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Hi hello avid believer here um NSFW YADA YADA YADA.

If you squirt while Leon is eating you out? ESPECIALLY if it’s Damnation Leon onwards, like the older Leons? Overstimulation time. No choice. Now that he knows you can do that there is no mercy.

At first he’s staring slack jawed for a second, watching how you cry and paw at his hair. Entranced by the spray of fluid that seems to have you mortified and embarrassed. That has not happened before, not with Leon anyway. You’re speechless, trying to find the right words in your bliss-ridden brain.

And then the most guttural groan of all time breaks from his throat. He’s diving back into your cunt, stubble grazing the tender skin as you hiccup and squirm, whining about how you’re sensitive.

“Fuck sensitivity.” Is all that’s grunted against your leaky pussy, kitten licking across your swollen folds like he hadn’t just forced a body twisting orgasm from you near moments ago. “Now that I know you can do that? I want to be fucking water boarded. Give me another, sweetheart. Fuckin’ soak me.”

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thinking about overstimulating re2 leon…

hand pumping up and down his soaked cock, agonisingly slow, watching his brows pinch together as his hips buck — overwhelmed, choked gasps heaving from him as he tried to determine whether he wants to escape your grasp, or melt further into it.

and he’s being so naughty. you’d already told him to keep his cute eyes on you, watch how pathetic and weepy his dick gets for you. but those blown eyes just keep rolling deep into his skull, fluttering shut as he loses himself completely in your hold.

but you don’t scold him, not really. you give him an odd pinch to his thigh, a tap on his knee, a little “eyes on me, pretty..” to bring him back to, but it’s only a matter of seconds ‘til he’s forgetting again.

and you can’t even get mad. not when he’s whimpering like a dog, hands clutching the sheets so hard that the veins in his forearms bulge deliciously. not when he’s whining your name like a mantra.

“baby— baby, fuh— please, m’empty. s’all gone!! i can’t— fuck. can’t cum anymore baby, please! ohhh…” and “goddd, it hurts, pretty… hurts so good… shit! haaa… m’close again, i can’t take it— pleasepleaseplease— oh, don’t stop—”

really, you’re not to blame here.

and when your hand speeds up, the lewd squelching of your palm and his drenched cock sliding in your grip filling the room, his moans dying out as he just opens his mouth in a silent scream, eyes clenched shut, you feel your soul is at peace. right where you need to be.

and when he cums, it’s not like the first time. that was a truckload — not as subtle as it is now. but you know your leon. you know when he arches his back like a cat in heat, when he cries out with a wrecked voice that drags longer than any of his shallower noises, when one hand lets go of the sheets to slam against the headboard. you know when he cums. that, combined with one sad, yet significant, spurt of his spend that joins the rest that’s cooled on his abdomen.

“well done, baby, you did so good for me…” you whisper, slowing your movements. his hips twitch with the aftershocks. you’d think he’d be used to them by now. he sighs, whimpering uncomfortably, desperately, thinking you’re going to continue.

and you’d rest your hand at his base, moving forward. tongue darting out and licking his seed from his stomach, relishing in the goosebumps that emerge in your wake. insides clenching at the hitch in his breath, the twitch in his fingers.

and when you’d licked him clean, you’d let go of him, letting his softened cock rest against his thigh. moving up to kiss his cheek softly, whispering such sweet praise into his ear.

and him looking up at you like you’d hung the stars, bottom lips out in a little pout, eyes glossy with long, damp eyelashes. his drool-coated lips moving to question if he did good, good for you, and you assuring him with a sweet kiss.

and when he reaches for you hand, tentatively guiding you back to that sweet spot between his legs, barely recovered and ready to go again — you smile at him, kissing his temple.

and when he sniffles and asks if you can use your mouth this time, you can only feel your grin grow wider. intentions grow wicked. and as you shuffle back down to your rightful place, watching him deflate back into the mattress, preparing himself, you know that in this moment, he’s yours.

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The Role I Played

a continuation of my first fic: here !

f!reader x finnick o’dair

summary 𐙚 - after the war, you turn to alcohol, lost in grief and memories of what never truly was. haymitch tries to reach you, but to no avail. out of desperation, he writes to finnick, asking him to check in on you. his return brings back everything they tried to forget — and everything they never said.

warnings 𐙚 - usage of alcohol, unrequited love (again), more angst, reader tries to come to terms with the fact that finnick will never love them like he does annie. reader can’t get over a 5 year situationship (real tbh).

authors notes 𐙚 - haymitch makes an appearance as a father figure (no surprise there) i’m gonna pretend this didn’t break my heart too lowkey. still new to this, so if you have any suggestions or criticism feel free to let me know🗿

The envelope sat on the table for days, yellowed slightly at the edges, its paper curled with moisture from a drink left sweating beside it. You hadn’t meant to let it sit so long, but truly meaning anything these days was hard.

The air was heavy, tinged with the smell of sea salt, old wood, and something sour, maybe the stale whiskey in your glass, or maybe just the ache that never left your chest. The window was cracked open, letting in a breeze that carried the cries of distant gulls and the soft rustle of waves, things that once brought peace, now just reminders of what you couldn’t forget. No, scratch that, who you couldn’t forget.

You knew it was from Haymitch the moment you saw the jagged handwriting. Messy, impatient, like the man himself. You told yourself not to read it. Told yourself it didn’t matter.

Haymitch and you had grown close during your time in District 13. In the quiet moments between bombings and briefings, you found something that neither of you ever said out loud. Not exactly love, but something like family. He became a father figure of sorts, rough-edged and deeply flawed, but solid in a way no one else had been for you.

He never asked questions you didn’t want to answer. He never made promises he couldn’t keep. But sometimes, he’d sit next to you in the dark with a flask in his hand and grief in his eyes, and you’d both drink until it was quiet enough to breathe.

You knew he cared in the way he shoved water bottles into your hands, in the way he’d tell you to get some damn sleep, even though he hadn’t rested in days himself. He had this way of looking at you like he understood everything you weren’t saying. Maybe he did.

That’s what made the letter worse.

Because he knew. He knew everything about you and Finnick. How your love for him had become something so unbelievably real, even when you knew there was no chance he would ever feel the same way. He knew what you were doing to yourself. And still, he wrote. Still, he tried.

You took another drink, slower this time.

Maybe you were hoping it’d burn enough to make the ache stop, or at least dull the memory of Haymitch’s voice telling you once, half-drunk and half-hearted, “You’re not meant to die with someone else’s ghost in your chest kid.” But Finnick’s ghost, if it was a ghost at all, still clung to your ribs like it had never left.

You told yourself you wouldn’t, but on a morning when the silence felt too loud, you finally peeled it open with trembling hands.

“Kid,” He begins, the familiar nickname bringing a warm feeling to your chest.

“I don’t usually write letters, so count this as a sign of how bad it’s gotten.

You’re not answering anyone. Katniss is worried. Hell, even I’m worried.

I know grief when I see it. I’ve lived in it longer than I’ve lived outside of it.

But you’ve got to come up for air, even if it’s just for a moment.

You’re not as alone as you think.

— H.”

The words blurred before you even reached the end.

You let out a slow exhale, one that shuddered through your chest and rattled something deep, something you weren’t ready to name. Then, carefully, you folded the letter back up and dropped it into the trash beside you, where it landed softly atop crumbled tissues and an empty bottle.

Your hand found the next bottle without looking. The rim touched your lips like muscle memory, practiced, easy.

You took a sip, letting the burn slide down your throat, and closed your eyes, trying not to remember the warmth of arms that no longer held you, the echo of a voice that once called your name like it mattered. You cursed to yourself softly, wondering if you’d ever get over those years you two spent together. Wondering if he ever thought about you, or even missed those small moments you two shared. You sit there in silence.

But even silence had a way of sounding like him.

—

The letter came in the early morning, tucked in with the usual stack of dull government correspondence. He almost missed it. No return address, just his name written in a rushed scrawl he hadn’t seen in months, maybe even longer. His eyebrows pinched together, focusing on the handwriting.

Haymitch.

Finnick stared at it for a while, thumb grazing the edge, stomach already sinking. Letters from Haymitch never meant good news. They weren’t the kind of men who wrote to catch up.

He opened it slowly.

“She’s not doing well. I figured you’d want to know, though I’m not sure what good it’ll do.

She’s not answering me. Not Katniss. Not anyone.

She’s drinking like I used to, maybe worse.

I’m not telling you this to fix it but I just thought…if there’s still a part of her you care about…

Maybe it’s time to stop pretending there wasn’t something real between you two.

— H.”

Finnick folded the paper, fingers clenched too tightly around it. Annie was still asleep in the other room. Peaceful. Whole. Annie had grown to count the other girl as a friend, even in the oddness of the situation. She never asked anymore about the girl he used to share a bed with during the Capitol days, and he never offered. Some truths were too cruel for softness.

But this wasn’t about truth. Not anymore. It was about someone drowning in silence, and the bitter taste in his mouth knowing you might believe no one cared.

He looked out the window at the morning tide rolling in. The sea had always brought comfort before, but now it only whispered your name.

He curses Haymitch’s name softly, then he curses the part of him that still ached to go. He sat there for a long time, letting the weight of the letter press into his chest. He wanted to go, wanted to check up on that girl he use to share every night with, the girl who knew him better than himself, the girl who would do everything in her power to make the best out of their situation.

But he was torn. Just down the hallway, Annie slept soundly, unaware of the turmoil in Finnick’s head. He was worried what going would stir up. Not only in him, but in Annie and, well, you. The memories they’d buried weren’t just Capitol performances. Not all of them. Some things had grown in the cracks. Quiet, complicated things.

He’s not saying it’s love, no. But something else, something that still sits in his chest when the nights grow too quiet.

He misses the way you’d curl against him after the cameras were gone, when it was just the two of you and the silence between. It isn’t love, but it’s longing.

And guilt.

And the hollow ache of knowing you needed him in ways he couldn’t let himself need you back.

Finnick stood in the doorway, watching Annie sleep.

Her chest rose and fell in that slow, peaceful rhythm he used to pray she’d find again. One hand was curled near her face, the other resting gently on the blanket. The sunlight casting rays of light on her face, and for a moment, he felt the familiar tug of everything he loved, everything he chose.

And yet…

He couldn’t stop thinking about you. The other girl. The ghost of something half-real and half-fabricated, who now might be unraveling alone. He could still hear Haymitch’s voice in that damn letter. Could still feel the ache it left behind. He let out a quiet breath, the letter still in his hand as his mind considered if he should go or not.

Surely Annie would understand.

He kissed her forehead softly, barely a whisper of contact, then turned and walked out the door.

—

You hadn’t had a visitor in months. Five, to be exact. The last had been a little girl selling chocolates to raise money for a new bike, something to ride with her friends while summer still lingered. You’d given her a few coins and a soft smile that didn’t quite reach your eyes.

Most people in town had stopped knocking, assuming what you wanted, or needed, was solitude.

But they were wrong.

You didn’t want to be alone. Not really. You just didn’t know how to be around anyone who wasn’t him. He was the only one who could quiet the nightmares, still the shaking in your hands, silence the ache in your chest.

And now? You couldn’t even bring yourself to say his name out loud.

But, you’ve come accustomed to being alone and not having any visitors.

Which is why you were so surprised to hear the faint knock at your front door in the early hours of the day.

It was barely audible over the hum of the refrigerator and the distant chirping outside, but it was there, soft, unsure. Your heart jumped before your mind could catch up, and for a moment, you just sat there, frozen on the edge of the couch, staring toward the door like it might vanish.

No one ever came here. Not anymore.

Another knock. Louder this time, but still careful, like whoever was on the other side wasn’t sure they were welcome.

You stared at the door, heart racing now. It kept going. Three knocks. A pause. Then another. Then, the faint sound of your name falling off of their lips. Your heart seems to drop to your stomach.

Everything in you told you to stay put. To continue about your day, pretending you didn’t hear the familiar sound of a voice that once brought you so much comfort. But, you’ve always had a hard time listening to anybody. Including yourself.

Now, the two of you sit in the living room, the same one you once shared. On opposite sides. A canyon of silence stretching between you.

The ghosts of old laughter cling to the cushions. Your half-finished bottle of liquor rests on the coffee table, untouched since his arrival. You don’t look at him. Not really. You’re not sure you can.

His eyes move slowly around the room, over the unwashed dishes in the sink, the dust that clings to windowsills, the wilted plant in the corner you used to water every morning. Then, finally, they land on you.

You’re thinner. Paler. Hollowed out in ways that go beyond skin and bone. The house looks rougher than it ever had.

And so do you.

You’re so focused on avoiding his gaze that you don’t hear the soft whisper of your name. He repeats it, snapping his fingers this time. Not in a rude way, but just to get your attention. Your head snaps up, your eyes finally meeting his.

“What?” You ask, not registering the question he had asked.

“I asked if you’ve been eating,” he says quietly, his voice gentler than it used to be. Like he’s afraid the wrong tone might make you crumble right there.

You blink, the question hitting you harder than expected. It’s not even the question, really, it’s the way he asks it. Like you matter. Like he remembers how you used to take your tea with honey and sit barefoot by the window when it rained.

You shrug, leaning back against the couch cushion. “I’m still alive, aren’t I?” His jaw tightens, but he says nothing.

The silence between you settles again, heavier than before. You can feel his eyes on you, tracing the shadows under yours, the way your sweater hangs looser than it used to, the trembling in your fingers you think you’ve hidden well.

He looks around the room once more, at the empty bottles lined up near the kitchen wall, at the pile of unopened letters, at the blanket still folded on the end of the couch where he used to fall asleep beside you.

He swallows hard, and when he speaks again, it’s more to himself than to you.

“I shouldn’t have waited so long to come.”

You let out a breath through your nose, quiet but unsteady. Your fingers twist in your lap, knuckles white.

“I didn’t really expect you to show up,” you say softly, voice tinged with frustration and something like resignation. “I thought… I’d just have to wait it out on my own.” He looks at you, eyes searching, unsure how to take that.

“I understood, you know? New life. The life you always wanted. Freedom with the girl you love.” You say, a weak smile ghosting your lips. Your voice falters, but you press on. “I never blamed you. Maybe that’s the hardest part, carrying the weight of your decision, even when I understood why you had to go.”

Silence. Long, awkward silence. The kind of silence where you could almost hear a fly rubbing its legs together, if you listened closely enough. Every tick of the clock seemed louder, marking time that neither of you wanted to fill, as memories and unsaid words crowded the space around you.

Finally, he speaks up.

“Haymitch is worried about you. I’m worried about you.” He mutters, fiddling with his hands as you both avoid each other’s eyes. You inhale sharply, realizing the reason he’s here. Haymitch sent for him.

Your chest tightens, the sting sharp and immediate. Of course. He didn’t come on his own. He had to be told to care, or at least, reminded.

You turn your head slightly, blinking hard as frustration rises in your throat, hot and bitter. “So you’re just… doing him a favor?” you murmur, your voice quieter than you intended, but laced with something close to anger. “You didn’t come because you wanted to. You came because Haymitch asked.”

He looks up at that, startled, maybe, or just ashamed. But the damage is already done. That flicker of hope you felt when you first saw him standing in your doorway? It starts to dim. He whispers your name, standing up quickly.

You stand up with him, holding a hand out as you move behind the chair you were just sitting in, trying to put extra space between you two.

“No, Finnick.” You start, your voice shaky.

“You know that isn’t true,” He cuts you off, his eyes seeming to bleed with regret. “I was going to come. I was. His letter just–“

You scoff, the anger rising back up. “What? Reminded you that I was out here? Reminded you that, oh hey! Maybe we should check up on old friends! Reminded you that there’s other people in this town besides you and your ‘fiancé’?” You say. His eyebrows form into a scowl.

“That’s not how it is and you know it.” He replies, his voice lowering. It’s true. You’re not really mad at him. You’re mad at the aching emptiness, the months of silence, the way everything fell apart and never quite found its way back. But anger’s easier than grief, easier than asking why it took a letter from Haymitch to bring him back to you.

You shake your head, biting your lip hard, trying to stop the words from spilling out. He keeps speaking, gentler now, like he knows you’re on the edge of breaking.

“I came because I care. I always have.”

“Why’d it take you so long?” you ask, your voice soft, almost trembling, not out of weakness, but from the weight of everything you’ve carried alone. You don’t mean for it to sound like an accusation, but it hangs there anyway, sharp and heavy in the stillness of the room.

He swallows hard, eyes flickering toward the floor. “I didn’t know if I’d make it better… or worse,” he says finally. “I thought maybe you wanted space. That maybe I was the last person you’d want to see.”

You glance away, jaw tightening.

“You were the only person I wanted to see.” Finnick looks like he’s been punched in the gut, but you press on, because if you stop now, you won’t be able to say it.

“The bracelet.” You continue. This makes his face contort with confusion for a split second before it softens. He remembers it of course. He hadn’t made it for you, but when he gave it to you that night as a token, he knew it was for you all along.

“Yeah?” He whispered.

“I keep it under my pillow.” You breathe out, your eyes falling to the floor. “In hopes that a singular piece of you can somehow help the nightmares that still continue to haunt me in those late hours.” Your voice is shaking, but there’s still more to be said.

“I think about the week after our wedding, where the Capitol threw us one last big party and my hands wouldn’t stop shaking.” You gather the courage to meet his gaze, tears threatening to spill out of your eyes. A lump forms in your throat. “You held my hand and whispered in my ear, reassuring me and telling me it’d all be over soon, and that’d you stay right beside me.”

“I remember that.” He replies, his heart breaking at the sight of your tear filled eyes.

"And then you left," you say, more bitterly now. "Went back to Annie, which I can’t blame you for. I would too if I were in your shoes.” You admit. “But I felt like I was a stopgap. Like none of those moments meant anything."

"That's not true," Finnick says quickly, his voice breaking around the words. "I gave you that bracelet because I didn't know what else to give you. Because it was all I had left of myself that felt real."

"Then why'd you wait so long to come back?" you ask, your voice rising despite yourself. "Why'd you let me drown in this house, in these memories, in the weight of all of it-alone?"

He exhales slowly, like the truth is something he's afraid to say out loud.

"Because I was a coward," he admits. "Because I didn't think I had the right to come back after everything." Silence settles between you again. Not the kind filled with tension, but the kind that aches. That remembers.

You reach for your glass again, hand trembling.

He protests softly, moving closer to try and grab the glass from your hands. His eyes pleading with you. “Please, stop.”

“It’s all I have.” You whisper, eyes falling onto the trembling glass. Despite your desire for the familiar burn, you allow him to take the glass from your hands, setting it down before replacing the emptiness you now feel with his own hands. It feels wrong, holding the hands of someone that feels so distant now.

But then again, you don’t want to let go.

“You have me.” He says, his eyes burning into yours. “You have Haymitch. Even Katniss for goodness sake.” He continues. You’ve received letters from Katniss too, and it shocked you. You two weren’t very close, talking to each other occasionally during lunch in district 13, or gossiping at night about how ridiculous Coin was. Still, you never would’ve thought she’d consider you someone to write to.

“I don’t have you.” You whisper again, eyes dropping to the floor as your hand loosens in his. “I never have.”

Finnick doesn’t respond right away. The silence between you is thick, like smoke, like memory. You hear the way his breath catches, but he says nothing. You pull your hand away gently, suddenly aware of how cold your fingers feel without his warmth.

“You had pieces,” he finally says, voice thick. “The ones I could give.”

You shake your head slowly, bitter and exhausted. “Pieces don’t hold people together.”

He looks away, jaw tight, as if trying to swallow down every moment that lingers between you, every stolen glance, every whispered secret beneath Capitol chandeliers, every night where the weight of the world shrank just enough for you both to breathe in the same rhythm.

“No,” he said quietly. “But maybe they help us remember who we were before we shattered.”

You look away, blinking hard as a wave of heat rises behind your eyes. He continues, his voice steady but thick with emotion. “I know I can’t fix it. I can’t go back and choose you the way you want me to. I can’t take away what Snow made us, or what we became after.”

His eyes searched yours, desperate, gentle.

“But I can pick up the pieces with you. Not to pretend we’re whole, or that it didn’t hurt. But so you don’t have to do it alone.”

You swallow hard, your breath catching. “I’m tired, Finnick,” you murmur, voice trembling. “I’ve been tired for so long.” He nods, moving closer, just enough to reach for your hand, not forcing it, just waiting.

“I know,” he says. “But I’m here now. Let me be tired with you.”

It sounds nice. Almost like those moments you used to share. It’d be so easy to slip your hands into his and allow him to hold you while he attempts to put you back together, but in the end, you’d shatter into even more tiny pieces. So, you do the opposite of what your heart is telling you to do.

You pull away.

For a moment, he doesn’t speak. Just stares at the floor with his jaw clenched and eyes glassy. “I get it,” he says finally, voice tight. “You don’t trust me not to break you more.”

His words sting because they’re true, and because they carry no bitterness, just quiet resignation.

“Maybe I shouldn’t have come after all,” he adds after a moment, not in anger, but with the kind of softness that comes from years of guilt. “I thought maybe… maybe there was still enough of us left to reach you. But maybe that was selfish.”

You feel the tears reappearing in your eyes, this time making their way onto your face. He reaches out again, slow, gentle, as if not to scare you, and you do what you always do.

You pull away.

But this time, something in him snaps.

Finnick takes a step back, his hand curling into a fist before he drags it through his hair in frustration. The softness in his face dissolves, replaced by something raw, hurt, yes, but also anger.

“Seriously?” he mutters, voice tight. “You’re really going to keep doing this?”

You look up at him, startled, and he lets out a sharp breath, stepping away like he can’t bear to be near you for a second longer.

“I come all this way, not because Haymitch told me to, but because I care, and you just… shut me out. Like I’m the enemy.” He gestures around the room, the dim lighting, the empty bottles, the fading photos on the wall. “This isn’t you. And I know it. But you won’t even let me try to remind you who that is.”

You stay silent. Tears streaming down your cheeks. He takes another breath, softer this time, but there’s still fire behind it. “You’re not just pulling away from me. You’re erasing everything we had , everything we still could have, whatever it is. And you don’t even care.”

Your bottom lip trembles, but you can feel yourself getting angry. How can he say you don’t even care when that’s all you’ve spent the last 5 in a half years doing? In fact, you care TOO much. Maybe you shouldn’t. Maybe you should allow yourself to become that stone hearted girl that seems to care about no one but herself.

He sees the look on your face, one that he can’t describe. That’s when his voice breaks, not angry anymore, just tired.

“You’re really gonna push me out, too, aren’t you?”

“I never asked you to come,” you say sharply, the bitterness cutting through the quiet room like a blade. Your eyes flash with a mix of anger and hurt, the words spilling out before you can stop them. “You think you’re some kind of savior, don’t you? Like you can just walk in and fix everything with a few words or a touch. But you don’t get it.”

Your voice trembles, a raw edge beneath the fury. “Maybe I just don’t want your help, because it’s never really about me, is it? It’s about you, trying to make yourself feel better by helping me.”

You take a shaky breath, tears burning. “So don’t. Don’t come here pretending like you care. Because all you’re doing is reminding me of everything I’ve lost, everything I never had with you in the first place.”

Finnick’s jaw tightens, his frustration bubbling over into something sharper, more bitter.

“Why did I even come here?” he snaps, voice rough with pain. “I thought maybe… maybe you needed someone. Maybe I could help, but you’re just pushing me away like everyone else.”

His eyes darken, and before he can stop himself, he blurts out, “Annie. She’s waiting for me. Maybe I should’ve stayed with her instead of wasting my time here.”

Immediately, he regrets the words, seeing the flicker of hurt in your eyes. His anger falters, replaced by a heavy, aching guilt. He swallows, voice softening. “I didn’t mean that… I’m sorry.”

Your tears seem to multiply as that familiar choking sensation fills your throat. You shake your head, your gaze falling to the floor. “No. It’s okay, you’re right.”

He steps closer slowly, pain filling his eyes as he realizes how harmful those stupid words were. “No,” he murmurs, his voice strained now, cracking around the edges. “I’m not right. That’s not what I meant, none of this is what I meant.”

You don’t look up. You can’t. The weight of his words, even the ones he didn’t mean, sit heavy in your chest, pressing down like a stone.

“I shouldn’t have brought her up,” he continues, barely above a whisper. “This isn’t about Annie. This is about you. And me. And… whatever we are.”

You wipe your face, your hand trembling slightly. “We’re nothing, Finnick. We never were.”

He doesn’t argue. He just stands there, helpless, staring at you like he’s watching something fall apart that he doesn’t know how to rebuild.

You take a deep breath, the kind that burns on the way in, like your lungs are protesting, like even your body knows what you’re about to do isn’t right, even if it’s necessary. The silence between you is thick, suffocating, but you break it anyway.

Because you know what needs to happen.

You both need to forget. To let go of the memories, the what-ifs, the almosts. The nights tangled in whispered lies and soft promises that were never meant to last. You need distance, real, unforgiving distance, because every time you look at him, it hurts. And every time he looks at you, it makes you hope.

And hope is a cruel thing to carry in a world like this.

So you steady yourself, your hands shaking slightly as you exhale and say, voice low but final,

“We need to stay away from each other… for good.”

And though your heart breaks for the hundredth time, you don’t take it back. Because maybe, just maybe, this is the only way either of you will survive.

There’s a flicker of resistance behind his eyes. Like he wants to argue, to tell you this is wrong. But he doesn’t. Because deep down, he knows it isn’t. He knows he’s only ever been a reminder of things you’re trying to forget, of pain, of pasts, of love that never had a real name.

So he nods. Once. Sharp and small.

“If that’s what you need,” he says, voice rough, barely more than a whisper. “Then I’ll go.”

He takes a step back, then another, his eyes lingering a little too long on you, like he’s trying to find the strength to walk away from the only person besides Annie who ever saw past the Capitol’s version of him. But he does it. Because he has to. Because staying might break you more.

And just before he turns to leave, he says, quieter this time:

“I hope it helps… even if it means forgetting me, and those nights we spent under the stars.” His words send pains shooting through your chest. You shouldn’t respond, but you do.

“You know I’ll never forget those nights.” Your voice barely carries the words, more breath than sound. A truth that tastes like longing and regret. A truth you wish you could swallow back down.

He gives a weak smile, small, tired, the kind that doesn’t quite reach his eyes. But it’s real.

“Me either,” he says, eyes glistening, voice rough.

There’s a pause. A moment where neither of you breathe. Where the weight of all the almosts, the what ifs, and the too lates sit heavy in the room.

His gaze lingers on you, just for a second longer, tracing every scar, every shadow, every memory you both carry before he speaks again.

“Goodbye, sweetheart.”

“Bye, Finn.” You respond, choking out a sob as you hear him use that stupid nickname again.

Then he turns, slowly, leaving you with only the echo of his footsteps and the scent of saltwater and something once beautiful, now broken.

pt.3 now available :)

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Leon needs a partner who gets so physically overwhelmed with bliss and emotional release during sex that when they cum together reader just starts crying with relief. So he can wrap his big arms around you and rub your back and tell you how well you did, so he can press kisses to your forehead and rub your hair, wiping under your eyes with his thumbs. “Oh, my baby. You needed that, didn’t you sweetheart? Yeah, you did. I’ve gotcha, honey.”

[ann1-the-s1mp]

I HAD A NEW THOUGHT TO TELL YOU!!!!!!

How do you think the Leon Eras would react if you locked him in during sex? Like legs wrapped around not letting him go till he fills you to the brim!!!

Hii Dani this is delicious and I've been thinking about it all day omgggg, you knew what to hit me with...

Warnings: SMUT, MNDI, Breeding Kink, Creampie, Premature Ejaculation,

Discord server

RE2: Cums instantly, like you pull him in closer with a whine. That it he's whimpering and whining as his cock twitches wildly inside you. There is a sense of panic at first but then he gets hard almost immediately feeling it seep out around him. Plus it gives him a chance for you to forgive him for cumming so quick

RE4R: He's the one that put your legs there. He moved them one at a time ensuring you get the picture and squeezes your thighs to ensure the hold is tight. Pants and groans in your ear and how well you are taking him and how good it feels. His grip on your thighs leaves tender spots where his fingers were, and he loves it if you squeeze them around him

Infinite Darkness: Takes it as a challenge to get himself as close to you as possible. He's like driving into you so deep that you swear he will abuse your cervix like no tomorrow, he does not give a shit. Prefer it if you tighten the grip, he might slowly squirm away just for you to trap him tighter again.

Damnation: You make him stumble and lose his rhythm, the sudden change in position doesn't help with the alcohol he drowned his sorrows with. However just because you made him lose his footing he'll use the closeness to his advantage and come back at a punishing rate. I'm talking your pelvis is hurting and your hips click when you release him...

RE6: Reaches around and actually holds the lock you have on him. Pushes his entire body weight on you trapping you into the mating press to ensure that you are completely filled to his own satisfaction

Vendetta: Freezes for a second, it's all suddenly to intimate and he feels slightly trapped. The consequences of a creampie are some he's not entirely sure he wants to face them. It's not until you arch yourself against him using the position as levage that he gets into it. The deeper connection suddenly becomes more fun and he's not longer thinking about the what ifs

Death Island: He's giving you the biggest fucking grin you have ever seen. Actually takes it as a challenge to abuse your cervix even more than he is. Giving your cunt no other option but to take his load.

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YAYYYY! I LOVE YOUR CREEPYPASTA CHARACTER NYEIN!

Could you maybe do a scenario where the reader is new to the group and Nyein notices how young they are and feels like a primal possessiveness over them. Like maybe where they both have to go on a mission and Nyein is in a heat and like after the reader gets almost killed and finds there way back to them Nyein looses it

I TOLD YOU IT WAS SPECIFIC AND I MADE IT SPECIFIC

🌚😘

Claim Bites, and Whatnot

[Nyein X GN!Reader]

[Warnings: Mating cycles/in heat, breeding kink lol, biting, primal, knotting, MINORS DNI]

[AN: GOD you have no idea how happy I am my bby girl got chosen. For those of you unaware, Nyein is my OC. Find some info on Ny here. Nyein uses he/they pronouns with no preference for whichever gets used more!]

Reblogs are appreciated!

Oh gods, how they've been watching you. From the moment you stepped in, to the moment he stares at you now, Nyein has been obsessed with you. There's something about the way you look, how you talk, the way you awkwardly fiddle with your weapons and Nyein can't exactly place how or why the Slender Man chose you. When they close their eyes, they can see how innocent you appear to be.

Nyein can feel themself coming undone at the seams, slowly unwinding and unraveling, just waiting to sink their teeth into you. Would it be wrong to do such a thing? He's not quite sure, only that it's what he desires most in this world. You look so sweet to bite, perhaps even to devour.

"You've already met Ruthie, Theo," your group leader, Wallace, began as he gestured about the safe house's living room to the now somewhat familiar faces before he gestured to a different figure. A pale white figure shrouded in shadows, with glowing yellow eyes - seemed to brushing their teeth. "That's Nyein, we call him Ny," the deep voiced group leader explained. "He's an independent, runs with our group on Slender's orders."

Theo chuckled softly on the couch as he sat next to Ruth and looked over his shoulder. His eyes narrowed slightly at Nyein and he hissed at him, "turn the light on, you fuckin' animal," he growled at the figure.

Nyein continued to brush his teeth before flicking his middle clawed finger up at Theo. It was dark in the bathroom where he stood, but with his eyes being so cat-like, he didn't need the light on. He always saw perfectly well in the dark. Nyein then removed the toothbrush after being satisfied with the cleanliness of his pronounced canines, and spit into the sink. After rinsing out their mouth, Nyein finally turned their attention to you.

Stepping out of the bathroom, Nyein fully turns their attention to you. They smile, eyes crinkling slightly at the corners to let you know that they mean this happiness genuinely before raising their hand, outstretched and fingers stacked together to their temple and flick outwards.

"They're saying hi," Ruth interjects. "Ny can't really speak the same way we do. He uses ASL, a notepad and the notes app on an IPhone," she chuckled. She shifted a bit on the couch to give Nyein and yourself more attention before nodding to Wallace to give you and the independent some space. "Ny is also an independent, like Wallace mentioned, and can't use head talk like proxies either."

Absorbing all of this information, you step forward, wanting to make a good impression. "Hi," you say, "very nice to meet you. I'm Reader, your group's, uh, runt," you semi-awkwardly finish.

Nyein laughs. It's not a run of the mill laugh, it's not even human. It's almost like a raven attempting to mimic human speech, or a cat's hiss. It's not an unpleasant sound, but it sure is uncanny. 'It's very nice to meet you,' they sign as Ruth interprets for them, 'welcome. We will teach you so Ruth does not need to interpret for you and me forever.'

As they sign, you give your full attention to Nyein. It's not just because it's preferred, but also that you can't take your eyes off of him. Nyein is tall, with dark hair. It's not pitch black, no, closer to an ashen grey coal. On their cheeks are slits, but they don't seem cut. The skin is too perfectly molded, as if it were never disturbed to begin with, but you can tell it served some sort of purpose on their face. The sclarea in his eyes is yellow, with their pupils about a similar greenish grey shade. Their skin is a pale white, almost like the surface of the moon.

You can't stop looking away from them.

"I'd love to learn," you manage to choke out, slightly shy to be in his presence. You watch his clawed hands as he moves onto the next thing he wishes to say, wondering what they'd feel like touching your heated skin.

Nyein isn't a fan now that his heat is in full swing. They felt the signs about a week ago, but they've finally reached the height now. Their heartrate has been up all day, and they've found they're hoarding all the pillows and blankets they can fine. When Theo swung by their room to see if Nyein was available to take over this specific run instead of him, he was more than annoyed to see the large cat hissing in the corner and then apologizing while holding out a pillow they'd taken from his room.

"You're so disgusting, keep it," Theo said, annoyance lacing every tongue click, "anyways, you need to do this thing with Reader for me. Cool? Cool."

And that led to now.

Nyein can't think straight. Nyein is certain he can't have a panic attack but with his vision going spotty and his nose not picking up your scent, he feels as if he's on the verge of one. The house was burning. Middle of the night, the house was burning and the two of you had gotten separated. It almost looked like the work of a proxy by the name of Toby, but no, it was the two of you.

The patriarch of this house, in a vain attempt to keep the two of you out, a stupid attempt, set the house on fire. Everyone inside was charred to a crisp, that, Nyein could smell out. But they'd lost your scent in the confusion. Nyein ran around the large property trying to find you, the clicks and whistles coming from their mouth mimicking the sounds of nature to identify you in response should you reply.

Eventually, they found your boot prints in the dirt. Like a bloodhound, Nyein took the scent and followed it out backwards to the barn. He could smell this was largely a veganic fam, so he was picking up strawberries, the squashes that threatened to fruit in the later summer, apple trees blooming, cherry blossoms on their way out, but none of it was the sweetness that was you. They ran towards the barn, their steps silent as their ears pricked upwards to the commotion inside.

"You need to be sent back to hell!" A male's voice yelled.

Nyein could hear metal moving. Something swinging upwards and the sound of scuffling on the barn's floor. Dust moving under boot.

Silently, they crawled up the barn, careful that the moon wouldn't betray their position as they peeked in. There was the father who'd lit everything up. His face was tear stained as he held the shotgun up and pointed it directly towards you. His vision was blurring from the tragedy he'd been through that night. "You did this," he sneered.

You held your hands up. Never had you ever been so ill equipped in your time as a proxy, staring up the barrel of a gun from a man who'd lost it all: his spouse, his children, even the family dog. You knew what he was doing. He'd gotten to close to the Slender Man's world. Tapped into a pocket, looked a little too hard, and saw irrefutable evidence of a divine war happening without any blood price to pay.

Nyein whistled like a bird. He watched you dive out of the way, and he pounced. His claws swiped quickly at the man's throat, before he moved his hands to pry the gun out of his hands. Nyein's eyes were wild. They opened their mouth, unhinged their jaw, and sank their teeth deep into the grieving man's throat and pulled. They pulled and pulled until their teeth wrapped solidly around the man's trachea and stole it from his body. He spit it out, huffing and puffing and looking damn near insane as they stood back up to their full height.

Nyein picked up the gun, unloaded it and then threw it down on the still warm body. They didn't look right in that moment, completely animalistic as they reached for your arm and yanked you roughly upwards. They quickly signed something to you, something along the lines of 'RUN' before tugging you along.

You were, admittedly, dazed. You felt bruises forming on your body where you'd fallen, and from where the farmer had hit you. But he was dead now, and so too was his family. You felt tears prick your eyes. Not because of that man and the farm, but because you'd almost died. You hastily wiped them away as you ran alongside Nyein, and cursed your lungs for not sucking in more oxygen.

Eventually, you and Nyein had made it to a temporary safehouse. Nyein's breathing had calmed by the time the two of you arrived, but he looked lawful. Blood was splattered all across his jaw, his shirt, and his milky colored skin. His eyes were tired, but he couldn't take them off of you.

'What happened in there?' He asked as he shut the door and locked it behind the two of you. The lights were off in the cabin but his vision and yours were far superior to that of a human. He reached around, groping in the darkness until he found a lamp nestled atop a table and turned it on. The room illuminated to a relatively cozy cottage, one that proxies often stayed in. It was a miracle no one else was here when you two arrived. 'Are you okay?' They asked as they gingerly moved to inspect your body.

"I'm fine," you said as you attempted to shrug them off. "Nothing-it was nothing. I was just stupid and thought I could take him by myself," you attempted to cover. Embarrassment fled over your face, racking up and down your body as you told him that you were... careless. "I'm sorry," you apologized awkwardly, "I forgot to check and he..."

'He could have killed you!' They signed, their express dark and serious. 'You would have died under my watch! You need to be more careful,' they rambled on.

"I'm sorry-"

'Sorry isn't good enough, Reader' they hissed at you.

"What the fuck, I made a mistake-"

'A deadly fuckling mistake!'

The two of you stared at each other in the darkness. Nyein's chest rose and fell dramatically, like he was trying to control his breathing. Neither of you blinked as you stared each other down in the darkness. Their towering form over you made you growl.

Without really thinking, you reached your hands upwards for him, and smashed your face into his. Angrily, you bit as his lips before he forced your mouth open and kissed you harshly. He nipped at you, his sharp teeth more than capable of drawing blood yet refusing in lieu of the blood he was already covered in. Their hands hungrily clawed at your body, the two of you gnashing against each other before falling down to the couch.

Nyein hissed at you again when you reached to get their shirt up. He obliged you, only barely, and shoved you down to the couch. One of his hands fell to the waistband of your pants as he kissed you. His tongue completely invaded your mouth, taking control as you fought against him. Your frustrations were sung out in your grunts and hisses as their hands groped you. You struggled to breathe as their tongue explored every inch of your mouth. You sucked on the appendage and rolled your hips upwards to meet his.

Nyein's hand pulled your pants down. Nyein's always been able to overpower most that they meet, and you were no exception. They yanked off your clothes, not caring if they were ripped or if you'd look indecent the next day when leaving, they had to have you. Their claws traced up and down your thighs. His own erection was painful in his pants. Briefly, their claws left your delicious thighs and forced your hand to his zipper. He purred when he felt you unzip it and free his large cock.

Briefly, you pushed him back so you could see him. In the dim light of the lamp, you looked over Nyein's form. Muscular, his abs were flexed, and his cock was large. It was a dark color, a gradient from grey to black, and had a thick knot at the base. His balls were heavy, full of cum and he'd looked like he was overtaken by lust.

Impatient, Nyein pushed you back down and spread your legs wide for himself. His clawed hand stroked himself a few times, a low purr sounding from deep in his chest before he lined up with you.

'I'm gonna fuck you,' they were able to sign as the head of their cock pressed against your entrance. 'I'm gonna cum inside of you and breed you.' Their teeth nipped at your neck and collar as they continued to rub the head of their cock at your pretty entrance. Their tip was already weeping with precum, something sticky, sweet and almost syrupy as they finally pushed into you.

Your eyes widened and instinctively you clung onto them, "oh my god-" you whimpered. He was huge, his cock was naturally ribbed, ridges seeming to exist just for your pleasure as they pushed into you deliciously inch by inch. They were stretching every bit of you open. Your hips angled upwards instinctively to meet them better and take them deeper. You moaned, eyes squeezed shut before you felt their knot kiss your entrance.

Nyein seemed to take joy in the fact you hadn't taken their knot yet but were still so full of them. Nyein panted, their hips drawing backwards before they started to roll their hips deliciously into you. His teeth dug into a special little crux in your neck, sure to leave a mark, as they slowly began to pick up the pace. Every drag of their cock inside of you felt like magic, heated, and powerful bringing you that much closer to the edge. Their eyes briefly flickered downwards to see the large bulge in your belly from how they stuffed you.

"Oh fuck," you whined as your legs wrapped tightly around their waist. "Oh fuck, fuck me-" you begged. Your hole squeezed around him even tighter. Your heartrate shot up as you took him. "Oh, oh my god, oh my god," you whimpered as he started to pound into you. Their snarls and growls filled your ears as they stuffed you full of his cock. The heat between you two covered your bodies in a thin, sticky sheen of sweat, but you didn't care.

Nyein's hips were ruthless. Their strokes were deep and powerful as they pounded into you. His brows furrowed deeply as he pressed his full body weight into you. Chest to chest, their teeth buried in that special crook between your neck and collar, their hips pumping hard and deep. The sound of skin on skin reverberated through the cozy cottage while your mewls accompanied them. He reveled in the feeling of your nails digging into his back, scratches like ribbons blooming all across his pale skin as he pressed you even harder into the couch.

You bit your lip as you took him. "I wanna feel you cum in me," you babbled, lustful and drunk off his touch. "Fuck, I want you to knot me and breed me," you whined as you squeezed around him tighter. You wanted every last drop of him in that moment. "Ny, Ny, fuck-Ny, knot me, knot me, knot me and fill me up-" you repeated wantonly.

Nyein broke. His drew back his hips and roughly slammed them back into you, his eyes rolling upwards as your soft hole met him with resistance before he simply popped in. He growled loudly as his body slumped against yours, his hips still moving to press his cock as deep as he possibly could inside your body. Your back arched and you screamed for him, eyes widened and tears pricked from just how big the intrusion actually was.

You pressed your chest to his and grinded your hips, you wanted him to cum inside of you. "Fuck, Ny, cum inside of me, please, please, please, please-!"

Your wish was granted. Nyein bit harder in that special little place, hard enough to let red bloom from their teeth marks though it did not hurt, and slammed inside of you with their knot as deep as they possibly could. They roared. Their knot puled deep inside of your eager, willing body and those hot, sticky ropes of cum you'd been begging for filled you to the brim. They purred deeply as they continued to rock their hips against you and continued to flood your body with their cum. Nyein licked at the spot they bit at on your neck, smiling dopily from how stuffed you'd become.

His hips rocked a few more times, though the two of you were still very much knotted. The couch was saved from evidence of your coupling outside of sweat until the two of you... disconnected.

You actually giggled a bit at the thought of it.

'What?' They asked.

"The mess," you trailed off with a slight heat crossing over your cheeks.

Nyein's ears flattened a bit and suddenly, they looked sheepish. 'We can clean it up later.'

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they look pretty neat oh how i love them sm

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i have no ideas but can u write something for ej or masky and hoodie of any of them x reader ? 🙏 thank u queen

A Little Tease

[Eyeless Jack X GN!Reader]

[Warnings: Teasing, and pretty adult leaned so MINORS DNI]

[AN: Something short and not so sweet lol]

Reblogs are appreciated!

Heat rises to your cheeks as you move your hips on Jack's lap. Your lips suction to his neck, teeth barely grazing his ashen skin while you relish in the feeling of his hands all over your body.

The two of you aren't supposed to be playing like this right now. It's the worst possible time to be doing so, but still, the two of you can't really help it. A simple supply run, and the two of you are clawing all over each other.

"Jack," you whisper as you nip at his neck. Your heart flutters in your chest when he softly groans and bucks his hips upwards to meet your warm body.

"What?" He asks breathlessly. His clawed hands dig into your hips as he leans his head back, bathing in your tongue on his skin. He closes his eyes from the pleasure, then reopens them with a newfound hunger nestled in his empty sockets. Jack tilts your head to the side and attacks your neck. His tongue slithers over your most sensitive spot. His ears twitch when you softly mewl. "Quiet," he chides.

You squirm. His hands are gripping your ass, slithering back to your thighs and caressing you everywhere he can. Your chest presses against his and you mewl softly once more. You can feel the muscle under his hoodie, and the slight warmth he gives off with that tinge of otherworldly metallic cold.

You grind your hips against his and rub perfectly against his growing bulge. Gods, what you wouldn't do to have that man inside of you in the moment. "Jack," you whisper breathlessly as he nips more at your neck. Jack plants kiss upon kiss, drunk off the lust fluttering between the two of you. You roll your hips perfectly against him. He moans softly through the kisses he plants on your neck. You can feel him twitch in his pants, begging to be buried deep inside of you. "Jack, Jack, Jack-" you giggle gingerly as you start to push away from him.

Jack instantly snaps up, annoyed he can't suck on your neck some more. "Co?" He hisses, ears flattened down and gaze full of begging to allow him to dote on you some more.

You roll your eyes playfully at your boyfriend while you peel your hands off of your hips. You watch as he groans in disappointment when you get off his lap and start to smoothen yourself out. "The ice cream we got isn't gonna stay a solid forever," you remind him.

Jack pulls a face at you. He gestures to the two of you, and hisses. "Oh, you are so lucky I love you. Cock blocking me for ice cream. Un-fucking believable," he complains like a child who missed a nap. Jack stands up and readjusts his pants a bit, mostly so a certain part of him won't get in the way and he can look decent, then slings the backpack over his shoulder. He only relents when he hears your giggles.

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Can u do tim wright with breeding kink 😳

[Tim Wright X F!Reader]

[Warnings: Breeding kink, cum stuffing, MINORS DNI]

[AN: Really wish you guys could see my face when I read some of these requests lol. Anyways, doing headcanons *insert index fingers tapping together*]

Reblogs are appreciated!

I've always thought that Tim has a huge breeding kink. Like, he's not supposed to, but the taboo nature makes it all the more alluring for him.

That means he's going to be incorporating it whenever he has the chance. So, no condoms, he's going to try fucking you raw any chance he gets. He'll tell you, of course, no stealthing, but sometimes the two of you pretend you don't know he's taking the condom off.

He feels better this way. Thick, long cock and he's going balls deep whenever he's finishing inside of you. Makes him drool.

He will press his whole body against you, shoving you into the bed and pick your hips up so you're flush against him. Growling in your ear, panting, and pounding into you as hard as he can.

He's going to ramble in your ear about how he wants to get you pregnant. Lots of "you're gonna get pregnant with my fucking kid," or "I wanna see you take every last drop so it takes" as he grinds his hips against you.

Tim gets kinda feral in these moments. Especially when you wrap your legs around his waist and beg him to fill you up, get you pregnant. He pounds as deep as he can, then releases. Feeling him fill your womb like that, hot sticky ropes of cum stuffing you as deep as he can... It's a good feeling.

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reaping day vs interviews

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and he wore his nicest waistcoat too...

(was rewatching Pride and Prejudice and my hand slipped)

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Room for One more?

Pairing - JJK Men x reader

Content Warning: Smut (oral sex, handjob, cum play), alcohol consumption, dubcon implications (drunken state), possessiveness, emotional tension, light angst, post-intimacy aftermath.

prev chapter | next chapter

Chapter 9

The night had unraveled in a blur of laughter, games that got filthier with every round, and drinks passed around like candy.

One by one, they all began to drop—Geto retreating to his room without a word, Gojo passed out on the couch with limbs tangled around you like a needy octopus, and Toji… Toji had disappeared into your room for god knows what reason, certainly not a good one.

Nanami was the only one still awake.

He hadn't drunk much—just enough to feel a buzz—but he stayed sharp.

Watching. Thinking.

When the chaos quieted, he stood there silently, eyes scanning the mess that had once been a living room. A low sigh slipped from his lips when he saw where Toji had ended up, and then his gaze dropped to you.

Your small frame was curled up awkwardly beneath Gojo's possessive weight, your head tucked into his chest, legs trapped under his.

Nanami moved without a word.

He approached, gently prying Gojo's limbs off you like he was defusing a bomb. You stirred, a soft little sound escaping your lips, but didn’t wake. Scooping you up into his arms, Nanami held you close, warm breath brushing your temple as he carried you out of the living room.

The scent of you—sweet, soft, laced with something sinful from the evening’s teasing—lingered around him.

He didn’t take you back to your room. Toji was there.

So he brought you to his instead.

He laid you down on his bed like you were something fragile. Something that mattered. Then, quietly, he took Toji’s bed in the corner of the room.

But sleep never came.

The image of you clung to him—flushed face, swollen lips from the kissing game, the sound of your whimpers echoing in his head. The way your eyes had fluttered shut. The way your breath hitched when someone so much as teased your neck.

It was hell.

He lay there, fists clenched under the blanket, eyes on the ceiling. It was around 3 a.m. when he finally gave in. Rising slowly, barefoot on the floorboards, he walked over to you. You looked like a dream laid out on his bed—innocent, unguarded, and beautiful in the dim light.

He sat beside you, hand reaching out before he could stop himself, brushing his fingers gently through your hair.

You stirred.

A soft cough left your lips.

He leaned in and grabbed the water from the nightstand, lifting your head as you sipped, eyes still dazed with sleep.

“Thanks,” you whispered, voice hoarse and sleepy.

Then you smiled.

That smile broke him.

Your lips were red, still a little glossy from the games earlier, your cheeks flushed from the warmth of the room, the remnants of alcohol, or maybe the memory of who kissed you last. You looked wrecked in the most innocent way. And Nanami couldn’t take it anymore.

He leaned down and kissed you.

A firm, desperate kiss, mouth molding against yours like he’d been holding back for far too long. And when you kissed him back—slow, soft, like you’d been waiting for him—he almost groaned.

His lips trailed down, grazing your jaw, then your neck. He lingered there, breathing you in. You tasted like heat and desire and something dangerous.

Then his mouth traveled lower.

His mouth trails lower, lower still—leaving soft, open-mouthed kisses down your chest, past your ribs, pausing at the waistband of your shorts.

You tremble beneath him.

You can feel his breath fan across your stomach. He looks up at you once, asking silently for permission, and you nod—slow, eyes wide, chest heaving.

His fingers hook into your waistband, dragging your shorts and panties down in one slow, deliberate motion.

The air hits you.

Cold. Exposing.

But Nanami’s gaze… it burns.

He settles between your thighs, pushing your legs apart gently, reverently. And for a moment, he just looks. His expression is unreadable—serious, intense. Then he exhales like he's been holding his breath for hours.

“You’re beautiful,” he murmurs, voice gravelly.

You don’t get to respond—not when he dips his head and licks you.

The shock of it rips a gasp from your throat. You arch off the bed, thighs trying to close around his head, but he’s strong. His hands grip your thighs, spreading them even wider, keeping you open for him.

He groans into you, and the sound is filthy. Raw.

Like he’s starved and you’re the only thing that’ll satisfy him.

His tongue drags through your folds, slow at first, tasting, mapping. Then faster—flicking over your clit with skilled precision. Your fingers fly to his hair, clutching the strands as your hips buck up against his face.

“Nanami—oh my god—” You’re already shaking.

He hums into you, lips wrapping around your clit, sucking gently, sending a jolt of pleasure through your spine.

“You taste,” he says between licks, “so fucking sweet.”

He dives back in, mouth moving faster, tongue lapping up every drop of slick. You cry out, writhing, overwhelmed by the intensity. He doesn’t let up. He’s relentless. Tongue swirling, lips suckling your clit, nose pressed against you like he wants to drown in your scent, your taste, your sounds.

You’re unraveling.

Tension coils in your belly, tighter with every flick of his tongue, every obscene slurp.

And then he does it—he moans into your pussy, deep and guttural, the vibrations shaking through you, and you cum with a sob, thighs shaking violently around his head.

He holds you through it, still licking, drawing it out, even as your legs twitch and your body trembles uncontrollably.

When you finally collapse back against the pillows, panting, sweating, spent—he pulls back.

His mouth and chin are slick with you.

He wipes it with the back of his hand, but the look in his eyes… it’s ravenous. Golden. Hungry.

He shifts up your body, kissing your stomach, your chest, your collarbone—until he’s face to face with you again. He brushes a kiss to your lips.

You can taste yourself on him.

“You okay?” he murmurs.

You nod, blinking slowly, dazed. “That was…”

He smiles—small, smug, hungry. “You’re not done.”

You blink. “What?”

He takes your hand and brings it to his lap.

Only then do you realize—he’s hard.

Painfully hard.

His sweatpants are stretched taut over his erection, the tip visibly straining, a dark wet spot forming at the top. You swallow hard.

“Can you?” he whispers.

You nod once.

You slide your hand beneath his waistband—and groan softly when you finally wrap your fingers around him.

He’s thick.

Heavy.

Hot.

Your fingers barely close around the shaft, and he hisses through his teeth when you start to stroke him.

“Shit—” His voice is tight, strained, head tipping back. “Just like that.”

You stroke him slowly, tentatively at first, watching the way his jaw clenches, how his stomach tenses beneath your touch. Then you speed up—twisting your wrist a little on each upstroke, your thumb smearing the bead of pre-cum across the head.

“Faster,” he growls, hand gripping your waist. “Don’t tease me.”

You obey—fisting him harder, slick and smooth from how much he’s leaking. His hips jerk forward, fucking into your hand. You watch him lose control—watch his expression fall apart, his breathing ragged, his lips parted as he stares down at your hand working him.

“Gonna cum,” he gasps. “Fuck, I’m—close—”

You don’t stop. If anything, you grip tighter, jerking him faster.

He moans your name, low and broken, and cums hard across your stomach, thick and hot and messy, ropes spilling over your skin. His entire body shudders with it, hands digging into your sides.

He collapses over you, panting, head buried in your neck.

Neither of you speak for a while.

Only the sound of your ragged breathing fills the room. Your hand is still wrapped around his softening cock, his cum sticky on your belly, his breath hot on your skin.

He presses a kiss to your neck.

Then another.

“I shouldn’t have done that,” he murmurs, voice raw. “But I did,” he whispers.

He exhales, resting his forehead against your shoulder.

“I don’t regret it,” he finally says. “But things are going to get… complicated.”

You smile faintly. “Mhmmm. . ..”

His fingers tangle with yours.

And in the quiet after, with your body still trembling and your heart still racing, you wonder—who’s going to find out first?

Because the sun will rise soon.

And you’re still in his bed.

Covered in each other.

The next day moves slowly—like a dream you’re still shaking off.

You act normal. Smile when you need to. Sit quietly at the kitchen table with your cereal, listening to Geto and Gojo argue about who used whose towel again. Toji saunters out of his room mid-morning shirtless, scratching his stomach, offering no greeting, just a grunted “move” as he passes behind you.

You feel Nanami’s absence.

He’d gone to work early. Quiet as always. No trace of last night on his face.

But you still feel it. Between your legs. In your chest.

You’re more aware of your body than you’ve ever been.

By the time he returns—pressed and calm in his usual shirt and tie—you feel like you’re vibrating under your skin.

“Come with me,” he says softly. Not a question.

You nod.

He doesn’t take you far. Just down the road, to a small local ice cream shop, the one with pastel chairs and faded menu signs and a little bell that jingles when the door opens. You’re surprised when he tells you to choose whatever you want.

You hesitate—until he says, “All of them, if you’d like.”

And somehow you end up at a table with a tray stacked with scoops—strawberry, cookies and cream, matcha, chocolate fudge, mango sorbet. It looks childish. Ridiculous. But Nanami watches you dig in like you’re the only person in the world.

He waits until your second bite of strawberry to finally speak.

“I need to apologize,” he says, voice low. “About last night.”

You stop mid-chew.

“I didn’t plan for that to happen. I wasn’t thinking clearly.”

You look up at him. His expression is unreadable—still composed, still reserved—but his fingers are curled tightly around the edge of his cup.

“I’m not… ashamed,” he continues. “But you deserve better than someone losing control.”

You shake your head quickly. “It’s fine,” you whisper, heart thumping.

He studies you. Like he’s trying to see if you really mean it.

“I liked it, Nanami,” you say, softer now. “I like you too. You’re always so kind to me. You always listen to me." You say, cheeks heating.

A long silence stretches between you.

Then—he smiles.

Not a smirk. Not a condescending curl of the lips like Gojo’s. Not the amused grin Geto gives you when you blush. Not Toji’s smug little quirk when you’re squirming under his stare.

No, this smile is warm.

Soft.

He takes your hand for just a second. Squeezes it. And then stands, offering you the last bite of chocolate before walking you back.

When you return, it’s almost late evening.

The apartment is lazy and golden with the last bits of sunset spilling through the windows.

Gojo and Geto are lounging on the couch, legs tangled, a shared bowl of chips between them.

You try to slip past, quiet and unnoticed.

“Oi,” Gojo calls, mouth half-full. “Where’d you disappear to in the morning, sweetheart?”

You pause.

He grins, wiping his fingers on his pants. “I woke up and you were gone. Freaked me out, y’know. Thought you ran away or something. My poor arms felt so empty.”

You laugh softly, glancing toward Nanami.

“Uhm… Toji went to my room, so Nanami moved me to his bed. He took Toji’s bed.”

Gojo blinks.

Then recoils.

“Toji went to your room? What the hell? What was he doing in there?” His voice rises, dramatic.

“That old pervert must’ve been trying to sniff your panties again, I swear—has no one taught that man boundaries?”

You blink, startled, while Geto snorts behind him.

Gojo barrels on. “I told you, you should’ve just stayed with me on the couch. I would’ve kept you warm. Kept you safe. Kept your underwear where it belongs.”

You glance down, flustered, while Nanami clears his throat pointedly and walks away toward the kitchen.

“Seriously, though,” Gojo adds, stuffing more chips into his mouth, “what if he took pictures? That man has dead eyes. Like he’s seen things. Done things. He's got that 'secret folder on his phone' kind of vibe.”

You leave him rambling, muttering something about Toji and foot pics, and disappear down the hall before your cheeks combust.

The rest of the evening is a blur.

Dinner happens. Laughter fills the kitchen. Toji says nothing about the morning, just eyes you once when you refill your glass. You avoid his stare.

You avoid all their stares.

Because it’s too hard to tell who sees what anymore.

It’s not that they don’t touch you.

They do. Constantly.

Hands on your waist in passing. Thighs pressed too close on the couch. A palm to your ass that lingers longer than it should. Toji’s fingers brushing yours when he hands you a fork. Gojo’s casual lap-pulling. Geto’s soft-spoken praises whispered in your ear late at night when he thinks no one’s listening.

They’ve all marked you.

Somewhere.

Somehow.

And they all know about each other. They pass you around like a shared secret, but there’s a strange balance to it. Unspoken rules. Mutual understanding.

But Nanami?

He’s not part of their equation.

Not really.

He’s separate.

And no one knows about the things that happen with him now.

How his hands wander beneath your shirt after the lights go out.

How his mouth presses into your skin with slow, reverent desperation.

How he whispers things soft filthy things into your eyes.

And you let him.

Because when Nanami touches you, it’s never rushed. Never greedy.

It’s not about claiming.

It’s about craving.

And God, he craves you. Quietly. Constantly.

Sometimes it’s just his hand under your skirt while the others are asleep. Or your mouth on his in the hallway when no one’s watching. Or his fingers slipping between your legs while you cling to him, panting into his shoulder, his lips pressed to your ear as he murmurs filth like a prayer.

Sometimes he don’t even have to touch. He just looks at you a certain way, and your knees go weak.

But none of them know.

Because how could they?

You're always covered in bruises and love bites anyway.

Your neck. Your chest. Your thighs.

Red and purple. Faint and dark.

A mosaic of desire.

No one knows which marks belong to who.

And that’s how it stays.

Nanami likes it that way.

Hidden. Secret. Sacred.

Something they’ll never understand.

Because while they joke and tease and share you—Nanami watches from the corner of the room, calm and composed, knowing exactly what you sound like when you cum with his name on your lips.

to be continued in the next chapter . . .

. taglist: @sparkling-obsidian @shiroonii @dinokens-blog @starryyairis @ngh-ch-choso-ahhhh @unrxdcl @nina-from-317 @dollbwun @lenafushiguro @riszei @mikasasarm @originalcrazycatlady @satorus-sweetbunny @socksfirst1 @yaurss

A/N: To all the people that didn't get included in the taglist even after requesting it - I'm really sorry I'm not being able to put some of you in the taglist idk why 😭 it shows no blogs found whenever i type some blog names. And sometimes it works and the next time it doesn't. Tumblr is a bish sometimes.

[ann1-the-s1mp]

We Kissed Like Drowning Things.

pairings: finnick odair x reader

summary: they were each other's first love—soft, sacred, sun-warmed. then the capitol took him, and you learned that sometimes, survival means letting go of everything gentle. years later, bruised by the capitol and silence, they're trying again. but the sea doesn't always return what it takes.

warnings: the usual hunger games (death, violence, prostitutions, etc.), annie is traumatized, reader is depressed, finnick is traumatized and depressed, slowburn

word count: 14.5k

author's note: not proofread! i accidentally hit post instead of schedule🥲🥲🥲

When you were six, you met a boy with bronze curls and sea-green eyes. You were crouched by the shore, trying and failing to build a castle out of sand, only to have every small wave undo your work with careless indifference. Frustration simmered in your chest until the boy appeared beside you, his shadow cutting into the sunlight. He asked if he could help, promised that together you could build something bigger, something the tide wouldn’t dare destroy. You said yes. By the time the sun dipped below the horizon, your mother’s voice was calling your name, and just before you turned to leave, the boy offered his name—Finnick Odair—and asked if you’d like to be friends. You said yes again. And somehow, that moment, all sun-warmed skin and saltwater air, set you both on a path that carried you fifteen years forward.

At eight, the two of you ran wild through the town square, sticky fingers swiping sweets from distracted vendors, mouths stained with chocolate as laughter rang through cobblestone alleys. You always ended up back at the beach, sand clinging to your skin as you talked about everything and nothing until the sky turned lavender. Sometimes it was your mother who’d call you home, and other times Finnick’s father would arrive, stern and tired from his son’s market ruckus again, dragging his son by the wrist. But he never included you in his scoldings. No—Finnick’s father looked at you like he might’ve looked at a daughter, gentle and kind. Finnick would sulk afterward, grumbling that you were definitely his dad’s favorite. You’d blow raspberries at him in response, which only made him roll his eyes harder.

When you were ten, Finnick showed up on your doorstep with a trembling smile, a box of chocolates in one hand and a single rose in the other. He was flushed and awkward and so very nervous when he stammered out the words—"Will you be my girlfriend?" Your father nearly had a heart attack, clutching his chest while your mother just laughed, amused and endlessly supportive, even though she said, "They’re children. It’ll pass." It took three nights to calm your dad down, reassure him that no, you and Finnick weren’t eloping anytime soon. Annie, your little sister, teased the both of you mercilessly. Whenever Finnick came by, she’d grin and say, “Dad’s gonna kill you if you ever make her cry.” Finnick always rolled his eyes and promised, “I could never.”

But that promise didn’t last long. You were twelve when you came home in tears over a ridiculous argument—something about sea animals and which one was the best. You lost, and your pride was bruised, and your father, loyal to a fault, nearly turned the entire district inside out looking for Finnick, who was hiding behind a fruit stall with his heart in his throat. That night, Finnick snuck through your window with your favorite lilies clutched in one hand and your favorite chocolates in the other. You forgave him before he even spoke. Giving him a kiss on the cheek as you hugged him.

By fourteen, the two of you had settled into something that felt eternal. Your relationship was soft and strong in the way only young love can be—full of promise and warmth and long walks along the beach with no need for words. He’d sleep over some nights, and you’d eat with his family just as often as he’d eat with yours. You had your own lives too, your own interests, your own spaces. You weren’t tied at the hip, but always tied at the heart. Arguments happened, sure. But they never lasted long. A few hours later, you'd be barefoot and breathless, laughing as he chased you across the shore like nothing had gone wrong at all.

But then came the 65th Hunger Games Reaping and it altered everything you once knew.

You heard his name called, and the world tilted. Time stopped. You watched him walk up to that stage, pale and shaking, and you felt your own heart fall from your chest and crack somewhere on the Justice Building’s stone steps. You wished you could scream. You wished you could run to him. You wished you could hide him away from the world. When the Peacekeepers finally let you in, led you through dim corridors to the room where Finnick waited, it felt like a dream unraveling into a nightmare. 

Because he was going, and you were staying, and neither of you knew how to live without the other.

Finnick made you promise not to wait for him—his voice thick with tears that tasted like the sea. One of his hands cupped your cheek gently, the other resting on your shoulder like he was trying to memorize the shape of you. You shook your head, burying your face in his chest, your arms wrapped around him like letting go would make everything real.

“Please,” Finnick whispered, his voice barely holding together. “When you leave this building… just forget it. Forget what we were. Everything we said we’d do, everything we thought we’d have—just let it go.”

A single tear slipped down his cheek. He tilted your chin up, gently, like he couldn’t stand not seeing your face one last time, even if it was streaked with tears.

Your breath hitched as you looked up at him, his face already starting to blur through the tears in your eyes. You wanted to tell him no—that you wouldn’t forget, that you couldn’t. But your throat tightened too much to speak, so you just nodded, slowly, even though your heart was breaking with every second.

Finnick leaned in, pressing his forehead to yours, eyes closed like he was trying to freeze time. “You’re gonna be okay,” he whispered, more like a hope than a promise. “You always were braver than me.”

You let out a shaky laugh, barely there. “That’s a lie,” you said quietly. “You were never scared of anything.”

“I’m scared now,” he admitted.

He kissed your forehead—soft, lingering, like a secret he didn’t know how to say out loud—and when he pulled back, his hands slid from your cheeks like he didn’t want to leave but knew he had to.

A knock on the door came too soon. A Peacekeeper's voice told you time was up.

You stepped back, arms falling to your sides, feeling colder already. Your fingers itched to grab him again, to hold on just one second longer, but you didn’t move.

“I’ll see you again,” you said, even though you didn’t know if you believed it.

Finnick gave you the smallest smile, eyes shining. “Yeah,” he said. “Maybe somewhere without the Games. Just us.”

And then you turned, because if you waited another second, you’d never leave. The door closed behind you with a final, hollow sound. And just like that, the boy who had built sandcastles with you, who brought you chocolate and lilies, was gone.

~

For the rest of the month, you moved through your house like a ghost, pacing from room to room with nerves crackling just beneath your skin. The television was always on, no matter where you were—living room, kitchen, even the bathroom while you showered. You couldn’t bear to miss a moment. Even when you tried to sleep, the static hum and flicker of the screen followed you, casting shadows on your walls. You watched as the boy you loved, the boy who once helped you build sandcastles and brought you lilies, was slowly carved into something unrecognizable. The Games stripped him bare, piece by piece, and you watched it all happen in real time.

Your father tried to pull the plug—told you that no child should be watching something so violent, so vile. You screamed, and you ran, and you ended up at a friend’s house just to sit in front of their screen instead. Every night, you whispered prayers into your pillow, begged whatever gods might be listening to bring him home. Just bring him home.

And they did.

But God, how you wished they hadn’t.

Because the boy who returned wasn’t your Finnick. He looked the same—same bronze curls, same sea eyes—but his smile was gone, and the warmth in him had been buried somewhere you couldn’t reach. The boy who used to pull you into rib-cracking hugs now stood at a distance, a stranger wrapped in skin that used to feel like home. His eyes didn’t shine anymore. They just stared, empty and far away, like he was still in the arena, still trying to survive.

At first, you tried to understand. Of course he was different. Of course the Games had done something to him. How could they not? You told yourself he just needed time. You tried to talk to him, to remind him who he was, who you were together. You begged him to come outside, to walk with you down to the beach like old times. But all you got in return was silence, or worse—polite indifference, as if you were nothing more than another face in the crowd.

And then, one day, he broke your heart clean in two. No warning. No kindness. Just words as sharp as a blade and twice as cruel. He said it was over. That it had always been over. That you needed to forget.

You didn’t understand. You couldn’t. The Games were over. That nightmare—bloody and cruel and distant—should’ve ended the moment Finnick stepped back onto District 4 soil. So why was he still breaking your heart? Why was he pushing you away like your love had been part of the price he paid to win?

“I don’t understand...” you whispered, your voice trembling as your vision blurred with tears. “You’re alive. You’re here. So why won’t you come back to me?”

You cried. You begged. And if it would’ve changed anything, you would’ve dropped to your knees right then and there. But before you could, Finnick’s father gently pulled you back, his arms steady and warm in a way that almost made you crumble all over again. He told you Finnick just needed time. That trauma like his doesn’t fade, not quickly. Not easily.

You nodded, brushing the tears from your cheeks, trying to convince yourself it made sense. But when you turned back toward Finnick, he didn’t move. He stood completely still, his face a blank page. Nothing there. No flicker of the boy you loved.

But you caught it.

The twitch of his fingers, like he was holding himself back from reaching for you. The storm caught behind his eyes, screaming silently. The slight, almost invisible twitch at the corner of his mouth, like some part of him was dying to speak.

And so you waited. Days, then weeks. Months. Two years. You were patient. Gentle. You told yourself this was what love meant—loving someone through the dark, even if they couldn’t meet you halfway. You were there when he needed help after the fire that stole his parents, when the only thing left was a hollowed house and smoke. You stayed by his side as he moved into the empty victor’s mansion, a “gift” from President Snow that felt more like a cage than a home.

Sometimes, you’d find a window left open or a door that hadn’t been locked all the way, and you’d slip inside quietly, just to leave behind a flower, or a plate of food, or a note you didn’t sign. Sometimes, you just stood outside, staring at the doorknob, wondering if today would be the day he opened it for you.

Sometimes, Mags would catch you waiting. She never raised her voice. She just looked at you with soft, tired eyes and said, “Don’t come back.”

But she always let you in anyway.

You kept coming, and she kept letting you.

Until your sixteenth birthday.

Your house was full of people, of laughter and light and plates scraped clean—but none of it felt like yours. Your smile sat too neatly on your face. The laughter felt too hollow in your chest. Your father noticed. He watched you all evening like you were glass, just waiting for the moment you’d slip out the door.

And you did—right under his nose, with Annie’s help, while the dishes clattered and your friends cleaned up. You stepped out into the night barefoot, the hem of your dress brushing your calves, your heart pounding loud enough to drown out the world. There was only one place you wanted to be.

And maybe—just maybe—you hoped tonight would be different.

The walk to his house felt endless. The streets of District 4 were quiet, hushed under the weight of nightfall, the only sound the soft thud of your footsteps and the ocean sighing somewhere in the distance. When you reached his door, you didn’t hesitate. You didn’t even knock. The back window was cracked open like always, and your fingers pushed it up with ease, slipping through like you’d done so many times before.

But this time, Finnick was waiting for you.

He stood in the middle of the dimly lit living room, arms crossed, as if he’d heard your steps coming from a mile away. His face was unreadable, his eyes shadowed by something heavy and cold.

You froze from your spot. You weren’t expecting him to be there at all. “I-I just wanted to see you. It’s my birthday.”

“I know,” he said flatly.

Something in his voice made your stomach turn. Still, you stepped closer, like you had a hundred times before. “I thought maybe tonight we could just talk. Or sit. Like we used to—”

“We’re not anything anymore.”

The words landed sharp, like ice water poured over your chest. “Finnick, don’t—”

“I’m tired,” he said, voice sharp now, clipped and distant. “Tired of you sneaking in. Tired of you acting like this is still something it’s not. You need to stop.”

You stood still, your fingers curling into your palms. “I’ve been there for you—after everything. I never stopped caring. You can’t just throw that away.”

His laugh was hollow. “You think this is some story where love fixes everything? That you showing up like a stray dog will make me come running back? Grow up.”

You blinked at him, stunned. “Don’t talk to me like that.”

“I don’t want you here,” he said, voice like stone. “I don’t want you waiting for me. I don’t want you loving me.”

You stared at him, at this cold-eyed stranger wearing your first love’s face. The silence between you stretched taut and unbearable.

Then you nodded. Just once. It felt like your chest cracked in half.

“Fine,” you whispered, barely able to speak. “You win.”

And with that, you turned. You didn’t look back. You didn’t cry, not until you were past the gates of Victor’s Village and halfway down the empty road. 

You dropped to your knees, the cold mud soaking through your dress, clinging to your skin like grief itself. Your father found you there, his arms lifting you gently as if you might shatter. He carried you home without a word. You wailed into your mother’s chest, her hands cradling your head while your sister sat on the staircase above, silent, listening.

That night, something in you snapped clean.

No more waiting. No more hoping.

He killed it with his own hands.

And what took its place was colder. Not the kind of anger that burns fast and wild—but the kind that settles deep, simmering low and steady. The kind that lets you walk away without looking back, even when your heart is still bleeding.

~

The final year of eligibility came and went with a tension that clung to your lungs like smoke. Each reaping before had felt like a tightrope walk—every breath held, every step tentative. But this year, something shifted. Maybe it was acceptance. Maybe it was the exhaustion of bracing for something that never came. Either way, when they called two names that weren’t yours, the air returned to your lungs like a flood.

You didn’t cry. You didn’t cheer. You just stood there, heart pounding in your ears, staring at the stage until your friends tugged you back to reality. The weight you’d been carrying for years finally loosened, if only slightly.

Later that evening, you all gathered in the clearing just outside town—a quiet spot near the cliffs where the ocean breeze carried away the noise. There was music from a nearby radio, low and grainy, and someone had brought pastries from the market to celebrate. You laughed. You danced barefoot in the grass. You tilted your head back and screamed into the open sky just to hear yourself alive.

It felt like the first time in a long while that you were breathing without flinching.

But as the sun dipped lower, turning the ocean orange, something tugged at you. A ripple across your skin. A sixth sense you never could shake.

You turned toward the path that led back to town—and there he was.

Finnick stood at a distance, half-shadowed beneath the trees. His posture still, arms crossed loosely over his chest. He didn’t move. Just watched. The fading sunlight carved a line across his face, and for a moment, everything around you fell away—the music, the chatter, even the wind.

It was just him and you.

You couldn’t read his expression. Maybe he didn’t expect to be seen. Maybe he hoped you would. But your eyes met, and the moment hung heavy between you, suspended in that slow-burn ache you thought you'd long buried.

You blinked, and the world resumed its spin.

“I’ll be right back,” you told your friends, forcing a smile that didn’t quite fit. They nodded, distracted, too wrapped up in the freedom of not being chosen.

You slipped away from the crowd and into the cover of trees, your heart unsettled, like a drumbeat without rhythm. The ocean roared somewhere behind you, wild and alive, and you let the wind press against your skin, let it remind you that you were still here. Still untouched. Still standing yet still not free.

You leaned your weight against the trunk of the mango tree, pressing your temple to the rough bark. The rustling of leaves overhead mingled with the distant laughter of your friends, soft and far away, like a memory you were already starting to lose. A quiet ache bloomed in your chest, and before you could stop yourself, your mind wandered to Finnick—because that could’ve been him. That should’ve been him, standing beside you, laughing with the rest of them. But pride had built walls between you both—his heavy with guilt, yours laced with bitterness. And neither of you had the nerve to climb over.

Even after everything he’d done. Even after he broke your heart. You still yearned for him.

The crunch of boots on grass cut through the stillness, pulling you from your thoughts. You didn’t move at first—just let your eyes flutter open, fingers curling into the fabric of your skirt as your heart kicked up its pace. The footsteps were slow, hesitant. You didn’t need to turn around to know who it was. You could recognize him by his scent alone. More than that, you could feel him—like a change in the air, the way memory sometimes brushes too close to your skin.

Finnick stood a few feet behind you, and the silence between you thickened into something almost physical. Neither of you spoke. Neither of you moved.

You kept your eyes on the horizon, pretending you hadn’t noticed. But your body betrayed you. Your skin flushed with heat, your breath caught short, your jaw locked tight. Every part of you was aware of him—his presence like gravity, impossible to ignore.

Eventually, you couldn’t help it. You turned.

It had been years since you’d looked at him—really looked—and time had etched itself into his features. He wasn’t the boy who used to press wildflowers into your hands or kiss your forehead when no one was looking. His face was sharper now, his jaw more defined, his shoulders broader. He carried himself differently, like someone who had survived things he couldn’t speak of.

But it was his eyes that hit you hardest—those sea-green eyes, dulled now, as if salt and sorrow had washed the shine from them. You didn’t know what haunted him, but you knew something did. Maybe it was the Capitol. Maybe it was the cost of survival. Or maybe it was everything he never let himself say.

He looked older. Tired. Worn thin by something invisible but heavy.

You knew, deep down, that the version of him the Capitol adored—the flirt, the heartthrob, the enigma—wasn’t real. It was armor. A mask. Finnick had always been good at making people see what he wanted them to see. But underneath all of it, he was still just a boy trying to survive a world that never played fair.

And part of you—despite the ache, despite the bitterness—still believed that when he let you go all those years ago, it wasn’t out of cruelty. It was to protect you.

From what, you weren’t sure. But you had your suspicions. And that involved the Capitol.

Even now, with dark circles under his eyes, the slight sag at the corner of his mouth, the lines forming between his brows—he was still devastatingly, achingly beautiful. And that, too, made you angry.

The silence stretched, suspended by rustling leaves and the steady roar of waves in the distance. Finnick squinted at you, like he wasn’t quite sure where he was or why he’d come. There was something in his eyes when he looked at you—a flicker of recognition, but deeper than that. Not joy. Not even regret. It was as if his body remembered you before his mind did.

He opened his mouth, then closed it again. His fingers twitched at his sides, like he might reach for you—or like he was stopping himself.

And you stood there, arms crossed over your chest, heart thudding against your ribs. Not angry. Not forgiving. Just exposed.

You didn’t know what to say. And he didn’t either.

So you both stood there in the shadow of what used to be, staring across a distance that time, pain, and silence had carved too wide to cross. Not now. Maybe not ever.

The wind picked up again, carrying the sharp scent of salt and something older—something lost. Memories. Promises. The ghosts of what could’ve been.

“It’s just us,” you said, the words scraping from your throat like they'd been dragged through sand. “You don’t need to look like you’re about to throw yourself in front of me to kill somebody.”

It wasn’t a great joke—barely a joke at all—but something in it eased the tension in his face. Finnick let out a breath he’d clearly been holding, like he wasn’t sure he’d be allowed to exhale in your presence.

Then, slowly, he tucked his hands into the pockets of his shorts. You noticed the hesitation, the way his fingers twitched before they disappeared.

“I’m glad you’re safe,” he said, barely louder than the wind.

The words hung in the space between you, light and fragile. If you hadn’t been watching his face so closely—if you hadn’t been trying to memorize every line of him like this was the last time—you might’ve missed them entirely.

You blinked. Brows furrowing. Your shoulders drew inward before you could stop them, like your body was trying to shield something. That wasn’t what you expected. You thought he’d come armed with that Capitol grin, or that same cold indifference he wore the last time you spoke. Not this. Not the look in his eyes now—like he was unraveling in front of you, thread by thread, and didn’t care who saw.

He looked like he’d carved his heart out and held it in his hands, raw and bleeding, asking you to take it again. Asking you to break it all over if you needed to.

You took a small step back, instinctively. Your eyes narrowed, scanning his face as if you could spot a lie hiding behind the softness. And he saw it—that flicker of suspicion, of hurt, still sharp-edged and buried deep.

But he didn’t move. Didn’t defend himself. Just stood there, letting the silence wrap around both of you again.

You shook your head slightly, glancing away, grounding yourself in the crashing waves and the tree bark under your fingers.

“Why now?” you asked quietly. “After all this time?”

He didn’t answer right away. He just looked at you the way someone looks at something they lost and never expected to find again. And then, voice low and unsteady, he said, “Because it’s the first time I’ve seen you at peace in years.”

That silenced whatever you were going to say next. Your breath caught in your throat, a familiar burn rising behind your eyes—but you blinked it back.

You looked at him and for a moment, the years between you flickered. The memories. The pain. The boy who loved you. The boy who left. The man standing here now, trying too late to be brave.

You didn’t forgive him. Not yet. Maybe not ever.

But in that moment, you saw the wound behind the armor, and it mirrored your own.

So you nodded once. Quiet. Detached. And said, “I need to get back.”

You turned before he could reply, walking back toward the sound of laughter and life, where your friends waited and your future hadn’t yet been tangled up in his shadow again.

~

The 70th Hunger Games reaping arrived like a thundercloud—heavy, ominous, and buzzing with unspoken dread.

You stood at the edge of the square with your parents, your hands clasped tightly in front of you as you scanned the crowd. Your eyes searched the eighteen-year-old girls’ section until they landed on a familiar head of auburn hair. Annie. It was her last year of eligibility, and your stomach hadn’t stopped twisting since you woke up.

You’d noticed the pattern over the years—how the girl tributes were often eighteen, how the Capitol liked the illusion of a coming-of-age tragedy. Annie had barely lived her life. The thought made your heart lurch. She caught your gaze from across the square and gave you a small, nervous smile—brave in the way only Annie could manage.

From the corner of your eye, you caught a flicker of movement. Tousled blond hair. A strong jawline. Finnick. He stood on the stage near the other victors, his eyes trained on the crowd. You could feel his gaze grazing your skin, but you refused to meet it. Last year had already broken through walls you’d spent years building. You weren’t about to let him ruin your footing again—not now.

The escort began her rehearsed speech, cheerful and detached. Her voice blurred around the edges as your heartbeat thundered in your ears. You were nineteen. Safe. Annie wasn’t. This was her final year. One last time to tempt the odds.

And this year, the odds are not in your favor.

“Annie Cresta.”

The name cracked across the square like a whip.

The air stilled. Conversations stopped mid-word. Heads turned. Your breath caught, and the world seemed to tilt beneath you. All eyes were on you—because they remembered. They remembered the last time someone you loved was taken.

And just like that, you were fourteen again. Watching the boy you once dreamed of forever with get ripped from your life. Only now, it wasn’t love on the line. It was blood.

At first, you didn’t understand. Your brain scrambled, lips parting, but no sound came out. You felt the air leave your lungs and your knees nearly buckled. You turned to Annie, whose face had gone pale, eyes wide, mouth trembling.

The silence stretched unbearably long before a Peacekeeper gave a subtle nudge. That broke her paralysis. Annie stepped forward slowly, her legs wooden, like every step was a decision she didn’t want to make.

“No,” you whispered, a soundless protest as your heart slammed against your ribs. “No!” You cried out as you reached for her, but someone was already holding you back.

Your father wrapped his arms around your waist and shoulder. Your mother cupping your face and pressing you into her shoulder. You kicked, thrashed, sobbed against their hold as the reality of your situation dawned on you fully.

Annie was probably crying too now, trying not to fall apart in front of the whole district.

You didn’t have to look to know Finnick was watching.

But eventually, you twisted enough to catch a glimpse of her. Annie stood on the stage like a leaf in the wind. Her sea-green dress clung to her in the summer heat, hair stuck to her temples with sweat. She looked impossibly young. Fragile in a way that made your chest hurt.

You barely remember who the male tribute was. He didn’t matter.

Everything in your world zeroed in on the girl standing alone on the stage, blinking fast as she tried not to cry.

Then your gaze flickered to Finnick. He was standing by the Victor’s section, hands clenched into fists, jaw so tight you swore it might shatter. His eyes didn’t leave Annie. Not once. Not even when she was escorted away toward the Justice Building.

The crowd began to dissolve, families murmuring soft prayers and farewells, but you stood frozen. Your hands still trembled at your sides, and your sister’s name kept echoing in your mind like a wound that wouldn’t close.

That was the moment the Games became real in a new way. Not as a far-off threat. Not as something that might happen.

But as something that had taken someone you loved.

Your father said something about being allowed to visit her before she left. A short goodbye. A few minutes. But your legs moved before your mind could catch up, pulling yourself free from their weakened grip.

Because you weren’t heading for the Justice Building.

You were heading for Finnick.

You ran to the docks. You didn’t have to think. Your feet just knew. That’s where he always went after a reaping—where the sea could swallow the things he couldn’t say. You’d found him there before, year after year, always standing just past the last post, where the saltwater licked the edge of the wood and the wind carried the cries of gulls overhead.

Finnick stood with his back to you, shoulders drawn tight, head bowed slightly. The sea mist caught in his hair, and for a second, he didn’t look like the boy you once loved. He looked like a myth. A shipwreck still standing.

You slowed, breath catching as your gaze traced the outline of him. He was broader now, stronger, wearier. Time had carved him into something harsher—like a statue softened by storms, not age. He hadn’t heard you yet.

“Finnick?” you called, voice fragile as driftwood.

He turned. And in the space of a heartbeat, he was in front of you—arms wrapping around your waist, breath hitting your cheek, lips crashing against yours like a wave that had waited years to break.

There was no hesitation. No words. Just the kind of kiss that doesn’t ask for permission, because it already knows the answer. A kiss made of everything you’d both tried to drown—grief, longing, rage, hope. His mouth tasted like salt and sorrow, and your tears slipped down between you, catching in the corners of the kiss, but neither of you stopped.

His arms wrapped around you so tightly it almost hurt. But you didn’t pull away. You clung to him like he was a wound and you’d forgotten how to stop bleeding.

The kiss wasn’t soft. It wasn’t careful. It was teeth and tears and years of silence crumbling between you. It was desperate, broken, angry. It was everything you never got to say, poured out in gasps and shudders.

You kissed him like you hated him. Like you still loved him. Like you wished it didn’t still feel like this.

And when you finally pulled away, breathless and aching, it wasn’t relief that followed. It was the kind of silence that settled between people who knew they had no future—only history. Only ruin.

Finnick didn’t say anything. Neither did you. You just stared at each other, chest heaving, salt from the sea and your tears sticking to your lips.

This wasn’t forgiveness.

This was grief wearing love’s face.

“Promise me you’ll bring her back,” you whispered, the words trembling but edged with steel.

Finnick’s gaze flickered, sorrow rising like a tide behind his eyes. His grip on your waist faltered, and that alone was enough to send panic lurching in your chest. You reached up and cupped his face firmly, grounding him. Forcing him to look at you.

“Finnick,” you said louder, voice hoarse. “Swear to me you’ll bring my sister back.”

His lips parted, but nothing came out. Then soft and pained,“You know I can’t—”

“I’ll spend the rest of this life hating you,” you cut in, voice cracking like ice under pressure, “and the next one, too, if you don’t. I can’t lose her. Not after everything.”

He closed his eyes like it hurt to look at you, lashes brushing his cheeks as he pressed his forehead to yours, breath warm and shaky.

“That’s not fair,” he whispered, broken open.

A hollow, bitter laugh escaped you. “You stopped playing fair the day you told me to forget you. The day they took you away.” Your thumb ghosted across his jaw. “This is me returning the favor.”

Finnick’s hands curled around your waist again, tighter now. “I don’t control the Games, sweetheart.”

“But you can influence them.” You met his eyes without flinching. “You have power in that hell, even if you pretend you don’t. Use it. Use whatever the Capitol gave you—your smile, your secrets, your body, I don’t care.”

Your voice wavered, a thread unraveling. “Just bring her back to me.”

A single tear slipped down your cheek, and Finnick caught it with the pad of his thumb—slow, reverent. His eyes searched yours like you were asking him to walk through fire. And you were.

He nodded once—slowly, solemnly—as if sealing something ancient and sacred. His thumb lingered against your cheek, then trailed down to your jaw, gentle as a prayer.

“I’ll do whatever it takes,” he murmured.

And then he kissed you again.

But this one was different—less fire, more ache. Like he was memorizing your mouth. Like he was afraid this would be the last time he’d taste something that reminded him what it meant to be alive. It was a promise, a confession, and a goodbye, all tangled in the same breath.

He pulled you closer, crushing you to him as though he could will the world to stop. As though this kiss could delay the storm waiting on the other side of the sunrise.

~

The rest of the month was a slow, merciless bleed. You paced the floors until the wood creaked in protest. Sleep became a stranger. Your meals went cold on untouched plates. Every second was haunted by the thought of Annie—of her dying alone in an arena designed to chew innocence to pieces.

You couldn’t bring yourself to watch the broadcasts. Every TV in the house remained dark, silent like a grave. You didn’t go outside. You didn’t speak to anyone who tried to console you. Because if you were going to lose her, if the Capitol was going to steal her the way it stole Finnick, then you wanted to be the last to know. You wanted to keep the illusion of hope alive for just a little longer.

You weren’t ready to grieve her yet.

The thought alone was unbearable—it felt like the same knife, twisted again, deeper. Losing Finnick once had shattered you. Losing Annie would be the final blow. You couldn’t come back from that.

So you prayed. Harder than you ever had. Not to any god you truly believed in, but to anything listening. You whispered promises to the sea, lit candles at dawn, begged the stars overhead.

Bring her back. Please, just bring her back.

It didn’t matter if she came home broken or silenced or strange. You’d take her in any form she returned. You’d rebuild her piece by piece, hold her hand through every nightmare. You’d trade your sanity, your soul, your future—anything. Just to see her again.

Because you knew her heart. You’d watched her grow from a bright-eyed child into a girl who still believed in kindness, even in a world that tried to kill it. You knew the sound of her laugh in a crowded room. The way she curled up in her sleep. The softness in her that didn’t belong anywhere near blood-soaked soil.

If you could’ve taken her place, you would’ve. Gladly. Because this time, unlike with Finnick, you had a choice to save her.

The announcement came on a quiet evening, when the clouds hung low like they, too, were bracing for something. You hadn’t planned to be near the screen. In fact, you’d been doing everything not to be.

But your father called your name with a voice that shook. It wasn’t loud. It didn’t have to be.

You walked into the room like someone heading toward a noose. Each step dragged with the weight of too many memories, too many hopes stitched together by desperation.

The Capitol seal spun. The anthem played. You didn’t breathe.

And then, there she was. Her face is plastered on the screen as the gamemaker announces her win. But unlike a close-up shot of the victor they usually do, it’s a poster of her face.

You staggered back like you’d been hit. The world blurred as tears rushed forward with no warning, and all at once, the ache you’d been trying to smother cracked wide open. You fell to your knees in the middle of the room, sobbing so hard it tore something loose in you. She was alive. She’s alive. Not untouched—but breathing, standing. Still here.

You pressed your face to your hands, overcome by a grief that had been paused for weeks and was now finally allowed to finish its scream. Annie. Annie.

The sea carried her back to you days later.

You waited at the docks long before the train arrived. The sky was the same soft gray it had been the day Finnick kissed you goodbye. The waves lapped against the shore in a quiet rhythm. The gulls circled overhead like guardians, watchful and wide-winged.

You saw her before she saw you—standing in the doorway of the train car, framed by glass and metal and too much sorrow. She stepped out slowly, eyes scanning the crowd with a blankness that punched the breath right out of you.

She was thinner. Her lips pale. Her eyes—those green eyes—were distant, darting like she expected someone to leap at her from the shadows.

But she was here.

You didn’t call her name. You didn’t need to. Somehow, she found you.

Her eyes landed on yours like they were remembering how to be hers again. And that was it. You broke into a run and she did too, stumbling at first, then faster, until the two of you collided.

You wrapped your arms around her with a strength you didn’t know you had left, clutching her like she’d slip through your fingers if you let go for even a second. Annie buried her face in your shoulder and sobbed—not like the girl who’d survived, but like the one who finally knew she was safe.

“I’m here,” you whispered over and over, your voice cracking, your tears soaking her hair. “I’m here. I’ve got you. I’ve got you.”

And behind the two of you, standing by the tracks, was Finnick.

He didn’t say a word nor did he try to interrupt, but his eyes met yours—and they said everything.

He kept his promise.

The outside of the train station was packed, a wall of faces blurring into one another—cheering, gawking, reaching for a glimpse of the girl who survived. Annie clutched your hand so tightly your knuckles turned white, her small fingers digging into your palm like she was afraid the moment she let go, she’d vanish back into that arena. You leaned down, whispering comfort against her temple, but your voice was lost in the roar of the crowd. The Capitol had announced her return, spun her survival into a tale of quiet victory, and now the whole of District 4 wanted to witness the aftermath of a miracle.

You should have seen it coming. The way her shoulders tensed, the way her breath started to hitch. Her gaze flitted wildly, like she was searching for a way out. The noise, the crush of people—it was too much. She stumbled, her body trembling. You turned to her, trying to anchor her, to bring her back into the safety of your voice, but it was already too late.

Annie screamed. A raw, guttural sound that split the air like a struck bell. Her hands lashed out—not in anger but in sheer terror. And one of them caught your face. You didn’t register the pain right away. All you knew was the copper taste of shock and the wet warmth blooming from your cheek. Then the crowd recoiled. Peacekeepers surged forward. You tried to shield her, to stop them, but a pair of arms wrapped around your waist and pulled you back.

Finnick.

He caught you just as your legs gave out, holding you against his chest while Annie was wrestled from the platform. Her cries echoed, high and frantic, as the Peacekeepers restrained her and led her toward a waiting black car. She thrashed like a wild thing, like a child in a nightmare that no one could shake her from. Your heart cracked wide open watching her disappear behind the metal doors.

The medical wing of District 4’s Justice Building smelled like antiseptic and ocean salt. A doctor patched up the gash on your cheek while your parents sat silent, pale and stiff, across the room. No one spoke until a Capitol official—your district’s escort, dressed in muted tones for once—arrived with a folder clutched tightly in her manicured hands. She didn’t sit. Just read off the facts like they were weather reports. Annie was experiencing acute post-traumatic psychosis. She’d had several episodes on the train ride back. Screaming in her sleep. Refusing to eat. Moments of complete dissociation. The Capitol had deemed her unstable, unfit for interviews or appearances. She would not be presented to the public. She would not have a victory tour. Her Games were to be erased, quietly shelved. She was to be kept out of sight—"for her own good," the escort added, eyes glossed with practiced sympathy.

You thanked her, numb and hollowed out.

It was strange, the way grief and relief could exist inside you at the same time. Annie was safe. She would never have to play the Capitol’s game the way Finnick had. She wouldn’t be dolled up in sequins, forced to smile while being showed off to people with power. She wouldn’t have to go through the same things Finnick did when he’s in the Capitol to survive. You should have felt victorious.

But you didn’t.

Because you’d lost her anyway. Not to a blade or a cannon, but to something slower, quieter. Annie had come back breathing, but not whole. The girl who whispered sea shanties in her sleep and laughed like sunlight on waves was gone. And in her place was someone the Capitol couldn’t use—so they discarded her, tucked her away like something broken.

You pressed your face into your hands, sitting in a sterile room that reeked of tragedy, and for the second time in your life, you felt the Games take someone you loved and twist them into something unrecognizable.

You took care of your sister. You quit your job at the front of your family’s fishery, turned your back on the small sliver of normalcy you'd managed to hold onto, and redirected everything into Annie. Because no one else could. Not in the way she needed. Your parents tried—your mother cooked more than she ever had, your father offered quiet gestures of comfort—but it was you Annie reached for when the nights grew long and the memories returned screaming. It was you who held her through every fractured moment, every disoriented stare, every time she forgot where she was.

You moved into the mansion President Snow generously allotted in the Victor’s Village. The place was too big, too white, too hollow. Your mother did what she could to make it feel like home—curtains with warm colors, potted herbs in the kitchen, family photos tucked into glass frames—but no matter how much she softened the corners, it never stopped feeling like a cage. Everything about the house was a monument to survival, but none of it felt alive. You tried to ignore the way the walls pressed in. You tried to ignore the silence. You tried, but it never left.

This wasn’t the life you imagined for yourself. You should’ve been outside right now, maybe stringing fish with the village girls, maybe letting some hopeful boy walk you home, someone who resembled Finnick in all the worst ways—pretty, careless, distant. You should’ve been pretending that heartbreak wasn’t a part of your story. That promises never made don’t hurt when they’re never kept. That the boy you built your world around hadn't become a stranger dressed in silk and scars.

But instead, you were here. In a mansion that echoed with old grief and new fear, in hallways where your parents’ voices ricocheted like sharp stones. Your mother shouting numbers. Your father sighing in exhaustion. Their arguments wove into the background like music, and you watched Annie flinch at each crescendo, her body curling in on itself as if trying to vanish into air. Then it would be you again—kneeling, soothing, holding her as her breathing turned erratic and her eyes lost focus.

You were tired. Tired of the weight. Tired of the pain. Tired of pretending that if you worked hard enough, loved hard enough, you could undo what had already been done.

Sometimes, when the house finally quieted and your bones ached with fatigue, you’d lie flat on the cold floor of your room, staring up at the ceiling like it held answers. You’d imagine other versions of your life—one where Finnick was never reaped, where his smile never carried secrets, where you were both just two kids in love, dreaming of something small and safe. Or maybe a life where he didn’t exist at all. Maybe then your heart wouldn’t feel like it was still waiting for him. Waiting for something that was never coming back.

Your gaze drifted to the form curled up on the bed across the room. Annie’s breathing had slowed. Her face, so soft in sleep, looked like it belonged to a child again. But even peace looked haunted on her. The Capitol hadn’t just taken her sanity—it had taken her time, her youth, her quietness. You swallowed hard and looked away.

And then you remembered that day. The first time Finnick stepped off the train after his Games. You remembered the way your lungs had locked up, the way you recognized him instantly and yet not at all. He looked older, like someone had drained the color from him. There was a shine in his eyes that had nothing to do with light and everything to do with damage. He had been gilded in gold and clothed in silk, but all you saw was the wreckage.

You rose carefully, checking Annie one last time, brushing a strand of hair from her cheek before slipping from the room. A quick, hot shower to wash off the stillness clinging to your skin, and then you dressed in something simple and clean. There was an hour left—maybe less—before Annie would wake from the nightmares again. You moved quickly. Slipped through the front door, past the silent garden your mother kept trying to coax to life, past the white fences that looked like bones.

The path to the beach wasn’t long. It never was. The sea had always been near, calling to you like a lullaby too old to forget.

You didn’t stop until your feet met the sand, until you stood before the great stretch of gray-blue water and let the salt sting your lungs. The ocean didn’t ask for anything. It didn’t explain itself. It just kept going—crashing, shifting, changing, surviving.

You closed your eyes and let it drown out everything else. For a moment, just a moment, you could breathe again.

You sank down into the sand, drawing your knees to your chest as the tide whispered its hush. The sky was heavy above you, smeared with clouds that looked like they’d forgotten how to rain. The wind was colder than it should’ve been, brushing your skin like a ghost you didn’t want to name. But you stayed, arms wrapped around your legs, head bowed like prayer, as the waves pushed and pulled at the shore like they were looking for something too.

It was always the quiet that made you think of him the most.

Finnick Odair.

Even now, the thought of his name hurt in a place words couldn’t reach. It throbbed somewhere beneath your ribs, like your heart had been split open and stitched back wrong. You remembered everything too vividly—how his laughter once wrapped around you like a safety net, how his eyes found yours in a crowd like magnets. You remembered the first time he kissed you by these very shores, sand in your hair and salt on your lips, his hands trembling just enough to tell you he was scared too.

You remembered the promises. Not the grand, theatrical kind—but the small ones, whispered under breath in the shadows between curfews and the seas. He’d promised to teach you how to dive deeper, to build you a little house on stilts by the rocks where no one could find you, to grow old with you in a place where the Capitol couldn’t reach.

None of those promises were kept.

It wasn’t his fault. You told yourself that more times than you could count. But it didn’t stop you from aching anyway.

Because the truth was, Finnick didn’t come back the same. The Games took the boy you loved and sent back someone who wore his face but none of his softness. The Capitol dressed him up like a prize and passed him around like he didn’t bleed the same way everyone else did. And you had to watch—helpless—as the light in him died out piece by piece, each interview, each appearance, each year that passed.

And what hurt the most—what broke something inside you—was that he let it happen. He let the Capitol turn him into something you barely recognized. He never fought to hold onto you. He just let go.

You tried to hate him for it.

You tried to bury every tender thing you ever felt and replace it with anger, but no matter how hard you tried, it never stuck. Because you knew. Deep down, you always knew.

He did it to protect you.

He gave you up like a gift, a final desperate offering to a world that only knew how to take. He loved you in silence because that was the only way he knew how to keep you safe. And in doing so, he shattered you.

So you sat there on the sand, choking on the memories, wishing you could hold him one last time. Not the version the Capitol claimed, not the Victor they paraded on screens. Just him. Just Finnick. Barefoot, sea-soaked, thirteen. Telling you he’d love you forever with a smile that didn’t know yet what it would cost.

You pressed your forehead to your knees and let the tide sing you something soft. There were no answers in the waves, only ache. And you carried enough of that to last a lifetime.

You didn’t hear the footsteps behind you. You were too lost in your thoughts to recognize the soft thud of feet meeting sand, too wrapped in the ache of what could’ve been to notice the shift in the air beside you. The tide kept humming, but something about it changed—like it suddenly had company. You only realized someone had sat next to you when the warmth of their presence brushed against your side, quiet and steady like a second heartbeat you forgot you missed.

You didn’t turn right away.

You couldn’t.

Because some part of you already knew who it was. The weight of him settled into the earth like it belonged there, like he had always been drawn to your orbit, and you to his. And you weren’t ready—not to see him, not to unravel beneath that face again. But then came his voice, quiet, unsteady, like he hadn’t spoken all day.

“I figured I’d find you here.”

You closed your eyes. Just for a second. Just long enough to keep the emotion at bay, to swallow the thousand things you wanted to scream and instead let silence stretch between you. You opened them only when you were sure you wouldn’t cry at the sound of him.

“Don’t tell me you’re here to apologize,” you said. Your voice didn’t sound like yours. It sounded older. Tired.

Finnick didn’t answer right away. Instead, he brought his knees up, forearms resting on them, head tilted slightly toward the sea. He looked like someone trying to memorize the horizon, maybe because the present was too hard to look at.

“I don’t think I have the right words to say sorry,” he admitted. “Not after everything.”

You studied him from the side. The light caught his face differently now. The angles were sharper, the shadows deeper. His beauty hadn’t faded, but there was something hollow behind it now, something bruised. It was the kind of face you ached to touch but knew it might burn you.

It had been months since you last saw him. The last time was when Annie broke down at the station, when the Peacekeepers tried to restrain her and you lunged forward like instinct. Finnick had caught you then, his grip strong and desperate, as if loosening it meant losing you too. He’d held you like you were the only steady thing left in the world. He accompanied you to the Justice Building, stood at the far end of the hallway with watchful eyes, quiet and protective. He helped your mother when her hands wouldn’t stop shaking, helped your father when he stumbled trying to sit down, and when the doctors told you Annie could finally come home, he was still there—lingering, waiting. But after that day, you never really crossed paths again. Not truly.

Even though he lived just across the street in the Victor’s Village. Even though you caught glimpses of him now and then through curtained windows or the rustle of grocery bags left at your door. He visited sometimes, brought fruit, helped your father with the porch railings and fixed the roof when the wind tore shingles off. But you were too buried in Annie’s care—watching her every breath, terrified she'd be taken from you again. And so you both existed in proximity, orbiting the same grief but never touching. Busy in lives that revolved around a shared ruin.

You turned back toward the ocean, the sand shifting beneath your fingers.

“I used to think I’d never stop loving you,” you whispered, not meaning to say it out loud. “That no matter what happened, you’d always be the one.”

His breath caught, and that silence that stretched between you before now felt like a scream.

“I never stopped,” he said.

And god, how you hated him for saying it. Because he meant it. You could hear it in the way his voice cracked on the last word, how his knuckles whitened against his knees.

“But you left,” you said, still staring straight ahead. “You let them turn you into something I didn’t recognize. You didn’t fight for me. For us.”

“I was trying to keep you safe,” he murmured. “If they knew how much you meant to me... they would’ve used you. Like they used everything else.”

A bitter laugh slipped from your lips, tired and sharp. “And what difference did it make? I still lost everything.”

You felt his gaze on you then—heavy, full of everything he couldn’t say. Your breath hitched when his hand brushed against yours, hesitant, like asking for permission to hold something sacred.

“I miss you,” he said, the words so soft they barely reached over the waves.

You turned toward him, finally letting yourself look.

There he was. Not the Capitol’s toy. Not the Victor. Just Finnick. The boy you loved. The boy you still loved in all the ways that mattered.

“I miss who we were,” you whispered back.

The space between you closed before you could stop it. His hand slid into yours and you didn’t pull away. Not this time. His forehead came to rest against yours, and the moment held still—delicate, aching, reverent.

No kiss followed this time. Just breathing.

Just two broken people trying to remember how to hold on without shattering further.

Finnick slowly pulls away from you, as if that he had lingered any longer, he would have broken down. He plants his hands behind him and leans back on them, staring blankly at the dark horizon as the waves continue their endless crashing against the shore. You examine him in silence, drinking in the way his hair catches the breeze, how his features have sharpened with time—his jaw more prominent, his cheeks leaner, eyes more sunken, heavier. He looks like someone who’s been carried too far out to sea and barely crawled his way back.

Your eyes catch on something at the base of his neck. A bruise. Fading, but unmistakable. The sight of it knocks something loose in your chest.

You shift closer, your voice tentative as your fingers hover just near the discolored skin. “Where did you get that?”

Finnick doesn’t answer right away. He doesn’t even flinch. He keeps staring out at the horizon like he’s searching for a way to disappear.

You draw back a little, heart beating faster, already fearing the answer but needing to hear it anyway. “Was it… from someone in the Capitol?” The words taste bitter in your mouth. You hate yourself for how jealous you sound. You expect him to confirm it, maybe shrug it off like he always used to when the topic came up—half a smile, a deflection, some comment about admirers with too many teeth.

But this time, he doesn’t lie.

“No,” he says quietly. “Not someone. Everyone.”

His voice is too hollow to be casual. Too cracked to be teasing. He finally turns to look at you, and what you see in his eyes isn’t embarrassment. It’s resignation.

Your stomach sinks. “Finnick…” you breathe, dread coiling in your throat.

“When you win,” he begins, slowly, like the words are costing him pieces of himself, “they let you think you’re free. You get your parade, your crown, the cheers. And then you find out that your real life—the one after the arena—is just another performance. Another prison.”

You don’t interrupt. You can’t. You’re barely breathing.

“Snow didn’t just want me to be a victor,” he continues. “He wanted me to be… presentable. Marketable. There’s a certain kind of entertainment the Capitol values more than blood. And they paid him well for me.”

The words hit you like a punch to the chest. You look away, eyes stinging, your breath caught in your throat. “He sold you,” you whisper.

Finnick nods. “Over and over again. To anyone who had enough money or enough power. Old men. Women. Senators. Sponsors. Some of them just wanted to say they had me. Some wanted more.”

You shake your head slowly, unable to stop the tears now falling freely down your cheeks. “Why didn’t you tell me? Why didn’t you ever say anything?”

“Because I couldn’t,” he says, his voice strained. “Because if I so much as hinted at it, they would’ve come after you. After your family. After anyone I cared about. I did everything I could to keep them from seeing how much you meant to me.”

You choke on a sob, your hand rising to cover your mouth. “God, I was so stupid. I thought you were just… sleeping around. I hated you for it. I thought you changed.”

“I wanted you to hate me,” he says quietly. “I needed you to. It was the only way I could keep you safe. If you thought I’d become just another Capitol puppet, maybe they’d think I saw you as nothing. Maybe they’d leave you alone.”

“She warned me,” he continued, eyes still locked on the sea. “Mags. The night I won. The Capitol hadn’t even let me sleep yet. They were already lining up people for me to meet. She pulled me into this quiet room, held my face like she used to when I was a kid, and said, ‘If you want her to live, you let her go.’ Just like that. No explanation. But I knew what she meant.”

Something cold twisted deep in your stomach. Mags—gentle, warm Mags—saying something so dire, so absolute. It made the back of your throat ache.

“They’d seen me with you,” Finnick said, his voice low and bitter. “Back home. Before the Games. They knew everything. They always know everything. And when a Victor becomes someone worth watching, the people around them do too. I thought maybe if I was careful… maybe if I kept just enough distance. But they made it very clear. You were a string they could pull if I ever misbehaved. So I cut it first.”

Your body trembles with the weight of it all. The months you spent hating him, envying his admirers, grieving the boy he used to be—all while he was being broken piece by piece behind closed doors. And you hadn’t seen it. You hadn’t wanted to see it. Because believing he’d become cruel was easier than imagining he was being hurt.

You wrap your arms around yourself, the night air suddenly colder, heavier, pressing down on your ribs. “You should’ve let me choose, Finnick,” you whisper, voice cracking. “I would’ve stayed. I would’ve fought.”

He shakes his head, a small, sad smile on his lips. “That’s what scared me. You would’ve followed me into hell if I asked. And they would’ve made you suffer for it.”

The silence that follows is thick with things unsaid, with the ache of love long buried beneath fear and sacrifice. The waves keep rolling in, the only constant sound between the two of you.

You feel the tremor in his words more than you hear it. Something inside you cracks again, like glass under too much pressure. You press your palm over his heart, feeling how fast it’s racing, as if the truth itself is clawing to escape from where he buried it for too long. You try to memorize the moment, etch it into your mind the way you did back then—his scent, the soft tremble in his breath, the way he says your name like it’s the only word that ever meant anything.

“I wrote to you,” he says, and your eyes snap up to his, wide with confusion. “After that night. Letters. Every week.”

You blink at him, stunned. “You… you did?”

Finnick nods slowly, a bitter smile tugging at his lips. “At first, I thought maybe they weren’t getting through. But then I stopped getting anything back, and I started wondering if you just… couldn’t forgive me. And then your father came to see me.”

A cold chill spreads down your spine, dread pooling at the base of your stomach. “My father?”

Finnick leans back again, looking up at the stars like he’s searching for an answer he already knows won’t come. “He said I needed to stop. That it wasn’t right for me to keep reaching out. That you were better off not being tangled in something the Capitol was obsessed with. He told me I’d ruin you if I kept holding on. And he wasn’t wrong. So I stopped.”

You’re frozen for a moment. A long, bitter moment where your mind races to piece together all the holes in your memory—after your sixteenth birthday, the way Finnick kept looking at you like he’s expecting something from you, the silence that followed. You remember asking your father once, asking if Finnick had written or visited, and how he shook his head without meeting your eyes.

Your jaw tightens as heat stings behind your eyes. “He never told me,” you whisper, voice shaking. “He never told me anything.”

“I figured,” Finnick says quietly. “He was trying to protect you. I can’t even hate him for it.”

But you can. And you do, just a little.

The betrayal cuts sharper than you expected. Because while your father kept you safe, he also kept you in the dark. He let you believe you weren’t wanted. He let you think Finnick had changed into someone else—someone cold, someone selfish. And you let that belief root itself deep in your chest, never knowing it had all been a carefully constructed lie meant to keep you apart.

Tears prick at your eyes again, but this time they’re different. This time they burn. “I hated you,” you admit, voice trembling. “For so long, I hated you. I thought you threw me away.”

Finnick looks at you then, really looks at you, and you see all of it written in his face—regret, guilt, sorrow. But not once does he try to defend himself. “That was the point,” he says softly.

You can’t stop the sob that escapes you. You turn away, burying your face in your hands as your shoulders shake. All this time, you thought he’d chosen the Capitol. You thought he’d abandoned you, turned into someone else. But he had been breaking in silence, alone, while you grieved a version of him that never really died.

You feel him move beside you, the warmth of his hand ghosting over your back, not pushing, not pulling—just there. Just steady.

“I would’ve waited forever,” you whisper. “If I had known.”

The tears on your cheeks have dried, but your skin still feels tight with salt and grief. You sit beside him in the hush that follows, your fingers curled into the sand, knuckles white. The air is thick with everything—everything he said, everything he didn't, everything you finally understand. It presses down on you like the weight of the ocean, vast and cold and merciless.

“You don’t get to do that,” you whisper. Your voice is low, sharp-edged and unsteady, trembling with everything you’re trying not to say. “You don’t get to decide that for me.”

Finnick’s head turns slowly, brows drawing together, confusion flickering in his eyes.

“You don’t get to rip me apart for years, make me think I was never enough, and then tell me it was all for my protection,” you say. “You don’t get to martyr yourself and leave me in the dark. That wasn’t fair.”

He looks away again, jaw clenching. “I—”

“No, you don’t,” you snap, voice rising despite the quiver in it. “Because if you did, you wouldn’t have let me believe I was forgettable. Replaceable. You wouldn’t have looked me in the eyes and made me feel like nothing.”

Finnick’s hands are fists in the sand now, knuckles scraped raw. “You think I wanted to do that to you?” he says, his voice breaking. “You think I wanted to see you cry every time I passed your house and didn’t look up? You think I didn’t die every time Annie tells me about you?”

“Then why didn’t you fight?” you ask, hating how wrecked your voice sounds. “Why didn’t you trust me? We could’ve figured it out. Together.”

He finally turns to you fully, and the look on his face guts you. It’s not anger. It’s not defensiveness. It’s devastation. “Because I wasn’t strong enough. Because they used me up, over and over, until I didn’t know who I was anymore. And I couldn’t ask you to love what was left.”

You suck in a breath, and it feels like broken glass in your throat.

Finnick’s voice softens, like he’s afraid the truth might shatter you now that it’s out. “You were the only thing that felt real, and I thought if I held on to you, they’d destroy you just to prove they could. So I let them destroy me instead.”

The sob that escapes you is ugly and jagged. “I spent years hating you, Finnick. Years thinking you never cared. And now I don’t even know where to put all of this—this guilt, this love, this hurt.”

He reaches for you then, carefully, like you’re a wounded bird. His fingers curl around yours, gentle and trembling. “Put it here,” he whispers, bringing your joined hands to his chest. “Put it where I kept you all this time.”

You stare at him, tears blurring your vision, your heart aching in every direction at once. “I don’t know how to fix this.”

“I don’t think we can fix it,” he says, quiet and steady. “But maybe we can carry it. Together, this time.”

You don’t respond. Not yet. The tide has gone still for now, but everything inside you is still churning. The world hasn’t shifted into clarity. If anything, it feels more uncertain than ever.

You draw your hand back slowly, fingertips brushing over the place where your palm had pressed to his chest. His heart still races beneath his ribs.

“I don’t know what to do, Finnick,” you admit. Your voice is soft, raw. “I don’t even know what to feel. It’s like I’ve been walking in the wrong direction for so long, and now I finally turned around, but everything behind me is on fire.”

Finnick doesn’t rush to comfort you. He doesn’t offer you promises he can’t keep. He just nods, eyes glassy, understanding exactly what that kind of lost feels like.

“Then we take it slow,” he says after a moment. “We wait. We try. One step at a time. That’s all we can do.”

You sit in silence after that, both of you listening to the waves breathing in and out. There’s nothing dramatic about how the night ends—no kiss, no dramatic embrace—just a quiet understanding, a fragile thread of something mending. When you finally stand, Finnick walks you home, his presence at your side solid and grounding. He doesn’t ask to come inside. He just watches you reach the porch, and when you glance back, he gives you a faint nod. No smile, no sadness. He’s just there.

Inside, the house is dark and still. But as you step into the kitchen, the lamp flicks on.

Your father sits at the table, a half-empty cup of tea cooling by his hand. He looks like he hasn’t slept all night, and judging by the silence, your mother must’ve taken care of Annie upstairs. The look on his face is hard to read—something between guilt and resolve.

You say nothing at first. You only walk past him, open the small drawer where loose keys and mail are sometimes left, and reach into the very back. You don’t even know what makes you check there. Maybe it’s instinct. Maybe it’s desperation. But your fingers brush something papery and old, bound by a fraying string.

You pull the bundle out slowly. Letters. Dozens of them. All addressed to you in Finnick’s handwriting.

Your hands tremble as you turn back to your father. “You kept them.”

He doesn’t deny it. He just exhales heavily, running a hand down his tired face. “I did.”

“Why?” The word is barely a whisper.

“Because he was already marked,” your father says. “We didn’t know how deep it went, but we knew enough. The Capitol had its eyes on him. And boys like that? They don’t get happy endings. They become warnings. Tools. Examples. I wasn’t going to let that destroy you too.”

Tears sting your eyes, but you refuse to blink them away. “You didn’t even let me decide.”

“It was for your own good,” he says. “I was trying to protect you. And if I had to do it all over again, I would.”

You clutch the letters tighter to your chest. There’s nothing more to say, not right now. The ache in your chest is too wide, too heavy. You turn and walk away, up the stairs, your father’s silence trailing behind you.

Later, in the quiet of your room, you sit on the edge of your bed, still holding the letters. You don’t open them—not yet. You’re not ready for that. But you press them against your heart, as if their weight alone can tell you everything you missed.

You lie back slowly, eyes unfocused as they settle on the ceiling. The wind outside shifts, brushing against your windowpane. You glance to the side.

Across the road, the light in Finnick’s bedroom is still on.

You don’t know what tomorrow will look like. You don’t know how much can be repaired. But tonight, you hold the truth against your chest and stare at the soft glow of his window, knowing—finally, fully—that you were never forgotten.

~

The year passes like the tide—slow in some places, quick in others, always shifting. At first, everything feels fragile. Annie flinches at the clink of cutlery, cries in her sleep, and stares blankly for hours. But you stay by her side through it all, arms always ready to catch her when she stumbles. You hold her through long nights, fill the silence with stories laced in childhood memories, and when words become too heavy, you sit with her quietly, just breathing beside her. You never ask for more than she can give. You’ve learned not to. You move at her pace, steady and gentle, letting her know with every small gesture: I’m here. I’m not going anywhere. And sometimes, as you lie beside her in bed, she’ll squeeze your hand before drifting off, and that squeeze says more than words ever could. It’s her way of thanking you—for staying. For drowning with her and never letting go.

You don’t mind if you’re going under too. As long as Annie’s with you, the rest doesn’t matter. You braid each other’s hair now, sit out on the porch with cold lemon iced tea, peeling fruit in the hush of late afternoons. It isn’t perfect. She still has days where she won’t speak, won’t move, where she wakes up screaming and thrashing. But she bathes herself now. She eats. She hums those ridiculous sea shanties she used to belt out as a kid.

Your father is another slow burn. At first, you barely speak. You leave the room when he enters, avoid his eyes, build a quiet wall between you made of resentment and pain. You hate him for hiding those letters, but deep down, you understand why he did it—he just didn’t want to see you hurt more than you already were. Still, understanding doesn’t make forgiveness easy. But time, as always, does its work. One quiet Thursday afternoon, you find yourself sitting with him on the porch, sharing coffee. You talk—not as father and daughter, not at first—but as two people who missed each other terribly and didn’t know how to begin again. You cry in his arms. He cries, too. It doesn’t fix everything, but it opens a door.

And through all this, Finnick is there—quietly, steadily, always showing up. He never asks for your forgiveness, never expects anything in return. He just helps. You wake up some mornings to find him in your mother’s garden, drawing water from the well or sweeping the steps clean. He shares easy laughter with your father as they work together in the yard. He reads to Annie with a voice that’s soft and careful. He never arrives empty-handed—sometimes it’s strawberries, ripe and sun-warmed, or slices of lemon cheesecake from the market. Sometimes it’s little seashell bracelets or small bundles of daisies tied with twine. Once, he brought you three lily buds—because he remembered how you like to watch them bloom.

There’s something between you. Not quite love—not yet—but the shape of it. The quiet promise of it.

When Mags' birthday comes, Finnick invites your whole family to her cottage. The house smells like salt and rosemary, the air thick with laughter and seafood boil. Mags glows with gentle pride, surrounded by the people she loves. There’s music playing from a battered old radio, someone’s whistling along out of tune. Even Annie sways to the beat, her fingers curled loosely around yours before she lets go, nudging you toward Finnick with the smallest smile.

He takes your hand gently, as if asking, Is this okay? And you nod, letting him lead you into the open space where the others have been dancing. The music is lazy and slow, something old and familiar. His palm is warm against your back. You haven’t danced in a long time—not like this. Not with someone who looks at you like you’re something soft and not already broken.

For a while, you just move, guided more by his steadiness than the music. And then, you look up.

Maybe it’s the glow of the hanging lights or the way his mouth twitches when he tries not to smile too wide. But something shifts.

You see him—not the Capitol’s golden boy, not the heartthrob everyone whispered about, not the Finnick who broke your heart by vanishing into a storm of war and secrets. You see the boy who never stopped coming back. Who brings you mangoes in the heat of summer and lilies just about to bloom. The boy who reads to your sister and laughs with your father and doesn’t try to fix you—only stand beside you.

You realize, with a jolt so quiet it feels like a breath, that you don’t hate him anymore. You hadn’t even noticed when the hatred left, only that now, in its place, there’s something else. Something tender. Curious.

Finnick says your name like a question, maybe because you’ve been staring too long, and your hand tightens just slightly in his.

“I’m okay,” you murmur, and this time, it’s true.

Finnick doesn’t say anything right away. His eyes stay on yours, searching for something—not doubt, not disbelief. Just making sure. Like he’s afraid the moment will slip if he breathes too hard.

Then, almost in a whisper, he says, “I’ve been hoping you'd be. Not rushing you—just... hoping.”

His voice is low, almost lost beneath the music. There’s no expectation in it, no pressure. Just that quiet kind of honesty that always catches you off guard with him.

You feel his thumb brush against your knuckles where your hands are still joined. It’s a small touch, one he could’ve made a hundred times before, but tonight it feels different. More grounded. Earned.

“I missed you,” he says, and though you’ve heard those words before—from him, in letters, in memories—tonight they feel new. Not the kind of missing that aches, but the kind that holds room for hope. The kind that says, I’m still here.

Your throat tightens a little. You want to say something back—something real—but the words catch on the edges of everything you’ve carried. So instead, you step a little closer, rest your cheek lightly against his shoulder. You let the music carry you both for a while, and listen to the quiet thrum of your heartbeat and the way Finnick holds you like you’re something sacred.

When the party winds down, people begin to drift out one by one, laughter fading into the night air. Your family lingers the longest. Just as your dad starts to gather his coat, Annie suddenly turns to you with an impish glint in her eyes.

“You said you’ll help clean up with Finnick, right?” she announces brightly, grabbing your parents by their sleeves and tugging them out the door before either of them can protest.

You’re left blinking at the doorway, stunned, as the door swings shut behind them. Beside you, Mags lets out a low chuckle, patting your arm before hobbling off toward her bedroom. “Don’t forget the pie tins,” she calls over her shoulder with amusement. And then it’s just you and Finnick.

You follow him back into the kitchen. He’s already at the sink, sleeves rolled up, methodically scrubbing at plates while the warm glow of the cottage lights frames him in soft gold. You grab a rag and start wiping down the counters, trying to keep yourself busy—anything to avoid standing there and letting the silence press down between you again.

It’s not awkward, exactly. The air between you feels like it’s waiting for something.

Finnick breaks it first.

“Sweetheart.”

Your head snaps toward him. His voice was soft, but it still catches you off guard.

He smirks gently, biting his inner cheek to hide a laugh. “Sorry,” he says, setting a plate in the drying rack. “Didn’t mean to scare you.”

“I wasn’t scared,” you mutter, grabbing a towel to dry the next plate.

“Mm, sure you weren’t,” he teases lightly.

You fall into a rhythm—he washes, you dry. Occasionally your hands brush, and each time, it makes your heart stutter in a way that’s both maddening and familiar. You glance at him once, just a glance, and catch him already looking at you. He doesn’t look away.

“I’ve missed this,” Finnick says suddenly, his voice low.

You pause, the plate in your hands halfway to the shelf. “What?”

“This,” he says again, softer this time. “You. Talking to you. Just being in the same room without feeling like I’ve already lost you.”

You set the plate down. You don’t say anything right away because there’s too much in your chest and not enough breath to say it.

“I didn’t know how to be around you anymore,” you admit. “It felt like… if I let myself be close to you again, I’d fall apart.”

Finnick’s hands are wet, and the dish rag is still hanging from his fingers, but he turns toward you anyway. “Then let me be the one you fall apart with,” he says, quiet and steady.

You’re not sure who moves first—maybe it’s you, maybe it’s him. Maybe it’s both of you at once, pulled forward by the weight of everything that’s gone unsaid between you, by the gravity of a love that never really left, only went quiet.

The space between you collapses all at once. Your hands reach for his shirt, fingers curling in the fabric like you’ve done in your dreams, like you did in another lifetime. His hands find your waist with a kind of desperation, like he’s afraid that if he touches too gently, you’ll disappear.

The first brush of his lips against yours is hesitant—testing the waters, asking a silent question. But you answer with your whole body. You rise on your toes, close the last inch of space, and press yourself to him fully, a quiet gasp slipping out as the kiss deepens.

It’s not gentle anymore.

It’s years of longing. Of silence. Of pretending. It’s the ache of missing someone who was standing right in front of you, and now you finally have him again. He tastes like sea salt and lemon and something so heartbreakingly familiar that it makes your knees weak.

You kiss him like you’re trying to memorize him all over again. Like you’re angry at yourself for waiting this long. Like you’ve just remembered what it feels like to be alive in someone else’s arms.

His hands slide up your back, anchor you to him, pull you even closer until there’s not an inch of space left. One hand cups the back of your neck, his thumb brushing just behind your ear in a way that makes you shiver. And when he pulls back, just enough to breathe, his forehead rests against yours, and you can feel him trembling a little.

“I thought I lost you,” he whispers, voice ragged.

“You didn’t,” you breathe back. “You never did.”

The air around you is thick with everything unspoken, humming like a live wire. His breath brushes over your lips again—barely there, teasing. And then he's kissing you once more, deeper this time, like he’s finally allowed to want you and he’s starved for it.

Your fingers slide up, over the line of his chest, curling behind his neck as if anchoring yourself to something solid. He sighs into your mouth, low and shaky, and you can feel the tension unraveling from his shoulders as he melts into you. Like he’s been holding himself together for too long and now, finally, he gets to fall apart in your arms.

His hands move restlessly—over your waist, your back, like he’s trying to map out every piece of you again, relearn what it means to hold you without guilt, without fear. There’s nothing rushed in the way he touches you. It’s reverent. Intentional. Like he’s afraid this moment might break if he moves too quickly.

You pull back, just slightly, just enough to look at him. His eyes are dark, heavy-lidded, pupils blown wide like he’s drunk on this, on you. His chest rises and falls with each unsteady breath and he’s staring at you like you hung the stars and he’s only now remembering how bright they shine.

“Tell me this is real,” he says, voice hoarse, almost pleading.

You nod, eyes never leaving his. “It’s real,” you whisper, and your voice trembles because suddenly you feel everything at once—years of grief and guilt and hope crashing together in your chest.

His lips part like he’s about to say something else, but no words come. Instead, he kisses you again—and this time it’s rougher. Not angry, but urgent. Needy. You respond with the same hunger, your hands fisting into his shirt as he walks you backwards until your hips bump the kitchen counter. It doesn’t matter. Nothing matters but the feel of him, the warmth of his body pressed against yours like he’s trying to make up for all the time lost between you.

His hands cradle your jaw, tilting your face up as he kisses you slow and deep, like a vow. You feel dizzy with it—like you’ve waited your whole life to be kissed like this, to be wanted like this. And for the first time in what feels like forever, your heart isn’t heavy.

You’re here. With him. And he’s here with you.

You break apart again, just barely, breathing each other in. His fingers slide down to your sides, squeezing lightly like he can’t believe you’re really in front of him.

“I love you.” He breathes out. “I never stopped,” he murmurs, brushing his nose against yours. “Not once.”

And there it is again—that ache, that softness, that overwhelming truth between you. A beginning born from everything broken.

This time, when he kisses you, it’s with no hesitation. Just certainty.

Just him. Just you.

[ann1-the-s1mp]

Overtime

synopsis: kento makes you squirt

“You’re holding back,” Nanami murmurs, voice a low thunder against your ear, warm breath skating over your sweat-damp skin.

You’re already trembling beneath him, thighs shaking as he holds them open with maddening ease, one hand pressing your hips down while the other works his fingers into you slow and deep. His pace is relentless, calculated—because of course it is. It’s Kento. He knows your body like it’s a cursed technique, breaking you apart with perfect precision.

“Ken—please—” you gasp, the coil in your belly tight and trembling.

“I said,” he growls, lips brushing your jaw, “don’t hold back.”

And then he does something devastating—crooks his fingers just right, thumb grinding against your swollen clit at the same time, the wet sounds between your legs obscene in the quiet room.

Your breath shatters. Your back arches. You come with a cry, but it doesn’t stop there—he keeps going, fingers pumping through your orgasm until your body spasms again and—

“Oh—fuck—” you gasp as the pressure bursts, liquid gushing out in a hot, uncontrollable wave.

His eyes flash with something feral. He doesn’t stop.

“You’ll give me another,” he says, voice dark and deliberate. “You’re not done until I say so.”

Your legs are still twitching, your skin slick with sweat and your breath hitching in erratic little gasps—but Nanami doesn’t give you even a second to come down.

“Look at the mess you made,” he murmurs, dragging his soaked fingers along your inner thigh, then slipping them into his mouth with a low groan. “Tastes just perfect.”

You whimper, half from overstimulation, half from the heat curling deep in your belly again.

When he lines himself up, your walls flutter around nothing, desperate.

“You’re soaked. I barely have to prep you again,” he says with a smirk that sends heat flooding through your core. “But I want to feel every twitch. Every clench.”

He pushes in slow, achingly slow, letting you feel the stretch, the way your slick heat welcomes him greedily. You cry out, nails digging into his back as he bottoms out, hips flush against yours.

“Still with me?” he asks, voice low and thick with lust.

You nod desperately.

“Good.”

Then he starts to move.

Each thrust is deep and deliberate, his pace unforgiving. He hits that devastating spot inside you again and again, your cries turning shameless, wanton. His name spills from your lips over and over like a prayer. Like a curse.

And then he does it—slips his hand between your bodies again, thumb pressing on your oversensitive clit with just enough pressure to make your whole body seize.

“I want you to come for me again. Just like before,” he pants, jaw clenched tight. “I want to feel you break.”

You do. Harder than before.

You scream—his name, a strangled moan, the sound of surrender—as you gush again, your whole body shaking, spasming around him. You feel yourself drench both of you, feel the slick mess between your thighs as he keeps thrusting through it, chasing his own release.

He groans, deep and low, then buries himself in you with a final snap of his hips. The warmth of him filling you is just as filthy as it is satisfying.

And even as your body goes limp, spent and overwhelmed, Nanami leans down, brushing your hair back from your face.

“I told you,” he whispers, pressing a kiss to your temple, “when it’s overtime, I don’t stop until I’ve ruined you.”

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[ann1-the-s1mp]

okkkkkayyyy heearrrr me outtttt: thigh-riding kento and overstim?

A woman has needs.

the first time thigh-riding your husband, nanami ✧

→ afab!reader, thigh riding, choking (barely), teasing, overstim, nsfw

the first time your reserved husband ever took control of you was half a year into marriage. like a flower blooming, he's started to open up to you slowly. now, he holds your hand a bit tighter—uses a lower tone when addressing you. he knows you're not fragile anymore, and bends that to his will.

you obey his every soft-spoken command. every dime and divot in his demeanor is like a book for you to study, and his lust is yours. hard-earned and soo hot when you're pressed to him.

with his thumb in your mouth, fingertips digging into the side of your face as he sits... observing you. it's like a warm-up, watching you grind sensually down his thigh like it was his cock.

he knows you're just teasing him, gasping when your lace panties slide so gently over your sensitive clit. it has you biting over him, drool pooling at your kissed lips. heady bedroom eyes stare into his wide gaze, silently begging him for a touch.

"slow... don't work yourself up." he's muttering, long golden bangs falling into his eyes that he has to push back. the sound of his sweet voice has you whining, brows knitted together, core dragging sensually up his thigh. "want to take our time, okay? can't make you cum like this."

"w-why?" you're slurring wetly against his thumb, breath shaking in your throat. "'m close baby... keep talking just—just keep talking."

"why don't i want to listen to you right now?" he's so soft, hardly taken with the circumstances like you are. in fact, he's sitting up from the headboard, pulling his thumb from your mouth to wrap his wet hand across your throat. he squeezes gently, it's his first time holding you like this.

and you're immediately cutting yourself loose, thighs strangling kento's as they squeeze down like a boa constrictor. you don't know how he does it, but your body is wired just for him, it takes you nothing but his presence and reassurance to have you soaking the panties he bought you, and of course, that's what happens this time around.

you're rutting like an idiot, soft little eh, eh, eh's falling from your throat. kento thinks you look godly when you're cumming, even though he just said he didn't want you to. it's okay, the way your gorgeous face twists up in lust and shame is just so addicting. he lets you have your moment.

until you're coming down, stilling your hips and wracked with sensitivity. but, ken's still got you by the throat, he doesn't see—or, doesn't care to see the way you're shaking, already overstimulated off his touch.

"wha—

"i didn't want you to work yourself up," he complains like a stubborn child, leaning close enough to press his forehead into yours. by the neck, noses brushing, breath shared—these little intimacies fuel your extraordinarily happy marriage.

"b-but i love you. 'm sorry, i love you so much."

you can't see him, but you can feel his hand drawing closer and closer to your messy cunt, still sticky with cum leaving your panties clinging to the skin pathetically.

and he tangles the poor fabric in his fist, grip tightening over your throat before he's ripping them off like a piece of paper. but it hurts, dragging harshly against your skin and clipping at the overwhelming sensitivity between your slit.

he doesn't care when you bite out a painful whine, he kisses it away, then commands against your lips.

"keep going."

[ann1-the-s1mp]

“Who’s calling?” Your husband, Nanami, huffs from above you, his hips snapping into you. Your teary eyes glance at your phone while you let out small whimpers. “I-it’s our son.” You breathe out, your thighs tremble beneath his hands holding them down beside you.

Nanami groans and stuffs his dick fully into you, a whine escaping your lips as he picks up the phone. Between his work schedule and your 4 kids, there isn’t time for you and your husband to partake in a your shared activities other than the few times you guys got creative.

There was this one time you guys had your oldest watch the kids while you guys went to the pharmacy to pick up some medicine, which ended in a quickie in the dark parking lot before heading home.

Or the other time you guys had a pool day and you went inside to start getting the snacks ready. Nanami followed shortly after to have himself his own quick snack. Both of your days are pretty busy, but Nanami never fails to make some time for you and your pussy. You can admit sex hasn’t really been a priority, until tonight. Upon realizing all the kids would be gone, you immediately called Nanami to be sure he brings his ass home when he is off and not do any overtime- yes you used your mom voice too. Nanami agreed not wanting to be scolded.

When he did get home, he noticed a few things, there was any tv on, or music blasting from your two oldest rooms. There weren’t toys scattered in the living room or the dining room table from your two youngest, no yelling or screaming from all of them in general, it was just quiet. He smelt food in the air, he usually does every night he comes home but it’d be already eaten, or everyone will be eating at the dinner table (he insists not to wait for him because he often stays late) but since he left early from work, it isn’t ready just yet. He quickly rushes up the stairs, starting to feel the panic seep in just a bit, all the kids rooms are empty.

He opens his shared bedroom to see you just laying on your stomach, in the silky robe he got you, reading a book. He calms down because if you were okay, surely, the kids were too. His eyes gaze down your figure, your feet are in the air crossed, while you read. The robe sits at your upper thigh, and since it’s so thin, your ass pops out in the most desirable way possible. “Honey?” He eyes you suspiciously, taking a breath as he starts to settle down, “Where are the kids.”

You heard the front door shut, squeezing your thighs together, feeling the arousal hit you even more. The book you have been reading had been in your mind, and hearing your husband come home really made you ready to take him, full. You had dinner cooking in the oven, almost ready to serve for just Nanami and you. Your oldest son is at a movie with his friends and they are going to go eat after. Your second oldest daughter is spending the night with her best friend, and your two youngest are sleeping over with their grandparents. To say you were practically rushing your oldest son to leave already, since he was the last one to go, was an understatement.

“They are busy and safe.” You closed the book and turn your body towards him, your eyes hungry before you looked at him, but damn near starving when you did. That damn suit and tie. You explained where they all were as you sat up in the bed, impulsively pushing your chest out as you leaned back on your arms. Nanami didn’t ignore the lustful look in your eye, the way your nipples perked against the thin fabric, only assuming you had nothing on underneath. He quickly put a few things together, why you called him to not do overtime. He knew what his wife wanted, at least he thought so.

When your sweet loving husband started off kissing your neck, waiting to use the few hours to just worship your body, you, your hands cupped his chin and looked him dead in the eye, “Honey, I love you so much and I know that you do but tonight-right now I need you to fuck me like you don’t. I want y-“ His eyes darkens more at your plea, how desperate you were truly. How can he ever say no to his gorgeous wife. He cuts you off with a kiss before he started fucking you every way loose. Yes exactly what I said. But of course no matter what time it is, you guys are parents after all….

“What?” Nanami answers the call, still buried deep inside you, grinding against you as his thumb circles your clit.

“..Oh Hey dad, where’s mo-“

“She’s busy, are you okay, why are you blowing up her phone?” Nanami cuts your son off, his eyes focused on you squirming around, biting your lip to keep any lewd sounds hushed while he was on the phone with your son. He speeds up his movements on your clit, softly sucking in a breath when you clench tightly around his dick.

“I wanna buy some snacks and get some food after the movie, mom said she’ll send me m-“

“How much?” Nanami asked wanting him to get to the point so he can get back to his wife. He slowly pulling out before pushing himself back in. Your hand quickly covers your mouth as you shut your eyes. Your legs were shaking crazy. Your husband wasn’t one to always be rough in bed, but the times he is, you would feel it for days, in the best way possible. (He has that dog in him😞) Nanami definitely isn’t holding back, not when it’s been this long you guys were kid free for a few hours and together at that. Nanami was making up for lost time, fingering you until you couldn’t talk properly, eating your pussy like it personally offended him, fucking you left, right, up, down, diagonal, all up until your phone kept blowing up.

“Like about $40.”

“Okay, give me a moment.” Nanami grunts, as he bottoms out again, the way you squeezed his dick nearly knocked him out cold. He feels his dick throb inside you and pulls the phone away from his ear, breathing heavy.

“Thanks d-“

Nanami hangs up the phone and tosses it beside you before leaning in closer to you, peeling your hand away from your mouth and pulling it above your head. “Tell me something honey.” He hums kissing your swollen lips.

You whimper as he fucks you again, slow but rough this time, ”y-yes?” You gasp as he hits your cervix.

“When the kids ask for money, do you send it to them from my account?” He looks into your eyes, sweat dripping down his head watching your reaction to his question really his dick.

You’re screwed. Both literally and physically.

“Not alwa- o-ooh shit.” You moan, his hips moving faster than light. Nanami absolutely hates when you use your own money, hell, even when you were working. When you guys first started dating he already knew you were going to be his wife. Nanami would always say you didn’t need to work but you didn’t want him to be the sole provider. Eventually, you guys moved in together and you were still working. Though, he convinced you to work less hours and took you out on a date when you agreed. It wasn’t until you got pregnant with your first baby, did his wish come true. Shit, he was more excited when you both went down to your job to quit than he was to see the 2 pink lines.

“All the hours I work, being kept away from our family, my perfect wife -ngghh- my perfect wife’s pussy. And you still insist on usi-fuck- using your own money when you have access to my money- no our money, shit your money.” He moans grabbing your other hand and pulling it above your head with your other.

“Y-you pay for e-ever-“

“I’m supposed to baby. I want to.” He interrupts you, lifting your legs to his shoulders, and grabbing your phone with his free hand and sending your son $100 from his account. “Why must you make things complicated, love. I am the man, it’s my job to take care of you, our family. Let *thrust* me. Use my money for the kids, the house, the cars, whatever it is, I have enough, more than.” He kisses your lips softly, opposite to his thrusts. “Use your money I give you for you, whatever you want for you- shit for you. Everything I do is for you, everything I make, it’s yours, ours on paper, but it’s all yours. All for you.” He grunts into your ear, as if he’s teaching a lesson. Technically, he is.

“Don’t let me find out you aren’t using my money first again, okay hun?” He hums at you, a moaning teary mess.

“Now where were we?” He smiles before pulling out and flipping you on your stomach, lifting your ass up and spanking it. “Oh, right.” He chuckles as he spreads your cheeks apart, seeing your drooling sensitive pussy, clenching on air.

*edited but not proofread*

More:

Pussywhipped!Choso | part 2

Married!Eren x Maid!Reader

Ex-husband!Eren

Sylus mini

[ann1-the-s1mp]

❀ Bev girl!reader and her favourite client, Mr. Nanami

You’ve already been hit on eight times and it’s only eleven in the morning. Tasked with driving a drinks cart around the golf course, you mostly rely on tips to make a living, which means, unfortunately for you and your dignity, having to put up with the flirtations from sweaty, pot-bellied, balding men. Married men. 

Like this one. 

“You must work out a lot, huh? How else would you get those sexy legs?” He flashes you a grin with his yellow teeth, leaning on his club, the metal glinting and blinding under the sun, as if it’s supposed to impress you. 

Putting on a tense smile, you retort, “No, this is all natural, sir. Much like our ciders, would you like one? They’ll taste great in this heat.”

He leans in closer. “I know what would taste better.”

“Perhaps your time would be better spent on practising your backswing instead of harassing poor girls, Jogo. I’ve seen straighter shots at a bar.”

You visibly relax. Your saviour is here. 

Tall, muscular, and totally out of your league, Mr. Nanami is a regular at the golf course and a favourite amongst the other girls. Whereas the typical frequenters are either dismissive or too friendly, he treats you all with respect. He tips well too, though, honestly, you wouldn’t mind if he didn’t tip at all because the luxury of being treated like a person feels just as good as payday. Okay, maybe that's an exaggeration but the point is, he can get with anything.

In fact, most of the girls would be ecstatic to be thrown a bone. You included.

The greasy man grumbles under his breath and backs off, joining the other men who stood by and did nothing. Thank God – no, thank him. 

“I do apologise about my colleague’s behaviour; there’s no excuse and so I will not make one.”

Wearing a cream polo shirt, tailored trousers, and an expensive leather belt you can’t spend too much time looking at, he takes a cold bottle of water from the fridge and fishes some cash from his wallet. Damn, he looks amazing with his blonde hair and tight pants. Focus. He’s a client. 

You reject his money. “No, it’s on me today, Mr. Nanami. You’re always so nice and sweet and I appreciate it more than you know.”

His smile is nothing short of dazzling – he’s not even trying to be charming and you know that. There’s just this amazing quality about that small twitch of his lips, like smiling isn’t something he does very often but when he gives you one, you know he means it — can hear how fast your heart is beating?

You sure hope not. That would be as embarrassing as being caught pressing your legs together at the low timber of his smooth voice.

“That’s kind, but unnecessary. I am simply doing what I should.” He slides a stack of money far exceeding the cost of his water on your hand, thumb grazing the skin, sparking electricity up your arm, and fixes you a firm gaze through his thin framed glasses. “Just a little thank you for your continued hard work. If it makes you uncomfortable, you can share with the other girls.”

You laugh. “No, sorry, we all know to pocket any tips the famously handsome Mr. Nanami gives us, so they’ll have to work for theirs.”

A quirk of his brow says you just said something you shouldn’t have and he has half a mind to punish you for it but he doesn’t. 

Awkwardly, you clear your throat and start up the cart again. Being around him sends your nerves on overdrives, he makes you want to impress him, to be as witty as he is, to be better, to be good. That’s why you and the other girls can only stand to be around him for a couple minutes before you implode. 

“Well, thank you for the tips. You're too good to us." You try and avoid his gaze; it's too much to bear in one sitting. "I wish you a good day, Mr. Nanami. Oh, and watch out for the grass by hole thirteen; it was just freshly cut and the other members say the ball curves right.”

“Thank you. And, please, call me, Kento.”

Beaming, you say, “Oh great! The girls have all been wondering what your first name was. They’ll be delighted to know.”

He leans in close, fresh cologne wafting in your nose and threatening to drive you dizzy. Up close, he looks even better, you can see the light stubble on his strong jaw, the sharp contours of his cheeks and nose, and his pretty eyes, clear as day and fixed on you. 

“Let’s keep this between us, hmm?” Yet another stack of papers end up in your hands. “For being a good girl and giving me a heads up; it’ll come in handy with the bet I have with a certain Mr. Gojo.”

Then he rejoins his group, just as cool, calm and collected as when he first walked in all those years ago, leaving you completely flustered and richer than you ever have been.