. “Just so you know, Shua isn’t home and Jeonghan is on a date with his friend he’s in love with. We have the place to ourselves.” Your smile drops at the fact that this man made you believe you had to be quiet so roommates didn’t hear you.

“You asshole—,“ you scream at him.

“But you were so good, baby. Nice and quiet.”

He’s wearing a cocky grin, and even though you want to be mad at him, you can’t deny that this was a fun game.

If you have asked to be tagged I request that you please reblog. If you could leave comments and or tags that would be greatly appreciated.

[ichorai]

xerox ; robert reynolds ; part two.

part one. | part three. | part four.

pairing ; robert (bob) reynolds x reader, thunderbolts & reader

synopsis ; you had one last job before you were free. no more splitting, no more deaths. unfortunately, that job seemed to rope in four other assassins and a... a man in hospital-wear?

words ; 11.8k

themes ; action, angst, slowburn, the beginnings of romance

warnings / includes ; much more intense violence/gore/death than in part one, suicide, self-harm, human experimentation, child abuse, reader has the ability to split into multiple bodies (think dupli-kate from invincible), foul language, mentions of pregnancy, everyone's mental health sucks!

a/n ; the support so far has been so sick guys! thank you so much! i initially wanted to cover all the events of the movie in two parts and move on to avengers tower type of stuff in the next part but i decided this part was already long enough and was itching to post LMAOO regardless, i hope you all enjoy!

main masterlist. read on ao3!

There was rarely a time in your early life when you weren’t being under surveillance. Cameras, everywhere. Nurses making their rounds. Scientists probing you. Surgeons with their hands on you, over you, inside you. 

But once, when you were sixteen, there was a black-out in the facility, which you later learned to be a total power outage through the entire city. No cameras to watch you. The nurses who had been drawing your blood scurried out with owlish eyes, spooked. Moving gingerly, you pulled the needle out of your arm, bandaged it with the gauze on the medical cart, and glanced out of your barred window. The past few weeks, the scientists had been trying to use your DNA to perfect biological cloning technology. As revolutionary as it sounded, you really didn’t like the idea of someone having to live your reality, death and pain constantly hovering over your shoulder.

For a few minutes, however, you got to be alone with yourself. Nothing but you and your own thoughts. You began to shake, but you didn’t register it. The only thing you clearly remembered was the scalpel on the medical cart. A pale silver, but reflecting the hazy green of the emergency exit signs from outside your cell. You’d always thought the sign taunted you. Exit here, just in case you have to, even though you can’t.

The blade was cold in your touch, cutting the warmth of your skin. 

You watched the blood drip down the first arm, and then sliced through the next. It hurt, of course it did. But then it wouldn’t hurt anymore, and it would all be over. 

Your shaking had intensified so much that the bed frame rattled like bones. Then, you began to split. Whether it was subconscious or your body’s natural, instinctive reaction, you weren’t sure. You sobbed, a mangled noise caught in the back of your throat, trying to merge back together. But this had never occurred before—you had never tried to stop yourself from duplicating. Typically when you split, you carried forth the same wounds as the original, but that wasn’t the case this time. 

It was as if your body had stored a clean, woundless back-up in case of a singular copy’s dire emergencies. You still felt it—the throbbing, searing pain on your arms—but no signs of the gash on you at all. You were wiped clean from your choice. A fresh restart. 

That was the first time you had to watch yourself die by your own hand. You tried to give your copy some sense of comfort during the last few moments, but it felt futile knowing you craved the very same thing. You never tried committing suicide again. Mostly because, well, you were a walking paradox. Unkillable, yet you’ve died a thousand and one deaths.

And so—when you watched Valentina’s cavalry pierce poor, innocent Bob with round after round of bullets, a guilty, nasty part of you thought about how lucky he was to be able to die so quickly. Of course, you felt terrible as soon as the thought entered your mind. You rather liked Bob and his warbly doe eyes, his skittish but considerate demeanor, and his eagerness to help. It was an awful shame you didn’t get to know him better. You were still reeling over seeing him in your nightmare—was that your mind playing cruel tricks on you or was Bob less innocent than he came off to be? 

His sacrifice certainly wasn’t going to be in vain. Walker had begun to drive the truck out of the compound down winding, sandy paths. 

Except—it seemed Bob was a lot more similar to you than you thought. When someone shot you down, another cropped right back up. Bob, to your relief and utter confusion, did just the same.

The streaking figure across the sky was no star. It was flailing about amongst the grey clouds and bore the pale, baggy silhouette of hospital clothes. 

Bob. Your Bob. He was alive!

“Palindrome,” you whispered in awe, face just about pressed up against the warm glass of the truck’s window. It was only a few seconds that he was suspended up in the air, but it felt like ages. Then, he began to plummet back down to the earth. “Oh, no.” 

His landing was not a graceful descent—in fact, the impact was so massive that it sent a strong gust of wind billowing across the base, knocking your truck clean off its path. The vehicle tumbled in rotation as it made its way down the sandy slopes. You would’ve likely gotten a concussion from being jostled about had you not split yourself into as many copies as you could fit, which was nearly forty, and stayed nice and tight amongst your own nervous copies.

It landed on its side, and you reabsorbed all the duplicates into one body. Moonlight spilled into the vehicle when John hacked at the truck’s metal with his shield. It caved noisily beneath the initial strikes, then eventually split. You might not have liked the man, but he was impressively strong. Was he super-serumed up just like the previous Captain America? The scientists in Madripoor that had been working on you were sure as hell trying their best to make their own formula of super serum, to no avail. 

“Oh,” he said, peering into the dark belly of the truck and seeing your deer-in-headlights expression. “I was worried you’d died in here. Good.”

“Xerox,” Yelena had said, helping you climb out of the truck. You took caution to avoid the sharp edges of the gap Walker carved for you. “Are you okay? Did you see that?”

You nodded. “That was Pal—Bob. Right? I wasn’t just seeing things?”

“Not unless all of us had a collective hallucination,” Ava put in. The group began to walk away from the totaled truck. There was no point in trying to get it up and running now—it was ruined beyond saving from the crash.

“Weirder things have happened,” you said, looking around the great expanse of nighttime desert. “Where did he land? Maybe we can help him.” 

“On the other side of the base. We couldn’t possibly get to him in time before Val and her crew,” Yelena said. Then, she handed you a file. “Valentina did this. To test on someone like that… it’s inhuman. She plans to use him.”

Your brows furrowed in confusion, then you looked down. It was designs of superhero suits—a collage of striking gold and blue, all sharp angles and bold flares. Lacking all the soft gentleness you would’ve attributed to Bob. It even had a cape. 

“The power of a thousand exploding suns? Golden Guardian of Good?” Ava read over your shoulder, scoffing. “That’s a mouthful.”

“Sentry,” said Walker, taking the case file from you, to your annoyance. He wrinkled his nose in distaste as he took a quick gander. “Very shiny. I didn’t think any of them were still around.”

“Did you know about this?” you asked. 

Walker shoved the file back into your awaiting hands. “There was a rumor that O.X.E. had some kind of big breakthrough. I don’t know much, but whatever it was, it was apparently way too extreme. Test subjects were dying. And then when the government looked into it, Val shut it down, and she put me on clean-up duty. I was meant to take care of him.”

“Take care of him,” you scathingly echoed. “Kill him.”

“Well, yeah,” John bit back. “We all were sent to kill each other. Haven’t you gotten over it by now?”

Your eye twitched. “I’m sorry I haven’t warmed up to the idea just yet!”

Ava drew a large, heaving sigh. It seemed she had no energy left to bicker. “Let’s just get home without getting caught.”

John, to your delight, found cactus berries for everyone to eat. You were starving. When you thanked him, quietly, he twisted his mouth to the side and nodded. Not embarrassed, not prideful, but… something more muted, as if he wasn’t sure how to accept gratitude. 

The rest of the group ate and walked in relative silence, save for the occasional complaint, grumble, and irritated tongue-click. 

The Red Guardian—and Yelena’s adoptive father, which you later came to find out—had come to pick her and everyone else up in the middle of the desert, waving his arms about and screaming like a madman. He was a giant of a man, so large that he had to drive his beat-up limo hunched over the steering wheel, despite putting his seat as far back as it would go. His shoulders were broader than the sticky leather seat itself. He donned a shoddy red suit that looked like it belonged in a museum dedicated to decades-old artifacts. And he was terribly loud, always spouting out something about collaboration, family, and the terrific rag-tag team the lot of you made. He seemed intent on calling the group the Thunderbolts in honor of Yelena’s peewee soccer team.

You found him rather amusing, even if he was obnoxious, overstimulating, and smelled of stale tortilla chips.

Both Yelena and Alexei were arguing about the next course of action—the former wanting to hunker down and hide, while the boisterous latter seemed intent on defeating Valentina with the power of… friendship. You decided to stay silent on the matter. You couldn’t deny that going home sounded like a brilliant idea. But… so did saving Bob. 

Before a proper conclusion could be reached, Walker announced a convoy approaching the limo from behind, three chunky vehicles gaining speed. Alexei tried to engage “defensive measures”, but he’d forgotten which of the several buttons to press, and instead engaged a “party mode”, where the lights turned flashy pinks and purples, and a ridiculous EDM song began to blare from the built-in speaker system, nearly shocking you into splitting. 

And then the gunshots started firing. Walker made himself useful by deflecting the majority of the bullets with his shield. Ghost tried to climb out one of the windows, only to be met by a piercing blast of concentrated, high-frequency sound waves, instantly disabling her suit’s phasing abilities. Yelena currently had nothing but a gun, and Alexei was busy driving. That left you.

With a determined puff of breath, you multiplied once, then climbed out the car window. Distantly, John barked at you to stay behind the shield but he went largely ignored. 

This was going to hurt like hell. But, on the plus side, you never really knew if you had a limit to the number of clones you could produce before you exhausted yourself. Maybe today you could find out. Within the blink of an eye, there were a hundred of you, growing exponentially by the second. 

Yelena realized what you were doing before the others. You were forming a human wall. 

One of the military vehicles plowed right through the weakest part of the wall, your blood and guts splattering every which way, staining the sand a deep shade of crimson. Another tried to swerve around, but ended up skidding too quickly, tipping over and crashing to the side, tires moving fruitlessly in the air. Your copies, still multiplying, swarmed the vehicle like angry, hell-bent ants, slipping into the open windows and pummeling the few soldiers in there. You could feel the bullets empty into your body, but you swallowed down the pain and kept going. But exactly as you told Yelena before—limited bullets, inifinite of you. And good Lord, did it hurt like—well, like you were being run over a thousand times over because you quite literally were. 

The remaining car was taken care of by an explosion so loud that it seemed to reverberate through the very ground. Initially, you wondered if someone from the car had thrown back a grenade, but when you caught sight of the sleek motorbike, you knew it was a newcomer. 

You heard Walker distantly yell, “Bucky!”

And true to his word, It was Bucky Barnes, in the flesh. Your eyes widened ever so slightly. You reabsorbed your copies—the few remaining that were still alive—and watched from a distance as he swerved past the last car’s gunfire, pinned a cable to its underbelly, and fell back to hold the wire down with his metal arm. The car flipped in the air as if it were an omelet on an oiled skillet. You blinked, impressed. 

Then, to your dismay, Bucky took off his sunglasses, and proceeded to shoot an explosive disk at Alexei’s limo. Similar to the previous car, it did an uneven pirouette before crashing onto the road upside-down. You winced, hoping none of them were killed in the crash. Even if they weren’t your friends, you thought that killing them went a step too far. 

Bucky was a little ways ahead of you, but he turned and fixed you with an expectant stare. Was he going to shoot you, too?

But you should’ve known—Bucky Barnes was smarter than that. He pulled out a different gun—and when he shot, electric ropes shot out as if they were sticky webs. You came crashing to the ground as they wound about your body, spasming with the sharp current frying your skin. To your panic, duplicating was not an option if you were bound. 

“If—” you choked out as he drew nearer to you. “If you’re going to kill me, please do it quickly.”

The ex-Winter Soldier looked down at you with a cocked head. “I’m not going to kill you. You’re evidence.”

Bob couldn’t remember the last time he woke up in a nice bed. In fact, this was probably the nicest bed he’s ever been in. His fingers twitched beside him—silk sheets. Just from that, he knew that this wasn’t his home (thank God for that), nor was it a hospital. He sat up.

There was a woman sitting by his bedside, watching him.

“Hi,” she said, voice soft and meticulously tender. “How are you feeling, Robert? Are you comfortable?”

He stared at her for a moment before awkwardly saying, “Yeah.”

She nodded in satisfaction. “Good, good. My name is Valentina Allegra de Fontaine.”

The name immediately had Robert backing up to the headboard, pointing an accusatory finger at her. “No, you—you tried to kill us!”

She began shushing him as if he were a child throwing a fit. On the glass table beside her, she put down what looked and sounded to be a metal plate.

“Let me explain. Would you like that?”

Bob stared at her for a moment, before looking down at his hands fidgeting with the silk. “Yeah,” he whispered. 

“You signed up for a medical study, which was, as advertised, at the cutting edge of human improvement. But not everybody could handle the amount of greatness that we had in mind—”

As she spoke, Bob took to looking around. The room was rather empty save for the bed, the glass table, and the chair Valentina was sitting on. Where was he? He hoped he wouldn’t have to stay here long… he didn’t like empty spaces very much. The blankness of the walls always made him worse than usual. When he was younger, he wasn’t even allowed to put up posters because his father would tear them down the minute he saw them. Bob swallowed the lump in his throat, realizing he hadn’t been listening to what Valentina was saying.

“Where—where is everyone?” he asked, interrupting her long-winded explanation. “Xerox? Yelena?”

“Xerox?” she repeated, pulling a distasteful face. Bob frowned. “Yelena… Oh, Bob, those people you were with… they’re not honest people. They’re criminals. Villains, really.”

Bob inched closer to the headboard until his back was flush against the leather. “No, but they… they helped me.” 

Well, if they weren’t here, he hoped everyone managed to get to safety. That he was useful for once in his damn life and not just… in the way.

Valentina stood up from the chair and sat down on the bed, inches away from him. Bob stiffened at the sudden movement.

“Let’s just forget about them for a bit. Let’s focus on you,” the woman said, “and how perfect you are.”

Perfect? Him, perfect? Perfect Bob. It sounded like an oxymoron. An embedded contradiction.

“You always thought of yourself as the victim. But you overcame it! You went to Malaysia—you were lost. You were searching for something, someone to help you. And you found me,” she crooned. 

Bob could feel his breath hitch in his throat. “How do you know about that?” 

It was embarrassing—mortifying, even—that someone found out that he was looking for help because he was a pathetic loser who couldn’t do anything on his own, as if he even deserved help to begin with. And now she was confronting him about it! Bob wanted a hole to open in the ground so he could crawl inside of it and hide away for the rest of his stupid life.

“I know all of it,” Valentina assured, though it wasn’t very reassuring. “I know about your mom’s mental illness, I know about your addiction, your juvenile record, and, you know—I even know about the times your father—”

Bob felt his insides seize at the mention of his father. “Stop!” he said, hands immediately coming up to cup his ears. “No, I didn’t say you could know that.” The lights began to flicker, a dangerous hum filling the room.

Valentina shook her head, scooching even closer. “Robert, I know everything about you—and I still want you to be my guy! All the bad things you’ve done… and I accept it. I accept you. Isn’t that what you want? To be chosen? No one else sees it. But I do. I see you. And I think, Robert, that your past is what makes you so special.”

At this, Bob could feel a small part of him cave. She wanted him. Out of all people, she thought he was capable! Capable of what? Did it even matter? He was picked. Wanted, chosen, special, needed, valuable, a true asset!

That was what he wanted. Yes, a dark voice whispered in the back of his mind. She’s your ticket out. You won’t be a useless fucking loser anymore. 

Then, Valentina took his hand. His eyes narrowed a fraction. He dove into her mind and he saw it all—her father, the tears on her chubby nine-year-old cheeks, the bullet in his chest. When he pulled away, he regarded her with a mixture of pity and confusion. 

This woman was just as sad as him. Was everyone equally messed up in the head or did he just attract like-minded people?

Valentina cleared her throat, trying her best to give him a warm smile, but it ended up looking more like a grimace than anything. “Would you excuse me for just a moment?” she said, getting up from the bed. She looked a bit frazzled. Bob supposed being forced to live your most traumatic memory again did that to someone. 

Before she could leave, she picked up the metal disk. He caught a glimpse of the shiny golden S engraved on the front side.

Your ticket! the dark voice hissed. You fucking idiot.

“No,” he croaked out, scrambling away from the headboard. “No, wait!” He swallowed the bile in his throat. “I can control it.”

She smiled, victorious. “Great,” she said. Then, she turned and left, leaving Bob alone in the empty room.

Bucky Barnes was very good at ignoring you. He only seemed to listen after tying the super soldiers up with bent metal rods, and you, Ava, and Yelena with special power-defusing cuffs. And even then, he dismissed everyone trying to tell him about Bob, Project Sentry, and how Valentina betrayed all of you. He made a scathing remark to John about his wife and kid deciding to leave him—it was clear the two had a tense, troubled history. 

Finally, after about half an hour sitting around and wasting time, Bucky got a phone call. Who with, you didn’t know. Someone close to Valentina, maybe. But she mentioned Bob, and suddenly Bucky straightened. His scowl deepened upon realizing that this group of misfits and criminals—were telling him the truth all along.

“So…” he said after hanging up the phone. “Bob.”

“Bob,” the rest of the group echoed in both exasperation and relief.

“We have to help him,” you said, emphatically wriggling your wrists and shoulders to indicate the cuffs. “Valentina is only going to hurt him or use him to hurt others.”

“Or both,” Ava chimed.

Bucky thought on it for a long second, a muscle in his jaw twitching. Finally, he stalked over and uncuffed you, Yelena, then Ava. He unwound the metal pipe around Alexei as if he was snapping a string. He paused behind Walker, clearly unhappy to let him back on his feet, but he also broke him free of his bonds.

“You guys know Valentina,” he said. His eyes met yours. “Like you said—people are going to get hurt. And if your knowledge of this Bob can help… then you’re coming with me.”

“Us?” Yelena said, incredulous. “Bucky, you have the wrong people. Isn’t there anyone else you can call? Thor?”

“Off-world.”

“Captain America?” you asked, venturing a glance at Walker.

“Busy. Out of the country.”

“The Hulk?” Ava asked.

Bucky shook his head, patience wearing thin. “Listen. I’ve been where you are. You can run, but it catches up. It doesn’t go away. I’m giving you guys the opportunity to do something about it now. It’s either you come with me, or it’s a prison cell. Take your pick.”

Alexei needed no convincing. “This is great!” he roared. “All of us will be fighting together, like a team!”

More reluctant, Yelena drew in a breath. “Stop Val. Save Bob.”

You nodded. “I’m in.”

Walker pursed his lips. “Fine,” he gruffed.

Ava nodded, solemn. “Come on, then.”

Alexei looked around with a wide, oafish grin on his face. “YES!” he yelled. “Come on, then, you slowpokes! What are we waiting for?”

The plan to save Bob was really no plan at all—which was to be expected from a group of mercenaries and assassins who were typically used to working alone. 

Crash into the Avengers Tower. Beat up the guards. Find Valentina. Take care of her (you still weren’t very sure what this bit meant). Save Bob. Easy, right?

Well, crashing into the tower and beating up the guards certainly were a piece of cake. Finding Valentina, which you suspected to be one of the harder steps, turned out to be handed over to you on a silver platter. 

Her voice echoed on the intercom, effectively halting everyone mid-punch or mid-kick. As for Bucky, he dropped the guard he’d been strangling. “Jesus, you guys,” Valentina sighed. “I literally just had a new drywall installed. Should’ve known you lot would mess that up, too. I left the door unlocked for you. Come up.”

Yelena stood beside you, chest heaving. “Think it’s a trap?”

“Probably,” you said. “But do we have a better plan?”

“We didn’t have one to begin with,” Ava retorted. She gestured to the elevator. “Come on.”

The elevator took the group up to one of the very top floors of the tower. You stepped in with wide, scrutinizing eyes. Most of the original Avengers were dead now, weren’t they? Dead or retired. A vague memory of heroism and destruction. You were gone during the Blip—and you thanked God for that—so the Avengers bringing you back was more of a curse than a blessing on your end. 

“Crazy, isn’t it?” Valentina greeted everyone from behind an island counter. There was the pop of a champagne bottle as she poured herself a glass. “Think of all the monumental fights that happened exactly where you’re standing. I mean, I don’t really care—the place wasn’t cheap, but it’s got good optics.”

That’s all she ever seemed to care about, wasn’t it? Image. Branding. It was no wonder she always sent you on undercover missions. You weren’t marketable. No little girl or boy would buy your figurine when there was an Iron Man or Black Widow to pick from. 

“It’s over, Valentina,” Bucky said, expression stoic. “This ends now.”

“Congressman Barnes,” Valentina greeted, voice snippy. “I never thought you’d have a promising career but—you managed to disappoint even the lowest of expectations. Not even half a term, huh? Yikes.”

“We’re taking you in, Val,” Walker interrupted. 

This made her laugh, though it was inauthentic and hollow. “I don’t think so… junior varsity Captain America.”

His hand fell on his gun, and he only paused when Bucky said his name with a warning tone.

“It’s good to see you, Ava. Yelena. You look awful, by the way. You sure you’re really ready for that public-facing role you asked me about?” 

“Eat shit, Valentina.”

“Where’s Bob?” you said, feeling the tensions creeping up until it felt near suffocating. “What did you do to him?”

“Xerox. I thought you wanted to leave… And yet here you are. Just makes me wonder why you haven’t left. You had every opportunity to. Are you getting attached already? That was always a weakness of yours, wasn’t it?” She took a long sip from her champagne flute. “You know, he asked about you. Even mentioned the little nickname you gave him. Palindrome, right? It’s a little bit of a mouthful, but that’s just me.”

You didn’t know what to say to that. Why were you still here? You didn’t owe Bob—or anyone else in this group—anything. 

Your evident hesitation made Valentina’s eyes light up. “Just look at you guys! So adorable, really. I sent you all down there to kill each other… but you made nice, and you form a team. Who would’ve thought?”

To your relief, Bucky cut through her condescending tirade by asking for Mel, who you assumed to be the person he was on the phone with earlier. 

“Oh, Mel,” she said, dismissive. “She’s having loyalty issues. But I’m just so grateful that she stuck around long enough to lure you all in—”

As she spoke, Bucky took the flute of champagne from her hands and placed it onto the island with a resounding tink. His hand then moved to close around Valentina’s throat.

But it never got there.

His hand froze mid-air, vibrating with strain. Bucky stared down at his arm with furrowed brows.

With a sharp, satisfactory grin, Valentina hummed, “I’m not alone. Robert?”

You turned to see a pair of dark boots descend down a flight of stairs. Each step revealed more of him—flashy golden suit, cinched blue belt, a dark, flowing cape. Blonde hair. A confident stance. A set jaw.

“Oh, my God,” Yelena said. 

“That’s Bob?” Bucky asked, words laced with disbelief.

“He looks… a little different from when we last saw him,” Ava said.

You stayed silent, watching him with what could only be described as a crestfallen expression. This wasn’t the Palindrome you remembered. What did Valentina do to him?

“It is my great honor to introduce to you… the Sentry,” Valentina beckoned to Bob as if he were a shiny new car she was parading. 

Bob nodded at the rest of you. “Hey, guys.” His eyes met yours for a brief second, but he was quick to look away. Your insides felt as if they were curdling.

“All powerful. Invincible. Stronger than all the Avengers combined—and soon to be known as Earth’s mightiest hero,” Valentina announced. 

Ava narrowed her eyes at him. “Have you dyed your hair?”

Bob blinked. “Yeah. It was—”

“My idea,” Valentina nodded.

“I preferred the dark hair,” you said, though you weren’t sure if you were saying it to spite Valentina or because it was the genuine truth. Perhaps both. “Brought out your eyes.”

Bob looked at you as if you had slapped him.

“People love a classic hero,” Valentina said. “All the strongest and most beloved were blondes. The original Captain America, blonde. Thor, blonde. Hawkeye, blonde-ish. Black Widow… blonde for some time.”

The mention of her sister made Yelena flinch. Valentina didn’t seem to notice.

“So what’s the plan?” Bucky said. He wasn’t here to discuss frivolities like hair color.

“You haven’t figured it out yet, Bucky? Geez. Did all that time in the freezer slow your brain down? At least you’re kinda cute—you have that going for you.” 

“You’re not going to hurt people?” the Guardian intervened, his inflection cautious and mildly confused. 

“Oh, no! No. I’m not going to hurt people. I’m going to hurt you—or, well, Robert here will. You see, the press is on their way here now. They’re going to witness the magnificent power of Sentry as he takes down this group of ruthless, rogue agents. Thus beginning a new era where I decide how to keep the American people safe, answering to no one. I’ll be unimpeachable.”

“Cool,” you snarked, lips curling into a snarl. “You got the villain monologue down and everything.” Then, you turned to Bob, trying your best to ignore Valentina’s presence right beside him. Your expression softened considerably. “You told her about Palindrome?” 

Bob froze, as if pondering if he’d done something wrong. “Ye–yeah. I thought—at first, I thought it would be a cool hero name. But yeah, uhm… Sentry is… better. Rolls off the tongue.”

You nodded. “Okay. No, you’re right, maybe. But Palindrome—same backwards as it is forwards, remember? Are you the same Bob I met down in the vault? Because I liked that Bob a lot more than what I see in front of me now.”

Initially, Bob’s expression crumpled. Any hope of seeking the team’s approval was immediately crushed under the heel of your foot. Then, to your dismay, Bob—no, Sentry’s—face grew stony.

“Valentina fixed me,” he said. “I’m better now.”

The team’s incredulous, disbelieving faces told Bob all he needed to know. None of you were on his side. 

Valentina nodded at the tall, now-blonde super. “Sentry. Your first mission is to take out these criminals.”

Bob swallowed heavily, brows furrowed as he weighed between his options. “I don’t want to hurt you guys,” he finally said. “Why don’t you just turn yourselves in?”

With a scoff, Walker said, “You don’t wanna do this, Bobby.”

A vein jumped on the side of Bob’s neck. “You can call me Sentry.”

“Please, you do not need to listen to her,” Yelena attempted to rationalize. 

“See?” Valentina exclaimed. “It’s exactly as I told you—they don’t think you’re good enough.”

“That’s not true!” Yelena asserted. “You can trust me, Bob! I know you!”

Bob fixed her with what looked to be a disappointed gaze. “I don’t think that you do.”

“But—you saved us. Only a few hours ago, you sacrificed yourself to help us escape. What was any of that for?” You loathed how your voice broke with desperation. 

Bob had a hard time swallowing around the rising lump in his throat. His mind darted back to the many times you died just to save him. None of this sat well with him, but… it needed to be done. 

“It was a mistake,” he said, simply. He chanced a glance to Valentina, who nodded in approval.

You recoiled like a wounded snake. 

“ENOUGH TALKING!” Alexei bellowed. Bob still wasn’t very sure who he was. “No one messes with the West Chesapeake Valley Thunderbolts!” 

Just as Val incredulously echoed, “Thunderbolts?” Alexei stormed forward, pulling all his weight into a barrel-slam. It was as if he were hit with a solid, thick wall of dense lead. Bob punched him straight in his round belly, and like a ragdoll, the super soldier went flying backwards, crumpling into a red heap against a nearby pillar. Immediately, the rest of the team dove into action and attacked Bob. Save for Yelena, who was still trying to make peace with him.

Bob was, as Valentina had alluded to earlier, seemingly invincible. Able to fling people away without having to disturb a single dyed hair on his head. Stop special-grade bullets mid-air and send them right back to the assailant at twice the speed. Withstood the sharpest of blades and the strongest of punches. 

You split into two copies. One to assist Walker, whose shield was embedded into a sofa, nearly cleaving it in two, and another running after Valentina, who you spotted hurrying to hide behind a corner.

“You lied to us,” you hissed, grabbing the collar of her dress shirt, yanking her close until her nose was inches away from yours. “I came to you for help. I thought you would save me.”

“I did,” she said, and began to howl and laugh like a maniac. “When I found you, you were an empty husk of a person. Now look at you. Fighting with your friends. There’s a spark that wasn’t there before. You know, if I hadn’t only stuck you to do my dirty work, you would’ve made a good hero. A lack of planning on my end, I’m afraid.”

You felt your eyes sting with the promise of tears. “I could’ve been good?”

“Yes,” she said, shrugging. “But you chose this. Sure, I gave you the order… but who, in the end, pulled the trigger?” Without giving you the chance to respond, she lolled her head to the side. “Oh, Sentry!”

Bob, who had been preoccupied smashing Alexei through the windows as if he were playing frisbee, snapped his head to see you holding Valentina. Immediately, his eyes started glowing, and you were ripped away. 

There was no hope in fighting against a man more powerful than all the Avengers rolled into one. You braced yourself for pain, squeezing your eyes shut. But there came none. Instead, when you cracked an eye open you were suspended midair outside of the penthouse. 

“How far?” he asked you, striding to the window, its frames lined with shattered bullet-proof glass.

“What?” you choked out, trying to struggle, though you knew that if he dropped you, you would be met with a terrible fall that was likely worse than the fall you had in the vault. 

“How far until you lose control and get a seizure?” He turned and bent Walker’s shield until it caved around his arm, now shaped like a curved taco shell. “I don’t want to send you too far. I’d prefer not to hurt you.”

“Fuck you!” you snarled. A second too late, you realized that was probably a terrible thing to say to him when he had you floating mid-air, completely at his mercy. “Wait, Bob—please just stop this—!” The rest of your plea was lost to the wind as he sent you streaking further away from the tower, going so fast that the civilians down below must have thought you were some sort of high-tech drone.

Your duplicate watched in horror, knowing there was nothing you could do for your other-you. You were taken farther and farther until you grew limp, convulsing hundreds of feet above the ground. The copy in the tower crumpled to the ground with not a sound. Ava, battered and bruised, dragged your convulsing body away from the action so you were less likely to be struck while down. 

And when the rest of the team gave up and turned to retreat, Bucky was the one to pick you up by the scruff of your dark suit, dragging you into the elevator. He was missing his metal arm, which Sentry had torn off like it had been attached with paperclips, hot glue, and a dream. Ava picked it up on her way into the lift.

Sentry advanced on them with glowing eyes. “Forgetting someone?” 

He reached out behind him, fingers curled into a beckoning motion. Your copy came flying back into the tower, crashing into the rest of the team as if you were a bowling ball, and the rest of the team the pins. Your skull rattled as it knocked into Alexei’s, and you gasped for air, dizzy and disoriented. If you had been more lucid, you would have apologized to Walker for your boot crashing into his eye. That was likely going to leave a terrible bruise. Yelena took your arm and wound it around her to help you stay upright. 

“I’m so glad you were able to catch a glimpse before your… retirement,” Valentina called out, slinking out from the shadows she was hiding in. “Camera crews are assembling. Finish the job, Robert.”

Bob waited until the elevator doors slid to a close, hiding all the fearful faces from his observant gaze, and he could hear the lift move downwards.

“Finish the job?” he echoed. “No. They’re not a threat to me, so… why do I need to kill them?”

Valentina gave him a tight-lipped smile. “You need to do what I say, Robert.”

Confusion washed over his polished, golden features. “Why?” 

“Why?” Valentina parroted, almost mocking. Bob could feel anger bubble behind his chest.

“I just…” He exhaled in frustration. “I feel like there’s an… unwarranted power imbalance here.” He motioned between himself and her. “There needs to be more of a collaboration between us if this is going to work. Like, the hair—I don’t know. Maybe I should have more of a say.”

She rolled her eyes to the broken ceiling from when Yelena was flung upwards. “Don’t let those idiots get to your head. The blonde is great.”

“You sure?” said Bob, now pacing back and forth, wringing his hands. “I thought I liked it, but now I’m not so sure. Xerox said—”

“Forget Xerox!” Valentina exclaimed. “That’s enough about the hair, Sentry.”

“It’s not just about the hair, though—”

“Well, you keep bringing it up, so—”

“No, but it’s everything!” Bob asserted. “It’s all of it. My suit, my name, my missions. I didn’t even want to be Sentry. I thought Palindrome was good. It… it is good.”

As if she were consoling a child, Valentina relented. “Fine. If you want to change it so bad, be my guest. We’ll just have to re-do all the paperwork all over again and—”

Bob shook his head. “Why would a god… take orders from anyone at all?”

Brow cocked, Valentina slowly said, “I think you’re throwing the word god a bit loosely there.”

“No,” Bob said. “No, but you said… I was all-powerful and stronger than the entire team of Avengers, which includes at least one God. I’m starting to think that maybe you don’t actually know what I am, nor what I’m capable of. I’m the only survivor from the medical trials, aren’t I? I’m the only one left.” 

Val drew in a sharp breath, folding her hands behind her back. “Oh, God.”

“Yeah,” said Bob. “Yes, that’s more like it.”

Before she could draw out the emergency killswitch, Bob took her by the throat and sent her flying across the room, pinning her against a metal support frame. She struggled against his hold fruitlessly. 

“You were going to turn on me,” said Bob, narrowing his eyes. “Just like the rest of them.”

“I’m not afraid of you, Robert,” she croaked before he began to apply more pressure against her esophagus.

“It’s not Robert you have to be afraid of,” he said, voice as cold as the steel behind her. His eyes began to glow a terrifying golden hue and—

There was a click and a zap, and Bob’s hold on her loosened. Sentry crumpled to the ground in a heap of golds and blues. Mel was standing behind the pair, holding the killswitch, legs shaking. 

“I want a raise,” she demanded. 

“Fine. Order cleanup and it’s yours,” said Val, gripping the support beam with shaking hands. “And help me up, damn it!”

The two eventually stumbled into the elevator, leaving Bob’s body alone in the Avengers tower. A minute after Val abandoned his corpse, however, the floors darkened to an inky blank around him. His suit and face was now pitch-dark, absent of any sort of color. His finger twitched. First his pinky, then his thumb, then his whole hand. By the second minute, he began levitating, floating a meter above the cracked floors.

Bob, Palindrome, Robert, Sentry, the Golden Guardian of Who Gives a Flying Fuck—what he used to be… was gone now. And what was left of him?

Nothing. Nothing at all.

Just a void.

Once outside the Avengers Tower, you reabsorbed into one body, stumbling away from Yelena to sit on the curb. Behind you, they were bickering, as always. Alexei wanted to go somewhere to regroup and try again. As if being completely beaten to a pulp wasn’t enough. 

Yelena was done. She was fed up with his bullshit. 

“Stop. Just stop! There is no us. There is no we. Bob is gone. He changed into that thing—and there is nothing that any of you could do about it,” she hissed. 

“Right,” Ava said, rolling her eyes. “And what did you do, exactly? Because I seem to remember you getting your ass beat way worse than mine. Xerox didn’t even try to stop Bob.”

“Because we didn’t stand a chance. There was no point,” you gritted out, getting back up to your feet. “Sorry I prioritized getting Valentina over him.”

“Fat load of good that did!” Ava exclaimed, throwing her hands up in defeat.

“Yeah, I get it! I suck! We suck! We’re all terrible!” Yelena screamed. The pedestrians going about their day eyed the rag-tag team of bloodied, bruised, suited individuals. “Ava, you’re not a hero. You’re not even a good person.”

Ava pretended that didn’t sting. “Bitch,” she muttered under her breath. 

When Alexei tried to step in, Yelena exploded at him, too. “I am not your little girl! I haven’t heard from you or seen you in a year! It’s like you didn’t even care about Natasha. You’re a fucking fake and a coward and I wish you never pretended to be my father!”

Walker stepped in, saying, “Come on, go easy on him.”

“Oh, so you’re nice now?” Yelena said, rounding on him.

“What, is it my turn?” he said, tone flat and unimpressed.

“No, you know you’re a piece of trash,” Yelena spat. “And so does your family.”

“Jesus,” said Walker, grimacing at how much that stung.

“Yelena,” you said, weary of her biting your head off for even speaking. “We tried. We failed. We move on. Can we do that?”

“No, but you didn’t try, did you? I saw you talking to Valentina. You could’ve done it. You had the chance to kill her, but you didn’t. You were too caught up in your selfish fantasies of self-fulfillment that you’ve doomed the rest of us!” 

You nodded, withdrawing, clearly wounded. “Mhm. Okay.”

Maybe she was right. Maybe it was your fault. You had Valentina. You did. Was your need for closure selfish? Did it cost everyone a potential victory?

“We lost,” Yelena said with a tone of finality. She turned around and began to stalk away. “This fucking team was built on delusions. We were never anything, not ever.”

Alexei went after her. The rest of the group slowly started to retreat into different directions. You looked to Bucky with sad eyes he thought resembled a kicked animal.

“Does it get better?” you asked. Your gesture to your head was vague and hard to interpret, but Bucky seemed to understand you almost instantly.

“I wish I had an easy answer for you, kid.” The soldier pursed his lips, regarding you with furrowed brows. “But not like this, it won’t. Not like this.”

“What are you going to do now?” you whispered. 

Bucky clenched his jaw. It was clear that he had no idea what the protocol was for a situation like this. “As of now, Valentina’s intentions with Sentry are unclear. She could be planning out acts of terrorism as we speak. I think the smartest course of action is evacuating the premises.” He eyed you warily. “You can go home. You’ve done enough.”

“I want…” The words lodged in your throat. “Bucky, I know I’m a fuck-up. I’ve done bad, terrible things. I know there’s no coming back from that. But I want to help. I want to be better.”

Something flickered in the blue of his eyes, as if he was recalling something. Someone. “Okay, kid,” he said after a brief pause. “Come on.”

The two of you began to usher the crowd away. You multiplied a few dozen times, scattering to hoard as many people you could off the streets. You heard many shocked whispers amongst the passerby. Is that Congressman Barnes? No fucking way—that’s the Winter Soldier. Is Captain America around? Why are there four of you? That’s freaky as shit.

“I’m Xerox,” you hurriedly told a family loitering by the entrance to the subway station, trying your best to seem friendly but you likely came off as a raving lunatic instead. “You need to evacuate the premises now. Someone dangerous could be—”

“Are you a hero?” a little girl asked you in wonder, taking a gander at your suit, which was battered and covered with dust and soot. It definitely had seen better days. “You don’t really look like one.”

The mother flinched with shock, and began to frantically apologize for her daughter’s lack of a filter.

“It’s okay,” you reassured. “I’m no hero. I just want to help.”

The mother nodded, looking worried. “That’s good enough for me.” It was clear she was no stranger to bizarre happenings in New York. “Come on, Adeline. Let’s go.” They hurried off, and you returned to Bucky, who was urging a gaggle of laughing teenagers not to go into a theater.

“Good. You cleared the street,” said Bucky. “We should set up some sort of blockade to—”

Abruptly, Bucky stopped mid-sentence. His eyes were trained up to the sky, and you turned to follow his gaze. You felt your heart painfully skip a beat in your chest.

A dark figure floated above the city. Caped, with a suspiciously similar silhouette to Sentry. You squinted, straining your vision, barely making out his arm extending out as if he was mimicking grabbing something.

“That’s—” Bucky started.

“Bob,” you breathed out. 

You watched in horror as helicopters came flying towards him. At first, you thought they were press, just as Valentina promised—until they started shooting at him. The bullets seemed to disappear through him. And after a second, the helicopters came crashing down, as if they were completely void of pilots. The vehicles spun into construction scaffolding, pieces of unfinished building breaking apart and falling to the world below.

You and Bucky were quick to move then, yanking civilians out from under falling rubble. You multiplied more in an effort to help, even if it meant getting hit by falling concrete once in a while. You caught sight of Alexei using a metal sign he had torn off a shawarma restaurant to protect citizens as they escaped down the subway tunnels, and Yelena saving an elderly woman from getting run over by a news van. Another helicopter was tumbling down from further down the street, and Ghost phased through rapidly-rotating blades to shove people out of the way. Walker was stopping a large slab of concrete from crushing a civilian. Your clones being as scattered as they possibly could meant you had eyes in all directions. A dozen of you hurried over to help him push it upwards, gritting your teeth with the solid weight.

Another one of you dragged the woman out from underneath. She was sobbing profusely, praying in a language you couldn’t understand. But she signed something—the tips of her fingers touching her lips, then beckoning out to you. Thank you.

It felt like something finally clicked into place. Was it inherently selfish of you to want to help people because it made you feel good? Or did it cancel out?

Yelena joined, then Alexei. Ghost phased through and began pushing beside Walker. Bucky put all his weight in with his metal arm, and the slab finally tipped over, crashing onto the street with such a weighty thud that the asphalt beneath fractured. 

And then the crowd around you started clapping. Quietly at first, but rising up to a deafening applause. 

“Mom?” called a small child across the street. There was a shadow falling over her, growing larger. Alexei was there before anyone else, shielding the little girl from the falling debris that would certainly have crushed her to death if he hadn’t been there. 

“You’re safe, little one,” said Alexei, kneeling down to her height. 

The dry tear tracks on her chubby cheeks bent as she smiled at the red giant before her.

And then she was gone. The only thing left in her place was a shadow in a blobby, vague shape of the girl, spilling darkness across the street. 

You flinched. Three civilians across from you disappeared in the same way. Then two to your left. Another pair behind you. Your eyes flew upwards to see Bob—Sentry—whoever that was descend down to hover only a few feet above the totaled street. 

“You will all know the truth,” his voice echoed. “You can’t outrun the emptiness.”

Screams erupted around you as people fled every which way. You reabsorbed your copies closest to the growing darkness.

“Come on,” Walker said, yanking your arm. “We need to get people off the streets!”

You nodded, rushing ahead to direct people into the subway tunnels. 

“Yelena!” you heard Alexei bellow. “Yelena, what are you doing?”

You turned to see her calmly striding towards the darkness. 

“No,” you whispered. Your closest copy ran towards her, only a few feet away.

“It’s like you said,” the dark figure murmured, his voice somehow loud enough to reverberate in your ears like a piercing drum. “We’re all alone. All of us.”

“Yelena,” you said, taking her forearm. “Yelena, we have to go.”

“Aren’t you tired of fighting?” Bob asked. Instinctively, you knew he was speaking to you. “I can fix it. Let me fix it.”

“No, Pal,” you said, edging away from the darkness, which was eating at the streets. “I don’t need you to fix me, thank you. I haven’t even tried a licensed therapist yet. Come, Yelena, please.”

Your words fell on deaf ears. The assassin shut her eyes and let out a sigh. She stepped forward, and then she was gone. You heard Alexei’s anguished screams somewhere behind you. 

The Void reached out and turned a few more panicked civilians into shadows. Before you knew it, the entire street was blackened, leaving only a circle around you.

“I promise it won’t hurt,” The Void said. He floated down to the ground to stand in front of you, just inches away. If you reached out, you would be able to touch him. You could feel the cold emanating off his body, tempting you to just—fall into him. “The darkness will keep you company.”

“And that’s you?” you whispered, trying your best to look for an expression in such a blank canvas of darkness. “Where’s Bob?”

“He doesn’t matter anymore,” the Void said.

“He does,” you insisted. “He did to me.” 

“You died for him,” he said, tilting his head.

You nodded. “And I would again.”

“Why?” 

The question, though it was just one word, weighed heavy on your mind. 

“I’m not the bad guy I thought I was,” you finally told him. You stared at the darkness closing in around you with a heavy heart. “If I went in—would I find Bob in there?”

“Your Palindrome is hiding. He isn’t looking to be saved.” The Void motioned around him. “Look at this mess. This is no place to be. Step in with me. I’ll take care of it. You wouldn’t need to worry anymore… it’ll be just us.”

“Can I try to help him in there?” Your voice broke, betraying your own fear.

The black figure’s shoulders trembled as if he were smothering a laugh. “You can try. I’d advise giving up, though. It’s never worth it. Now… come.” 

His arms spread wide open, inviting you in. Distantly, you could hear Bucky and Ava call out your name. You swallowed heavily.

Then you fell forward, willingly embracing someone for the first time since you were a child. He was solid for a split moment. All frigid edges and hard muscle—then you collapsed into the soft darkness, and sat back up in a hospital room.

It was the same vision as before. Two of you. One whole and one cut. Without hesitating, you kicked at the surgeon, grabbing a scalpel from the table and slitting his throat. You watched the blood gush out of his wound, dark and bubbling. Too dark to be real blood. 

You turned to free yourself with the missing leg from the operating table, slicing at the leather straps. And then, to your shock, young-you began attacking yourself. 

It was disorienting to see your younger self snarl like a rabid animal, leaping from the table to claw at you, sinking sharp little teeth into your exposed throat. You made a garbled noise of pain, and threw the kid off. Your throat stung, but it was a hollow pain that was quick to fade back into nothingness.

“I’m you!” you screamed before the kid could leap at you again. “I’m you!”

“I don’t know you,” little Xerox said. “You’re not real. You can’t be real.”

“I’m you,” you whispered. You put the scalpel down and approached like one would a nervous horse. “Honey, I’m you. I’m okay, see? You’ll be okay.”

Little-you swayed. You began to cry in the silent way you always did, smaller frame wracking. 

“It’s okay,” you said with an aching chest, gathering yourself up in your arms, stroking the back of your head. “Let it out. There you go.”

The child began to bawl into your chest. You reached over for the scalpel again, slicing through the bonds of the young, whole copy. “Here. Take care of each other, okay?”

“Okay,” the whole copy said. Both of the younger Xeroxes held onto one another. You stepped away with a heavy heart. 

“Palindrome?” you called out. “I’m here to help. Come talk to me.”

Nothing.

With a huff, you turned out of the hospital room, shoving your way through the doors, though not before bidding a respectful goodbye to your younger copies. 

You found yourself in a different room now. You had escaped the hospital at this point, now living off of the meager cash you earned by doing the dirty work for Madripoorean crime lords. Your gun was trained on a woman as she sobbed for mercy.

“I didn’t mean to—” she said, wiping away the snot that dribbled from her nose. “I didn’t mean to, please tell him that for me!”

“I don’t speak to my bosses,” your copy said. Current-you rounded about to look at Xerox’s face here. Gaunt, with glassy, empty eyes. “He wants you gone.”

“I can be gone!” she said, nodding. “Please. You can pretend you shot me. I can disappear without a trace.” When you said nothing, she doubled over, wailing out a pitiful noise. “I’m pregnant. Please. Please don’t kill me.”

Past-Xerox’s eyes thinned into disbelieving slits. “Lie.”

“I’m not lying. Please. It’s his child, but I can—”

“Don’t tell me that.”

“Just listen to me—”

Your younger self began to panic. “Why would you tell me that?”

“If you could—”

“Shut up. Shut up, shut up, shut up.” 

“Is—do you need money? Is it money you want?”

“No.” Yes. “I don’t need your charity.”

The woman shakily pulled out crumpled bills from her bag, offering them to you. You gritted your jaw and pulled the trigger. She fell to the ground with her mouth frozen mid-plea. Before you left, you took the bills and stuffed them into the holey pockets of your ratty trousers. You took the silver necklace the woman was wearing for good measure, too.

Your past-self looked up at you. “Do we ever find out?”

“What?”

“Was she really pregnant?”

You stared down at the dead woman with horror. “I don’t know.”

Young Xerox straightened, shoulders rolling back. “We don’t deserve to be forgiven. Not for this.”

“Maybe not,” you agreed. “You’re also only eighteen.”

“So?”

“You were just a kid. You had no money. No food. No home. No family. Just you and your copies and your missions,” you whispered. 

“Tch. Sounds like a bunch of excuses to me.”

You nodded. “It is. It’s an excuse.” You looked down the alleyway. “Valentina will be coming soon for you. She’ll be too good to be true at first. A house. A clean bed. Food in the fridge. But it’ll be the same thing again. Just… repackaged.”

Your younger self’s face twisted with a rotten, disappointed look. “Do we ever get better?”

“We try to. I try to.”

“Good.” Young Xerox pointed up a rusty metal fire escape. “He’s up there. Your Pal.”

“Thank you,” you said, about to make your way up the creaky stairs. 

“He wants to be found,” said young you, nodding. “He made the rooms easy for you. There’s a lot worse that he could’ve chosen from.”

“That’s true,” you whispered, though saying that made you feel all the more terrible for the dead woman on the ground. “What about you? Did you want to be found?” you asked, unsure if you wanted to hear the answer.

“You tell me,” retorted the younger you with a wolfish grin. “I’m all me, remember?”

Your final room was when you lived in America. It was dark in your apartment. You were twenty-five, looking a bit healthier than you had been at eighteen, but still just as miserable. 

You stood in front of the stove, which held a pot that was almost halfway full to the brim with boiling water. “Come on,” younger you said, jumping up and down on the spot, psyching yourself up. Your palm raised to slap yourself across the face. There was a belt tied about your mouth so as to not alert your civilian neighbors. “Come on, you pussy,” you hissed at yourself from behind the belt.

Inhaling sharply, you held in your breath as you dove your left palm into the boiling water. Your scream went muffled behind the belt. After a moment, you quietened to an occasional whimper. It was strange being able to watch yourself and not feel the same pain. Only the memory of it. 

It wasn’t self-harm. At least, you didn’t consider it to be so back then. It was endurance training. Upping your pain tolerance for the job. Valentina had told you that you were useless if you couldn’t handle dying. 

Younger you pulled your raw hand out of the pot after about thirty seconds, then flipped the tap on to its coldest setting, sticking it beneath the running water with a hiss. The next day, you would repeat the process until you lost all feeling in your left hand, frying your nerve endings to shit. 

As the room began to repeat itself, you stopped your younger self from plunging a hand into the pot by grabbing your wrist. “You don’t have to do that,” you said. “There are other ways of being strong.”

“If I don’t do this, I’m not worth anything,” young Xerox said. “I’d be nothing.”

“Hurting yourself doesn’t make you stronger,” you deadpanned. “You’re wasting your time.”

“I know,” the younger you sighed. “I know that. It’s just nice to be in control of my own pain for once.”

“You can be in control by consciously trying to keep yourself from the pain,” came your soft whisper. “Hurting yourself doesn’t fix anything. It doesn’t solve anything. It only leaves scars that take way too long to heal. Trust me. I still can’t wear short sleeves.”

Younger you barked out a laugh. “Oh, I know. Summers are hell.”

“I know, right?” you said, smiling for the first time in what felt like weeks. “You know what helped me?”

“What?”

“Crosswords,” you said. “The newspaper stand across the store sells entire books. Every time I had the urge, I would solve a puzzle or two.”

“Oh, God,” said the younger you, bending over into what sounded like a cry, but it was actually an incredulous laugh. “I’m such a nerd. Seriously?”

“Yes, seriously,” you said, rolling your eyes. “Just try it. It helps.”

“Okay, okay. Fuckin’ geek.”

“We memorized every single element of the periodic table in order by age eleven. I think the nerd has been with us all along.” As you spoke, you took the pot of boiling water and carefully maneuvered to dump the steaming water into the sink. You turned off the stove, and past-you didn’t try to stop you.

Your younger self smiled, and it was clear that it’s been a while since that happened, too. Then, it faded just as quickly as it appeared. “What happens if we run out of crosswords?” 

The question didn’t seem to be just about crosswords.

“We can always try something new,” you ventured. “I think crocheting is all the rage now.”

“Is it?” 

“Probably not, no. I’m not really sure what the youths are into these days. It changes every other day.”

“We can try crocheting anyway,” past-you laughed. Then, you pointed into the living room. “Look in the TV. He should be there.”

“Alright. Thanks.” You gave mid-twenties Xerox a two-fingered salute, then turned to sit down in front of your TV. 

And, as promised, you caught a glimpse of Bob in the reflection. When you looked behind you, it was still your regular, dim living room. You looked back at the dark screen.

“Found you,” you murmured, a relieved smile playing at the corner of your lips. “Hey, Bob? It’s good to see you.”

Despite the warped reflection, you could see him look up with a creased, almost guilty expression. “You found me,” he said, surprise evident in his tone. 

“I did. Will you let me in?”

“... I don’t know.”

“Please let me in. I want to help.”

Bob drew his knees up to his chest, cradling himself. The darkness surrounded you, and in the blink of an eye, you were in a different room. One you didn’t recognize. Your gaze flickered about. This must’ve been one of Bob’s rooms. An attic, by the looks of it—cluttered with junk.

You sat down in front of him. He was fiddling with a Rubix cube. “I used to love solving those,” you told him. 

“I’m—” He handed the cube over to you. “I’m pretty bad at it. I don’t know.”

“I was, too,” you said, turning the squares about. Bob watched you gradually align the colors together—orange with orange, green with green, blue with blue. You struggled with one side, but after moving back a few paces, you managed to get it right. “I was terrible at it. I kept giving up and reshuffling. But I got better with time and practice.”

You handed the cube back to him, neatly solved. Bob took it with soft fingers, inspecting your handiwork. “I don’t know how.”

“I can help you,” you said. “And there’s people out there that can help you, too.”

“They can’t help me. I’m… broken.”

There was screaming coming from downstairs. The noise made Bob flinch, his hands instinctively going up to his ears. As you listened, you could hear a man yelling, the sound of skin smacking skin, and the sound of a woman crying. A little boy intervened. More thuds, smacks, a shattering glass. The woman began berating the little boy for making things worse. It made your heart sink low to the pits of your stomach.

“Just ignore that, please,” he said once the noise died down, as if afraid you would leave now. “Don’t mind them.”

You drew in a breath. Tentative, you asked, “Can I touch you, Bob?”

“Yeah,” he said, voice croaky. “Yeah, you can. What are you doing?”

“I’m going to give you a hug. Is that okay?” 

Bob nodded again. His mom used to give him hugs, but that was a long time ago. Before she…

“Yeah,” he said, and he felt shame wash over him when tears pricked the corner of his eyes. You wrapped your arms around his neck and held him. He patted at your back awkwardly, but eventually took to mimicking your embrace when you sank into him, holding you close. 

“This is the first time I’ve hugged someone else in a very long time, you know. I’ve mostly just hugged my clones, as sad as that sounds,” you mumbled into his shoulder. 

“I don’t think that’s sad. I like to hold myself, too.”

“I like your hair like this, by the way,” you said as you tried to pull away, but he was holding onto you rather tightly. “Bob.”

“Oh!” He cleared his throat shyly, forcing himself to relinquish his grasp on you. “Sorry. Thanks. That was nice.”

“It was,” you agreed. There was some more silence. Bob put a fist up to his mouth and began to weep, utterly overwhelmed but nearly silent. You placed a hand on his shoulder, rubbing circles over his back. “I’m sorry this happened to you.”

“No, I’m—” Bob let out a quaky breath and began to cry all over again. You scooched closer to him and let your hand lay over his. He enjoyed feeling your fingers trace shapeless patterns over his skin.

“Bob,” you murmured after he began to calm down. “I don’t want to stay here forever. Do you?”

He swallowed around nothing, and avoided the question. “It’s quiet here. Quieter than the other places. The rest are… worse than this.”

“Hm.”

“It’s not me, you know. I wish I could fix it, but I just can’t. I can’t stop it,” he muttered. “It’s—it’s the Void.” 

You nodded. “Could you let Yelena in here, at least? I saw the Void take her. We can help you together.”

Bob blinked back his tears. He nodded. The room slowly rotated ninety degrees, and you could hear creaking footsteps outside. Yelena busted the door open with a sharp kick to the doorknob, which you found amusing, considering the door didn’t look to have a lock on it. The team had a troubling tendency not to check if doors could just open on their own without breaking them down first.

“Bob!” she exclaimed. Then, her brows rose upon seeing you. “Xerox.”

“Hi,” you greeted. Bob waved at her besides you.

“What’s going on?” she asked, surveilling her surroundings in typical assassin-fashion. 

“Therapy session,” you said, only half-joking, patting the spot beside you. 

There was screaming downstairs again. Yelena wandered over to look down the attic’s opening, where she could see a man with a glass bottle in his hands. She looked up at you and Bob, then sat down where you gestured. 

“I’m sorry, you had to live through this, Bob. And listen,” she said, lips pursed, meeting his watery gaze. “What I said to you before was wrong. You can’t stuff it down. You can’t hold it in all alone. No one can. Nobody should. We have to let it out. We have to spend time together. Even if it doesn’t make the emptiness go away, I promise you… it’ll make you feel lighter.”

Bob sniffed. “How do you know?” he whispered.

“Because it already has for me,” Yelena told him. “I found a team of people I could trust.”

At this, she looked to you, expression apologetic. “I’m sorry for what I said to you out there, too. You are not selfish. In fact, you’re probably the most selfless person I know. Not a lot of people are willing to die all the time for others.”

“Thanks, Yelena,” you said, simultaneously warm with sincerity and stiff because you weren’t at all used to receiving compliments. “So what do you say, Bob? Will you help us get out of here?”

To your delight, Bob nodded. You smiled, taking his hand. Yelena’s eyes bounced between the two of you—absent-mindedly wondering what the two of you were talking about before she arrived. She didn’t have much time to dwell on it, however, because the walls and furniture began to hum with a low-tone frequency.

“Look out!” Bob exclaimed, pulling Yelena down as a lamp flew across the room, nearly hitting her square in the head. A plastic kiddie chair whizzed into his back, striking him painfully. There were papers—monstrous childhood drawings—flying every which way. The curtains broke free of their hooks on the railing, wrapping around you and Yelena. Bob hurried over to try to claw the fabric off you, to no avail. It wouldn’t let go.

“Just try to get used to it, okay?” he called out over the whizzing and smashing of objects. “If you try to resist—the pain only gets worse!”

You could feel your vision swim with black dots as you gasped for breath—and all of a sudden, there was a slicing noise, and you were falling to your knees, filling your lungs with air. It was Ava, holding a sharp blade in one hand. 

She nodded at you, helping you up to your feet. “I should start keeping track of how many times I’ve saved you.”

Before you could respond, Walker and Alexei burst in through the walls, followed by Bucky through one of the windows. You only narrowly managed to dodge his metal arm cuffing you across the head with his dramatic entrance. 

“You came for us,” Yelena said, looking at her father with a touched frown. “What did you see? Are you all okay?”

Bucky only shrugged. “Oh, I’m fine. I have a great past, so I’m totally fine.”

“We’re probably going to need another one group therapy session once we’re out of here,” you said, which made both Bob and Yelena smile to themselves, nodding. 

“Thank you guys,” said Bob. “Really.” He was about to say something about how he didn’t deserve this—but when you put a hand on his arm, he bobbed his head again and kept his mouth shut.

“How do we get out of here?” asked Walker, glancing back at the ruined walls. “I’d prefer not to have to go through my rooms again.”

Bob scratched at the back of his head. “As far as I know, it’s just… endless rooms.”

“You said that this was the quietest room, right? That all the others are worse?” you asked, and Bob nodded hesitantly. 

The Thunderbolts team all exchanged determined looks. Alexei cracked his neck, John rolled his shoulders, and Ava flexed her fists. 

You gave Bob a gentle push towards the broken doorway. “Okay, Palindrome. Show us the worst of ‘em. We’ll take on whatever comes our way together.”

[nanamiskentos]

34 + 35 = ?! ✤ jujutsu kaisen

SYN. ➤ just some simple hc's about the jujutsu kaisen men going down on you !

𝐉𝐉𝐊 ➤ Gojo, Geto, Nanami, Toji, Sukuna, Hiromi, Choso, Kashimo, Naoya [Separate]

cw ─ MDNI. oràl (f), spànking, squírting, overstím, fàce-sitting, reader is called a slút, fíngering, afab!reader

wc. 3k

呪術廻戦 NOTE ( author says ) ariana what are u doing here. lazy post ik...but i had a lot of fun writing it 😭

➤ SATORU GOJO

he is so cocky and smug about it. the strongest will go down with a lazy smile, taking his sweet, sweet time about reaching his destination in the world. a.k.a what lies in between your thighs. kissing n' teasing, licking as thoug he's eating a dessert he made himself.

there's constant jewel-blue eye contact through those impossibly long, snowy lashes, " awh, look at ya'. soo sensitive, pretty girl. " and god, he loves overstimulation, and he's not likely to stop when you (inevitably) cum, and he's such a manwhore, 'cause he'll be moaning into you as though he's the one being pleasured. and in a way he is, because this is nothing strenuous to him, not as long as he's got rct on his side.

gojo's gonna' put your legs over his bare, milky shoulders, and keep you there until you're absolutely shaking splayed out for him. he's absolutely treats going down on you like a game he's determined to win, and he knows he's good. and it shows, with every flick and curl of his pink, kiss-stung tongue.

and you just know how obsessed satoru is with the view, with your flushed cheeks and lidded eyes. trembling thighs, the way your hands grip the fine sheets, or his hair (the key to making him bust a fat load). and the sorcerer just can't shut up when he's eating you out, 'cause he's just talking so damn much! between sucks and licks, he teases you, whispering raspy things like, "already so wet, aren'tcha? and i haven't even gotten serious."

gojo's fingers are going to find your sweet spot and curl so deliciously, working perfectly in sync with his mouth. the more you cum. (because, let's face it, it's multiple times), the more turned on he gets, and he'll keep you on edge, overstimulated and glassy-eyed until he decides to fuck you.

➤SUGURU GETO

oh, he's so worshipping 'bout it. and slow, as though you're sacred, and he's got all the time in the world to pray between your thighs. he uses deep, languid strokes with his tongue, fingers lightly teasing your heat. and geto's definitely moaning softly into you, for he's enjoying this as much as you are.

suguru calls you 'baby' n' 'sweet thing' in the softest voice while his mouth absolutely ruins you. he'll grip your thighs tightly to hold you still when you start squirming, "don't run from it, angel. 'm not done."

and his approach is oh, so intimate. he'll lay you back, kissing the plush flesh of your inner thighs, tracing his fingers over your slick folds while watching every expression that crosses your face. he groans softly when he buries his mouth into you, and it vibrates through you.

geto's not really rushed 'bout it, and he'll luxuriate in the way you arch and sigh, like he's reading poetry in your body. when you tug his raven-silk hair, and roll your needy hips, it's an easy recipe to make him possessive. he holds you down with a rippling, strong arm over your stomach to double down.

and he loves drawing out orgasms, and he makes them so slow and steady, and powerful. "come on, baby. . . let go. let me have it." and if you're a little teary after? he kisses your thighs, admiring the marks that he's left, and rests his head there. probably falls asleep there, like a big cat.

➤ NANAMI KENTO

oh, kento is so thorough and precise. pretty methodical, but what else is expected from the 7:3 sorcerer? he studies you with every lick, learning every reaction, and making it a mission to make you fall apart.

he loves when you tangle your quivering fingers in his amber locks, and pull. probably makes him cum on the spot, but his sheer restraint in trying not to empty his balls turns you on even more, what can you say?

his voice drops several octaves (if that's even possible) when he's between your legs, smooth voice raspy as he coos at your reaction, your glossy cunt winking up at him, "that's it. . . let go for me." and he'll clean you up with his tongue as though it's his last task on earth.

because face it, nanami kento is a gentlemen everywhere else, but between your legs? he's relentless. he starts soft, like a slow kiss, but every motion is calculated. he memories exactly how you react to different forms of stimulation.

nanami grips your thighs firmly, pressing them apart as he dips his head and eats as though he's starved. he doesn't even care how long it takes, and you'll cum at least twice before he even considers stopping.

his deep, calm voice as he talks you through it is absolutely killer, "good girl. keep going, n' don't hold back for me, wife." (yeah he's got a diamond ring in the unfairly tight back pocket of his beige slacks).

➤ TOJI FUSHIGURO

filthy, so filthy. that's all you really need to know. he loves the taste, the mess, the slick. he honestly may have had some trepidation in the early days of his youth, but now he'll fall to his knees for his woman with little questions asked. he'll drag his tongue through you slow at first, primed to devour.

calloused hands spread you wide, holding you down, and it's a sign of little mercy for the night ahead, "you taste so fuckin' good, princess." he'll edge you with his mouth just enough to make you beg, then growl when you finally break, gushin' all over his handsome face.

you'll be yanked to the edge of the shared beg, legs thrown over his broad and rippling shoulders, and his face is buried before you can blink. his dark lashes already flapping in delight over hazy green eyes as he dives right in.

he licks at you fast, deep n' dirty, making noises as though he's addicted to way that you taste. he'll hold you down with one large, warm hand, gripping your hips, and using his other hand to finger you with much vigour, hitting all the right spots.

toji whines into you (but he'll pretend he didn't) and arc his fingers in a three-fingered smack over your sensitive clit, fascinated by the sloppy arc of release and arousal streaking through the air onto his face, "this pussy's all mine, huh? you gon' cum for me again, doll?"

he's always gonna' bite your inner thighs, leaving marks, and it leaves you even more soaked, cunt absolutely drooling over the front of his dark sweatshirt. and you're always going to finish with your legs shaking, locked around his head, and your mind spinning.

➤ RYOMEN SUKUNA

you don't get to cum until the king of curses says you can, let's be real. he will tease and taunt you, while barely brushing your clit with the rough, forked surface of his tongue.

he loves to watch you write, and he thinks (though he'll never admit it), that you're the loveliest sight in the entire world when you squirm, "beg louder, girl. maybe this time i'll actually give ya' what you want."

and when sukuna does go in? it's so brutal, sucking and licking, biting and blowing. he's always growling into you, so loss in the awe of watching your transparent arousal smear over your thighs, drip over his chin. true form sukuna uses two hands to hold you still, and the other two to spread you wide for him to slot in between the gap.

sukuna is cruel, deliberately so, and he'll lap at you softly, teasing your clit with the very tip of his tongue, holding you down while you whimper. if you beg? nah, it's not gonna' move him, and he's going to scoff, "pathetic. is that all it takes to break ya' ?"

there's little warning before he really lets loose, full tongue sucking your clit with insane pressure, alternating between a mind-blowing speed, and then, slow torment that leaves to a flooding torrent of arousal and release.

he'll edge you, deny you, then push you over so hard that your vision goes white. and he can go for hours, from when the sun rises 'till the moment the sun sets and disappears below the horizon. he absolutely kisses you sloppily to make sure you're tasting yourself afterwards.

➤ HIROMI HIGURUMA

the lawyer is surprisingly gentle. . . at first. soft kisses, and shy eye contact, and there's a flush that crawls over his pretty nose, over one temple to the other. but he grows obsessed with the way you sound when you moan and fall apart for him.

hiromi loves makin' you cum on his mouth, over and over. and you just know he loves having you perch your thighs over his face, sitting on it till he crassly jokes that this is his favourite way to go out, being waterboarded.

hiromi is also soft-spoken, but intense. he's a giver, and please you? it's his form of divine salvation. he holds your hips gently, tongue slow and reverent, dark eyes full of restrained hunger.

he starts sweet, but once he hears the right-pitched moan from you? he loses it entirely, and becomes feverish. hungrily lapping at your pussy, and not caring if the slick strands stick to the lapels of his (expensive) suit.

he's got long, elegant fingers, and he's definitely prodding them into your gummy, sticky walls as he eats you out. absolutely enamoured with how your voice cracks and break.

and hiromi is always going to moan into you, getting messy and off-kilter as his perfect composure is thrown out the window, and he's burying his face deeper into you, "you deserve this, let me show ya' just how good this can be.'

➤ HAJIME KASHIMO

for the first week, kashimo pretended as though he was above it all. because, well, he's the strongest sorcerer of his (medieval) era and he'd never be caught doing something so. . . lewd. fortunately for all parties involved, he got one look at your bare thighs and almost fell to his knees, tearing up and pleading for a taste.

so aggressive and chaotic with it, because, of course, kashimo treats everything like a damn race, and a challenge. his tongue is like lightning, literally, fast and precise. overwhelming when you swear you feel a zap! of something sharp over your clit, and he shakes his head vehemently denying the use of his cursed technique, but his cyan eyes gleam with mischief.

kashimo grins when you squirm, grabbing your hips, "is this not what you asked for, little dove?" and he loves to taste you after a fight or a workout, and he'll often quote that there's nothing to get the blood pumping down there like a fight with a beautiful woman.

he's gonna' tease you with barely there touches, and then suddenly leap all in, leaving you gasping and tugging the two bundles of teal hair atop his choppy layers, sorta' like handlebars.

will laugh, low and wild, when you cum too fast, "that easily? huh, it did not take much, hmm?" and he's insatiable about all of it, biting at your clit with gentle pressure to have your thighs tremble and suffocate him in between your legs.

"come on, little dove. one more, you can give me one more." his pink mouth is swollen, smeared with your release, and he's got the most priggish, satisfied grin painted over his face.

fingers never letting up with their pace as he buries them deep within you, that overstimulation mingling pain with pleasure till it ebbs away into quick orgasm after orgasm.

➤ NAOYA ZEN'IN

he has the worst attitude, but the best mouth. you know he's arrogant as hell, and it shows in how he eats you out. and he probably only does it so he has something to laud over you later, but he can't also deny the very faint pink flush dusted over his creamy skin.

"tch', do ya' really think you deserve this?" he's humming, smearing a thumb over your aching clit, "beg properly, and then, maybe i'll give you what you want."

and but when he finally goes down on you, it's intense and messy, fast and precise. unfortunately, he knows what he's doing, and he's so smug about it. he licks at you as though he's proving a point, winning an argument, and if you don't scream his name, he'll take it super personally.

"oh, so now 'm not doing it good enough for ya', is that it?" so, basically, he's going to sulk later if you don't end up gushing over his face. naoya holds your thighs wide open, thumbs digging into your skin so you can't even move, and he wants you trembling.

there's constant eye contact as he eats you out, 'cause he wants you to know that it's him, giving you this much pleasure, and you can see the lidded, dark gaze clouding over his topaz, jewel-tone eyes. pink tongue pressed flat against your throbbing bud, rolling it slow just to watch your face. quickly alternating the pace to flick it rapidly, as arousal leaks out of you, and you're moaning.

"all pretty n' dumb when i'm eating ya' out like this, eh?" and if you try to close your legs from the sheer stimulation, naoya is going to get even meaner, "did i say you could run away?" you cum once, and he doesn't stop nor slow down. tawny, sand-blonde hair plastered to his head as he picks up the pace, "one isn't enough, wifey. not for a slut like you."

and when he does pull away, his mouth is glistening, and he makes a big show of wiping your sticky arousal away, and making faux noises of disgust (you can see the dark, translucent patch over the groin of his fine haori). but he shoves his fingers back into you, "don't pass out, idiot. 'm not done."

➤ CHOSO KAMO

oh, he deserves his own shrine for the way he eats your cunt. he's so quiet about it at first, no teasing nor taunting. just that intense gold-hazel as he drops to his bulky knees, hands gliding up your thighs like you're somethin' precious.

he's so slow and cautious about at first, treating you like a personal alter. kissing at your folds gently, nibbling at the edges of your outer folds. but choso eats you out as though he's starving.

wide tongue flat, licking deep and fast instinctually, then sucking your clit into his mouth with a firm n' sloppy pressure. you make one noise, one mere moan that bubbles past your lips, and choso loses it. groaning into you, fingers digging into his hips as he pushes your legs up to his broad shoulders, atop his soft, white robes.

choso is absolutely the type to cum in his pants just from making you climax, and he needs not even touch himself. he's just that obsessed with the way you taste, the way your thighs squeeze his head, and obscure the rest of the vision until all he can see are the dewy beads of release dripping from your glossy pussy.

he's always panting, messy, with his tongue darting between your folds as though he's desparate and breathless, "you taste so good. . . i can't stop. i don't want to stop." and when you do cum, he's over joyous, and he continues right through your orgasm. hurtling through your first climax to knock down the door to your second.

choso groans into you, face soaked, tongue fucking you through it while you writhe, tugging his stringy, dark hair, "i know, i know, sweet thing. you can give me another one." but afterwards, he's dazed, pupils blown and lips shining, and you know he's proud as hell of himself.

if you sit on his face, he'll moan like a virgin seeing heaven for the first time. hands on the plush of your ass, tongue poking out, and eyes shut, just letting you ride and snag the hood of your clit against the slope of his nose.

[traffys-heart]

one piece men + awkward sex moments | nsfw

some of these r inspired by irl events + stuff ive seen online. sex isn’t always the perfect mind blowing smut we read but i think i like the goofier aspects of that.

characters: monkey d. luffy, roronoa zoro, vinesmoke sanji, portgas d. ace, sabo, eustass kid, killer, trafalgar d. law

cw: lowercase, afab! reader, blood, fingering, female and male receiving oral, virgin! loser! law

monkey d. luffy

he was pounding u on the bed when his stomach started to growl, killing the mood entirely. the whole crew had already had dinner too, so u were pretty miffed to say the least. a sheepish shrug and a dash to the kitchen without pants on left both u and luffy unsatisfied for that night, and sanji horrified.

roronoa zoro

zoro makes sure to put all his strength in everything he does, and that includes fingering u. he has two of his thick fingers inside of u and his thumb on ur clit, but it isn’t long before he asks if ur on ur period. when u respond w no he learns abt the importance of clipping back ur nails.

vinesmoke sanji

u were sucking him off when the cigarette smell became a little too much and u coughed on the d. both of u were embarrassed and u gave him a handy to compensate as he mentally made a note to lay off the cigs more often. unfortunately it’s not just his clothes that hold the scent, it’s his sweat.

portgas d. ace

he tried to do something sexy and warm up his cock for u but ended up almost burning ur cunt. he offered to eat u out after but u opted out on an ice bath instead. temperature play was going to have to be put on hold until he can actually control the heat. he sat at the edge of the tub w sad puppy dog eyes tho. “sorry pussy :(”

sabo

sabo once came so hard he went up in flames. luckily u made it out unscathed but the same cannot be said abt the bed. it was difficult to convince dragon to use the revolution’s finances to fund the new bed frame and mattress. u two decide to fuck on the floor instead while u wait for the delivery until he destroys a carpet.

eustass kid

kid meant to slightly pull u toward him w his devil fruit while u were going down on him when he ended up pulling ur earrings out. yes ur ears were bleeding, no the holes were not ruined, no kid did not cum that night. he made up for it by making u another custom pair the next day in his workshop.

killer

he was on top and his gorgeous blond hair was caging u in underneath him when he started to shift uncomfortably. u asked him what was wrong and he told u that u were laying on his hair. u tried to adjust urself to get off but that ended up tugging on more of it. u guys had to switch positions bc he refused to put his hair in a bun.

trafalgar d. law

where do i even start. we’re back w the virgin! loser! hc and bc of that i got something special. so he was jacking off in his office to that sweet memory of playing w ur tits and right when he was abt to cum his snail started to ring. his heart almost leap out of his chest and he fell out of his chair partially going to answer to the call and partially out of surprise. he also ended up giving himself a facial from the position.

[writeriguess]

hiii

may i request a katsuki x reader where the reader and katsuki are new to their relationship and make out for the first time?

Caught in the Heat of You

The air crackles with the tension of unspoken words, the weight of anticipation pressing on your chest. Katsuki stands close enough that you can feel the heat radiating from his body, every inch of him taut and electric. His crimson eyes bore into yours, searching—daring you to look away. But you don’t. You won’t.

“You’re staring,” he mutters, the words rough but edged with something softer.

Your cheeks burn as you bite back a smile. “You’re one to talk.”

“Tch.” Katsuki scoffs, crossing his arms, but the way his eyes flicker down to your lips betrays him. “Not my fault you’ve got a face worth staring at.”

“Oh?” You tease, heart fluttering. “So you think I’m pretty?”

His eyes narrow, but a faint blush betrays his bravado. “Shut up. You already know I do.”

Warmth spreads through your chest. Despite the roughness in his tone, you can hear the sincerity underneath. You’ve only been dating for a couple of weeks—new, exciting, and a little terrifying. Katsuki Bakugo is an explosive force of nature, and being close to him feels like standing at the edge of a cliff: thrilling, dangerous, and breathtaking.

You take a breath, trying to gather your courage. “Katsuki…”

He raises a brow. “What?”

You chew your lip. “I want to kiss you.”

The room falls silent. Katsuki’s eyes widen a fraction before his expression hardens, but you’ve learned to read him by now. The rigid set of his jaw, the twitch in his fingers—he’s nervous.

“I-if you’re just gonna talk about it—”

“I’m not just talking.” Your voice shakes a little, but you push through. “Unless you don’t want to?”

His glare sharpens. “Did I say that?”

“No, but—”

He curses under his breath before stepping closer, crowding you against the wall. He smells like smoke and caramel, a familiar comfort that sets your pulse racing.

“Shut up already,” he mutters, and before you can react, his lips crash against yours.

The kiss is clumsy and rough—more teeth and stubbornness than grace. His lips are warm, insistent, and demanding. You gasp, and he takes advantage of it, pressing in deeper. One of his hands slides around your waist, pulling you flush against him, while the other tangles in your hair. He growls against your mouth when you kiss back just as fiercely.

You grab onto his shirt, tugging him closer. Katsuki grunts, and his grip tightens possessively. He tastes like mint and something fiery, a dizzying mix that leaves you breathless. When you finally pull back, panting, his eyes are hooded and intense, the pink flush across his cheeks proof that he’s just as affected.

“Damn,” you breathe, staring at him.

His smirk is sharp and self-satisfied, but there’s a softness in his gaze. “Hah. Didn’t know you could kiss like that.”

“Me?” You raise a brow. “You nearly knocked the wind out of me.”

Katsuki scoffs. “Suck it up. You can handle it.” He leans closer, lips brushing your ear. “Unless you can’t?”

Your heartbeat thunders in your ears. “Oh, I can handle it. Can you?”

The challenge is enough to spur him on. He kisses you again—harder this time, deeper, until your knees go weak and you cling to him for support. The world narrows to the warmth of his mouth, the steady strength of his arms, and the rasp of his breathing. His hand slides lower, tracing your waist before settling possessively on your hip.

A shiver runs down your spine. The kiss slows, turning languid and exploratory. He nips at your bottom lip, and you whimper softly, the sound swallowed by his mouth. Katsuki groans, and his grip tightens. When he pulls back, his lips are red and kiss-swollen.

“You make it real damn hard to hold back, you know that?” he mutters, glaring at you like it’s your fault he’s this flustered.

“Then don’t,” you whisper, breathless.

He groans, pinning you harder against the wall. “You’re a menace.”

You grin up at him, emboldened by the haze of desire in his eyes. “Takes one to know one.”

He huffs but can’t hide the twitch of his lips. “Keep talking, and I’ll shut you up again.”

“Promise?”

Katsuki curses and kisses you again, and this time, you know neither of you is backing down.

[anglbunny]

RIDING NERD!GOJO'S FACE

smut mdni, nerd!gojo, kinda long, face riding, cheetah!reader

He looked so cute like this—spread out on his twin bed, books shoved off to one side, mouth slightly open as he blinked up at you from behind thick-rimmed glasses.

“S-So, um…” Gojo licked his lips, clearly flustered as you straddled his chest. “You sure about this? I-I’ve never really—well, I mean, I have, technically, just not with someone on me, you know? On my—uh—face. Your fac-” You grinned.

“Relax, genius. You said you wanted to help me de-stress before finals, right?”

“Yeah, but I thought you meant like… a back massage,” he squeaked, then immediately clamped his mouth shut when you started shimmying out of your shorts.

“Does this look like I want a massage, Gojo?”

His throat bobbed in a swallow. “No! Definitely not.”

He was still wearing that stupid sweater vest, his tie a little crooked, his pale cheeks flushed like he was running a fever—and yet his hands instinctively gripped your thighs as you crawled up, settling above his mouth like it was your throne.

He whimpered. Actually whimpered.

“You’re not gonna, like… suffocate me, right?”

You smirked. “Only if it's bad.”

The second you lowered yourself onto his mouth, everything shy about him evaporated. One long, slow lick had your hips twitching. He moaned under you like your taste was better than any cheat code, hands tightening on your thighs as his tongue flicked and circled your clit with shocking precision.

"F-fuck, Gojo—where'd you learn that?" you gasped, grinding against his face.

His glasses were already fogging, nose pressed deep between your folds, his tongue doing filthy things that made your head spin.

He pulled back just long enough to pant, breathless, “I, uh—read some stuff. Research. Y’know. For science.”

You laughed—until he sucked your clit between his lips and you choked on a moan.

That tongue of his? A little awkward at first, but the man was a fast learner. Every whimper you made, every time your thighs clenched around his head, he adjusted—flicking faster, licking deeper, humming like a damn vibrator until your hips were jerking and you were close. “Just like that, nerd boy,” you panted, one hand gripping his messy white hair. “Don’t stop.”

He couldn’t stop. He was drunk on it—tongue gliding through your slick folds, nose bumping your clit, mouth soaking, desperate to make you come on his face like a star student.

You rode his tongue shamelessly now, using him like a toy, grinding your pussy into that flushed, eager face with no hesitation. He looked so wrecked. Glasses tilted. Lips shiny. Whimpering beneath you.

“Gonna come,” you moaned, hips stuttering. “Satoru—shit—fuck—”

And when it hit, it hit hard. You cried out, riding the waves of pleasure as his mouth kept moving, overstimulating you, tongue greedy and starving for more. He only stopped when you collapsed forward, trembling, thighs slick against his flushed cheeks.

You looked down.

His lips were glossy, his chin wet, glasses askew.

“…You okay?” you asked. lifting yourself off just enough for him to breathe.

He blinked, voice cracking adorably. “Y-Yeah. Just, um… when can we do that again?”

"christ, satoru.." you huffed, laughing but your legs were still trembling

TL: @samm1e13 @syleepy @werfiedeii @mikemsmm @yanderebluelockfan @cyberheartrebel @arwawawa2 @valexqpt @snowsilver2000 @mitsurisupporter @meikstv @ravenbc @mihyas-dieehefrau @laslowchan

A/N: idk what this is. also i dont write about him enough

ꨄ︎Anglbunny | Do not copy, steal or translate my work and pngs. you'll be blocked.

Masterlist

[webbluvrsugar]

earlyseasons!spencer making you squirt.

cw: doesn’t mean sub!spencer, it’s more like eager Spencer experimenting on reader, written mostly for funsies.

Every since you and Spencer have been messing — fucking — around, you’ve noticed that he’s been a little shy, at least at first, his touch has been gentle but also… experimental, the way he looks at you when you’re under him and pushes you just a little harder almost makes you feel like like he’s studying you, testing something on you. But he’s a profiler, he’s learned that you don’t mind, so when he comes with the proposition of trying to make you squirt, you’re doubtful, specially as he pushes you down on your bed — already naked.

“Spencer, you don’t really need to do this, I —“ you try to speak but he’s quick to interrupt you, his hands running down your thighs.

“I know, I just.. I just want to try something new, just for a bit,” he hushes, eyes looking up to you for approval as he puts away his glasses and when Spencer says ‘just for a bit’ he is indeed just… lying, lying to your face.

His tongue licks a fat strip up your folds, it’s bold, something that he’d at first would hesitate to do, gently circling your clit before he attaches his lips onto it, gently sucks and his fingers go up to spread you further.

Spencer’s tongue feels good, but by now, you know that he would’ve already tried to stick a finger or two in you, but he doesn’t, it almost seems like he’s trying to reach this personal goal of his all with his mouth, and he’s doing a good job at it, because his tongue prods at your entrance and you arch your back, softly moaning, head throwing back and meeting your pillow.

“How does that feel?” He questions as if you need to answer for him to know it.

But still, you nod again, “Good,” you whisper, hand going down to grab at the sheets.

“Yeah, I can tell.” He grins, cocky, before his mouth latches onto your cunt again.

He devours you, nose bumping into your clit as his tongue precisely chooses where to run through, your breath being taken from your lungs when it caresses your insides one more time, the warm tip of the muscle moving within you.

“Spence,” you whimper, your knees struggling to keep themselves in place as he pulls back and pays attention to your swollen pearl one more time.

“Close?” He asks, tongue licking up a few more times through your folds, trying to get all up in there.

“Mh — Mhm,” you moan, a pleased sigh following suit.

“Did you know that —“ he pauses, “statistically, only thirty-five to fifty percent of women have experienced squirting mid sex—“ he presses an open mouthed kiss to your cunt. “But it depends on the method, I’ve read about it, we can try and see if this will be the one for you.”

And for someone who’s so used to talking, Spencer finally goes to quiet after a while and focus on your pussy, paying extra attention to what you like, guiding himself with your moans and gentle curses.

“Spence—“ with that, he thinks this really might be his chance of getting you to do it the first try, so his lips wrap around your clit one last time, only letting go when he hears a hushed cry of his name escape your lips— “Spencer!” A stream of fluid expels from you, and he watches in awe, slightly tilting his head as your body shivers and writhes right before him.

His hands gently caress your thighs, fingers letting go of your folds, his eyes finally meeting yours when you take a breath and before you can speak, he notes;

“Let’s do it again, maybe you’ll do it quicker if I actually use my fingers…”

[sadesluvr]

TEETH.

Sergei Kravinoff might be a villian, and you a hero; but at the end of the day you're both animals.

A/N: First fic in a while so my bad if it sucks. You already know this movie was basically ass but we only watched it for ATJ anyway - I'm changing some of Kraven's character so he's similar to the comics/Spider-Man 2 game, so be sure to read the tags bc he’s a lil dark…

Word count: 2.3K

Tags: SMUT / DUB-CON / Spiderwoman! Reader / Breeding / Unprotected + rough sex

Kraven feared nothing. 

It simply wasn’t in his blood; not his staunchly machismo upbringing, nor in his DNA, quite literally having that of a lion. Fear made one weak. Fear made you less of a man. Fear was what killed his mother. 

If anything, fear was just another animal; ready to be captured, killed and conquered, ultimately destined to be draped across his chiselled body or mounted on a wall.  

You were simply no different. 

He never really understood why people were afraid of spiders, but he knew that they were a nuisance, having haunted him since he was a boy. Spiders weren’t savages like lions or bears, but they were sneaky; crawling around in the dark and waiting to strike, with a face so obscured that you’d never really know what you were looking at...what they were thinking.  

But now, with your mask off, he could see you clearly. Fear; clouding your eyes and consuming your lungs as you heaved, choking on the intensity of the emotion itself as your pupils darted between the beige, bloodied teeth on his necklace and a crossbow pointed right at your heart. 

“So, you’re the insect causing me all this trouble?” the man mused; legs crossed upon a desk as he eyed you. “I should’ve known.” 

“Should’ve known what? You know nothing about me.”  

“You’re a girl.” 

“Sexist, much.” 

He chuckled. 

“Far from it. My father, however, was quite the traditionalist. He would’ve done much worse by now.” 

There was a heavy silence as you swiped at your bottom lip. Much to your dismay, blood had begun to dry, and you were left with a salty, scratchy throat. Liquid, some of any kind, would’ve been appreciated, but you knew all too well that Kraven wasn’t one for showing mercy. Like all the villains you’d encountered, you’d had a push-pull relationship with the Hunter since the very beginning. He created a plan; you foiled it, sometimes you’d get your ass beat but the ending was almost always the same – with you safe from harm's way, and a bloodthirsty ego chipped away, but momentarily put to rest. 

On this occasion you’d slipped up, your Spidey-senses failing you and placing you right into harm's way, shipped into the back of a van and somehow escorted to a somewhat uncharacteristically lavish mansion.  

You'd always found Kraven to be a man of contradictions; whether he realised it or not. He was the best and worst of both worlds, a hunter with all the grit of someone who’d been fighting their entire life as a poverty-stricken rogue, and yet you’d come to learn that he was a Russian aristocrat, hence his rather extensive knowledge and unrelenting desire for control. Still, nothing took away from the fact that he was a brute, not even his strikingly good looks. 

“Just shoot me and be over it,” You continued, watching as he lowered his feet from atop the desk and strolled over to you.  “You didn’t need to drag me all the way here.” 

He looked even bigger than usual, but perhaps it was because you were perched uncomfortably on a chair, arms bound behind you as you craned your neck to look up at him. Your mind couldn’t - no, didn’t - want to fathom what he was thinking of you from this angle. 

“Don’t get me wrong, I care nothing about your secret. I just wanted to look you in the eye.” He mused, rummaging through his back pockets. Your breath hitched in your throat as he slid a knife from its sheath, finely carved and sharpened and lowered it to his side before pacing around you, stopping as his firm torso pressed up against the tip of your neck. Squeezing your eyes shut, you braced for your neck to be split open, only to be released from your bounds.  

Instinctively, you went to shoot some webs, hoping you could at least catapult yourself across the room, but he tightly grasped your wrists, steadying your arms in place.  

“I wouldn’t try anything if I were you,” he sneered. “These are antiques.” 

You rolled your eyes. 

“Fuck you.” 

“Get up,” he announced suddenly, almost dragging you to your feet. Hesitantly, you began to shuffle out of the room, overwhelmed by the seemingly endless walls and corridors, all framed in ivory and the finest mahogany. “Keep walking until I tell you to stop.” 

You continued down the hall, opting for a straight line. It seemed to be the correct way as once you passed into the threshold of a room that had a velvet chaise lounges and a dresser, he dropped his hands from their grip on your own, closing the door behind you. Oddly enough, you never heard the click of a latch. 

Without a word, he walked past you to open the drawer, rummaging through the contents. It utterly baffled you why you didn’t feel the urge to protest, or even fight. The entire ordeal was feeling more like a glorified house tour with a side of intimidation rather than a future crime scene. 

Was it because he was handsome? Wild? Filthy rich? Whatever happened to your values? Perhaps Jameson was right.  

Your thoughts were interrupted by the man placing something in the desk, curling his finger to beckon you towards him.  

“See this? This is what keeps me going,”he said, rolling a vial of florescent liquid in his fingertips.  “You and I are more alike than you think.” 

You scoffed, trying to ignore how close he was to you. He had an earthly musk that invaded your senses, sending tingles down your spine… and to your core. 

“I don’t need a drug to do what I do.” 

“Never mind the drug. It’s our blood that makes us strong.” 

You cocked a brow and he ignored your confused look. 

“You know, I’ve always hated spiders…” he began, rubbing his beard in contemplation.  “Too itchy; unpredictable. You never really know where they’re going to show up. If I ever saw one, I used to pop them like a zit.” 

There was a clear disgust in his words and vacant look in his eye that sunk you into a pit of fear for perhaps the first time since regaining your consciousness. You knew that it was just about you (surely), but perhaps a weird extension of your being; something bigger, far more innate than a girl in a spandex spider suit. 

“But then I realised that for their size, they’re deadly. Powerful, even. Recently I’ve wondered what it would look like if I harnessed it myself.” 

You swallowed, suddenly conscious of your dry throat once more. 

“A drop of blood usually does the trick.” 

He tutted. Perhaps you were being too fickle. 

“No, любимец [darling], not that way. I crave something more.” 

Your eyes darted to the lounge. Since when did Spider-Woman lack composure? Kraven’s impenetrable gaze followed your own, and he chuckled knowingly. 

“With your arachnid abilities and my strength, we could create something truly unique. Nature has its ways, you know.” 

“You’re sick,” you replied, your chin held high but your bottom lip wobbled. “I’ll never join you. What you do is immoral.” 

Kraven furrowed his brows. 

“You killed a man, and you talk about morality?” 

“He was a bad man.” 

“He was my brother.” 

The word humanised him a bit. The Chameleon wasn’t your most imposing foe, but he was still a challenge you’d been rather glad to conquer. It was all too often that you’d fallen into the trap of thinking that the world was black and white; good and bad, when occasionally it was grey. Kraven was allowed to grieve his brother, but at the end of the day they were both bad guys. 

Then why did he turn you on so much? 

“You don’t have to resist,” the man grinned, strolling towards you. He stopped, glancing down and reaching a hand up to cup the sides of your face, caressing your cheekbones and sides of your lip with his thumb, threatening to penetrate your mouth. “I’ve never been this close to you before…I can smell you.” 

You were both superhuman, but he had the thirst of a predator. Quite literally. Breath hitched in your throat as he angled his lips to your ear, whispering a few fatal words. 

“Give in, маленький паучок [little spider]. Your body yearns for me.” 

One large hand was wrapped around your neck as he kissed you, his wild beard scratching against your face as his other hand snaked down your suit, down to between your thighs. The latex did nothing to offer you safety, his callouses prodding at your wet slit and beginning to rub in small circles, oh-so internationally slow, making sure he pressed against the hood of your clit. 

He had you as soon as a small moan escaped your lips. It’d been a while since you’d been touched, let a alone by someone who was as well-travelled as The Hunter himself, and every kiss, nibble and squeeze was sending you into a deeper spiral of lust and guilt that you could barely fathom that you’d already made your way to the lounge. 

You pulled away as your calves collided with the frame, lips wet and parted as you glanced up at him – wholly helplessly. His hand remained firm on your face, angling his head as he smirked at your shielded demeanour, a far cry from the flashy superhero you’d been but an hour ago.  

“Kra—“ 

“Don’t call me that,” he said through gritted teeth. “Call me Sergei. I need to hear you say it.” 

The name rolled from your lips as a cry as he bunched the sides of your suit in his hands and tearing it apart, exposing your bare pussy and ass, with strands of fabric shaping your legs like a makeshift garter. He grinned, large hands frantically groping at your thighs and ass, spreading your cheeks apart and exposing your hot core to the cool air. 

“прекрасный.” [Gorgeous] he moaned, swatting at your ass before dipping his fingers inside you, rubbing your folds between his fingers as you coated him in your juices. Grasping your hands around his thick neck, you clung onto what you could as he explored your body, lowering you down onto the smooth velvet. 

It wasn’t long before he straddled you, holding your body down with his pelvis as he removed his jacket, giving you an eyeful of his crafted torso. Unsurprisingly, he had the body of a God, with a prominent v-line and happy trail pointing down to between his legs. Even through his heavy trousers you could make out his bulge, mounded and ready for you. 

You gasped in anticipation, watching as the man withdrew his cock from his briefs; red and girthy, with precum spilling from his tip. Skilfully, he spread your thighs, making sure they were safely by your sides (he’d seen how flexible you were, your ankles touching your ears was nothing) and lifting your lower back slightly off the cushions, pushing into you with a deep sigh. 

At first, his intrusion was a dull ache, but as he began to move his hips against your own you felt utterly fulfilled, moaning and writhing as he wasted no time in daggering your wanting pussy, making sure you felt every inch.  

“Sergei...” you cried, eyes fluttering shut as you flung your head back in pleasure. “Please...” 

“Say it again.” 

Words evaded you. 

The man grinned, flashing his canines as he tightened his grip, compelling him to fuck you harder. The whole ordeal was obscene; New York’s most treasured hero being bent into submission by the villain of the week, a scene so heinous that it was all the more endearing, and with every thrust you knew you wanted him more. Sergei didn’t care whether his combat boots scuffed the fine upholstery, or if his grip on your waist would leave a few bruises – he just wanted to own you. 

He huffed as his heavy balls slammed repeatedly against your crack, beginning to bottom out in you with every hit, so much so that it looked like you were conjoined.

Even through the strain in your legs you could tell you were close, knots in your stomach slowly beginning to unravel as your walls clenched around him, earning a delighted rumble from deep within his chest. 

You knew that he wasn’t one for talk, but you would’ve appreciated the warning that he was about to come. Every guy you’d been with tended to get sloppier, but he grew stronger, the literal animal in him taking over as he began to ramble and curse through gritted teeth in Russian.  

Sergei threw his head back as he held you down, hands pawing your breasts and strands of hair sprawled in a beautiful mess across his face as he came, ropes of hot white cum spilling into your pussy just as you dressed his cock in a silky sheen. Your chests heaved as you desperately tried to come down from your high, glancing down at your messy nether regions as his seed began to seep out of you.  

There was no going back. Nine months began now. 

Would it really be all that bad? 

It all went back to fear, really. In the back of his mind the thought of a spider still troubled Sergei, but at least he’d conquered it. Even if it was temporary. 

FIN.