#until it started to turn into things i liked less and less until i was completely alienated from it

[rosesaints]

mystery of love

pairing: clark kent (superman 2025) x reader summary: clark is light in ways the world doesn’t always notice. he makes breakfast for dinner, reads to you when you’re sick, peels oranges like his mom used to, and sunbathes on the fire escape like a houseplant that loves way too hard. he doesn’t say “i love you” until the light is just right and you’re wrapped up in him like a second skin, but he shows it every day in the way he stays. inspired by the orange poem by wendy cope. (or alternatively: 4 times he showed you he loves you + 1 time he says it) listen to the playlist here. word count: 11.1 k. oops. i swear this was only supposed to be 8k words but unfortunately, i'm insane. content warnings: 18+ mdni, fem!reader, established relationship, piv sex, character study, dom/sub undertones, switching (reader and clark take turns domming/subbing), marking kink, hair pulling, big soft men who are whipped for you, soft but kind of unhinged sex, size kink (clark picks up the reader/pins them down), nipple play, unprotected sex, oral (fem!receiving), outdoor sex (sex against a tree), face riding, public sex, use of pet names, tooth-rotting fluff, my love letter to midwest summers!

Your boyfriend photosynthesizes.

Well, that's the joke, anyway. 

You’ve said it so many times now it might as well be printed on a T-shirt. My Boyfriend Is Solar-Powered! in Comic Sans. Or maybe Papyrus. Whatever will annoy him the most. Haven't really decided yet.

It started out as a throwaway line, one of those things you kind of just say when you’re half-awake and fully-annoyed because he’s hogging the sunny spot in the kitchen again like a smug, six-foot-four housecat with insane shoulders and even more insane bedhead.

But the first time you said it—like, actually really said it—he was standing by the window, shirtless, holding his coffee in that chipped blue mug that says "My Son's a Smallville Elementary Grad!" and somehow survived a farm, a college dorm, three apartments, and a move cross-country. 

The light was doing that thing it loves to do in the morning, all golden and warm and syrupy, catching on his collarbones and the slope of his neck like he was painted by fucking Michelangelo. He had one hip braced against the counter, the other leg crooked, like someone told him to look as unintentionally hot as possible while waiting for the kettle filled with your guys' tea to boil.

You blinked at him, still clutching your own mug and not yet caffeinated enough to regulate your mouth, and said, “Do you ever feel like… like a plant?”

He raised an eyebrow. Blew on his coffee. You can see the way his breath fogs up slightly, that super breath of his doing just enough to cool down his coffee to the perfect temperature. “That a dig?”

“No. It’s just. You—" You waved vaguely in his direction. "Well, you just kinda look like you’re charging.”

That got a huff of a laugh. “What, like a phone?”

“No,” you said, and grinned into your mug. “Like I said, a plant. Like you're photosynthesizing.”

After that, it became a thing.

He always smiled when you said it. Looked down at himself, half-amused, half-embarrassed. “I mean,” he’d say, “you’re not wrong.” Or: “Someone’s gotta keep the plants company, y'know?"

But he never corrects you. Never laughs it off like it’s ridiculous.

Because it isn’t.

You’ve seen the truth of it, slow and subtle and layered in all the small things. The way he’s just a smidge lighter on his feet after a sunny day, how he runs warmer, more golden, like someone turned the saturation up to a hundred. The way his voice softens, deeper, when he’s been in the sun too long. The way the shadows under his eyes seem less sharp after just an afternoon spent lying on the roof, pretending he’s napping when you both know he’s just... breathing.

And the bruises. That’s the part he thinks you don’t see.

You do.

They heal so much faster when he’s been drenched in the sun. You’ve watched the inky blackish-purple fade to this sickly yellow in the span of a couple hours and tried really, really hard not to stare. 

You’ve said nothing when he limped into bed one night after a particularly difficult battle and rolled out of it the next morning like absolutely nothing had even happened. Sometimes he winces and pretends it’s nothing. Sometimes he… forgets to pretend.

And still, you never say that’s not normal out loud, even though it’s not. Because he isn’t. Not in the way that matters. Not in the ways that make you love him.

You love him like a long exhale. Like a secret that’s safe with you. Like the song you play on repeat in the car, the one you never get sick of, even though it makes your throat tighten every time.

Sometimes it’s peaceful, like when your ribs finally uncages and let someone else in for the first time in your life. But sometimes, sometimes it's just so fucking devastating. 

Because he’s Clark. And Superman. And most importantly, he's yours.

And it feels too big. Too fragile. Like trying to hold water in your hands. You want to keep him safe, but you also want to keep him. The real him. The him that leaves you sticky notes that say “eat something, please” and walks around humming old Mighty Crabjoys songs and insists you don’t have to fold my socks, seriously, who folds socks?

But you lie awake sometimes watching him breathe, thinking to yourself, How do I love someone that belongs to the world?

And the answer is: you just do. One day at a time. One morning at a time. One sunlit moment in the kitchen at a time.

That Monday morning, it’s the same as always.

You pad into the living room half-asleep, dragging your feet and wearing one of his T-shirts that hits you mid-thigh. He’s already up, standing barefoot by the window, coffee in hand, arms folded loosely across his chest like he’s holding himself together in case he gets pulled apart again later.

Pause in the doorway. Watch him for a second. The way the light pools around his ankles. The way his shoulders lift, just barely, when he hears your steps.

He doesn’t turn.

“Guess what,” you say.

He smiles, small and crooked. “Hmm?”

You cross the room. Slide your arms around his waist from behind and press your face between his shoulder blades, where the sun’s been warming him for at least half an hour.

“You’re glowing again,” you murmur. “Must be that high-potency sunlight. You hogging the sun again?”

He laughs, the sound low and warm. “You caught me.”

“You’re a danger to local crops,” you whisper. Feel the goosebumps rising underneath his skin. “The corn’s jealous.”

“Oh no. Not the corn.” He turns a little, just enough to look down at you. His eyes are so fucking blue at that moment. “Should I apologize to the corn?”

“Absolutely. It’s your fault they can’t compete. You're literally the reason why Iowa's GDP is going down.”

He leans in. Brushes a kiss to your temple. “I’ll draft a formal statement for them later.”

You stay like that for a minute. Him holding you. You pressing your nose into the slope of his back, breathing him in—sunshine and laundry and that faint green note that’s uniquely Clark. Like basil, or clean leaves. Like something still growing.

And you think: This is the part he doesn’t say out loud.

This is how he tells you.

Not with words. Not yet.

Your boyfriend photosynthesizes. And maybe it’s not the kind of love you can pin down, or explain, or protect. But it’s real. It’s alive.

And you love him.

And he, quietly, completely, loves you back.

(He hasn’t said it yet. But you don’t really need the words to know.)

.

Clark shows you he loves you in ways so small, they’d be easy to miss if you didn’t know how to look for them. 

But you do. You catch them in those quiet little corners of the day. 

The way he folds down the corner of your book before you can reach for a receipt or a pen. The way he touches your wrist, not yanking, just there, when you step into the street without looking. The way he makes a soft sound of protest—ahem, maybe more like politely exasperated—when you try to carry six grocery bags at once like you, too, are invincible.

And then there’s the orange.

You’re curled into the couch, one of his sweatshirts swallowed over your knees, watching—but not really, to be honest—some long-winded documentary about volcanoes or Icelandic horses or some other quietly majestic subject that definitely feels at odds with your mood. The narrator has this super calm, soothing British lilt and the lighting is very National Geographic: all muted blues and wide drone shots and crashing waves. You haven’t really spoken in close to at least half an hour.

Clark doesn’t push. Never does. 

He just lets you sit in it, whatever it is, as long as you need to. 

But eventually, he nudges your ankle with his socked foot, like a hello, and when you glance up, he’s setting something on the coffee table with a kind of shy precision.

An orange.

Already peeled.

Not just peeled. Sectioned. Arranged.

It’s kind of ridiculous, how careful it is. No torn rind, no mangled wedges. The peel’s just laid out like a ribbon, one continuous spiral that speaks of time and gentleness and someone who took this seriously. Each segment is placed on a napkin, still glistening with juice, like a little offering.

You blink at it.

Then at him.

He’s pretending to watch the TV, but his body betrays him. His shoulders just slightly angled toward you, eyes flicking sideways like he’s checking the weather.

“I didn’t know if you were hungry,” he says after a beat. Like he’s not sure he’s allowed to say more. “But it’s one of the sweet ones.”

Your throat does something stupid. You reach for a slice and hold it for a second, too long, then pop it into your mouth.

It’s still cold from the fridge. Bright, juicy, perfect. Like summer broke through the haze in your chest.

You make a noise you don’t mean to. Something between surprise and relief.

Clark shifts, trying to look casual, but you catch that familiar smile tugging at the corner of his mouth.

“I was gonna ask if you wanted one,” he says, still mostly facing the TV, his face painted in blue. “But you looked kind of… I don’t know. Stuck. So I figured I’d just do it.”

“You peeled it for me?”

He finally looks over at you, eyebrows lifted. “Well, yeah.”

And somehow that—that—is what catches in your chest. Not the orange, not the care. The way he says it like it’s obvious. Like of course he did. Like there’s a whole world of things he would do just for you without even needing to be asked.

You swallow. “You didn’t have to.”

“I know,” he says, shrugging a little. “But that's kind of the point.”

You don’t say anything for a minute. Just reach for another slice.

When you bite into it, something in you loosens. Maybe it’s the juice. Maybe it’s the tenderness.

Clark, watching out of the corner of his eye, shifts a little closer and says, voice low, “When I was a kid, my ma used to 'em for me.”

You glance over. He’s staring at the documentary again, but the way he says it, it’s not for the Icelandic horses on the screen.

“She knew I hated the sticky part,” he goes on. “Didn’t like having all that juice on my fingers. So she’d do it before school. Wrap ‘em up in plastic, tuck ‘em in the corner of my lunchbox next to whatever sandwich she made that day. Tuna on Fridays. Always with too much mayo.”

You smile, just a little. “You were a picky eater?”

“Not picky,” he says defensively. “Just—just particular. I didn’t like when my food touched.”

“Mhm.”

“I was seven!”

You laugh, and he finally looks at you, sheepish and warm.

“She used to write little notes sometimes too,” he adds. “On the napkin. Stuff like ‘remember your science quiz’ or ‘you’re stronger than you think.’” He scratches the back of his neck. “Sometimes just a heart. Sometimes that was enough.”

You watch him as he says it, and you think, Of course. Of course you grew up like that. With kindness taught into you like table manners. With love folded into your lunchboxes.

“And now,” you say, voice subtle, “you’re the one peeling oranges for someone else.”

He shrugs again. “Only for you.”

You raise an eyebrow.

“I mean it,” he says. “Everyone else can deal with the sticky fingers. You get the napkin and everything.”

You press a slice into his hand before you can talk yourself out of it.

He pauses, then leans forward and bites it from your fingers, playful but gentle. A little juice escapes down the corner of his mouth. He licks it away without breaking eye contact.

It shouldn’t make your heart ache. But it does.

“Thank you,” you say quietly.

“For the orange?”

“For the orange. And the napkin. And, you know. The general care and keeping of me.”

He smiles at that. Tilts his head toward you until your shoulders brush.“Well,” he says, “you’re pretty high-maintenance. Comes with the territory.”

You scoff, gently ebow him. “I am not.”

He raises his brows. “Okay. Yesterday, you made me reheat the tea because it was two degrees below your ideal sipping temperature.”

“That’s not high-maintenance. That’s just me having standards.”

“Sure,” he murmurs, bumping your knee with his. “And your standards include expertly peeled fruit on Tuesdays, apparently.”

You roll your eyes, but your smile gives you away. “I just mean…” You trail off, unsure how to say it without sounding too serious, too much. You chew your lip, watching the way the light hits his profile. “I hope,” you say softly, almost to yourself, “you never stop doing that.”

He leans his head against the back of the couch, close enough that his shoulder brushes yours. “What, feeding you citrus?”

You huff out a laugh. “You know what I mean.”

He doesn’t answer for a long moment. Then he says, simple and sure, like the truth it is:

“I won’t.”

.

You don’t even really remember texting him. You think you might’ve. Maybe. Who knows. 

In the middle of your 2 a.m. sick delirium, burning up and freezing at the same time, with every single cell in your body screaming and staging some sort of mutiny, you vaguely remember opening your phone with bleary eyes and typing something half-coherent. 

A string of emojis. A sad face, a skull, a wilted flower. Vomit emoji. You might’ve hit send. You might’ve just passed out mid-thought.

Either way, Clark’s there when you come to.

He’s on the floor beside your bed, cross-legged, slouched a little in that way he always is when he’s trying to make himself smaller than he actually is. He’s doing this thing he does similar to when he's reading out his first drafts—voice low and even, a little scratchy like he hasn’t used it much today, or maybe just because it’s the middle of the night and the Metropolis is quiet for once and so is he.

You blink, once, twice, groggily, and he doesn’t even look up as he says:

“…and then I told Jimmy that if he was going to hide in the cafeteria instead of facing Eve, he should at least clean up after his brooding, because no one wants to sit next to a scone that’s been glared at for thirty minutes."

That's when you make a sound—half a groan, half a breath—and he glances up.

“Oh,” he says, smiling. “Hey. You’re awake.”

God, you swear your head's a pressure cooker. Your throat feels like someone lined it with sandpaper and regret. You’re pretty sure you’re covered in sweat, and not in a sexy, cinematic way, but more in a swampy, bedraggled, my skin might never be clean again kind of way. 

And yet here he is, reading from what you now realize is his work notebook. 

Not even a novel. Just… Clark, narrating his week.

“God,” you croak. “I think I’m dying.”

Clark shifts immediately, one knee bent, his hand brushing against your arm like he’s checking for tremors. “You’re not dying,” he says gently. “You’re just sick. Classic human stuff. I Googled it to make sure.”

“You Googled my flu?”

“Yeah. Also called my dad.”

Your lips twitch. “Of course you did.”

“He said tea, soup, and don't try to touch your toes.”

You blink at him slowly. “I wasn’t gonna—”

“I didn’t think you would. But he insisted.”

He presses a glass of water into your hand. Holds it there, actually, like you might forget what to do with it. You sip slowly, mostly because he’s watching you with the intensity of someone monitoring the nuclear launch codes. His hand stays curved behind your back the whole time, steady and warm, his thumb sweeping once over your shoulderblade.

“Still tastes like shit,” you mutter, grimacing.

“That’s just your fever lying to you,” he says. “Give it time. I brought supplies.”

Which is how, ten minutes later, you’re propped up like a limp marionette with three pillows, wearing one of his hoodies, while Clark, bless him, is rumbling around in your kitchen making the world’s most dramatic instant ramen.

He hums while he works, something mellow and vaguely twangy—something that sounds like wide-open spaces and Sunday mornings and the kind of radio stations that only exist halfway between here and Kansas.

When he brings the bowl back, he sits on the edge of the bed and feeds you, spoon by spoon, blowing on each bite first like he thinks you might scald your tongue.

You watch him through a fever-glazed blur. “You’re really committing to the bit.”

He raises an eyebrow. “What bit?”

“The Florence Nightingale… Florence Kent thing.”

He grins, bashful. “It’s not a bit. I just… I didn’t want you to be alone.”

Your stomach flips. It has nothing to do with the soup.

“And also,” he adds, “I brought a book, thought you might like something to listen to in the background.”

You blink at him.

“I figured I’d read to you once the soup’s done. Unless you’d rather I make more toast. I could do toast. Or try. I mean, it’s technically one of the few things I can’t mess up.”

You take the spoon from his hand. “Baby.”

“Yeah?”

“Sit down before you vibrate out of your flannel.”

He obeys instantly, because Clark is nothing if not obedient when you sound just a tiny bit bossy and ill. You laugh a little. Then cough a lot.

When you stop hacking, there’s a glass of water in your hand again, and he's looking at you like he’s trying to mentally calculate your temperature based soely off your pupil dilation. You wave him off until he settles down again, until his work stories blur into white noise and you feel yourself drifting.

Later, when the room is dark except for the glow of the bedside lamp, and your fever’s burning lower, no longer trying to boil you alive but still leaving your limbs really heavy and wrung-out—you stir, blink groggily, and find him exactly where he’s been all day: back on the floor, this time leaning against the bed frame like he’s trying to become one with the carpet.

There's a book in his hands.

You squint. “Is that… Star Wars?”

He doesn’t look up right away. Just flips a page, calm and unbothered, like this is a completely normal Wednesday night activity. “Yeah. From a Certain Point of View.  It’s like… like—little side stories. People on the edges of the main stuff. Background characters getting the spotlight. I thought you might like it.”

You blink slowly. “You’re reading me Star Wars fanfiction.”

Clark glances up, grinning. “Not fanfiction. It’s licensed content.”

“Clark.”

“It’s from Jimmy.”

“Clark.”

He holds his hands up in mock surrender. “Okay, okay, it’s kind of sanctioned fanfic. But it’s good. There's one from the point of view of Obi-Wan’s ghost and it made me emotional.”

You try to snort, but it comes out more like a croak. “You’re such a nerd.”

“Says the person who cried over an R2-D2 Lego set last Christmas.”

“That was a very moving gift and you know it.”

Clark reaches over to adjust your blanket, tucking it up under your chin with careful fingers. “I just thought it might be nice. Something familiar. It’s kind of like comfort food, but for your brain.”

You look at him—really look at him—glasses askew, hair flattened on one side from the couch pillow, sweatshirt stretched over his broad chest like it was never meant to fit a man built like a brick wall—and feel that weird, awful feeling twist in your chest again. 

The one that always comes when he’s like this. Sweet and earnest and just slightly off-center in a way that makes your whole life feel gentler.

“Thank you,” you rasp, voice hoarse but sincere.

He shrugs, like it’s nothing. “Don’t mention it.”

Then, after a beat:

“I was gonna read the one about the cantina bartender next. He has some very strong feelings about the music.”

“. . . Okay yeah, you're weird.”

“Exactly.”

He closes the book for a moment and reaches for your hand under the blanket. His fingers wrap around yours, warm and firm and callused at the knuckles. He squeezes gently.

“I know I’m not good at this,” he says, so quietly you almost miss it. “The taking-care-of-people thing. Not like my dad was. He used to bring orange Jell-O and put those cold cloths on my head when I got sick. He'd sit with me and hum old country songs like that could fix it. And sometimes, it kinda did.”

You squeeze his fingers back. He looks at your joined hands like they’re something fragile.

“I don’t really even know all the right things,” he continues. “But I’m gonna stay right here until you feel good again.”

You swallow. Your throat aches. Your heart does, too, but in a different way.

“Clark,” you whisper. “You’re doing perfect.”

He gives you this look—hazy and overwhelmed, like maybe he needed to hear that more than he thought. He leans in and presses a kiss to your forehead, cool and steady and grounding.

“I got you,” he murmurs. “Always.”

He reads until your breathing evens out again, then switches to humming—barely there, just a thread of melody tracing the shape of the room. He doesn’t move from his place beside your bed. 

You don’t think he even blinks when you stir, reaching a hand out for his. He’s just there. 

So you dream of a cantina bartender with strong feelings about the music. Of a man with dark hair and horrendous posture and the kindest eyes in the galaxy, carrying soup and picture books and the whole weight of your heart like it’s not heavy at all.

.

It was supposed to be a date.

Like, a real date. One with proper shoes and napkins that aren’t made of recycled drive-thru material. A night where neither of you had to sprint, lie, cover for the other, or show up late with leaves in your hair because someone, cough, got caught helping rescue a tour boat from sinking off the coast of Maine.

Just dinner. Just one Thursday evening. A normal, honest-to-god, pre-planned, mildly fancy dinner. 

You’d even made a reservation at that Italian place ou guys have been meaning to try.

Clark had combed his curls with what looked like actual intent and buttoned his shirt all the way to the top, then unbuttoned one (just one) like he’d read about the concept of casual in a book. You caught him practicing his posture in the hallway mirror before you left.

“Do I look like I own a belt?” he’d asked.

“You do own a belt.”

“Right, but do I look like I believe in it?”

You had rolled your eyes. He’d kissed your forehead. You’d both agreed, silently and aloud and silently again: This time, it’s gonna stick.

Just dinner.

Just you and him.

Just—

The sky, it turns out, had other ideas.

You’re only two blocks from the restaurant, your heels clicking rhythmically against the sidewalk. He’s saying something about dessert—about how he’s never actually had crème brûlée and how suspicious he is of any food that requires a blowtorch—and you’re about to tell him that he’s a coward and has terrible, horrible opinions when he—

Flinches.

Just slightly. A twitch, more than anything. Like someone tugged on the collar of his shirt from behind.

You stop. Narrow your eyes.

“Kent.”

He stills, then winces, and it’s over. The wind picks up just enough to ruffle his jacket and toss a strand of your hair across your lip.

“Baby,” you say, dragging out the vowels like you’re preparing to scold a dog who’s eyeing the Thanksgiving turkey.

“I’m sorry,” he says. “I know. I know. I just—there’s something happening in Hob’s Bay. I think it’s Parasite again.”

“Parasite?” you repeat, like that somehow makes it better. “The guy who eats energy and punches holes through cement walls like graham crackers?”

Clark winces again, guilt washing across his face like rain.

“I can take you home first,” he says quickly. “I’ll be fast. Twenty minutes. Tops.”

“You said that last time,” you remind him.

“Yes, but this time I mean it with—” he pauses, trying to sell it, “—I mean it. I've got improved time management skills. I’ve been working on it, I swear. I downloaded a calendar app.”

“Oh my god, Clark.”

“I even color-coded it!”

You cross your arms. “Clark.”

“I swear on my mom’s ceramic cow collection.”

“…The one on the microwave?”

“She dusts them twice a week.”

You sigh, but you’re already unhooking your arm from his. He’s practically vibrating now, trying to stand still. There’s a flash of green in the far-off clouds.

“I liked this dress,” you say.

“I love that dress,” he says, almost reverent. “I��m gonna come back and ruin it for you in much better ways.”

A beat. He realizes how that sounded. “I mean, like—because of pasta sauce. And maybe dancing? gosh, I’m terrible at this—”

You laugh despite yourself. Even as the first drops of rain start to hit your shoulders. “Go, Kansas.”

He kisses your cheek. Then the other. His hands linger against your face a half-second too long, his thumbs warm even through the chill.

“I’ll make it up to you,” he says, quiet now. “Promise.”

Then he’s gone.

“I know,” you reply to no one in particular, because you do.

You spend the next hour curled on the couch in the dress you never got to wear properly, the hem slightly damp from the rain and your eyeliner gently betraying you. The news cycles through static, then footage of Clark shielding a crowd with a dented bus stop sign like it’s a riot shield, eyes glowing faintly, shoulders squared. Calm. Measured. Still gentle, even in a fight. You eat a sleeve of saltines out of spite.

He texts you twice:

CLARKY <3: STILL FIGHTING THE SLIME GUY. HE’S YELLING ABOUT “THE SYSTEM” SO I THINK THIS IS POLITICALLY MOTIVATED. CLARKY <3: ALMOST DONE. PLEASE DON’T FALL ASLEEP. I OWE YOU SO MUCH CREME BRUILALAE 🍨

You don’t reply. He needs to focus. But you do leave the kitchen light on.

It's past ten when he gets back. He lands with a whisper on your fire escape—so quiet it takes you a second to realize he’s there. You’re already in pajamas at this point.

He taps gently on the window.

When you slide it open, he’s dripping. Suit ripped at the collar. A graze on his temple that’s already healing. Mud on his boots. Eyes wide and sheepish and a little desperate.

“You’re late,” you say.

“The Italian place was closed,” he says, holding up a crumpled brown paper bag like an offering. "But I brought dumplings?"

Your stomach betrays you with a loud growl. Fucking saltines. He smiles, relieved.

“They’re from that place you like,” he adds quickly. “The one with the crab rangoon that makes you make weird noises.”

You cross your arms. “You think you can just bribe me with steamed buns and flattery?”

“Yes?” he tries.

“…You’re not wrong.”

You step back to let him in. He shrugs off the cape, moving slower than usual. His shoulders dip lower. His steps drag a little. The exhaustion sits in him like weight.

“Sit down,” you say.

“I can—”

“Clark. Couch. Now.”

He obeys without question, settling into the cushions like a man unraveling. You grab a towel and a hoodie from your room—one of his—and toss both at him. Then you disappear into the kitchen.

After a beat, he calls after you: “I missed you, by the way.”

You don’t answer right away. Just finish plating the takeout, dividing the dumplings and the sticky rice and the rangoon with practiced ease. Your apartment smells like warm ginger and garlic. Familiar. Safe.

When you bring the food over, you find him curled sideways on the couch, legs too long, towel around his shoulders like a cape. He grins when he sees the plates.

“You forgive me?” he asks, hopeful.

You hand him a rangoon. “Chew before you talk.”

He does. Then says, with a mouthful of crab: “I really did want it to be a normal night.”

You look at him. At the tired, good man who flew across the city to keep someone else’s world from breaking. At the one who brought you dumplings and rainwater and apologies on the roof of his tongue.

“I know,” you say.

He finishes chewing, then leans forward, chin on your shoulder, voice curling around the edges. “You look beautiful, by the way.”

You snort. “You say that now that I’m in fleece pants with soup stains.”

“I stand by it,” he murmurs. “Always.”

You let him curl around you then, dinner plates on the coffee table, reruns of I Love Lucy playing low in the background. He eats with one arm around your waist. You steal his dumplings when he’s not looking.

Later, when you’re both too full and too warm and too tired to move, he says it again.

“I’ll make it up to you.”

You nudge his leg with your foot. “You already are.”

He hums, pleased but tired, and lets his head fall back against the cushions. “Still wish I hadn’t missed dinner. Not the food. Just—being there. With you.”

There’s a smear of sauce near his mouth when you glance over him. He’s so unbelievably warm around the edges like this—like the fight’s finally bled out of him and he’s just Clark again. Your Clark.

“You always say that,” you murmur.

“Because I always mean it.”

You reach up, thumb brushing the corner of his mouth. He goes quiet. Doesn’t blink. Just watches you like he’s trying to memorize the moment.

There’s a beat where neither of you speak. The kind that hums with the weight of something unspoken, blooming slow between you. Then, without moving your hand, you ask, “You gonna let me kiss you now, or are you still trying to be polite?”

That gets a smile. A real one. A little crooked, a little shy.

“You can do whatever you want,” he says. “You always could.”

So you lean in.

The kiss starts off like a warning.

Your mouth brushes his—brief, firm, no room for questions, not really—and then again, slower this time. He makes a noise, deep in his chest, something caught between relief and surrender.

When your fingers slide into his hair, he tilts into it instinctively. His hands stay right where they are, just one at your waist, one braced uselessly on the couch cushion like he’s reminding himself not to move unless you ask him to.

He huffs something like a laugh when you pull back for a breath. “You’re terrifying, you know that?”

You smile. “Flatterer.”

His hand on your waist shifts slightly, pulling you in closer. Not rough. Not needy. Just—anchoring. Your knees bracket his hips and you kiss him again, open-mouthed this time, licking into his mouth like you’re starved and this is your first taste of real food.

And Clark lets you. 

He lets you kiss him with all the frustration of the ruined date and the tension of waiting and the affection that’s been building in your chest for weeks, maybe months. He meets you where you are—mouth pliant, eyes closed, his breathing slowly unraveling under your hands.

“You always come back like this,” you whisper, teeth grazing his jaw. “All apologies and those puppy dog blue eyes and your make-up take-out. Like I wouldn’t crawl across glass to have you.”

He exhales, sharp and shaky, like your words hit a nerve. His hands tense slightly at your thighs, just for a second, then relax again. He doesn’t try to flip you, doesn’t shift to take control. Just looks at you.

“I mean it,” you murmur, kissing just under his ear. “You come in, wrecked and kind and too damn good, and I’m supposed to what? Sit next to you like my skin isn’t trying to crawl off my bones just to get to yours?”

Clark swallows. “You—” His voice is rough, halting. “You can have me.”

He says it so quietly you almost miss it.

“You already do,” he adds. “You don’t have to prove anything. You—”

Your mouth is on his before he can finish. You kiss him like you’re trying to breathe him in, to memorize the way his ribs rise under your hands. His lips part on a gasp, and you take it as invitation. He lets you tilt his head back even further, lets you set the rhythm—his hands gripping the couch cushions like they’re the only things that can possibly ground him.

You pull back, just enough to see his face. His hair’s still damp, starting to curl at the edges, his cheeks flushed. His glasses are askew, so you reach up, slow, deliberate, and slide them off. Set them gently on the side table. His eyes don’t leave yours for a second.

"Stand up," you say, and he does, wordless, chest rising fast under the hoodie. He's got the towel instead of the cape draped around his shoulders, like he's still half in hero mode. You take that off.

Your fingers go to the hem of the hoodie next, lifting it slow. He raises his arms obediently, eyes half-lidded, focused. He’s still in the bottom half of the suit, and your breath catches—because even now, even like this, he wears it like a second skin.

But you want the man. Not the symbol.

“Off,” you say, fingers brushing the slick, faintly scorched fabric of the suit’s torso. “I want you, not him.”

He nods. It’s so damn slight, like he’s not so sure his voice will work. His hands go to the hidden seams and he peels the suit down, exposing inch after inch of bare skin beneath—toned and marked from the night, faint purple bruises already turning gold where his healing has started. You trail your fingers and follow him down, down, down his sternum, then lower, across his ribs.

The suit hits the floor in a gentle whisper. Boots, too. The cape’s already been discarded—somewhere between the fire escape and your front door—and now he’s just standing there in front of you, bare and breathless and completely yours.

“Come closer,” you say. "It's my turn."

He goes to help you, but you stop him. Eyebrows raised. "Eyes up here. I'll do it myself."

Clark watches you the whole time, not rushing, not leading. His expression open, undone. His bottom lip's caught between his teeth, eyes trained on every single one of your painstaking actions. Peeling your shirt off, your ratty fleece pants, your bra, all of it. He's enjoying this way more than he should, those eyes of his glinting in the light, but that's the intoxicating part of it. 

When you're done, he finally speaks up, voice reduced to a hush. Wills himself to look away from your body and just look into your eyes. "How do you want me?"

You hum, turning on your feet, pretending to think it over. Really, it's just an excuse to have him look at your bare body. Tempt him a little bit. It drives him insane. Still, he doesn't break eye contact. 

"I think," you purse your lips. "I want you underneath me tonight."

He nods. Serious. "Of course."

You lead him back to the bedroom slowly. Not because he needs help walking, but because there’s something in you that just wants to savor the walk. He lets you guide him backward, his legs bumping against the edge of the bed.

He sits.

Then waits.

Clark just looks so… perfect like this. 

Hard, aching, weeping, cheeks pink and pupils dilated. Hands, those goddamn hands, politely by his sides. Does nothing but lay down on the mattress, just waiting for whatever you feel like doing to him. The knowing—the seeing, does more to you than you'd like to admit.

You crawl, slowly, over his body. Fingers skirting over the freckles of his body, the light dusting of hair across his torso, the goosebumps that rise there. Anything but pay attention to his cock that's begging for you, until you're close to straddling his face, hovering there.

A pause. Those baby blue eyes, the cause of so many of your little deaths. His lips, pink and wet as his tongue swipes over them. A hint of a smile. You brush a curl away from his forehead, fingers slow and thoughtful.

"Okay."

Once you give him the go-ahead, he's all instinct, steady hands pulling your thighs more snug over his shoulders with all of the skill and quiet confidence of a man who's been breaking you down and laying you out for a long time. 

It's so easy—so easy to lose yourself in it. So easy when you're on top of the world.

Clark knows. You've genuinely never met a guy who enjoys eating someone out more than him. He knows all the ways to make your legs shake and your head vibrate out of its skull, all the little skills and patterns and consistencies to get you to cum within minutes, but from the way he takes his time, mouth roaming everywhere—your thighs, your legs, the back of your knees—

He means to torture you. Make you eat your words. But you're gonna have the last say tonight.

You squeeze your legs around his face, bringing his attention to you, all blue-eyed innocence glancing up to you. Little shit. "Hey," you will your voice into something vaguely commanding. "How many times do you think you can make me cum tonight?"

All you get is a lopsided smile. "As many times 's you want."

"Ball park?"

He strums his fingers along your thigh. Pretends to think about it. Looking up at the corner of his eyes like he's doing mental math. "How about we start with five or six and go from there?"

"Perfect. Delightful, Kent. Alright, procee—"

His arms tighten around your thighs, and that's all the warning you get before he dives right in, parting your lips with his tongue and tasting all that you've got to offer, and god, if that doesn't make the slick accumulate even more in between your thighs, gushing, eyes falling closed. 

A trooper always, Clark's mouth is warm, forming into a smile. "Baby, you taste so good. Needed this."

There's desperation in it, the way he sucks on your clit, two fingers finding themselves rocking against your cunt so that you feel nothing but full, boundless pleasure. You're so wet that his digits are sliding effortlessly, even more so as he licks you through it.

All you can do is whimper and whine, hands coming to rest up against the headboard. "Clark, Clark, so good. Don't stop. Please."

The mattress shakes around you as he grinds up into the air, barely concealed want and need and everything he hasn't said before, teeth gently scraping at your cunt. You can hear it too, the way his mouth works against you, his moans rising above it all. And god, the tension—the fucking strength of this man—the fact that he's letting you ride his face like there's no tomorrow.

Then his tongue sweeps hot across your clit, his two fingers curling inside you at the exact moment you squeeze. And fuck, you pulse hard and come until you've got nothing left to give, just a mantra of his name—"Clark, Clark, baby—"

He licks and sucks you through the aftershocks, shuddering through it all, and then it's back down to earth.

You fall down on the bed next to him, legs unable to hold you up. The only way to describe how you feel now is just—pure, fucking, boneless glee. And then you look over, and god, if that's not the best view in the world—Clark. The bottom of his face glistening, smiling in that stupid, boyish way of his, curls in his eyes and a twinkle there like he just won the lottery. 

"What are you smiling about?"

Clark shakes his head, shrugging and looking up at the ceiling like it has the answers. "Oh, nothin'. Just happy."

This hunger, this love for him—you don't think it'll ever go away. You don't think you could ever get sick of it, you don't think you can ever get your fill of him.  You're going to want him this badly for the rest of your life. 

But before you could spiral down that terrifying staircase of thoughts, you're brought out your stupor with one large hand trailing up your thigh. Clark's shifted so that you're beneath him, world turned upside down. He's going back down for more.

"We've got at least four more to go, sweet girl. Made you a promise, remember?"

.

It’s honestly the quiet that gets you, at first. 

That slow, rolling kind that doesn’t sit heavy so much as drape itself across everything like an old quilt. The kind of quiet that has its own rhythm. Space between sounds. 

Not silence, never that, but it's more akin to a hush. A pause you didn’t know your life had been missing.

There are birds, sure. A lot of them, actually. There’s the wind, too, rattling through those wheat-colored fields, whistling past the house's warped slats like it’s trying to remember a song it used to know. But underneath it all is stillness. 

A kind of breath you didn’t realize you’d been holding, now slowly, slowly letting out.

Smallville wasn’t supposed to feel like this.

You’d pictured something more… stylized. Romanticized. 

A little more soap opera meets Hallmark original—maybe some mysterious family feuds and charming small-town antics. Some lingering drama about a pie contest. You fully expected someone with an old-timey name to pour you coffee at the local diner you guys stopped at and mention she “hasn’t seen Clark Kent around these parts in a while.”

Instead, you got: rooster at 5:30. Floorboard in the kitchen that creaks like it’s about to file a complaint against you just for exisiting. A guest room that smells faintly like wood polish and wheat. You got Clark, elbow-deep in chicken feed at seven a.m., wearing a white t-shirt that’s hanging on by a thread but you're not complaining.

You’re house-sitting for the Kents while Jonathan and Martha are on a cruise—a cruise, of all things. Clark’s voice had been thick with disbelief when he told you. 

“Can you believe my dad packed four Hawaiian shirts?” Then later, when they called from the boat to say they’d already made friends with a retired couple from Branson and signed up for salsa dancing classes, Clark had stared at the phone like it had personally betrayed him.

“They deserve it,” he says eventually, a little quiet. “They’ve never done anything like this. I hope they stay gone the full two weeks.”

You’d kissed his shoulder and said, “Selfishly, me too.”

Because being here, just the two of you, it’s not glamorous. But it feels like something. Something good.

One morning, early on, you found yourself squinting into the haze of a Kansas dawn, clutching a cup of coffee that tasted like burnt hope, and whispering, half to yourself, “Do… do the cows have names?”

Clark, already in his work boots and wrist-deep in a feed bag, turns like you’d just offered to marry him.

“Of course they do!" he says, smug. “That’s Millie.” He points at a big black-and-white cow with the expression of someone who’d once gone on Twitter and got traumatized. “She’s real skittish when it rains but loves, absolutely loves cantaloupe rinds. That one’s Donnie—he’s dramatic. Moooos like he’s dying if you’re even five minutes late.”

You blink at him. “You’re serious.”

“Deadly,” he says, patting Millie with the same affection he uses on your lower back when you cook dinner barefoot. It makes you snort. “Also, we don’t call it breakfast here. It’s ‘morning feed.’”

You stare. “This is so not the rural romance novel I signed up for.”

He grins, boyish and crooked. “Let me guess. Thought it’d be Days of Our Lives  but make it cornfed?”

“Exactly. Where’s the murder mystery? The barn dance? The family rival who wears all linen and says ominous things like, ‘You’ll never take the south pasture from me, you bastard.’”

"You forget. It's the Midwest. We're not in the South," He scratches behind Donnie’s ear. “But there is a someone with drama kinda like that here. Name's Barb, I think,” he says. “She runs the Dairy Queen and once hit a deer with her truck and cried about it for a week.”

You pause. “…Okay. That’s actually kind of sad. But wholesome."

“See?”

The days fall into a rhythm, eventually. 

You weed the garden (poorly). He fixes the gate (obscenely well). You help collect eggs and try not to let on that the chickens genuinely unsettle you. Clark, that menace, just laughs every single time one flaps in your general direction and you flinch like it’s going to demand your wallet and keys and job.

One Friday afternoon, you find yourself washing strawberries at the sink while Clark scrubs paint off the porch railing—some old project Jonathan started and never finished. 

You glance up and he’s standing there in the sun, t-shirt stained, face flushed, humming some old country song under his breath, and your chest physically hurts from how much you love him.

“You wanna do something dumb?” you ask, voice louder than it needs to be, just to get his attention.

Clark looks up, squints against the light. “Always.”

It’s not fancy. 

Twenty minutes later, you’re both in the back pasture, far enough from the house that it’s just you and the cows and the sound of summer in every direction. 

There’s a plastic grocery bag between you full of things neither of you should technically call lunch. Two kinds of chips (barbecue for you, cheddar for him). A Diet Dr. Pepper, sweating in the heat. One sad gas station brownie. And a couple of oranges, wrapped carefully in plastic wrap.

You lift an eyebrow as you start to unpack. “You know we have actual food, right?”

He shrugs, pulling the chips open. “The grocery store’s like forty minutes away,” he says, like that explains everything. “Didn’t wanna leave you.”

Your mouth opens, ready to toss something casual back—something about sandwiches, or homemade pasta salad, or literally anything with protein—but then you see how gently he’d wrapped the oranges. How he packed napkins, remembered your favorite chips, brought two plastic forks for the brownie like it was a birthday cake.

So instead, you say, “...I like barbecue,” and your voice is quieter than you mean it to be.

He glances over, chin on his shoulder, smiling like it’s the easiest thing in the world. “I know.”

You eat like kids. Cross-legged on the blanket, crumbs everywhere, licking orange juice off your thumbs. You wipe your hands on your pants. He stretches out on his side, elbow propped, watching the clouds like they’re moving too slow. His knee brushes yours and doesn’t move away. 

You think you feel a mosquito bite. You don’t really care anymore.

“I forgot what this feels like,” you say at one point, picking salt from the corners of your lips. “Just… doing nothing. On purpose.”

He hums. “It’s good for you. Stillness.”

“You sound like your mom.”

“She’s smarter than I am.”

“You said that last night when I told you to take a nap.”

“See? Pattern holds.”

You lean back on your elbows and look at him, really look. The way the light gets caught in his lashes. He’s watching you, too, like there’s nowhere else he’d rather be. Like the world could ask for him and he’d still choose to stay here, sweaty and dumb and mosquito-bitten and happy beside you.

He peels another orange with a practiced hand, splitting it down the middle and handing you the sweeter half.

“Thanks,” you murmur.

“Sometimes I miss this, y'know?” he says, around a bite of an orange.

You glance over.

“Not the chicken poop or the mosquito bites,” he adds, “but the...quiet. The not-having-to-be-everything-all-the-time. Out here, you’re just...you. You fix the fence. You make a mess. You listen to cicadas and complain about the humidity and your ma yells at you for tracking dirt inside.”

You tilt your head. “You ever think about staying? Settling down here?”

He doesn’t answer right away. Just plucks a blade of grass and spins it between his fingers.

“Sometimes,” he admits. “But then I think—this is what shaped me. But it’s not all I am. The world’s loud, and it’s messy, and it needs things. But this…” He looks at you. “This is what I miss when I’m out there.”

You nod. Reduced to speechlessness, because it's so tender and perfect and so him that it hurts.

Clark finishes the orange. Wipes his fingers on a napkin, then on his jeans when that doesn’t do the trick. You lie back on the blanket with a quiet sigh, letting the sun press into your skin, the breeze lift the sweat at your temples.

It could’ve ended there. Could’ve been just a quiet kind of golden. But then you nudge his ankle with yours.

“Bet I could outrun you,” you say lazily, like you’re not poking a bear.

Clark huffs. Turns his head toward you, amused. “That so?”

“Mmhm,” you say, stretching. “You’ve been slacking. Porch paint and chicken duty’s got you soft.”

He squints at you. “You really wanna start this?”

“You said yourself, Kansas. Nothing to do out here but complain about the heat and cause a little trouble.”

He smiles slowly. The kind of smile that curls at the corners. Dangerous in the way only someone so gentle and kind can be.

“Alright then,” he says, sitting up. “You get a ten-second head start.”

Your eyes go wide. “Wait, really—”

“Nine,” he says, already grinning, already counting.

You scramble to your feet. “Oh my god, you are not serious—”

“Eight.”

You bolt.

The grass is taller in some spots and it catches at your ankles, slows you down. The air is thick with sun and the hum of everything living. You turn left, laughing, hair sticking to the back of your neck, and glance behind you just in time to see him loping after you, easy and unhurried, like he’s letting you win.

Which is worse. Infuriating. Fucking ass.

“KENT!” you shout over your shoulder. “I swear if you let me win I’m gonna trip myself just to spite you—”

“Then you better run faster!” he calls back, but he’s laughing too, bright and open and young in a way he doesn’t always let himself be in the city.

You make it halfway to the barn before he catches you, just a hand on your waist, barely a tug. You spin with the momentum and half-collapse against him, breathless, wheezing from the run and the heat and the sheer absurdity of it all.

“You cheated,” you gasp.

“I didn’t even use my powers.”

“That’s worse.”

He leans in, resting his forehead against yours, both of you flushed and sweating and smiling like idiots.

“You’re fast,” he murmurs, voice low. “But I know how you move.”

You roll your eyes, still catching your breath. “Don’t say stuff like that unless you wanna get kissed.”

“Maybe I do,” he says, quiet now.

Oh, if that doesn't make you wanna ruin him. When you lean in, he tastes like oranges and sweat and something warm you can’t name.

“You’re always holding back,” you murmur against his mouth. “Let me have you.”

Clark’s breathing stutters.

“You have me,” he says, like it’s a promise. Like it’s been true since the first day you met.

Your teeth graze his lip, just enough to make him gasp. “Then act like it.”

Now that—that—does something to him.

His hands slip quickly under your sundress, palms mapping the curve of your back, hungry and greedy all at once. Your head tips back when his mouth finds your neck again, hot and open and just a little bit wild. His teeth scrape the spot just beneath your ear and your fingers clench in his curls, hard.

The bark digs into your shoulder blades. You can faintly feel the ground disappearing from under you. Grass sticks to the backs of your calves. The sky overhead is lazy and blue, clouds like pulled cotton, and none of it, absolutely none of it, matters. 

Not the cows, not the heat, not the fact that you're pressed up against a pecan tree in the middle of a Kansas pasture—just this. Just him.

It doesn't take long for it to escalate. 

You're not normally a fan of this—quickies, anyway, you'd rather take your time, break him down methodically, piece by piece, but you think you'd actually combust if you don't have him right there, right at that second. And damn it, you will. 

You will. 

Your hands scramble to wrench his shirt off, a mad dash to get as close to his skin as possible. He helps you, your pretty boy, your sweetheart, your sunshine—chuckling when the fabric inevitably gets caught between his head and shoulders. 

"Clark—" you glare at him, not really annoyed with him but his stupid, stupid shirt. "Get it—please, get it off—"

"So impatient," He grins. He helps you anyway, giving you that final push to get the shirt off his head. And then ou're like a moth drawn to a flame, nipping at his skin, sucking little love bites that you know he adores into his chest. "Baby, sweetheart—"

"Sweetheart, baby—" You kiss his collarbone, hands going to undo his belt, the metal clinking from your actions. "Need you now."

Clark nods vigorously at that. "Yeah, yeah—okay."

He readjusts, free now from his belt, jeans dropping low, and he's scooping your thighs up so you're flush against the tree for leverage. The bark of the tree's rough and it'll leave some truly horrendous marks later, but he's pushing your dress up around your waist, cock situated and ready at your entrance. 

A breath. A look between you. And then he sinks you down, no prep, no foreplay, just him and the burn of taking all of him bare.

You make an embarrassing noise when he bottoms out, yelping and wrapping your arms around his neck. Clark slows down, pressing kisses on your forehead and muttering small little praises. "You're doing so good. You feel amazing, baby, you just let me know when, I'll wait—"

Fuck, that turns you on more than it should've. You clench around him, mouth parting in a quiet moan. "Now, I'm ready now. Move, Kent."

His hand hitches your leg up higher for a better angle, and—yeah, if that's not the hottest thing in the world. The tenderness mixed with the way you know he's about to utterly destroy you. He rolls his hips, once, twice, until he sets a punishing rhythm.

He moves, hard and deep inside of you, always a stretch widthwise. Always feels like a rearrangement. Every single vein, every twitch, every agonizing inch as he gets to work fucking you like your life depends on it.

And the tree shakes—it fucking shakes, leaves falling all around you—when his pace gets punishing and relentless. All you can do is take it, legs shivering and hands scrambling to hold on to something, anything.

The strap of your dress has fallen down your shoulder at this point, and Clark takes the opportunity to wrap his hot mouth around your exposed nipple, eyes falling closed. "Tastes like heaven."

"Clark—" You shudder, his ruts turning more and more shallow. "Need more, I need—need help, please—"

He nods against your skin, letting go of your nipple with one wet pop. A hand skirts down between you, wordless, and rubs hard circles against your clit, never twisting, just a constant, almost vibrating pressure that wrenches more desperate gasps out of you.

You love him.

It hits you the hardest at that moment, when he grins and you can feel those tell-tale signs of your orgasm shuddering closer, so impossibly close that it makes your knees weak. Like your body can’t hold the thought anymore. 

Months of this, this agonizing need to tell him, to show him. And suddenly it’s all you can feel—this pressure behind your teeth, this wild, unspooling thing clawing to get out. You didn’t plan on it. You don't meant to. But it’s already there, clawing its way up your throat with a kind of ferocity that feels unstoppable.

You pull back a breath. Just enough to get the words free. Try to get lucid fast.

“I—”

But then his hand’s on your cheek.

Soft. Certain.

“Wait,” he says, and it’s gentle, but firm enough to stop you.

You freeze, stunned. Like someone hit pause on your entire brain.

“W–W–What?” you whisper, barely breathing. His pace doesn't break. Still pounding into you like he doesn't see right through you. His eyes flicker between yours—quiet, careful, like he sees exactly where you were going. Like he caught the words mid-flight.

“Not yet,” he murmurs. “Not like this, baby. Not while I'm—not against a tree.”

“I don't—I don't mind,” you whine. 

He laughs under his breath. "No.”

You must've pouted, must've frowned, or… or something, because Clark's expression goes soft. He tugs you closer, hips going deeper this time until your head falls back, like an apology. 

You're so close, so goddamn close, and fuck, if he's not determined to make it up to you. Focus redirected to the sole goal of making you finish harder than you ever have before. Another broken moan slips out of you.

And you're still overtaken by this need to say something, something to encapsulate this feeling inside of you. So instead, you say the next best thing, “You’re mine,” you say, fierce and true and sure.

Clark nods. “Yours,” he echoes, like it’s gospel.

You come around him like that, muscles wound up tight, him working himself into you faster—faster, until he pulses inside you. It's all warmth, his shoulders shaking like a leaf, you holding onto him like the old tire swing on a tree. Chests heaving. Sweat pooling underneath your knees. But he doesn't let go.

He pulls back just a tad, just enough to rest his head against the crook of your neck. His curls tickle your skin, just slightly. "Hold me tighter?"

You're still quivering, traitorous legs twitching, but you do. You wrap your arms around him and squeeze until he sighs, relaxed and spent and all the things that you let go unsaid. 

The cows, thankfully, have the decency not to interrupt.

.

He’s on the fire escape again.

You don’t see him at first—just the corner of his shirt sleeve through the window screen, fluttering gently in the breeze like a flag someone planted in a place they want to stay.

You step closer.

And there he is.

Sitting on the metal grate, knees drawn up, socked feet tucked against the warm steel, one arm draped loosely over the railing like he forgot the rest of the world exists. His head's tilted back against the sun, eyes closed, face subdued in that way it only gets when no one’s watching. 

Or maybe just when you are.

His shirt—some washed-out old thing from Central Kansas A&M—is rumpled and crooked on his frame like he pulled it out of the laundry basket and shrugged it on without thinking. One sleeve's shoved all the way to his elbow, exposing the freckles on his forearm.

You’re barefoot, cradling a sweating glass of lemonade in your palm, still in sleep shorts and one of his too-big sweaters again. You hadn’t meant to come looking for him. You just woke up and felt the space beside you was empty, not in a sad way, just… hollow. Cool. 

You followed the pull of it until it led you here.

He doesn’t move when you open the window. Doesn’t speak. But his eyes blink open, lashes catching the light. He looks at you, and that alone does something to your insides.

It’s the kind of look that hits low and blooms slow.

Not a spark, but a sunrise.

His smile when he sees you is small. A little crooked, like maybe he’s not so sure it’s okay to be this happy about something so simple. 

Like you just standing there, sleepy and squinting and probably still with pillow creases and hints of drool on your cheek, is his favorite part of this whole Saturday.

He lifts a hand and stretches it toward you.

Palm up.

Fingertips flexing.

“C’mere,” he says, voice warm from disuse. “It’s nice.”

You don’t hesitate. 

You climb carefully, your lemonade forgotten on the windowsill, and ease down between his legs. The fire escape creaks beneath you but holds. Of course it does. He shifts to make room for you like he already knew exactly how this would fit—your back against his chest, his knees bracketing yours, arms folding around you like second nature.

And you just sit like that, folded into him.

His chin hooks over your shoulder. His breath brushes your neck. One of his hands rests against your stomach, just above the hem of your sweater, warm through the fabric. The other finds your thigh, fingers drumming lazily against the denim there.

And you breathe. In and out. Slowly. Like maybe you forgot how before this.

“You been out here long?” you murmur.

He shrugs behind you. “I dunno. Long enough, maybe.”

You lean back into him, let your head fall onto his shoulder. “Get what you needed?”

There’s a long pause. Not like he’s unsure, just like he’s letting the quiet fill in some blanks first.

“Yeah,” he says finally. “I think I did.”

You let the silence stretch after that. It’s not awkward. It’s just… Clark. 

Which is to say: it’s safe.

The sunlight spills golden across the alley, catching in the curls at his temple. Today, he smells like clean cotton and cedar and whatever fancy soap he borrowed from your shower. His skin's warm. 

You rest your hand over his where it sits on your stomach. His thumb traces a lazy circle just under your ribs, like he’s mapping out the shape of you in his mind.

“I used to sit like this back home,” he says after a while, voice soft. “Not on a fire escape, obviously. We had a roof. And a swing. My dad always left it out a little too long, so in the summer it was warm to the touch by the time I got to it.”

You hum, eyes slipping closed.

“He used to say it was good for me. Sunlight. Said I always looked like a weed after a storm when I stayed inside too long. Pale and strung out and grumpy.”

“Grumpy?” you smile, turning your face a little to glance at him. “You?”

“Oh yeah,” he grins. “Pouty little farm boy, hair sticking up, refusing to eat my vegetables unless they were corn.”

“Let me guess,” you say. “Martha snuck green beans into casseroles when you weren’t looking.”

He makes a pleased noise. “Bingo. Said it was her secret weapon for keeping me out of trouble.”

“That and the swing?”

“That and the swing.”

You settle again, your cheek to his shoulder, the metal warm beneath your thighs. You wonder if this is what he felt like, back then—sitting outside in the golden quiet, the weight of the sky pressing gentle on his shoulders, like a blanket he didn’t know he needed.

“Isn’t it a beautiful day?” he says suddenly, like it just occurred to him.

And it is.

But it would’ve been, anyway.

You twist slightly, enough to catch the line of his jaw, the slope of his nose. He’s not glowing. Not exactly. But something in him is bright. 

And you—you love him so goddamn fiercely in that moment it feels like your ribs might crack from the inside. Like your heart is blooming against them, stubborn and wild and wholly his.

You lace your fingers with his where they’re still resting against your chest. His grip tightens. Not possessive. Just… sure.

He’s quiet a long time.

Then, like he’s been trying to time it right: “I love you.”

Just that.

Just the words, tucked into your collarbone. No fanfare. No build. Just truth. It roots into you like sunlight in soil. You don’t speak for a long moment, trying to get your lungs to work again. Your body. Everything else. Because it’s a simple sentence, but it feels like something tectonic and holy.

Eventually, you turn, slow and sure.

“I love you too.”

His head drops forward until his forehead presses to yours. You feel him exhale, shaky but smiling.

“I kept trying to find the right time,” he says. “I didn’t want it to feel like… I don’t know. A checkpoint. Like I had to say it because it was next on the list.”

You smile, thumb still brushing his skin. “So you went with the middle of the fire escape, during golden hour, while I’m in your hoodie and haven’t showered since last night?”

He shrugs. “Yeah. Felt right.”

You sit like that for a while, sun on your skin, his breath on your neck. The world feels quieter with him this close. Still.

Eventually, when the light starts to dip low, painting the fire escape in rust and gold, you shift to get up.

He doesn’t let go. Not immediately. His hands stay at your waist, his fingers patient where they rest at your sides. Anchoring you.

“You look good in this light,” you murmur. “Like—too good. It’s kind of rude, honestly.”

He huffs a laugh. “Yeah?”

You nod. “Like you belong in it.”

He looks at you for a long moment, something intimate and private in his eyes.

Then, “You’re not wrong.”

You tilt your head. “What, that you photosynthesize?”

But he just shakes his head, slow.

“No. Just… I think it���s you,” he says, almost like he’s surprising himself. “You make everything brighter.”

And it’s stupid, and it’s a little embarrassing, and you kiss him anyway. Because he’s warm and real and saying the kind of thing that would make anyone else roll their eyes—but with him, it just lands.

Tastes like the last light of the day and something sweet and earthy beneath it. Like coming home.

[quarterlifekitty]

Werewolf!Soap who’s tried so hard to keep his dog on a leash for you.

Not that he isn’t still nasty. He is. He’s still burying his nose in your pits every time you come back from hiking. You know what he is— but he’s never let you see him turn. He’s terrified of hurting you, or worse, without even knowing— he isn’t himself when he turns, he can never remember the things he does, so it’s best for everyone if he just stays away.

Until one night after a long deployment. Six months he’d been away— six months since he’d seen you, smelled you, touched you. The pair of used panties he’d taken with him had practically been worn to shreds with how often he fisted his cock with them and felt for them in his pocket. He’s so damned excited to see you, his leg thumping the entire ride home, practically sprinting away once Price dismisses him.

He’s too heavy with anticipation and need. He doesn’t keep track of the date. Of his cycle.

He wakes up at dawn with that sore, tingly feeling that follows his transformations. Once it settles in his brain, he shoots straight up. Your side of the bed is empty, save for some stray specks and one larger pool of blood staining the sheets.

Johnny immediately buries his face in his hands, bearing only to look at the evidence through the gaps in his fingers. He sobs. His worst fear in the entire world has been realized, the monster inside him that’d always hungered for you had finally got what it wanted. His stomach lurched and rolled with the possibilities— what might have ultimately become of you. Where the body was— if there was one. Maybe, if he was lucky, you crawled off and lived and would never want to see him again. But he knows his instincts would have never left escape an option— especially not when it came to you. The ring box that’s been sitting in his coat pocket is proof of that.

His entire body shakes with the torment and grief of it all, teeth clenching, his eyes shut as the tears just keep escaping. Love is over, because he killed it.

He’s so caught up in his despair that he doesn’t hear the footfalls on the floor. He doesn’t hear the clink of a glass set onto the nightstand. He doesn’t feel the dip of another weight on the bed.

Soap almost thinks it’s a trick from his deranged mind, a symptom of lupine madness, when he feels the warmth of a hand comfortingly rubbing up and down his back, another hand at his shoulder in a half-embrace.

“Baby, what’s the matter? Was it a nightmare?”

He had them, on occasion. Nature of the job, you knew that when you got involved. But he’d never seen this bad. It takes a minute or two before Johnny can bring himself to pull his trembling hands from his face, eyes puffy and wet with tears.

“B-Bonnie…? Yer… Yer okay?”

Soap was beginning to care less and less if this was a delusion. He would live in whatever reality kept you with him.

“I should be asking you that… Oh, Johnny—“ you sighed before wrapping him in a tight hug, even though his face and neck were wet and a little snotty from all of his crying.

“But, the blood—“

“Oh my god. Please, I’m so embarrassed… my period started while I was sleeping. I was so excited about you coming home that I totally lost track of the days…”

“So ye were gone because—“

“I left to clean myself up and get water… I wanted to change the sheets, but I didn’t want to wake you…” you start connecting the dots, even more embarrassed from all the worry you caused. “Did you think something happened to me?”

“Thought I fockin’ killed ye!” He says with a new wave of tears rushing to him, this time in relief. He pulls you in about as close as he can.

“Well, uhm… you basically did with like the dozen orgasms you gave me when you turned. I didn’t… I didn’t know your cock would do that thing, uhm, where it swelled up and… god, it was so hot,” you murmur, face feeling a bit warm just recalling it. A shiver runs through Johnny’s spine— your confession would have him thumping his tail if he still had it.

“Marry me.”

[writtencrone]

"Your husband knows about me, intimately."

Yandere! Dilf x bttm male reader

You had always assumed your sugar mommy was either single or had a very free relationship with her husband. You learn this isn't the case after you meet a man at a bar, and find that he knows more about you than you'd like.

Anal sex, anal fingering, rough sex, you break the bed on this one, stalking, cum tribute, possessive behaviour, cheating, infedility, mentions of m/f sex but never fully described because I'm lazy!

“Your husband knows about us,” you say.

You're sitting across from her in her tea room, and she's just served you some rare yellow tea (‘you look so pale, darling’). Your relationship with Claudia was not vague, it was defined and signed. You'd be her companion in moments like these, as usual after you've fucked and reached mutal bliss for however long or little Claudia wants. In return you were allowed a fixed stipend that covered all your living costs and then some.

You had been a host before, that's how you met this elegant and beautiful woman, but Claudia always liked to possess things. So she approached you with this contract. The idea of being a thing was less threatening when you could also afford other nice things.

“Yes, I suppose he does,” Claudia says, lounging in her afterglow. She wore only a silken robe, and you your boxers

“He's not… upset?” You ask, feeling a bead of sweat roll down your spine.

Claudia rolls her eyes. “Just drink your tea, darling. Charles is only upset when business is bad.”

Ofcourse, before this, you had met Charles – not knowing he was the Charles. Now you found yourself metaphorically wedged between these two wealthy sycophants.

About a week ago…

Yandere! Dilf who… You meet at a bar one night with your friends. You peel off from the group to sit and talk with the handsome older man sat in a booth by himself. He's hard to talk to at first, withdrawn. Eventually, you coax him to open up, buying him a drink and leaning in closely – it reminds you of your days working as a host. The satisfaction of earning a regular customer.

Yandere! Dilf who… Tell you his wife is cheating on him, and you sympathise with him. Nevermind the fact your sugar mommy is a married woman, because that's different . You assume your sugar mommy (lady, as she prefers it) has some sort of agreement with her husband, and never questioned it further. You brought him another drink, nodded and put your hand on his as he vented about years of an unsatisfactory marriage.

Yandere! Dilf who… When you place your hand on his thigh, leaning in closely. You know he's hard, You ask if he wants revenge, your lips ghosting over his. He says he just wants you.

Yandere! Dilf who… Drives you to his penthouse with a hand on your thigh, you lean across the space, talking, slightly tipsy. When you get home you both fumble in the dark, you ask for light but he says no – not until you're in the bedroom. You pout and ask him why he doesn't want to see you, he silences you a kiss and half your clothes are off by the time the back of your knees hit the bed.

Yandere! Dilf who… guides to your knees with his big hands, calloused yet surprisingly soft. You undo his belt and zipper, and he makes a joke about how every silver fox has a silver tail when you oggle at the silver streaked in his pubic hair. You had to turn your head into his thigh as you stifled a slight laugh, not because it's funny but because it is so bad. He instructs you to stand, and puts down a pillow for you to kneel on. It was a mercy, because you were there a while.

Yandere! Dilf who… moans and groans, rocking his hips into your mouth. You hollow your cheeks and suck, pulling yourself off his dick to run your tongue down his entire length and swipe across his balls. Before immediately putting it back in your mouth and taking it to the hilt, his pubic hairs were ticklish against your face as you deep throated him. He moaned, his hands tangling in your hair. You started to choke around him, the fluttering of your throat so euphoric he released down your throat. Your eyes rolled into the back of your head, spots danced across your vision - death by dick?

Yandere! Dilf who…pulls you off leisurely, admiring how the mix of semen and spit connect your lips to his departing tip. He holds you there, head tilted back as you gulp for air.

“I hope your appetite isn't ruined,” he says, and oh how he stares down at you. You feel dissected.

“I'm just getting started.”

Yandere!Dilf who… fingers you for a horrible amount of time. He works you open leisurely, cooing about how good you'll look on his cock whilst a finger curls against your prostrate. You whine, and by the end of it you're taking three fingers with ease.

“That was quicker than I thought,” his gravelly voice remarks, hitching one of your legs over his shoulder. He presses a kiss to the ankle, and you actually blush. “I suppose you have experience in this as well, I almost forgot.”

Before you can ask ‘hey what do you mean by that. Your dick was ticking my lungs areoli just a minute ago—’ followed quickly by ‘wait aren't areola my nipples?’ he buries himself in you in a brutal snap of his snap.

Your mouth is agape in a silent scream, drifting off into a whine as you bury your head into the pillows, your legs were kicking uselessly as your body was catching up the sensation of fullness.

Yandere! Dilf who… fucks you tenderly then brutally, holding you close then pinning you down, reducing you to a creature halfway to grief out of how much it was, and halfway to total bliss out of how good it was.

The lewd sounds of skin against skin overpowered your cries, your wanton moans.

Yandere! Dilf who… is an attentive lover, which makes him all the more crueler when he knows you're reaching out to hold him, to find some leverage as he plowed you into the mattress, and he denies you with a tsk. Your knees are by your shoulders and your feet somewhere higher as he finds leverage in this position where you can't cover yourself – can't flee.

You whimper and fist at the sheets, the pillows tossed to the ground after you tried to hide in them. You were drooling, weeping, flushed red and your eyes rolled back into your head as you came with a shout. He lifts your hips higher, thrusts deeper, and beneath you the creaking bed cracks once and for all. You yelp as a sudden dip forms…

You guys broke the bed.

When he finishes you feel his warmth pool in your gut like a match, you let out a whine when he pulls out – half hard.

“We're not done just yet.”

Yandere! Dilf who… is good at after care. He cleans you up, inspects the bites he left on you and confirms none of them broke skin (“A shame.”), carries you limp in his arms to the washroom. He lathers you, holds you. He doesn't demand more, and when you lay down on his bed you look at him, a little nervous, and ask.

“Do you want me to stay?”

He tilts his head to the side.

“What ever made you think I'd want you to leave?”

You let yourself be gathered into his arms, you breathe in his expensive body wash and fall asleep like that. Sandalwood and citrus notes on your mind.

Yandere! Dilf who… doesn't wake up first. You slip out of his arms and drape a robe around yourself, stumbling out of the room quietly whilst picking up your clothes. Your lower back is aching, but it's lost in all the hickeys that crown your collarbone. You'd almost think him a vampire for how much he'd latch onto you.

Yandere! Dilf who… left the room to his study unlocked, and you stumble in whilst getting dressed. His laptop is sat open and you tentatively press the space bar, only for it to light up and go immediately to his desktop (he didn't set a password?).

What catches your eye is an email notification with your name in the subject. Your full name.

‘On the matter regarding L/n, F/n.’

Your hands shake as you click on it, settling at the edge of the plush seat. What you find is a resignation from a private investigator, citing that the requests had gotten too unethical to continue.

You find an email thread 79 emails long. It starts with an image of you and Claudia after having sex, your hair wild from where he ran his hands through it. You're smiling at something she said - you remember this day.

Then it's your name, your social security number, your address, your parents address, the addresses of the schools you attended. Your stomach drops as you scroll and watch as Charles - now you know that he's that Charles - curated an intricate portrait of your life. Of the bars you frequented.

Then it's pictures, so many pictures. The final request was to put cameras in various rooms of your house, including your shower, before the PI resigned.

You scramble through his desks, trying to find something. A pen, a phone, something.

You find a photo of yourself, taken candidly whilst you were on the beach. Its sticky and the paper is crinkled - it's a cum tribute. You gag, rolling your chair away from the desk only to bump into…

Yandere! Dilf who… wraps his arms around you, locking you in that chair.

“I never quite figured out how to set a password,” he sighs, his breath is minty. Your mouth is dry. “Though, I suppose I didn't expect company so soon.”

He pressed a kiss to your cheek and you felt his teeth.

“You're Claudia's husband,” you remark, dryly.

“And you're her boyfriend. Very liberal of her to allow you to see other partners, probably the only liberal thing about her.”

He shrugs, and pulls away.

“ I should go home,” You say around the lump in your throat.

“Of course,” he purrs, sauntering away. “I did hope you'd stay for brunch, but I suppose your appetite has been ruined.”

He smiles, studying you. Alight with horror and sat in his seat wearing basically nothing.

“I'll see you around.”

You stumble out of the apartment, your clothes the wrong way around.

[multi-fandom-imagine]

Fucking Divine || Johnny Storm ||

A/n: here it is! As promised!

Warnings: Pregnancy sex

The soft whirr of the fan in the Baxter Building did little to cool the flush blooming across your face. Third trimester, swollen ankles, and a dress that didn’t quite drape the way it used to.

You stood by the mirror in your shared bedroom with Johnny fidgeting with the waistband of your maternity slip. You knew he’d never said anything unkind—but lately, every reflection felt like a stranger.

Your hands skimmed over the curve of your belly, a small pout forming on your lips.

“I look like a house,” you muttered.

“Excuse me?” came Johnny’s voice behind you, smooth and edged in disbelief.

You turned halfway, startled, catching him in the mirror’s reflection—white T-shirt, dark slacks, and that stormy look in his eyes reserved only for two things: villains, and you doubting yourself.

Johnny walked up slowly, arms crossed, heat radiating off him in more ways than one. “You wanna say that again, sweetheart?”

“I just… I feel huge. My thighs rub, my back hurts, and don’t even get me started on my—”

Before you could finish, he was behind you, hands on your hips, lips brushing the shell of your ear.

“You’re carrying our baby,” he murmured, voice low, reverent. “You think that makes you anything less than fucking divine?”

You tried to deflect with a soft laugh as you tried to twist away, but Johnny wasn’t letting go. One hand slid around to cup the underside of your belly, while the other smoothed up your waist, fingers splaying over your ribcage.

“I want you,” he whispered, voice turning molten. “So bad I can barely stand it.”

“Johnny…”

His lips pressed to the back of your neck. Then your shoulder. Then lower.

“You don’t get to hide from me,” he said as he knelt down, hands trailing reverently over your hips. “Not when you’re glowing like this. Not when you’ve never looked more like mine.”

He nuzzled your belly, then looked up at you from under those lashes with a wicked grin.

“Lie back for me.”

You hesitated only a second before letting him guide you to the bed, slow and careful. You propped yourself against the pillows, your thighs parting as he crawled between them.

He kissed the swell of your belly again before trailing lower—down to the top of your mound.

“God, I love your pussy when you’re like this,” he groaned, breath hot. “All soft and swollen and dripping for me.”

Your breath hitched, warmth creeping up your neck as gaze remained glued to him. He pushed your thighs wider, kissing the plush inside of one while his fingers slipped to tease at your entrance.

“You feel that?” he murmured, drawing a long, slow stroke through your folds. “You’re soaked.”

“Johnny,” you whispered, voice trembling.

“I’m gonna fuck you so good, baby, you’re gonna forget every single thing you said in that mirror.”

His mouth descended on you, slow and greedy—tongue curling into your folds, lips sucking your clit just the way you liked, until your hips bucked and your fingers gripped the headboard.

“God, Johnny, I—”

“That’s right,” he growled, replacing his tongue with two thick fingers, fucking them into you steadily while his other hand kneaded your thigh. “Let me hear how beautiful I make you feel.”

Your walls clenched hard around him, and he groaned like it hurt. “Fuck—I need to be inside you.”

He stood, hastily pushing his pants down, cock springing free and hard, tip flushed and dripping.

You opened for him instinctively.

“Look at you,” he said, climbing over you. “So perfect. So fucking made to take me.”

He guided himself to your entrance, his forehead pressing to yours.

“Tell me to stop,” he whispered.

“Don’t you dare,” you breathed.

He pushed in slow, deep—inch by inch until you were filled, stretched, utterly wrecked beneath him.

“Shit, sunshine,” he groaned. “You feel unreal.”

You whimpered, clinging to his biceps, thighs shaking.

He pulled back and rocked into you again, hips finding a rhythm that hit deep—slow, deliberate thrusts that brushed everything inside you. The bed creaked, your moans mixing with his.

“I can feel how tight you are,” he gasped. “Squeezing my cock like you wanna keep me in there forever.”

“Don’t stop,” you begged.

“I’m not fucking stopping,” he growled.

He shifted, slipping a hand under your thigh to angle you just right—each thrust now pounding into the perfect spot, cock thick and pulsing inside your pussy.

You cried out as the pleasure crested, eyes wide as it overtook you.

“Johnny—!”

“Yeah, that’s it,” he panted. “Cum for me, beautiful. Milk my cock. Show me how pretty you are when you fall apart.”

Your pussy clenched around him, spasming through your orgasm, and Johnny couldn’t hold back—he drove in deep with a strangled cry, his cock pulsing as he filled you with thick, hot come.

He stayed there, breathing ragged, forehead to yours.

“That,” he said, voice hoarse, “is what beautiful looks like.”

You blinked up at him, dazed and glowing.

He leaned down to kiss your belly once more.

“And now I’m gonna go run you a bath, rub your feet, and remind you every damn hour how sexy you are with my baby inside you.”

You laughed, flushed and breathless. “You’re ridiculous.”

“I’m obsessed,” he corrected, already slipping off the bed. “There’s a difference.”

And you let yourself believe it. Because with Johnny Storm, you never felt anything less than adored.

[danitcx]

More Human Than You Think

Clark Kent x female reader

Synopsis: She was just supposed to do the interview Clark couldn’t attend. That was all. Just questions, answers, and a photo with Superman. But something about the way he looked at her… the way he spoke about Clark… made everything shift. And maybe, without knowing it, she gave away more than she meant to.

Warnings: No explicit content. Lots of fluff, shyness, accidental confession, secret identity, romantic tension.

WC: 3,686 words

════ ∘◦❁◦∘ ════

You looked at your reflection in the elevator glass one last time before reaching the rooftop. You had chosen the most professional outfit your closet allowed: light beige dress pants, straight-cut, paired with a matching blazer and a short-sleeved white blouse with a high collar, perfectly ironed and fitted to your body without losing formality. Your heels, also beige, made barely any sound with each step. Your hair was tied in a low bun, with a few loose strands framing your face. And your handbag was elegant, small, cream-colored.

You sighed.

It was the most formal thing you had. The most professional. And even though your stomach twisted with nerves, you couldn’t wipe away that faint smile that kept appearing. You were about to interview Superman. No less than Superman. And you knew that if the interview went well, your name could end up on the front page… right where you’d seen your coworker Clark Kent’s name before.

Clark… Of course you owed this to him.

He was the one who always got direct interviews with Superman. No one knew how he did it. But this time, Perry White had requested that the Daily Planet at least be visible in the background. And Clark had managed it… until the night before, when he texted you saying he was very sick and wouldn’t be able to make it. He ended the message with a sentence that still made your heart flutter:

“I trust only you with this.”

You accepted, of course. Though your first reaction was to worry about him. More than anyone, you had watched him since you both started working there. Silently, you had fallen in love with Clark with almost absurd devotion. Lois had noticed, she even encouraged you to talk to him, but you always refused with a nervous smile. Because, come on… it was Clark. The kind guy, always smiling, bringing coffee for everyone and helping even when he didn’t have to. You were probably just confusing his kindness for something more.

So you settled for having him close. Even if it was just as a coworker.

But that night, standing in front of you, would also be Superman. And although you looked like a background fangirl at a K-pop concert, the truth was you admired him beyond the superficial. Yes, he was handsome. Impossibly handsome. But what captivated you was the other stuff: his way of saving humans and animals alike, his calmness, his humanity… More human than many humans. Though they called him a metahuman, some even considered him a threat. You didn’t.

You took a deep breath as you opened the rooftop door. Luckily, it wasn’t windy. The air was warm, steady. You closed the door gently. No one knew he would be there. That’s why, after your shift, you had snuck back to your apartment and returned just for this moment. The buildings at that hour were already empty. Just you… and him.

You checked your phone. Still no response to the message you had sent Clark during lunch: “The interview will be soon. How are you feeling? If you need anything, let me know.”

“Good evening.”

The voice behind you was soft, deep, with a warm tone you recognized instantly. You turned slowly… and there he was. Floating. Hovering effortlessly in front of you, his cape gently billowing behind him, lit by the golden lights of the city.

Superman.

“Good evening,” you managed to say with difficulty, trying to sound professional. You never imagined being so close to a man who literally defied gravity. “You must be waiting for Clark. He said that…”

“Yes,” he interrupted gently, landing, his boots touching the ground with a soft sound. “I got an email.”

“You have an email?” you asked, surprised, before you could stop yourself. He smiled, with that almost unreal warmth that made your chest tighten.

“Sorry. Please, have a seat,” you said quickly, pointing to the chairs you had set up earlier that morning. Two simple chairs, facing each other, with the golden globe of the Daily Planet in the background.

“Clark said he could trust you,” he said as he sat down. “He… really appreciates you.”

Your heart gave a little jolt.

Clark talked about you to Superman?

“Clark has always been kind to me. We're just coworkers,” you murmured, not knowing why you felt so exposed. “But I’m not here to be interviewed by you,” you added, which caused a soft, genuine laugh from him.

“You're right. Go ahead, please,” he replied.

You nodded, turned on your pocket recorder, and opened your notebook.

“Let’s begin,” you said, forcing yourself to keep a formal tone, though your fingers trembled slightly. “Thank you again for doing this,” you began. “I know you’re usually very private, so… I really appreciate it.”

“Clark insisted,” he said with a smile. “But I’m doing it because I believe in the importance of what is said… and how it’s said.”

“Then I’ll start there. How do you decide when to speak and when to stay silent in the face of international crises?”

“Every word can carry political, military, or emotional weight. Sometimes, silence is also a message. But when I speak, I try to do so with hope… not fear.”

“What has been the most difficult moment you’ve faced during a mission?” you asked.

Superman hesitated.

“Saving someone who doesn’t want to be saved,” he finally answered. “People who are so hurt by life that they believe they don’t deserve help. That… hurts more than any blow.”

You fell silent for a moment, touched by his honesty.

“How do you deal with loss? With… what you can’t save?”

The sadness that appeared in his eyes was so human that you almost forgot you were standing in front of a symbol.

“With memory. I remember their names, their faces. I pray for them. And I keep going… because stopping would mean failing them again.”

Your fingers stopped writing for a second.

“Lastly,” you said, looking up, “this is a slightly more personal question. Clark mentioned that you save lives equally, without distinctions, and that moved me. You give each life a deep value. Why do you do that?”

Superman remained silent, but not out of discomfort. It seemed he truly wanted to find the right words.

“You said it yourself. They’re lives. Each one has a universe inside, dreams, fears, laughter, people waiting for them at home. It doesn’t matter who they are or where they come from… everyone deserves to be saved. Because the simple fact of existing is reason enough.”

You put away the recorder and looked at him with a calm smile.

“And that makes you more human,” you said softly, but firmly.

The surprise on his face was clear. But also something deeper. Gratitude. As if no one had ever told him that before. As if, for a moment, you had touched something no one else could reach.

“Thank you for your time. Really. I hope I didn’t take too much of it. Maybe I’m not Clark but…”

“You did a good job.” His response was quick, and when you looked at him, he smiled at you. For a moment, the way he said it reminded you so much of Clark that you let yourself be carried away. “Clark mentioned you were a big admirer of mine,” he added, lowering his voice slightly.

“Oh, of course… but don’t think I’m going to throw myself at you right now,” you replied with an amused smile.

He let out a genuine laugh. Deep. Warm.

“Is that… what you want?” he teased, without losing that charming expression.

“No… no, I don’t want you to get the wrong idea,” you stammered nervously, searching your bag for your camera to distract yourself. “You’re Superman. But I… I’m in love with someone else.”

He didn’t answer. But if you had looked at him in that moment, you would’ve seen how his face changed subtly. His eyebrows lifted slightly, his lips parted. Surprised. Almost disappointed. As if he wasn’t expecting that answer.

When you finally looked up, he had already recomposed himself, as if nothing had happened. His expression was neutral again. Almost too much.

“May I?” you asked, raising the camera. “I need the Daily Planet world to be visible in the background of the photo. It’s to visually justify the interview.”

He nodded with a slight tilt of his head.

“And… that someone you’re in love with… do they work here?” he asked suddenly, taking a few steps but without taking his eyes off you.

You didn’t notice. You were focused on adjusting the lens, searching for the ideal light.

“They do,” you replied, without thinking too much. “But I can’t say who.”

“No?” he repeated, pretending to be offended. “Do you think Superman is a gossip?”

You laughed at the joke, not noticing that, even though he was still smiling, it hurt him a little more than he wanted to admit.

“Not at all,” you said playfully, still looking through the viewfinder. “There it is… give me a second.”

A few seconds passed in silence. Just the click of the settings.

And then, without thinking too much, you said:

“Just imagine if you went and told Clark that I’m in love with him…”

You took the photo.

The flash lit up his face just as his eyes opened wide. Disconcerted. Vulnerable. As if a ray of truth had been fired into his chest.

You lowered the camera and checked the image, unaware of everything.

“I need you to smile, for the photo,” you said, not noticing the storm of emotions you had just unleashed.

But you didn’t know what that phrase had caused.

Superman… no, Clark, smiled. He truly smiled. Not forced. Not out of protocol. He smiled as if his soul had lit up. As if his whole body was vibrating from within.

An absurd, warm, and sweet happiness flooded him completely. You. You were in love with him. With Clark. And you had just told him… without knowing it.

And you took four more photos of him, one after the other, not realizing you were capturing a moment he would treasure forever.

“All done,” you said when you finished, carefully lowering the camera. “Thank you very much. It was a pleasure meeting you… but I have to go.”

“Of course…” he said, taking a step back, still smiling. “It was also a pleasure meeting you… but, if you’d like… I can walk you home.”

You looked at him, surprised by the offer, but gently shook your head.

“Don’t worry. It’s still early, it hasn’t gotten dark. Besides… you have to protect the city, right?” you smiled, lowering your gaze with shyness. “And I’m not going to my apartment. I’m taking some dinner to… Clark.”

Your voice softened at the end, almost like a whisper, as if saying his name that way revealed more than you wanted to admit. Because no one —except Lois— knew you were in love with him.

“Oh…” he murmured, almost breathless. “You’re going to see him?”

You nodded, adjusting your bag.

“Well… say hi to Clark for me. I hope he gets better soon.”

“Well… send my regards to Clark. Hope he recovers soon,” he said with a voice that tried to sound casual.

You said goodbye with a smile and began to walk away. You didn’t see him stay there, motionless, watching you leave as if the world became more beautiful with every step you took.

As you walked through the city, you carefully put away your camera and the photos, making sure nothing got lost. You decided to stop by a pharmacy first: you bought cough medicine, a box of lemon tea, and a jar of honey. Then you went to a homemade food restaurant called Ma’s Kitchen, where you knew they made one of Clark’s favorite dishes: meatloaf with mashed potatoes and garlic bread. For yourself, you ordered a club sandwich you had been craving since the morning. Everything to go.

You were hungry, but the idea of not having dinner alone excited you more. It was the perfect excuse to see him. You had never been to his apartment before, but this time you couldn’t resist. You had missed him at work. You were afraid his cold might get worse. And you wanted to be close.

When you arrived, you stood in front of the door, hesitating to knock. You finally did. Once. Twice. You heard strange noises on the other side. What if he was so sick he didn’t want visitors?

And just when you were about to leave so you wouldn’t bother him, the door opened.

Clark appeared on the other side. His hair was messy, he was wearing an open robe that showed a simple white T-shirt and dark green plaid pajama pants. His glasses were slightly crooked, and a loosely wrapped scarf hung from his neck. He was smiling… but he immediately looked away, and his face fell as if he had forgotten something important.

“Hi. Cof,” he coughed strangely, very unconvincingly. You had no idea that Clark had flown at full speed to make sure he got there before you, changed clothes, and put on a sick expression… which he had clearly forgotten to rehearse.

“Hi, Clark,” you greeted with a soft smile, not noticing anything odd, just worried about him. You watched him closely, his cheeks were slightly flushed—was it from the effort? The heat? Or because of you?

“Sorry to interrupt. You must be really sick… but I brought some medicine and, well, I didn’t know if you had dinner yet. But if you’re tired, don’t worry. I can leave everything and let you rest. Maybe I should’ve warned you first…”

“No, no, come in,” he said quickly, stepping aside. “I’m feeling a bit better. Cof.”

He repeated the cough, as if he believed saying it at the end of the sentence made it more believable. You gave him a compassionate look, not questioning anything. He just watched you walk in with your bags, unable to stop smiling… because you were there. Because you hadn’t gone home. Because you had come to see him.

He let you in, pointing the way to the kitchen. The place was clean, too tidy for someone who was sick, but that didn’t surprise you. Clark had always been meticulous.

“I left everything here,” you said, placing the bags on the table. “These meds help me when I’m sick, and the ginger tea is awful, I know, but if you add honey, it’s tolerable. If you want, I can make it for you…”

Clark looked at you with a sincere smile, nodding gratefully.

“How did the Superman interview go?” he asked suddenly, with a natural tone that sounded almost rehearsed as he sat down.

“Good,” you replied while unpacking the dishes and serving the food. “He was kind. He answered everything I asked. You could tell that… it’s not just strength. He’s very human in some of his answers.”

Clark looked down, as if the compliment affected him, though a smile escaped him.

“Yeah… let’s say he likes to know things. Even if they’re not always his business.” He scratched his neck, pretending to be uncomfortable. “Did he say anything… about me?”

You simply shook your head, though your cheeks lit up. You couldn’t help but think about the moment when, in front of Superman, you confessed that you liked Clark Kent. It still embarrassed you.

“No, he didn’t say anything,” you lied quickly, looking away and pretending to check the bags. “I just talked to him… took some pictures. Nothing important.”

“Thanks for this… really.”

“Eat. It’ll make you feel better,” you said, changing the subject. “Perry said it’s okay if you don’t go in tomorrow. You should rest all weekend,” you added as you sat in front of him.

Clark silently cursed himself. That lie —being sick— now kept him away from you all Friday… and maybe the weekend. And that meant not being able to ask you out like he had been planning. But amid the guilt, a spark of happiness appeared when you looked at him, a little shy, a little hesitant.

“If you want, I can bring you dinner again tomorrow,” you said as you gathered the wrappers. “And I can tell you how my article turned out and what Perry said.”

Clark looked up immediately, with eyes so wide and bright they almost lit up.

He nodded softly. “I’d love that.”

There was a warm brief silence as you finished your meal.

“You know?” you said, raising an eyebrow. “My grandma used to swear that the best remedy for a cough was wrapping your feet in hot mustard and putting on thick socks.”

Clark looked at you, confused. “Mustard… on your feet?”

“I swear. And then she said you had to sleep with a slice of onion on your neck.” You laughed, remembering the scene.

Clark laughed too, though the image caused him a mix of horror and affection. “Please tell me you’re not bringing me onions tomorrow.”

“Jokes aside, Clark…” you murmured, lowering your voice a little. “Are you sure you’re okay?”

He swallowed hard. He knew he wasn’t acting sick very well, but your sincere gaze disarmed him.

“I’m okay. Just… tired, I guess. But thank you for worrying.”

When you got up to say goodbye, you gave him a playful little punch on the shoulder. He blushed like a teenager, looking down, both delighted and nervous.

“Get some rest, okay?” you said, this time with a sweetness in your voice as if you’d cared for him your whole life. “And if you feel worse during the night, don’t hesitate to call me. Really, Clark. Anytime.”

He looked up slowly and nodded, grateful, with that tenderness in his eyes that almost made you stay a minute longer.

“See you tomorrow,” he replied.

You left the building not knowing that, from his window, Superman was still watching you. He flew at a safe distance, quietly keeping watch until he saw you enter your building. He was fascinated by how beautiful you looked in that coat.

And then he understood.

You had friend-zoned Superman. His most iconic version. Because to you, only Clark Kent existed. Only he lived in your mind. Only he was the one you liked.

The man who blushed when you smiled at him. The one who walked with you through the newsroom and offered you his coat if you felt cold. You had chosen him. His most real part. His clumsiest, most human, most vulnerable version.

Because while the whole world dreamed of flying among the clouds, you had stayed on the ground… to walk by his side.

And in that moment, nothing else mattered. A thousand catastrophes could come, a thousand responsibilities, a thousand exhausting days. But if you kept looking at him the way you did today, if you kept bringing him tea and offering to have dinner together, if you kept wanting to take care of Clark Kent…

Then he was the luckiest man on the planet.

He couldn’t wait to ask you out. To tell you that he had chosen you too. Long before you even knew it.

════ ∘◦❁◦∘ ════

💌 I take requests occasionally! If you have an idea, feel free to send it my way. I’d love to bring it to life 🤍

[stayycalm]

“Too Much”

𝓹airing ꒱ ˒˓ Maknae Line x Female!reader ˒˓ established relationship. 𝓰enre/ angst, hurt-no comfort, they lose their cool and say your presence is too much, so you give them what they asked for, space. (a.k.a the classic they call you clingy trope).

[ 𝒏𝒐𝒕𝒆. ] — here’s the Maknae line full of angst, hot and ready for y’all! Let me know what u think! <3

Hyung line

Han

You were starting to forget what his voice sounded like when it wasn’t recorded.

Text messages had thinned out to one-word replies, if you even got those. Calls went unanswered.

The last time you FaceTimed, he looked exhausted and distracted, barely able to finish a sentence without checking the screen behind the camera.

You understood, he had a comeback in two weeks, and 3RACHA was in overdrive.

But that didn’t make the silence hurt any less.

So, when you showed up at the studio with his favorite pastry and an iced americano (half sweet, extra ice—the way he always forgot to ask for it), it wasn’t to guilt him or get in the way. It was because you missed him.

Plain and simple.

You just wanted to see your boyfriend.

When you stepped inside, the familiar smell of coffee, dust, and electronics wrapped around you.

The studio lights were low, but the soundboard was glowing. There he was, headphones on, lips moving as he murmured along to something, hands flying across the keyboard in bursts.

He didn’t hear you at first.

“Jisung?”

You tried to sound soft. Not intrusive. Not demanding. Just… present.

He turned, blinking like he’d forgotten other people existed. His expression didn’t change. Not even when he saw you standing there, holding a coffee and a brown paper bag with a little heart drawn on it.

“I… I figured you’d be here,” you said, your smile a little too hopeful.

“You haven’t answered me, so I thought… I don’t know. I’d stop by.”

He didn’t say anything.

“I brought coffee,” you added quickly, walking over. “And cheesecake. New York style, right?”

Still no response. Just a slight hum as he turned back to the screen, the track looping in his headphones.

You told yourself not to take it personally. He was working. You’d just sit in the corner like always, quietly cheerleading from the background. You’d done this before. It used to be your thing.

You started tidying his space while he clicked through sound samples, moving a few empty bottles, stacking his notebooks so they weren’t splayed across the floor. Just something to do while you waited for him to say anything.

But then your elbow brushed one of the cables. A bump. Barely noticeable. Until everything on the screen glitched.

Your heart jumped.

“I’m so sor—”

“What the hell?!”

His voice cut you off. Sharp. Loud. Angry.

You turned slowly. He was standing now, chair pushed back, arms stiff at his sides.

“Are you serious right now?” he snapped. “You can’t just come in here and touch stuff like it’s your personal hangout!”

You blinked. “I—I was just trying to help—”

“Help?” He laughed, short and bitter. “You think showing up here and messing with my setup is helping?”

Your hands were shaking.

“I just wanted to see you,” you said, voice small.

“This isn’t a date,” he bit out. “I’m at work. You don’t belong here when we’re on a deadline. God, you’re always just… showing up. Hovering. Acting like—like some clingy—”

He stopped. But not fast enough.

You felt like the air had been knocked out of your chest.

Clingy.

Obsessive.

The words weren’t new, not in your head, anyway. You’d feared them every time you double-texted, every time you asked if he needed anything.

But hearing them now? From him?

You blinked fast, trying to hold in the tears. You’d promised yourself you wouldn’t cry in front of him.

“I just thought maybe… you missed me.”

He didn’t answer.

That said more than anything.

Your eyes flicked to the coffee cup. Still untouched. The little heart you drew on the sleeve was already smudging from condensation.

“I guess I was wrong,” you whispered.

Then you turned and left, before he could see the tears.

That night, you waited.

For a call. A message. Anything.

You got:

hey
u good?
i didn’t mean it like that
just rly stressed

You didn’t respond.

Not because you wanted to be petty. But because you didn’t know what to say.

Because you weren’t okay. And no amount of him backpedaling could erase how easily he’d thrown that word at you. How he’d looked at you like a problem instead of his person.

The next few days blurred.

He texted a few more times. You muted the thread.

You needed space, something he had clearly wanted, and now you were trying to give it.

You were walking home a few days later when you saw him.

Standing outside your apartment building, hood pulled low, mask on, iced coffee in hand like that was some kind of peace offering.

You almost pretended not to see him.

“Hey,” he said, stepping forward. “Can we talk?”

You didn’t stop walking.

“Please,” he added. “Just a minute.”

You let out a slow breath and turned.

“What?”

He blinked, caught off guard by the coldness in your voice.

“I’m sorry,” he started. “I didn’t mean what I said. I was exhausted, and that track was already wrecked, and I wasn’t thinking straight—”

You held up a hand.

“Jisung, stop.”

He looked at you, pained.

“You don’t get to blow up on me and then act like a coffee and half an apology makes it okay.”

“I didn’t mean to hurt you.”

“But you did.”


Your voice cracked despite your best efforts. “You called me clingy like my caring for you was wrong. Like I haven’t been here for you, quietly, patiently, while you disappeared into your own head for weeks.”

He stepped forward again, desperate. “I miss you.”

“Do you?”


You tilted your head, blinking at him. “Or do you just miss the idea of me? The one who shows up, drops off coffee, cheers you on, and doesn’t expect anything back?”

He was silent.

“I’m not a convenience, Jisung. You don’t get to ignore me for weeks and then need me when it suits you.”

His jaw tightened. “That’s not fair.”

“Neither was what you said,” you shot back.

“Neither was the way you made me feel like I was suffocating you just by caring.”

There it was again, that stunned look on his face, like he didn’t think this would still matter to you. Like he expected you to be over it by now.

You smiled bitterly. “But sure. I’ll be the clingy one.”

You turned to go.

“Wait—”


His voice cracked. “Can’t we fix this?”

You looked over your shoulder.


“I don’t know, Jisung. I don’t think I’m the one who broke it.”

Then you walked into your building, leaving him there.

Felix

The flash drive feels small in your hand, insignificant, but really, it held so many important things on it, and if it was what got you out the door. What gave you a reason to see him again, you’d take it.

You hadn’t expected it to come from Chan.
His text had been short and casual:

“Hey, sorry to bother, but I think Felix left that black flash drive at your place a few days ago? We need the demo files on it. If you’re free, mind dropping it off at the dorm?”

You stared at the message a long time.

You weren’t sure if Felix even remembered he left it behind.

But you answered quickly:

“Of course. I’ll head over now.”

Because it had been over two weeks. Two weeks since you’d last really seen him, face-to-face, not over a blurry call or a half-asleep voice note.

He was buried in preparations for the comeback: rehearsals, recording, dance practice, schedules that blurred day into night. You understood. You always had. But that didn’t make the ache in your chest any less.

He hadn’t been distant, not intentionally. Just… exhausted. Spread too thin. Always running late. Always apologizing.

You hadn’t wanted to be one more thing on his to-do list. So you kept your distance, tried to be understanding.

But now you had an excuse to see him.

You stop by the convenience store on the way and grab a few of his favorite snacks. Stuff he used to always crave when he was working too hard.

You even get that vitamin drink he likes, the one that’s hard to find but helps him sleep better. Maybe it’s silly. Maybe it’s too much. But you missed him, and this was the only way you could show it.

By the time you reach the dorm, your heart is racing. You knock twice.

Felix answers the door. He looks tired. Pale. His hair is tied back messily, and he’s wearing sweatpants and an oversized hoodie you’d seen a hundred times before. But there’s no smile when he sees you.

“What are you doing here?”

It’s not harsh. Not exactly. But it’s not warm either.

You blink, holding up the flash drive. “Chan said you needed this. You left it at my place the other day.”

“You could’ve just given it to him,” he says quickly, already reaching for it. “You didn’t have to come all the way here.”

You hesitate, trying to ignore the sting in your chest. “I figured… I could drop it off and maybe say hi. It’s been a while.”

You offer the small bag in your other hand.

“And I brought snacks. You probably haven’t eaten, and I know you—”

He cuts you off.

“I’m in the middle of something.”

The voices from inside the dorm confirm that. The guys are working. You recognize Seungmin’s laugh, the scrape of a chair, Chan saying something too low to catch.

You try again. Soft. Hopeful.

“I won’t stay long. Just wanted to make sure you’re—”

That’s when he snaps.

“God, you just keep showing up. At practice, outside the studio, now here. Do you not get it? I’m busy. I don’t have time for all of this. It’s like I can’t breathe without you hovering around me.”

The words hit harder than they should.

He’s not yelling. But his voice cuts like glass, sharp, impatient, irritated. Like you’re some stranger pushing too far.

You feel the stillness behind him. Someone shifts inside the room. You know they heard. You know they’re watching.

Your cheeks burn.

You nod slowly, lowering the bag of snacks and placing it on the table just inside the door.

“Sorry,” you murmur. “Didn’t realize I was smothering you.”

Before your voice can crack, before your eyes can betray you, you turn and walk away.

You make it to the elevator before the tears come. You press the button too many times, the sting behind your eyes blurring everything. It takes everything in you not to sob in the hallway.

You just wanted to see him. Just wanted to help.

You didn’t expect him to call you clingy. Or look at you like you were an inconvenience.

Like someone he didn’t want.

He doesn’t text that night.

Or the next.

It’s two full days before your phone buzzes with a message from him.

“Hey. About earlier. I’m sorry.”

You stare at it for a long time.

Then turn off your phone.

The next message comes the day after.

“I didn’t mean to snap. I was just stressed. I appreciate you bringing the drive.”

You don’t answer.

Because you’re not sure what to say that wouldn’t shatter you both.

When he finally calls, a week later, you almost don’t pick up.

But your thumb betrays you.

“I miss you,” he says as soon as you answer. “I hate that you won’t talk to me.”

You don’t say anything.

“You know how things are right now. Comeback’s in a few days. I’m exhausted. I wasn’t trying to hurt you.”

Still, silence.

“Can’t you just—let’s just move past it. Please. I need you right now.”

You blink.

And then you laugh. Just a little. A bitter, dry sound.

“You need me?”

He hesitates. “…Yeah. I do.”

“That’s funny,” you whisper. “Because last week, I was everywhere. You couldn’t breathe remember? I was in your way.”

He tries to interrupt—tries to explain, backtrack, soften the blow. But you keep going.

“You think you get to decide when I’m too much and when I’m not enough? That I’m supposed to sit here waiting until it’s convenient for you to need me?”

“It’s not like that—”

“Then what is it like, Felix?” you snap, voice finally cracking. “Because I stood in front of you with food, with a flash drive you forgot, trying to be good and quiet and supportive, and you embarrassed me in front of your friends like I was some obsessive stranger.”

There’s a long silence.

You finally exhale.

“I just wanted to make you feel loved,” you whisper. “And you made me feel like a burden.”

He doesn’t know what to say.

And you don’t wait for him to figure it out.

Seungmin

You were used to the waiting.

Late-night rehearsals, hours in the studio, short phone calls in between packed schedules. You knew what came with dating a K-pop star. Especially one as determined as Kim Seungmin.

But what you weren’t used to was this.
The ache in your chest. The way he looked through you like you were a noise instead of a person.

A burden, not a comfort. You’d only come because he said he was having a hard time.

Chan had casually mentioned in a message earlier that morning:

“Seungmin’s been pushing hard on the vocals for the comeback. He’s getting frustrated, I think he’s overworking himself. Maybe you can get him to take a real break?”

So you packed a little lunch, nothing big, just some things he liked. A couple of warm sandwiches he always asked you to make when he was stressed. The citrus vitamin drink he always drank when he lost sleep. A folded note with a little drawing on it, tucked under the lid.

You didn’t want to be a distraction.

You just wanted to be there.

When you arrive, the studio is quiet, except for the low hum of Seungmin’s voice behind the recording booth glass. You pause before entering fully, catching Chan’s eye through the window. He waves you in with a soft smile.

“He’s on take seventeen,” Chan murmurs with a little sigh. “This bridge is killing him.”

You glance toward the booth.

Seungmin’s face is focused, brows knit tightly. Headphones pulled low over his ears, he’s swaying gently, mouthing along with the guide track.

And then—

He cracks. The high jump note falters. It’s not off-pitch, but it isn’t right, and you see it in the sharp clench of his jaw as he rips the headphones off and mutters something you can’t hear.

You flinch a little at the frustration in his eyes. But still, you smile softly when he steps out of the booth, wiping sweat from his brow with a towel slung around his neck.

He doesn’t see you at first. Not until you speak up.

“You sound great,” you say gently. “You’re doing great.”

Seungmin stops in his tracks, His gaze locks on you, and he doesn’t smile.

“Are you seriously here right now?”

You blink shocked at his tone. “I—I thought I could bring you something. You haven’t been sleeping much, and Chan said—”

“You thought now was the right time? When I’m literally about to lose my mind trying to get this bridge right?”

You’re stunned into silence.

Chan shifts awkwardly in his seat behind the control board, clearly sensing the tension, but Seungmin barrels on.

“Do you have any idea how long I’ve been in there? This isn’t just some casual track I’m trying to get down, this is our big comeback after a major tour, and I can’t even get through one verse without messing up.”

You take a shaky breath. “I know you’re stressed, I just— I thought I could help. I brought—”

“I don’t need snacks,” he snaps, voice rising. “I don’t need distractions. I need space. God, you’ve been texting constantly, calling after practice, and now showing up here? Can’t you just back off for once?”

Your lips part. But no words come.

Your chest tightens with embarrassment, pain curling into shame as his words ring in the silent room.

You glance at Chan, he’s clearly uncomfortable, not meeting your eyes.

You feel like a fool.

“You always say you understand,” Seungmin adds bitterly, “but you don’t. If you did, you’d know this isn’t the time for cute little drop-ins.”

You swallow hard. “I wasn’t trying to bother you.”

“Well, you did.”

That’s all it takes.

You nod once, stiffly, and turn to leave, bag still in your hand, unopened.

“I’ll go,” you whisper, not looking back. “I won’t bother you again.”

You cry in the stairwell.

Because the elevator felt too slow, and you didn’t want to risk anyone seeing your red, humiliated face.

You didn’t mean to mess up his rhythm. You didn’t think your presence would ruin his focus. You thought, naively, that maybe being there would be comforting.

But all you did was become one more thing he had to shake off.

He doesn’t text that night.

Or the next.

When he finally does, it’s not to apologize.

“I don’t get why you left so suddenly. You said you understood how stressful this is.”

You stare at the message, stunned.

Then another:

“You’ve been quiet. I guess I’m the bad guy now for being overwhelmed?”

And that’s when the guilt hits him.

Because you don’t answer.

Two more days pass.

A voice memo arrives late at night. It’s short.

“I didn’t mean to take it out on you. I was frustrated. I’m still frustrated. But I shouldn’t have snapped. I know that. I just—please. Don’t shut me out, okay?”

But you are shut down.


Completely.

Because how do you open up to someone who saw your love and called it too much?

The next time you speak to him is at a dinner with the other members, He’s already there when you arrive, sitting stiffly at the far end of the table. His eyes find yours instantly. But you don’t smile.

You sit far from him, even though there’s a seat next to his.

During the meal, he doesn’t say a word to you until you’re leaving, he follows you outside into the soft night air, calling your name.

You don’t stop walking.

“Can we talk?” he asks, catching up.

“Please?”

You pause, but don’t look at him. “Why?”

“Because I need to explain.”

You sigh. “You already did. I’m too much. Too clingy.”

“That’s not what I—”

“It’s what you said.” You finally turn to face him. “You made me feel like a chore, Seungmin. Like I was just one more thing on your list of things to get through. Do you know how humiliating it is to be looked at like that?”

He says nothing.

“I came to give you something. To cheer you up. And you made me feel embarrassing. Like I wasn’t wanted.”

You blink away tears, shaking your head. “I don’t know if I can come back from that. Not yet.”

His voice is soft. “So you’re done with me?”

You take a long breath. “I don’t know. I just know I need space. This time, I need you to give me that.”

And you walk away before he can stop you.

Because if you don’t leave now, you’ll fold into his arms.

You’ll forgive too soon. And this time, you need him to feel it.

Jeongin

It’s the third unread text.

The third one you sent in the last twenty-four hours, left on read.

You sit at the edge of your bed, thumb hovering over your screen, reading the single-word reply he did send earlier that week:

“Busy.”

No emoji. No “sorry.” Not even your name. Just busy.

You understand or at least, you’re trying to.

It’s comeback season, after all. Their schedules are stacked. Jeongin barely has time to sleep, let alone spend time with you. But still, something about the way he’s been lately…


It doesn’t feel like just stress. It feels like distance.

Which is exactly why you’re now standing outside his dorm, holding a cup from his favorite café, and a plastic-bag full of his favorite sweet and salty snacks.

Just a quick visit. Five minutes, ten max. Just to remind him you’re thinking of him, that you’re in his corner.

You knock gently, nerves fluttering in your stomach. It takes a moment, but the door finally clicks open.

Jeongin stares at you like he didn’t expect you to exist outside a phone screen. He looks… exhausted. Hair a little damp, sweatpants low on his hips, phone still in hand.

“Hey,” you offer, lifting the bag slightly with a hopeful smile. “I thought you could use a little pick-me-up.”

He blinks. “What are you doing here?”

Your smile falters, just slightly. “I know you’ve been busy and tired lately, so I figured I’d bring you something. I won’t stay long, I just—”

He exhales sharply through his nose and turns away, walking into the kitchen. You follow instinctively, setting the bag down on the counter like something fragile.

“I didn’t ask you to come,” he mumbles.

You hesitate. “I know… I just… I missed you.”

He leans against the sink, rubbing his temples like he’s fighting a headache. The silence stretches uncomfortably.

“Jeongin?”

He straightens. “I told you I was tired. You couldn’t wait?”

His tone is flat. Not angry, not loud just… done.

You open your mouth, stunned. “I just wanted to do something nice.”

“Well, it’s not helping,” he snaps suddenly.

“You’re not helping.”

The sharpness in his voice cuts like glass.

“I—what?” you breathe, confusion tightening your throat.

“I came because I care. Because you’ve been distant and I thought maybe—”

“Exactly.” He throws his hands up. “You always assume I need you here. Like I can’t breathe without you showing up at the worst times.”

You feel like the ground just cracked beneath your feet. “Jeongin…”

He doesn’t stop.

“You get all clingy when things don’t go your way. You need constant reassurance. It’s exhausting. You’re exhausting.”

Your lips part, but there are no words. Just the sound of your heart shattering in your chest.

“You don’t mean that…”

He sighs, suddenly quieter. “I don’t have the energy for this. For you. Not right now.”

There it is.


The confirmation.


You were too much.

You don’t cry. Not yet. You simply nod, pick up your bag, and turn for the door.

“Where are you going?” he calls, not even chasing after you.

“I’m giving you what you asked for,” you reply without turning around.

“Space.”

The door shuts behind you with a whisper instead of a slam.

The texts come two days later.

“Hey”

“You ignoring me now?”

You don’t answer.

Then come the voice notes. His voice sounds less tired now, just cautious. Defensive.

“I was stressed. You showed up out of nowhere. I didn’t mean all that, okay?”

“You know what comeback season’s like. I’m juggling choreography, vocals, press stuff… I just snapped. It wasn’t personal.”

But it was.

Calling someone clingy isn’t a slip of the tongue. Calling them exhausting…that’s not stress talking.

That’s how you really feel.

When you don’t reply, he sends a full paragraph:

“you’re really gonna ghost me for this? After everything? You know I didn’t mean it like that. Can we just move past it?”

You stare at the message for a long time. Then finally, you type:

“You said I was exhausting.”

His reply comes fast.

“I didn’t mean it. I was tired. People say stupid things when they’re tired.”

You type. Then delete. Then type again. And finally… you send it.

“You made it clear. You’re too tired for me.”

this time, he doesn’t reply.

The ache in your chest doesn’t ease. There’s no release. No healing. Just a dull throb that worsens when you see his name on your phone and don’t open the notification.

You still love him. God, you love him. You don’t know if that is enough to survive when the person you love sees you as a burden.

Maybe he didn’t mean to say it. But he said it. And now, it’s all you hear.

You’re clingy.


You’re too much.


You’re exhausting.

You’re not worth his time when he’s tired. And now, you’ll leave him alone .

Just like he wanted.

Tag list:

@vernorica123 @quaxing-lour @staytinyarmy @elisabeeee @stronglychanbiased @loz3389 @kittykatz1227 @jenzlovschan @mysticpolicedonut @roron33 @socandytales @f1ln4dr3cl16mv33 @dungeonduchess @ongodimintoomanyfandoms @thereadinglurker @harmonygal @thackery-blinks @ghostly-xxo @enhacolor @sailorkoss @skeletonontheroad @felixlsworld @the3catlovers @leeknowz-pudding @sibulamoos @d1gital-data @peartreegarden @lyftyyy @mehrmonga @yoli123-8 @finding-nikaa @euphysia @whoa-jo @dragon03138 @wanderingrusalka @cardtak @16lotonhermind @mypnwlife-blog @kwanniehae @awesome-oana1234 @lyuuu88 @ridhi1608 @coraleexox @xox-chy @ellie1725 @estella-novella

[telephoniii]

Platonic!diasomnia reaction to malleus's little sister (y/n) saying "I wanna marry silver when I grow up!" How would they react?

THE WEDDING FIASCO

☆彡 in which malleus's sister wants to marry silver

platonic!diasomnia + malleus's little sister

word count: 190 per character + a 250 scenario at the end

tags: probably ooc but I had fun writing this, platonic, crackfick/very unserious

a/n: possibly the silliest thing I've written. i was going for normal headcanons and it spiraled out of control. lot's of fun little shenanigans. i hope you enjoy :>

sebek zigvolt

Well, Sebek's completely devoted to his master, Malleus. And Malleus's sister is an extension of Malleus to some extent... "Silver! Marry the young girl at once!" "What!?" After the initial shock, Sebek is a little offended by the fact she chose Silver over him. I mean, what attracted her to Silver and not him? He's the superior choice! He's way better at protecting Malleus compared to his lazy, human counterpart! Subconsciously starts doing cool stuff in front of the young girl to try and change her mind. Ironically, he tries to do moves that he's yet to master and falls on his ass. Tries to play it off like it didn't hurt that much when in front of Malleus's sister but once he's out of her sight he's crying. Sebek has no idea why he's vying for the attention of a child, but he's determined to win. At least it helps him get his practice in? With time he'll grow out of this 'phase' but he still doesn't like the thought that this child thinks Silver is the cooler attendant.

lilia vanrouge

Finds the situation very funny. "Sure you will, sweetheart." He teases Silver a lot, telling him he'd better find a partner soon before Lilia marries him off to the young girl. He'll tease Malleus too. "Your sister is fresh out of her egg and she's already found love before you~" Of course, he does have a bit of a fatherly possessiveness over her though. For as much as he teases, he starts having Silver around her less and less, sending him off to attend to Malleus while Sebek watches the young girl. He knows there's no chance in the universe that Silver and Malleus's sister would get together. It's just... dad instincts. The longer this goes on, the more he'll start saying things like, "No boys until you're ruling the kingdom." It gets to a point where the young girl starts crying because Malleus told her a relationship like that wouldn't work. Lilia swears he's turning gray. He tries to calmly explain to the girl that she's way too young and that another boy (or girl) will appear later down the road. In short? Found it funny at first but once it starts to drag on longer he's getting STRESSED.

malleus draconia

Oh! How peculiar. "A relationship between a Draconia and their attendant wouldn't work. Especially one of such a large age gap." He states like it's the most obvious thing in the world right next to his sister— crushing the young girl's dreams. Malleus really didn't have any malice when he said that. It was merely just him thinking aloud. He didn't anticipate for his younger sister to start crying. Malleus didn't know how to handle her and tossed her to Lilia. After hearing how much trouble Lilia is having calming her down, Malleus actually thinks about it for a moment. "Silver? How would you feel marrying a fae?" "... Please tell me you're not seriously considering it." An actual marriage might be troublesome, so Malleus proposes the idea of a fake marriage. Have her think she's married to Silver when in reality it's all just pretend. It's not like Silver is getting an actual partner anytime soon. With a snap of the fingers, he's arranged a fake bridal venue set up. Malleus easily gathered guests to attend and prepared a beautiful white dress for his sister. Is it way overboard for a fake wedding? 100%. But whatever makes his sister stop crying.

silver

The man of the hour. Unbothered at first. Might get a little flustered and murmur a 'Thank you', but that's about it. Everyone gets silly crushes sometime in their life, don't they? He doesn't really entertain her but doesn't avoid her. The guy just does his job. It's not until the other three start acting different where he's starting to get worried. The fact that Sebek and Malleus have both asked him to marry the young girl makes him panic a bit. He doesn't want to be the guy to marry a girl when he's twice her age?! Dragon years or not, that girl is way too young for him! He did not sign up for this. Silver considers asking someone, anyone, to date him so that he could just turn down the young girl gently. When Malleus proposes the idea of a fake marriage? Oh Silver wishes this was a dream. What do you mean he has to fake marry her. WHAT. Silver could never imagine arguing with Malleus, but he is mortified. He agreed only to get the young girl to stop crying. But internally he's the one crying.

.

.

Wedding bells ring at NRC and students are lined up in chairs, watching intently as Silver stands in front of everyone in a suit and tie. He's unbelievably tense. This is the one event where he isn't dozing off. And it's the one event where he wants to.

The Prefect soon rises to take the mic with a smile. They look down at the paper on the podium and begin reading. "Hello! Today we are gathered to celebrate the marriage of Silver and... Ms. Draconia?"

Malleus may or may not have forgotten to tell the guests that this was a fake marriage.

Suddenly, the doors burst open as Malleus's little sister walks down the aisle in white. Jaws are to the floor; there are whispers asking, "Is this legal??" None of it matters as the young girl takes her place to stand across Silver. The Prefect gives both of them concerned glances and contemplates whether or not to continue. Very hesitantly, they do.

"... Ms. Draconia, do you take Silver to be your wedded husband till death?" "I do!" The Prefect shoots Silver a what the hell is going on look before lifting the mic back up to their mouth to speak once more.

"And, Silver, do you take Ms. Draconia to be your wedded wife? Till death do you part?" "...Sure."

The Prefect now looks very disturbed as they clear their throat and continue to read off the paper.

"... Cool. Now, any objections?"

The entire room raises their hand.

Needless to say, the girl got over her crush.

[hgfictionwriter]

Still Yours: Part Six - New Normal

Jessie Fleming x Reader

Summary: Jessie and you navigate awkwardness and fragile boundaries as you establish a new life apart. Jessie starts to confront herself and hard work begins.

Warnings: Angst. Language.

A/N: Rest of the series is here.

Jessie sat at the dining room table of her new place, a book open in hand, and working valiantly to digest the words in front of her. Her knee bounced anxiously as she sighed intermittently while she continued to fidget and do her best to not check her phone.

Her mind drifted as she went through a mental checklist of things yet again. The girls beds were ready. They had everything they needed in the bathroom. Food, snacks. Books, toys. Check. Everything was set. As set as could be given it'd only been a few days since she moved.

She sighed once more and gave in, picking up her phone.

You still had another 10 minutes before you were supposed to arrive. Still, she'd been ready and waiting for the past hour. This was the first drop off of this new arrangement and she was both keen and nervous.

She missed Ky and Harper, though she'd talked to them each night. And while it really wasn't all that different from her being at an away game, and heck, it was even less time than when she was at tournaments, it made her uneasy and she felt distanced from them.

And, of course, she missed you.

She looked at her conversation with you. What used to be a conversation overflowing with texts, and pictures, and links shared, was now dishearteningly transactional.

Your last message was telling her when you'd be by. She'd felt ashamed to think it, chalking it up to anxiety more than anything, some fraction of her had worried that you'd not honour your side of the deal. You had the kids, you had the house, maybe you'd cut her out altogether; never bring the girls by like you originally promised.

She'd deserve it, after all.

However, even at her most illogical, no matter the state of your relationship, deep down she knew you wouldn't do that.

Her mind continued to drift and wander until motion out the front window caught her eye and she saw you pulling up. Her heart raced and she glanced at her phone - right on time.

She stood abruptly, smoothing out her clothes and feeling a rush of apprehension go through her, butterflies erupting in her stomach.

She took a breath and steadily made her way towards the front, forcing herself to not rush. She stood nervously at the door, debating back and forth if she should wait until you knocked or not, before ultimately scolding herself for her worries and simply opening the door to step out onto the landing.

From the stoop, she could see Ky gathering up her things and you had the other back door open and were leaning down behind it. Before she could process much more Ky came running over, her backpack jostling noisily as she threw her arms around Jessie's legs in a tight embrace.

"Oh my gosh. It's so good to see you," Jessie greeted as she bent down and hugged her oldest tightly.

"I missed you," Ky said, voice was sad and muffled against Jessie's clothes as she held her head tightly against her. Jessie knelt down so she was at eye level with Ky and gave her a big smile.

"I missed you, too, Stringbean," she reciprocated as she turned her head to give her a kiss on the cheek that had the little girl scrunching up her face. Jessie laughed as she chest filled with affection. "Hey," she went on, "I got us a climbing wall kit for the backyard. Want to help me set it up this weekend?"

At this, Kylen pulled back to look at her.

"A climbing wall?" She asked with growing awe.

"Yeah," Jessie nodded with a smile, "pretty cool, huh?"

Ky held onto a shred of resistance, seemingly not wanting to get too excited. Jessie maintained her smile and lightly tickled the girl's stomach.

"You're stoked, you can admit it," she teased. Ky finally giggled, body folding at the tickling, lips pursed adorably as she tried to not laugh more, but her eyes were bright.

Some weight fell from Jessie's shoulders at Ky's slight change in demeanour. A small victory in this still-to-be long journey.

"Where's your sister?" Jessie asked as she peered over Ky's shoulder to now see you and Harper coming up the driveway hand-in-hand, Harper shuffling behind. It took only a moment for Jessie to see her red little nose and tear-streaked face.

"Baby," Jessie said gently as she stood and took a few steps towards you two. She locked eyes with you for the first time and you gave her a weary look.

"What's wrong, sweetie?" Jessie asked as she knelt down in front of Harper and sought eye contact. Harper's little lip trembled and she sniffled.

"I don't know why Momma can't just come home. Why do we have to come here?" Harper asked, voice wobbly as she looked up to you with new tears pooling at the corners of her eyes.

"Honey," you said gently despite how tired you must've been by all of this, "we've talked about this. I know it's hard right now. Please give this a chance. It'll get easier, I promise."

"This is your home too, now," Jessie offered optimistically. "You get two homes!"

"I only want one!" Harper yelled as she began to sob anew.

"Oh, baby," Jessie cooed as she reached for her daughter. You let go of Harper's hand and the little girl practically fell into Jessie's arms. She stroked her back soothing and rocked her gently. "I know, baby," she said. "It's a big change. Your Mom's right though - it feels hard and sad right now, but it'll feel better eventually."

The little girl hiccupped in her arms and she gave her a light squeeze, unable to prevent herself from looking up at you. She caught you observing them both and you averted your eyes immediately. She watched quietly as you retreated to the car. Jessie laid a soft kiss against Harper's hair, returning her attention to her.

"And most importantly, we really need you to know that we love you so, so much. No matter which house we're at, you're our little girl and we adore you and we're here for you." She turned to look at Kylen pointedly. "Both of you."

She turned back to see you returning with Harper's bag. Harper was starting to calm so she gently disengaged, holding the girl out from her to give her a warm smile. She lifted a hand to run a thumb tenderly across the girl's rosy cheeks, removing a tear with it.

"You're my girl," she said, "and I love you so much." She let her words settle in for a second before smiling anew. "Do you want to watch [Harper's favourite movie] tonight?" The little girl sniffled and gave a tiny nod that made Jessie's heart swell. "Yeah?" She couldn't help but chuckle. "Okay, then that's what we'll do."

"Can we have popcorn, too?" Harper asked, her little fist rubbing at her eye as she sniffled once more.

"Sure, Princess," Jessie responded with a laugh. She stood and finally locked eyes with you once more. Or at least attempted to as you looked away again.

"Hi," she belatedly greeted as nervousness snuck back in.

You cleared your throat gently and held out Harper's backpack. You looked nearly as unsettled and apprehensive as Jessie had felt only a few minutes prior.

"Hi," you returned, giving only a fleeting glance.

"Thanks." Jessie tried not to mutter as her chest panged. She took the bag from you and began shifting her weight unknowingly from one foot to the other.

Despite how many times she'd rehearsed this moment in her head the past few days, her mind struggled to formulate what to say to keep you from leaving immediately.

"Um, thanks for dropping them off and bringing all their things," she went on, tone rising with eagerness. She caught how you arched an eyebrow briefly before ridding your expression of it.

"Yep," you said slowly, "that's the arrangement."

She felt stupid.

"So, um, how are you?" She tried again. You gave a faint shake of your head with a shrug.

"Fine," you replied, barely concealing your confusion and burgeoning irritation. You seemed to catch yourself and took a silent breath. You gave a polite smile. "How are you?"

"I'm...okay," Jessie answered, mustering up a half-hearted smile of her own. It felt like a gargantuan feat given the veil of disappointment that had fallen over her at how this was going. She tried to smile again. "Just getting the house organized. Get settled. You know."

You gave a wordless nod and a tight-lipped smile as you held your hands behind your back stiffly.

Jessie tried not to cry.

"Um," you started now, "so you'll drop them off Sunday evening?"

"Yep," Jessie replied readily with an enthusiastic nod, wanting to maintain any kind of momentum in the exchange. "I'll bring them by after dinner. I'll make sure they do their homework and everything, of course. Do you want me to make their lunches for Monday?"

"No," you dismissed, eyes downcast with a series of shakes of your head. "That's fine. I'll make them."

"You sure? I don't mind," Jessie offered. You waved her off.

"I know you don't. It's fine. Really."

Jessie swallowed her disappointment once again with another smile. She nodded in acceptance.

She was about to invite you inside when suddenly, a bright expression crossed your face as you turned your attention to the girls.

"Okay, my babies," you said as you knelt down and beckoned them both into a joint hug. "Have a great time. We'll talk, and I'll see you in a couple of days." You pulled back, still smiling at them. Despite how heavy Jessie felt about her interaction with you, she couldn't help but appreciate your obvious love and affection for the girls and the way you were with them.

"Don't give your Momma too much trouble with bedtime, okay?" You teased with a faint smirk. "Love you," you said as you gave them both one more hug.

You rose and turned to Jessie. You gave a stiff smile and a delayed, awkward wave. To her surprise, your cheeks began to burn pink.

"Bye," you said quickly as you pulled out your keys. "Um, call me if you need anything."

Her eyes were trained on you as you started the car and began to reverse out of the driveway. Her emotions threatened to continue to drag her down, but she had to force herself to rally. The girls needed that. Deserved that.

She looked down at them with a look of excitement, offering a playful stance.

"Okay, rock, paper, scissors to see who gets the first piggy back ride of the tour." Her smile grew as they both pushed shoulder to shoulder against one another, their fists held out. "I got you guys some pretty cool stuff for your rooms. Come on, let's check it out!"

She enthusiastically ushered the girls inside to try and establish a new normal. For all their sakes.

-------

The next couple of weeks of drop-offs went smoother and smoother. The girls were adjusting and were now even at the point where they'd run to the house to greet whichever parent they were returning home to.

The weather was still nice enough that drop-offs could just be a family walk from one house to the other, if wanted. She felt it made the girls feel better, too, to fully realize how close each parent really was.

Today, however, you pulled up in your car and the girls clamoured out of the vehicle, their backpacks swinging wildly as they ran up to Jessie.

"Mom's sick," Ky blurted out as she looked up at Jessie. A frown plastered itself on Jessie's face as her head snapped from the girls to you as you were walking up with a shoebox in hand.

You rolled your eyes and even just upon a glance, Jessie could tell Ky was absolutely right.

"Ratted out by an eight year old," you said flatly, voice congested. You held out the shoebox to Jessie. "Harper's science project. She could definitely use your help," you said in a way that pulled a laugh out of Jessie, intentional or not.

You ignored her laugh and crossed your arms. "And I'm fine."

"You didn't go to work," Ky argued and you shot her a withering, but good-natured look.

"She thinks she knows everything," you remarked sarcastically before glancing at Jessie. Her mind could practically paint the following, “Wonder where she got that from,” that you used to tease flirtatiously.

No such quip came today. Obviously.

“You sound and look sick,” Jessie affirmed. Your expression shifted, all levity and teasing gone, and you cocked your head and narrowed your eyes slightly at her.

“Oh I do, do I? Thanks. Appreciate that.”

Oh great. Now she’d offended you. One sentence in. Fantastic.

“I just meant-” she started, but was cut off by you giving a barely veiled, exasperated sigh. You looked past Jessie with a nod to the house.

“Girls, bring your things inside, please," you instructed gently. The girls did as they were told, Jessie's eyes following them briefly until looking back at you, shoulders rounded out with how deflated she felt already.

"I didn't mean to offend you," she said under her breath so as not to draw the girls' attention. "What I'm trying to say is - yes, if you're sick, I could've come picked up the girls, you know. Taken them earlier. Whatever." Your expression remained remained hard and she gave a final shrug as she wrapped her own arms around herself. "I could've helped is what I'm trying to say."

You were quiet for a moment, drawing Jessie's eyes up to you only for you to look away. You gave a shrug of your own.

"I survived just fine before we lived together, you know," you muttered, gaze still adrift. You looked back over Jessie's shoulder and cleared your throat apprehensively, now giving a small smile. Jessie looked to see the girls were hovering at the front door, listening in.

You cleared your throat and rubbed the bridge of your nose with a sniffle.

"I should go. I need some sleep," you announced. "Call me if anything comes up though."

She didn't want you to go. Not like this. But she knew your dynamic well enough now to know that pushing would only make things worse. So, she smiled.

"We've got things covered here," she said assuredly.

To her surprise, your head snapped up with a near-scathing look. Accusatory. She couldn't help but frown in confusion. What could you possibly be mad at? Her mind rapidly processed, until her features well in disbelief.

"Are you serious?" She asked, not really bothering to hide her bewilderment. "There's no one here, Y/N. Ever. Not like that anyway. I meant me and the girls," she finished pointedly, beyond baffled that you could think anything else.

You seemed embarrassed by the leap you'd made and you rubbed your face tiredly with a shake of your head.

"Sorry. I should go," you repeated in a subdued manner, now turning on your heel to leave.

"Are we still on for Thursday?" Jessie asked after you, the uneasiness of this whole exchange compelling her to verify that your first joint counselling session would, in fact, still happen.

You stilled, glancing back over your shoulder with an irritated look.

"Yes," you said in a tone. Your expression shifted and you looked offended once more. "I wouldn't just cancel or flake, Jess."

She wanted to say something. Try to smooth things over somehow, but the window closed and she sighed heavily. She took a moment to regroup before heading inside with a cheery look on her face to greet the girls once more. They watched her intently, clearly having witnessed that entire conversation.

She leaned down with her hands atop her knees.

“Hey, why don’t you bring your things up to your rooms. We’ll do homework after dinner, but since your Mom’s sick, what do you say we make her some meals tonight so she doesn’t have to worry about cooking the next couple of days? We’ll bring them by tomorrow morning before school, okay?”

The girls nodded eagerly, excited at the project and ran to drop off their things.

Together, they cooked some soup and a couple light meals. They also swung by the store to pick up your favourite treat and a couple for them.

The next morning Jessie sent you a text as she helped the girls get ready for school.

“Hey, is it alright if the girls swing by the house and drop some things off before school?”

She didn’t hear back right away and her eye kept going to the clock more and more anxiously as the time to leave approached. She was zipping up the girls’ backpacks when her phone buzzed.

“That’s fine. I’m at work for a meeting this morning and then coming home after, so just open the door for them.”

“Thank you. You shouldn’t have to go in to work if you’re not feeling well. Glad you can come home after though.”

You didn’t reply.

Jessie pulled into the driveway of your old house together and felt a familiar pang deep in her chest.

Since the day she moved out, she hadn’t been by without you present. Even though you were still together, the house was still technically both of yours, it felt intrusive of her to go in without you there. You didn’t explicitly invite her too, either. So she sent in the girls alone.

“Here,” she handed Ky the keys. “Put the containers in the fridge and the bag on the counter, please.” A thought struck her and she called out the window to the girls. “And bring your laundry down, okay? If you have any clothes lying on the ground put them in the baskets and bring them here, okay?”

With the girls at school during the day, Jessie took it upon herself to do the girls laundry from your place. She'd contemplated telling the girls to bring her your laundry, but she worried that’d be an invasion of privacy.

She hated that she had to analyze so many things from so many angles all the time now. She'd always been an overthinker, but this forced her to lean into it even more. Being cognizant to not cross lines that were new and never used to exist.

She texted you.

"Hi. The girls put a few meals in the fridge for you. And I got them to bring out their laundry. Hope that's okay. We all just want you to be able to rest up."

It was a while later that you replied.

"Wtf. I didn't need you - or them - to do that. I told you I'm fine."

Her chest constricted painfully. She really couldn't do anything right. She tried to make her case though.

"Babe," she started to type before deleting the name with a frustrated sigh. She started again.

"I'm not doing anything anyway. I have time. I'm happy to take care of a few things so you don't have to."

She continued to type.

"I know we're not together the way we used to be, but I'm still here for you. And the kids, of course."

"If it makes you feel better, I didn't go in the house. That's your space."

She watched the text bubble appear, disappear and reappear. Eventually a message come through from you.

"Thanks. And it's fine if there are times you need to go in. I'd like to know if you are, that’s all. I don't want to make a habit of it, but I'd just appreciate a heads up if you do."

You sent through another text quickly.

"See you tomorrow for drop-off."

------

"Mom!"

The girls greeted as they ran up the steps to the house.

"Are you feeling better?"

"Did you like the food we made you?"

"I helped peel the carrots!"

"I stirred!"

They peppered you with questions and comments while you hugged them. A subconscious smile formed on Jessie's face as she watched from the bottom of the steps, a small chink in the underlying worry she had about if you were still mad at her or not.

You finished greeting the girls and then ushered them inside before coming back out to greet Jessie who'd come to the door with the bins of now-clean, folded laundry.

Your colour had returned and the bags under your eyes were mostly gone.

"Thanks," you said quietly as you took the bins, some hint of almost pouting in her voice. Jessie couldn't help but find your demeanour cute.

"I'm sorry if it was too much," she offered. "I didn't mean to upset you. I just wanted to take a little off your plate so you could rest."

You nodded. "It's alright," you said with a small sigh. "It was actually kind of nice. So...thanks."

A baffling amount of elation filled Jessie's chest at your acceptance. She actually had trouble fighting back a proud grin and beaming like a school girl.

"I meant it you know," she went on. "Even if things are different between us, I'm still here for you. So...if you ever need help. Or a break. Or anything. I'm here."

You gave her a faint smile. "Thanks." A beat passed and you gestured vaguely, closing your eyes momentarily. "I'm, um, here for you, too."

“You’re feeling better?” Jessie asked. You exhaled quietly, seeming sheepish if anything.

“Yeah. Much better,” you assured her, preemptively waving off any concern. “I was just…a little run down, I guess, and it caught up with me.”

A pang of guilt rang out through Jessie’s chest.

“That’s understandable. I’m sorry.”

You cleared your throat and took a step, backing into the house now.

"Okay. Well. Thanks again. I'll, um, see you at the appointment."

"Yeah," Jessie nodded, trying to keep her voice light despite wanting more. "No problem. And sounds good."

You gave another weak smile and closed the door with a soft 'bye', leaving Jessie to stare at the beveled patterns etched into the wood.

-------

The counsellor’s office was eerily quiet as you and Jessie sat on the couch in front of the therapist. Jessie sat down first and you sat very distinctly away from her on the other cushion.

Her heart pounded loudly in her head as she tried not to fidget. Counselling was not her thing. Clearly, talking had never been her thing, so whole sessions focused solely on digging into the most vulnerable, raw parts of her psyche and emotions was something she'd never grown comfortable with.

But, for the first time in her life, she was really, really willing to try. Previous counselling had all been just going through the motions. Mandatory team things here and there. But this was different. Her marriage, the way she showed up for her daughters, the rest of her life, would be dictated by how she navigated this and the work she’d accomplish as part of it.

She had wondered plenty how today would go. You sitting stiffly several inches from her, arms and legs crossed, jaw clenched with a stern expression on your face wasn't the scenario she'd hoped for.

Your therapist, Joanne Marlowe, began to speak.

"Thank you for choosing to be here. As you both know, I met with each of you for an individual session to get to know you independently and to understand a bit more about where you're coming from and what you're coping with. That said, I know this isn't easy. Before we dive in, I want to remind you both that this space is meant to be safe - a place to speak honestly, even when it's hard. There's no pressure to have it all figured out today. This is going to take time.”

Jessie nodded and saw in her periphery your shoulders visibly rise and fall with an inaudible breath. Joanne continued.

"I'd like to start by giving you both the chance to share what each of you is hoping to get out of this process. Jessie, would you be willing to start?"

Jessie sat up straighter, swallowing nervously as she inched forward on the cushion, hands clasped together anxiously.

"Sure. Um," she glanced at you briefly before looking forward at the therapist. "I...I want to understand how to rebuild. And how to make Y/N feel safe, and loved, again. I know I broke something - a lot of things - and I know it's not as simple as saying 'sorry' or moving out or moving back in. I-I want to earn her trust again. And I want to be a family again. Our girls to have their family. I-I want you back," she finished timidly as she braved another look your direction. She saw you purse your lips and readjust your position on the couch.

"Thank you. That took vulnerability and courage. Y/N, how does that land for you?"

Jessie looked out of the corner of her eye at you before angling subtly your direction.

"Yeah," you flashed a tight smile and shifted uncomfortably again. "I don't - I don't know. I'm honestly," you chuckled sardonically, "kind of just trying to figure out how to not snap every time we talk."

"That's valid," Joanne said. "Anger has a lot to say. Would you be open to saying more about what's coming up for you lately?"

You laughed the same way you did a moment prior.

"Um," your voice was tight though you were smiling, "I'm pretty...pretty on edge because her retirement video's been airing.”

Jessie’s stomach immediately sank.

“So, you know, every time I open my phone or watch tv, it's not uncommon to see it." You ground your teeth together and spoke stiffly. "So it's kind of a constant reminder of her cheating." You laughed bitterly, a small waver in your voice despite how forcefully you spoke. "I see it and all I can think of is her fucking that girl on the other end of the lens. Her choosing to step out on me. On our marriage, on our family."

You sniffled, wiping temperamentally at your eye.

"And it's really fucking shitty. She's heralded as this national treasure. Sweet, humble, dedicated - a family woman - when that's a fucking lie. And it doesn't help that people love her. She can do no wrong."

You finally shot a look over at her, face breaking before looking hurriedly back at Joanne.

"Do you know how it feels when people hear about our separation and sometimes I read comments or get questions like what else was going on, because there must be more to it - Jessie's so sweet and loyal. She'd never betray me without reason. There has to be a good reason for her to cheat and surely I'm going to forgive her. How could I not?"

You snatched a tissue from the box in front of you with an irritated huff and dabbed at your nose.

Jessie heart broke in two. She didn't know you were dealing with that. She’d avoided the retirement video as much as possible. She’d hate watching it in any case, but now? She couldn’t bear it. And frankly, anyone she’d talked with about the separation had scolded her - justifiably - and been upset with her. She hadn’t seen another side.

The session continued. Your grievances were things she knew, but it seemed the airing of her retirement video had newly wounded you. Anything between you two that had started to calm or even heal felt raw again.

As you aired your feelings in this new environment and context, your anger faded into heartbreak and the tears came. Hurt glances, sniffles and a wavering voice.

Jessie was beside herself again with grief and anguish at what she’d done. Tears of her own freshly rolling down her cheeks as she watched you helplessly. She wanted so desperately to reach out – to hold your hand, to pull you close, to offer any comfort she could.

You rebuffed an attempt she made to hold your hand, and she withdrew, settling on listening intently to your pain as she sat hunched over forlorn and ashamed. She offered impromptu explanations, apologies and understanding where she could, but it only did so much.

When she had room to truly respond, her pulse picked up. She hesitated momentarily before  she withdrew a neatly folded up letter from her back pocket and held it up briefly.

“I, um, thought I’d write something,” she said sheepishly, eyes darting between Joanne and you before falling to the floor. She scratched the back of her neck and cleared her throat before looking up once more. “I’m just, you know, not great at thinking on my feet when it comes to something like this. And this,” she glanced over at you, “means a lot – the most – to me, so I want to make sure I get it right.”

You didn’t say anything, but you studied her with muted surprise, a soft look in your eyes that disappeared as soon as you glanced away. You shifted in place, tightening your arms against you while you now tried to look indifferent.

“That’s very thoughtful, Jessie,” Joanne complimented. “And you’re right, some people need time to compose the things they want to say, especially when something holds so much weight.” She turned her attention to you. “Y/N, it looked like you were a bit surprised by this. Is that true?”

You fidgeted in place. “I guess,” you admitted reluctantly. “I mean, she’s never been great at expressing her emotions in difficult situations. And not proactive about it. So.”

“Y/N, do you feel ready to hear or read what Jessie’s written?” Joanne asked.

You let out a quick exhale and gave a flippant shrug of one shoulder. “Fine. Whatever,” you replied in a clipped tone.

Joanne observed you. Jessie clutched her paper unknowingly tight in her hands and awaited validation to move forward.

Joanne offered a small, polite smile.

“There’s been a lot of emotion here today. And that’s good – please hear that. There’s been a lot simmering and building, and it sounds like there hasn’t been a proper space or time for you two to properly communicate, process and begin to heal.

“Having brief or stilted discussions and arguments between obligations or behind closed doors with your daughters or friends within earshot don’t facilitate the kind of conversation and interaction needed to work through something this heavy or complex.

“That said, Jessie, I’d ask that you hold that note for another time when Y/N is more ready to receive whatever may be in there.”

Jessie swallowed her disappointment, but was quickly drawn to how your face fell in something akin to embarrassment.

“It’s okay, I can share it another time,” Jessie quickly assured you and Joanne was quick to echo it.

Whether it was right or not, Jessie felt a flicker of hope in her chest. Even if you weren’t ready to really hear from her, even if things were hard right now and there was still so much hurt, maybe she was finally doing something right.

Eventually, the end of their hour neared.

“I think that’s a good place to end things today. Is there anything either of you want to address before we close out this session?” Joanne asked, looking between the two of you.

Your eyes were still red from crying earlier and you gave a listless shake of your head. “No.”

Joanne settled her gaze on Jessie. Jessie stammered slightly, cursing inwardly over her inability to just give a straight answer.

“Go ahead, we still have a couple of minutes,” Joanne encouraged.

Jessie glanced from you – your hand specifically – and away. She gripped the edge of the cushions apprehensively and could feel your eyes boring into her.

“I, uh, no, it’s okay,” she backtracked.

“Maybe we can practice saying what’s on our mind,” Joanne suggested.

A silent exhale escaped Jessie’s nose and she steeled herself to address something she’d noticed over the past few weeks, but hadn’t had the courage to confront.

“You’re- you’re not wearing your ring,” she said, voice a bit flat in an attempt to not sound accusatory as she subconsciously played with her own ring.

You released an exasperated huff.

“Yeah, well, it’s just a ring. Wearing it didn’t stop my wife from sleeping with someone else. I can not wear a ring and still be committed. Unlike someone else here,” you said tersely.

Joanne mediated and you relented some.

“I just find it hard to wear now,” you relayed quietly as you worked to mask a fresh set of tears. “I’m still committed,” you stressed, “but it hurts to see it.”

Jessie’s heart crumbled further again. You used to be so open and unguarded with her; it’s part of what drew her to you. Your ability to love so openly and deeply, to cry, to share your worries and fears with her unhindered. She’d taken that away from you.

“Commitment and marriage is more than a physical item, that’s true. At the same time, it's symbolic and holds different weight for different people,” Joanne said. “And thank you, Jessie, for sharing what was on your mind. Maybe we can pick up there again next time? There’s more for us to dig into.

“One thing I want both of you to take away is that it’s obvious to me that there’s a lot of love here. A lot of hurt, yes, but that hurt is so prominent because of the love underneath. I’ve worked with couples who come in with a lot less to draw from. Now, love alone is not enough for a relationship to thrive and sustain, but if you’re both dedicated to working on rebuilding and re-establishing trust – like now – it’s possible.”

You sniffled and gave Jessie a cursory glance. You nodded your acceptance.

That’s all Jessie needed for today.

-----

She was exhausted by the time she stepped into her house. She set down her keys and wallet with a heavy sigh.

The session didn’t go exactly how she wanted, but the therapist’s affirmation of hope echoed brightly in her mind. Still, there was a lot going on inside her as she reflected on everything in the session.

She padded upstairs and got changed into her running clothes. As she was putting away her other clothes, the letter she’d folded up and tucked into her pocket fell to the floor. She paused and bent down to pick it up.

She turned the paper over in her hand and thought back to the look you gave her about the note. The softness in your eyes she’d hardly seen since that morning together after her retirement party.

Between that and the affirmation from Joanne, she went downstairs, bypassing her running shoes and instead rummaged through a drawer until she found a notebook she’d bought months ago with the intention of writing travel notes in, but remained blank.

She grabbed a pen and retreated to the front room. She settled herself onto the couch, moving aside the blanket and pillow that were mainstays there the days the girls weren’t around, only to be hidden other days.

The bed was too lonely without you; too big. She never felt settled. Sleeping on the couch felt more at-home to her now. Her back pressed up against the structure of the couch as she curled herself in was the only way she could reliably find sleep these days.

She cracked open the notebook and stared at the blank page, pen poised.

She contemplated for several moments before relinquishing her worries by confronting them head on.

I don’t know what to write. I’m worried about what to write. What should I write? What am I supposed to write? What would be right? That’s my problem. I’m always worried about what I should say. What I should do. What’s expected of me. What would someone think or say? I worry so much I lose track of what I really feel or want.

I want you. I miss you. I want to make you happy again. To be the one who makes you smile, makes you feel safe. Not the one who makes you cry. I want to be comfortable and confident in myself. I want to know I’m being the best wife and partner I can be. The best mom I can be to my girls.

These things I know.

She wrote until the words would no longer come.

Tag request: @marvelwomen-simp @user1269

[fear-is-truth]

i need jimmy olsen making it up to jealous reader after he got flirted with when they went out together (yes im projecting)

warnings: jealousy. mild smut. oral sex (f!receiving). | 18+ note. i’m so sorry.. consider this your emotional ice pack and forehead kiss. jimmy’s got you. and so do i ♡

JIMMY OLSEN was the most desirable man in metropolis.

he had what gen z called “rizz”—a word so unserious it felt almost disrespectful in this context. women, en masse, had made a consensus: if they were going to fold for anyone, it wouldn’t be the glib arrogance of actors or the predatory power plays of tech execs. it’d be the redhead with a camera strap across his chest and an honest-looking face.

and jimmy never entertained nor encouraged it. but he also never seemed particularly surprised. but it happened all the same. a sidewalk full of traffic and he’d be the one every head turned to. waitresses gave him napkins with phone numbers written in lipliner. old women on benches pinched his cheek like they wanted to “eat him up.”

which is why tonight, as you stood beside him at a gallery opening downtown, you felt hot jealousy start to rise in your chest like acid reflux.

a pretty blonde in the silk halter had been circling him all night. jimmy hadn’t reciprocated. hadn’t said much at all, actually, he shot you a glance and rolled his eyes apologetically. still, he could’ve had rebuffed her more directly.

annoyed, you left first. during the uber ride home, you stared out the window and tried not to cry over something he hadn’t technically done.

fifteen minutes later, jimmy showed up at your door later with a paper bag and wearing open-faced guilt. “you’re mad, right?”

you didn’t answer. not that you didn’t have one, but because none of the options sounded articulate.

“you should be.” he dropped the bag on the coffee table and sat cross-legged on the floor, clearly knowing he didn’t deserve the couch. that made you feel a bit better. “if some guy looked at you the way she looked at me, i’d’ve thrown the first punch that got me beaten into a coma.”

the corner of your mouth twitched, unbidden.

“i’d also let you put a cigarette out on my chest before i let her touch me.” then, after a beat, “but also, i would really prefer that you didn’t.” his hand hovered, then landed awkwardly on your thigh. a tentative pat.

“please,” jimmy begged, shifting to kneel, “let me make it up to you.”

“how.” you grabbed the paper bag with exaggerated disinterest. inside was an assortment of your favourite candy.

“well.” he looked upward, sheepish. “first i thought i’d apologise. then i figured i’d let you yell at me. then i planned to go down on you until you felt better.” the tips of his ears went scarlet, redder than his hair. god, you hated how badly you wanted to keep being mad.

jimmy watched you with the tension of someone awaiting a verdict.

“see?” he said hopefully. “three-step plan. you don’t even have to pick.”

-

hours later, jimmy’s hair was sticking out in defiance of its usual shape, mussed into near-extinction by your fingers. when he surfaced for air, his freckles looked less prominent due to the dark flush of extertion. he blinked up at you, dazed.

“jesus christ,” he mumbled, nose nudging the inside of your thigh as he tried to catch his breath. “if you keep pulling like that, you’re gonna give me traction alopecia.” he’d been self-conscious about his high hairline since the second week of dating.

“you think i’m kidding,” jimmy went on, “but i already have a slightly concerning hairline.”

you grinned without pity, then raked your fingers through the mess again, not even gently.

“worth it,” he mumbled, and ducked back down like a man on a mission.

the thing about jimmy olsen was—he had rizz.

[yukkiji]

emperor's constant

when the world moved on without him, she was the only one who searched—and the only one he wanted to be found by.

starring. michael kaiser x fem!reader

genre. angst, hurt/comfort, it's a happy ending though.

wc. 8.5k

cw. mental health struggles, emotional distress, isolation, career pressure, burnout, mentions of childhood trauma, suggestive scenes at the end (not detailed).

author's note: as per requested, anon that I should use akaza and koyuki's reunion a inspo and I shall deliver

You met Michael Kaiser in Berlin, of all places.

The cold was biting that afternoon, your phone had died, and the GPS had led you to the wrong stadium gate. You were half-lost, half-frustrated—until a voice from behind broke through your annoyed muttering.

"You look like you're about to murder your phone," he said in smooth English, accented just enough to place him here.

You turned, and there he was. Kaiser. Blond, smug, too pretty for his own good. You didn’t know who he was back then—not really. He was just some guy who offered directions, smirked when you glared, and walked you all the way to the right entrance even though he didn’t have to.

"You're not from here," he said casually.

"Wow. What gave it away?"

"The eyes. They look like they still believe in people."

You should’ve walked away. But you didn’t.

He found you again the following week, then the next. Always somehow nearby. Always a little too observant. His flirting was relentless, shameless even—but never cruel. And you realized, eventually, that Kaiser wasn't just offering company. He was offering a place in his world. And you took it.

Falling in love with him was easy. Staying in love with him? That was even easier.

Of course, there are times where things get rough. Especially when football takes its toll on him.

You started noticing it not long after you officially became his. At first, it was subtle—missed calls, unread messages, a certain dullness behind his eyes after a match he wasn’t proud of. Then came the avoidance. The sudden declarations that maybe it was better if you broke up. That he couldn’t handle a relationship. That you deserved someone who could be present—someone who wouldn’t fall apart the moment pressure crawled under his skin.

You were confused at first. Hurt, even. But the more time passed, the more you learned. That shutting you out was his instinct—one bred from years of surviving instead of living. The aftermath of a father who tore him down in ways words couldn’t fix and a mother who didn’t stay long enough to try. For Michael Kaiser, love was foreign, terrifying. And self-sabotage was familiar—comfortable even, in its own twisted way.

He asked you once why you stayed. Why you kept choosing him even when he gave you every reason not to.

You still remember where you were—on the balcony of his apartment, the city lights below, his voice quiet in the dark.

“Why?” he asked, eyes downcast, mouth pressed into something too thin to be a smile. “Why would you stay? When I’m like this?”

And you told him—calmly, like it was the most obvious thing in the world.

“Because I love you.”

And it was the truth. All of it. You loved him on the days he shined and the nights he fell apart. You loved him even when he couldn’t love himself. Even when he tried to make you leave—especially then. Because he never really wanted you to go. He just didn’t know how to believe that someone would stay.

But you did.

And every time, he came back a little softer.

Every time, it took him less time to reach for your hand.

Every time, it hurt a little less to be vulnerable.

Because he was learning, slowly, painfully, beautifully—that love wasn’t supposed to vanish when things got hard.

It was supposed to hold on.

You supported him in his football career—always cheering, always by his side.

You were there through every whistle, every press conference, every post-match silence when things didn’t go his way. You never missed a game if you could help it. You wore his number like a second skin, screamed his name until your voice broke. And every time—every time—he would find you after the final whistle.

Win or lose, muddy or bleeding, exhausted or triumphant—he would pull you into a kiss.

Cliché as it may seem, but it was never empty. It was the kind of kiss that spoke in all the words he didn’t say. A kiss that said thank you. A kiss that said you keep me grounded. A kiss that said I’m still here—and thank God you are, too.

That’s why—when he became one of the Bastard München players chosen to be sent to Blue Lock for the special program—you didn’t even blink.

“I’m going with you,” you said.

He blinked at you, caught off guard. His shoulders tensed, like he was already bracing to argue.

“You don’t have to,” he said. “It’s going to be strict. No visitors most of the time. You might get bored. Japan’s far—different.”

You only smiled. "I don’t care.”

You reached for his hand—tugged until his fingers laced with yours.

“I’ll wait,” you said. “It’s enough if I’m near you. That’s always enough.”

He stared at you—like he was trying to read between the lines, trying to find a reason you’d be that selfless. But there wasn’t one.

There was only love.

Kaiser let out a low breath—part laugh, part sigh. Then he tugged you into his chest, burying his nose in your hair.

“If you say so, liebling…” he whispered. “Then once it ends—we’ll go around Japan.”

His voice dropped softer, dreamier.

“We’ll start in Tokyo, where the lights never sleep. I’ll buy you the weirdest street food we can find and kiss you on every zebra crossing we run across.”

“Then Kyoto,” he murmured, “where it’s quieter. I’ll kiss you under every lantern and every cherry blossom tree, even if it’s out of season.”

He pulled back just enough to look into your eyes—smiling like he already saw it.

“We’ll get lost in alleys we can’t pronounce. I’ll buy you a yukata. You’ll look so pretty I might forget how to breathe. And we’ll take the train until the sea shows up and I’ll kiss you there too—until the sun goes down and maybe even after.”

His voice grew even lower then, a promise tucked beneath the warmth.

“No cameras. No managers. No football. Just me and you. You’ll finally get all of me, and I’ll make sure the world feels small enough that you never want to leave.”

He pressed one last kiss to your forehead—so gentle, it barely grazed skin.

“Promise.”

And with that, you found yourself on a plane beside him—bound for Japan, your shared dreams tucked between your joined hands and quiet promises mouthed between airport gates.

Kaiser had everything arranged before you could even think to ask—an Airbnb nestled in a quiet neighborhood not too far from the Blue Lock facility, close enough for you to walk when matches were open for viewing. He made sure it was comfortable, warm, somewhere you could feel at home while he was locked away training.

He dropped you off there first.

The car pulled up to the building just as the sun began dipping past the roofs, casting long golden streaks through the streets. He helped you with your luggage, carrying it inside like it wasn’t heavy at all, like it was second nature to take care of you. But as soon as you stepped in, you could feel it—the way the air shifted, the pause in your movement, the quiet press of reality setting in.

He couldn’t stay. Not yet. He was needed inside the facility.

You turned to him at the door, brows furrowed, lips parting with words you weren’t sure how to arrange until they tumbled out: “Good luck there, Micha, okay?”

He looked down at you, soft in a way few ever got to see. His hand reached for yours—steady, grounding—and he leaned in to press a kiss to your lips.

“Of course, liebling,” he murmured with a half-smile against your mouth, the corners of his eyes crinkling just enough to betray how much he already missed you.

You pulled back just slightly, eyes searching his. “You’ll return here after.”

It wasn’t a question—it was a truth you needed spoken aloud.

Kaiser didn’t hesitate. He nodded once, slow and sure, like he was sealing a pact between the two of you.

“I will,” he said. “Right here—back to you.”

And with one last squeeze of your hand, he turned to leave, the door closing behind him with the softest click.

You stood there a moment longer, the warmth of his touch still clinging to your skin, before finally stepping into the small apartment that would—for the time being—hold all the echoes of him.

You watched every single game of his. Always cheering by the side, and he would immediately find you in the crowd—your familiar wave and exaggerated wink always earning a smirk or a playful shake of the head from him.

He dominated every game, winning each one like it was second nature. Like he didn’t even need to try. Micha was on fire, unstoppable—everything you knew him to be.

But during that last game against PXG… something shifted.

He still played. Still dribbled, passed, scored. But you knew him well enough to recognize when something was off. His movements lacked sharpness. His usual spark—the arrogance, the playful swagger—was gone.

When the final whistle blew and Bastard München emerged victorious, your heart didn’t lift.

Because on the field stood a man who looked like he’d lost.

Micheal Kaiser looked up into the crowd, scanning briefly until his eyes found yours. But instead of smiling, instead of holding up his signature heart-shaped fingers, he simply stared. His expression was unreadable for a second—until it wasn’t.

Defeat.

Guilt.

Embarrassment.

You mouthed something soft—"You did great," or maybe "I’m proud of you"—you weren’t even sure. You just wanted him to know you were still there. Still with him.

But he didn’t acknowledge it.

Not with a nod. Not with a glance.

He turned and walked straight into the tunnel, leaving the field—and you—behind.

That night, back at the Airbnb, the silence felt heavier than usual. You sat on the edge of the bed, already preparing a mental checklist: his favorite snacks, a warm bath, maybe a movie he liked or soft music he could fall asleep to. Anything to help ease whatever storm was raging in him.

Because if Kaiser wouldn't let anyone else see him like that, you knew—he’d still come home to you.

An hour went by. Then two, then three. You stayed curled on the couch, blanket tugged to your chin, sleep creeping in while hope stubbornly lingered. Maybe he didn’t want to talk yet. Maybe he’d wait until you were asleep. Maybe it would be easier that way—no questions, no pressure. Just silence, and his quiet return.

But when morning came, he still wasn’t there. The stillness in the apartment was unchanged—too clean, too untouched. Nothing had moved since the day he dropped you off. No suitcase by the door, no keys tossed on the counter, no jacket thrown carelessly over the back of a chair. There was no scent of him in the air, no rumpled clothes in the hamper, no dent in the mattress where he should’ve been. It was only your things—your suitcase half-unpacked, your charger plugged in beside the bed, your food in the fridge. His absence was absolute. He’d never stepped foot inside, not once.

Your heart started to race, panic curling cold at the base of your spine. He didn’t come here. Not even after the match.

Your fingers fumbled slightly as you unlocked your phone and called Ness. It barely rang before he picked up.

“Ness,” you said, voice tight, “was Kaiser still at the facility last night?”

There was a pause. Longer than usual.

“Kaiser left last night,” Ness said, careful—like he already knew how the words would hit. “He didn’t even speak with us. He just left.” Another pause, heavier this time. “Didn’t say a word to anyone.”

And that was when your stomach dropped—because he didn’t just lose the match. He disappeared.

“Oh God, Ness. He didn’t come here to the Airbnb,” you said, voice trembling, cracking at the edges.

“Calm down. Maybe he’s just… somewhere around here,” Ness replied, though the way his words faltered made it clear—he didn’t believe that either.

“Ness, I saw your last game,” you whispered. “He was broken.”

There was a long breath on the other end. A sigh full of things left unsaid. Because you both saw it. The moment something inside Michael Kaiser—something loud and brilliant—just… disappeared.

“I know.”

“He didn’t say anything?”

“No. We were supposed to leave yesterday night or today, but most of us decided to go today since we’re all tired. He didn’t wait.”

The silence that followed weighed heavy. Because if Kaiser didn’t wait for his team, if he didn’t come back to you—then where the hell did he go?

You found yourself wandering aimlessly through the heart of Tokyo, a city that had never once felt so cold, so distant, so unbearably overwhelming. The skyline towered above you like indifferent giants, bright neon signs and shimmering hotel marquees flashing names you’d seen on Kaiser's itinerary before—but none of them led to him. Not this time.

You clutched your phone like it was an anchor, fingers trembling as you dialed his number for the seventh, eighth, ninth time that day. Each ring dug deeper into your chest until it cut like broken glass, sharp and agonizing. The voicemail came on again, that same impersonal tone telling you to leave a message after the beep, as though he hadn’t just vanished without a trace. As though the world hadn’t started spinning off its axis.

You left messages anyway. Some were frantic and filled with words you didn’t even remember saying. Others were quieter, whispers into the void. Please call me. Please let me know you’re okay. I don’t care about anything else, just let me hear your voice. But the silence that followed each desperate attempt never changed. It just stretched longer, colder.

Then came the internet. The vultures of speculation. At first, it was just a few murmurs on fan forums and sports blogs—mild concern about why the infamous Michael Kaiser hadn’t made a post-NEL appearance. But soon, those murmurs snowballed into grotesque headlines and conspiracy theories, their cruelty growing more grotesque with each refresh. Some claimed he was spiraling into self-destruction. Others painted him as the egotist who couldn’t handle defeat.

And the worst—the absolute worst—were the ones that dug into the dark, buried corners of his childhood. Speculative threads about the trauma he’d tried so hard to keep out of the spotlight. Photos, rumors, half-truths twisted into poison. You read them until your stomach twisted into knots and the bile in your throat tasted like grief.

You couldn't take it anymore.

With resolve sharpening into something volatile, you made your way to the hotel where Bastard München’s PR team was currently based, a sleek high-rise tucked in a quieter district of the city. The receptionist barely had time to process your presence before Ness spotted you from across the lobby. His expression dropped in an instant—the usual smug confidence erased by the worry tightening his jaw.

“Hey, wait—” he called out, quickly moving to intercept you as you stormed toward the elevators. “Come with me. They're all upstairs in a private conference suite.”

You didn’t answer. You didn’t even look at him. You just followed, your jaw set, your pulse thudding violently beneath your skin. He led you to a secluded floor, the hallway dimly lit and far too pristine, the kind of sterile luxury that only amplified the chaos swelling in your chest. When the doors opened to the meeting room, a panel of executives and PR specialists turned toward the commotion, startled by your sudden intrusion.

Noel Noa was seated at the end of the long table, arms folded, eyes as sharp and unreadable as ever. But even he looked uneasy at the sight of you.

“I need you all to shut the fuck up and listen to me,” you snapped, voice cracking with the sheer force of everything you’d kept buried.

The room fell dead silent.

You stepped forward, unblinking, heart pounding so violently that it echoed in your ears. “Kaiser is fucking missing and the internet is out there inventing wild, fucked-up stories about him because no one in this damn organization is doing a goddamn thing to handle it.”

Someone opened their mouth to speak—probably a PR coordinator—but you didn’t give them the chance.

“They’re talking about his past. About shit that should’ve stayed buried forever. His childhood trauma, his old guardians, some of them even dragging up files that were sealed years ago. Are you seriously just going to sit there, sip coffee, and wait for the fire to burn itself out while he’s being torn apart online?”

“We’re working on finding a response that—”

“No,” you cut in, voice rising into something hoarse and near-broken, “I don’t care if you can’t find him right now. That’s my job. I will tear Tokyo apart brick by brick if I have to, but you—” you pointed at the team, at the clueless PR heads and calm-faced strategists “—your job is to handle the fucking damage control. Protect his image. Buy him time. Do your goddamn job.”

Your voice cracked mid-sentence, the burn in your throat impossible to hold back anymore. The weight of sleepless nights, of haunting silence on the other end of the line, of watching the person you love be dissected like a scandal—everything collided in a storm that left you shaking.

“I begged him to trust again,” you whispered, voice raw and trembling. “He tried so hard to believe he wasn’t just a product of what happened to him. And now—now you’re all letting strangers make him out to be a monster.”

The tears came before you could stop them. Hot and silent at first, then rushing like a flood as your knees nearly buckled under you. Ness moved quickly, guiding you gently toward the plush sofa in the corner of the room. He didn’t say anything at first, just sat beside you, a hand resting on your back as your shoulders trembled uncontrollably.

“He changed,” you choked out. “You all don’t even know how much he changed. For me. For us. He learned how to be gentle. How to be kind. He started smiling for real. And now he’s out there somewhere—alone—and you're just sitting here worrying about press releases.”

The room was still.

Noa, who had remained quiet throughout, finally let out a quiet sigh. He stood from his seat, his gaze sweeping across the room like a silent reprimand.

“For his sake,” he said quietly, firmly, “and for her sake, do what needs to be done.”

The heads around the table nodded, subdued, some already typing hastily into their laptops. The hum of movement resumed, but it felt distant. All you could hear was the sound of your own ragged breathing, the ache of your heart echoing through your ribs like a siren call.

Ness remained at your side, hand steady on your back as you buried your face in your hands, letting the sobs shake you to your very core.

Wherever he was, wherever he had run to—he had to know that you were looking for him. That you weren’t going to stop. That you would scream at the entire world if that’s what it took to protect the boy who had once believed he didn’t deserve to be loved.

For days now, your body had existed on little more than autopilot. You couldn’t remember the last time you had a proper meal—only the stale remnants of convenience store snacks Ness had left on the kitchen counter in the hopes you’d eventually get hungry enough to eat them. Sleep had become just another casualty of the anxious haze wrapping itself tighter around you with each hour Kaiser remained missing. Every time your eyes closed, your brain conjured worst-case scenarios—some horrifying, some absurd, all equally torturous.

And Ness… God, Ness had tried.

He had delayed his flight back to Germany more times than he could count, each reschedule accompanied by a quiet sigh and a glance in your direction, as if silently weighing whether or not you were okay enough to be left alone. You weren’t, and both of you knew that—but he never said it aloud. He would visit the Airbnb daily, letting himself in with the spare key you left him. Sometimes he brought food. Other times he brought silence. But always, he brought himself, anchoring you to reality when your thoughts drifted too far into places you didn’t want to be.

He watched you spiral with a guilt that sat heavy on his chest, caught between his duties in Germany and his instinct to protect one of his closest friends—especially now, when everything was crashing around you.

Today was no different. He stood in the small living room of the rented Airbnb, watching as you pulled your sleeves down over your hands, your fingers trembling slightly from the cold and something deeper you couldn’t quite name. The daylight outside had started to fade, but you hadn’t bothered to turn on the lights.

His bag was already packed and sitting near the door. He’d pushed his flight as far back as he could.

Still, he hesitated.

“Are you sure you’ll be alright here?” he asked quietly, like he was afraid raising his voice might break you further.

You didn’t answer immediately. For a moment, you just looked at him, blinking slowly like it took extra effort to process the words. Then you nodded—small, tired.

“I’ll be fine,” you said, your voice hoarse from disuse. “I just need a few more days.”

“You’ve been saying that for a week,” he replied gently, not accusing, not demanding. Just worried.

“I know,” you murmured, eyes fixed on the window like you were waiting for something—or someone—to suddenly appear. “But I mean it this time. I’ll go back to Germany soon. I promise.”

Ness exhaled and crossed the room, sitting beside you on the couch. He didn’t say anything else, just sat close enough that your shoulders brushed. You were grateful for it—for his presence, for his patience, for the way he hadn’t once tried to tell you how to feel.

He left not long after, reluctant and silent, pausing in the doorway for a long moment before finally stepping into the hallway and closing the door behind him.

The moment you were alone again, the stillness returned. And in that stillness, the ache in your chest flared to life once more—an unbearable hollowness left in the shape of a man who was still nowhere to be found.

As promised, you packed up and left Japan after a few days—anxiety curling in your chest at the thought that he might still be there.

Your bags felt heavier, not because of souvenirs, but because of everything you couldn’t say—everything that clung to you like second skin.

Still, you flew back to Germany, hoping, praying even, that he’d be waiting in your shared apartment in Munich.

But as the train pulled into the familiar station and the skyline came into view, nothing felt like home. The streets you used to walk side by side, the bakery at the corner, even the trees lining your block—everything felt weighed down by memory.

The ache in your chest only grew when you reached the apartment building. You paused outside the door, fingers tightening around your keys, already bracing yourself for the emptiness inside—no shoes by the doorway, no keys in the bowl, no faint humming from the kitchen.

You turned the knob.

The door creaked open, and before you could step in fully, the scent hit you.

That cologne—the one he wore every time he came back from training, the one that lingered in your sheets for days after he left.

It was still here.

You moved slowly, cautiously, afraid that your mind was only playing tricks on you.

But when you looked up, the weight of your bags slipped from your shoulders and crashed to the floor.

There—by the window, framed by the faint afternoon light—stood a silhouette.

His back was turned. Still, unmoving.

And in that moment, you couldn’t tell if your heart stopped completely or if it had been beating too loud this whole time to notice.

Kaiser felt it before he saw you—something in the air shifted, like the weight of your presence had announced itself without a sound. He turned around, expecting a ghost, but it was you.

He froze.

Not out of fear, not even surprise—but like his body couldn’t keep up with the flood of emotions surging through his chest all at once.

You didn’t wait. Your feet carried you forward before your mind could catch up, your hands reaching for him like a compass finally pointing north. You held his face in your palms, thumbs brushing over the stubble on his jaw, then moving up to sweep his bangs aside like muscle memory.

He didn’t speak at first—he just looked at you, eyes wide and guarded, searching for something he couldn’t name.

“What are you doing here?” he asked finally, voice low, stiff with restraint. He tried to sound cold—like the weeks apart had frozen over the part of him that used to soften for you.

But you heard the crack in his tone. The part that didn’t quite make it to cold.

You swallowed the lump in your throat.

“Because I was looking for you, Micha,” you whispered.

And that was the only truth that mattered.

Kaiser didn’t speak at first.

He just stood there, unmoving—shoulders taut, jaw clenched, eyes flickering like he couldn’t decide whether to run or let himself fall apart. You could see the storm behind his gaze, the exhaustion in the way he carried himself. And then… something broke.

He dropped to his knees.

Like the weight of everything he had carried alone finally crushed him.

A ragged breath escaped him as he clutched the hem of your coat, arms quickly wrapping around your waist as he buried his face into your stomach. The hug wasn’t gentle—it was desperate, trembling, like he was afraid you’d vanish if he let go.

“I’m a failure,” he rasped, his voice breaking into something raw and jagged. “No matter what I did… no matter how hard I tried… it was never enough.”

You froze for only a second before your hands instinctively went to him—fingertips weaving into his hair, gently brushing it back the way you always used to. The way that used to make him sigh, used to ground him.

But now, he shook under your touch.

“I pushed myself past the edge, thinking if I climbed higher, if I won more, if I just became more… then maybe I’d be worth something. Maybe then you’d be proud of me. Maybe I could finally be the kind of man who deserves someone like you.”

He gave a bitter, broken laugh against your stomach, voice muffled and thick with tears. “But it was never enough. Not for them. Not for me. Not for anyone.”

His fingers tightened in the fabric of your coat, knuckles white.

“I was always chasing something. Approval. Perfection. The next victory. The next goal. And in doing all that, I lost everything that actually mattered. I let everything slip through my fingers—I let you go.”

You felt a warm drop through your shirt and realized he was crying. Really crying. Not the kind he could blink away or hide behind a smirk.

“I thought if I stayed away, it would hurt less. For both of us,” he whispered. “That maybe I could protect you from the mess that is me. But I couldn’t even do that right. I fucked it all up, again and again.”

He finally looked up at you, and the sight nearly brought you to your knees too.

His eyes were red, lashes damp, and for once… there was no arrogance. No mask. Just Michael Kaiser—stripped of his pride, his charm, his ego. Just a boy who had tried so hard to be a man worthy of love, only to end up broken by the pressure he’d buried himself under.

“I’m not enough,” he whispered. “I’ve never been enough.”

You dropped to your knees in front of him without hesitation. Gently, you cupped his face in both hands. His skin was warm and damp beneath your palms, but you held him steady—held him close.

And then, with the softest voice, like you were trying to speak directly to the pieces of him that no one else saw, you said:

“You’re more than enough for me, Micha.”

His breath hitched.

You leaned in, pressing your forehead to his. “You’ve done more than enough. You always have. Even when you thought you weren’t. Even when you couldn’t see it.”

He tried to speak, but you hushed him, gently stroking your thumb along his cheek.

“You’ve never needed to be perfect. You just needed to be you. And that was always enough for me.”

The silence that followed was heavy—but not empty. It was full of all the things he never let himself believe, all the things you wished he’d known sooner.

And slowly, Kaiser let himself fall forward—into your arms, into your warmth, into the truth of your love.

And for the first time in a long time… he let himself be held.

You two stayed in that position, his body curled into yours, his shoulders shaking as he cried into your shoulder. The back of your shirt grew damp with every breathless sob he couldn't contain, each one dragged from somewhere deep and raw. He kept muttering apologies like a broken record, voice cracking under the weight of them.

“I’m so sorry, mein liebe. I’m fucking sorry, mein liebe.” Over and over—so much regret spilling from his mouth like it was the only language he remembered how to speak.

You didn’t interrupt. Just held him tighter. Let him fall apart until the pieces soften in your arms.

Eventually, when his breathing lost its erratic rhythm and his hands began to unclench from your back, you shifted—slowly, carefully—pressing a kiss to his temple before coaxing him upright. He was pliant, exhausted, eyes red and swollen but still locked on you like he was scared you’d vanish if he looked away. You helped him up and walked him down the dim hallway to your bedroom, your fingers interlaced with his, grounding him with every step.

He climbed into bed without a word, but when you followed, he gripped your waist tight, burying his face into your neck as if you were the only real thing left. His arms trembled around you, and you felt it—the fear still there, buried beneath exhaustion.

“I’m not going anywhere,” you whispered, brushing his hair back with gentle fingers.

His voice was fragile, barely audible against your skin. “If I blink, you’ll disappear.”

You let out a soft chuckle, the sound warm, the kind you knew he needed. “Then don’t blink,” you murmured, still carding your fingers through his hair, slow and soothing.

He didn’t answer—not with words. Just a quiet exhale, the kind that only came after too many emotions and too few hours of rest. Within minutes, his breathing grew even, shoulders still, body slack against yours. And then, the faintest sound—his snoring, soft and steady, vibrating gently against your collarbone.

The sun was still climbing when Kaiser stirred awake, its golden light spilling into the bedroom through the gaps in the curtains. It painted long streaks across the sheets, warming the cold corners of the room that had felt empty for far too long.

For the first time in weeks—maybe longer—he didn’t jolt upright in a panic. There was no dream to escape, no phantom hand on his chest choking the air out of his lungs. Just quiet.

Just breath.

And beside him—warm, steady, real—was you.

It took him a moment to adjust, the softness of morning and the unfamiliar calm making the world feel strangely distant. His body ached, not from strain but from the unfamiliar weight of rest settling into his bones. He blinked slowly, taking in the sliver of peace still lingering in the air, and when he turned his head, he saw you curled into him, your hand resting lightly against his chest, your face tucked close to where his heart had always belonged to you.

And for the first time in what felt like years, Kaiser smiled.

It was small, barely there—tugging just faintly at the corners of his mouth. But it was genuine. A quiet ache blooming beneath his ribs as he looked at you—his girl, his light, his constant. You’d stayed. After everything. After he shut you out. After he stopped answering. After he fell too far into himself and started believing you deserved better than someone so lost.

You still found him.

You still came back for him.

You still loved him.

But then—his smile faltered.

Because now he saw you. Not the soft blur of you through sleepy eyes, not the imagined memory he had clung to in the silence, but you—clearly. Fully. And what he saw punched the air straight from his lungs.

Your lashes were stiff with dried tears, crusted slightly at the edges like you’d cried long after he fell asleep. Your eyes, usually bright and brimming with warmth, were shadowed with deep, purplish hollows—evidence of nights lost to worry, to pacing, to sleeplessness he had caused. Your skin, once glowing with warmth and laughter, looked far too pale now, like the life had been drained from you in slow, unbearable pieces.

But what broke him the most—what shattered something deep inside him—was the change in your face.

You were thinner.

Painfully so.

Your cheeks, once full and soft, the ones he loved to cup in his hands and pepper with kisses until you laughed—were hollow now. The gentle roundness he adored was gone, replaced by sharp angles and sunken skin. Your jawline stood out more prominently, your features more severe, as if the weight of waiting for him, of worrying for him, had whittled you down day by day.

His chest tightened. He couldn’t look away.

He noticed it all now—how your collarbones protruded more sharply than before, how the sleeves of the hoodie you wore (his, he realized—it was always his) hung a little too loosely around your wrists. You’d stopped eating properly. You’d stopped sleeping. You’d lost yourself in trying to find him.

And he let it happen.

He told himself he was protecting you by staying away. That distancing himself was the noble thing to do, that if he fell apart quietly and alone, he could spare you from the mess he had become. But all he’d really done was hand his suffering to you in silence—and then turned his back while you carried it for him.

He thought vanishing would make you safe.

But all it did was make you ache.

His throat closed up, and for a moment, all he could do was stare. His hand hovered over your cheek, shaking slightly, aching to touch, to soothe, to offer anything even remotely close to comfort—but he didn’t wake you. Not when you finally looked like you were resting, even if it was the kind of rest born from complete emotional depletion.

Kaiser blinked rapidly, trying to push back the sting in his eyes.

He had broken things. He had broken you.

And still, here you were—sleeping beside him like your heart hadn’t been torn to shreds by his absence, like you hadn’t waited night after night hoping he’d come home, like you hadn’t dragged yourself through hell just to reach him before the darkness claimed him completely.

He thought he had been running from the worst version of himself.

But maybe the worst thing he had done was make you believe you had to suffer in silence to love him.

“I’m so sorry,” he whispered, barely audible, the words trembling as they slipped past his lips. He wasn’t even sure if the apology was for you or for himself—or maybe for both. “I should’ve come back sooner.”

The guilt settled into him like ice, cold and sharp, threading itself between the steady beats of his heart. He didn’t deserve your love. Not after this. Not after what he let happen to you.

And yet—

You stayed.

Even now, with your body thinned from stress, your lashes heavy with dried tears, your arm draped around him like he was still worth saving—you stayed.

Kaiser swallowed hard and slowly leaned forward, brushing his lips gently against your temple. He let them linger there, eyes closed, as if by staying close enough, he could make up for the time he stole. Just breathing you in. Just holding onto the fragile miracle that you were still here—warm, alive, and within arm’s reach. That you hadn’t slipped through his fingers for good.

His breath hitched. He hadn’t allowed himself to believe he deserved this—your forgiveness, your patience, your presence. But here you were.

And he was terrified you'd vanish if he blinked.

So he stayed there, soaking in the scent of your shampoo and the steady rhythm of your breathing.

Until that rhythm shifted.

You stirred softly under the sheets, your brows twitching as your body slowly roused from sleep. A faint hum left your lips before your lashes fluttered open. Your eyes, still hazy from slumber, adjusted to the light—only to find Kaiser hovering above you.

“Micha…” you murmured, voice raspy with sleep. A tiny smile tugged at your lips. “You’re already awake?”

But your smile faded as you noticed the look on his face.

His shoulders were tense. His eyes glossed with emotion, and his lips were pressed into a thin, guilty line. That expression—like he was about to shatter—was enough to pull you fully awake.

“Micha? Are you okay?” you asked, voice gentle, concerned.

He stared at you for a long second before speaking, his voice hoarse.

“Mein liebe… I’m so sorry,” he whispered. “I’m so sorry for the pain I caused you.”

Your brows furrowed, but he kept going, voice raw and low, almost like a confession.

“I saw it… what my disappearance did to you,” he said quietly, his thumb brushing over your cheek. “You looked pale. Tired. Smaller somehow. Like you were carrying the weight I should’ve never put on your shoulders.”

His voice cracked. “You were always strong. But I made you brittle.”

You shook your head, but his hand moved to cradle your jaw, thumb lightly grazing your skin like he couldn’t bear to stop touching you.

“I thought I was doing the right thing. That keeping my mess away from you would protect you. But I was wrong. I wasn’t shielding you—I was running. And you—” He swallowed hard. “You didn’t deserve the silence. Or the questions. Or the nights where you cried yourself to sleep wondering if I even loved you.”

Tears welled in your eyes.

“I lost myself for a while,” he admitted. “But even at my lowest, it was always your name I whispered. It was always your face I saw when I closed my eyes.”

His grip on your hand tightened, desperate.

“If I had to search across every city, scream your name into every storm, tear up the whole goddamn world just to find you again—I would.”

You blinked slowly, tears spilling freely now, and your hand came up to cradle his face.

“Micha,” you whispered, voice breaking with emotion, “I would look for you always… even if it meant tearing up the world just to find you.”

His breath caught.

For a heartbeat, neither of you moved—just eyes locked, foreheads pressed together, pain and love bleeding into one another.

Then he leaned in, not for a kiss, but to rest his forehead against yours, voice nothing more than a breath.

“Please don’t let go,” he whispered. “Even if I lose myself again. Please… hold on to me.”

And you did. You always would.

You two eventually drifted back to sleep, hearts lighter, wrapped in each other’s warmth. There were no more heavy words or unspoken fears—just the quiet rhythm of your breathing in sync, the kind of silence that felt like peace. For the first time in a long while, everything felt… okay.

You weren’t sure how long you’d been asleep, but when you stirred again, the bed felt noticeably colder.

Kaiser’s side was empty.

Your heart leapt into your throat as you sat up, eyes scanning the room. For a moment, irrational panic took hold. Was it a dream? Had he left again? Was last night nothing more than a fleeting comfort?

But then—a soft, warm scent met your nose. Butter. Something rich and savory, drifting into the bedroom and wrapping around you like a hug. You breathed it in, slowly letting the anxiety ease off your chest.

You slipped out of bed and padded quietly to the kitchen.

There he was.

Michael Kaiser stood at the stove in one of his old jerseys, sleeves carelessly rolled up, his back to you as he stirred a pan with quiet concentration. The soft golden light filtering through the windows caught the edges of his hair, giving him a gentle glow.

You walked up behind him, climbed onto the counter just beside his cooking space, and watched with curious eyes.

He glanced at you and smiled, his whole face softening. He leaned in and kissed your cheek without hesitation.

“Good afternoon, mein liebe,” he said, his voice a gentle murmur. “It’s already lunchtime, so I decided to make your favorite. Butter chicken and potatoes with mixed vegetables.”

You blinked at him, still processing the domesticity of it all—him, here, cooking, like nothing had shattered between you two.

“I thought you were—” You stopped yourself, the rest of the sentence lodged in your throat. “Never mind.”

He put down the ladle and turned to you, hand reaching up to tuck a strand of hair behind your ear with heartbreaking gentleness.

“I’ll never do that again,” he said firmly, his tone quiet but steady, like he needed you to believe it—needed himself to believe it too. “I swear.”

You held his gaze for a moment, and something unspoken passed between you—fragile, but honest.

“Go sit by the stool,” he added with a soft smile. “It’ll be done soon.”

You nodded, slipping off the counter and making your way to the island.

A few minutes later, Kaiser turned off the stove and carefully plated the meal. He walked over and gently set a plate in front of you, then sat beside you with his own.

“Here you go,” he said, nudging your elbow lightly. “Made with extra butter. Just how you like it.”

You looked down at the plate, then back at him.

“I didn’t even know you remembered the exact way I like it,” you murmured, touched by the detail.

He gave you a small, sheepish grin. “I remember everything when it comes to you.”

You picked up your fork, heart thudding softly in your chest.

And for the first time in a long while, you and Kaiser shared a quiet lunch together—side by side, in a kitchen that smelled like comfort and home, where every bite tasted like forgiveness and a fresh start.

You picked up your fork, heart thudding softly in your chest.

The warmth from the food seemed to seep into your bones, grounding you in the present. The room was quiet, save for the faint sound of simmering from the stove and the occasional clink of cutlery against porcelain. The smell of butter and herbs lingered in the air—rich, nostalgic, calming.

Kaiser sat beside you, eating slowly, gaze occasionally drifting your way like he was making sure you were still there. You didn’t miss the way his shoulders, usually squared with arrogance or stress, had dropped just slightly. He still looked tired, but there was a softness around the edges now—a peace that hadn’t been there in weeks.

You glanced at him, setting your fork down gently on the plate.

“Micha,” you started quietly, and he looked up right away, eyes alert but open, like he was bracing for something.

“If you want to rest… or disappear for a while, that’s okay.” You reached out and placed a hand over his, giving it a gentle squeeze. “We can leave Munich. Just the two of us.”

His brows lifted slightly, but he didn’t interrupt.

“Somewhere quiet. Somewhere no one recognizes us. No press. No pressure. Just you and me,” you said, your voice tender but steady. “Then… when you're ready, we’ll come back.”

You paused, searching his face. His blue eyes were glossy again, lips parting slightly like he couldn’t quite believe what he was hearing.

“We can stay as long as we need,” you added, voice softening even more, “even if it means doing absolutely nothing for months. Even if it’s just to get you healthy and okay again, Micha.”

His throat bobbed with a swallow, and for a long moment, he said nothing. Just stared at you like he was trying to memorize the shape of your love.

Then he reached up, cupping your cheek with one hand, thumb brushing tenderly under your eye.

“I don’t know what I did to deserve you,” he whispered, voice hoarse.

“You don’t have to earn it,” you replied, leaning into his touch. “Just let me love you. That’s all.”

Kaiser pulled you gently into his arms, pressing his forehead to your temple, holding you like you were his anchor in the storm.

“Let’s go,” he murmured. “Anywhere. As long as it’s with you.”

With that, you two left your apartment in Munich—locking it behind you with quiet finality, as if sealing away the version of yourselves that once lived there. Two suitcases each, fingers laced together in a silent promise that wherever you were going next, you were going there together.

Getting Bastard München’s approval for the extended leave wasn’t easy. It involved long calls, three heated meetings, and a final phone conversation where you said flatly, “If your club loses Michael Kaiser again, the public won’t care about context—they’ll care that your golden boy disappeared twice under your watch. And if you think I’m going to forget how you fumbled the aftermath of the Neo Egoist League, then you’re bigger fools than I assumed.” There was silence, followed by stammered agreement. You didn’t let them off easy—and you made sure they knew you weren’t finished with them either.

The first stop was Florence, Italy. You stayed in a sun-washed apartment nestled above a bakery, the air thick with the scent of warm bread and espresso. Mornings were lazy, afternoons full of art galleries and cobblestone streets, and nights spent tangled in linen sheets with the windows open to the sound of the city breathing below.

Next came the Swiss Alps, where you rented a secluded cabin. The snow piled high outside, but the fireplace kept you warm—along with shared baths, long naps under thick blankets, and hands that couldn’t seem to keep to themselves. He kissed you like you were oxygen after drowning, and you let him, until the snow melted and spring followed your trail out of the mountains.

In Paris, you lived out of a chic but creaky flat in Montmartre. There were street musicians beneath your window and wine bottles that multiplied too fast in the kitchen. You danced in the living room to old records, your laughter echoing as he spun you, then pinned you against the wall with soft curses in German, lips trailing down your neck like a vow.

Amsterdam was slower, hazier. You biked everywhere—he was terrible at it—and spent hours in secondhand bookstores and by the canals. You made love with the windows open, the scent of tulips and wet stone mingling with sweat and skin, his voice a breathless prayer against your collarbone.

You visited Prague, Vienna, Madrid, Santorini. Each place etched into memory like a postcard—some vivid with color, others soft and faded, all of them yours. The year moved like water, slow and sparkling, and by the time you reached the edge of it, you both knew it was time to rest.

You chose Bali. A quiet bungalow tucked against the shoreline, where the mornings began with waves and the nights ended with tangled sheets and skin still warm from the sun. He made breakfast shirtless while you draped yourself in a sarong and watched him move like he belonged to this place, salt in his hair and a lazy smile on his lips. In the afternoons, you read on the porch while he painted, not caring what the outcome looked like, only that it kept his hands moving and his heart quiet. Sometimes he pulled you into the water fully clothed, laughing when you cursed him, kissing the words off your mouth until you forgot what you were angry about. Sometimes, in the deepest hours of the night, he whispered confessions into your skin—soft, broken things that only the moon and you were allowed to hear.

Then one morning, while sharing a breakfast of eggs, sambal, and fruit at a beachside café, he set his fork down and said quietly, “I think I’m ready to go back.”

You looked up, eyes steady, and smiled. “Then I’ll be right there with you.”

You two booked a flight back to Munich with everything finally lighter—your hearts, your steps, your luggage filled not just with clothes and souvenirs, but with memories that stitched him back together piece by piece. This time, he wasn’t returning out of obligation or pressure—he was coming back because he wanted to, and that made all the difference.

The airport was buzzing when you landed, a small sea of fans gathered beyond the glass barriers, signs that read KAISER IS BACK, and cameras clicking nonstop. The club’s staff greeted him with more warmth than before, tentative but genuine, as if acknowledging both his absence and the quiet storm he had walked through. Reporters tried to swarm, but the club kept them at bay—for once, letting him breathe.

Bastard München gave him a grand re-entry: a press conference, new campaign visuals, and a welcome video that trended for hours. Fans filled the stadium the day of his first match back, chanting his name louder than ever—Kaiser, Kaiser, Kaiser. And he delivered. A comeback play so precise, so aggressive, so undeniably him—with a goal that curved past three defenders and slid into the net like poetry—that the crowd erupted in something that felt like more than just applause. It was forgiveness. It was celebration. It was home.

Online platforms exploded within minutes. Headlines praised his form, but more than that, they noted the shift in him—More grounded. More focused. Still ruthless, but less volatile. Analysts speculated on what changed him. Fans commented on his calmer energy, the warmth in his post-match smiles, the way he no longer seemed like he was trying to outrun something invisible.

And in the photos, whether from the game or snapped by paparazzi, one thing always appeared quietly in the background—you. Sometimes walking beside him. Sometimes cheering from the stands. Sometimes caught laughing with him at some forgotten inside joke. You didn’t need a spotlight. You never asked for one. But somehow, you became part of the story too.

Because everyone could see it now—Michael Kaiser had come back a better player, but more importantly, he had come back a better man.

© 2025 yukkiji ☾ creations by yukkiji — please do not repost, copy, or translate without permission.

[onlypinkslut]

since a lot of you have been curious about me, i thought i’d finally do this. i want my readers to get to know every part of me the soft parts, the freaky parts, the chaotic parts all of it. even the messy, unpretty things. you can ask me personal questions if you want. really, it’s okay. i’m not shy about who i am anymore. i’m just me, and this little space is where i let that exist fully.

hi. i’m 23, and i’m the type of girl who lives a little too much in her head but still manages to be loud as hell in real life. i speak both english and french fluently because i grew up in the french school system since i was a kid. french has always been part of how i think, speak, express love, or throw shade. i’m naturally introverted, but not the quiet type more like, i keep a lot to myself until i randomly start talking your ear off like we’ve known each other forever. i’m weird as fuck in the best way. i feel things deeply, i talk fast, i zone out, i laugh hard. i overthink and forget things all at once. i write all my filthy little fics in my notes app, literally. no fancy setup. just me, thumbs tapping, daydreaming at midnight, writing from my bed or the bathroom floor or while eating something sweet.

i procrastinate a lot. like… a lot. i’m lazy, moody, impulsive, i don’t take things seriously unless they hit me in the face, and i’ve got anger issues that flare up when i least expect them. my emotions switch without warning sometimes i care too much, sometimes i couldn’t care less if i tried. i don’t do therapy. i tried it once because someone thought i might have bpd (i was never diagnosed, just had symptoms), and i stopped going after the second session because the therapist made a weird comment about my makeup. which, by the way, i wear a lot of not for anyone else, just for me. it’s part of my armor, my art, my power. i’m a baddie and i don’t want to be fixed. i don’t need to be soft all the time to be real. i’m freaky and hypersexual, and yeah, a lot of that came from trauma, but i’m not ashamed. i don’t care to be healed in the way people expect. i’ve survived by turning pain into jokes, stories, characters, lipstick, and messy truths.

i’m bisexual, and i genuinely love women. like deeply. emotionally and sexually. i’ve mostly dated girls in real life because i feel safer, softer, and more myself around them. we like the same things makeup, cute shit, emotional messiness, being hot and sweet and dramatic at the same time. i’ve only dated one guy. hooked up with another one. but i’ve never had sex. i’m still a virgin. not because i’m shy or prudish or scared, but because i’ve never trusted a man enough to let him take that part of me. it was always rushed. always disappointing. always felt like i was supposed to give in before i was ready. i’ve sucked cock, and honestly… i liked it. i probably have an oral fixation i don’t even try to deny it. i’ve let men suck my tits too, but never let them fuck me. something in me always said no. maybe because i’m waiting for a moment that doesn’t feel cheap. something that feels like mine. not just some random sweaty fuck. and yeah, i write the nastiest shit about men in fiction i go full pick-me freak for fictional dilfs but in real life? you’d never catch me being down bad for a guy like that. not ever. i’m built different. i’m private. i hold myself sacred, even when i write dirty.

i like roblox. i love plushies. not the labubu ones because… EW. i like cute ones that feel soft when i’m sad. i vape. i scroll too much. i get attached easily but pretend i don’t. i don’t go out much unless it’s with my girls. i used to draw, roleplay, and spend hours on wattpad imagining lives that felt safer than mine. i still have a wild imagination. i daydream more than i sleep. i talk to myself when i’m alone. i tease people for fun because i’m a little brat. i romanticize everything and get crushed when reality disappoints. but that’s just me. soft. unfiltered. a little fucked up, but loving. craving safety, even if i act like i don’t need it.

and if you’re still here, reading this… thank you. you’re in my little world now. be gentle. or don’t. either way, i’ll write about it.

[4doras]

WISHFUL WINTER “I SHOULD’VE TOLD THEM SOONER.” *ੈ✩‧₊˚  

genre. yushi x reader, fluff, 0.9k 

ꕤ. ty for the req!! ( ๑ ˃̵ᴗ˂̵)و ♡ also i miss winter can summer end already IT'S SO HOTTTT 

every year on the first snowfall, you and yushi meet up, no matter what. it started in high school when you both got stuck at school due to the amount of snow, ending up with you two talking for hours until you could go back home. 

you never miss it, and neither does he. 

but this time, things feel different. he feels different. 

nothing happened between you two that you were aware of, so why was he acting so distant? 

more under the cut! 

the snow started falling not long after school ended. out of habit, you text yushi a quick “it’s snowing.” and yushi being yushi, he responds instantly, “meet in 15?” you send him a simple okay and get ready to go out. 

you slip on a sweater and a puffer jacket over it, hoping it’ll keep you warm. you slide two heat packs into the front pockets of your jacket before heading out. 

yushi’s sitting at your usual spot; a quiet bench near the park, surrounded by dim orange streetlights and falling snow. the air is peaceful, but yushi seems… off. 

not only is his face a little more glum – he laughs a little less, talks a little slower, his hands stay buried in his pockets, and he keeps glancing at you like he’s trying to memorize something – something is wrong, but you don't know exactly what it is. 

but other than that, everything is the same. you bring up the things you always talk about, school, winter break plans, the vending machine that finally got fixed. but the words feel like padding, like you’re both avoiding something. 

the silences between you two aren’t comfortable anymore, they’re awkward and filled with tension. there’s nothing you can do but bring it up. 

“are you okay?” you ask, voice barely above a whisper. 

he seems caught off guard by the question, as if he thought he was hiding his discomfort well. and maybe he was, but it was easy to read him. to you, at least. 

yushi exhales, breath shaky. “yeah, i just… heard stuff.” he sounds like he wants to tell you something, but at the same time wants to keep it from you. 

you blink. “...like?” 

he hesitates, like he’s not sure if he should even tell you. “that someone confessed to you.” 

“oh.” you freeze for a second. 

it was true, someone did confess, but it was barely a thought in your head. you rejected them because someone else was in your mind. 

yushi laughs quietly. it’s not bitter, just pure regret. 

“i don’t even know if it’s true,” he says, “but i heard it and thought… ‘i waited too long.’” he looks up, snow catching in his hair. “i should’ve told you sooner.” he turns his head to face you, staring straight at your eyes. “i’ve liked you for years, and i just kept… waiting. like the right time would show up.” he sighs, breath creating vapour as he breathes out. 

you don’t respond right away, you just stay looking at him. yushi turns his head, looking away from you, nodding like he expected this answer. his head hung low, already preparing to move on from you. 

even though he’s sitting right beside you – albeit a little like a dejected cat, shoulders slouched, arms tucked in tight against the cold – he feels so far, so distant. 

he feels so unlike himself, like a version of yushi you’ve never seen before. he’s quieter tonight, almost fragile, the way he avoids your eyes and keeps glancing at the snow covered ground instead of at you. it’s unlike him to be so unreadable. usually, yushi wears his emotions like an open book, too expressive for his own good. but tonight, he’s closed. not cold, just careful. hesitant. 

but the strangest part? 

you never expected he could feel this way. not about you. 

“you always wait until it feels like too late, yushi.” you speak softly, gently, like you’re afraid that he’d run away if you were too loud. 

he flinches, barely. just the smallest twitch of his shoulder, the slight downward flicker of his gaze, seemingly bracing for something worse. 

you look at him, really look at him — the way the snow nestles in his hair, the way his hands are clenched in his coat sleeves like he's trying to hold himself together – and something about it aches in your chest. 

“you have this habit of waiting, yushi. like you think if you just stay quiet, the right moment will eventually come to find you.” you pause. your breath fogs the air between you. “and by the time you speak, you always look like you’re already preparing for it to be too late.” 

he doesn’t say anything. 

“but you’re never too late to me, yushi.” 

his head turns slowly, like he wasn’t sure he deserved to look at you. and the second your eyes meet, the distance between you doesn’t feel so wide anymore. 

“i was hoping you’d say something this year.” you shifted closer to him, your knees bumping with one another. “i like you too, yushi.” 

his eyes widened, the words hitting him harder than he expected, like he hadn’t even let himself imagine that you might feel the same. 

“...you like me?” he said it as though it was something that could only happen every blue moon. “i thought you said yes to the person, no?” 

you chuckled at the thought of it. “no, you were the one in my mind.” 

“oh.” 

he didn’t say anything else, he just let you get comfortable, linking his arm with yours. 

you reach into your jacket pocket and pull out a heat pack. taking his wrist gently, you open his hand and place it in his palm. he doesn’t let go. instead, he laces his fingers through yours, holding your hand. 

and even though snow continues to fall around you, everything feels much warmer now. 

perm taglist. @jellyouse

[teezingme]

Making Up For Lost Time

PART 1

boyfriend!jongho x reader NSFW

Summary: After nearly two months apart, you finally reunite with your boyfriend Jongho. The night quickly turns intimate as the two of you make up for lost time; physically and emotionally.

Genre: smut, fluff

Word Count: 2.1k

ao3 link

‧₊ ˚ ⊹ ࣭ ⭑ . �� ⊹ .₊๋‧₊ ˚ ⊹ ࣭ ⭑ . ₊ ⊹ .₊๋‧₊ ˚ ⊹ ࣭ ⭑ . ₊ ⊹ .₊๋

“Quarter to ten and I’m still here….” You sigh to yourself. 

Sitting at your desk, pen in mouth, and leg bouncing with anticipation. Anxious to leave work. Why? It’s been a month and a half since you’ve seen your boyfriend, who’s been touring across the world. Choi Jongho. Main vocalist of Ateez. Yeah, that one. Big chest. Big thighs. Big voice. Big… Well. Focus. You’re late. 

He’s been home since lunchtime, and you told him you’d be out at 7:30 PM. Maybe because you were daydreaming again — the way he’d hold you in those arms, those soft pink lips brushing yours, or those big brown puppy eyes he weaponizes against you. Exciting yourself again, you quiet your brain. 

You finally finish the last emails you’ve been in and out of focus on for the last half hour, ignoring your phone so you don’t get distracted. You close your laptop, shut off the lights in your office, and pack your things. You notice your hands are a bit sweaty. Are you…. Nervous? I mean it’s been almost 2 months without seeing him… but you’ve dealt with this before…. 

You shake yourself from your thoughts, pick up your bag and phone and walk towards the exit of your workplace. Curious to see if he’s noticed your tardiness, you unlock your phone and check to see if there are any missed calls or texts.

None. 

“Interesting.” You mumble, a bit annoyed because you expected a “you okay?” at the least. 

Enough, he’s probably exhausted or relaxing for once. You can’t blame him. Unlocking your car, you throw in your bag and decompress for a moment. You start to feel your heart flutter, and you can’t stop bouncing that damn leg. You’re nervous. You check your messages once more before blasting your favorite playlist.

“He must be sleeping,” you sigh. 

Pulling into your driveway, your heart is racing a mile a minute. You park next to his car, grab your things, and make your way to the front door. Barely able to grab your keys from sweaty and jittery hands, you unlock your door, and before you push it open, you stop. You take a deep breath. Why does this feel like a first date? 

Opening the door and you notice the lights are off, and everything feels quiet. 

“Hm, sleeping.” 

You put your bag down and shut the door quietly behind you. Jacket off next, and you toss it on the couch. It’s too late to eat, so you ignore the kitchen and head for your bedroom, hoping to see a big brown bear snuggled up in bed. Hands still sweaty but less shaky, you open your bedroom door quietly so you don’t wake Jongho. 

Or so you thought? But when the door opened, the room was lit beautifully by candles, almost like a sunset. You relax your shoulders and already feel at peace. A bouquet of your favorite flowers lay in the middle of your freshly made bed. You finally realize there’s a soft ballad playing from your speakers as well. Still, no Jongho in sight. That is, until you go to grab your sleep shirt from your closet and feel warm, calloused hands grab your hips from behind. Your heart dips, but you blame it on the jumpscare. 

You smile and turn around quickly, more than happy to see the big brown bear standing behind you. He stands there in a simple white top and loose fitting pajama pants. Hair is brushed back, and his face is glowing as if he just finished his skincare. If you had it your way, this is the Jongho you would see every day. The effortless, barefaced, simple look really does something to you. 

Laying both hands on his chest, you say 

“Hello there,” barely able to hide a huge, teethy grin. 

He keeps his hands on your waist, and he offers that sweet, smug smile of his.

“You’re late,” he whispers.

“I’m sorry I had so much work to do, the emails were nonstop, and-“ 

You’re interrupted as he grabs your cheek.

“It’s okay, I’m patient.” He says, sliding his hand down to your neck and looking at you for a moment before he opens his mouth again.

“Do you like this? The candles? The music? I thought we could relax a bit. Nothing too crazy. You can tell me about your days longing for me while I was out saving the world.” He says.

You giggle and notice your heart picking up its pace again. 

“I would want nothing more.” You say, softly releasing yourself from his grip and starting to undress. 

You turn around after you notice him staring. 

“Hey!” He yells 

“What are you shy now?” He goes to sit in bed behind him.

You pull your sleep shirt down and turn around laughing. 

“You were gone for a long time! I can’t help it!” 

You make your way towards the bed, and he’s still staring. Your cheeks are on fire, and there’s that dip in your chest again. You crawl and lie on his lap, staring up at him.

“Is that why you’re so red right now?”

Eyes wide, you feel embarrassed and hide your face behind your hands, feeling how hot your cheeks are to touch. 

He pulls them away and pulls you in closer.

He leans in close enough for you to feel his breath against your lips.

“Your face is still red.” He giggles 

“Because you’re staring!” You fire back, half buried in his chest from embarrassment.

“Can you blame me?” He grabs your chin and tilts you to face him again. 

“I’ve been thinking about you for weeks.”

You’re not sure if it’s physically possible to burst into flames, but if it is, you’re close.

You feel yourself melt under his gaze, heart pounding. 

Those big brown eyes staring into you, you finally ask 

“What are you thinking about right now?”

He smirks and leans in — enough to make your breath catch

“Oh, you know…. I was gone for a while…” he gets closer, and his lips are hovering just above your own. 

“It’d just be a shame if we don’t… You know… make up for lost time.” 

You swallow, trying to steady your breathing. 

“M- make up for lost time?” You repeat, barely even a whisper.

Jongho likes seeing you like this, falling putty into his hands. He giggles, and you feel his chest vibrate under your hands. 

“Yeah,” he says softly.

“Starting right now.”

He doesn’t give you even a second to comprehend what he said before he leans in and touches his lips to yours. Softly, like he’s trying to remind himself how they feel. He pulls you in closer, and the kiss gets deeper, more insistent. He reaches behind your head and stabilizes your movement.

You’re melting, your heart is racing, and your cheeks now have their own Pantone color of a deep, blushed pink. You wrap your arms around his shoulders as he slides his free hand down to your waist. You jolt from the grip, havingn’t been touched in almost 2 months. 

When he finally pulls back, you’re both out of breath like you’ve just run a marathon. He pulls your head closer and rests his own against yours. 

Caressing your cheek, 

“you’re so warm.” He teases.

You laugh, shaky but happy. 

“Stop calling me out!” You yell as you lightly slap his hard chest. 

He laughs again and gives another smug smirk. 

“Okay, okay, I’m sorry!”

Then everything stops, his tone shifts from playful to serious more husky. 

“I missed you, my girl.”

My girl. Your stomach flutters. Oh, how you missed being called that. 

You bring both hands up to his face and stare for a second, smiling before you say 

“I missed you, too.” 

You missed his soft cheeks and the way his eyes crinkle when he smiles at you. 

A song playing in the background ends, and the room is silent for a moment. The candles are flickering around both of you, and for a second, you realize he is really in front of you, he’s back, and it’s just you two. Feeling as if the world is miles and miles away, you feel like you’re floating. He falls into you and places another soft kiss onto your lips and trailing down lower.

“I want to hear everything,” he mumbles into your neck. 

“Every single thing that I missed. But later.”

“Later?” You ask a bit confused.

He pulls himself out of the crook of your neck and holds a mischievous grin. 

“Yeah, later, first, I need to hold you. I’ve been starving for this. For you, my girl.” 

You feel that flutter in your stomach again. He doesn’t even know what he does to you.

And with that, he pulls you in closer, fully against his chest. Smothered. Wrapping you up like he’s never letting you go. You giggle and relax your body a bit. His warmth, his scent, the sound of his steady heartbeat. This was all you dreamed of while he was gone. You don’t want him to let go, but you’re still intrigued by his “making up for lost time” line. You pull yourself back a bit and look at him. 

“Is this really all we’re doing to make up for lost time? You suffocating me?” You laughed

Jongho lets out a breathy laugh, pulls himself up and looks at you. One hand still resting on your waist, the other brushing a strand of hair out of your face.

“I was just getting my fix. I have a few other things in mind.” He says, lips ghosting your cheek. 

“But we don’t have to rush,” he says, pulling back to meet your eyes. 

“I know it’s been a while, love.”

Your heart jumps, and you feel that pit in your stomach again. You swear you could melt into him right here and now. Your shyness and nervousness are escaping as a warm need pools into you. You pull his face close to yours and part your lips perfectly, just enough for him to close the gap and deepen the kiss. He grabs your waist tighter, and your sleep shirt balls up in his hand. Your breath hitches at the feeling of him getting rougher. This is what you needed. He moves from your lips and starts trailing kisses from your jaw to your neck, and that sweet spot just below your ear — the one that ties your stomach in knots.

“Every night-“ he says heavily.

“Every night, I’ve been thinking about this. About touching you.” He mumbles between kisses.

“How you taste…. How you sound when I touch you….” 

He says as his lips find their way back to yours while grabbing your thigh.

You whine softly, and every nerve in your body lights on fire under his touch. He tightens his grip and pulls you closer, getting rid of any open space between the two of you. 

“God, I missed you…” He exhales into your mouth, voice low, raspy, and full of hunger.

You let out a shaky breath and grab the collar of his shirt to pull him closer, feeling his warm skin underneath. 

He giggles.

“You’re that impatient, huh?” He whispers, smiling against your lips. 

You feel him trail back down to your neck, not leaving a spot without a kiss. 

You shift slightly in his lap to get more comfortable, but your eyes widen when you feel just how much he missed you pressing against your thigh. He lets out a deep groan, hands sliding underneath your sleep shirt, thumbs tracing circles against your waist. 

“You really drive me crazy, baby.” He breathes. 

“All those nights trying to fall asleep after a show…. All I could think of was having you like this. Warm. On me. Around me.”

You hear your heartbeat in your ears now, dizzy with desire. You gasp when he bites your neck just enough to make you arch into him.

You lean back and attempt to pull your sleep shirt off with shaky hands. Your mind is spinning, but you look up to see Jongho staring. Not smiling anymore, his gaze is heavy, hungry, and dark. 

You shudder at the sight of him. 

“Take it slow?” You tease breathlessly 

He leans forward and kisses along your collarbone, then your shoulder, then lower, and lower. The pool forming between your thighs could drown someone.

“Don’t worry,” he says, kissing just above your breast. You twitch, trying to contain yourself.

“I plan to savor every second of this.” He breathes as he laps his tongue across your oh so sensitive nipple. 

You gasp, grabbing a handful of his thick, silky hair. He looks up at you with playful eyes full of lust. Tongue still teasing your now swollen and erect bud, waiting for your reaction, like it fuels him. 

“You’re cruel.” You whimper, half laughing, half trembling.

Jongho smiles against your skin, slow and smug. 

“You have no idea.”

‧₊ ˚ ⊹ ࣭ ⭑ . ₊ ⊹ .₊๋‧₊ ˚ ⊹ ࣭ ⭑ . ₊ ⊹ .₊๋‧₊ ˚ ⊹ ࣭ ⭑ . ₊ ⊹ .₊๋

Authors note: HI GUYS! If you’ve read this far, please let me know how you liked it! This is my first ever piece of writing and I’m shy. Sorry to leave a nasty cliffhanger, but I will write more if people enjoy this! Thanks so much!

[ghostly-bat]

New dabble that I also posted on ao3

Damian doesn’t remember when it started—just that one day, Jon looked at him the same way he always had, and it made his stomach twist.

Not in a dramatic, soul-clenching kind of way. More like... his stomach hiccupped. Like it forgot how to be normal. Like it saw Jon’s stupid grin and decided to turn inside out. How his laugh turned from something that Damian thought was too loud to something he wanted to hear consistently.

Everything was the same. That was the problem.

Jon still showed up at his window without warning, knocking like a woodpecker on caffeine. Still texted him memes at 2 a.m. with no explanation whatsoever just to leave him confused and baffled. How Jon would send him long video essays about things he could care less about. But because it was Jon he watched them anyway, all of them. He still threw an arm around Damian’s shoulders like it belonged there.

How they had their own little secrets, how Jon would tease him with a “You may be short, you may be tiny, but people find that cute. I say you're the perfect size,” and he said it with a cadence, with a smile that was just a little more playful than it was with anyone else. And he'd tease him back, “Careful, hayseed. You keep smiling like that and the world might think you're actually charming,” with his own smile that was slightly less snarking, that was more soft.

Still flew him around the city for no reason except, “You looked grumpy.”

It had always been like this. This was normal.

But now Damian was malfunctioning over it.

Because now, he liked him. Liked liked him. And everything Jon did—everything that used to be background noise—was now a full symphony playing directly into Damian’s skull.

Jon handed him a drink the other day and their fingers brushed, and Damian spent the next twenty minutes staring at the can like it had secrets.

“God... This is so dumb!” he'd think to himself. “Overanalyzing something as simple as fingers touching?! We touch fingers all the time; this is nothing new! Hell! He flies me places half the time; we've touched more than just fingers!” Internally he was fighting with himself. Externally he just looked like a weirdo that was staring at a can for a little too long.

It wasn’t even that he thought Jon was doing these things with anyone else. He knew Jon wasn’t. That’s what made it worse. These were their things. No one else got Jon showing up with Damian’s favorite pastries without asking. No one else got their names doodled together in the margins of Jon’s notebook (in Kryptonese, so no one could tease them).

“Why is my name in your notebook?” Damian asked one day when he was helping Jon with a history report that was literally due the next morning.

“In case I forget it,” Jon replied nonchalantly while watching a video that gave a quick rundown of World War I. And then a stupid grin grew on his face like he made the funniest joke ever.

At that, Damian thought it’d be a great opportunity to write Jon’s own name in his own notebook, right next to his.

“There, now your own name is in your notebook in case you forget that too.”

After that, it naturally became one of the many other things that was just theirs.

No one else got to fly around at midnight playing chicken with airplanes because Damian dared him to.

No one else got to see him jump rooftop to rooftop blindfolded because Jon dared him to.

It was just them.

And still, Damian found himself overthinking. Overthinking so much at the thought of Jon sharing these special little things with anyone made him almost not want to eat anything ever.

He wanted nothing more than for these thoughts to back off until the next day.

Was that dramatic? A bit. Then again, he was only a teenager of 16 with a crush on someone he had known for most of his childhood.

Did Jon ever send those dumb voice memos to anyone else? Did he ever call Kathy when he couldn’t sleep, or offer to fly Irey despite her being able to run faster than the speed of light just because? Ever share his shirts and hoodies that were just a little too big on him with Maya or Tai?

No. He didn’t. Damian knew that. But still. Still.

He wanted Jon to not just not do those things with other people. He wanted Jon to know they were special. He wanted Jon to feel it the way he did.

And that’s when it hit him. Right there in the middle of a rooftop stakeout, with Jon chewing bubblegum beside him and humming some terrible pop song.

He was jealous.

Not because Jon had done anything wrong. Not because Jon had betrayed their unspoken little routines. But because Damian cared too much about the meaning of them. Because he had turned their inside jokes into tiny love letters, and he didn’t know if Jon was even reading them. That he wanted to keep that kindness and sweetness only for himself.

He didn’t say anything. Just sank a little deeper into his hoodie and bumped Jon’s shoulder with his own.

Jon bumped back without missing a beat, then leaned his head on Damian’s for a moment like it was the most natural thing in the world.

And Damian’s heart did a whole cartwheel.

He didn’t ask. Didn’t need to.

He just smiled into the dark, hoping Jon never gave their things to anyone else.

[classyelegantpotato]

Pre-Petrification -Lift-Off

Senku X kryptonian Superman reader

Synopsis: Before the stone world, young Senku thought science explained everything that was until he met you.

Now? He’s got questions so may questions

Before the world turned to stone, if you asked anyone who knew them they would’ve all said the same thing:“Those two were joined at the hip, it seemed.”

Funny enough, It didn’t started that way, though.

Senku first meet you the same way everyone else did. An awkward timid ten-year old transfer student from America. You stood out instantly among your new peers. At first glance, you would noticed the oversized, ridiculous glasses . You seemed to decked out in star themed accessories from your head to your shoes. All this followed a foreign accent struggling to introduce themselves.

“M-My name is… (Y/N) Kent. I—um—I’m from Kansas.” Said in broken Japanese You tripped over the words, earning a few giggles from the class.

Overall just another kid. But for some reason, Senku was slightly intrigued, more like something was strange about you. It couldn’t just be the novelty of you being new and no less a foreigner, was it? Nonetheless, Senku quickly chalked it up to mild curiosity and shoved those thought down and went back to studying.

After that Senku didn’t pay much attention after the first week or even the first half of the school year. You were just another classmate, and he returned to his experiments. But he did happen to notice barely a week later you were speaking fluent Japanese….strange

You were speaking full conversations. Sure it was still accented, yes, but fluent. Senku’s ears perked the first time he heard you joking with taiju,with out a stutter. The progress was unnatural. Memorization that fast? You’d either studied obsessively before arriving and just nervous the first week… or something was up.

Senku off-course waved off these thoughts and concluded logically to motivation .Maybe you were just retentive with language. He could respected that.

He might have never paid you any mind if it wasn’t for that faithful day in the park

It wasn’t until about half a year later that Senku truly noticed you. He had been walking to the park, mentally sorting through the details of his latest failed experiment, and where to improve. That when a speeding car came out of nowhere. Metal and tires shrieked against the pavement . Everything slowed down— *wooosh*

Before he could even fully react, someone yanked him back hard. It was all a blur and he couldnt even process so he tried Soft grass, blue sky and what sound like heavy panting Senku blinked, disoriented. He was across the park.No not at the sidewalk. Not the curb or the street. The park. At least 200 feet from where he had just been.He sat up sharply and saw you.

Then there you stood panting your face pale with worry.before he could ask what just happened, you awkwardly blurted out, “Are you okay—?” followed by a panicked don of realization on your face as you look around your surroundings, on that note you gave a gentle peace sign followed by a “see ya” and bolted away like your life depended on it.

Needless to say, the experiment got postponed. Because now Senku had a different mystery to solve. There was no logical way the two of you and him had gotten across that distance so fast. And when he returned to the scene later that evening.

He found something even more bizarre small footprints indented into the pavement, like someone had slammed their feet into the concrete and pushed off with sheer force.

Human legs didn’t allow that. But there they were your shoes’ unique sole pattern of a star burned into concrete.

“What the hell…”

You have his full attention now.

⋆.˚————————ᯓ★————————⋆.˚

From that day forward, Senku adjusted his schedule adding to “observe” you more. stalking more like…peer behavioral analysis.He noticed a few of your…..quirks .

For starters, you seemed to avoid PE at all costs. On the occasion you had to participate, you never seemed tired. Almost if you had to constantly hold yourself back. Not even a drop of sweat. Nothing to indicate any long period of exercise.Also, while you didn’t look particularly muscular, you lifted heavy objects with ease. Almost…above Taiju-level ease.

Side note, Taiju and you seem to get along swimmingly. Apparently you two hit it off the first month of being here. Senku concluded with similar personality’s you two naturally become friends.

Asking Taiju further add to his suspicion. When Senku ask,Taiju only had this to say

Taiju “Now that you mention it there’s something different about them. But not like in a bad way or anything, you know? They’re always helping people, like the other day. I saw them catch a ball that was about to hit someone face. When they threw it back it dented the soccer fence. Hahaha they’re pretty strong too !

Senku “THAT’S NOT NORMAL !!YOU BONEHEAD!!!”

Taiju “Is it not? When I ask them about it all they said it’s cause they drink their milk every. Hey Senku, do you think if I did that to would I get that strong?”

Despite these oddities, he couldn’t find anything concrete evidence supporting his current hypothesis.(he will comeback to that display of strength later)He would have simple change theory if there wasn’t another glaring fact that added to his suspicion.

You seem to disappear,especially around him.

Every time he tried to ask you about that day, you dodged the question or vanished entirely. More than once, he was sure you were just in the room, only to turn around and find it empty. (Cue shot of you hanging from a window ledge whispering to a pigeon: “Shhh!”)

So, if he couldn’t catch you in the act? He’d make you catch him.

After enough observation and glowing praise from Taiju. He learned one thing for sure: you were a goody-goody. A exhausting, borderline self-sacrificial urge to help everyone type of person. Pretty much, everyone in school and on your usual route to school seems to know your name. He swears he’s seen you help every little old lady cross the street.

He could use that to his advantage. ⌓‿⌓

One afternoon, he totally not rigged for the two of you to be assigned cleanup duty after class. Alone. Just the two of you. You had no way to escape him now. Senku only had one current a theory. With what little evidence he had Senku had come to one conclusion despite all logic, you had super speed. So like any good scientist he up set a test.

He volunteered to climb the ladder and take down the classroom banners. As he worked, he casually asked you to grab something far across the room. As soon as you were distracted and far enough, he let out a yell and pretended to fall.However, Senku being his unlucky self… he actually fell

“Whoa—!” He never hit the floor instead… you caught him.

Mid-air

Both of you floated, suspended in zero gravity. You blinked eyes wide in shock

He look to you between triumphant and dumbfounded ready to boombard you with questions; that didn’t last long when gravity remembered it existed. The two of you slammed into the floor with a thud and a groan.

Senku got up quickly you not getting away this time.

“So it was you ,” he said, pointing. “The day at the park with the car. You launched yourself. That’s why the pavement was demolished.”

There was a long silence. Then, winced then quietly, you muttered, “I didn’t even know I left marks “

Senku eye twitch, apparently you are honest to a fault too. He wished you were this more up forth earlier

You stood up and started pacing, muttering under your breath. “Stupid! So stupid. I’ve been so careful……Ma and Pa said everything would be okay if I just stay calm and not push myself !”

Senku ignore you little ongoing rant and bluntly starts firing rapid questions

“Genetically altered superhuman?”

No!

Are you a robot from the future?”

“What? No!”

“Tch. Shame.” He sounded genuinely disappointed at one in particular.

Alien!

You hesitated. Thats all Senku need

“Wait. Wait, wait. That wasn’t a no.”

It was not a yes either!

“I shouldn’t have been able to!” you blurted and slightly redirected. “I wasn’t even near you …how did I move that fast…again?!”

Senku’s smirk slowly faded.He narrowed his eyes.“You didn’t know… you could do that?”

You froze.

You shook your head slowly.

Then, very quietly, you said: “My parents told me something weird a few years ago. They said… they found me in a field one night. After something crashed. They found a pod. And inside it… was me.” “You laughed, but it was hollow. “I always knew I was adopted but not like this. But lately, I’ve been changing. Stronger, faster, I don’t get sick anymore .Now I’m flying?!”

Senku sat in stunned silence “So you haven’t had it your whole life?” he asked.

“I don’t think so,” you said, brows knitting. “It started about a year ago. At first, I thought I just had to with puberty or something. But it like something in me is waking up. Something that’s always been there.

Senku desperately wanted to correct you that’s not how puberty works so instead leaned forward, ponding with his eyes close.

You expected him to accuse you. Or freak out. Or call the government.You really don’t want to move country again.

Instead, when he open his eyes looked exhilarated.

“…We’re going to figure this out,” he said. “Logically. Step-by-step. I’ll run tests. I’ll analyze your biology. And we’ll find out what you are and what you are capable of ”

You flinched “What I am and what I can do?”

Senku caught your expression and corrected gently as possible for him, “I mean that in the scientific sense. Species, physiology whatever you are.

You glanced down at your hands. “What if I don’t want to know. What if I’m just danger waiting to happen?”

He raised an eyebrow and sighed“Then I’d call that dumb,science isn’t just about discovering things that are neat and pretty. It’s about understanding everything the good, the bad, and the unknown.”

You snorted. “You’re a terrible at comforting.”

He grinned. “Yeah, well. I’m not trying to be. I’m trying to be the smartest guy on Earth so I need data. And you, my strange and mysterious classmate, are currently destroying known laws of human physics and biology .”

So… are you going to tell-

Senku“You don’t have to worry I’m not telling anyone about your alien heritage/ abilities . One, I need study you without interference. He said with his finger in his ear

Wait what (≖_≖ )

He continued without stopping Two, people are dumb, panicky and dangerous over anything they don’t understand. We don’t need that kind of attention. Three, you’re scared, So yeah, your secret’s safe with me mostly because I don’t feel like dealing with the drama.”

You pinky promise?

Senku “Yeah yeah not like this legally binding but what ever comforts you” he says finally taking his pinky out of his ear …. Best to skip the pinky part

“Besides,” he added, “I’ve always knew I would reach the stars one day.Never thought one would go ahead and meet me on earth”

You stared at him, a sudden rush of heat crept into your cheeks. However, that quickly vanished when he followed up with

“I wonder if you need a running start to fly or maybe we should take nature’s advice. We give you a little shove off a ledge and see if you fly or splat. Only one way to find out heheh time to get excited! ( ≖‿ ≖ )

Reader : “Ma and Pa, pray for me… pretty sure I just made a deal with the devil.”

Yes, heavily inspired by the Superman movie. it’s just a silly little idea I had to get out. Hope you enjoy! 

[h1r4-n7rr]

ғᴜsʜɪɢᴜʀᴏ ᴍᴇɢᴜᴍɪ x ʀᴇᴀᴅᴇʀ

ᴇɴᴇᴍɪᴇs ᴛᴏ ʟᴏᴠᴇʀs ᴛʀᴏᴘᴇ

"ᴛʜᴇ sᴘᴀᴄᴇ ʙᴇᴛᴡᴇᴇɴ ᴜs"

ᴡᴏʀᴅ ᴄᴏᴜɴᴛ: 4.3ᴋ

The only thing worse than your Monday morning home room was sharing it with Megumi Fushiguro, of all people.

You don’t know why exactly he irritates you so much—maybe it’s the way he always acts so aloof, as if the rest of the class seems low beneath him. Or, it could’ve been the way he never raises his hand but always has the right answer in a second. Or maybe it’s just how, even without trying, he makes your heart stutter every time he glances your way half-way into the period. You hate that the most, of all things.

You aren’t exactly friends. Not enemies, either. But he challenges you in ways that no one else would ever dare to, especially when it came to academics and training. You are both first years at Jujutsu High, stuck in the same class, the same dorm building, and unfortunately, often the same missions.

It’s been like this since day one, for as far as you could remember.

“You should focus less on flair and more on precision,” he mutters after one of your sparring matches during combat training.

You quickly whip your head around, breathing heavily, your sweat clinging to your forehead. “And you should try not being a condescending jerk for once.”

He shrugs like he didn’t just insult you. “I’m just offering you constructive criticism.”

You roll your eyes at him. “Thanks, Mr. Perfect. I guess it must be nice to have a personality built completely from a wall, huh?”

You could have sworn his lip twitched into a smirk, before he turns away from your gaze.

That was the thing about Fushiguro. He never dares to fight back in the way you would want him to. He doesn’t throw disses like Gojo, or bicker loud like Nobara. Instead, he quietly tears you down with a single sentence, subtle jabs at you, and that maddening calm expression that he never fails to keep.

And yet, somehow, that only makes things worse.

You don’t expect the turning point to come in the form of detention.

Apparently, Gojo-sensei thought it would be funny to pair the two of you for the purpose of ‘training detention,’ which you quickly came to realize was ridiculous code for ‘I want to watch these two suffer.’

“Don’t kill each other,” he says, cheerfully sipping his tea from the observation deck, a smug grin plastered all over his face.

You and Megumi stand at opposite ends of the practice yard, just barely making eye contact.

The silence between you stretched thick and long, until you decide to break it.

“Let’s just get this over with.”

Megumi gives you a small nod, raising his fists in defense. You charge first, pouring pure frustration into your strikes, but he blocks them easily, every single one. Like usual, always calm, always unreadable.

It wasn’t until he counters with a move you haven’t seen before that you lose your balance. You land hard on your back with a groan, collapsing to the ground.

He rushes to your side, carefully crouching beside you. “Are you okay?”

You blink, stunned—not just by the fall, but by the genuine concern that lies in his voice.

“I’m fine,” you mutter, but your voice lacked any sort of conviction.

“You were overextending. Again.” He says blatantly.

“Why do you always do that?” you snap back, sitting up.

“Do what?”

“Criticize everything I do like you’re some sort of master.” You groan and roll your eyes at him, your voice underlying a hint of annoyance.

He looks at you for a long moment. “Because I notice things. That’s all. And I’d rather you be annoyed and alive than dead.”

The sincerity in his voice took the fight right out of you.

For once, you don’t have a comeback to him.

After that, something felt as if it were shifting…

You start to train together more often—voluntarily, not just because of Gojo-sensei pairing you out of spite. There were still pointless arguments, of course, and plenty of sassy eye rolls, but the edges begin to soften little by little. Conversations happen. Sometimes, they even drift outside of training—books you were reading, favorite foods, or complaints about Gojo’s ridiculous missions.

And then…comes the library incident.

You’re curled up in a corner with a textbook in hand, trying to cram for a cursed technique theory exam you had forgot about, when Megumi appears and sit’s down next to you without a single word.

You glance at him. “This seat taken?”

He doesn’t budge to look up. “It is now.”

You stare at him for a second before huffing a laugh. “Bold of you to assume I won’t just move.”

“You won’t.” He shoots back.

“…Why wont I, then? Hm?”

He looks at you then, eyes steady. “Because I know you don’t actually hate me.”

The silence that follows felt almost deafening.

You stare at him, pulse ticking in your throat.

He goes back to reading.

You don’t move.

The realization comes quietly, like most dangerous things do. You’re falling for Fushiguro.

Somewhere between those late-night study sessions, the careful way he wrapped your injured wrist in gauze after a mission, and the small smile he would give when you complimented his shikigami—you fall for it so easily.

And you hate it, so much.

Not because he doesn’t deserve it, but because you feel scared he wouldn’t feel the same way. That you’ll always be the one who cared more. That maybe, to him, you’re just another classmate. An annoyance he’sgrown used to.

That fear sits in your chest like a stone.

You try to distance yourself whenever you can.

Yet he notices every time.

“Are you avoiding me?” He asks.

The question comes one afternoon as you were heading out of the common room. You turn to find him standing behind you, arms crossed.

“I’m just busy,” you say quickly.

“With what?” He raises an eyebrow.

“Some stuff.”

He frowns. “Did I do something?”

You sigh, rubbing your eyes. “No, Megumi. You didn’t. I just…need more space.”

“…From me?”

You hesitate. “Yeah.”

He looks like you had just slapped him.

“Okay,” he says quietly. “If that’s what you want.”

And just like that, he turns and walks away.

You stand there for a long time, feeling like you just made a terrible mistake.

It only got worse when the next mission came by.

It’s supposed to be simple—clean-up duty after a first-year squad exorcised a low-level cursed spirit at a school in Kyoto. But something’s off there. The air feels heavy, unnatural. Gojo had sent you and Megumi to check it out.

“Stay close,” Megumi says cautiously when you arrived.

You nod, tension crawling under your skin.

The school hallways are dark, long shadows twisting gauntly at the edges of your vision. You step carefully, every creak of the floorboards loud in the silence.

That’s when the spirit reveals itself.

It’s not weak. Not even close.

Megumi launches into battle immediately, summoning his divine dogs, barking orders for you to stay behind for cover. You ignore him, charging in to back him up. You aren’t going to let him fight alone.

But the spirit is fast—much faster than either of you had expected.

One wrong move and it would send a heavy, slicing blow toward you.

You don’t see it coming soon enough.

But Megumi does.

He dives in front of you, taking the hit across his side.

“Megumi!” You exclaim.

You catch him as he stumbles back, blood staining your shirt.

“Don’t…stop fighting,” he hisses.

Your heart thunders. “Like hell I won’t—”

“(Insert name), please.” He begs.

It was the desperation in his voice that snaps something inside you.

With a guttural scream, you pull on every bit of cursed energy you have, launching into a counterattack that left the spirit obliterated.

When it ended, erupting into a loud silence, you drop to your knees beside him.

“You idiot,” you whisper, pressing your hand to his wound. “You could’ve died.”

He gives you a weak smile. “I told you…I’d rather you be annoying and alive than dead.”

You laugh through the subtle tears. “That’s not funny.”

“I wasn’t joking.” He says through a small grin.

You meet his eyes, heart thudding.

“Why would you do that for me?” you whisper.

He doesn’t hesitate. “Because I love you.”

The world stills inside your mind.

“What?” You say, a hint of shock in your voice. As if you thought you must’ve heard something else, anything besides the words ‘I love you.’

His voice is barely audible. “I think I have for a while now.”

You stare at him, stunned.

“I thought you hated me,” you whisper back.

“I didn’t, I never did. I just didn’t know how to talk to you without wanting to kiss you or argue with you. Sometimes it was both.”

Your chest aches in the best way possible.

“I love you too, you dumbass.”

You lean in and kiss him, soft and lingering, not daring to let go. The weight of all the months of built-up tension finally beginning to break apart.

He smiles into it, and for once, Megumi Fushiguro looks at peace.

He recovers quickly—too stubborn not to.

Things were different after that. Softer than ever before.

He still corrects your technique, and you still call him pretentious. But he holds your hand under the desk during lectures. He brings you tea whenever you’re studying late. You patch up his bruises with hands gentler than you’d ever used before on anyone.

Sometimes, you find yourselves in the library together again. This time, he lets his head rest on your shoulder, eyes closed, fingers loosely tangled with yours.

Enemies once. Lovers now.

Not quite perfect, but real.

And in a school where death always lingers just beyond the tall gates, you both learn to cling to what matters most, beyond death.

Each other…

The infirmary is quiet, except for the steady beep of the monitor standing beside Megumi’s hospital bed.

You sit in the chair next to him, fingers nervously curled around the edge of your sweatshirt, eyes watching his slow, steady breaths. It’s been three days since the mission, since the confession, and still, you aren’t sure if you had dreamt it all.

Because Megumi Fushiguro doesn’t ever say things like ‘I love you.’

He doesn’t bleed for people who irritated him.

He doesn’t kiss like that unless it meant something deep.

…Right? You would think to yourself, trying to reassure yourself from it all.

You drop your forehead into your hands and exhale.

“Why does this feel so much scarier than fighting curses?”

“You tell me,” comes a rough, familiar voice.

You jolt up. “Megumi—! You’re awake—”

“Yeah. Unfortunately..” His eyes are half-lidded, and he looks pale, but there’s a ghost of a smile tugging at his lips.

“You almost died,” you say softly.

“You keep saying that like I don’t know already.” He chuckles.

You lean forward, your hands trembling slightly. “You shouldn’t have done that.”

“I’d still do it again.”

Silence washes over.

Your heart stutters painfully, and something in your chest cracks a little wider.

Megumi turns his head slowly, looking at you.

“I meant what I said,” he murmurs. “Even if you never say it again. Even if you change your mind tomorrow. I needed you to know.”

You stare at him, stunned by the quiet vulnerability in his voice.

“…You think I’d change my mind?”

He shrugs, trying to play it off, but the way he clenches his jaw gave him away.

You reach out and take his hand.

He tenses at first—but then relaxes.

“I’ve always seen you, Megumi. Even when I said I hated you. Even when I pretended I didn’t care.”

“I noticed,” he says, his voice barely above a whisper. “I just…never thought I deserved you.”

Something odd twists inside you. All this time, you thought you weren’t enough. That he couldn’t possibly feel anything real for someone as loud, emotional, and impulsive as you.

But Megumi—he’d been carrying doubts all along too.

Your fingers tighten around his.

“You do,” you whisper. “You deserve to be seen, and loved.”

His eyes flick up to meet yours.

And this time, he doesn’t dare to look away.

That night, as the sun dipped below the dorm windows and the world hushed into a warm glow, Megumi let’s you lay beside him on the infirmary cot—his hand rests gently over yours, softly twined in your hair, his head tucked close.

Neither of you speak much to each other.

But the silence between you two isn’t cold anymore.

It feels safe and soft.

Like you’re finally coming home.

For once, the space between you is filled with something brand new.

Love.

And growing, together…

Megumi is healing. Fast, of course—too fast for his own good, as usual.

You barely see him anymore.

Not because you don’t want to, but because suddenly he seems to be always gone. Training with Gojo. Running errands with Nobara. Disappearing into town after missions without a word.

You don’t want to overthink it. But the silence between you—once soft and warm—has gone cold again.

What makes it worse was the new second-year transfer…Hana.

That Sweet voice, and bright eyes. And the way she clings to Megumi like she’s known him for years already.

You watch her sit next to him at lunch. Touch his arm during training. Smile at him in ways you had once claimed as your own.

And Megumi doesn’t flinch. He never correct her. He doesn’t even look uncomfortable with it.

It feels like a thorn in your chest.

Small, at first. Then constant, thickening.

“You’re mad,” Megumi says to you one night as you pass each other in the hallway.

“I’m not,” you reply, a little too quickly.

He turns to face you, eyes narrowed. “You haven’t spoken to me in three days.”

“You’ve been busy.” You shrug, keeping your tone flat.

“With missions.” He says hesitantly.

“Yeah, and Hana.” You snap back.

The air shifts.

Megumi’s brow furrow. “What does she have to do with anything?”

You give a dry laugh. “I don’t know, you tell me. She’s practically attached to you.”

“She’s just a classmate, you know that.”

You meet his eyes. “Does she know that?”

His mouth opens, but no words came. Just awkward silence.

And the silence says everything it needs to.

You don’t fight, not exactly. But the distance grows again—more sharp and painful this time.

You start to skip dinner whenever you know he’d be there. Training early to avoid running into him. Pushing yourself to exhaustion to keep from thinking too long about him and Hana.

Megumi never stops to go chase after you.

And that hurts you more than anything else.

One rainy evening, Nobara finds you in the gym, fists pounding a sandbag hard enough to bruise your fingers.

“You okay?” She asks lightly to you.

You don’t stop. “Why does everyone keep asking me that? I’m fine!”

“It’s because you look like you’re five seconds from crying or punching a wall.”

You finally still at that, breathing ragged.

She walks up to you, her voice low. “Look, I know Megumi’s being…Megumi. But he’s not doing it on purpose.”

You look down. “Then why does it feel like he’s pulling away for Hana?”

Nobara hesitates. “Because he’s scared.”

You scoff. “Of what?”

“Of messing this up. Of being too much. Of hurting you.” She softens her tone. “You guys are so busy trying not to fall apart from each other, that you forgot how to hold each other.”

You sit on the mat, wiping your forehead. “It’s like I don’t even know how to talk to him anymore.”

“Then maybe it’s time to try, don’t you think?” She suggests.

Suddenly, the opportunity came unexpectedly—Gojo’s dumb idea of “perfect team bonding.”

You, Megumi, Nobara, Yuji…and Hana—stuck in a van together, heading to a small and quiet countryside town for the weekend.

You choose the back seat. Megumi sits in the middle, and of course he’s right beside Hana.

She laughs at something he said, then leans her head against his shoulder.

You turn your face to the window, your throat tight and soar.

Later that night, at the inn you all were staying at, you find yourself sitting alone on the veranda, the cold air brushing against your skin.

“You’ve been avoiding me again.” Megumi says to you.

You don’t need to turn your head to know it’s him.

“Habit, I guess,” you say dryly.

He steps beside you, hands in his pockets.

“I don’t know how to fix this,” he says quietly.

You finally look at him. “Start by being honest with me, then.”

His eyes flick to yours. “I am.”

“Then why does it feel like I’m the only one who cares anymore?” You say, your throat feeling tight and heavy as you spoke.

Megumi’s jaw tightens.

“Do you like her better?” The words slip out before you can stop them. “…Hana?”

He stares at you, stunned. “What?”

“She’s always around you. You don’t push her away. I don’t know what to think—”

“I don’t like Hana,” he cuts in. “She’s been through a lot. I was trying to be kind.”

“But that’s the thing. You’ve been kind to everyone but me!”

That lands deep in his face.

He exhales sharply, stepping closer to you. “You think I don’t care about you? That I don’t want this?”

“You haven’t shown it.” You say, not meeting his eyes.

“I didn’t know how. I thought I was giving you some space.”

You blink. “I never asked you for space.”

“I know that now.” He says, and sighs with a hint of annoyance.

There’s a long pause.

“You confuse the hell out of me, Megumi,” you say quietly. “You open up just enough for me to fall into you deeper, and then you shut the door in my face…”

“I’ve been scared too,” he admits. “I don’t know how to be with someone who actually acknowledge me. I keep messing it up, I know.”

You hesitate.

“…Then stop it. Stop messing it up.”

Megumi’s gaze meets yours. “You still want this?”

You don’t answer with words. Just reach out and touch his hand hesitantly.

He takes it, intertwining your hand is his.

For a moment, the noise between you melts.

“I missed you,” he says, so softly that you almost miss it completely.

“I missed you more…”

That night, Megumi sits with you under the stars. His arm wrapped around your shoulder, his silence no longer as heavy…

You lean into him.

“You know,” you say, voice light, “you suck at this whole ‘being in love’ thing.”

He gives a tired smile. “I’m learning, just you wait.”

You smirk. “Slow as ever.”

“Hey.” He says with a grin.

But when you glance up, his expression is different. Sincere this time.

“I don’t want to lose you again, (insert name).”

You reach for his hand and squeeze it tight.

“Okay, then don’t.”

And just like that, the thorn loosens.

The silence heals.

And the space between you becomes something you could finally share…

The next mission is short, brutal, and exhausting.

You both stand outside the abandoned temple, bloodied and sore but alive, the last cursed spirit finally gone.

Megumi sits on the stone steps, one hand pressing against his side, the same spot where he’d been injured weeks ago. You drop beside him, breathing heavy.

“You okay?” you ask softly.

“Yeah. Just bruised,” he says. Then, after a moment—“Thanks for watching my back.”

You nudge his knee with yours. “Always.”

There’s a long silence, broken only by the distant hum of the bundle of cicadas. Then he clears his throat, eyes fixed on the cracked pavement of the steps.

“I’ve been thinking,” he begins. “About us. About everything I didn’t say when I really should’ve.”

You turn to him, heart thudding fast.

“I want to try. Like…really try,” he says. “No more holding back. So—”

He pauses, catching his breath.

“Would you go on a real date with me? I mean, just us. No curses. No drama…except for me and you.”

You blink, then smile.

“You’re lucky I like you.”

He gives a faint laugh, as relief softens his expression.

“Is that a yes, then?”

You reach over and lace your fingers with his.

“It’s a hell yes, Megumi.”

And that’s all the words he needs…

The first real date—it’s all awkward, at first.

Megumi stands outside your dorm room in a black hoodie and baggy jeans, hands shoved deep into his pockets. His hair is messier than usual, like he’d run his fingers through it a dozen times debating whether or not to knock.

You open the door mid-thought and smile up at him, the corners of your eyes creasing.

“You look like you’re trying to talk yourself out of this.”

“I was,” he admits, his cheeks faintly pink.

You lean against the frame. “And?”

“I lost the argument.” He sighs softly.

You laugh. “Good. Because I was gonna drag you out either way.”

The two of you walk to a quiet cafe tucked right between a used bookstore and a calm record shop, the kind of hidden place that didn’t see to behold much foot traffic. It smells like cinnamon and rain, soft jazz playing from an old speaker in the corner.

Megumi pays before you could argue with him, then leads you to a booth near one of the windows.

“Still not used to seeing you in normal clothes,” you tease at him, sipping your drink.

He shrugs. “Still not used to you not yelling at me.”

“Oh, I can yell if it turns you on, then. Would that make you comfortable?” You laugh lightly.

He gives you a look, but you catch the tiny smirk tugging at his lips.

It feels slow, soft—your first real date. The kind that didn’t revolve around blood, curses, or Gojo being a menace of a mentor. Just you, him, and a table full of stolen glances and quiet smiles.

By the time you step out of the cafe, the sky has deepened into violet-blue, the sidewalk still damp from the earlier rain.

Megumi walks beside you in silence, his fingers brushing against yours but not quite holding them. Not yet, at least.

“You’re being oddly quiet,” you say, bumping your shoulder into his.

He exhales slowly. “I keep thinking this’ll go wrong somehow.”

You stop walking and look up at him. “It won’t. Not if you stop assuming it will, that is.”

He meets your gaze—and for the first time in a while, he doesn’t look away.

“I want to kiss you right now,” he says suddenly.

Your heart stutters.

“Okay, then do it.”

At that, he leans in. It felt surreal at first, his lips passionately against yours. Warm in embracing your touch, the sweet aroma of his lips lingering onto you. After moments that felt longer than needed, you both let go—breathless, blushing vibrantly…

You end up back at the training field, empty and quiet under the moonlight. The grass is still a little wet, the air cool against your skin.

Megumi stands in front of you, face barely lit by the silver light, unsure but so achingly beautiful you wanted to wrap your arms around him and never let go.

“I’ve thought about this before,” he admits.

“About what?”

“This. Us. You.”

You step closer to him, breaking off the distance. “And?”

“I thought it would ruin everything.”

You’re close enough now to see a subtle blush scattered across his cheeks, the vulnerability in his eyes.

“Megumi,” you whisper, “you were the best thing that happened to me. Even when I hated you.”

“I never hated you,” he murmurs.

“I know that, dumbass.”

And then, finally—he kisses you again.

It feels careful at first, almost hesitant, like he isn’t sure he was allowed to feel this much a second time. His hands slide down to your waist, drawing you in gently, like he might break you otherwise if he wasn’t careful. You fist the fabric of his hoodie and pull him closer, lips parting against his with a breathless sigh.

Something in him snaps—softly, sweetly. The kiss deepens more. Slow and aching. The kind that makes your knees weak and your thoughts blur into a whirl.

His hands move up, one cupping your cheek, as his thumb brushes against your skin with a reverence you didn’t know he had in him.

You can feel everything in the kiss.

All the tension. All the anger. All the months of fighting and miscommunication, just to get to this moment.

When you finally pulled apart, you’re both breathless.

“…You’re really good at that,” you say, voice unsteady.

He smirks. “I’ve had practice…In my head, that is.”

You laugh and bury your face into his shoulder, heart full, chest warm.

That night, lying under the stars on the rooftop of Jujutsu High, Megumi holds your hand like it was the most natural thing in the world.

Now, it was just you and him, finally in sync.

Whatever would come next—missions, curses, chaos—you know one thing is for sure:

You found your way to each other.

Not easily.

But completely, just at the right amount.

And that was enough for you.