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spoiled-oatmeal · 11 days ago

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Mhin x AFAB! Reader (Anatomy Lessons) 🔞

Mhin x AFAB! Reader inspired by this post from @rabidprey. This one took me a while to complete, my last class for my Bachelor's degree started, so finding a balance also took away some of my time. But it’s finally ready. This is the first time I’ve written smut, so hopefully it's not too bad. I’ve spent so much time rereading and proofreading this I can’t tell if it’s good anymore, but I want to focus on other projects so I said fuck it. Enjoy!

MC is described with female anatomy, Mhin’s is left undescribed. The MC has hair long enough to tuck behind their ear.

*SMUT* MDNI!!

WC: 5,004

It’s been a busy night. Mhin’s started allowing you on their nightly patrols, or more accurately, stopped complaining when you showed up. But that might change after tonight. It’s not your fault, Mhin must have done something new with their hair, maybe got it cut or changed shampoos, they almost seemed to sparkle in the moonlight. You swear you were trying to pay attention to your surroundings, but every time you weren’t looking at them, you would see, out of the corner of your eye, the moonlight hitting them in such a way that it would be a crime not to stop and admire them. This lack of situational awareness resulted in an unexpected soulless attack and an upset Mhin. After enduring a harsh lecture that mentioned something about lacking brain cells and them leaving you behind as a soulless snack, Mhin proceeded to give you the silent treatment as you both made your way back to their dwelling. You would’ve thought that they were genuinely upset and wanted to be left alone if only they didn’t keep glancing behind them every few minutes to make sure you were still following safely behind them.

You’ve been to the place closest to what they would call a home a few times. It’s a small house squeezed between two larger buildings. Every time you’ve been there, you've nearly walked right past it due to it almost becoming invisible, overshadowed by its surrounding houses. Maybe that’s why they chose it as a place to call home, unnoticed and ignored, the perfect combination for privacy and silence. Mhin walks up to the door and pulls a brass key, embedded with intricate designs, from their cloak, unlocking it and leaving the door open as a silent invitation to enter. You’ve been here enough times to have an understanding of their routines when they get home. You quietly shut the door behind you and latch the various locks they've installed.

Inside their house is extremely minimalistic. Although calling it a house would probably be overzealous, it’s more like a small room. Walking from the entrance to the back wall can’t be more than ten steps. Inside contains just their basic necessities, lacking any decor, unless you count the books and scraps of medical supplies scattered around as decor. Their home consists of a small bed, a kitchenette, and a table that previously only had one chair, but a second one appeared after your first few visits. Mhin refuses to acknowledge this mysteriously appearing chair.

Upon entering their home, Mhin walks over to their kitchen, silently grabbing a kettle to brew some tea. Opening one of the small cupboards to pull out a small tin container, they told you that they have a small collection of different tea leaf blends that they occasionally find in the market. There was one night you managed to get them talking, and they revealed that they chose which one to try based on their mood. You always wondered what they drank when they were angry. You suppose today is the day you find out. The energy is still tense in the room; they're still upset that you managed to put yourself in danger, albeit without injury due to Mhin’s intervention. You decide the possibility of relighting their anger is better than sitting in the deafeningly silent room any longer..

“I’m sorry,” you mutter, quietly taking a seat at the table and keeping your head down, staring at your clasped hands in your lap. The clinking of cups and the crackling of fire that will soon be boiling the water in the kettle is the only response you get. You let the silence settle over the room again before trying once more.

“You were right, my negligence not only put me in danger, but also put you in harm's way.” You continue confessing your mistakes, hoping for their forgiveness or at least a response. “I wouldn’t be here if it weren’t for you.”

They still don’t respond, but you hear the fire in their oven being put out and the sound of water being poured out of a kettle. Their footsteps approaching the table cause you to raise your head and finally look at them. They place one of the cups in front of you while taking their seat at the table. Despite them avoiding eye contact with you, lost in the cacophony of thoughts racing through their mind, you can tell they don’t seem angry; their face, almost neutral. That is, until you just barely see a minuscule muscle in their jaw start to tense. Without them telling you what they want from you, you’re left to guess. Maybe they’re tired. Maybe their still wired from the fight. Or maybe, just maybe, they were worried about you. Without Mhin giving you any more hints, you’re left to continue trying to guess the infinite things that could be running through their mind.

“How did you learn how to fight soulless?” you ask in the hope they’ll take the bait of conversation. Lucky for you, this question manages to make them finally make eye contact with you. They expected you to continue apologizing; a small part of them was wondering if you would start begging for their forgiveness. An even smaller part of Mhin was wondering if they would enjoy hearing you beg. You switching the conversation was just enough of a shock to pull them from their silent act.

“Practice,” Mhin says, leaning back in their chair, taking a sip of their tea, “I had to learn or else I wouldn’t survive.”

“Maybe you could teach me? Just in case you're not there next time,” you propose, mimicking their movements and taking a sip from your cup. Before the cup can even reach your lips, your nose is invaded by a strong, spicy, earthy smell. Cinnamon. You figured that with them being in a sour mood and being fresh from a fight, they would’ve chosen a more relaxing blend, maybe some chamomile or lavender. As it hits your tongue, the warmth begins to spread across your mouth, the spice of the cinnamon biting at parts of your tongue before you swallow. As the auburn liquid travels down your throat, the warmth begins to spread across your chest and leaves a soft warmth on your cheeks.

“Hmm, that's not a terrible idea, maybe learning something would help you stop being so idiotic,” they chide, drinking the rest of their cup before standing up from their seat.

You watch Mhin slowly make their way around the table, your eyes following their every move, before they stand behind your chair, resting their hand on the backrest. Their hand rises, thumb making gentle contact with your cheek. Your breath releases with a shudder, hands gripped tight around your cup. Their hand rotates to run the tips of their fingers over your cheekbone, guiding the stray strand of hair behind your ear. Mhin’s fingers drag, featherlight, down the side of your neck. Your head naturally tilting to give them as much surface as they desire. Until the gentleness suddenly leaves them, both hands find your neck and with a firm, but not painful grasp around the back of your neck, they force your chin to your chest. You feel them bring their thumbs dragging up your spinal cord. You let out a surprised gasp as they bring their thumbs up to the base of the skull, searching for something, but you’re not sure what.

“Do you feel this spot right here?” They massage their thumbs into the spot to accent their words. You know their fingers resting against the column of your throat can feel the swallow you take before you're able to croak out a response.

“Y-yes.” You manage to get out through almost gritted teeth. Mhin slides their fingers resting on your throat to the side of your neck and gently presses them into your skin, checking your heart rate. Checking to see if it’s beating just as fast as theirs is.

“This spot connects the brainstem to the spinal cord,” they instruct, while you feel the heavy blush that has been creeping over your face manage to get deeper. Their calm, confident tone they take when teaching does not make it easy to focus. Especially when your mind keeps wandering to the other activities their hands, currently around your throat, might be suited for, “severing that connection will immediately kill any creature.”

“Okay,” You mutter, eyes not being able to focus since every nerve is focused on Mhin’s firm grasp on your nape and neck.

“Stand up,” Mhin commands, quickly withdrawing their hands from your neck and stepping away from your chair.

Obeying their command, you quickly, without sparing a single thought, slide out of your chair and face them. Eagerly waiting for their next touch. Finally able to look at Mhin again, you see them remove the bracers around their arms and roll up their sleeves, revealing their forearms.

“Every creature has almost the same weak points, their heart and their brain being the most important,” Mhin instructs.

They seem more confident than you’ve ever seen them, like they're finding comfort in reciting their knowledge. And throughout your time knowing Mhin, although all parts of them are attractive, there’s something about confident Mhin that makes your heart rate spike.

“Maybe I should start with basic anatomy…” You barely manage to hear them mutter under their breath, trying to decide the best starting point for their lesson. Nodding to themself, they turn to you and begin to speak. “We’ll start with basic muscles and muscle groups. There are numerous benefits to understanding this basic part of anatomy. The muscles are made of thousands of small fibers woven together-”

You raise your hand to interrupt them before they get too far into their lesson, ”Wait, wait, wait, why are we starting with muscles? Isn’t this supposed to be for self-defense and killing soulless?”

Jutting their lips and raising one of their brows, not happy about the interruption. With a sigh, they make a proposition, “Instead of telling you, why don’t I just show you,” they say, bringing their left foot behind them and twisting their body with it, getting into a fighting stance, “try to hit me.”

“Wha-What?” You question in utter disbelief, this was not how you saw this conversation going. You start to wonder if you heard them wrong, but your eyes only confirm what they said.

“What are you worried about? It’s not like you’ll actually land a hit.” They say, with a ghost of a smirk on their lips. It’s almost as if they enjoy your confusion.

Their confidence calms your nerves; you know where Kuras’s clinic is, in case this goes wrong. With a final deep breath to push away the last of your nerves that scream at you to stop, you pull your fist back and throw your best punch. Mhin blocks the blow, pushing your hand out of its path while grabbing your wrist and side-stepping behind your back. Using their free hand, they place their hand on the back of your upper arm, twisting and pushing down with almost minimal effort. This movement, paired with their other hand around your wrist pulling it behind you, causes you to drop one knee to the ground. Using this momentum, you manage to break free of their grasp; it’s more likely they let you get out, but you’re willing to take a win where you can get them. You quickly stand up to continue your little spar, but before you can even turn around, you feel one of their arms wrap around your throat and their other arm caging in the back of your head, putting you in a chokehold. You attempt to grab their hands to try and pry them off, but your hands freeze as their grip tightens, resulting in their body pressing firmly against you. You can feel their arms hugging around your throat, their elbow tightens just right around your neck where you're not in any real danger, but your head starts to feel lighter for a variety of reasons. Mhin’s body is just barely a breath of distance away from yours, but every once in a while, you can feel the bite of their belt buckle dig into your back.

“This is why you’re learning anatomy,” Mhin whispers into your ear. Their breath tickles your ear, and you feel your face start to flush. Your entire body feels like pure fire runs through your veins. Every time your own clothes brush against your skin, it feels like an unbearable punishment.

You’ve felt arousal before, but nothing like this. This is punishing, like being stuck in a desert and looking at a glass of water you can’t even touch. Mhin might tolerate your presence for now, but you never know when the wind will change. And from what you know of them, it will change. You might wake up one day and have them decide that they’re tired of saving you… It might be better to avoid getting any more attached to them, but like a dog whining for a sweet piece of chocolate, you never stop wanting something that could kill you.

With a small huff of laughter that sends shivers over the skin it brushes over, Mhin releases you. You take a moment to try and compose yourself, knowing without a doubt that Mhin’s going to start their lesson, and your brain's still stuck, balanced between the dichotomy of wanting to taste every inch of them and to run away from possible future heartbreak.

Their words are a garbled mess of empty static in your ear as they begin to lecture again. You hear them mention something about muscles and the different uses they have, but your brain is so muddled with thoughts that their lecture becomes background music for your internal musing. You’re keeping your back to them as they keep talking, knowing that if you were facing their direction, they would be able to see your empty stare and blush immediately.

Their footsteps starting to approach your form cause you to finally manage to escape from your thoughts long enough to listen to their words. “There are some areas of the body where the nerves in the muscles are more sensitive; using these sensitive areas, you can create a distraction,” Mhin lectures.

“These areas are typically on the feet, neck, underarms, …” When you feel their presence at your back, their sentence starts to trail off. Suddenly, you feel their hands ghost over your mid back. Your hands jump back, preparing to grab their hands. The new access to your sides allows them to slide their hands around your waist, stopping at the bottom of your ribcage below your chest. “And the ribcage,” they say, dropping their voice into a whisper that ghosts over your ear.

“It’s rude not to listen when someone’s talking to you.” Mhin chastises, their hands slowly starting to creep upwards, causing your back to arch, pushing your chest forwards, ”especially when you asked them to teach you.”

“I apologize.” You manage to say with a shuddering breath. You bite your lips together in a futile attempt to steady your breath. You squeeze your legs together to add some sort of friction to the parts of your body that are growing the most needy.

“I don’t think you are,” they say, pressing their body into you, maneuvering their head to the side of yours, brushing their lips to your ear as they continue their sentence. “Maybe I should try another way of teaching you, a lecture is obviously not working. Maybe a more… physical demonstration will help you finally listen.”

Their grip on your body shifts, their left hand moves to have a firm hold on the side of your waist to stop you from moving, while the right flattens and the fingers spread against your stomach. Your hands hover to the sides of your body, frozen in shock at their intimate touch and their close proximity.

“This is called the rectus abdominis,” they mutter into your ear. Their hand slides down to your lower stomach, the tips of their fingers lying on top of your pelvis. “This muscle assists with movements between the pelvis,” They say, punctuating their words by applying pressure where their hand rests. Dragging their hand up your torso, stopping just under your breast, their hand perfectly framing it, thumb resting in the valley between both breasts. “ and the ribs,” They finish.

As their hand slowly slides, checking to see if you show any signs of discomfort, before finally cupping your left breast. The feeling of their hand slowly kneading your chest and their fingers teasing your nipple through your clothes, you can’t help but let out various whimpers and squirm, causing their left hand to squeeze your hips even further, keeping you pressed into them.

“This is where your pectoralis major is located,” Mhin breathily whispers, pressing their nose to your shoulder, muffling their words, “its main functions are keeping the arms attached and allowing movement in the humerus bone.”

The only response you can give is whimpers, moans, and the muttering of their name like your personal mantra. Mhin pulls away from your chest, pulling a groan of protest from you. But, before you can miss their touch for long, they quickly guide you to rotate your body, facing them. Finally able to see them, you see that their face is coated red with a deep flush, their eyes are half-lidded and staring deeply into yours, and their lips are parted, allowing their quick, shallow breaths an escape. They place their hands on your jaw and pull you close before kissing you, surprisingly gently when compared to their previous actions. Their lips pressed firmly against yours, but not making any attempts to deepen the kiss. That is, until they break away briefly to grab a breath of air, before quickly bringing their lips to yours. Their right hand slides to the back of your head, getting lost in the strands as their left hand drops to your hip, pulling you tighter against them. You make quick work of their hair tie, throwing it in the direction you assume the table is, allowing their snowy locks to fall over their shoulders. One hand gets lost in their hair with the occasional tug that earns you a muffled groan from Mhin, the other exploring their back, grabbing tightly to their shirt. As their kisses start to get more feverish and greedy, you find Mhin walking forward, pushing you backwards, forcing you to walk until your knees hit the edge of their bed. Before you can fall back on their bed, they grab your waist to keep you upright, breaking their heated kisses to take your shirt and start to tug it upwards, telling you what they want without saying a word. You tear your hands away from their body to pull the offending garment over your head. You attempt to take off your pants as well, but before you can get further than one button, Mhin gets impatient and pushes you onto their bed.

You attempt to push yourself onto your elbows to look at them, but before you can, Mhin parts your knees, crawling onto the bed, and hovers above you. Their hands start to explore your newly exposed skin while their lips start to kiss and mark your neck. Every fear you felt before has instantly vanished. The feeling of their lips brushing against your neck starts to feel more vital to your well-being than even the air you're breathing. You’re hands lacing in their hair and your legs wrapping around their hips, squeezing around them, encourage them to continue. After their lips bite on a sensitive part of your neck and their thumb brushes over your hardening nipple, your hips involuntarily buck into Mhin’s. One of their hands drops down to your hips as they start to roll their hips into yours. After marking your neck to what they deem an acceptable amount, they start to kiss past your clavicle towards your right breast.

You’ve long lost your ability to make a cohesive sentence, barely able to say Mhin’s name, followed by a variety of curse words and grunts. As Mhin’s lips finally make contact with your nipple, you let out a surprised hiss and groan, your hands jumping to hold their shoulders. They freeze. Mouth disconnecting from your skin, hands moving to the bed next to you, hips moving away from yours, stopping all friction. Mhin looks up at your face, eyes wide and jumping over every feature of your face.

“Did I hurt you? Was it too much? Do you want me to stop?” They bombard you with questions, misunderstanding your cry of pleasure as cries of pain. You quickly reply with a shake of your head, hands gently holding onto the front of their shirt. Their hands slowly move to gently cradle your face.

“Are you sure you’re okay to continue?” They say with their eyes still looking into yours, searching for anything telling them to stop. You manage a small nod against their hands. They close their eyes and gently lean their head until your foreheads are resting against each other.

“I need to hear you say it… that you’re okay… please?” they implore, voice slowly trailing off. You feel a slight tremor in their hands, were they just that worked up from your heated touch, or maybe they were just that scared that they had hurt you. Swallowing the saliva building up in your throat and taking a deep breath, you manage to find your voice.

“I’m okay, I promise. Please don’t stop.” You beg. Taking a deep breath, fully processing your words and pushing away the last of their fears, Mhin slowly leans away from you. They look into your eyes before dropping them to your lips, leaning back in for another quick kiss.

“Good. I got… distracted,” They pause searching for the right words before continuing, “but now I can continue our lesson.” They say with a sly smile fueled with newly renewed confidence, knowing you want this as much as they do.

Mhin brings their lips down to your again before breaking away to linger kisses along your jaw and neck before stopping at your chest. Leaving soft kisses against each breast before dragging their tongue over your nipple. They continue to kiss their way down your stomach, they slowly bring their knees to the floor, kneeling before the bed as they loop their finger into the waist of your pants, slowly pulling them off. As their lips greet the new skin being revealed, stopping at the band of your undergarments, their hands run over the skin of your legs, squeezing the upper thighs before running their hands back down your legs. Your head rolls back in the anticipation of their next move, hand resting on their head thats pressing kisses to the band of your undergarments.

They give a soft kiss to the mound covered by your underwear before looking up at you, silently asking if you’re ready. The nod you give is all they need before hooking their fingers into the waistband and finally revealing the entirety of your body to them. Seeing them take a deep breath through their nose and lick their lips in anticipation while staring at the last piece of your body they have yet to touch, to taste, causes your legs to reflexively close. Their hands catch your knees before you can hide their newly found treasure from them. Mhin’s glossy half half-lidded eyes catch yours and hold your gaze while they push your knees apart and slot themself between them. You can feel your slick, the evidence of your arousal, coating your lower lips and upper thighs. The breath Mhin releases near your aching core cools the liquid releasing in anticipation for whatever they give you next, the contrast between the almost unbearable heat from your aching desire and the cooling arousal making your eyes squeeze shut and your back arch in pure pleasure. Their hands slowly slide from your knees, traveling up your thighs, every inch their hands get closer to your core, you feel coils in your stomach tighten in anticipation of the relief only they can provide. Their hands stop at the point where your hips and thighs meet, sliding their hands into your inner thighs. Their thumb gently presses onto your lips, gathering your arousal before dragging it up your slit, teasing but not venturing any further yet. Their voice breaks you out of your haze of pleasure, pulling your head up only to look at them.

“This,” Mhin starts, gaze fixed on their ministration as they continue their previously forgotten lesson, they swallow the saliva pooling in their mouth before continuing, “is your labia majora, it protects the sensitive and fragile parts of the female anatomy.”

They finally press their thumb past your folds, dipping down to your entrance, gathering even more of your arousal. You can’t help the moans escaping from your mouth, finally fulfilling the dreams you thought you’d only be able to live while asleep, your hand slaps over your mouth in feeble attempts to quiet your cries of pleasure. The moment Mhin hears your noises become muffled their eyes shoot up to your face. As soon as they see your efforts to quiet down, they pull their hands away, crawling up the bed, hovering over you, and grabbing your wrist.

“Don’t-,” Their eyes look anywhere but your face, suddenly embarrassed with what they were going to say, “Don’t… do that. Hearing you lets me know you enjoy what I’m doing.”

They release your wrist, eyes looking into yours as a silent plea. Instead of a verbal response, you gently bring your hands up to Mhin’s face, cradling their cheeks. They tilt their face further into the palm of your right hand, you pull yourself up to them, and bring your lips to theirs. The kiss didn’t last long, but it was sweet, almost innocent, a jarringly different type of kiss you thought you’d have lying naked underneath someone. They pull back from you with a small smile gracing their face. They're amazed that, despite being cursed and constantly being at threat of soulless attacks, they can find solace and joy in you. They steal a few more kisses from your lips before they crawl back, settling into their previous position between your thighs. Before you can even lean back to enjoy whatever pleasure they plan on bringing you, their tongue delvies between your lower lips sliding from your slick hole to your throbbing clit.

Your hands instinctively jump towards their head, wanting something from Mhin to hold on to. Mhin continues to leave kisses on your clit, while their hands rub and squeeze your thighs encasing their head. At some point they start to lecture again between kisses and light sucks, but the blood rushing to your head and your moans drown out their voice. They keep making out with your second pair of lips, at one point adding their hand to further add more stimulation to your dripping hole. As the pressure in your stomach starts to build, the only thing you're able to say is their name on repeat. With the encouragement of your almost pleading moans, Mhin seems to get more confident and determined, their lips wrapped around your clit seeming to barely pull themself away to even take a breath, their fingers deep inside you finding and abusing the spot that has you seeing stars, and their unoccupied hand moving to hold your bucking hips with a strength you tend to forget about. As the pressure building in your stomach finally snaps, your hands tighten around Mhin’s hair below you, your eyes are squeezed closed as your head throws back in a silent scream, and your body stops bucking and twitching as your muscles suddenly contract. Despite bringing you to a mind-blowing orgasm that makes you worried you’ll never feel satisfied without their help, Mhin still hasn’t pulled their lips from you or stopped their fingers from stretching and pumping from your spasming hole. The drawn-out pleasure that they keep pulling from you feels like pure ecstasy as you feel the sheets start to get soaked beneath you. When the feeling of their touch starts to become too much, you glance between your thighs to catch the sight of Mhin pulling away from you before they bring their hand to their lips, licking them clean.

“MC.” Mhin says your name, standing up to grip your chin, forcing you to look right at them, stealing a kiss before continuing their sentence, “What all do you remember from our lesson?”

Your eyes widen, trying to glance at anything but them, which proves difficult as their hand is still forcing you to look at them, you try to rack your mind, trying to remember anything they taught you tonight. You’re mind is only filled with images of them between your thighs and the sensation of their lips on yours. If you weren’t fresh from an orgasm, you might’ve been able to forge a response that would’ve appeased them. Unfortunately, or rather extremely fortunately, your legs are still twitching from the pleasure they just ripped from you. Your only response to their questions is a variety of stuttering apologies as they look down at you in faux disappointment.

“Tsk, if you don’t remember, I guess I’ll have to teach you all over again,” they punctuate their sentence by grabbing underneath your knees and dragging you towards the end of the bed again. “We’ll see which happens first, you finally remembering my lesson or the sun rising.” While you might not have been able to get much sleep that night and were only able to walk the next day on wobbly legs, you were now intimately informed about your own anatomy.

#mhin #ts mhin #mhin x reader #mhin x mc #touchstarved mhin #touchstarved vn #touchstarved game #touchstarved

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spoiled-oatmeal · 16 days ago

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Highschool Sweetheart, University Love

In a chance happening, you're paired for a group project with the girl you've been dying to meet all school year. You're determined to befriend her, just as she's determined to hide away. But fate has already made it clear whose side it's on, and your connection follows you both to university, where it blooms into something more.

A/N: ANON, THANK YOU FOR YOUR PATIENCE. I've been chipping away at this piece for ages and it just kept growing. I did tweak it a bit from someone asking you out, as the original prompt mentioned, because I already had that on my list of topics for Modern Mizu headcanons (so you'll be getting it anyway). I hope that's okay! This was such a comforting fic to work on, honestly. It's the fluffiest (and spiciest) piece I've done so far, though naturally that means it's still full of minor angst and pining. I hope nobody minds if I tried out my hand at loser!Mizu. I champion the switch-Mizu supremacy.

Reader is meant as wlw, but their gender isn't hugely specified so have fun!

((You can see the original prompt <a href="https://www.tumblr.com/fernslivers/784084562788679680/had-thoughts-about-a-high-school-into-college-au">here</a> )) (help, I do not understand hyperlinks)

TWs: Spice, some internalized self-image issues, insecurity, mentions of He*ji Sh*ndo and T*igen (in passing)

---

It started with a fight.

See, the teachers had a bad habit of pairing the quiet studious students with the rowdier ones, thinking they would balance out. Often, it does. And so, innocently, your teacher had tried to put the quiet Mizu with…Taigen.

Gasoline…meet spark.

“Enough! Enough!” Your teacher shouts over the chaos, waving her arms as she tries to separate them. Desks clatter to the floor, people shrieking and scattering out of the way, as she finally bodies her way in between them, fearless in the way only older female teachers ever are.

Silence finally falls.

Taigen is sporting a spectacular black eye, Mizu a split lip. Her bloodied teeth are bared, eyes blazing under her uneven bangs, while Taigen laughs mockingly from behind the teacher.

“Enough, the pair of you!” The teacher shouts again, furious. Both of them glare at the floor. She huffs, out of breath, and looks around the room. She seems too flustered to figure out what to do; she's also not the type to send kids for punishment without talking to them first. “We will deal with this after class. For now, Taigen, you are with him…”--she points somewhere on the other side of the room–”... and Mizu, you go there.”

She points. You freeze when you find yourself at the end of that point.

Your eyes slide from the teacher’s to Mizu’s. Two shards of ice glare back above a bloodied mouth.

Without thinking, you give her an awkward little wave. Here goes nothing.

—

You both work very quietly for a few minutes. You keep glancing her way–wary of that aura of anger still emanating from her, but unable to stop looking at the already swelling lip. She'd looked terribly fierce when she'd been fighting… the memory of that tooth-baring snarl is making your heart flutter strangely.

You've had a crush on this exact girl for most of the school year at this point. It started when you'd walked out of class and directly into a slim shape crossing the hallway; you'd looked up into the most beautiful eyes you'd ever seen, recognizing the new girl right away. She had apologized, quickly and efficiently, then turned away before you could say a word. You'd been watching her ever since. The way she walked with such a strange mixture of flinching and defiance; as though she expected to be struck down, and already planned on stubbornly getting back up. You had waited and waited for an opening, always had a smile ready on your lips when she passed by, but she never looked up, never gave you an ounce of an opening… until now.

Meanwhile, Mizu sulks, avoiding your gaze, already assuming that you hate this forced pair-up. She doesn't want to see you looking at her like she's a rabid animal you've been forced to sit close to. She wonders with a dull pang of resignation what stories you've heard, about her, about where she comes from. She had tried to catch Ringo’s eye when this all started–he can be annoying, but he is at least diligent. But he had already partnered with Akemi, sitting next to him. Then the teacher had partnered up who was left, and…

A soft voice catches her attention.

“That looks painful…”

She meets your gaze with a start, surprised to see your brow furrowing slightly in concern.

“S’fine,” she mumbles, but it's clear the swelling is starting to affect her speech, and she scowls harder at her own human limitations. You dig in your bag, pulling out a little pack of wipes. When she looks at you skeptically, you giggle nervously. “They're not scented or anything, but they're supposed to soothe…it might help?”

Wonderingly, she reaches out. You think she looks much less intimidating when her eyes are wide like this, her fingers hesitant. Nervous…almost shy.

She takes the wipe like she's preparing for you to snatch it back and laugh. When you don't, she smiles tentatively, as much as her swollen lip will allow.

—

The project goes surprisingly well. You both fall into a strangely easy rhythm of meeting for your free periods, occasionally after class … This is the first time Mizu has ever had a fellow student to meet up with. Eiji grumbles about her lack of presence in the forge, but she catches the edge of a smile as he turns away, shooing her out the door to the library, where you're waiting, every day for the next few weeks, with a ready smile that makes her guts feel squirmy.

Mizu handles the display; you handle the presenting. She blushes with half-hidden delight when you praise the artistic beauty of her work with genuine admiration. She'd always wondered if her designs merited any pride, but who could she ask? Eiji of course could tell her plenty about technical skill, but he isn't the type to bother praising her aesthetics, even if he could. And she feels a profound sense of gratitude when you field the questions at the end; blocking those that would previously have asked her joke questions just to force the weird kid to speak.

When the presentation concludes with a spattering of the usual bored classroom applause, you shoot her a beaming smile. She feels a little glow in her chest, swelling up like a warm bubble. This is the first project where she didn't end with wanting to sink into the ground and vanish.

The bell rings, and you walk with her out into the hall, the same way you have every day since the project started. She's grown used to the company, now. It's… really nice.

“That went so well!” You chirp, pausing in the hallway. “That's the first time I didn't hate a group project.” You rub your arm, wondering if you're saying too much. “I'm actually kinda sad to see it end…”

…Oh. Right.

The bubble in her chest pops abruptly.

The project is over. She’s got no further reason to spend time with you. Her suddenly empty ribcage aches; no more afternoons in the library filled with your chatter, no more emails and texts to cut the monotony of training and working with Eiji. She might never see your name pop up on her little flip-phone again. She's horrified to feel her throat tighten painfully.

Why is she so disappointed? What is this? Spooked by her own emotions, she panics, just as you start to speak.

“Would you maybe wanna–”

“I gotta get to class.” She blurts out over top of your words, turning on her heel and hurrying away, terrified you might see the emotion on her face. That would be humiliating. It was just a project.

You stare after her, your mouth still open on the half-finished invitation to hang out.

—

It takes another school year, and at least one more paired project, to get her to the point of even conversing outside of class-based activities.

You don't care.

You saw the way she warmed to you during that first project. And–frankly–you know what she's like with people she can't stand, you share several classes with people she has snarled at. If she wanted you gone, truly, she'd have cut you down already.

You’re determined to make this strange, prickly girl like you. It's like slowly coaxing in a wild animal; there's an honor in gaining that trust.

It's not easy.

She looks away when you sit next to her in class, mumbling her responses to your greetings. She hunches her shoulders and speeds up when you call out to her in the hallway, then hyperventilates in the bathroom stall, berating herself for being unable to just turn around. She won't sit with your friends at lunch; she finds them banal and irritating.

She sits very close by, though, close enough to hear the bright arpeggio of your laughter, to glance over the top of her sketch book and study the way your hand raises to cover your smiling mouth selfconsciously. Each laugh strikes like an arrow, a pang of wistfulness that she immediately resents. She feels irrationally jealous every time someone else prompts that laugh. She wishes you were laughing with her.

Sometimes, rarely, you do sit with her. Those are the best days. When she can sit quietly and let herself sink into your voice like a warm bath. You always ask about her newest sketches; she always hopes that you will, but can never bring herself to offer first. Slowly, she's begun to draw with the hopes that you'll soon be looking at these pieces and praising them. The praise begins to settle in her mind as pride in her own work; it's new, a little scary.

You never chatter too much; the silences are easy. In those moments, she knows you understand; the importance of giving each other room for thought, of knowing when you do choose to speak, it will instantly be picked up with warmth, of following a conversation half-started inside another person’s head. There's an intimacy in that silence, unquestioned and full-felt.

But the next day, you’re back with your friends, and she's left to wonder, to drive herself slowly crazy with doubt.

She has no idea that you come so rarely only because you worry you're bothering her. It would surprise her that her quiet presence is a balm to you the same as yours is for her. That she feels more real to you than anyone else in the school. That when she raises her pale gaze and listens to you, you feel like what you're saying has more weight than ever before. Simply by listening, she makes you slow down, think harder about what you say and what you believe. You feel yourself becoming more you every moment you spend within her simple acceptance. You'd sit there every day if you could; but instead, you only do it when you just can't stay away a second longer.

For her, those are bright moments of beauty, where she has your full attention, and she can believe that you're here because you feel that same need for her. For you, they are tiny moments of connection to something that feels already deeper and more special than the fleeting teenaged fancies of high school.

The day she finally, grumblingly, agrees to give you her social media accounts, it feels like getting the wolf to briefly let you stroke its muzzle. It is a prize you hug to your heart and allow to buoy you up for weeks afterwards. She trusts me–it electrifies you with excitement that even impedes your sleep.

The social media in question is bare-bones. No profile picture, no posts. Her friends list is hidden.

You don't realize it's because she created it for you.

Because you kept asking.

That hidden friends list is only two people long; you, and Ringo (who immediately discovered her page with the skill of a bloodhound, despite her attempts to be unsearchable).

For your part, you try not to think about the little thrill that pops through you when you notice a like from her in your notifications. You sometimes just stare at the grey outline of her blank profile photo, at her name next to it. Thinking about her. Wishing she would post some tiny hint of her life, her interests, anything that might give you a glimpse past the wall of stoicism. You aren't sure when you started posting your own content hoping she'd see it, but at some point towards the end of that second year, you can admit that you think of her with every new upload.

She regrets it every day; it makes it impossible to turn her brain away from you. It’s like a little reminder of you in her fucking pocket that dings every time you post a story, a picture, a note, a video–how many ways can people post on these things?? It's torture.

She consumes every pixel of it religiously.

Memorizes the exact curl of your real smile versus the one you think makes you look nice in photos. Learns what music you prefer to go with your posts. What days you’ll be putting up little Stories and why; the ones that come with being bored in class, the ones being out with friends, the ones when you're at home. She learns hints of what your room looks like through the back of your selfies.

She's not trying to be creepy; she isn't lurking in your bushes or something. It's just that you're…interesting. For some reason.

For the thousandth time, she slams the laptop shut abruptly, glaring at her ceiling, hearing the ring of Eiji’s hammer downstairs. Mizu he shouts up, and she hops to her feet, grateful for work to purge her mind temporarily.

It doesn't matter.

None of it matters.

You'll be gone soon, anyway, and she's certain you won't remember her. She's watched you from afar, seen how you're always happy, always smiling, with everyone equally.

Meanwhile, she feels like her chest only lightens when she's near enough to hear your laugh. The yawning pit of grief she feels when she looks at that looming graduation date…it feels impossible, like it can't truly happen. Surely something so essential to her life can't simply…leave?

It doesn't. Matter.

She's used to losing things. She'll adjust to this too, who cares? And you seem to have no problem being happy without her. You'll move on.

—

She freezes on the threshold of the dorm, statue-still with her cardboard box in hand. Behind her, Eiji crashes into her back and swears loudly. She doesn't move, even when his cane-tongs clonk her ankle. A pair of familiar eyes look up at the commotion, going as wide as hers.

“Mizu…?”

She drops the box. Before she can scramble for it, you’re leaping into her suddenly empty arms.

She's assaulted by the warmth of you, your familiar scent; only ever caught in wisps except for that one painful, poignant hug at graduation–the last time she thought she would ever get the chance to hold you close. As her brain struggles to reboot, her body reacts, wrapping around you, gripping you back tightly, as though she'll never risk letting go again.

“Mizu, I can't believe it!” She looks down into your beaming face. Your smile is so close. Have your eyes always been this full of light? Your skin so soft-looking, your hair falling so perfectly? She's still frozen, even with Eiji growing frustrated behind her.

“It’s like fate!” Your voice, that same bright peal of laughter.

She is so fucked.

—

Slowly, impossibly, you settle into a routine.

Not that it isn't torture. It absolutely is, to be so close to you, actually haunted by the scent of your shampoo, even your laundry soap. Even more devastatingly, your dorm begins to smell like both your scents mingled–sometimes she can catch a whiff of you on her own jacket. It's as though her own fantasies are laughing at her.

Every time she opens the door to find you glancing up from your bed with that bright smile, her heart lurches, a joy that is somehow knife-sharp. It hurts to look at you too long, and yet she can never satisfy the need to do so.

This is so much harder than high school.

For the first week, she lies awake, staring in awed silence as you sleep peacefully less than a room-length away from her. You're here. Not just on campus–in her room. It feels impossible to have gotten this second chance to be close, even if she'll never have you the full way she wants. This is already more than a blessing. It’s like a kind of greed; surviving on tiny gasps of your presence before, and now she can just breathe you in.

It only takes her that first week to notice that you always wake up too late to get breakfast before the hall closes.

As you shovel one of the pop-tarts from your care package into your mouth, again, frantically shoving your shoes into your sneakers without untying them, already looking around for your bag, a raspy voice arrests you.

“What do you usually eat in the morning?”

“Mmph?” You stop and turn to her; her voice has always had the power to do that. She speaks so rarely and always with purpose.

God, she looks good; you remember how long she's been doing her sword training now, and her body has that well-seasoned fighter’s slouch as she sprawls in her desk chair. You could just crawl into that lap... Whatever she did in your summer apart, it's working for her. Her high bun highlights the sleekness of her cheekbones, lets more light into those intense eyes.

Rousing yourself, you shake your head on an indistinct noise, waving at the poptart in your teeth.

She curls her lip up with a stoic look of disapproval. It shouldn't be hot; it really is. “If you could get up in time. Get real food.”

“Hmg–...mm…” You finish your bite hastily, pulling the rest of the pastry away to mumble around it, “I don't know… I'm not really very picky.”

You get a bombastic eye roll. She's grown a bit more confident over the summer as well, and that sharp sass you've always seen buried under the surface has come out in full. You're not complaining.

She leaves the conversation there, but the next morning, the clack of a plate dropping onto your bedside table is what wakes you. You squint up at her, confused; of course she's already dressed without a hair out of place. She swallows the thought that you look extremely cute like this, and soft, and warm, and she would very much like to burrow down into the extra plush blankets with–

“Eggs.” Her voice is as clipped as ever.

“Did you steal that plate from the dining hall…?” You push yourself up on one elbow, blinking, too disoriented to think to say thank you. “They have to-go boxes…”

She’s already turning away for the door; your voice is husky from sleep and it's killing her slightly.

“Eat.”

You eat about half the eggs; they aren't your favorite. She surveys the leftovers on the plate the next time she's in the room, but says nothing.

The next day it’s oatmeal instead. She watches as you crinkle your nose before hiding it in a flash, remembering this time to say thank you, and eating a bit to be polite.

Then bacon. Then waffles.

You thank her profusely no matter what it is; she grunts and flees. Every day.

You’re not about to be outdone. You begin to notice how often she gets back late to the dorm from her practices. You've got to take the breakfast plates back anyway (she keeps stealing them), or she'll try to do that for you, too, so…

The next time she comes in late, she drops her duffle with a sigh, and goes towards her side-table to grab a protein bar from her stash. She finds a takeout container waiting. She looks over at you, startled.

You smile. “Eat,” you tell her, playfully.

—

She keeps waiting for the other shoe to drop. For you to reveal some fundamental incompatibility. Maybe you put dirty socks on the radiator? Or talk loudly on the phone late at night? But as the autumn cools and the leaves crisp to burnt caramel and drop, things only grow warmer between you.

Slowly, your things begin to encroach on each other’s sides, her jacket slung over your chair on her way to sit on your bed, your books stacked on her desk, trying to entice her to read your favorites. Slowly, she finds that more and more Friday nights are spent curled distractingly close to you on one bed or the other, watching something on the laptop, instead of studying in silence or training at the gym. It still feels like a miracle when you turn to her and smile like she’s something special to you, but it’s no longer a bizarre shock.

When will you start to hate her? There must be something she's going to do that will turn you away, fill your eyes with the cold distaste she's come to expect as a greeting from others. When will she catch you gossiping about her? When will your smile suddenly turn cruel, and you reveal this has all been some ridiculously long joke? Or that you've just figured out that she's not worth your time? Surely you can't really be the only one who will never turn on her, another like sword-father?

One day she catches herself smiling even when she's alone–just remembering your laughter the night before.

Panic sets in. She's … happy. You make her happy. This is all going too well.

She’s getting in too deep. It can't last, she knows it can't.

She begins to pull away.

At first, you take it in stride; this is Mizu, she gets in weird moods, and you've seen her go through grumpy phases before. Something from class, something Taigen said–frankly, just her suddenly recalling that he somehow ended up at the same university is sometimes enough to put her in a funk.

But after the third week of untouched takeout containers, and two skipped Friday hangouts, it starts to sting.

You thought things were going well. What did you do wrong?

Suddenly, you're back in highschool again, wanting to sit at her table but afraid you'll piss her off by coming around too much, having to constantly calculate how much you can be with her before you scare her away. Have you been spending too much time around her? Is she burnt out on you? Every time you ask her to do something and she turns away with a shrug and a grunt, it feels like something breaks in your soul.

You can feel yourself wilting away, your smiles less ready as her scent starts to fade from your clothing and pillow. You blame yourself. You got too comfortable and forgot about moderation. You let yourself be yourself too much, and now you've lost her.

Maybe…maybe you can still fix this. Maybe if you just give her space, maybe spend some time with your other friends, and let her have more time to herself, she'll come back around again?

Mizu notes your cooling demeanor, the sudden absences from your room, the way you stop inviting her to shared activities, the empty spot on her desk where your books have vanished. Within her, something grows cold, and nods with cynical resignation. Things are going back to the way they were always meant to go.

It's better this way, she thinks, lying awake and staring at the ceiling.

She still feels cold.

She feels like something important is slipping through her fingers. There's another, realer panic, quieter and more confusing, bubbling under the surface that she can't quite grasp. She shoves it down deep and tries to ignore it.

Lying dead still, barely blinking, she watches the cracks in the ceiling fade out of sight in the dark, then slowly reappear as the room lightens with the next morning’s dawn.

The cold only grows deeper.

—

Akemi has had just about enough of this bullshit.

Seriously.

Her friend group is in tatters thanks to the two of you.

It used to be fun; you two were thick as thieves. If she invited one, the other would show up without being asked. And somehow with you next to her, Mizu would sometimes smile, maybe even talk! Not to mention, Akemi had less of an issue keeping the conflicts between Mizu and Taigen to a minimum. She even had time to chat to Ringo without having to manage two ridiculous hotheads slinging their swords around in endless dick-measuring contests that neither could seemingly back down from.

Now? Forget it.

If one of you shows up, the other shuts down or leaves. More often it's you showing up, which of course means half the time, Ringo scuttles off to make sure Mizu isn't dead in a ditch somewhere, so Akemi never sees either of them. When Mizu does make a rare appearance, she's so damn irascible that Akemi is genuinely starting to fear for her boyfriend’s safety. In the miraculous event that you do both join the group, she has to endure the cliched sight of you both staring longingly at each other when one is looking away, only to turn quickly when they glance towards you, prompting them to start looking longingly…

She’s never seen two bigger, more oblivious boneheads. My god.

Something simply has to be done.

When she mentions this to her boyfriend, Taigen offers to flirt with you to entice Mizu to act; Akemi is forced to pretend at jealousy just to keep him from getting his ego bruised by the fact that she’s sure Mizu would outright kill him.

See? This is exhausting. Everything is conflict. Can't a girl get some damn peace.

That said… Taigen might be onto something here.

While Akemi isn't willing to risk her boyfriend’s life … there is a party coming up soon. She's happy to gamble on a few less frat bros in the world if it means getting her friends group off of life support.

Time to rehearse how she's going to rope you into dressing up.

—-

How Akemi roped you into this, you have no idea.

You're grousing under your breath in the mirror, still struggling to get your hair to behave, when the door to the dorm room opens behind you. You freeze. Dammit. You had been trying to get out the door before Mizu got home, but you're so out of the habit of dressing up that you've lost track of time.

You turn warily around to find Mizu outright staring.

When she catches your eye, she drops her duffle on her foot, trips over it, and then shuts the door on the bag, having dropped it right on the threshold. Her expression shifts rapidly as you watch; one betraying wide-eyed flick up and down your outfit, her cheeks flushing, then a guilty flash as she catches herself doing it and quickly glances away.

“Hm. Fancy,” she comments dryly, looking down at her dropped belongings and finally managing to shut the door.

Picking up her bag with deliberate casualness, she then hangs her things up with unusual care, the activity keeping her back to you. The brief fizzle of certainty that she was checking you out dies in the face of her now-customary coldness.

“Yeah,” you mumble, giving up on your hair. You don't really care if you look good for this thing anymore. It's amazing how one reminder of the lost closeness between you two can immediately kill your mood. “Sorry–I’ll be out of your hair in a minute.”

She grunts in reply, stalking over to throw herself into her bed without looking at you, and grabs her sketchbook. That seems to be the end of her input on the matter.

Jesus. You'd think such a rare event as you dressed up would–... well, maybe some part of you had hoped she might– … Well, fine. Whatever.

Stifling a sigh, you pad over to the end of your bed and bend forward to start putting on your shoes. Maybe you'll talk to your RA about a room transfer, you think. This late in the year, they probably won't replace you and then Mizu will have a room to herself. That would probably be better for her… Your mood is dropping to gloom when she unexpectedly pipes up again.

“Where are you going.”

You're surprised enough to turn and glance at her, but she's firmly ensconced behind the book and hasn't looked up. You aren't aware that she risked a glance a moment ago while you were bending forward and nearly swallowed her tongue. All you see is a literal wall, hiding her face from you when she used to meet you with eyes like a warm ocean.

You feel yourself crack.

Okay. You've been patient. You've been nice. But now you're just confused, upset–and mad. You're not sure if it’s the sight of her face blocked by that sketchbook–the one you know almost every sketch in–or the way she’s demanding to know where you're going despite ignoring you for weeks. Maybe it's the way she definitely looked you up and down when she came in, then pretended nothing happened. Regardless of what it is, something absolutely evil burrows into your chest.

“I'm going to that party tonight at Heiji Shindo’s.”

You had planned to be gone, or at least to tell her you were simply partying with Akemi. You weren't going to tell her. You know exactly how much Mizu hates Shindo; admittedly, that might have been a private reason you let Akemi talk you into this. And for the first time since this all started, you find that you kind of want to piss her off. God, at least maybe then she'll do you the courtesy of looking at you.

You get your wish.

“What.” The sketchbook flops forward, covered by her hands, and you almost flinch at the expression on her face. She looks stricken rather than angry; naked shock and a genuine disbelief etched in every angular plane and line.

You grit your teeth; you can smell an argument coming like rain on the breeze. Too late to turn back now.

“I said I'm going to–”

“Heiji. Shindo.” She cuts in. Every syllable tinkles with ice. Her face is twitching, emotions shifting rapid-fire between dismay and disgust, disbelief and something deeper, something that crumples the edges of her mouth and makes your heart clench. You shake your head; already you regret everything.

“Yeah.” You swallow. “Akemi asked me to go. She thinks it'd be good for me to get out, meet some people.”

You can see her fingers tighten on the edge of her sketchbook.

“Meet people.” Her voice drops with disdain. “Dressed…like that.” She curls a lip, but as her eyes drift to your outfit, you can tell the snark is, as usual, masking something else.

You can't help the way your shoulder slump, even if you want to pretend she doesn't bother you. “What's wrong with my outfit?”

The snark melts off her face at once at the sight of your stung expression, and she looks almost regretful for a moment before her face disappears behind the sketchbook. “Nothing. It's fine,” she snaps. “Nevermind.”

You pause, biting your lip. It's clearly not fine. Only a few weeks ago, you'd have pursued it, but not now, not when you’re already afraid you've driven her away by being too pushy. You go back to fastening your shoes, and for a few moments, the only sound in the room is the skritch of Mizu’s pencil. It stops suddenly.

“I don't think you should go.”

“Huh?”

She takes a breath. “You talk to enough people,” she says shortly. You frown.

“What's that supposed to mean?”

“Nothing,” mumbles the sketchbook. You can see her shoulders hunch around its edges. “... You're always out. With people.”

“Are you saying I get around or something?”

“No!” Horrified blue eyes peep over the top of the sketchbook, then disappear again. “… Just … the people at those parties…”

You wait, as you always do, for her to find her words.

“They're… they might be unsafe.” Even she sounds confused by her own words. What the fuck is going on.

“You know I can take care of myself.” You cross your arms, but your tone is less angry this time; you're staring at her in bemusement. This is the most she's talked to you in weeks.

“They’re not your style,” she counters irritably. She's grasping at straws now; even you can hear the mounting frustration in her voice. A little whisper of intuition stops you from flaring up, and you pause, studying the taut figure on the bed.

“Who says they’re not my style?” You ask, more softly this time.

“They're just not.” She sounds certain. Internally, you know she's right–but you're not about to cave to a literal blank page with no answers.

“Well … maybe it'll be good to broaden my horizons,” you counter. You hear a faint choke disguised as a scoff.

“Sure, get harrassed by some frat guy,” She snaps. “I'm sure that's what your social life needs.”

You stand for a moment longer, shoe in hand. You could get angry at her tone, or the harsh words. Maybe you should. But…

As slowly as if you were approaching a stray cat, you walk over and sit at the edge of her bed. Her shoulders hunch further as she feels your weight dip the mattress. She draws her knees up defensively. Suddenly, you're reminded of the girl you met in high school, the one that watched you and waited for you to pull away when you'd just seen her thrash another student. Who looked surprised when you reached out instead. Maybe I've read this wrong.

“Mizu? Why are you so worked up about this?”

“I'm not.”

O-kay. You can already feel the wall you're going to hit if you insist on pushing that angle.

“... Okay. Well. Why … don't you want me to go?”

“Because I don't want you to– …” She nips off the end of her sentence abruptly.

“To?”

“Just– … forget it.” She's not even pretending to draw anymore. The sketchbook is pulled almost touching her face, purely a shield. You've never seen her like this. She's avoidant, to the max. You do know that. But hiding behind a book, openly almost cowering–that's not Mizu. A little grain of possibility is beginning to take root in your mind. But it can't be…

“Mizu. Please.” You keep your voice soft, but you're starting to get concerned, and the distress is showing in your voice. “Tell me what's going on. Why don't you want me to go?”

“I don't care if you go.” Her voice is tight behind her shield.

“Mizu, come on.” Your voice cracks; you're trying not to cry. What happened to you two? All you've ever wanted was to be close to her; a friend if that's all she wanted, even though you wanted more. How did you make so much progress and then suddenly get caught up in such a tangled mess? The words spill out of you in a frustrated rush; you can't seem to stop them. “You've been weird for weeks, and…and I thought we were close, you know??” You stand up from the bed abruptly, beginning to pace. “I don't know what I did wrong. But you won't even look at me, much less talk to me– and now you’re finally talking to me again but just to tell me not to go somewhere without even telling me why–”

“Because I don't want you to meet someone.”

It's so quiet that you could have talked right over it, but Mizu’s voice has always had the power to stop you in your tracks. You stop pacing.

“… What?”

“I don't… want you to-... meet someone.” You can't see her face, but the words sound like they're coming out through a tightly clenched jaw.

… Ho-ly shit.

“Mizu...” You sink back down onto the bed, feeling a little dizzy. You're at a loss for words, your voice genuinely stunned. Does she… does she really mean…? Is she saying…? Suddenly, you're consumed by the need to see her face; you can't know if this is real until you've seen it in her eyes. You reach out tentatively, and try to pull down the sketchbook, but she grips it tight. Damn. You always forget how strong she is.

“Mizu, please? Talk to me?” Your voice is cracking again, trying to stay soft with such a potent need building behind it.

At your soft plea, she almost seems to flinch. After a moment, slowly, jerkily, she lowers the sketchbook. You glance at the page in passing, and then stare at it in surprise.

It's a rough outline, barely, but it's clearly you, in your outfit, perfectly represented in only a few graceful strokes.

You stare at it for a long moment, pieces fully clunking into place in your brain. Then, gently, you pry the sketchbook from her stiff fingers and set it aside, before reaching out to take her hands. You can feel her fingers spasm under yours, as though she's afraid to squeeze back, but wants to.

“You know, you're right that the party isn't really my style,” you say very quietly. Raising your eyes from your entwined fingers to her eyes, you finally see her face. You’re struck again with a vision of your very first meeting; she looks as lost and uncertain as she did in that first moment of connection. This makes … only the second time you've ever seen Mizu look afraid. You hold her gaze in yours. “I'd rather be here. With you.”

Her breath catches on an inhale, blue eyes widening even further. Convulsively, the long fingers suddenly wrap around yours.

“Mizu, I ... I really missed you lately,” you continue, your voice still quiet. Your eyes are searching hers, vulnerable with hope. Color is rising along the pale column of her neck, her lower lip trembling. You shift up the bed a little, closer to her. You're not going to ask her why she pulled away; now that this has happened, you know her well enough to guess. Actually, you suspect you might understand better than she could have explained it to you–if she even would have.

A giddy, excited nervousness is bubbling in your chest. She likes me. She likes me. She likes me. This is happening. Oh my god. Don't fucking blow it now.

“Did you…miss me?” You're close enough to whisper now, your fingers still entwined between you. Your voice is husky now, somewhere between enticement and encouragement.

“Yes.”

Startlingly, her hands suddenly tighten hard around yours. Squeezing, gripping like iron. You couldn't pull away if you wanted to–lucky that you don't.

She says it with such drive, almost aggressively. One of her hands slides to your upper arm, tugging you in closer with one unintentionally rough jerk. Her eyes never leave yours; the yearning suddenly revealed is so potent that it knocks you breathless for a moment.

“Yes,” she says. “Yes. I missed you. Yes.”

Your foreheads are nearly touching. She keeps her firm grip on you, but she seems at a loss now that you're close; she doesn't seem to know what to do next, only that she wants you as close to her as possible. She says your name hoarsely; you can see her pulse rabbiting in the hollow of her throat. I'd like to kiss you there.

You’re afraid to spook her. You don't want to accidentally ruin this before it even starts. Gently, you raise the hand that's still entwined with one of hers; you watch her eyes fasten on your lips as they near her hands, giving her time to pull away. As you breathe softly over her knuckles, you can see her eyelids flutter for a moment, before the softness of your lips makes her swallow.

“Good?” You ask softly. She nods, swallowing again at your immediate, heart-melting smile.

She wants to kiss you. And–like she does with every goal in her life–she immediately throws herself directly into what she wants now that she knows how to get it, the hand on your bicep suddenly tangling in your hair, yanking you into a hard kiss.

It's clumsy with mutual inexperience, a bit toothy, but Mizu’s lips are on yours, her hands grasping you, her harsh breaths against your mouth–and that's enough to pull a soft moan from you as you scramble around on the bed to pull closer.

The dam of mutual desire is breaking after so many long years, both of you surprised by the other’s intensity, and your own. Nothing could stop the torrent now. In a rushing tangle of limbs, you end up in Mizu’s lap, one hand braced on the wall behind her, her face buried in your neck. “Smell so good–” she mumbles into the flesh of your throat, mouthing with inexpert passion at the soft skin. You feel woozy; this is real, her hands gripping at your hips, those slender fingers digging into the soft flesh there.

“Oh– fuck, Mizu…” your whine is almost lost in the rustle of fabric as you press yourself closer to her on top of the blankets.

With a desperate groan, she disentangles and pulls back to look up at you. “God–” She gasps, taking in your hazy expression, tracing down over the reddened marks littering your neck and shoulders, down to where your clothes are riding up, the skin of your thighs soft and vulnerable wrapped around her hips. “You look–... you're so–...”

“You too,” you say in a breathless rush, sounding someone both giddy and hungry. She looks fucking delicious. Her hair is coming down in tousled strands from its tidy knot, her blue eyes hazy, a heady flush painting her cheekbones. As she devours the sight of you greedily, you cup her face, bringing her gaze back to yours. “Mizu– I want you,” you say, simple and blunt, and watch the shudder roll through her.

Her eyes darken even as they widen. She buries her face in your neck again, hiding from her own reaction, struggling to control her breathing as she veers between painful, fearful joy and a deep chasm of arousal. “Fuck–” she rasps, her grip on your hips tightening almost painfully, dragging you closer, one hand skating up your back to wrap you in her grip fully.

“I want you,” you murmur in one reddening ear, again, and feel her shudder again, her teeth fastening into the meat of your shoulder. Your cry cascades into a moan. “I need you.” She hisses out your name again, maybe a warning–too much–too real–too powerful–or maybe a prayer answered, maybe some kind of grateful call and response. It's everything she never even let herself fantasize–it's more than she could ever believe she could have. It's terrifying. She clings to you tighter, presses her face closer to your skin, pushing away her terror with the feel of you, your scent like a drug around her.

“Mizu. I love you.”

You can feel the hot breath against your skin suddenly hitch and stop for a moment, her body going still. She pulls away again, looking up at you like she did before–the Mizu that took the wipe all those years ago, the Mizu hiding behind the sketchbook. Scared to hope, scared to reach out and take the connection even as she craves it desperately.

“I love you,” You whisper again, even softer, your hands cupping her face again. She closes her eyes, pressing her cheek harder into your hand, her breathing heavy. Her lashes are darkening--there's wetness under your cupped hand. When you lean in to kiss her softly, you can smell the faint tang of salt.

Her lips move softly against yours for a moment, trying for that same clumsy urgency, but you hold her to a sensual kiss–slow, gentle, thorough–making her feel the lingering depth of your desire until she's shivering against you. When you pull back, the blue gaze is raw.

“I-... I-I…” Her voice cracks; suddenly she looks stricken at her own lack of words. You can see the struggle on her face; to bare such a tender spot, after a lifetime that has battered her tender spots mercilessly. She says your name again, helplessly, her hands clutching at you. “I…”

“It's okay,” you whisper, pressing another kiss to her lips to silence her. You already know; just like every other unspoken moment that's passed between you two in the comfortable silences ever since your school days. There's no need for her to say it when she isn't ready. The sentiment is clear. “You don't need to, Mizu. I know.”

“I'm sorry–” she says anxiously–you cut her off with a soft nip to her throat, melting some of her anxiety into a moan.

“Don't be,” You murmur. “Just be here. With me.”

“I am– I am–oh–...”

As you trail more kisses down her neck, across your collarbone, you can feel her hips twitch up underneath you, and you smile, shaky with nerves, but determined, as your hands find the hem of her shirt. You're no more experienced than she is, but damn it if you aren't going to put those long hours of internet research to some constructive use.

“Fuck,” she hisses again when your lips close around one already tight nipple. “Ah!” She was utterly unprepared for the sharp jolt of sparks that shot straight from where your lips connected to her very core. You hum with delight, taking her soft cries as positive feedback as your tongue laves over the tight bud.

You would happily stay here all day, switching from one pert breast to the other, feeling her thighs clench around your waist with each swipe of slick muscle, but you take mercy on the helpless bucking of her hips, the way her voice is going higher and higher every time you switch nipples and start afresh.

Her toned belly flinches at the first kiss, as though even that were too sensitive, and her thighs twitch around you again as you breath over the slick mess between her thighs. When you look up, the nervous desire in her face is almost adorable; brows quirking up, blue eyes gone soft and hazy. You know you're not doing much better; you’re shaking, you want to please her so badly.

“Tell me if it's bad?” You ask her, a twinge of self-consciousness showing through your attempts at confident seduction. She reaches out, stroking a lock of hair from your face.

“It won't be,” she whispers, shakily, and you smile, turning to catch her palm with a kiss, before your lips find her thigh and begin to move inwards.

She claps a hand over her mouth at the first swipe of your tongue along her slit, muffling a broken cry. Her taste already dominating your senses, you glance up, still unsure of yourself, but she nods, panting.

You bury your face in her folds at last, finding your rhythm quickly as her moans and cries grow louder. God–fuck, i could die here and be happy. You don't look up again, lost in a daze at the taste of her, her arousal slicking your chin as she bucks her hips up frantically. She sounds perfect, and feels even better against you, all slick, wet heat and delicately fluttering muscle. She's already so keyed up that it takes nearly no time at all. When your lips find her clit and close around it, she abandons all attempts to muffle herself, both hands finding your hair as her thighs tighten around your head, shuddering helplessly and crying out your name to the ceiling as orgasm whites out her vision.

You work her through the aftershocks greedily with lips and tongue and fingers, until finally she's pushing you weakly away with a whine, legs falling limply to the mattress. You crawl up to pepper very wet kisses to her neck and cheek, unable to hide your smug pride.

“The great Mizu, finally subdued,” you purr teasingly, your voice warm with affection, nuzzling into her cheek before pulling back to grin.

Her eyes snap open. The room suddenly spins around you.

You fall back against the mattress with a yelp, your outfit now fully ridden up to leave you exposed between parted, soaked thighs. Mizu looms over you, hair a mess, skin sweat-slicked, pale eyes as sharply intent as a predator. Holy shit. Your skin is already tingling as she hooks your knees over her shoulders and drags you easily back towards her with a palm on the top of each thigh. Seemingly, you aren't the only one to have done your homework.

“My turn.” Her voice is a husky, ominous rasp, an undercurrent of danger and play making your stomach flip.

Those burning eyes never leave yours, even as her face buries itself between your legs.

—

Akemi taps one heel on the sidewalk outside of the party, irritated. She tries to do something nice and what does it get her? She gets to be the Walmart Greeter for Heiji Shindo’s bash for over an hour while you leave her dangling. Five missed calls. Five! All the good booze is gonna be gone by the time she gets in there; she knows Taigen doesn't have the empathy to save her a bottle of anything good.

She opens her phone again, sighing at the sight of the long string of texts lining her side of the chat window with no replies from you.

Well?! Are you coming?!?!?!

She's not exactly expecting a response, so she surprised to see the three dots pop up within a few minutes.

Oh, I'm coming.

Just not to the party ;)

GIRL

WTF

TMI

You heart her texts without replying. Akemi sighs. So, as it turns out, the frat boys weren't the sacrifice this evening; she was.

Tut, tut. That's what I get for being the responsible one in this friend group, she tells herself, before turning and making her way into the party.

All in a day’s work.

Maybe she'll be lucky enough to get a sip of Malibu before she has to chug the orange-flavored Mad Dog.

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