#to try and get back in the right headspace

[tinytarotandtea]

「 ✦ PICK A CARD✦ 」

What's your future S/O's love language?

Masterlist || GET YOUR PERSONAL READINGS HERE <33 Directions: Take a moment to breathe, calm down and focus as you choose a picture from above. From left to right is pile 1, 2 and 3. Then Scroll down to your pile! Please remember to only take what resonates with you and leave the rest 🫶

A/N: Hiya my loves! Sorry it's been awhile, been super busy and just not in the right headspace to be doing readings and I didn't want to force them. But, I'm back, and hoping to get back to doing more of these. Also apolgies for the change in style for these reaidngs, just trying out new ways to do these :)

PILE ONE -

Hello my lovelies!! How are y'all? Good I hope! And I hope this lil reading brightens your day a little if not :)

Your future S/O is very much giving off acts of service vibes when it comes to their love language. But in a deeper, more emotional sense. They're there for you through every dark time that passes through you. They're there to carry your burdens, help with your responsibilities, and help you heal.

So whilst they might show their love through little things like making you tea or helping you with the small things, they're also there to help carry those deeper burdens, ease your responsibilities and help with those deep emotional struggles that threaten to drown you. They're there to help you heal, too, maybe from past relationships that snuffed you out. They're there to help you learn those tricky lessons, too.

Masterlist || GET YOUR PERSONAL READINGS HERE <33

PILE TWO -

Hiya, pile two! I hope your day is as bright as you are, and that this reading brightens it even more!

With your future S/O, my loves, I'm getting a mix of acts of service and a hint of quality time and emotional reparenting.

Their acts of service are subtle. Things like checking every morning, learning your routine and what helps you feel safe. They're not big talkers, or big on flashy, but they're reliable. They're there for you when it counts, and when you need them. They love spending time with you, too. Even if it's a quiet, daily activity. Be it helping you with the laundry or talking to you whilst they cook. They're not big on adventurous activities, and probably prefer to stay in for dates, or have sweet little dates like picnics or book shopping, things like that.

I'm also getting that your future S/O is healing from past wounds, childhood stuff or nostalgic wounds. They might be trying to unlearn love languages that they grew up with, or things they never received. This might mean them being extra soft with your inner child because they understand how that pain lingers.

Masterlist || GET YOUR PERSONAL READINGS HERE <33

PILE THREE -

Hello pile three!! Are we doing well today? I hope so. Anyways, let's get into your reading.

So, your future S/O is giving major words of affirmation and emotional presence.

With words of affirmation, I feel like it's a mix of giving and receiving. Something in them wants to know that they're doing well, doing good, that they're safe and wanted. But they give it in return, too, like by giving you such words, it's helping them as much as it's helping you. They'll give the same reassurance in return.

They're very emotionally present, too. They're not going to leave easily, no matter how hard you try to push them away. They're in it even when things get messy between you both. They're there for all the small ups and downs, and even the bigger ones. They want to make things work between you two. A result of fear of abandonment or emotional stagnation, possibly. This might mean gently helping them release the past so they can fully step into being present with you.

Masterlist || GET YOUR PERSONAL READINGS HERE <33

[yzafre]

This post sponsored by the youtube vid title I saw referring to Aqua as "mom" my teeth are set on edge and I'm eying it suspiciously because I DON'T trust it. I've seen that "oh, she's the mom-friend and the only one with her life together, just going around picking up the boys' messes" opinion too many times, I am hissing warily.

That's way too simplified, stop reducing her depth, she's much more complicated and also even inside the mom-energy she admittedly has, it's like. Hm.

She does have some mom-energy (affectionate) but I think she also has mom-energy (derogatory). Y'know?

[gxlden-angels]

I've had this account now for 5ish years now. I've been in therapy for years, not exclusively for religious trauma but it's a major part. I've gotten better. I have a lot of content here I could reflect on, but I don't think I want to. I like knowing I progressed. I don't like looking at what from. Usually religious trauma comes up in therapy as an "oh yea...." instead of by name now. It's indirect. Enmeshment. Parentification. Vaginismus. Scrupulous and Harm OCD. Alexithymia. Derealization and Depersonalization. Paranoia.

I'm like, a real adult now I guess. I have a bachelor's degree now. I walk this upcoming weekend. I live in a house and I'm renting out a room with my own money. It has a backyard my cat likes to run around in. I had a job interview in my chosen field today. It went well

Then I'll go back to my family for the weekend and I find out they're spiraling into AI generated christian conspiracy theory videos. Their pastor is preaching about Trump being the anti-christ, and any non-Trump or Conspiracy message is the same thing he's said for the past decade, sometimes word for word. My uncle is convinced he's a prophet. He tells a story about a girl that was paralyzed after not listening to his message. My grandfather is convinced us black people are the true Israelites and chosen people. I thought I was the only one medically neglected by my aunt who's a doctor. I was not. I show her my emotions chart app. She tells me it's good so I can recognize when I feel bad and remember Jesus's love until I'm happy again. It's not normal for your joints to pop out of place apparently. We all learned this at the same time. It's Ehlers Danlos Syndrome. That explains a lot. My grandfather fell asleep to a video about the Ethiopian bible and how other bibles were made to take out miracles by Jesus and angels again. The remote is lodged in his hand so we can't change it

Then I talk about plants and food with my dad and my grandmother. My dad jokingly complains about his mom making him garden with her all day half a century ago. I give her a little kiss on her forehead before I go. My dad sends me home with leftover peach cobbler he made. I eat it with my lunch at my job. I answer phone calls at a front desk. I paid real taxes for the first time this year. I go to therapy and I talk about everything from my sex life to my graduate school plans to my opinions about generative AI (I hate it). I'm like, a real, breathing adult that has autonomy I guess. I'm not even claimed as a dependent anymore. I built my own desk that I bought from Big Lots.

You get where I'm going with this right? I'm not cured or healed by any means. Far from it in fact. I still get a pang of anxiety using the lord's name in vain and a chill down my spine when manifesting feels too close to confessing. It's harder making a personal post about religious trauma now though. It's not necessarily that I'm cured, it's just so engrained that I've created atheistic excuses to stay stuck in my religious trauma. I can pinpoint the source of it if I think about it long enough, so I don't think about it long enough

I'm not afraid to think lustful thoughts because holding lust in your heart is a sin, it's because I feel like a creep. I'm not worried I'll be sent to hell if I make mistakes that take me further from Jesus, I just think making mistakes would make me a bad person and an asshole. These beliefs popped out of nowhere, of course. They aren't influenced by the religious trauma so deeply buried in my head that taking it out would feel like taking out the gray matter of my brain itself. I'm schrodingers's man where I'm only a human when I'm observed. It used to be a deity but then it was you. I'm observed by you and that proved I'm human just long enough to get by when I most needed it. I still have that problem, but I'm seen outside of here. I see myself more often too

I don't want this post to seem like a good-bye, because it's not. I'm just currently in a period of limbo and I feel like the next generation of religious trauma bloggers are rising. I'm too busy arguing with my therapist about why I'm a bad person in a way that doesn't just boil down to "I'm a sinner in need of redemption" in a desperately-secular way. I'm self-aware enough to know that's what I'm doing, but not progressing enough to stop yet. I think what will happen is I'll eventually get frustrated enough to give up on the secular origins of my mental distress. I think a lot of you are in a similar place. You're out long enough that it feels like it should be over. You don't live in the bible-thumping, belt-wielding, gay-bashing, hellscape you once did. You might even be no-contact. You pay taxes now in your apartment. But it's not over. It's still there. It's just harder to say it's Jesus's fault I'm like this. It feels like it's been too long to still blame the bible.

It's not. It's buried in your synapses and neurons and muscles and bones and skin and hair and teeth and it's hard to remember that after 5 years. It's not oozing out into your bloodstream and filling you with enough cortisol and adrenaline to fuel an elephant anymore. It trickles though like a leaky faucet. I think I've lost the plot at this point, but you get it

Like I said, not a goodbye despite what it seems like. I just have to remember that a leaky faucet is still a concern

[ramshacklerumble]

.

[copper-sands]

starting to think that maybe it's a good idea to stop forcing myself to create and take a break actually

[sketchy-tour]

A shame I wasn't able to find the motivation to finish my Halloween art in time for Halloween. Might still finish it and post it late for fun, especially since it's already lined.

Started it early and everything and I still couldn't make it. Oh well. That's what I get for getting distracted doodling silly stuff.

[innocence-wont-save-you]

OOC: [Goes up to overseer who spouted all the Triple Affirmative Nonsense] Sir, I mean this in the kindest way possible: What the flippity frick are you on about?

[Posting this without comment because funni]

[sensitivegoblin]

👉🏻👈🏻 if you like littles pls feel free to dm meeee

[tiny-wren]

see I get new supplies in the mail and THEN my inspiration fizzles out HA

[neverendingford]

.

[mondayepiphanies]

anyways i’m bound to fuck it up again this time….!

[strawberryfaced]

spent the plane ride trying to reignite some of my past, half-forgotten, deep-running love for writing… i think it worked because a few nice snippets have been freshly, healthily birthed and are living in my notes app right now

[seumyo]

yearning drunk!husband ushijima wakatoshi.

NOTE. contains a bit of alcohol content—though nothing too explicit or anything concerning <33

It always started the same way—kind of like an inside joke that grew wings, feathers, a tab, and Ushijima’s name on the reservation list.

Ushijima never initiated going out drinking with his Schweiden Adlers teammates. In fact, he rarely said anything about it at all. It was always someone else who mentioned it after a game. Always someone else who slung an arm over his shoulder and declared, “C’mon, Ushiwaka, we have to celebrate,” even though Ushijima had never once expressed interest in alcohol, bar food, or drunken conversations.

Still, he always went.

Because it’d be rude if he didn’t at least stay for a few minutes, he thinks.

Sometimes he showed up in his team windbreaker, sometimes in a long, dark gray coat that made him look like a trench-wearing monument of silence. And he never said no, even when the clamor of celebration was already grating at the edges of his patience.

Tonight was one of those nights.

They’d won by the skin of their teeth—an overtime set against a grueling opponent, the kind of match that made even the benchwarmers feel like champions by the end. So of course Heiwajima had started the round-up in the locker room. Hoshiumi had shouted over everyone about their lucky bar down the street, and within twenty minutes, the entire team had found themselves in their regular private suite.

Ushijima sat at the end of the table, his back straight, a glass in front of him filled with alcohol he didn’t particularly like. His teammates were loud and loose and chaotic—laughing at Sokolov trying to arm-wrestle the bar’s bouncer, clapping every time someone dropped a fork, and yelling across the table in at least three different languages.

“A thousand yen says he’ll ask about his wife in twenty minutes,” Hoshiumi said quietly, leaning toward their captain, Hirugami Fukurou.

“You’re giving him way too much credit,” Romero replied, fondly grinning. “He gets wistful around minute twelve.”

“He gets wistful the moment he sits down.”

Ushijima was unmoved. He stared at his drink, took a single sip, and let it rest in his hand. He didn’t participate in the yelling, the toasts, or the story someone was animatedly telling about a missed serve from three seasons ago. He just existed—quietly, stoically—as a satellite to the chaos.

Except, of course, they all knew he was waiting.

He always was.

There was a pattern to the transformation. First, he’d sit there like stone. Then he’d blink a little more slowly. His brows would draw together—not in anger, but in vague confusion, like he was lost in a thought he couldn’t solve. His fingers would move against his glass, not to drink but to fidget, just a little.

And then…

“Has anyone seen my phone?” Ushijima asked, barely louder than the buzz of conversation.

Hoshiumi slid it across the table immediately. “Right here, Ushiwaka. Sorry! We took a few pictures here and there.”

“Thank you.”

He looked down at the screen. It was still lit with the last message from you from earlier that day: Good luck, baby. Don’t forget to stretch your left shoulder. He’d never replied—he never did, not when he was already in headspace—but now, he stared at it like it was the only thing tethering him to reality.

“You want to text her?” Hoshiumi asks, lightly teasing, which Ushijima didn’t catch onto.

Ushijima didn’t answer. He opened the thread and typed a few letters. Deleted them. Typed something else. Backspaced. Then just stared.

And then finally: “She hasn’t replied.”

His teammates laughed.

“There it is!”

“It’s only been seventeen minutes! I win!”

“No, you cheated. I said ten, and he didn’t even check his phone until minute twelve!”

“Shh, shh, look at him—he’s pouting.”

“Wait, is this the pout phase? I thought that came after the silent brooding phase.”

“Technically we’re entering pout-brood overlap. It’s a dangerous time.”

Ushijima didn’t argue. He simply set the phone down again and folded his hands in front of him. Kageyama leaned over.

“You want me to call her for you, Ushijima-san?”

Ah, yes. Kageyama was too nice for his own good. Trying to enhance his socialization and trying to lessen his awkwardness with his teammates when the conversation didn’t revolve around volleyball.

Ushijima nodded. Just once. Immediately. “Yes.”

...

“Amazing! He’s not even trying to hide it.”

“Can you imagine being that in love?”

“He just wants his wife. Look at him. He’s a whole sad poem in one sitting.”

“She’s gonna get here, and he’s gonna light up like a lantern.”

“May this love run me over.”

Kageyama stood and walked a few paces away from the table, already dialing your number. Meanwhile, the others watched Ushijima sip his drink again—not because he wanted it, but because it gave his hands something to do. His eyes were glued to the screen even though no new notifications had appeared.

Romero leaned in conspiratorially to Hirugami. “Do you think she talks to him in, like, soft tones? Calls him ‘baby’ and stuff?”

“I think so,” he shrugs. “I think they’re sweet like that.”

“Aw, young love.”

The teasing continued, but it softened. Because underneath the jokes and the laughs was a sort of awe.

Their teammate—so serious, so focused, so unreadable on court—was completely and utterly soft when it came to his wife. Not in a loud way. Not in any way that could be easily teased, really. It was quiet. Heavy. Real.

When Kageyama returned, he had a pleased expression. “She’s on her way. Said she just got off work and is driving over.”

Ushijima gave another slow blink.

“Thank you.”

Kageyama nods. Somehow they manage to have conversations even if they just continue nodding to each other.

As soon as Kageyama said it, his phone buzzed with a new message. He didn’t even need to open it. He could tell by the way his entire body relaxed by a single, barely noticeable degree.

Sorry, hun. Just got off work. Are you okay?

He replied.

I’m okay. I miss you.

And then he set the phone down and folded his hands again, this time with more calm. More certainty. You were coming. That was all he needed to know.

The others noticed the shift immediately.

“He smiled.”

“No, he didn’t.”

“He did! Don’t argue with me; I saw it. It was micro. But it counted.”

“He’s already halfway out the door with his heart.”

“Watch, the second she walks through that door, he’ll go full puppy mode.”

Sure enough, fifteen minutes later, the door opened. A gust of cold air followed you inside, along with the soft jingle of the bar’s entrance bell. You spotted them easily—your eyes landing on Ushijima before anything else. And his entire body seemed to change shape.

He stood up—not quickly, but instantly, with a kind of gravity no one else in the room had.

You smiled as you approached, slipping out of your coat and brushing off the cold that nipped your nose softly. “Hi, love,” you greeted softly. “You ready to go?”

“Yes,” Ushijima said, already reaching for his jacket.

As he shrugged it on, you turned to the table. “Hope he wasn’t too much trouble?”

Hoshiumi leaned on the table with a grin. “[Name], your husband is the definition of ‘not trouble.’ We’re just grateful you came to collect him before he sighed himself into the carpet.”

“Tell them what he said!” someone shouted.

“He asked if anyone had seen his phone like it was a national emergency.”

“And he didn’t pout—he brooded. Like a man out of a romantic novel.”

“I think I did,” Ushijima just nodded at their comments about him.

He then stood by quietly, waiting for you to finish your goodbyes. When you looped your arm through his, he leaned ever so slightly toward you.

As they left, Romero raised his glass.

“To [Name]’s husband,” he declared. The table cheered.

Outside, as you two walked toward the car, you glanced up at him, fingers tightening around his arm.

“You really okay?” you asked.

He hummed. Then, in that low, steady voice only you ever got to hear, it softened—

“I missed you,” he said again. “They were loud. I wanted to see you very much.”

You smiled and gave his arm a firm, loving squeeze. “Well. I’m here now.”

And... yeah.

That’s what he’s been wanting to hear all night.

SEUMYO © 2025. PLEASE DO NOT REPOST, PLAGIARIZE, MODIFY OR TRANSLATE.

[calebslittlecrow]

Stop Procrastinating Shifting Nah, you're not "waiting for the right time", you're just avoiding your own power and I love you, but get the fuck up and do something. We are all out here saying we want to shift. We believe in it (more or less for some people). We yearn and dream about or DR, about that hot looking, successful and potentially emotionally stable version of ourselves. But lets take a look at what we are actually doing a lot of times. Scrolling through shifting posts.... again. Because we haven't done that the last few days, huh? Re-reading the same LoA post hoping it hits a bit different this time (it doesn't). Shuffling unnecessary shit around in our scripts, because changing where the "About Me" section is will unlock the cheat code to the multiverse somehow. Telling ourselves "I'll do it tonight if the vibes feel right". And then we fall asleep before we get the second affirmation out because we pushed back sleeping and trying for 4 hours at this point. Busted, huh? When we are constantly doing that, we are neither manifesting nor shifting, we are just mentally pacing in circles like a neurotic racoon. This isn't preparing... it's procrastinating. I say this with all the love I can come up with after only 4 hours of sleep: There is no perfect attempt. You just need to fucking start doing something. The chances you will shift by only tweaking your script over and over and over again, waiting for something to happen, are rather low. The chances you will wake up one day and say "Yes! I have been enlightened and now I am ready!" in regards to shifting are also low. Because you are already ready! You have been from the moment you got the definition of shifting thrown your way. I think most of us are just scared to fuck it up and "fail". Of course it's sometimes scary to want something so bad it makes us cry and all we can do is manifest and hope for the best. But delaying that shit won't make that scary feeling go away. It just gives doubts more time to invade your thoughts. Can we all agree to drop the thought of needing a 27 step pre shifting routine, stop pretending that we need to be "in the right headspace" while trying to shift and to stop expecting motivation to just suddenly appear like a convenient divine ass-kicking as if it is needed? Yeah? Great. We'll just start anyway. Picking some random fucking method, doesn't matter which one. Saying our affirmations even if we feel like a delusional nutjob. Just.. trying. Doing something, anything really. Even if we suck at focusing or visualizing. Just do it anyway. Showing up and doing something even if it is not perfect is pulling your brain away from being scared of fucking it up. Build that momentum. We shift through starting and doing, not through running away from shifting ^-^

[tsuyalovebot]

watch you entertain.

pairing: xia yi zhou / caleb x reader (love and deepspace)

synopsis: caleb comes to a few conclusions when you give him a blowjob for the first time.

cw: NSFW and explicit sexual content, mdni. established relationship. mentions of intercourse. oral sex (blowjob). mentions of reader receiving oral sex. hair pulling. imaginative violence (not to reader). petnames (pretty, pipsqueak). mention of oral sex (receiving). he slaps his dick on your face (not sorry). mention of spanking and watching porn. caleb-typical warnings.

wc: 1.7k (drabble....ish????)

author's note: i can't defend myself since 90% of this is word vomit. i'm working on another caleb piece right now, but i needed to get this out of my system. think of it as a precursor piece, like an hors d'oeuvres. also, please disregard any typos. (— - —)|||

The first time Caleb felt your lips on his was magical. The second, third, fourth, and succeeding times were all but surreal.

He had all but convinced himself that your mouth, pressed to his in a flurry of tender touches or desirous cravings, was something he conjured up in the blurry moments of his delusions. You always manage to kiss them away, though.

Later on, you admitted that he was your first kiss.

"When I visited you after you moved out," you said. Hands wrung, your gaze averted downward as you were perched on his lap one evening.

He knows what you're talking about. Remembers its vividness with a startling clarity that would have embarrassed him otherwise, if you didn't share the same sentiments.

By now, you've already kissed and made out in the intimacy of his place beyond finite counting. Had sex with him on whatever surface the two of you could get your hands on. You've long since spoiled him with your presence, both physical and mental. There's a key tucked away in his headspace with your name engraved into the metal. Magnetic and the signification of a special place for you in his heart.

He spoiled you, and now, you spoil him. Neither of you complain about this mutually beneficial arrangement. Why would you?

Though, he can't say he's exactly pleased at the current moment.

"That's it, mmm. You're being so sweet today."

He's watching you, as he always is. You're on your knees before him—you insisted, said it added to the atmosphere despite his crows of indignance at the possibility of them bruising—and your mouth impossibly full of his cock.

You're bare before him, towel discarded on the coffee table with your body damp and he's barely presentable in his uniform. Disheveled and pants undone, he wasn't sure if he was exactly living up to the honorable nature of the clothes he donned. He tried to undress, but you'd been pawing at him the second he walked through the doorstep in nothing but one of the towels he bought you, so his resistance was doomed from the start.

His arms spread on the top of the couch, he tilts his head back and sighs slowly. Hot breath escapes him in time with his Adam's apple bobbing, swallowing a heavy moan that threatens to break free. It takes him a few moments before he peers at your kneeling form once more.

One of his hands cups your cheek, the cool leather swiping over your cheekbone and pushing some of your hair back. Rapt attention on you, whispering soft words of, "that's how you do it" and "a biiit wider, pipsqueak— yeah, like that" with so much appreciation in his tone. Because that's what he feels toward you right now; so much appreciation in his heart belongs to you.

Your tongue was doing sinful licks along the underside of his cock's curve, the girth hefty in your two hands, and your eyes stayed closed in a quiet pleasure. It's expertly done, and the creation of human response as you wrap those pretty pink lips around the tip of him and suckle on it, strings of your saliva leaving sticky wefts along the shaft.

Alternating between peppering his length in kisses and taking a couple inches into your mouth, he's fighting for his fucking life trying to not bust a nut. He's sort of ashamed to have dreamt of this moment for years. You would never let him live it down.

As if the deities couldn't get enough of his suffering, his mind had made the fatal mistake of noting the visible difference of the size of him and your hands and your mouth. It gets him going, that stark contrast and how gently you were treating him.

It's a sight reserved for his eyes alone. Something he wants to pocket and immortalize because it's his and only his. That's the only reason for the powerful plethora of emotions boiling over in his gut. Truly, the only reason.

That's what he tells himself as he observes you with a progressively darkening, clinical, dead-eyed stare that you weren't aware of. A little voice in him nagging at his conscience, spitting words of venom that feeds into the slowly, slowly expanding green-eyed monster rising onto its feet.

"I got a question for you, pretty," he says calmly, deceptively so. Making sure to sound as casual as possible, his gloved hand coming to stroke over your damp, silky hair. You really just couldn't wait to please him, immediately pawing at him when he arrived home and you were fresh out the bath.

You murmur something in reply, lips suctioned to his shaft. Those gorgeous eyes, ones that beheld him with such reverence and adoration in round shape flicker up to his. The vibrations and sight hit him like a freight train and he groans, low and deep. He lets the pleasure settle into his bones.

"You have to answer honestly, 'kay?" He croons down at you, assuring. His facial expression had finally relaxed from its initial, contemplative one. You're happy with this, he notes as you eagerly bob your head, careful to remain quiet.

Good. It'll make hearing your voice all the more worth it. When you said he was your first kiss, he was beyond ecstatic.

Hopefully, you can echo the same thing now.

With an easygoing air betraying that of his positively threatening smile, he asks, "Where'd you learn how to do this?"

There's a sick sense of pleasure in watching you process his words a second too lats. Because you're such an open book with him, aren't you? The way your eyes widen and your lips halt, as if your heart stopped even beating. Even if makes his own blackened heart speed up, its thudding resembling a rabbit's stomping.

Your blinks were a linguistic of their own, and he was the expert in unraveling the lexicology of your existence.

You don't answer fast enough. Or, you don't answer at all. Because now, you're staring him like a child chastised for having their hand in a candy jar—where they weren't supposed to be.

Unfortunately for you, that was more than telling for him.

Caleb doesn't speak. The air is several degrees colder now, like the air circulation was suddenlt cut off, and he drinks in the way anticipation tenses your muscles and your uneven breaths smooth over his skin when you pop your lips off his cock. Those sinful lips that he stole away as his were now glistening in a mix of your spittle and his pre-cum.

He could almost forgive you right now. But, you make the crucial mistake of looking away from him.

"Oh?" It's inquisitive—his tone, yet it has the power of a knife being drawn.

The hand on your head loses its comforting, encouraging air and instead becomes a weight.

A threat.

The visual that's formulating in his head isn't a pleasant one. An image of stained glass shards, blurry yet clear in the vision of you on your knees for another guy. The scattered light capturing your mouth wrapped around the faceless stranger, servicing him the same way you're handling Caleb, seeking that same, sickly sweet tang of validation.

Could it have been that Xavier guy he sees on your phone notifications from time to time? Or is it someone closer to you, from your Association? There's a chance someone else from your childhood reached out to you, maybe after his disappearance. Did they hold you in ways he's been craving to hold you for years?

That's not fair, now, is it? He's worn your hairtie around his wrist for years, disregarded countless scribbled love letters from bystanders, based his little trinkets around those apples you love so much, and spoiled you countless times in his misplaced desire for playing the role of your protector. It simply isn't fair that you sought gratification from a source that wasn't him—because for him, it was always you.

Is it too selfish of him to want your everything?

You don't say anything even as your mouth opens and closes. You're either searching for an excuse, weighing the costs of lying to him at the moment, or you're genuinely floundering for words at the sudden blankness in your head.

He hums again, and it's lower than before. Full of thought and contemplation as his amethyst eyes bore holes into your speechless state. It's full of disappointment and he sees the worry creep into your eyes like a leaking faucet.

Threading his gloved fingers into the tresses of your hair, its smooth leather massaging your scalp, his face softens.

"I guess I did say you should be honest, not fast," he murmurs, laughing to himself quietly.

His lips tilt into a boyish sort of grin, and it's so full of mirth and entertainment that it's easy to process as him diffusing the situation. It works like so, and you're soon tilting your head into his palm and seeking his touch.

In the distance, the kettle in the kitchen screeches like an alarm of what's to come.

Disconcertingly relaxed, his smile seems absolutely sarcastic. A bit sharp at the edges.

"I should make it easier to understand. Let me rephrase it, then."

He pulls your hair. It's one harsh motion and it jerks your head up. A gasp torn from your lips as they fall open, the slight sting shooting through your body with an charged breeze.

"Who did you learn this from?"

He's so used to tasting you before fucking; your sex and his tongue are practically best friends in his eyes. It never once occurred to him to have you suck him off.

He should've been suspicious the second you offered to begin with.

The blood drains from your face some more and he relishes the blank yet alert state your eyes reflect. He's sure your mind is in disarray right now. The feeling is mutual, though you're aware of that too, most likely.

"I have a right to know. I always said that you could come to me if you needed help with anything, right?" It's a rhetorical question. You both know that. You're doomed either way.

You make another breathless noise, and he wants to explore your vocality. Now, how would you sound gagging on him?

"Caleb—"

He shushes you softly and you quiet down in an instant.

"I don't need an answer that isn't related to my question, don't you agree?"

Another rhetorical question as he cocks his head, the gesture mocking.

"You're always tellin' me to be honest and share my thoughts with you. I'm bein' honest now. Everything should be mutual, so, answer my question. I might even go easy on you."

You're totally panicking now, aren't you?

His other hand wraps around the base of his cock and he slaps the shaft onto your cheek, then smearing his leaking tip over your glistening lips, a thoughtful smile playing on his own as if he were offering you candy.

"And depending on how you answer, I'm either taking you over my knee while you spell their name out, or you'll be showing me exactly what pornos you've been watching without my knowledge. So, what's it gonna be?"

[retiredteabag]

Caretaking and Guilt

Pairing: Toji x Reader

Synopsis: quintessential sickfic- you just have a hard time accepting help from others.

Tags: Fluff, comfort, mild angst

〰・♡・〰〰・♡・〰〰・♡・〰〰・♡・〰〰・♡・〰

These past few days you hadn't been feeling so well.

Friends and coworkers had been getting sick left and right. You had thought you were lucky enough to pass it by but after a couple restless nights and a depleted appetite, it was fair to say you had caught the bug.

Yesterday you had tried to prevent the worst of it, taking medicine, drinking orange juice, staying active; none of it seemed to hold back the storm that was this illness.

The second you had opened your eyes this morning you could tell it had all been pointless.

Your head was throbbing, you were unbearably congested, your chest felt heavy, and chills racked your body. There was a cold sweat sticking to your neck and it hurt to swallow. Above all else, you were exhausted. You kept drifting in and out of dreamless sleep, waking to a deeper state of drowsiness.

At one point you had checked your phone only to realize it was mid-afternoon and you had been in bed all day. Toji had been out on a job and would likely be back before dinner.

It's not as if you were embarrassed or ashamed to be sick, but being the fervently independent individual you were, you hated the idea of needing to be cared for.

So, despite your shaky legs and turning stomach, you stumbled your way into the bathroom to try and wash off the sweltering perspiration and muck from yourself.

Something had to be made for dinner after all.

You’d probably feel better after washing up, right?

After what can only be described as a brave attempt at standing under the shower head's assault, you found yourself covering up the drain in your shower bath and allowing the downpour slowly fill up the tub surrounding your collapsed form.

You sat for an inordinate amount of time, every so often opening your eyes to see the waters rising closer to your chest. The droplets knocked against your ears and eased you into a cloudy headspace.

The water was hot. Stiflingly so. What you assumed would aid in clearing out your clogged sinus cavity did very little on that front but rather aided in the onslaught of an enervating fever.

Too weak to consider the sweating and dehydration your hot "rain bath" had caused, you fell into a state of delirium as you shook and dressed yourself in some sweatpants and crew neck.

The man who so frequently was at the forefront of your thoughts was no longer haunting your thoughts. You had originally gotten out of bed to prepare a meal but in your current state, that would not be happening.

It was laughable even to yourself as you made your way into the living room, pitching off to this side and then and staring off at the kitchen and front door for what would appear to an onlooker to be an unnervingly duration.

Eventually, you had to blink and come back to yourself, lost at how you had even gotten into the living room. And for being in such a position to seek comfort, you were overcome with the sudden need to lay on the couch.

Just for a couple minutes to "rest your eyes" as Toji often called it. And "rest your eyes" you did as the room started to spin and your hid your head into the cushions.

--

That was how Toji found you when he arrived home.

The two of you didn't text too often so the fact that you hadn't messaged all day hadn't set of any alarm bells for him. When he came through the front door, finding the place untouched since he left, well, that certainly did.

The room was dim, there wasn't any noise coming from the other rooms of the place, your presence was something he felt he needed to seek, not follow.

It was odd, seeing you there, conked on the couch, smooshed into the bolstering. And even more odd was the feeling it filled him with.

There was an overwhelming sense that something is wrong... Toji had never seen you like this. He tried to recall any hints that could have alluded to you clearly feeling unwell but the two of you had both been so busy. In and out of work, how long had you felt this way?

He knew how you were, never sharing when you hadn't gotten enough sleep or when a light was too bring and causing your headache to throb. Of course you wouldn't have said anything.

He should have noticed it. If Toji is good at anything, it's noticing. Especially when it comes to you. So whatever was going on, it must have progressed rapidly.

Toji sat up against you on the couch, when you didn't move or make any show of recondition, he pursed his lips and told himself to relax. His palm made its way around your head between the couch in order to feel your forehead and it was then that he started to panic.

You were hot. Too hot.

He had never been sure of what to do in these types of situations. His immune system was just too good, he rarely had issues like this and he had never seen you in such a pathetic state.

You were going to play it off when he woke you, he knew you would, so, how then, is he supposed to know for sure how serious it was?

He leaned his weight against your back now, looking down as your sunken form. He didn't say anything until you had whined and shifted to squint up at him.

"Hey." It came out grumbly.

"Mmm?" Everything felt airy, your ability to move your body, your recondition of where you lay, the man before you. Was any of this even real? Gosh, you felt awful.

"How you feelin'?"

Toji was a big, tough, guy. He was notorious for his unfeeling and cold nature. Rarely did he take the initiative to coddle or pamper you. And even rarer still were the times you would allow it.

In this moment though, every fiber of his “big, tough, guy" being was blaring for him to treat you gently.

He ran his hand down your back, the gooseflesh on your neck sent a chill across his and he began to seriously worry that you must be sick.

"mmm" Was your only response.

You firmly placed your face back between the couch and its cushions, truly believing you had just given a proper reply to Toji.

Narrowing his brows even further, Toji leans in, gently petting your back, lifting your hair from your neck. He places the back of his hand to your flesh there.

He couldn't recall a time where you had ever been more heated than he.

"Hey, I need you to look at me." He whispers, trying to draw your attention again.

"...ughhh...'oji" You try to shift from him but in no state, certainly not the one you presently found yourself in, were you a match for his strength.

"hey, hey, hey..." He doesn't even realize the tone he has taken on, as if he is approaching a wounded animal. He really just doesn't know what to do.

"...Eghhhh... it'ssso cold."

It is this slurred declaration that finalizes it for him. Never before, even when inebriated, have you taken on this tonality.

Toji's thigh jitters on the couch but he hides his internal alarm well otherwise. He is usually so quick to manhandle you over his shoulder, tossing you this way and that. But not now.

He takes you tenderly, and when you shuffle your face into his arm, he swallows the feeling that coats his throat.

"You been feelin' bad all day?"

He makes his way to the bedroom, when you nod into his chest his posture straightens.

Of course.

Once you're feeling better he's going to need to have a talk with you about sharing how you feel. At this moment, however, you are a limp noodle, falling away from his body as he plops you onto the bed.

He tucks the blanket around your body and sits on the edge of the bed.

"You eat yet?"

If you think that not responding will get him off your back, you are sorely mistaken. He would get an answer out of you. Nudging your side, pressing your body further into the mattress.

"Hey. Have you eaten?" He asks, slower this time.

You open your eyes, feeling a bit more cognizant. From the bed, you heave a breath and blink up at the man. "M' a bit nauseous."

"So, no."

"Yeah…”

He sighs, saving his lecture for when he isn't pounding with anxiety at your expression. The bed starts to tilt as Toji shifts his weight, moving to get up.

He was very likely going to prepare something light for your stomach, but in a moment of weakness, (wholly brought on by the cloudy brain and certainly not your realization of how soft your man was being) you reach out for him.

"Don't go."

A shiver causes his shoulders to tremble. A week ago he would have said no, shoving you off him only to fulfill your request. But in this moment he doesn't even have it in himself to jokingly deny you.

Turning back, he tickles a hand along your face. Pressing slightly at your temples. The massage eases everything for a moment, you wish you could stay like this for the however long your ailment lasts.

You roll over slightly, turning your face away from him and into the pillows. His fingers dance from your temples to the side of your eye, to the bridge of your nose. He presses slightly, running his fingertip up the length of it, to the space between your eyes, then back again.

He repeats the motion a few times, watching your breathing even out. He watches chills roll over you as his hand finds the back of your neck, moving to scratch gently there.

It does not take long for you to fall back into a restless sleep. As he watched you snore under the lump of blankets, he hoped this rest would do you well.

Toji isn't the best cook out there, but he's not as useless in the kitchen as he might seem. He would swap between preparing soup to peeking into the bedroom every so often. Cutting up some potato, shredding some chicken, chopping some carrots. Only to get nervous and stand in the doorway to watch the heep of germs on his bed.

Typically he would feel a sense of accomplishment for his healthy meal and the speed at which he prepared it.

Not now. His thoughts were filled with your weak voice back on the couch, your gaze when you asked him to stay with you.

He had never seen you like that. It had thrown him.

Toji almost didn't want to wake you but it only took remembering that you hadn't eaten all day for him to eventually nudge you awake.

You groaned and complained but once you were conscious, it seemed that you were more aware.

"W-wait, what?…Toji, you made this?"

"Yeah, so you better eat it all."

He scooched you over into the middle of the bed before sitting up beside you. You waved off his attempt to feed you, insisting on holding the bowl in your lap.

So Toji just watched, looking down at you spooning soup into your mouth. Humming every so often.

"It's good, Toji."

"Oh, yeah?" You aren't looking at him but you can hear his grin, "Lucky you, there's plenty of extra."

You smile. But it doesn't reach your eyes.

You know Toji did this because he wanted to, but sitting here, being useless all day, you felt so ashamed.

"...Lucky me....thank you...Toji."

"No worries." His fingertips found the back of your neck once more and started thrumming a pattern while you stared off, still eating.

"I'm sorry."

You couldn't not say it. It just came out.

"What? Why?"

The spoon clinks against the bowl and you cover your eyes with a hand. "Just...all of this, I'm sorry it happened, and that you had to come home and do all this."

"Alright-“ He leans over now, trying to bend and catch your eye but you turn away. He grabs the bowl in one hand and sets it on the bedside table beside him. "I don't want to hear you say that again."

You shake your head to disagree but he leans back then, gripping your shoulders and laying you atop his shoulder.

"I wish you would let me take care of you."

You stay on him, feeling his chest rise and pound with life and love. But you still try to avoid the eye contact he was trying to make happen.

"You already have-"

"Well I wish you would let me without whatever all this guilt is. I don't want you feelin' bad for getting sick. And then apologizing for me watching out for you."

There was a steady pause. The two of you lay, listening to the silence, awaiting your reply.

"Thank you." Is all you said.

Because it's what you felt. And you knew he wouldn’t accept anything else.

"Sure, baby." He leans down and kisses the top of your head.

And as badly as you would like to stay present and ask about his day like you normally would. It is becoming a real challenge to stay awake. Especially with his hand tracing patterns over your arm.

And for the first time in three days. You have some restful sleep.

--

The next day you wake feeling much better, rejuvenated even. But Toji is still fussing over you like he's your grandma. Tapping his foot and waiting for you to finish eating before allowing you to do anything else.

"I slaved over that, you better not leave a drop."

You roll your eyes, grateful the teasing dynamic has come back to you both. Even so, there is an underlying care that the two of you share, you smile before getting up, he tries to take your bowl but you insist on washing it yourself.

Toji’s head is on your shoulder and his breath whispers on your neck, you rinse the suds from your dish. For once, it feels nice and warm to be cared for without pretense.

You set your bowl on a towel, quickly shifting to tiptoes and leaving a smooch on Toji's cheek.

He makes a funny noise in the back of his throat then. Whiling around to squish your cheeks in a firm grip.

"Ya better not go getting me sick."

You stare at one another, and although he had just finished pushing your from him, he looks at your face in his hand. And without a moments hesitation longer, he drags you in for a proper kiss.

To him, felt good to love you, and to you, it felt good to be loved