randombush3

[randombush3]

ughhhh don't make me blush

why did you change?

leah williamson x reader

part one, part two

summary: you meet leah in a VIP bar and can't decide what to do with her

words: 3625

content warnings: smut (i think), references to smut, just general misery

notes: this was fun lol x

also idk if any of you noticed, but all the part titles are lyrics from the smiths fun fact!

You fuck Leah in Zürich. 

It’s good. You said that last time. She bathes in your confirmation anyway. 

She saves your number in her contacts, saying, “I thought it was you but I wasn’t sure,” as if that explains why she never replied. As if that reveals to you how she miraculously found your hotel. “I wanted to tell you to ignore Alex,” she lies as you lead her to your room, the both of you knowing that this is a bad idea and accepting the mistake. Leah hesitates for a moment, taking in the hunger in your eyes. “I remember the rules.” 

You see her again in London. 

It’s not part of the schedule, not where you should be. Neither of you mention that. She messages you when you land. A charter to Luton. Nearby. Of women to fuck, one a twenty-minute taxi ride away is the most convenient. 

It becomes a rhythm. She doesn’t come to any other shows. Never asks about them. Doesn’t care whether you’ve added to the setlist or banned the glitter she had licked off your neck in Zürich. 

You familiarise yourself with the hotels in St Albans. Soon, with her house and the code for her gate. 

You keep moving – Munich, Amsterdam, Budapest – but London seems to be a regenerative point. You appear, sleep with her, and fly back with the ache still between your thighs. Your shoes are always off by the time she closes her door, coat dropped in the hallway. She always tastes of the ridiculous berry-flavoured electrolyte drinks she keeps stocked in her fridge. She shoves them into your hands just before you leave. 

It is neither kindness nor a joke. It’s a parting gift. You are certain it is because she has been drilled to think about hydration levels like they bring impending doom. You’re not sure you will ever grow to like their bitter taste. 

And still, it continues. 

You don’t text her from Vienna. You don’t call from Prague. But she seems to know when you will be circling back. Somehow. Like a bad habit she disappointedly awaits. 

One night, she’s in Paris at the same time as you. You’re playing a sold-out arena where no one listens to the lyrics; she’s playing in a Champions League match and scores in the 78th minute. The timing is off, but you get her message before you go on stage. 

1-0. You’re welcome.

You had made the mistake of letting it slip that you’d grown up in a red-and-white household. You regret it, deeply. 

You reply with a photo of the crowd and a message following it that just says, Sold out. 

She doesn’t respond. That’s the way it is. 

You joke once, half-asleep in her sheets, wearing down the minutes remaining in the space between sex and your taxi arriving, that you have never seen her play.

She shrugs. “Why? You’d hate it.” 

“You don’t know that.” You’re a little offended – no idea why. You’ve been to a football match before. Your father is a Manchester City fan. He took you with his family. He couldn’t shield you from the glares of his wife. 

Leah only smirks and shakes her head, because she knows she doesn’t have to explain. There’s hardly time for you to disagree, anyway. 

Weeks later, you’re at her house again. She buzzes you through the gate without a word. You’re barely past the threshold before her hands are on your waist. Clothes drop like the pretence of formality. Then she veers left, not towards the stairs that lead to her bedroom. 

The corridor opens into a study.

No. 

A shrine. 

Clean white walls, soft lights, and a glass cabinet full of medals and trophies. Some still shine like they were won last night. 

She presses you against it, her mouth at your neck. You let it go for a moment, her tongue hot enough to counteract the cold surge of glass against your bare back, until you push her away, breathless. She blinks at the glint of her silverware. 

“Did you want to show them to me or something?” you ask. She freezes. Only slightly. “Because this isn’t the way to your bedroom, and I’ve heard that you do have a gigantic ego.” 

She laughs. Head thrown back, eyes rolling. 

“I don’t show them to anyone,” she says, though you find that hard to believe. 

“Then why are we fucking next to them?” 

“I didn’t expect you to stop me.” 

“I didn’t expect a detour through your autobiography.” 

She bites your shoulder lightly and guides you backwards out of the room, into the hallway, then the bedroom. You quell your curiosity. 

Her bedroom is dark but you can tell she tidied before you came; dirty clothes folded and piled on a chair, bed made only for the covers to be ripped off as she pushes you onto it. 

She’s on top of you, moving like she’s got time to waste – a lie, but she tells it well. Her mouth is on your collarbone and her hips grind into you with the smug rhythm of someone who knows exactly how much she’s already turned you on. 

You’re trying to focus, trying to stay in it, but something is itching at the back of your mind. 

Your gaze flickers to the doorway. 

“Wait,” you blurt out, hand almost leaving Leah’s waist to cover your mouth. 

Leah stills. “What?” 

You hesitate, hating the question that rests in your tongue. You say it anyway. “Which ones are with England and which are with Arsenal?”

She blinks down at you. Her face is flushed, breathing a little heavy, and for a second she just stares, absolutely blindsided. “Are you seriously…” Her mouth twitches. “You want a medal breakdown now?” 

You shrug beneath her, already grinning. Her forehead crinkles from unfettered irritation. “You dragged me into your trophy porn palace. I’m just trying to understand what’s fucking me.”

Another beat passes with Leah’s gormless stare. Then, she groans like you’re the most frustrating, irresistible thing she has ever met. “You’re unbelievable.” She rolls off you, griping about the mood being killed under her breath, but she’s laughing. And then, to your surprise, she grabs your wrist. “Come on.”

“No way.” 

But you’re halfway out of the bedroom. And she’s so excited, you can tell, although she tries not to be. 

Half-naked. Flushed. Barefoot. 

She nudges the door open and flicks on the light. You look around again like you hadn’t the first time – not breathless, not with your back pressed to cold glass, not with impatience. 

Leah crosses to the cabinet like muscle memory is pulling her there. She points. 

“These,” she says, knocking gently on one glass shelf, “are club-level. Arsenal. Most of the silver ones. That’s the Conti Cup. That’s the FA Cup.” She reaches into a drawer and takes out a box. “This is the community shield. Far from flashy, but it still counts.” 

You squint. “And that one?” you ask, nodding towards the only medal not inside the case. It looks as though it had been haplessly dropped in the chair tucked under a desk. You briefly wonder what on earth she needs a desk for. 

She turns, following your gaze, and you see the change in her face before she says anything. The medal’s ribbon is thick, the metal heavy. Sleek. Recent. And she looks at it with pride. A different kind to the other accolades she has shown you. 

“That one,” she says, stepping over, lifting it gently. “Champions League. We beat Barça in May.” You remember how Jess went to the match, invited you to come with. How you’d scoffed and said no. How your younger brother, with whom you’d replaced your friend, insisted he put it on in the background as a die-hard Arsenal fan unsatisfied by the men’s season. 

“It was 1-0, wasn’t it?”

She nods and then walks back to you with it, dangling it loosely in her hand. “I haven’t put it away yet.” 

You look at her. “Still parading it around?” 

She snorts. 

“I don’t know where it should go.” 

Her answer is more pragmatic than you had expected. Then again, any humility Leah shows you never fails to surprise. 

She’s standing too close now. You’re still topless, still wet, but suddenly this feels too intimate for sex. You glance down at the medal in her hand, then back up. “Are you going to let me wear it?” 

“You want to?” 

You shrug. “Might as well flex my pretend abs and bathe in fantastical glory.” 

That makes her laugh. Then, without ceremony, she reaches up and drops it over your head, letting the ribbon settle around your neck, the weight of the medal thunking against your chest. 

It’s heavier than you had assumed. She adjusts it slightly, fingertips brushing your skin.

“There.” Her voice is suddenly quieter than before. “You’re officially decorated.”

She’s smiling, teeth showing, lips parted proudly. Her eyes reflect the trophies behind you. She exudes a warmth that you know you shouldn’t be seeing. 

You look down at her lips. 

Your mind flashes red and angry but intrigued. Wanting. It feels as though you are being torn apart. 

It’s spectacular. It’s painful. 

It’s a terrible, terrible thought. 

Still, it comes fast and stupid and true. 

You’re in love with her. 

Leah’s hands find your waist, lips on your neck, teeth scraping past the medal adorning it. You gasp into her. You force your eyes shut.

…

“Is this sanitary?” 

You jump out of bed, hastily pulling on a t-shirt that has been left to grow creases on the floor. The girl you were just about to go down on hides her face under the covers. 

“Jess!” Your tone should be enough for her to leave the room, but she doesn’t. “How did you even get in here?” 

“Your manager gave me the second key. Said something about you needing to be interrupted.” 

Angrily, you plonk back down on the bed, crossing your legs as if restraining yourself from physically attacking her. The girl’s legs are folded into her stomach, and you feel a bit bad for her. 

“Jess, turn around so she can leave.” 

It’s a clear dismissal of the girl, whoever she is.

She obliges, sighing at the sound of zippers being done up and the wet kiss the girl presses to your cheek as she scurries out of your hotel room. Arms folded, eyes closed, she only waits for the door to close before swivelling on her heels and giving you whiplash. 

“As I said, is that sanitary?” You look at her as though you don’t get it. “Multiple sexual partners.” 

“I get checked.” 

“I mean in an emotional sense.” She frowns. “What happened between you and Leah?” 

“We still fuck. When I’m around.” But Jess isn’t entirely convinced by your blasé demeanour. You falter. “It’s just harder to get flights to London during this part of the tour.” 

She walks towards you slowly, brushing the sheets of the bed as though that will purge it of the bodily fluids, before sitting down and mirroring your position. For some reason, it is hard not to flinch. 

“What happened between you and Leah?” she repeats. 

“How did you know we were…?” 

“Leah told Alex.” Right. You suppose it never was an official secret. Perhaps you’re just a bit more private. Or you shout less about your conquests. 

“Nothing happened,” you finally say. “We still fuck.” 

Jess looks at you in a way that forces you to confront the disappointment in her eyes. As you stare helplessly, you notice the care that mixes with it. She’s worried about you. 

“Why haven’t you let her kiss you?”

The answer rolls off your tongue, automatic, reflexive. Insincere. “I don’t let anyone–” 

“But this is Leah.” 

She raises an eyebrow. You open your mouth, but nothing comes out at first. 

“We just fuck.” 

There’s a pause. Jess doesn’t argue, but she wears an expression that belongs to an observer watching a car crash in slow motion. You hate that look.

“Apparently with you wearing her Champions League medal.” 

You shift, uncomfortable. “It was hot,” you defend, more to the sheets than to her.

“It was personal,” she counters, not missing a beat. “And there’s nothing wrong with that.” 

You want to point out that there is. Explaining would be fruitless, however, since Jess has never understood why you refuse to attach yourself to other humans and you have never had the courage to fully come out with it. 

Instead, when faced with this challenge, you deflect. Your arms fold over your chest, your eyebrows knit together. “Do you have an actual reason to be here?”

“It’s the last show before your break.” 

You’d like to be annoyed but it’s sweet that she knows that. It’s sweet that she can see the exhaustion in your eyes and the fatigue that weighs down your bones. It’s sweet that Jess gets how important the break over Christmas will be. Christmas is far too complicated to be cocktailed with performing, anyway.

“I wanted to offer you an escape for your favourite holiday, too,” she says after a moment. Gently. Treading on cracking ice. “If you don’t have plans?” 

You hesitate. “I think I’m spending it with my father.” 

“He asked you to?” 

“Well, Stephen and my mother are in the Maldives. Cecily is in New York.” The days of opening presents around the ostentatiously large tree are long gone. Your little sister perhaps wishes for the memories to linger, like of the Rockefeller and skiing with your step-father’s American friends. “God knows where our darling brother is. And so Johnny asked me and I agreed.” 

“That’s good!” She tried to be enthusiastic. 

You know she means it kindly, but the strained positivity make your throat feel tight. There’s no easy way to convey the place this second ‘home’ holds in your life — awkward dinners, a half-decorated room, forced attempts at wanting to be there. Your father’s wife still winces when she sees you, refuses to ever join the boys if they go to one of your shows. She can’t bear the reminder of her heartbreak. You can’t bear the scorch of your parents’ mistakes. 

Jess is watching you now and you realise that your silence has revealed far too much. She was already scrutinising you, aware of the situation, but now you have really exposed yourself. 

“I didn’t mean—” she starts.

“No, I know,” you cut in, voice a sharpened blade ready to kill this topic. You shake your head. “It is good. It’s good.” 

It isn’t. Not really. But it’s better than spending Christmas alone. Or worse… trying to invent an excuse for ending up in London just to perhaps see Leah again. 

You’re not sure what that would even look like. She’s probably let you in without asking why. Probably have one of those godawful drinks in hand as though she has been expecting you. Probably would have been. 

Jess sighs and stands. “Okay. Well, I said what I came to say.” 

You nod. 

She walks to the door and pauses, hand hovering over the handle. This time, her voice is softer. 

“You know you’re allowed to want something more, right?” 

You swallow. “What if I don’t?” 

She gives you a look that has had its frustration sucked out and replaced. You know she can see through you, as though your skin were transparent and your organs on show. Your heart on show. 

And then she leaves. 

…

You see Leah again in late January. 

The new year rolls in with fog and conflicted emotions. A kiss with a stranger — a man, just so it wouldn’t mean anything. A brief respite between a family that’s not yours and the intensity of the tour. 

That is until the emails start flooding in from people who you pay to care about your schedule. Demands, requests, suggestions. Chords to new songs with pleas for lyrics. 

You’re meant to be writing. Everyone expects you to be writing.

But you can’t. 

Then, the tour picks up again. The crowds are delighted and entertained, and the glitter never really washes out. With the rhythm comes the need to escape. You’re on a lead and the collar is itching. 

No one questions you when you ask for a layover in London. 

She answers your text in twenty minutes. 

You’re in London? 

Technically, you’re supposed to be elsewhere. 

I’ve got training tomorrow. Early. 

It means nothing, which you know. 

I haven’t changed my gate code.

You know this too. 

It isn’t long until Leah is pressing you against the inside of her front door, teeth desperately scraping your neck as if she has missed you. You slide your hands under the back of her training top (she has only just returned) and she gasps at the feeling (your hands are cold from the biting wind outside). 

You want her to gasp like that every second of every minute. Every minute of every hour. 

You want her to devour you. To free you. To trap you. 

You want her to fuck you until nothing else matters and it is just you in Leah’s bed, naked and wet, sweating and moaning and writhing until she makes you come. 

And. Well. 

You want her to kiss you. 

She is leading you to her bedroom, hand in yours, hair tousled. She doesn’t check to see if you’re still following, even when she drops your hand to pull off her clothes. She’s practical. Efficient. 

You’re standing there like a lemon. 

You only realise when Leah gives you a puzzled look, a flash of vulnerability crossing her face when she notices you haven’t copied her. 

“Are you okay?” she asks, and she shouldn’t have done that.

She really shouldn’t have. 

“Leah…” It comes out splintered, hoarse. 

For a moment, she hesitates, as if deciding whether or not to pry. But she does, because she can. Because you’d tell her. “What’s wrong?” 

“The rule.” 

Leah’s brows draw together. “Yeah, I know the rules.” 

You swallow hard, still fully clothed, still frozen. You shake your head. “No, I know you know the rules.” She moves towards you, a hornier version of a shrug, prepared to carry on. You shake your head again. “I don’t kiss the people I sleep with. I never have.” 

Her jaw tenses. “Okay,” she says, slowly. “I kind of figured that out.” 

You look away. The words don’t come easily. “Kissing is different, you know? It’s not like the rest of it. It’s… more dangerous. Or something.” 

You hear Leah’s breath hitch quietly, but she says nothing. 

“I know that sounds stupid,” you murmur. 

“No,” she says. “It doesn’t.”

Her eyes are calm. Understanding. Settled on you like that is where they belong. 

Her eyes are beautiful, you suddenly think to yourself. 

“Leah,” you start, and it’s so quiet it almost doesn’t count. “I want to.” 

Leah blinks. “You… want to kiss me?” 

No one can know about this. 

No one can know, you decide, even as she closes the distance between you, fingertips brushing lightly against your collarbone. She lets her fingers trail upwards, just barely grazing your jaw. 

“Are you sure?” 

You nod. It’s small, but it’s there. 

She smells like wind and perfume and the conditioner she pretends not to care about. You must smell like an aeroplane and cigarettes, and maybe the coffee you had with your salad at lunch. 

Leah doesn’t seem to mind. 

Your eyes flutter shut. 

When Leah kisses you, you feel as though you have lost the game. 

[randombush3]

i just don't like making fics simple yk xx

why did you change?

leah williamson x reader

part one, part two

summary: you meet leah in a VIP bar and can't decide what to do with her

words: 3625

content warnings: smut (i think), references to smut, just general misery

notes: this was fun lol x

also idk if any of you noticed, but all the part titles are lyrics from the smiths fun fact!

You fuck Leah in Zürich. 

It’s good. You said that last time. She bathes in your confirmation anyway. 

She saves your number in her contacts, saying, “I thought it was you but I wasn’t sure,” as if that explains why she never replied. As if that reveals to you how she miraculously found your hotel. “I wanted to tell you to ignore Alex,” she lies as you lead her to your room, the both of you knowing that this is a bad idea and accepting the mistake. Leah hesitates for a moment, taking in the hunger in your eyes. “I remember the rules.” 

You see her again in London. 

It’s not part of the schedule, not where you should be. Neither of you mention that. She messages you when you land. A charter to Luton. Nearby. Of women to fuck, one a twenty-minute taxi ride away is the most convenient. 

It becomes a rhythm. She doesn’t come to any other shows. Never asks about them. Doesn’t care whether you’ve added to the setlist or banned the glitter she had licked off your neck in Zürich. 

You familiarise yourself with the hotels in St Albans. Soon, with her house and the code for her gate. 

You keep moving – Munich, Amsterdam, Budapest – but London seems to be a regenerative point. You appear, sleep with her, and fly back with the ache still between your thighs. Your shoes are always off by the time she closes her door, coat dropped in the hallway. She always tastes of the ridiculous berry-flavoured electrolyte drinks she keeps stocked in her fridge. She shoves them into your hands just before you leave. 

It is neither kindness nor a joke. It’s a parting gift. You are certain it is because she has been drilled to think about hydration levels like they bring impending doom. You’re not sure you will ever grow to like their bitter taste. 

And still, it continues. 

You don’t text her from Vienna. You don’t call from Prague. But she seems to know when you will be circling back. Somehow. Like a bad habit she disappointedly awaits. 

One night, she’s in Paris at the same time as you. You’re playing a sold-out arena where no one listens to the lyrics; she’s playing in a Champions League match and scores in the 78th minute. The timing is off, but you get her message before you go on stage. 

1-0. You’re welcome.

You had made the mistake of letting it slip that you’d grown up in a red-and-white household. You regret it, deeply. 

You reply with a photo of the crowd and a message following it that just says, Sold out. 

She doesn’t respond. That’s the way it is. 

You joke once, half-asleep in her sheets, wearing down the minutes remaining in the space between sex and your taxi arriving, that you have never seen her play.

She shrugs. “Why? You’d hate it.” 

“You don’t know that.” You’re a little offended – no idea why. You’ve been to a football match before. Your father is a Manchester City fan. He took you with his family. He couldn’t shield you from the glares of his wife. 

Leah only smirks and shakes her head, because she knows she doesn’t have to explain. There’s hardly time for you to disagree, anyway. 

Weeks later, you’re at her house again. She buzzes you through the gate without a word. You’re barely past the threshold before her hands are on your waist. Clothes drop like the pretence of formality. Then she veers left, not towards the stairs that lead to her bedroom. 

The corridor opens into a study.

No. 

A shrine. 

Clean white walls, soft lights, and a glass cabinet full of medals and trophies. Some still shine like they were won last night. 

She presses you against it, her mouth at your neck. You let it go for a moment, her tongue hot enough to counteract the cold surge of glass against your bare back, until you push her away, breathless. She blinks at the glint of her silverware. 

“Did you want to show them to me or something?” you ask. She freezes. Only slightly. “Because this isn’t the way to your bedroom, and I’ve heard that you do have a gigantic ego.” 

She laughs. Head thrown back, eyes rolling. 

“I don’t show them to anyone,” she says, though you find that hard to believe. 

“Then why are we fucking next to them?” 

“I didn’t expect you to stop me.” 

“I didn’t expect a detour through your autobiography.” 

She bites your shoulder lightly and guides you backwards out of the room, into the hallway, then the bedroom. You quell your curiosity. 

Her bedroom is dark but you can tell she tidied before you came; dirty clothes folded and piled on a chair, bed made only for the covers to be ripped off as she pushes you onto it. 

She’s on top of you, moving like she’s got time to waste – a lie, but she tells it well. Her mouth is on your collarbone and her hips grind into you with the smug rhythm of someone who knows exactly how much she’s already turned you on. 

You’re trying to focus, trying to stay in it, but something is itching at the back of your mind. 

Your gaze flickers to the doorway. 

“Wait,” you blurt out, hand almost leaving Leah’s waist to cover your mouth. 

Leah stills. “What?” 

You hesitate, hating the question that rests in your tongue. You say it anyway. “Which ones are with England and which are with Arsenal?”

She blinks down at you. Her face is flushed, breathing a little heavy, and for a second she just stares, absolutely blindsided. “Are you seriously…” Her mouth twitches. “You want a medal breakdown now?” 

You shrug beneath her, already grinning. Her forehead crinkles from unfettered irritation. “You dragged me into your trophy porn palace. I’m just trying to understand what’s fucking me.”

Another beat passes with Leah’s gormless stare. Then, she groans like you’re the most frustrating, irresistible thing she has ever met. “You’re unbelievable.” She rolls off you, griping about the mood being killed under her breath, but she’s laughing. And then, to your surprise, she grabs your wrist. “Come on.”

“No way.” 

But you’re halfway out of the bedroom. And she’s so excited, you can tell, although she tries not to be. 

Half-naked. Flushed. Barefoot. 

She nudges the door open and flicks on the light. You look around again like you hadn’t the first time – not breathless, not with your back pressed to cold glass, not with impatience. 

Leah crosses to the cabinet like muscle memory is pulling her there. She points. 

“These,” she says, knocking gently on one glass shelf, “are club-level. Arsenal. Most of the silver ones. That’s the Conti Cup. That’s the FA Cup.” She reaches into a drawer and takes out a box. “This is the community shield. Far from flashy, but it still counts.” 

You squint. “And that one?” you ask, nodding towards the only medal not inside the case. It looks as though it had been haplessly dropped in the chair tucked under a desk. You briefly wonder what on earth she needs a desk for. 

She turns, following your gaze, and you see the change in her face before she says anything. The medal’s ribbon is thick, the metal heavy. Sleek. Recent. And she looks at it with pride. A different kind to the other accolades she has shown you. 

“That one,” she says, stepping over, lifting it gently. “Champions League. We beat Barça in May.” You remember how Jess went to the match, invited you to come with. How you’d scoffed and said no. How your younger brother, with whom you’d replaced your friend, insisted he put it on in the background as a die-hard Arsenal fan unsatisfied by the men’s season. 

“It was 1-0, wasn’t it?”

She nods and then walks back to you with it, dangling it loosely in her hand. “I haven’t put it away yet.” 

You look at her. “Still parading it around?” 

She snorts. 

“I don’t know where it should go.” 

Her answer is more pragmatic than you had expected. Then again, any humility Leah shows you never fails to surprise. 

She’s standing too close now. You’re still topless, still wet, but suddenly this feels too intimate for sex. You glance down at the medal in her hand, then back up. “Are you going to let me wear it?” 

“You want to?” 

You shrug. “Might as well flex my pretend abs and bathe in fantastical glory.” 

That makes her laugh. Then, without ceremony, she reaches up and drops it over your head, letting the ribbon settle around your neck, the weight of the medal thunking against your chest. 

It’s heavier than you had assumed. She adjusts it slightly, fingertips brushing your skin.

“There.” Her voice is suddenly quieter than before. “You’re officially decorated.”

She’s smiling, teeth showing, lips parted proudly. Her eyes reflect the trophies behind you. She exudes a warmth that you know you shouldn’t be seeing. 

You look down at her lips. 

Your mind flashes red and angry but intrigued. Wanting. It feels as though you are being torn apart. 

It’s spectacular. It’s painful. 

It’s a terrible, terrible thought. 

Still, it comes fast and stupid and true. 

You’re in love with her. 

Leah’s hands find your waist, lips on your neck, teeth scraping past the medal adorning it. You gasp into her. You force your eyes shut.

…

“Is this sanitary?” 

You jump out of bed, hastily pulling on a t-shirt that has been left to grow creases on the floor. The girl you were just about to go down on hides her face under the covers. 

“Jess!” Your tone should be enough for her to leave the room, but she doesn’t. “How did you even get in here?” 

“Your manager gave me the second key. Said something about you needing to be interrupted.” 

Angrily, you plonk back down on the bed, crossing your legs as if restraining yourself from physically attacking her. The girl’s legs are folded into her stomach, and you feel a bit bad for her. 

“Jess, turn around so she can leave.” 

It’s a clear dismissal of the girl, whoever she is.

She obliges, sighing at the sound of zippers being done up and the wet kiss the girl presses to your cheek as she scurries out of your hotel room. Arms folded, eyes closed, she only waits for the door to close before swivelling on her heels and giving you whiplash. 

“As I said, is that sanitary?” You look at her as though you don’t get it. “Multiple sexual partners.” 

“I get checked.” 

“I mean in an emotional sense.” She frowns. “What happened between you and Leah?” 

“We still fuck. When I’m around.” But Jess isn’t entirely convinced by your blasé demeanour. You falter. “It’s just harder to get flights to London during this part of the tour.” 

She walks towards you slowly, brushing the sheets of the bed as though that will purge it of the bodily fluids, before sitting down and mirroring your position. For some reason, it is hard not to flinch. 

“What happened between you and Leah?” she repeats. 

“How did you know we were…?” 

“Leah told Alex.” Right. You suppose it never was an official secret. Perhaps you’re just a bit more private. Or you shout less about your conquests. 

“Nothing happened,” you finally say. “We still fuck.” 

Jess looks at you in a way that forces you to confront the disappointment in her eyes. As you stare helplessly, you notice the care that mixes with it. She’s worried about you. 

“Why haven’t you let her kiss you?”

The answer rolls off your tongue, automatic, reflexive. Insincere. “I don’t let anyone–” 

“But this is Leah.” 

She raises an eyebrow. You open your mouth, but nothing comes out at first. 

“We just fuck.” 

There’s a pause. Jess doesn’t argue, but she wears an expression that belongs to an observer watching a car crash in slow motion. You hate that look.

“Apparently with you wearing her Champions League medal.” 

You shift, uncomfortable. “It was hot,” you defend, more to the sheets than to her.

“It was personal,” she counters, not missing a beat. “And there’s nothing wrong with that.” 

You want to point out that there is. Explaining would be fruitless, however, since Jess has never understood why you refuse to attach yourself to other humans and you have never had the courage to fully come out with it. 

Instead, when faced with this challenge, you deflect. Your arms fold over your chest, your eyebrows knit together. “Do you have an actual reason to be here?”

“It’s the last show before your break.” 

You’d like to be annoyed but it’s sweet that she knows that. It’s sweet that she can see the exhaustion in your eyes and the fatigue that weighs down your bones. It’s sweet that Jess gets how important the break over Christmas will be. Christmas is far too complicated to be cocktailed with performing, anyway.

“I wanted to offer you an escape for your favourite holiday, too,” she says after a moment. Gently. Treading on cracking ice. “If you don’t have plans?” 

You hesitate. “I think I’m spending it with my father.” 

“He asked you to?” 

“Well, Stephen and my mother are in the Maldives. Cecily is in New York.” The days of opening presents around the ostentatiously large tree are long gone. Your little sister perhaps wishes for the memories to linger, like of the Rockefeller and skiing with your step-father’s American friends. “God knows where our darling brother is. And so Johnny asked me and I agreed.” 

“That’s good!” She tried to be enthusiastic. 

You know she means it kindly, but the strained positivity make your throat feel tight. There’s no easy way to convey the place this second ‘home’ holds in your life — awkward dinners, a half-decorated room, forced attempts at wanting to be there. Your father’s wife still winces when she sees you, refuses to ever join the boys if they go to one of your shows. She can’t bear the reminder of her heartbreak. You can’t bear the scorch of your parents’ mistakes. 

Jess is watching you now and you realise that your silence has revealed far too much. She was already scrutinising you, aware of the situation, but now you have really exposed yourself. 

“I didn’t mean—” she starts.

“No, I know,” you cut in, voice a sharpened blade ready to kill this topic. You shake your head. “It is good. It’s good.” 

It isn’t. Not really. But it’s better than spending Christmas alone. Or worse… trying to invent an excuse for ending up in London just to perhaps see Leah again. 

You’re not sure what that would even look like. She’s probably let you in without asking why. Probably have one of those godawful drinks in hand as though she has been expecting you. Probably would have been. 

Jess sighs and stands. “Okay. Well, I said what I came to say.” 

You nod. 

She walks to the door and pauses, hand hovering over the handle. This time, her voice is softer. 

“You know you’re allowed to want something more, right?” 

You swallow. “What if I don’t?” 

She gives you a look that has had its frustration sucked out and replaced. You know she can see through you, as though your skin were transparent and your organs on show. Your heart on show. 

And then she leaves. 

…

You see Leah again in late January. 

The new year rolls in with fog and conflicted emotions. A kiss with a stranger — a man, just so it wouldn’t mean anything. A brief respite between a family that’s not yours and the intensity of the tour. 

That is until the emails start flooding in from people who you pay to care about your schedule. Demands, requests, suggestions. Chords to new songs with pleas for lyrics. 

You’re meant to be writing. Everyone expects you to be writing.

But you can’t. 

Then, the tour picks up again. The crowds are delighted and entertained, and the glitter never really washes out. With the rhythm comes the need to escape. You’re on a lead and the collar is itching. 

No one questions you when you ask for a layover in London. 

She answers your text in twenty minutes. 

You’re in London? 

Technically, you’re supposed to be elsewhere. 

I’ve got training tomorrow. Early. 

It means nothing, which you know. 

I haven’t changed my gate code.

You know this too. 

It isn’t long until Leah is pressing you against the inside of her front door, teeth desperately scraping your neck as if she has missed you. You slide your hands under the back of her training top (she has only just returned) and she gasps at the feeling (your hands are cold from the biting wind outside). 

You want her to gasp like that every second of every minute. Every minute of every hour. 

You want her to devour you. To free you. To trap you. 

You want her to fuck you until nothing else matters and it is just you in Leah’s bed, naked and wet, sweating and moaning and writhing until she makes you come. 

And. Well. 

You want her to kiss you. 

She is leading you to her bedroom, hand in yours, hair tousled. She doesn’t check to see if you’re still following, even when she drops your hand to pull off her clothes. She’s practical. Efficient. 

You’re standing there like a lemon. 

You only realise when Leah gives you a puzzled look, a flash of vulnerability crossing her face when she notices you haven’t copied her. 

“Are you okay?” she asks, and she shouldn’t have done that.

She really shouldn’t have. 

“Leah…” It comes out splintered, hoarse. 

For a moment, she hesitates, as if deciding whether or not to pry. But she does, because she can. Because you’d tell her. “What’s wrong?” 

“The rule.” 

Leah’s brows draw together. “Yeah, I know the rules.” 

You swallow hard, still fully clothed, still frozen. You shake your head. “No, I know you know the rules.” She moves towards you, a hornier version of a shrug, prepared to carry on. You shake your head again. “I don’t kiss the people I sleep with. I never have.” 

Her jaw tenses. “Okay,” she says, slowly. “I kind of figured that out.” 

You look away. The words don’t come easily. “Kissing is different, you know? It’s not like the rest of it. It’s… more dangerous. Or something.” 

You hear Leah’s breath hitch quietly, but she says nothing. 

“I know that sounds stupid,” you murmur. 

“No,” she says. “It doesn’t.”

Her eyes are calm. Understanding. Settled on you like that is where they belong. 

Her eyes are beautiful, you suddenly think to yourself. 

“Leah,” you start, and it’s so quiet it almost doesn’t count. “I want to.” 

Leah blinks. “You… want to kiss me?” 

No one can know about this. 

No one can know, you decide, even as she closes the distance between you, fingertips brushing lightly against your collarbone. She lets her fingers trail upwards, just barely grazing your jaw. 

“Are you sure?” 

You nod. It’s small, but it’s there. 

She smells like wind and perfume and the conditioner she pretends not to care about. You must smell like an aeroplane and cigarettes, and maybe the coffee you had with your salad at lunch. 

Leah doesn’t seem to mind. 

Your eyes flutter shut. 

When Leah kisses you, you feel as though you have lost the game. 

[randombush3]

can’t wait for part 4!! so good!!!

i hate to break it to you butttttt

it was a trilogy

sorry!!!!

[randombush3]

loved that part, also found the ending kinda sweet as well 😶

also loved the champions league final mention as well ik you kinda had to for the plot but i bet it hurts you to think about hehe 😌

thank you my darling

shut the fuck up x

[randombush3]

why did you change?

leah williamson x reader

part one, part two

summary: you meet leah in a VIP bar and can't decide what to do with her

words: 3625

content warnings: smut (i think), references to smut, just general misery

notes: this was fun lol x

also idk if any of you noticed, but all the part titles are lyrics from the smiths fun fact!

You fuck Leah in Zürich. 

It’s good. You said that last time. She bathes in your confirmation anyway. 

She saves your number in her contacts, saying, “I thought it was you but I wasn’t sure,” as if that explains why she never replied. As if that reveals to you how she miraculously found your hotel. “I wanted to tell you to ignore Alex,” she lies as you lead her to your room, the both of you knowing that this is a bad idea and accepting the mistake. Leah hesitates for a moment, taking in the hunger in your eyes. “I remember the rules.” 

You see her again in London. 

It’s not part of the schedule, not where you should be. Neither of you mention that. She messages you when you land. A charter to Luton. Nearby. Of women to fuck, one a twenty-minute taxi ride away is the most convenient. 

It becomes a rhythm. She doesn’t come to any other shows. Never asks about them. Doesn’t care whether you’ve added to the setlist or banned the glitter she had licked off your neck in Zürich. 

You familiarise yourself with the hotels in St Albans. Soon, with her house and the code for her gate. 

You keep moving – Munich, Amsterdam, Budapest – but London seems to be a regenerative point. You appear, sleep with her, and fly back with the ache still between your thighs. Your shoes are always off by the time she closes her door, coat dropped in the hallway. She always tastes of the ridiculous berry-flavoured electrolyte drinks she keeps stocked in her fridge. She shoves them into your hands just before you leave. 

It is neither kindness nor a joke. It’s a parting gift. You are certain it is because she has been drilled to think about hydration levels like they bring impending doom. You’re not sure you will ever grow to like their bitter taste. 

And still, it continues. 

You don’t text her from Vienna. You don’t call from Prague. But she seems to know when you will be circling back. Somehow. Like a bad habit she disappointedly awaits. 

One night, she’s in Paris at the same time as you. You’re playing a sold-out arena where no one listens to the lyrics; she’s playing in a Champions League match and scores in the 78th minute. The timing is off, but you get her message before you go on stage. 

1-0. You’re welcome.

You had made the mistake of letting it slip that you’d grown up in a red-and-white household. You regret it, deeply. 

You reply with a photo of the crowd and a message following it that just says, Sold out. 

She doesn’t respond. That’s the way it is. 

You joke once, half-asleep in her sheets, wearing down the minutes remaining in the space between sex and your taxi arriving, that you have never seen her play.

She shrugs. “Why? You’d hate it.” 

“You don’t know that.” You’re a little offended – no idea why. You’ve been to a football match before. Your father is a Manchester City fan. He took you with his family. He couldn’t shield you from the glares of his wife. 

Leah only smirks and shakes her head, because she knows she doesn’t have to explain. There’s hardly time for you to disagree, anyway. 

Weeks later, you’re at her house again. She buzzes you through the gate without a word. You’re barely past the threshold before her hands are on your waist. Clothes drop like the pretence of formality. Then she veers left, not towards the stairs that lead to her bedroom. 

The corridor opens into a study.

No. 

A shrine. 

Clean white walls, soft lights, and a glass cabinet full of medals and trophies. Some still shine like they were won last night. 

She presses you against it, her mouth at your neck. You let it go for a moment, her tongue hot enough to counteract the cold surge of glass against your bare back, until you push her away, breathless. She blinks at the glint of her silverware. 

“Did you want to show them to me or something?” you ask. She freezes. Only slightly. “Because this isn’t the way to your bedroom, and I’ve heard that you do have a gigantic ego.” 

She laughs. Head thrown back, eyes rolling. 

“I don’t show them to anyone,” she says, though you find that hard to believe. 

“Then why are we fucking next to them?” 

“I didn’t expect you to stop me.” 

“I didn’t expect a detour through your autobiography.” 

She bites your shoulder lightly and guides you backwards out of the room, into the hallway, then the bedroom. You quell your curiosity. 

Her bedroom is dark but you can tell she tidied before you came; dirty clothes folded and piled on a chair, bed made only for the covers to be ripped off as she pushes you onto it. 

She’s on top of you, moving like she’s got time to waste – a lie, but she tells it well. Her mouth is on your collarbone and her hips grind into you with the smug rhythm of someone who knows exactly how much she’s already turned you on. 

You’re trying to focus, trying to stay in it, but something is itching at the back of your mind. 

Your gaze flickers to the doorway. 

“Wait,” you blurt out, hand almost leaving Leah’s waist to cover your mouth. 

Leah stills. “What?” 

You hesitate, hating the question that rests in your tongue. You say it anyway. “Which ones are with England and which are with Arsenal?”

She blinks down at you. Her face is flushed, breathing a little heavy, and for a second she just stares, absolutely blindsided. “Are you seriously…” Her mouth twitches. “You want a medal breakdown now?” 

You shrug beneath her, already grinning. Her forehead crinkles from unfettered irritation. “You dragged me into your trophy porn palace. I’m just trying to understand what’s fucking me.”

Another beat passes with Leah’s gormless stare. Then, she groans like you’re the most frustrating, irresistible thing she has ever met. “You’re unbelievable.” She rolls off you, griping about the mood being killed under her breath, but she’s laughing. And then, to your surprise, she grabs your wrist. “Come on.”

“No way.” 

But you’re halfway out of the bedroom. And she’s so excited, you can tell, although she tries not to be. 

Half-naked. Flushed. Barefoot. 

She nudges the door open and flicks on the light. You look around again like you hadn’t the first time – not breathless, not with your back pressed to cold glass, not with impatience. 

Leah crosses to the cabinet like muscle memory is pulling her there. She points. 

“These,” she says, knocking gently on one glass shelf, “are club-level. Arsenal. Most of the silver ones. That’s the Conti Cup. That’s the FA Cup.” She reaches into a drawer and takes out a box. “This is the community shield. Far from flashy, but it still counts.” 

You squint. “And that one?” you ask, nodding towards the only medal not inside the case. It looks as though it had been haplessly dropped in the chair tucked under a desk. You briefly wonder what on earth she needs a desk for. 

She turns, following your gaze, and you see the change in her face before she says anything. The medal’s ribbon is thick, the metal heavy. Sleek. Recent. And she looks at it with pride. A different kind to the other accolades she has shown you. 

“That one,” she says, stepping over, lifting it gently. “Champions League. We beat Barça in May.” You remember how Jess went to the match, invited you to come with. How you’d scoffed and said no. How your younger brother, with whom you’d replaced your friend, insisted he put it on in the background as a die-hard Arsenal fan unsatisfied by the men’s season. 

“It was 1-0, wasn’t it?”

She nods and then walks back to you with it, dangling it loosely in her hand. “I haven’t put it away yet.” 

You look at her. “Still parading it around?” 

She snorts. 

“I don’t know where it should go.” 

Her answer is more pragmatic than you had expected. Then again, any humility Leah shows you never fails to surprise. 

She’s standing too close now. You’re still topless, still wet, but suddenly this feels too intimate for sex. You glance down at the medal in her hand, then back up. “Are you going to let me wear it?” 

“You want to?” 

You shrug. “Might as well flex my pretend abs and bathe in fantastical glory.” 

That makes her laugh. Then, without ceremony, she reaches up and drops it over your head, letting the ribbon settle around your neck, the weight of the medal thunking against your chest. 

It’s heavier than you had assumed. She adjusts it slightly, fingertips brushing your skin.

“There.” Her voice is suddenly quieter than before. “You’re officially decorated.”

She’s smiling, teeth showing, lips parted proudly. Her eyes reflect the trophies behind you. She exudes a warmth that you know you shouldn’t be seeing. 

You look down at her lips. 

Your mind flashes red and angry but intrigued. Wanting. It feels as though you are being torn apart. 

It’s spectacular. It’s painful. 

It’s a terrible, terrible thought. 

Still, it comes fast and stupid and true. 

You’re in love with her. 

Leah’s hands find your waist, lips on your neck, teeth scraping past the medal adorning it. You gasp into her. You force your eyes shut.

…

“Is this sanitary?” 

You jump out of bed, hastily pulling on a t-shirt that has been left to grow creases on the floor. The girl you were just about to go down on hides her face under the covers. 

“Jess!” Your tone should be enough for her to leave the room, but she doesn’t. “How did you even get in here?” 

“Your manager gave me the second key. Said something about you needing to be interrupted.” 

Angrily, you plonk back down on the bed, crossing your legs as if restraining yourself from physically attacking her. The girl’s legs are folded into her stomach, and you feel a bit bad for her. 

“Jess, turn around so she can leave.” 

It’s a clear dismissal of the girl, whoever she is.

She obliges, sighing at the sound of zippers being done up and the wet kiss the girl presses to your cheek as she scurries out of your hotel room. Arms folded, eyes closed, she only waits for the door to close before swivelling on her heels and giving you whiplash. 

“As I said, is that sanitary?” You look at her as though you don’t get it. “Multiple sexual partners.” 

“I get checked.” 

“I mean in an emotional sense.” She frowns. “What happened between you and Leah?” 

“We still fuck. When I’m around.” But Jess isn’t entirely convinced by your blasé demeanour. You falter. “It’s just harder to get flights to London during this part of the tour.” 

She walks towards you slowly, brushing the sheets of the bed as though that will purge it of the bodily fluids, before sitting down and mirroring your position. For some reason, it is hard not to flinch. 

“What happened between you and Leah?” she repeats. 

“How did you know we were…?” 

“Leah told Alex.” Right. You suppose it never was an official secret. Perhaps you’re just a bit more private. Or you shout less about your conquests. 

“Nothing happened,” you finally say. “We still fuck.” 

Jess looks at you in a way that forces you to confront the disappointment in her eyes. As you stare helplessly, you notice the care that mixes with it. She’s worried about you. 

“Why haven’t you let her kiss you?”

The answer rolls off your tongue, automatic, reflexive. Insincere. “I don’t let anyone–” 

“But this is Leah.” 

She raises an eyebrow. You open your mouth, but nothing comes out at first. 

“We just fuck.” 

There’s a pause. Jess doesn’t argue, but she wears an expression that belongs to an observer watching a car crash in slow motion. You hate that look.

“Apparently with you wearing her Champions League medal.” 

You shift, uncomfortable. “It was hot,” you defend, more to the sheets than to her.

“It was personal,” she counters, not missing a beat. “And there’s nothing wrong with that.” 

You want to point out that there is. Explaining would be fruitless, however, since Jess has never understood why you refuse to attach yourself to other humans and you have never had the courage to fully come out with it. 

Instead, when faced with this challenge, you deflect. Your arms fold over your chest, your eyebrows knit together. “Do you have an actual reason to be here?”

“It’s the last show before your break.” 

You’d like to be annoyed but it’s sweet that she knows that. It’s sweet that she can see the exhaustion in your eyes and the fatigue that weighs down your bones. It’s sweet that Jess gets how important the break over Christmas will be. Christmas is far too complicated to be cocktailed with performing, anyway.

“I wanted to offer you an escape for your favourite holiday, too,” she says after a moment. Gently. Treading on cracking ice. “If you don’t have plans?” 

You hesitate. “I think I’m spending it with my father.” 

“He asked you to?” 

“Well, Stephen and my mother are in the Maldives. Cecily is in New York.” The days of opening presents around the ostentatiously large tree are long gone. Your little sister perhaps wishes for the memories to linger, like of the Rockefeller and skiing with your step-father’s American friends. “God knows where our darling brother is. And so Johnny asked me and I agreed.” 

“That’s good!” She tried to be enthusiastic. 

You know she means it kindly, but the strained positivity make your throat feel tight. There’s no easy way to convey the place this second ‘home’ holds in your life — awkward dinners, a half-decorated room, forced attempts at wanting to be there. Your father’s wife still winces when she sees you, refuses to ever join the boys if they go to one of your shows. She can’t bear the reminder of her heartbreak. You can’t bear the scorch of your parents’ mistakes. 

Jess is watching you now and you realise that your silence has revealed far too much. She was already scrutinising you, aware of the situation, but now you have really exposed yourself. 

“I didn’t mean—” she starts.

“No, I know,” you cut in, voice a sharpened blade ready to kill this topic. You shake your head. “It is good. It’s good.” 

It isn’t. Not really. But it’s better than spending Christmas alone. Or worse… trying to invent an excuse for ending up in London just to perhaps see Leah again. 

You’re not sure what that would even look like. She’s probably let you in without asking why. Probably have one of those godawful drinks in hand as though she has been expecting you. Probably would have been. 

Jess sighs and stands. “Okay. Well, I said what I came to say.” 

You nod. 

She walks to the door and pauses, hand hovering over the handle. This time, her voice is softer. 

“You know you’re allowed to want something more, right?” 

You swallow. “What if I don’t?” 

She gives you a look that has had its frustration sucked out and replaced. You know she can see through you, as though your skin were transparent and your organs on show. Your heart on show. 

And then she leaves. 

…

You see Leah again in late January. 

The new year rolls in with fog and conflicted emotions. A kiss with a stranger — a man, just so it wouldn’t mean anything. A brief respite between a family that’s not yours and the intensity of the tour. 

That is until the emails start flooding in from people who you pay to care about your schedule. Demands, requests, suggestions. Chords to new songs with pleas for lyrics. 

You’re meant to be writing. Everyone expects you to be writing.

But you can’t. 

Then, the tour picks up again. The crowds are delighted and entertained, and the glitter never really washes out. With the rhythm comes the need to escape. You’re on a lead and the collar is itching. 

No one questions you when you ask for a layover in London. 

She answers your text in twenty minutes. 

You’re in London? 

Technically, you’re supposed to be elsewhere. 

I’ve got training tomorrow. Early. 

It means nothing, which you know. 

I haven’t changed my gate code.

You know this too. 

It isn’t long until Leah is pressing you against the inside of her front door, teeth desperately scraping your neck as if she has missed you. You slide your hands under the back of her training top (she has only just returned) and she gasps at the feeling (your hands are cold from the biting wind outside). 

You want her to gasp like that every second of every minute. Every minute of every hour. 

You want her to devour you. To free you. To trap you. 

You want her to fuck you until nothing else matters and it is just you in Leah’s bed, naked and wet, sweating and moaning and writhing until she makes you come. 

And. Well. 

You want her to kiss you. 

She is leading you to her bedroom, hand in yours, hair tousled. She doesn’t check to see if you’re still following, even when she drops your hand to pull off her clothes. She’s practical. Efficient. 

You’re standing there like a lemon. 

You only realise when Leah gives you a puzzled look, a flash of vulnerability crossing her face when she notices you haven’t copied her. 

“Are you okay?” she asks, and she shouldn’t have done that.

She really shouldn’t have. 

“Leah…” It comes out splintered, hoarse. 

For a moment, she hesitates, as if deciding whether or not to pry. But she does, because she can. Because you’d tell her. “What’s wrong?” 

“The rule.” 

Leah’s brows draw together. “Yeah, I know the rules.” 

You swallow hard, still fully clothed, still frozen. You shake your head. “No, I know you know the rules.” She moves towards you, a hornier version of a shrug, prepared to carry on. You shake your head again. “I don’t kiss the people I sleep with. I never have.” 

Her jaw tenses. “Okay,” she says, slowly. “I kind of figured that out.” 

You look away. The words don’t come easily. “Kissing is different, you know? It’s not like the rest of it. It’s… more dangerous. Or something.” 

You hear Leah’s breath hitch quietly, but she says nothing. 

“I know that sounds stupid,” you murmur. 

“No,” she says. “It doesn’t.”

Her eyes are calm. Understanding. Settled on you like that is where they belong. 

Her eyes are beautiful, you suddenly think to yourself. 

“Leah,” you start, and it’s so quiet it almost doesn’t count. “I want to.” 

Leah blinks. “You… want to kiss me?” 

No one can know about this. 

No one can know, you decide, even as she closes the distance between you, fingertips brushing lightly against your collarbone. She lets her fingers trail upwards, just barely grazing your jaw. 

“Are you sure?” 

You nod. It’s small, but it’s there. 

She smells like wind and perfume and the conditioner she pretends not to care about. You must smell like an aeroplane and cigarettes, and maybe the coffee you had with your salad at lunch. 

Leah doesn’t seem to mind. 

Your eyes flutter shut. 

When Leah kisses you, you feel as though you have lost the game. 

[randombush3]

Let me get what I want part 3 like asap. Real talk. The people want what they want. grant us with your gracious gorgeous fic. Please…. Like pretty please 🙏🙏

Heheheehhe soon

I want it to be good and dense x

[randombush3]

five stars x

let me get what i want

leah williamson x reader

part 2 to this

summary: you meet leah in a VIP bar and can't decide what to do with her

words: 4106

content warnings: smut, mentions of drugs

notes: ok here is part 2. thank @p0orbaby for the smut because i couldn't do it 😵‍💫

Leah’s knee brushes yours as she leans over to grab a beer. You’re sitting on the woven rug outside her yurt – part of those pop-up hotels that are more wood and electricity than flimsy tent poles – and the conversation is still going. It’s about one in the morning. The diffusers dotted around the field have done little to mask the smell of mud and grass. 

You don’t know when you were led here. Perhaps it was during the migration from the mainstage to the bars. Perhaps she had taken your hand and pulled you through the crowd, losing the rest of your company in the process. 

Leah is bold in a different way to you. You get what you want. You take without giving back. But she… convinces. Ensnares. Waits like a leopard perched in thick branches, stalking its prey until the perfect opportunity arises. 

It’s difficult not to bring it up. You should mock her the way she’s playing host in her little den, practicing xenia like a devout Ancient Greek, but the words die in your throat.

The pretence has been abandoned now. 

“LSD?” 

You’re currently listing the drugs you have done between you. Interestingly, the athlete has tried cocaine. Two years ago, sometime in the off-season. Says she gets why people are addicted to it. 

She shakes her head, taking a sip of her drink which technically disrupts the nature of never-have-I-ever. You’d have thought she’d follow every rule. Leah’s a captain. A footballer. Breaking rules is supposed to be sacrilege. “You have?” 

“I thought we’d established I was going to win.” 

Her spirit is competitive and you see her jaw tense at the notion of losing. You’re not going to admit that in the grand scheme of things, she isn’t. 

“Did your parents never… find out?” she asks, and her syllables are slurred but the nosiness is loud and clear. “Mine would have clocked. Immediately.” 

You say, “they knew. They didn’t care.” 

Leah laughs like that’s funny, like there’s something charming about that particular kind of glamorously-dressed neglect. Her laugh is too big for her mouth. It doesn’t match the rest of her: the sleekness, the discipline, the control. 

She shifts closer. 

Her hand grazes your thigh. Stays there as she leans to set down her drink. Casual, confident, asking you to notice but not pointing it out. 

This is the point where people usually lie to themselves. They construct a fantasy where this is chemistry or a connection. Where it’s romantic and life-changing – as if sex ever is – and that the memory will be surrounded by an imaginary shrine. You don’t like lying, though. You like practicality, efficiency. You like getting what was needed, avoiding the superfluous. 

All you’re thinking about is logistics: how close the bed is, whether the yurt’s walls will muffle sound, whether she’ll want you to stay after. 

Her fingers splay out to hold your knee, as if she is determined to not let you disappear. She’s not being subtle. 

You don’t move. But when she leans in, slow and trying to read you, your hand goes to her shoulder to parry her away. Not forceful. Not mean. But a rejection, of sorts. 

“No,” you say and your voice does not waver. “You can’t kiss me.” 

That does it. She’s unaware of your general rule, so you don’t blame her for recoiling like she has touched something sharp. You watch her recalibrate, eyes darting from your lips to the rest of the field, mouth parted in a half-formed apology. She wears that awkward expression – fuck, did I read this wrong? – and it makes something in you flicker. It’s not quite guilt. 

Her mouth widens, words bubbling at the back of her throat. 

You get there first. 

“Don’t worry. You can still fuck me.” 

A beat. Her blush deepens, pooling high on her cheeks. She looks like she has forgotten how to smile. She swallows and her gaze steadies again. 

Leah is trying to recover. 

Her jaw sets. Shoulders straighten. 

You’ve already decided this is the last time you’ll see her. She doesn’t know it yet. She probably won’t until you’re gone. Not that it’s your problem; you never made her a promise. 

This is just a transaction. Clean. Contained. Predictable. 

A rare occurrence at 1AM at a festival, but one that you deal in with expertise and precision.

By morning, you will be out of here, high in the sky above this tiny island. Your tour of Europe starts in four days. There’ll be plenty of other women to fill plenty more nights like these.

And Leah is already moving again, this time with certainty. 

You don’t stop her. 

You stand only when she does. No ritual, no ceremony. She takes your hand. Functional – she’s learning. 

It’s dark inside and the threshold lip is steep. Her grip is warm, though. Dry. It occurs to you that, between various escalations of alcohol percentages, she hasn’t stopped drinking water all night. Her discipline is far from enviable. 

The inside of the yurt is less curated than you expected. Her suitcase contains folded clothes, but beside it crumpled fabric piles up. Her wellies are crusted with dried mud, set by the door. There’s a book next to the bed (what kind of PR-manager-pet brings a book about leadership to a festival?) that looks partially read, front cover weighed down by a half-eaten protein bar. A pair of compression socks hangs over the footboard of the double bed that takes up most of her £3000 real estate.  

She hesitates near the bed. Shirks under your blatant judgement of her space. Straightens as though to remind herself she shouldn’t care.

You walk past her. Sit. Your fingers deftly untie your boots; deliberately, calmly. You don’t look up as you say, “I didn’t think you’d be nervous, Leah.” You’re sure many women have thrown themselves at her. The allure of fame and stadia and superficial relationships with money… it must be like wasps to a toddler’s melting ice-lolly. 

“I’m not nervous,” she says, and she almost pulls it off. Almost. 

It’s a tiny wobble in her tone that betrays her. You don’t mention it, but you keep score. 

You lean back on your hands, head tilting to look at her fully now. She hasn’t moved yet, still standing beside the bed like she is trying to decide whether she should unlock Pandora’s box. The look is familiar. She’s trying to convince herself that this doesn’t mean anything. That if she keeps her hands steady and her mouth shut, it won’t.

You want to help her. Not out of kindness, but rather impatience. A clean break. 

“I’m not going to stay,” you say. “If that’s what you were wondering.” 

She exhales. It could be relief. 

“Didn’t ask you to,” she replies. 

You nod. That’s that. 

There are footsteps outside the yurt – someone is staggering past with the elegance of a drunk zombie, probably heading back to a stranger’s bed. Neither of you look. Her eyes are trained on yours, as though she is willing you to forget that the world is still turning. You want to forget. 

Leah steps forwards, pulling her tank top over her head in a single, efficient movement. No fanfare. 

You stand again. For a moment, you think you see her frown.

By the time you touch her, everything else has left the room. You’re both dead and alive, here and not. As soon as this starts – and it already has – you will be free. Just for a moment, for a sweet, sweet moment. 

You breathe out like it’s your last. 

Her skin is warm. Tense in places. You can feel the edge of control she is refusing to let go of and the hard sinew of muscles which should intimidate but don’t. You wonder if she fucks like a footballer – how do they do it? If it’s good, you might develop a taste for it.

She watches you as you undress, gaze unashamed but quiet. She’s curious, not worshipful. Your body is not her new altar. You are not her new religion. And that’s good, because you’d hate that. 

You don’t speak again. There’s nothing left to clarify. 

Her hands wrap around your forearms as steps into the gap between you. She’s confident again, earlier hesitation long erased. Her fingers settle at your waist – firm, controlled. This competence was not unexpected. You remain unimpressed. 

Your back hits the bed. You let it. The covers are still warm from where you sat down, and the air is cool against your skin. You’re left lying there for a moment, no body surrounding yours, not yet. 

Then her mouth is on you. The bed sinks lower where her weight falls as she straddles your waist. She kisses your stomach, your ribs, the flesh of your chest left exposed by your skimpy bra. 

Her mouth is hot. Too slow. Too careful. Each movement calculated, precision replacing hunger. 

Irritated and impatient, you arch your back. It’s a clear hint, yet her tongue continues to glide over your sternum as though she wants to change the pH of your skin. She’s being too careful, and you don’t believe in half-measures. You’re not some precious thing she can’t afford to crack. You hate that it feels that way. You’re not a thing. Neither are you precious. Neither is this anything worth handling with care. 

You will Leah to get it: you’re here because you’re horny and bored. She’s beautiful and she will do. 

Your hand grabs her hair, grip tight. You twist until she lets out a sound – low, strained, the first real thing she’s offered. Better, comes your brief satisfaction. 

“Think less,” you say, voice flat, not a command but not far off. She takes it like one anyway. Her mouth opens wider. Her teeth graze your rib, harder this time. Not gentle, not sweet. You loosen your grip and drop your arm. The bed shifts beneath you as she lowers herself, lips dragging down over the curve of your chest. She mouths at your bra, wet tongue pressing through the lace. She lingers at the edge of your nipple, sucks it through the fabric, tongue flattening hard over it. 

Your fingers stretch the elastic of your knickers as you shove them past your knee, letting them fall off the edge of the bed. She unclasps your bra, and suddenly you’re naked. You breathe heavily at the thought – anticipating something, despite it seeming rather ambitious with her pace. You can already feel the way she’s looking at you, seconds elongating so that she can stare more. She looks like she wants to memorise everything. Tragic, really. It’s just a fuck. 

She hooks her fingers under the waistband of her own shorts, yanking them down unceremoniously. You scoff as you see the pair of Calvins she’s wearing underneath. She’s half-dressed now, straddling you, the air still damp with the smell of rain and sweat and smoke from two-thousand cigarettes. 

When her fingers touch you, finally, you don’t gasp. 

You make a noise low in your throat. Disappointed at first, then distracted, then something else. Her fingers drag through slickness and quickly find a rhythm. She adjust and fine-tunes and repeats like a battle strategist with a tactics board – slow, precise, greedy for information. You hate how good she is at this.

Your head tips back. Her fingers curl just right. Her thumb is on your clit now, soft pressure, then firmer. She watches your face. Shameless. Focused. It’s a deliberate assault. She’s trying to win. 

Her fingers move again, exploiting the angle until you are forced to grace her with a whine of appreciation. Your body is responding without thought and you can hear it: wet and sticky, every push inside louder than the last.

Her eyes meet yours. You hold her gaze. 

“Show-off,” you mutter.

“Say that again when I’ve made you come all over my fucking face.” 

She pulls out with a slick pop. 

Before you protest, her mouth replaces her fingers. 

Your hips jerk. Your legs spread wider. You swear. 

She doesn’t stop. She groans against you. The sound sends a pulse through your being. 

You grab her hair again, forcing her closer, holding her where she is. Her tongue circles once, twice, and then pressed flat, dragging. She sucks. She buries her face between your thighs. Her tongue is relentless, like she needs this, like she’ll take it all. 

You moan loudly. No attempts are made to muffle it. 

Like a reward, she fucks you with two fingers again, tongue working your clit while she curls inside you. She pushes hard. You’re soaked – her chin’s wet. 

You bury one hand in the sheets and the other in her hair. The sheets are wet too. Her tongue moves against you. It’s obscenely good.

This is making you hate her. You’re half-inclined to let her know. 

You don’t. 

You let your body speak instead. It twitches and rises, pressing into her mouth with newfound desperation. 

“Fuck,” you hiss through your teeth. You don’t mean to, but the gasp that follows is of her name.

You feel her smirk. As you cry out again, you glance downwards to see her hand thrusting in and out and her mouth flush between your thighs. You want to burn the image into your skull. 

You are not sentimental, but she looks so fucking good down there. Like it’s where she belongs.

You fuck yourself onto her hand and let yourself make noise. There’s no point holding back – she’s earning it. And the coil inside you pulls tighter because of it. Sharp. Hot. 

Your thighs begin to shake.

She’s wrecking you.

Her tongue flicks, flattens. Her fingers thrust faster. She angles her wrist, hitting the spot hard. She doesn’t stop. 

You cry out. You can’t hold it; it’s ripping through you. 

You come with a broken, sharp breath.

Jerk. Clench. Release. 

Your eyes squeeze shut. 

And still, she does not stop. 

You’re overstimulated; nerves screaming, thighs twitching, but she does not fucking stop. Her mouth is wet, tongue merciless. It’s unbearable and too much and perfect all at once. 

She groans, licks again, and pushes deeper. 

You shove at her shoulder. “Okay – fuck, okay.” The only sound you can hear now is the thrum of your pulse in your ears. 

Leah stops, pulling her fingers out. Your wetness is smeared all over her face and she shines like she has just been polished with it. She licks her lips. 

For a moment, she is looking at you and you are looking at her. Your chests rise and fall. Your breathing mingles into one satisfied chant of exertion. 

Propping yourself up on your elbows, you address the wild eyes and messy hair. “You done?” 

She shakes her head. “Not even slightly.” 

You raise your eyebrows. She crawls over you again. Kisses your neck – just about avoiding your lips as you turn your head slightly. 

“Take them off,” you say between her biting down on your collarbone and her grinding her hard, lean body against yours. She makes no move to follow the order. Your jaw clenches. “Take the fucking pants off now, Leah. Or I’ll do it for you.”

…

This time, the glitter is not going to come out.

“I said no to the glitter cannons, didn’t I?” Your question is pointed as you and your manager march back to the greenroom, her assistant tentatively handing you a water bottle, recognising this warpath. “In fact, I’m sure I even reviewed it–” 

“We thought it might be boring without them.” 

“Boring?”

Your voice reaches a pitch that indicates your offence, fingers ruthless as you scratch through the layers of hairspray to loosen some of the bastard little glitter particles from your scalp. It’s not very nonchalant but you’re annoyed and tired and you’re already growing sick of the tour. Zürich, Switzerland. One quarter down. August is only seconds away. 

You slam the bottle of water onto the greenroom table and glare at the assistant, who startles like you’ve hurled it at him. “Could I have a towel?” He jumps into frenzied action but doesn’t quite know what to do. “Warm. Not one of those threadbare things from catering.” 

Another crony follows him as he bolts out the door. 

Your manager, seasoned in your moods by now, just sighs and takes a seat. Her phone is already out. She’s probably texting someone to apologise on your behalf, or crafting a well-timed tweet. You don’t care. You’re too busy yanking off your boots, making the beige carpet sparkle fucking blue. 

Zürich was loud. Glossy. The crowd was ravenous, excited to add you to their events calendar. You’d fed them what they wanted: your voice, your body, your image. Except their screams did not fill the hollowness of the stage. And that glitter had pushed it over the edge. 

You grab a makeup wipe and press it against your eyes, dragging your mascara sideways across your temple. “I feel like a fucking firework.” 

Your manager doesn’t look up. “You’re a pop star. It’s part of the job.”

“I hadn’t realised my title was synonymous with ‘disco ball’.” 

You throw the spent wipe into the bin and reach for another. You’re supposed to have people to do this for you but you suspect one of those devious texts your manager has been sending was to alert your team to leave you alone. At least for the moment. 

“You said yes to the new visuals.” 

“I said yes to minimal pyrotechnics and some fog.” Even then, that had felt unnecessary. “Glitter is not fog.”

She shrugs, one shoulder rising. “They loved it.” 

You make a sound of disgust. “Of course they did.” 

You lean back in the chair, muscles tight from the performance and tension and barely-slept nights. Your mind, however, is clear. Or, more accurately, emptying. 

Time moves too quickly. 

There had been no note. No lingering kiss to the temple. Just silence and the early rustlings of a hungover festival field. An easy severance.

And then Zürich. 

And this. 

The assistant returns, mercifully, with a towel. It’s warm and fluffy and folded like a hotel robe, and you accept it with a nod. Your face welcomes the material and your neck itches for the same treatment. The towel pulls away just as a sparkly as the carpet. 

There’s a knock on the door. Your tour photographer peeks his head in, camera still dangling from his neck. “Hey,” he starts, knowing he walking into the lion’s den, “quick question: you okay with us using the shot from the second chorus as the official still? The one with the glitter–” 

“No,” you cut in sharply. 

He blinks. “Oh.” He clasps his hands together in supplication but he doesn’t push. You glare. “Uh. Got it. Cool.” 

The door clicks shut behind him. You press the towel to your eyes and let yourself breathe, hard and slow. 

You are not sentimental. You keep reminding yourself of that. 

Another knock sounds. 

“I already told you!” you shout so the stupid photographer can get it into his stupid head. “I don’t–” 

A phone is thrust in your face. You don’t know to whom the hand belongs. A voice comes with it. “I’m sorry. She said it was urgent.” 

You glance at the caller ID, quickly recognising the device as your own as well, before pressing the phone to your ear. 

“I literally just finished,” you grumble, anger still bubbling but ebbing just in case Jess isn’t lying. She could need you and you’re not a terrible friend. 

“Alex is cross with you.” 

“What?” Your manager’s head turns, ears perking up at your loud confusion. She raises an eyebrow but you shake your head, signalling she continue her damage control of the tempest you are going cause. 

Jess repeats what she said. 

“No, I fucking got it. But why? What have I done?” 

“Well,” Jess says, and it makes you fairly certain that she is projecting. “She’s cross with me.” Point proven. “BECAUSE of you.” 

“I haven’t done–” 

“Leah’s in Zürich.”

You dismiss it. You need to get to the root of the problem without superfluous facts about a woman you slept with drunk and high at Glasto. 

“Why is Alex cross with me?” 

Jess, from the other end of the phone, sighs with the theatrical flair only she can get away with. Sometimes you really do consider blocking her. “Because you slept with her best friend a month ago and then vanished like a ghost.” 

You force a blink, wincing as another fucking glitter particle scratches your red eyes. The towel drops to your lap as you sit up straighter in the chair. 

“I didn’t vanish,” you say. You don’t have superpowers. “I left.” 

“That’s vanishing, babe.” 

“She knew what it was.” 

She did. She must have. She was still asleep when you woke up and if she heard you escape, she didn’t plead with you to stay.

But still, Jess snorts. “Did she? Because from what I’ve heard, it sounds like you left a very hot, very flustered England captain high and dry in a yurt.” 

You’re too tired to correct her second adjective. Instead, you close your eyes, fingers pinching the bridge of your nose.

“I told her not to kiss me.” 

“Yeah. And then you let her eat you out like it was a Champions League final.”

You don’t dignify her crudeness with a response. Fucking footballers and their brainwashed girlfriends. 

Even though she has reduced herself to sports-related similes, Jess manages to take the silence as a victory.

“She’s not upset,” she continues, and you’re glad she doesn’t say her name. “Just… prickly about it. You fucked with her pride, I think. Thought I’d let you know because Alex is threatening to somehow find a string to pull and cancel your Wembley show if you don’t at least text her.” You exhale softly. “Alex only found out that she was going to your concert through the woman she’s here with.” 

Probably another footballer. Surely Leah doesn’t need your shabby company and forced text messages if she is able to enjoy a nice night-out in Zürich with a friend.

“Alex doesn’t scare me,” you reply indignantly, because the rest is too much to address. Not all of your one-night-stands have been left content with you just moving on, but you had assumed that with Leah it would have been different. 

It was a good night. Why would she want to stain its memory? 

“Okay, well, she fucking scares me, so…” 

You glance at yourself in the mirror. Glitter in your hair. Sweat at your temples. Lips chapped. 

Leah has watched you tonight. 

This is why you draw the fucking lines. 

“I’m going to Munich in two days,” you mutter. 

“That gives you forty-eight hours to grow a conscience. Or at least the decency to say, ‘thanks for the mind-blowing orgasms’.” 

Your jaw clenches. “It was just a fuck.”

Jess wants to say something – you can hear her mouth open. The words catch in her throat. She retracts them for rephrasing. 

There’s a beat while she does this. Your manager points at her watch and motions for you to hurry up, sensing the privacy of the conversation but interested in herding you to the dressing room so that you can be de-glamoured and everyone can go back to the hotel. 

“Leah doesn’t know the rules yet.” 

You hate how she uses the word ‘yet’. You don’t want her to know the rules. You don’t want her to think there are rules. 

Because rules imply a pattern. 

And patterns imply that you and Leah will have sex again. 

“Do you want me to say something?” Jess asks gently. “To smooth it over?” 

You stare at your reflection, slightly horrified by it. 

“No,” you say. 

“Then text her.” 

“I don’t have her number.” 

Jess’ sigh is profound and visceral, felt in her bones. Your manager hears it and laughs.

“I’ve just sent it to you,” comes Jess’ verbalised exasperation. When you fail to respond, she continues, stifling a yawn. “Anyway. Congrats on another killer night. I love you, I’m proud of you. Try to sleep.” 

She hangs up and you’re not sure who won that battle. 

Your manager clears her throat and you follow her to the dressing room. 

You sit in silence as they professionally melt everything off you until you feel human again. 

Type. 

Delete. 

Type again. 

Eventually, you settle on: you were good. 

Then, after a pause, because something in you – not guilt – twinges…

Thanks.

You hit send and hope Jess gave you the wrong number.

[randombush3]

Is there gonna be a part 3 or is this the last one?

I'm working on part three right now!!!!

[randombush3]

let me get what i want

leah williamson x reader

part 2 to this

summary: you meet leah in a VIP bar and can't decide what to do with her

words: 4106

content warnings: smut, mentions of drugs

notes: ok here is part 2. thank @p0orbaby for the smut because i couldn't do it 😵‍💫

Leah’s knee brushes yours as she leans over to grab a beer. You’re sitting on the woven rug outside her yurt – part of those pop-up hotels that are more wood and electricity than flimsy tent poles – and the conversation is still going. It’s about one in the morning. The diffusers dotted around the field have done little to mask the smell of mud and grass. 

You don’t know when you were led here. Perhaps it was during the migration from the mainstage to the bars. Perhaps she had taken your hand and pulled you through the crowd, losing the rest of your company in the process. 

Leah is bold in a different way to you. You get what you want. You take without giving back. But she… convinces. Ensnares. Waits like a leopard perched in thick branches, stalking its prey until the perfect opportunity arises. 

It’s difficult not to bring it up. You should mock her the way she’s playing host in her little den, practicing xenia like a devout Ancient Greek, but the words die in your throat.

The pretence has been abandoned now. 

“LSD?” 

You’re currently listing the drugs you have done between you. Interestingly, the athlete has tried cocaine. Two years ago, sometime in the off-season. Says she gets why people are addicted to it. 

She shakes her head, taking a sip of her drink which technically disrupts the nature of never-have-I-ever. You’d have thought she’d follow every rule. Leah’s a captain. A footballer. Breaking rules is supposed to be sacrilege. “You have?” 

“I thought we’d established I was going to win.” 

Her spirit is competitive and you see her jaw tense at the notion of losing. You’re not going to admit that in the grand scheme of things, she isn’t. 

“Did your parents never… find out?” she asks, and her syllables are slurred but the nosiness is loud and clear. “Mine would have clocked. Immediately.” 

You say, “they knew. They didn’t care.” 

Leah laughs like that’s funny, like there’s something charming about that particular kind of glamorously-dressed neglect. Her laugh is too big for her mouth. It doesn’t match the rest of her: the sleekness, the discipline, the control. 

She shifts closer. 

Her hand grazes your thigh. Stays there as she leans to set down her drink. Casual, confident, asking you to notice but not pointing it out. 

This is the point where people usually lie to themselves. They construct a fantasy where this is chemistry or a connection. Where it’s romantic and life-changing – as if sex ever is – and that the memory will be surrounded by an imaginary shrine. You don’t like lying, though. You like practicality, efficiency. You like getting what was needed, avoiding the superfluous. 

All you’re thinking about is logistics: how close the bed is, whether the yurt’s walls will muffle sound, whether she’ll want you to stay after. 

Her fingers splay out to hold your knee, as if she is determined to not let you disappear. She’s not being subtle. 

You don’t move. But when she leans in, slow and trying to read you, your hand goes to her shoulder to parry her away. Not forceful. Not mean. But a rejection, of sorts. 

“No,” you say and your voice does not waver. “You can’t kiss me.” 

That does it. She’s unaware of your general rule, so you don’t blame her for recoiling like she has touched something sharp. You watch her recalibrate, eyes darting from your lips to the rest of the field, mouth parted in a half-formed apology. She wears that awkward expression – fuck, did I read this wrong? – and it makes something in you flicker. It’s not quite guilt. 

Her mouth widens, words bubbling at the back of her throat. 

You get there first. 

“Don’t worry. You can still fuck me.” 

A beat. Her blush deepens, pooling high on her cheeks. She looks like she has forgotten how to smile. She swallows and her gaze steadies again. 

Leah is trying to recover. 

Her jaw sets. Shoulders straighten. 

You’ve already decided this is the last time you’ll see her. She doesn’t know it yet. She probably won’t until you’re gone. Not that it’s your problem; you never made her a promise. 

This is just a transaction. Clean. Contained. Predictable. 

A rare occurrence at 1AM at a festival, but one that you deal in with expertise and precision.

By morning, you will be out of here, high in the sky above this tiny island. Your tour of Europe starts in four days. There’ll be plenty of other women to fill plenty more nights like these.

And Leah is already moving again, this time with certainty. 

You don’t stop her. 

You stand only when she does. No ritual, no ceremony. She takes your hand. Functional – she’s learning. 

It’s dark inside and the threshold lip is steep. Her grip is warm, though. Dry. It occurs to you that, between various escalations of alcohol percentages, she hasn’t stopped drinking water all night. Her discipline is far from enviable. 

The inside of the yurt is less curated than you expected. Her suitcase contains folded clothes, but beside it crumpled fabric piles up. Her wellies are crusted with dried mud, set by the door. There’s a book next to the bed (what kind of PR-manager-pet brings a book about leadership to a festival?) that looks partially read, front cover weighed down by a half-eaten protein bar. A pair of compression socks hangs over the footboard of the double bed that takes up most of her £3000 real estate.  

She hesitates near the bed. Shirks under your blatant judgement of her space. Straightens as though to remind herself she shouldn’t care.

You walk past her. Sit. Your fingers deftly untie your boots; deliberately, calmly. You don’t look up as you say, “I didn’t think you’d be nervous, Leah.” You’re sure many women have thrown themselves at her. The allure of fame and stadia and superficial relationships with money… it must be like wasps to a toddler’s melting ice-lolly. 

“I’m not nervous,” she says, and she almost pulls it off. Almost. 

It’s a tiny wobble in her tone that betrays her. You don’t mention it, but you keep score. 

You lean back on your hands, head tilting to look at her fully now. She hasn’t moved yet, still standing beside the bed like she is trying to decide whether she should unlock Pandora’s box. The look is familiar. She’s trying to convince herself that this doesn’t mean anything. That if she keeps her hands steady and her mouth shut, it won’t.

You want to help her. Not out of kindness, but rather impatience. A clean break. 

“I’m not going to stay,” you say. “If that’s what you were wondering.” 

She exhales. It could be relief. 

“Didn’t ask you to,” she replies. 

You nod. That’s that. 

There are footsteps outside the yurt – someone is staggering past with the elegance of a drunk zombie, probably heading back to a stranger’s bed. Neither of you look. Her eyes are trained on yours, as though she is willing you to forget that the world is still turning. You want to forget. 

Leah steps forwards, pulling her tank top over her head in a single, efficient movement. No fanfare. 

You stand again. For a moment, you think you see her frown.

By the time you touch her, everything else has left the room. You’re both dead and alive, here and not. As soon as this starts – and it already has – you will be free. Just for a moment, for a sweet, sweet moment. 

You breathe out like it’s your last. 

Her skin is warm. Tense in places. You can feel the edge of control she is refusing to let go of and the hard sinew of muscles which should intimidate but don’t. You wonder if she fucks like a footballer – how do they do it? If it’s good, you might develop a taste for it.

She watches you as you undress, gaze unashamed but quiet. She’s curious, not worshipful. Your body is not her new altar. You are not her new religion. And that’s good, because you’d hate that. 

You don’t speak again. There’s nothing left to clarify. 

Her hands wrap around your forearms as steps into the gap between you. She’s confident again, earlier hesitation long erased. Her fingers settle at your waist – firm, controlled. This competence was not unexpected. You remain unimpressed. 

Your back hits the bed. You let it. The covers are still warm from where you sat down, and the air is cool against your skin. You’re left lying there for a moment, no body surrounding yours, not yet. 

Then her mouth is on you. The bed sinks lower where her weight falls as she straddles your waist. She kisses your stomach, your ribs, the flesh of your chest left exposed by your skimpy bra. 

Her mouth is hot. Too slow. Too careful. Each movement calculated, precision replacing hunger. 

Irritated and impatient, you arch your back. It’s a clear hint, yet her tongue continues to glide over your sternum as though she wants to change the pH of your skin. She’s being too careful, and you don’t believe in half-measures. You’re not some precious thing she can’t afford to crack. You hate that it feels that way. You’re not a thing. Neither are you precious. Neither is this anything worth handling with care. 

You will Leah to get it: you’re here because you’re horny and bored. She’s beautiful and she will do. 

Your hand grabs her hair, grip tight. You twist until she lets out a sound – low, strained, the first real thing she’s offered. Better, comes your brief satisfaction. 

“Think less,” you say, voice flat, not a command but not far off. She takes it like one anyway. Her mouth opens wider. Her teeth graze your rib, harder this time. Not gentle, not sweet. You loosen your grip and drop your arm. The bed shifts beneath you as she lowers herself, lips dragging down over the curve of your chest. She mouths at your bra, wet tongue pressing through the lace. She lingers at the edge of your nipple, sucks it through the fabric, tongue flattening hard over it. 

Your fingers stretch the elastic of your knickers as you shove them past your knee, letting them fall off the edge of the bed. She unclasps your bra, and suddenly you’re naked. You breathe heavily at the thought – anticipating something, despite it seeming rather ambitious with her pace. You can already feel the way she’s looking at you, seconds elongating so that she can stare more. She looks like she wants to memorise everything. Tragic, really. It’s just a fuck. 

She hooks her fingers under the waistband of her own shorts, yanking them down unceremoniously. You scoff as you see the pair of Calvins she’s wearing underneath. She’s half-dressed now, straddling you, the air still damp with the smell of rain and sweat and smoke from two-thousand cigarettes. 

When her fingers touch you, finally, you don’t gasp. 

You make a noise low in your throat. Disappointed at first, then distracted, then something else. Her fingers drag through slickness and quickly find a rhythm. She adjust and fine-tunes and repeats like a battle strategist with a tactics board – slow, precise, greedy for information. You hate how good she is at this.

Your head tips back. Her fingers curl just right. Her thumb is on your clit now, soft pressure, then firmer. She watches your face. Shameless. Focused. It’s a deliberate assault. She’s trying to win. 

Her fingers move again, exploiting the angle until you are forced to grace her with a whine of appreciation. Your body is responding without thought and you can hear it: wet and sticky, every push inside louder than the last.

Her eyes meet yours. You hold her gaze. 

“Show-off,” you mutter.

“Say that again when I’ve made you come all over my fucking face.” 

She pulls out with a slick pop. 

Before you protest, her mouth replaces her fingers. 

Your hips jerk. Your legs spread wider. You swear. 

She doesn’t stop. She groans against you. The sound sends a pulse through your being. 

You grab her hair again, forcing her closer, holding her where she is. Her tongue circles once, twice, and then pressed flat, dragging. She sucks. She buries her face between your thighs. Her tongue is relentless, like she needs this, like she’ll take it all. 

You moan loudly. No attempts are made to muffle it. 

Like a reward, she fucks you with two fingers again, tongue working your clit while she curls inside you. She pushes hard. You’re soaked – her chin’s wet. 

You bury one hand in the sheets and the other in her hair. The sheets are wet too. Her tongue moves against you. It’s obscenely good.

This is making you hate her. You’re half-inclined to let her know. 

You don’t. 

You let your body speak instead. It twitches and rises, pressing into her mouth with newfound desperation. 

“Fuck,” you hiss through your teeth. You don’t mean to, but the gasp that follows is of her name.

You feel her smirk. As you cry out again, you glance downwards to see her hand thrusting in and out and her mouth flush between your thighs. You want to burn the image into your skull. 

You are not sentimental, but she looks so fucking good down there. Like it’s where she belongs.

You fuck yourself onto her hand and let yourself make noise. There’s no point holding back – she’s earning it. And the coil inside you pulls tighter because of it. Sharp. Hot. 

Your thighs begin to shake.

She’s wrecking you.

Her tongue flicks, flattens. Her fingers thrust faster. She angles her wrist, hitting the spot hard. She doesn’t stop. 

You cry out. You can’t hold it; it’s ripping through you. 

You come with a broken, sharp breath.

Jerk. Clench. Release. 

Your eyes squeeze shut. 

And still, she does not stop. 

You’re overstimulated; nerves screaming, thighs twitching, but she does not fucking stop. Her mouth is wet, tongue merciless. It’s unbearable and too much and perfect all at once. 

She groans, licks again, and pushes deeper. 

You shove at her shoulder. “Okay – fuck, okay.” The only sound you can hear now is the thrum of your pulse in your ears. 

Leah stops, pulling her fingers out. Your wetness is smeared all over her face and she shines like she has just been polished with it. She licks her lips. 

For a moment, she is looking at you and you are looking at her. Your chests rise and fall. Your breathing mingles into one satisfied chant of exertion. 

Propping yourself up on your elbows, you address the wild eyes and messy hair. “You done?” 

She shakes her head. “Not even slightly.” 

You raise your eyebrows. She crawls over you again. Kisses your neck – just about avoiding your lips as you turn your head slightly. 

“Take them off,” you say between her biting down on your collarbone and her grinding her hard, lean body against yours. She makes no move to follow the order. Your jaw clenches. “Take the fucking pants off now, Leah. Or I’ll do it for you.”

…

This time, the glitter is not going to come out.

“I said no to the glitter cannons, didn’t I?” Your question is pointed as you and your manager march back to the greenroom, her assistant tentatively handing you a water bottle, recognising this warpath. “In fact, I’m sure I even reviewed it–” 

“We thought it might be boring without them.” 

“Boring?”

Your voice reaches a pitch that indicates your offence, fingers ruthless as you scratch through the layers of hairspray to loosen some of the bastard little glitter particles from your scalp. It’s not very nonchalant but you’re annoyed and tired and you’re already growing sick of the tour. Zürich, Switzerland. One quarter down. August is only seconds away. 

You slam the bottle of water onto the greenroom table and glare at the assistant, who startles like you’ve hurled it at him. “Could I have a towel?” He jumps into frenzied action but doesn’t quite know what to do. “Warm. Not one of those threadbare things from catering.” 

Another crony follows him as he bolts out the door. 

Your manager, seasoned in your moods by now, just sighs and takes a seat. Her phone is already out. She’s probably texting someone to apologise on your behalf, or crafting a well-timed tweet. You don’t care. You’re too busy yanking off your boots, making the beige carpet sparkle fucking blue. 

Zürich was loud. Glossy. The crowd was ravenous, excited to add you to their events calendar. You’d fed them what they wanted: your voice, your body, your image. Except their screams did not fill the hollowness of the stage. And that glitter had pushed it over the edge. 

You grab a makeup wipe and press it against your eyes, dragging your mascara sideways across your temple. “I feel like a fucking firework.” 

Your manager doesn’t look up. “You’re a pop star. It’s part of the job.”

“I hadn’t realised my title was synonymous with ‘disco ball’.” 

You throw the spent wipe into the bin and reach for another. You’re supposed to have people to do this for you but you suspect one of those devious texts your manager has been sending was to alert your team to leave you alone. At least for the moment. 

“You said yes to the new visuals.” 

“I said yes to minimal pyrotechnics and some fog.” Even then, that had felt unnecessary. “Glitter is not fog.”

She shrugs, one shoulder rising. “They loved it.” 

You make a sound of disgust. “Of course they did.” 

You lean back in the chair, muscles tight from the performance and tension and barely-slept nights. Your mind, however, is clear. Or, more accurately, emptying. 

Time moves too quickly. 

There had been no note. No lingering kiss to the temple. Just silence and the early rustlings of a hungover festival field. An easy severance.

And then Zürich. 

And this. 

The assistant returns, mercifully, with a towel. It’s warm and fluffy and folded like a hotel robe, and you accept it with a nod. Your face welcomes the material and your neck itches for the same treatment. The towel pulls away just as a sparkly as the carpet. 

There’s a knock on the door. Your tour photographer peeks his head in, camera still dangling from his neck. “Hey,” he starts, knowing he walking into the lion’s den, “quick question: you okay with us using the shot from the second chorus as the official still? The one with the glitter–” 

“No,” you cut in sharply. 

He blinks. “Oh.” He clasps his hands together in supplication but he doesn’t push. You glare. “Uh. Got it. Cool.” 

The door clicks shut behind him. You press the towel to your eyes and let yourself breathe, hard and slow. 

You are not sentimental. You keep reminding yourself of that. 

Another knock sounds. 

“I already told you!” you shout so the stupid photographer can get it into his stupid head. “I don’t–” 

A phone is thrust in your face. You don’t know to whom the hand belongs. A voice comes with it. “I’m sorry. She said it was urgent.” 

You glance at the caller ID, quickly recognising the device as your own as well, before pressing the phone to your ear. 

“I literally just finished,” you grumble, anger still bubbling but ebbing just in case Jess isn’t lying. She could need you and you’re not a terrible friend. 

“Alex is cross with you.” 

“What?” Your manager’s head turns, ears perking up at your loud confusion. She raises an eyebrow but you shake your head, signalling she continue her damage control of the tempest you are going cause. 

Jess repeats what she said. 

“No, I fucking got it. But why? What have I done?” 

“Well,” Jess says, and it makes you fairly certain that she is projecting. “She’s cross with me.” Point proven. “BECAUSE of you.” 

“I haven’t done–” 

“Leah’s in Zürich.”

You dismiss it. You need to get to the root of the problem without superfluous facts about a woman you slept with drunk and high at Glasto. 

“Why is Alex cross with me?” 

Jess, from the other end of the phone, sighs with the theatrical flair only she can get away with. Sometimes you really do consider blocking her. “Because you slept with her best friend a month ago and then vanished like a ghost.” 

You force a blink, wincing as another fucking glitter particle scratches your red eyes. The towel drops to your lap as you sit up straighter in the chair. 

“I didn’t vanish,” you say. You don’t have superpowers. “I left.” 

“That’s vanishing, babe.” 

“She knew what it was.” 

She did. She must have. She was still asleep when you woke up and if she heard you escape, she didn’t plead with you to stay.

But still, Jess snorts. “Did she? Because from what I’ve heard, it sounds like you left a very hot, very flustered England captain high and dry in a yurt.” 

You’re too tired to correct her second adjective. Instead, you close your eyes, fingers pinching the bridge of your nose.

“I told her not to kiss me.” 

“Yeah. And then you let her eat you out like it was a Champions League final.”

You don’t dignify her crudeness with a response. Fucking footballers and their brainwashed girlfriends. 

Even though she has reduced herself to sports-related similes, Jess manages to take the silence as a victory.

“She’s not upset,” she continues, and you’re glad she doesn’t say her name. “Just… prickly about it. You fucked with her pride, I think. Thought I’d let you know because Alex is threatening to somehow find a string to pull and cancel your Wembley show if you don’t at least text her.” You exhale softly. “Alex only found out that she was going to your concert through the woman she’s here with.” 

Probably another footballer. Surely Leah doesn’t need your shabby company and forced text messages if she is able to enjoy a nice night-out in Zürich with a friend.

“Alex doesn’t scare me,” you reply indignantly, because the rest is too much to address. Not all of your one-night-stands have been left content with you just moving on, but you had assumed that with Leah it would have been different. 

It was a good night. Why would she want to stain its memory? 

“Okay, well, she fucking scares me, so…” 

You glance at yourself in the mirror. Glitter in your hair. Sweat at your temples. Lips chapped. 

Leah has watched you tonight. 

This is why you draw the fucking lines. 

“I’m going to Munich in two days,” you mutter. 

“That gives you forty-eight hours to grow a conscience. Or at least the decency to say, ‘thanks for the mind-blowing orgasms’.” 

Your jaw clenches. “It was just a fuck.”

Jess wants to say something – you can hear her mouth open. The words catch in her throat. She retracts them for rephrasing. 

There’s a beat while she does this. Your manager points at her watch and motions for you to hurry up, sensing the privacy of the conversation but interested in herding you to the dressing room so that you can be de-glamoured and everyone can go back to the hotel. 

“Leah doesn’t know the rules yet.” 

You hate how she uses the word ‘yet’. You don’t want her to know the rules. You don’t want her to think there are rules. 

Because rules imply a pattern. 

And patterns imply that you and Leah will have sex again. 

“Do you want me to say something?” Jess asks gently. “To smooth it over?” 

You stare at your reflection, slightly horrified by it. 

“No,” you say. 

“Then text her.” 

“I don’t have her number.” 

Jess’ sigh is profound and visceral, felt in her bones. Your manager hears it and laughs.

“I’ve just sent it to you,” comes Jess’ verbalised exasperation. When you fail to respond, she continues, stifling a yawn. “Anyway. Congrats on another killer night. I love you, I’m proud of you. Try to sleep.” 

She hangs up and you’re not sure who won that battle. 

Your manager clears her throat and you follow her to the dressing room. 

You sit in silence as they professionally melt everything off you until you feel human again. 

Type. 

Delete. 

Type again. 

Eventually, you settle on: you were good. 

Then, after a pause, because something in you – not guilt – twinges…

Thanks.

You hit send and hope Jess gave you the wrong number.

[randombush3]

my least favourite thing to write is smut. this leah fic is currently bullying me x

[randombush3]

sneak peek

part 2 is in the works hehe

[...]

“Did your parents never… find out?” she asks, and her syllables are slurred but the nosiness is loud and clear. “Mine would have clocked. Immediately.” 

You say, “they knew. They didn’t care.” 

Leah laughs like that’s funny, like there’s something charming about that particular kind of glamorously-dressed neglect. Her laugh is too big for her mouth. It doesn’t match the rest of her: the sleekness, the discipline, the control. 

She shifts closer. 

Her hand grazes your thigh. Stays there as she leans to set down her drink. Casual, confident, asking you to notice but not pointing it out. 

This is the point where people usually lie to themselves. They construct a fantasy where this is chemistry or a connection. Where it’s romantic and life-changing – as if sex ever is – and that the memory will be surrounded by an imaginary shrine. You don’t like lying, though. You like practicality, efficiency. You like getting what was needed, avoiding the superfluous. 

All you’re thinking about is logistics: how close the bed is, whether the yurt’s walls will muffle sound, whether she’ll want you to stay after. 

Her fingers splay out to hold your knee, as if she is determined to not let you disappear. She’s not being subtle. 

You don’t move. But when she leans in, slow and trying to read you, your hand goes to her shoulder to parry her away. Not forceful. Not mean. But a rejection, of sorts. 

“No,” you say and your voice does not waver. “You can’t kiss me.” 

That does it. She’s unaware of your general rule, so you don’t blame her for recoiling like she has touched something sharp. You watch her recalibrate, eyes darting from your lips to the rest of the field, mouth parted in a half-formed apology. She wears that awkward expression – fuck, did I read this wrong? – and it makes something in you flicker. It’s not quite guilt. 

Her mouth widens, words bubbling at the back of her throat. 

You get there first. 

“Don’t worry. You can still fuck me.”

[randombush3]

It’s such a relief that finally there’s something worth reading (imo), poorbaby has been the only person doing some good fics for Leah recently and now this masterpiece. I cannot wait until part 2!

thank you so much! glad to be of service, always.

p.s. part 2 is already started... 😏

[randombush3]

i don’t tend to read leah fics but that one was 10/10 😮‍💨 looking forward to the next part

AYYY SOPHIEEEE thank you i love you xx

[randombush3]

Number 1 problem solver 😗😗

a sweet and tender hooligan

leah williamson x reader

summary: you meet leah in a VIP bar and can't decide what to do with her

words: 3545

content warnings: recreational drug usage

notes: i never write for leah but it felt apt. there's a second part planned. i quite like this fic so i hope u do too

and thanks @p0orbaby for holding my hand through writing this xx

You’re so bored. 

No one ever really talks about the patience it takes back-stage at Glastonbury. Or maybe they do, and you just ignore it, forever clawing at the need to be original. 

You can’t really warm your voice up any more, you’re wearing your chosen stage outfit, and you’re sitting on a flight case. You feel like a little girl, swinging your legs about and hoping you don’t accidentally roll onto stage and ruin the set of the artist two heads in front of you in the line-up. 

You could smoke, but you can’t do that here. You could go and snort cocaine with the rest of your team. You could pick up the guitar lying in its open case on the floor beside you. You could run laps around the muddy fields in your Docs, proudly putting them to use as though they don’t live at the foot of a clothing rack with the rest of your costumes. It’s still part of my aesthetic, you would tell your stylist, as if real mud doesn’t ruin the ‘cool and nonchalant’ thing you’ve got going on. 

As if you didn’t spend most of your childhood in the dining rooms of important people or at Evensong services in one of the Oxbridge colleges. 

In a state of inertia – because even though you could do anything you wanted to, you won’t – it is very easy to be excited by the familiar voice calling your name from the other side of a large smoke machine that will be wheeled out behind you when you eventually get to perform. 

“Babe,” sings the voice with its inherent boisterousness. “You’ve got two hours to go. That’s at least three drinks.” 

You don’t grace her with eye contact just yet, still contemplating your state of self-pity. 

“Drinks,” Jess says again, more insistent. “Now. Come meet my girlfriend!” 

The case rolls backwards with a low rumble as you hop off it, feet landing precariously between thick cables. “I’ve met your girlfriend already, Jess.” 

She grabs your wrist and drags you along with her anyway. You let her, whisked through the semi-organised chaos of the VIP corridor – past handlers, stylists, and an ex-boybander deep-throating a Calippo. Orange, naturally. You try not to smirk. It’s Glasto, after all. No one is above anything here. Not even you.

The VIP bar is tucked just behind the main stage, buzzing with poorly-veiled networking and celebrities who aren’t sure where they stand amongst the spattering of artists who are internally crippling with nervousness. Everything smells like stale cider and cigarettes, although neither you nor Jess wrinkle your noses at it. A few heads turn at your appearance, but you don’t pay it much attention. 

Alex Scott is already holding court at a picnic bench strewn with empty plastic cups, sunglasses, and a large plate of loaded fries that look cold and soggy. Perhaps she had been waiting for her girlfriend to return – perhaps it is your fault her food is ruined. 

She stands when she sees Jess, arms thrown around her in a way that makes you smile, despite yourself. There’s real warmth there. Unforced. You don’t envy it, but you award them a certain level of respect. 

“Hiya,” Alex says to you, flashing that pearly grin. She reaches out a hand, placing it on your bicep. She knows you don’t like hugs. “You’re up soon, yeah? Big set.” 

You shrug like it’s nothing. “Same as last year.” 

She laughs. Alex likes your cockiness. Finds it effortless. “Far too smooth.” She places a limp chip in her mouth, humming in delight for a reason lost on you. “Ready to party with us afterwards?” 

“I know we’re not your preferred crowd,” Jess teases. “Seeing as neither of us are an option for you to fuck and then ghost in the morning.” 

“Don’t sound so jealous,” you reply, rolling your eyes. 

Jess snorts, pleased with herself, while Alex shakes her head. She’s used to this particular brand of cattiness. 

“Actually,” she says, glancing past Jess, “we’ve got someone new in our little VIP girl gang today. Sort of a plus one.” 

You raise an eyebrow. “Did you adopt someone?” 

“Basically,” Jess says, stepping sideways to make space for a bobbing blonde head that is meandering towards the picnic bench.

And that’s when you see her.

She’s a footballer. You know her name. You’re sure of it.

“This is Leah,” Alex says when the blonde reaches her destination. Leah leans against the back of the bench in that way footballers must spend ridiculous amounts of time mastering in the mirror – loose-limbed, confident, wearing baggy denim and a tank top that rides up enough to hint at her toned stomach. Her eyes are shadowed behind shades, but she lifts them now, peering at you over the top. 

“Leah knows who you are.” Alex punches her girlfriend’s arm. “What? That’s quite a normal thing! She’s used to it.” 

Leah smiles. It doesn’t hide her slight apprehension, but you’re used to that, too. 

“I like your dad’s music.” 

The air stills, just for a second. You blink at her. 

It’s not the worst thing someone could say. It’s not even surprising. But it is lazy. 

Jess winces in slow motion beside you, and even Alex seems to pause her slow consumption of the soggy chips for a beat too long. 

Clearly not an idiot, Leah clocks the tension. “I mean… I like your music too. Obviously. That’s why–” She shrugs, trailing off. “Sorry. Shit opening line.” 

You don’t reply. Not verbally, anyway. She suffers in your silence and it’s a satisfying compensation for the can of worms she has unintentionally opened. Your head tilts slightly to one side, gaze narrowing, curiosity blending with amusement. And maybe something sharper. 

“I’ve had worse,” you offer, just before she is about to suffocate. 

“Have you?” she asks, with that footballer grin (Alex is good at it too) – the one that suggests she wins things for a living and isn’t afraid of getting mud on her knees. 

“Someone once said I reminded them of Lana Del Rey. But with ADHD.” You look at Jess; “Or did they say coked up?” She snorts her drink.

“I mean, I see it,” Leah says, eyes glinting behind the tinted lenses, pushed arrogantly back up her nose as if you don’t all know that she’s probably just shielding herself from her hangover. “Angsty but feral.” 

“Oh my god,” Alex mutters. “Leah. Inside voice.” 

But you laugh. Soft. Unexpected. The first real laugh you’ve given anyone all day. She beams, as though she knows that, and you don’t plan to figure out the sudden clarity in your vision before your set. 

“So,” Leah says, casually looping her arms across the back of the bench. “Do we get a preview? Or do I have to stand in a field jam-packed with strangers and pretend I’m not sweating my tits off waiting for you to start?”

“What makes you special, Leah?” you ask, voice steady and innocent. Her indignance is the last thing you see before someone from your team (you had felt a demon sneaking up on you) pulls you away, back to your cage in the VIP corridor. 

The encounter, while intriguing, does not quite satiate your need for excitement, and with an hour left on the clock, you have nothing better to do than give in. 

Your greenroom is full, bustling with the joy of getting to exist here without the pressure of performing. You don’t share that privilege but you do like being a dancing monkey and so you let them get away with it.

Almost every surface is littered with cigarette butts and energy drinks, empty bottles of champagne and tequila lined up neatly against the make-shift walls.The coffee table in the centre of the room is the hearth, grounding everyone in a relative circle around it. The familiar sight of white powder being diligently scraped into lines is comforting — at least this year is no different. 

Like always, your presence is noticed in the room. Most of these people are glorified groupies, anyway. Apart from the head that stays level with the table. A head you know very well. 

“Cecily, what would Mummy say if I let you do coke backstage?” The room goes silent out of respect for your voice, but it feels stilted and forced. Your half-sister looks up at you only when she has finished her line. 

“She doesn’t know I’m here.” You frown. Neither did you. “Daddy said not to tell her. Said that she’d worry.” 

“She would!” 

“She’s a hypocrite,” Cecily replies with a whine in her voice that no amount of maturity will ever rid her of. “What was she doing when she was twenty-one?”

You wince. 

You know what’s coming. Everyone knows what’s coming. 

Perhaps that is why she never gets the chance to make the comparison, because someone swoops in (you really should learn these people’s names) and rescues the mood: “I think we should head into soundcheck.” 

You pretend not to hear the collectively exhaled sigh of relief. 

It’s so much sweatier backstage now. The sound engineer is fussing over the guitar amps and a scratchy undertone of feedback. Your manager’s assistant is standing to attention, holding a Lemsip in her hands in case you want some. Your stylist is moaning about the dirt on your shoes. 

No one talks to you. They know that the last thirty minutes before it’s time are yours. Your silence, your thoughts. Your preparation. 

You shed the layers of yourself that aren’t the woman that is going to appear on the stage. You quell the niggling doubt that whispers that you’re not good enough. 

…

“You were fucking amazing!” Jess shouts in your ear as you appear in the VIP bar once again. Now, your hair is twisted back, glitter brushed into it by your relentless younger sister, the same colour smudged on your eyelids. Your clothes are fresh – a tight skirt, old shirt, wellies. Something that makes you look chic. Refined enough to be worth the school fees. Ready for a festival, even if there are only a few hours left of tonight’s live music. 

You smile because you’re used to this. The compliments, the attention, the sweaty half-sincere praise from people who watched you from behind tinted lenses and forgot to clap. It’s fine. You didn’t do it for them. You did it because you like the power of watching a crowd swell and bend beneath you. 

“Thank you,” you say, reaching for the lukewarm drink someone hands you. You don’t check who or what, simply taking a sip and letting your mouth scrunch into a grimace. Whiskey. You hate whiskey. 

“You looked like a fucking rockstar,” Jess continues, buzzing with the kind of energy that always makes you tired. “Like, everyone’s obsessed with you. Even Leah said–” 

You hold up a finger. “Don’t ruin it.” 

“How was she supposed to know–”

“She wasn’t,” you grant your friend. You shrug. “But she’s annoying. You know I hate footballers.” 

“You like Alex.” 

“She’s retired.” Your sigh is deep, drenched with the exhaustion of performing. “What’s the deal with her, anyway? Is she Alex’s friend? Here on a sponsorship deal?” 

“I thought you found her annoying.” Jess raises an eyebrow, catching you out with the ease that only someone who’s seen you at your worst can manage. With a profound lack of subtly, she gestures to where Leah is standing at the bar, engaged in an animated conversation with Cecily, of all people. 

You roll your eyes. “I do. But I’m curious as to which brand of annoying she is.” 

“She’s not with sponsors,” Jess says, grinning now like she knows something you don’t. “She’s just here. A civilian, apparently.” 

“Doesn’t exist.” The speed of your response makes her laugh, but she gets it: no one’s a civilian in the VIP bar. 

Jess shrugs, sitting into her hip like she’s bored of your cynicism. “She came with Alex. Something about needing a break before the Euros. I don’t know. She’s nice.” 

“She’s a defender, isn’t she?” 

Your friend looks vaguely impressed. “Look at you pretending not to know who she is.” 

“I only know because she did that weird hand-ball thingie in that final. I can’t remember when, but Stephen was shouting so loudly at the TV that Cec and I literally left the house.” Your stepfather doesn’t care much for football but a fellow producer (younger and therefore naturally woke) had called him a bigot for abstaining from women’s sports and so he had no choice. Apparently it’s the second sport at Westminster, though. They used to thrash Eton. 

You sip the whiskey again, just to punish yourself. 

“She’s hot though,” Jess offers, too lightly. And she has a girlfriend, so there really is only one hint she could be giving. You’re not taking her bait. 

There’s a beat between you. Your eyes dart over to the enthralling chat Leah and Cec seem to be having. Jess is smirking. 

“I’ve seen that look before,” she says. 

You scoff. “The one with blinking and open eyes?”

“No.” You wonder if Jess ever tires of your tendency to irritate the fuck out of her. “The look you gave her back at the picnic bench.” 

You pull your face into something as neutral as possible. Unimpressed, even. “She said she liked my dad’s music.”

“Well, he was in The Smiths. Pretty sure lots of people do.” Jess is far too reasonable for her level of drunkenness.  

“Yeah, but as an introductory statement? It was basically a hate crime.” 

“And yet you laughed. I was there. I saw it.” 

You let the moment hang. Let Jess think she’s right. Then: “It was politeness.” 

“Politeness?” Jess is openly laughing now. You wish Alex would return from whatever adventure she has embarked on and save you from her insufferable girlfriend. “You’re never polite. You told Victoria Beckham her boots looked like bin bags.” 

“They did.” You sigh, gaze drifting lazily across the bar. Of course, it lands on Leah. 

She’s still there. Still talking to Cecily, now joined by two other vaguely familiar faces – some actor, maybe, and a girl who used to date someone who used to date you. Leah’s smile is easy. Careless. But you’re not an idiot and you know performative charm when you see it. You invented it. 

As if sensing your attention, she glances over.

Your eyes meet. 

She holds it, just long enough to be cocky. Just long enough to challenge you. Before you look away in repulsion, she raises a brow: are you going to talk to me or just stare all night?

The whiskey finally hits your bloodstream. 

“She’s looking at you,” Jess says, entirely unhelpful. 

“No, she’s not.” 

“She is.” 

“Fine,” you sigh, already bored of yourself. “I’ll just pop over there and make sure Cecily hasn’t invited her to the family Christmas.” 

Jess clinks her drink against yours as you step away. “Be nice.” She remembers who she’s speaking to, laughing at her own words. “Or don’t. Just don’t shag her in a Portaloo.” 

You glare at her. “That was one time.” 

She shrugs. “I still don’t understand the mechanics of it.” 

It’s something you have refused to explain to her time and time again. She knows the scar GCSE Physics left on you, and therefore should know better, but a defining feature of your friendship with Jess is her incessant over-stepping and your forgiving nature. (Here, you tell a lie – you don’t forgive her, you just gave up on chiding her.) Anywho, the best way to avoid denying her of her mythology story-time is to get on with interrupting Leah and your sister.

The conversation stops when you approach, Leah’s voice dying in her throat, her sentence doomed to be unfinished. The four of them – actor and ex’s ex both staring gormlessly – seem to wait for you to announce what you have deemed important enough to grace them with. 

You fix your eyes on Leah. “I hope Cec hasn’t bored you with the logistics of maintaining an eating disorder.” 

Cecily doesn’t even blink. “You’re just jealous that I’ve walked runways and you haven’t.” 

“Not at all,” you murmur, gaze unwavering. 

The actor, aggressively toothy in a leather waistcoat, sporting a generic face you’re pretty sure you scrolled past on Netflix last week, takes the opportunity to interject, apparently confusing the silence for an invitation. 

“I’m Edward, by the way.” He leans in as if this matters. Cec subtly glances at you – you’re both thinking the same thing. “I won the BAFTA for Best Short Form Performance. Web-based narrative – all very pioneer and such. You might have seen it? Houndstooth?” Only the ex’s ex reacts, and it is unconvincing at best. He recovers, undeterred. “Anyway, I was just saying how much I love your dad’s music. Real Manchester grit. Proper lyrics, you know?” 

He gestures between you and Cecily. You weigh out what would be more fun: expose his mistake or ask him whether he can actually point Manchester out on the map. 

Cec gets there first. “He’s not my dad,” she says, tone sickly sweet but laced with a level of mocking she has learnt from you. “Just hers.” She jabs a finger in your direction. “See” – and here’s where she gets you back for earlier – “my half-sister is my mother’s daughter. Don’t you recall that big affair? ‘96, ‘97. Well, here she is, walking and talking.” 

You laugh, hoping she hears the special kind of fury you reserve for this topic lurking in the brightness of your voice. 

Leah’s eyes flicker to you, apologetic. “Shit. Right.” She swallows. “I shouldn’t have – back at the table – about the whole, uh…” She trails off, waving her hand as though it conjures up the rest of her words. You briefly wonder if this woman has ever finished a sentence. 

You tilt your head. “The whole ‘I like your dad’s music’ thing?” 

She winces. “That.” 

Cecily grins, clearly enjoying the awkwardness she hasn’t had to cause for once. The actor looks confused and the girl takes an abrupt interest in her drink. 

“Well, I think I’m going to mingle with the… common folk,” Cecily says then, voice light as a feather. Edward laughs – of course he finds that funny. “Coming, Leah?” 

You’re about to say no, as though you have authority to do so, when Leah smiles, a little tight around the edges. “I’m good, thanks.” 

Cec shrugs, already turning away. “Suit yourself. Come on, darlings,” she chirps to the others, acquiring tonight’s entourage. “Let’s leave the artist alone with her muse.” 

You don’t dignify it with a response. You watch them go.

Something settles in the atmosphere. Probably a sigh of relief that your sister has fucked off. Things feel quieter. 

“You know, when you meet a nepo-baby, you’re not supposed to remind them of it.” The whiskey you sip to chase your first teaching burns your throat. “Much less talk about the fame of their parents.” 

“I liked your set.” She is defiant in the way she says it, shoulders squared, jaw set. You assume she hates being patronised more than the average person. The small amount of empathy in you connects that to being a female athlete. Or maybe just a woman. 

You nod, noncommittally. A truce. “Thanks.” 

“I hadn’t connected the dots about your dad.” She really should stop talking about it, else you’ll have to find a way to make her shut up. “Must be terrifying to have him watching you on days like today.” 

Your laugh is involuntary. Startling. She jumps. “He’s not watching. His son has a gig in some pub in Manchester.” You hope she doesn’t pity you. “Glasto’s televised,” you say, feeling the need to justify it. 

“He missed out.” 

She doesn’t understand the weight of that statement. 

“Perhaps. Anyway, you know I’m more nepo through my mother? My grandfather was the CEO of Sony Music for a long time. Then he died and they got the new guy in, but such is life.” 

“I should have been more diligent when reading your Wikipedia.” And that makes you laugh, you’re embarrassed to admit. She smiles, almost proud of herself. “I am quite a fan of The Smiths though.” 

“They’re a bit angsty.” 

“Mate,” she says incredulously, “have you heard your lyrics?” 

You roll your eyes. “But I don’t listen to my own music. Do you watch yourself play football?” 

Leah thinks about that for a moment. Her expression softens, as though you have just said something completely idiotic. 

“Well, yes. We have film sessions – hours spent pouring over how we play, how the other teams play.” 

“I don’t know how sports work.” 

“Well, I don’t know my C major from my A minor.” 

Her confusion is amusing. “They’re the same,” you say gently, though you’re not sure why you’re enjoying this conversation or educating her on entry-level music theory.

Leah frowns. “They don’t sound the same.” 

You take a slow sip of your drink, let it burn just long enough. “They’re not supposed to, even to an ignorant ear.” 

“Are you calling me ignorant?” 

You gesture lazily with your glass. “No. Just your ears.” 

She scoffs, offended. You’re a total bitch.

[randombush3]

No literally mean that wholeheartedly there hasent been any good Leah Williamson fics on here in a l00000NG time that was literally worth the 2 month doom scroll of nothing rhat was just so perfect

AW thank you I’m so chuffed 😁

I never write Leah fics so I thought I should at least do it well

[randombush3]

I EFFING LOVED THAF GLASTO FIC WITH LEAH GIVE US A PART TWO RIGHT NOWWWWWW PRETTY PLS

THANK YOU THANK YOU

Part two is coming but u know how sporadic I am 😮‍💨

[randombush3]

a sweet and tender hooligan

leah williamson x reader

summary: you meet leah in a VIP bar and can't decide what to do with her

words: 3545

content warnings: recreational drug usage

notes: i never write for leah but it felt apt. there's a second part planned. i quite like this fic so i hope u do too

and thanks @p0orbaby for holding my hand through writing this xx

You’re so bored. 

No one ever really talks about the patience it takes back-stage at Glastonbury. Or maybe they do, and you just ignore it, forever clawing at the need to be original. 

You can’t really warm your voice up any more, you’re wearing your chosen stage outfit, and you’re sitting on a flight case. You feel like a little girl, swinging your legs about and hoping you don’t accidentally roll onto stage and ruin the set of the artist two heads in front of you in the line-up. 

You could smoke, but you can’t do that here. You could go and snort cocaine with the rest of your team. You could pick up the guitar lying in its open case on the floor beside you. You could run laps around the muddy fields in your Docs, proudly putting them to use as though they don’t live at the foot of a clothing rack with the rest of your costumes. It’s still part of my aesthetic, you would tell your stylist, as if real mud doesn’t ruin the ‘cool and nonchalant’ thing you’ve got going on. 

As if you didn’t spend most of your childhood in the dining rooms of important people or at Evensong services in one of the Oxbridge colleges. 

In a state of inertia – because even though you could do anything you wanted to, you won’t – it is very easy to be excited by the familiar voice calling your name from the other side of a large smoke machine that will be wheeled out behind you when you eventually get to perform. 

“Babe,” sings the voice with its inherent boisterousness. “You’ve got two hours to go. That’s at least three drinks.” 

You don’t grace her with eye contact just yet, still contemplating your state of self-pity. 

“Drinks,” Jess says again, more insistent. “Now. Come meet my girlfriend!” 

The case rolls backwards with a low rumble as you hop off it, feet landing precariously between thick cables. “I’ve met your girlfriend already, Jess.” 

She grabs your wrist and drags you along with her anyway. You let her, whisked through the semi-organised chaos of the VIP corridor – past handlers, stylists, and an ex-boybander deep-throating a Calippo. Orange, naturally. You try not to smirk. It’s Glasto, after all. No one is above anything here. Not even you.

The VIP bar is tucked just behind the main stage, buzzing with poorly-veiled networking and celebrities who aren’t sure where they stand amongst the spattering of artists who are internally crippling with nervousness. Everything smells like stale cider and cigarettes, although neither you nor Jess wrinkle your noses at it. A few heads turn at your appearance, but you don’t pay it much attention. 

Alex Scott is already holding court at a picnic bench strewn with empty plastic cups, sunglasses, and a large plate of loaded fries that look cold and soggy. Perhaps she had been waiting for her girlfriend to return – perhaps it is your fault her food is ruined. 

She stands when she sees Jess, arms thrown around her in a way that makes you smile, despite yourself. There’s real warmth there. Unforced. You don’t envy it, but you award them a certain level of respect. 

“Hiya,” Alex says to you, flashing that pearly grin. She reaches out a hand, placing it on your bicep. She knows you don’t like hugs. “You’re up soon, yeah? Big set.” 

You shrug like it’s nothing. “Same as last year.” 

She laughs. Alex likes your cockiness. Finds it effortless. “Far too smooth.” She places a limp chip in her mouth, humming in delight for a reason lost on you. “Ready to party with us afterwards?” 

“I know we’re not your preferred crowd,” Jess teases. “Seeing as neither of us are an option for you to fuck and then ghost in the morning.” 

“Don’t sound so jealous,” you reply, rolling your eyes. 

Jess snorts, pleased with herself, while Alex shakes her head. She’s used to this particular brand of cattiness. 

“Actually,” she says, glancing past Jess, “we’ve got someone new in our little VIP girl gang today. Sort of a plus one.” 

You raise an eyebrow. “Did you adopt someone?” 

“Basically,” Jess says, stepping sideways to make space for a bobbing blonde head that is meandering towards the picnic bench.

And that’s when you see her.

She’s a footballer. You know her name. You’re sure of it.

“This is Leah,” Alex says when the blonde reaches her destination. Leah leans against the back of the bench in that way footballers must spend ridiculous amounts of time mastering in the mirror – loose-limbed, confident, wearing baggy denim and a tank top that rides up enough to hint at her toned stomach. Her eyes are shadowed behind shades, but she lifts them now, peering at you over the top. 

“Leah knows who you are.” Alex punches her girlfriend’s arm. “What? That’s quite a normal thing! She’s used to it.” 

Leah smiles. It doesn’t hide her slight apprehension, but you’re used to that, too. 

“I like your dad’s music.” 

The air stills, just for a second. You blink at her. 

It’s not the worst thing someone could say. It’s not even surprising. But it is lazy. 

Jess winces in slow motion beside you, and even Alex seems to pause her slow consumption of the soggy chips for a beat too long. 

Clearly not an idiot, Leah clocks the tension. “I mean… I like your music too. Obviously. That’s why–” She shrugs, trailing off. “Sorry. Shit opening line.” 

You don’t reply. Not verbally, anyway. She suffers in your silence and it’s a satisfying compensation for the can of worms she has unintentionally opened. Your head tilts slightly to one side, gaze narrowing, curiosity blending with amusement. And maybe something sharper. 

“I’ve had worse,” you offer, just before she is about to suffocate. 

“Have you?” she asks, with that footballer grin (Alex is good at it too) – the one that suggests she wins things for a living and isn’t afraid of getting mud on her knees. 

“Someone once said I reminded them of Lana Del Rey. But with ADHD.” You look at Jess; “Or did they say coked up?” She snorts her drink.

“I mean, I see it,” Leah says, eyes glinting behind the tinted lenses, pushed arrogantly back up her nose as if you don’t all know that she’s probably just shielding herself from her hangover. “Angsty but feral.” 

“Oh my god,” Alex mutters. “Leah. Inside voice.” 

But you laugh. Soft. Unexpected. The first real laugh you’ve given anyone all day. She beams, as though she knows that, and you don’t plan to figure out the sudden clarity in your vision before your set. 

“So,” Leah says, casually looping her arms across the back of the bench. “Do we get a preview? Or do I have to stand in a field jam-packed with strangers and pretend I’m not sweating my tits off waiting for you to start?”

“What makes you special, Leah?” you ask, voice steady and innocent. Her indignance is the last thing you see before someone from your team (you had felt a demon sneaking up on you) pulls you away, back to your cage in the VIP corridor. 

The encounter, while intriguing, does not quite satiate your need for excitement, and with an hour left on the clock, you have nothing better to do than give in. 

Your greenroom is full, bustling with the joy of getting to exist here without the pressure of performing. You don’t share that privilege but you do like being a dancing monkey and so you let them get away with it.

Almost every surface is littered with cigarette butts and energy drinks, empty bottles of champagne and tequila lined up neatly against the make-shift walls.The coffee table in the centre of the room is the hearth, grounding everyone in a relative circle around it. The familiar sight of white powder being diligently scraped into lines is comforting — at least this year is no different. 

Like always, your presence is noticed in the room. Most of these people are glorified groupies, anyway. Apart from the head that stays level with the table. A head you know very well. 

“Cecily, what would Mummy say if I let you do coke backstage?” The room goes silent out of respect for your voice, but it feels stilted and forced. Your half-sister looks up at you only when she has finished her line. 

“She doesn’t know I’m here.” You frown. Neither did you. “Daddy said not to tell her. Said that she’d worry.” 

“She would!” 

“She’s a hypocrite,” Cecily replies with a whine in her voice that no amount of maturity will ever rid her of. “What was she doing when she was twenty-one?”

You wince. 

You know what’s coming. Everyone knows what’s coming. 

Perhaps that is why she never gets the chance to make the comparison, because someone swoops in (you really should learn these people’s names) and rescues the mood: “I think we should head into soundcheck.” 

You pretend not to hear the collectively exhaled sigh of relief. 

It’s so much sweatier backstage now. The sound engineer is fussing over the guitar amps and a scratchy undertone of feedback. Your manager’s assistant is standing to attention, holding a Lemsip in her hands in case you want some. Your stylist is moaning about the dirt on your shoes. 

No one talks to you. They know that the last thirty minutes before it’s time are yours. Your silence, your thoughts. Your preparation. 

You shed the layers of yourself that aren’t the woman that is going to appear on the stage. You quell the niggling doubt that whispers that you’re not good enough. 

…

“You were fucking amazing!” Jess shouts in your ear as you appear in the VIP bar once again. Now, your hair is twisted back, glitter brushed into it by your relentless younger sister, the same colour smudged on your eyelids. Your clothes are fresh – a tight skirt, old shirt, wellies. Something that makes you look chic. Refined enough to be worth the school fees. Ready for a festival, even if there are only a few hours left of tonight’s live music. 

You smile because you’re used to this. The compliments, the attention, the sweaty half-sincere praise from people who watched you from behind tinted lenses and forgot to clap. It’s fine. You didn’t do it for them. You did it because you like the power of watching a crowd swell and bend beneath you. 

“Thank you,” you say, reaching for the lukewarm drink someone hands you. You don’t check who or what, simply taking a sip and letting your mouth scrunch into a grimace. Whiskey. You hate whiskey. 

“You looked like a fucking rockstar,” Jess continues, buzzing with the kind of energy that always makes you tired. “Like, everyone’s obsessed with you. Even Leah said–” 

You hold up a finger. “Don’t ruin it.” 

“How was she supposed to know–”

“She wasn’t,” you grant your friend. You shrug. “But she’s annoying. You know I hate footballers.” 

“You like Alex.” 

“She’s retired.” Your sigh is deep, drenched with the exhaustion of performing. “What’s the deal with her, anyway? Is she Alex’s friend? Here on a sponsorship deal?” 

“I thought you found her annoying.” Jess raises an eyebrow, catching you out with the ease that only someone who’s seen you at your worst can manage. With a profound lack of subtly, she gestures to where Leah is standing at the bar, engaged in an animated conversation with Cecily, of all people. 

You roll your eyes. “I do. But I’m curious as to which brand of annoying she is.” 

“She’s not with sponsors,” Jess says, grinning now like she knows something you don’t. “She’s just here. A civilian, apparently.” 

“Doesn’t exist.” The speed of your response makes her laugh, but she gets it: no one’s a civilian in the VIP bar. 

Jess shrugs, sitting into her hip like she’s bored of your cynicism. “She came with Alex. Something about needing a break before the Euros. I don’t know. She’s nice.” 

“She’s a defender, isn’t she?” 

Your friend looks vaguely impressed. “Look at you pretending not to know who she is.” 

“I only know because she did that weird hand-ball thingie in that final. I can’t remember when, but Stephen was shouting so loudly at the TV that Cec and I literally left the house.” Your stepfather doesn’t care much for football but a fellow producer (younger and therefore naturally woke) had called him a bigot for abstaining from women’s sports and so he had no choice. Apparently it’s the second sport at Westminster, though. They used to thrash Eton. 

You sip the whiskey again, just to punish yourself. 

“She’s hot though,” Jess offers, too lightly. And she has a girlfriend, so there really is only one hint she could be giving. You’re not taking her bait. 

There’s a beat between you. Your eyes dart over to the enthralling chat Leah and Cec seem to be having. Jess is smirking. 

“I’ve seen that look before,” she says. 

You scoff. “The one with blinking and open eyes?”

“No.” You wonder if Jess ever tires of your tendency to irritate the fuck out of her. “The look you gave her back at the picnic bench.” 

You pull your face into something as neutral as possible. Unimpressed, even. “She said she liked my dad’s music.”

“Well, he was in The Smiths. Pretty sure lots of people do.” Jess is far too reasonable for her level of drunkenness.  

“Yeah, but as an introductory statement? It was basically a hate crime.” 

“And yet you laughed. I was there. I saw it.” 

You let the moment hang. Let Jess think she’s right. Then: “It was politeness.” 

“Politeness?” Jess is openly laughing now. You wish Alex would return from whatever adventure she has embarked on and save you from her insufferable girlfriend. “You’re never polite. You told Victoria Beckham her boots looked like bin bags.” 

“They did.” You sigh, gaze drifting lazily across the bar. Of course, it lands on Leah. 

She’s still there. Still talking to Cecily, now joined by two other vaguely familiar faces – some actor, maybe, and a girl who used to date someone who used to date you. Leah’s smile is easy. Careless. But you’re not an idiot and you know performative charm when you see it. You invented it. 

As if sensing your attention, she glances over.

Your eyes meet. 

She holds it, just long enough to be cocky. Just long enough to challenge you. Before you look away in repulsion, she raises a brow: are you going to talk to me or just stare all night?

The whiskey finally hits your bloodstream. 

“She’s looking at you,” Jess says, entirely unhelpful. 

“No, she’s not.” 

“She is.” 

“Fine,” you sigh, already bored of yourself. “I’ll just pop over there and make sure Cecily hasn’t invited her to the family Christmas.” 

Jess clinks her drink against yours as you step away. “Be nice.” She remembers who she’s speaking to, laughing at her own words. “Or don’t. Just don’t shag her in a Portaloo.” 

You glare at her. “That was one time.” 

She shrugs. “I still don’t understand the mechanics of it.” 

It’s something you have refused to explain to her time and time again. She knows the scar GCSE Physics left on you, and therefore should know better, but a defining feature of your friendship with Jess is her incessant over-stepping and your forgiving nature. (Here, you tell a lie – you don’t forgive her, you just gave up on chiding her.) Anywho, the best way to avoid denying her of her mythology story-time is to get on with interrupting Leah and your sister.

The conversation stops when you approach, Leah’s voice dying in her throat, her sentence doomed to be unfinished. The four of them – actor and ex’s ex both staring gormlessly – seem to wait for you to announce what you have deemed important enough to grace them with. 

You fix your eyes on Leah. “I hope Cec hasn’t bored you with the logistics of maintaining an eating disorder.” 

Cecily doesn’t even blink. “You’re just jealous that I’ve walked runways and you haven’t.” 

“Not at all,” you murmur, gaze unwavering. 

The actor, aggressively toothy in a leather waistcoat, sporting a generic face you’re pretty sure you scrolled past on Netflix last week, takes the opportunity to interject, apparently confusing the silence for an invitation. 

“I’m Edward, by the way.” He leans in as if this matters. Cec subtly glances at you – you’re both thinking the same thing. “I won the BAFTA for Best Short Form Performance. Web-based narrative – all very pioneer and such. You might have seen it? Houndstooth?” Only the ex’s ex reacts, and it is unconvincing at best. He recovers, undeterred. “Anyway, I was just saying how much I love your dad’s music. Real Manchester grit. Proper lyrics, you know?” 

He gestures between you and Cecily. You weigh out what would be more fun: expose his mistake or ask him whether he can actually point Manchester out on the map. 

Cec gets there first. “He’s not my dad,” she says, tone sickly sweet but laced with a level of mocking she has learnt from you. “Just hers.” She jabs a finger in your direction. “See” – and here’s where she gets you back for earlier – “my half-sister is my mother’s daughter. Don’t you recall that big affair? ‘96, ‘97. Well, here she is, walking and talking.” 

You laugh, hoping she hears the special kind of fury you reserve for this topic lurking in the brightness of your voice. 

Leah’s eyes flicker to you, apologetic. “Shit. Right.” She swallows. “I shouldn’t have – back at the table – about the whole, uh…” She trails off, waving her hand as though it conjures up the rest of her words. You briefly wonder if this woman has ever finished a sentence. 

You tilt your head. “The whole ‘I like your dad’s music’ thing?” 

She winces. “That.” 

Cecily grins, clearly enjoying the awkwardness she hasn’t had to cause for once. The actor looks confused and the girl takes an abrupt interest in her drink. 

“Well, I think I’m going to mingle with the… common folk,” Cecily says then, voice light as a feather. Edward laughs – of course he finds that funny. “Coming, Leah?” 

You’re about to say no, as though you have authority to do so, when Leah smiles, a little tight around the edges. “I’m good, thanks.” 

Cec shrugs, already turning away. “Suit yourself. Come on, darlings,” she chirps to the others, acquiring tonight’s entourage. “Let’s leave the artist alone with her muse.” 

You don’t dignify it with a response. You watch them go.

Something settles in the atmosphere. Probably a sigh of relief that your sister has fucked off. Things feel quieter. 

“You know, when you meet a nepo-baby, you’re not supposed to remind them of it.” The whiskey you sip to chase your first teaching burns your throat. “Much less talk about the fame of their parents.” 

“I liked your set.” She is defiant in the way she says it, shoulders squared, jaw set. You assume she hates being patronised more than the average person. The small amount of empathy in you connects that to being a female athlete. Or maybe just a woman. 

You nod, noncommittally. A truce. “Thanks.” 

“I hadn’t connected the dots about your dad.” She really should stop talking about it, else you’ll have to find a way to make her shut up. “Must be terrifying to have him watching you on days like today.” 

Your laugh is involuntary. Startling. She jumps. “He’s not watching. His son has a gig in some pub in Manchester.” You hope she doesn’t pity you. “Glasto’s televised,” you say, feeling the need to justify it. 

“He missed out.” 

She doesn’t understand the weight of that statement. 

“Perhaps. Anyway, you know I’m more nepo through my mother? My grandfather was the CEO of Sony Music for a long time. Then he died and they got the new guy in, but such is life.” 

“I should have been more diligent when reading your Wikipedia.” And that makes you laugh, you’re embarrassed to admit. She smiles, almost proud of herself. “I am quite a fan of The Smiths though.” 

“They’re a bit angsty.” 

“Mate,” she says incredulously, “have you heard your lyrics?” 

You roll your eyes. “But I don’t listen to my own music. Do you watch yourself play football?” 

Leah thinks about that for a moment. Her expression softens, as though you have just said something completely idiotic. 

“Well, yes. We have film sessions – hours spent pouring over how we play, how the other teams play.” 

“I don’t know how sports work.” 

“Well, I don’t know my C major from my A minor.” 

Her confusion is amusing. “They’re the same,” you say gently, though you’re not sure why you’re enjoying this conversation or educating her on entry-level music theory.

Leah frowns. “They don’t sound the same.” 

You take a slow sip of your drink, let it burn just long enough. “They’re not supposed to, even to an ignorant ear.” 

“Are you calling me ignorant?” 

You gesture lazily with your glass. “No. Just your ears.” 

She scoffs, offended. You’re a total bitch.