#BUT then it actually got better. i turned 18 moved states away from my abusive parents got some of the healthcare i needed

[caffeinatedopossum]

Adults stop telling kids how much "adulthood sucks" challenge. You might be jealous and nostalgic but you never know which one of those kids *already* has an awful life and can't stand the thought of things getting any worse

Btw, if you are that kid, it doesn't get worse. Adulthood actually gets much better, don't let assholes scare you

[marcnutz]

Pillow Prince

Since hearts1ck is dedicating his sapnap thigh kink bits to me it's only right for me to dedicate this fic to him <3

18+ MINORS DNI

Tags: Sapnap x M!Reader, 3.5k words, SoftDom!Sap, Dom!Reader for like 2 seconds, fluff, thigh kink, thigh riding, thigh fucking, soft sex, slight choking, long and horny build-up to the actual smut, chubby Sap cause he's always been pretty yall are just fatphobic

Sapnap was a chubby boy, and you loved him for that.

You loved Sapnap's body. Every inch of it. When your relationship first bloomed you would spend hours mapping every inch with your hands. Memorizing the feel of every bump and curve to your mind.

He was perfect. You loved your boyfriend's body, and you loved him.

He was soft and warm. His nose was that of a Greek god's, and his hair that curled ever so slightly at the ends matched the look.

You would be more than content to spend the rest of your life resting your head on his chest or stomach. Feeling his arms around you, safe and warm and comfy.

However, if you were to say you loved every part of him equally, you would be lying.

His thighs were immaculate. Every time he changed in front of you your eyes were drawn to that oh so special place on his body. Anytime you lay down together your head is drawn to their promise of a soft resting place.

No matter what he wore they were accented perfectly. They would press against the seams of his jeans and sweats. They would be so free yet still so hidden when he wore shorts. They would ever so slightly spill over the edges of his thighs boxers that he knew you loved.

His thighs were beautiful. They were perfect. He was perfect.

It was not uncommon for you to find yourself staring at them at any given point of the day. Watching as they moved when he walked. As they spread out as he sat. Staring at the hair that got darker the farther up you looked. The way the water would drip down them after he exited the shower.

You thought you were slick, eyeballing him all the time. However, Sapnap wasn’t dumb. He saw every glance at his lower body. Noticed the way you squeeze his thighs ever so slightly when you got the chance.

Sapnap loved to please you, and knowing your love for his thighs, he decided to do some research. (Often times his "research" included watching porn, but who were you to judge.) When Sapnap read about a 'thigh kink' he figured that's something you probably had. He was never one to say no to trying something new in the bedroom. When he read about all the fun things you two could do in the bedroom together that involved his thighs, he knew he had to get you involved.

The plan was easy, he was going to spend a few days working you up, but not directly saying he had anything planned for you. Then, he would spring himself upon you at just the right time.

Hopefully, if all went well, he would end up with your cocks pushed together and inside one another.

In all honesty, all he had to do was ask. But he liked to play around with you. The wait made the pleasure oh so much better.

"Hey, baby? Do you like these new shorts I got?" You heard your boyfriend call from the bedroom. Shorts? Of course you were going to like them.

You got up and walked into your shared bedroom and stopped dead in your tracks when you saw him. The shorts he was wearing were definitely... short.

"So? What do you think? They're those new five-inch inseam shorts that are popular now. They're a little tight, but I think I like them."

While saying this, Sapnap turned around to examine himself better in the mirror, and you got a perfect view of his ass in the light blue shorts. If they were any smaller then you would be able to see it stick out the bottom.

"Baby?"

You were snapped out of your thoughts by Sapnap calling you. You looked up at him, a blush forming across your face.

"I- uh, I think they're really great! They look really good on you, I like the, uh, color."

Sapnap beamed at you, "I'm glad! I know you like lighter colors on me, that's why I chose these."

You soon found out that these were not the only pair of short-shorts your boyfriend purchased, as he spent the next few days flaunting about in different pairs. Every time he'd come out of the shower after breakfast and get dressed for the day he would plop down next to you on the couch in another pair of thigh shorts that left very little to the imagination.

Today he had chosen a black pair that made his fair skin seem to glow beautifully.

"Darling, I want to do something today," He said, snapping you out of your staring.

"Oh, ok. Did you have anything in mind?"

Sapnap thought for a moment. "Let's go to the beach! I got a new bathing suit I want to show you."

Oh dear lord, were these going to be as revealing as his new day shorts? You have no idea if you should allow him to be walking around in something like that when it's wet and sticking to his skin even more than they already do.

Despite your slight pang of jealousy of the thought of strangers ogling at your boyfriend, your want to see him half-naked and wet took over your brain, and the next thing you knew you were lounging on a towel as your lovely boyfriend cooled off in the water.

Your assumptions about the bathing suit were correct, they were just as short as the others, however looser.

This changed, however, when Sapnap stepped out of the water to come cool off. The suit stuck to his skin and even showed off the slight print of his dick in the front. It was taking every ounce of your focus to not get a boner right then and there. It became even harder when he sat down on the towel next to you, thighs spreading out and resting against your own. His soft, wet skin cooling your own legs and sending shivers down your spine.

"You ok?" He asked, offering you his shirt. "Put this on, looks like your shoulders are getting a little burnt, let me dry off and then we can head home, looks like it's about to rain soon anyways."

You took his shirt and put it on, his smell enveloping you in the best way.

Before long, you were headed home. Sapnap wanted to hop in the shower again to get all the sand and salt off his body, and you decided to rest in bed for a bit.

You had begun to doze off when you barely registered the shower turn off. After a few minutes, you noticed your boyfriend still hadn't come out of the bathroom. What was he doing? Oh no matter, you're getting sleepy from the sun...

"Sweetheart!" Sapnap called from the bathroom door, his call rousing you from your half-asleep state.

The image in front of you woke you up even more, in more ways than one.

Your lovely boyfriend stood in front of you, top half bare, legs covered in long socks that went up to just above his knees and were much too tight, causing the plush fat on his thighs to spill over the sides.

On top of this, he had on garter belts that were also very snug, a belt connecting them to the socks.

"I got these for you... And those shorts and bathing suits... I had noticed you always staring at my thighs and touching them and- well, I wanted to do something special for you so I got this."

You tried to say something, but all the blood from your brain rushed down to your dick, so you just sat there with your mouth slightly open.

"Baby? Do- Do you like it?" Sapnap asked quietly, he was nervous, and you could tell.

"I- YES! You look, really, really, good."

Sapnap smiled and walked over to you, sitting down on the edge of the bed, you had just now noticed his own cock was out, and he was about as hard as you were.

He reached out for you, and pulled you onto his lap, latching his lips onto your own. It started gentle, but quickly morphed into a deep kiss, tounges tangling together in each other's mouths. He tasted sweet, and it was divine. You would be happy to just sit here and make out on his lap for hours, but Sapnap had other plans.

His hands began to go up his shirt that you were still wearing, going up your chest and over your nipples before pulling it over your head, only breaking the kiss for a moment. He then moved his hands down to take off your trunks, leaving you in just your boxers that were growing much too tight for your liking.

Sapnap moved his hands to your chest, thumbs rubbing over your nipples, which began to harden under his fingers. He pulled on one, causing you to moan into his mouth and grind down into his thigh a bit. He smiled in your mouth, pulling away, causing you to moan at the loss of contact.

"Aw baby, do you like it when I play with your nipples?" He asked. He already knew the answer, this was something he did to you quite often. You were so sensitive here, and he knew it. "What about if I did this..."

Before you could even register that he has said something, Sapnap had reached his head down and began to suck on one of your pink nipples. You arched your back into him, hips once again rutting against his thighs.

Sapnap reached the hand that was not abusing your other nipple down to your waist, and he repositioned you so that one of his thighs was in between your legs.

He pulled off your nipple for a moment, resting his cheek on your chest before gazing up into your eyes. "I'm going to have so much fun with you tonight..." He moved his hand from your chest and began to rub circles on your back.

You looked down at your boyfriend, his green eyes staring into your own. "Are you gonna fuck me?" You asked nicely.

Sapnap giggled a little bit, "No dear, you're going to fuck me, but not in the way you're thinking. But first, I get to have some fun. Just be a good boy and do what I say, ok?"

You nodded as Sapnap's words, nervous, curious, and excited at what was to come.

Sapnap lifted his head up and placed a kiss on your forehead, then your cheek, then a small one directly on your lips.

He had both hands on your hips now, and he hooked one of his thumbs into the band of your boxers before snapping them into your waist. You jumped at the slight sting of them, cock rubbing against his thigh at the action. You moaned at the sensation of feeling your clothed cock push against his soft skin and began to rock your hips onto his thigh slightly.

Sapnap laughed before stilling your hips. "You're a fast learner. These boxers aren't coming off until you cum just like this, riding my thigh. Got it?"

You nodded quickly as Sapnap placed another soft kiss on your shoulder. He released the tight grip he had on your hips, but his hands remain in their place, ready to move you down onto himself as he pleased.

You began to rock your hips back and forth on Sapnap's mostly bare thigh. Every few thrusts of your hips, your own leg would bump into Sapnap's cock, and his leg would jump, thigh pressing into your cock even more.

It didn't take long for you to begin to pant, the inevitable soon approaching.

Sapnap reached his hands around, and dipped his hands into your boxers, grabbing fist fulls of your ass before using them as leverage to grind you even more onto his thigh.

In doing so, he managed to pull you even closer to his body. You were now chest to chest, and your leg rubbed up against his dick with every thrust. Sapnap began to moan quietly in your ear, but you could barely hear him over your own whines and pants.

"I know you're close baby, you're doing so good, you don't have to ask."

You hadn't realized it, but you had been begging your boyfriend for release. He moved his head to press his tongue into your mouth once more, beginning to bounce his leg up and down.

All it took was for Sapnap to moan into your mouth once more before you were spilling into your boxers. Your eyes rolled back into your head as your hands reached down to grab at Sapnap's soft love handles for dear life.

You quite literally rode out your orgasm, hips continuing to roll into Sapnap's thighs. You eventually parted your mouth from his, your hips stilling, but his hands continued to push you down onto his thigh. You shook and bit his shoulder at the overstimulation, moaning as small tears began to roll down your cheeks. You weren't sure if you wanted to stop or have Sapnap continue to manhandle your hips into his thigh.

Eventually, Sapnap took pity on you and allowed your hips to still. He removed your hands from your ass, one coming to rub gentle circles on your back. The other came up to your cheek, pulling your face towards his to gently kiss your tears away.

"You did so well for me baby, such a good boy." Sapnap praised as he gave small pecks to your cheeks. "Take deep breathes, you still have your prize for doing so well."

Oh yeah, you were going to fuck him. That was always nice, but he said not in the way you were thinking. What did he mean by that? You didn't care, honestly, as your cock was starting to harden once more and all you wanted was some part of him wrapped around it.

You heard Sapnap laugh, "Wow, ready again already? Good boy, you deserve it. Let's get these off of you."

Your cum had left a large wet spot on the front of your boxers, sticking to Sapnap's legs slightly. You lifted yourself off of him slightly so he could pull the soiled boxers off of you. Your hard cock springing out of them, glistening with your cum.

"Wow, you that was a lot, makes sense, I've been keeping myself from you so you'd be all worked up for me today."

Oh, so he was planning this. For whatever reason, this nudged the small part of your brain that wanted to dominate him oh so badly, and you let out a small growl before wrapping your hand around his throat and thrusting your tongue in and out of his throat.

Sapnap let his back fall down onto the bed and allowed you to have this moment of control over him. He knew it was hard for you to be patient and obedient when you were as built up as you were, and he was feeling nice enough to let you let it out for a moment.

Your hand tightened around his throat as you continued to fuck his face with your tongue, wishing it was your cock instead. However, you knew your boyfriend had plans, and you didn't want to ruin those.

You pulled off of him, Sapnap moving his head up slightly to try and chase your mouth. He gasped when you removed your hand from his throat, blood rushing back to his head and back down to his cock.

"So, what's my prize?" You asked, hand running up and down his side before coming to rest on his chest that formed into soft breasts that you squeezed gently.

Sapnap moaned softly at your touch, "I-I'm going to lay down, and you're going to fuck my thighs."

All of your movements stopped as your eyes snapped up to his, wide in excitement.

You had thought about this moment so often. Taking his thighs in your hands and fucking into the soft pillow-like flesh, and now the time had finally come. You felt your cock jump slightly at the thought that was a soon-to-be reality, and you pushed Sapnap over so that his legs were no longer dangling over the edge of the bed. You manhandled his legs so that his calves were on either side of your shoulders, and his knees were pushed as to create a perfect place for your dick.

Your hands rested just above his knees, where his socks ended. You felt the skin fall over the sides, and you were never more horny than you were at that moment.

You couldn't wait another second before you took your cock in one hand, rubbing your tip between Sapnap's two thighs. You gently rubbed the length of your cock on them, not yet pushing in between.

"Come on now, don't be shy. Fuck me already." Sapnap said, his hands thrown above his head, clutching the pillow above him.

You were quick to follow directions, throwing your head back as you pressed your tip in between his thighs. You threw your head back and let out a loud moan as you felt his large, soft thighs take every inch of your cock. You sat there for a moment, savoring the soft warmth that surrounded you, staring down at your lovely boyfriend who was happily staring back at you, a small lopsided smile on his face.

It didn't take long for your needs to overwhelm your mind, and you started to softly thrust your cock into Sapnap's thighs. He was so soft and so warm, and your cum that had coated your cock from your previous orgasm was leaving delicious wet spots on his thighs, allowing for easier movement between them.

You were in pure bliss. Mouth open as you watched your cock slowly disappear and reappear between Sap's thighs.

Sapnap didn't have a bad view himself, he got to stare at your lust-clouded face, the tip of your cock poking out at him whenever you would bottom out.

"Go on, baby, fuck me for real. Be rough. I know you want to. You deserve it."

Sapnap's soft encouragement was all it took for something to snap in your head. You began to smack your hips against Sapnap, your balls hitting against him with every thrust. A small amount of precum began to leak from you as you began to grow close again. Every so often it would come out as your tip was out the front of Sapnap's thighs, leading to a small amount that only he could see to drip down his thigh.

Of course, Sapnap was not getting nothing out of this arrangement, his thighs were sensitive to the point that just your thrusting felt so good to him. Slowly, he moved one of his hands down to gently grasp his own cock that had been steadily leaking precum onto his stomach the entire time.

It took you a moment to notice that your boyfriend was touching himself, and you quickly swatted your hand away and replaced it with your own, hand moving with the force of your own thrusts.

"Oh fuuuuck, baby. Just like that, fuck yes." Sapnap was babbling his praises at you as his hips began to gently move with your thrusts. "I'm so close, baby. Can we cum together? Please..."

He didn't have to ask twice, and you quickly nodded to let him know you had heard him and were close yourself.

Your back began to arch just as Sapnap's moans turned into the high-pitched whines he let out whenever he was about to cum. It took only two more hard thrusts before you were both spilling all over Sapnap.

You watched as some of your cum mixed with his on his tummy, however, most of yours painted the insides of his thighs and dirtied his socks and garters.

After your highs, you sat there for a moment, still nestled between his thighs. You only moved when you realized you wanted to see how your cum had painted his thighs.

You gently moved his calves from off his shoulder and spread them on the bed gently, knowing he would be slightly sore from the stretch.

Your view was amazing. Seeing your perfect prince spread out all for you, covered in sweat and cum, was beautiful. You were so grateful to be able to see him like this, and you fell back onto your heels to stare at your amazing boyfriend.

You were broken out of your trance by Sapnap's whine and outstretched hands. You took him into a hug, not caring that you were getting cum all over you.

"I guess you liked my surprise, huh?"

You giggled and pressed a gentle kiss to Sapnaps forehead. "Yeah, I liked it a lot. Come on, let's go get cleaned up."

With that, you both showered together, before falling asleep in each other's arms, Sapnap's perfect, nude body pressed against your own.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Masterlist and Info

[joshfuckingkiszka]

stranger things have happened - [6] Harder To Breathe

Shaking and crying, absolutely distraught because my computer won’t work. I did this on my ipad and there were quite a few times I nearly decimated the population, but it’s done. Y’all better like it, that is a threat.

THIS SERIES IS 18+ MINORS DNI

chapter warnings: where would be if there was no asshole!josh??? some spicy dialogue, and overbearing family being somewhat verbally and emotionally abusive.

series masterlist 

The look on Josh’s face was nearly dehumanizing. You felt like the next words out of his mouth would be mocking and a less than graceful way of saying “fuck you”.

He shocked you when, rather than spitting laughter in your face, he simply asked, “Why?”

You stuttered out an explanation, heat expanding throughout your body with embarrassment.

Sam laughed when you sat down exasperated, to which Danny hit him on the arm.

“Well,” you started, “your brother drives a hard bargain.”

“He made you pay for his drinks, didn’t he?” Jake smirked, his arm wrapped around the back of Jita’s chair.

You nodded, grimacing, “If you see him order another Salty Dog, punch him for me.”

“With fucking pleasure,” the younger twin replied with a smile.

Despite their tour being so short, they seemed to have plenty of stories. Some of which required Jake shushing Sam when he would get too detailed. Everyone laughed when Danny recounted when Sam attempted a cartwheel on the bus, ending in him and Josh being knocked to the floor. The youngest Kiszka claimed that Josh got in his way, and otherwise he would have definitely stuck the landing.

“Why are you doing gymnastics on a bus anyway?” You asked, laughter bubbling over.

Sam shrugged, “Lots of pent up energy before shows and no supervision mainly. Speaking of authority, where is Joshua?”

Looking around the bar, the table went virtually silent when everyone noticed a pretty brunette grazing his exposed forearm with her fingertips. She seemed to love exploring because they soon moved to his chest and then his curls.

“I’m sorry, Bee.” Sam frowned and he moved to stand, probably to get Josh away from whatshername.

You sighed, prying your eyes away from Josh, whose dimples were clear even from your seat. “Why? He’s not my real boyfriend.”

Of course, they all knew you would still be upset. You weren’t aware but they could all sense the way you felt towards the vocalist, despite the annoyance he caused you. Again, you knew you had no right to feel upset, he wasn’t your boyfriend, he was a mere acquaintance who occasionally teased you in ways that no one ever had. Just a friend, you thought, if that. You could hear his boisterous laughter, even over the booming music, and it caused a slight surge of anger in your veins. No one was that funny, and for a second, you thought he was mocking you, in his own tasteful and thought out way. The thought disappeared when you realized that he was his own person, and not everything he did was about you.

“So,” Jake started, pulling your attention away from his twin, “when are your mom and sister coming in?” In the midst of this new distraction, you had almost completely forgotten about them. Almost.

Rolling your eyes, you responded, “They’re driving in on Wednesday and staying until Sunday.” You were so incredibly grateful that they turned down your offer of staying with them, claiming they would be much more comfortable in a hotel. A part of you hoped they were paying $1000 a night, but you knew that was unrealistic, even for Downtown Nashville.

“And when does Josh come in to play in this scheme?”

“Oh, they insisted that they meet him ‘as soon as possible’, so Thursday,” you replied, annoyance clear in your tone and body language.

Sam smiled that goofy smile that you had come to love so much, stating dreamily, “I can’t wait for you to meet our mom.”

“Hey, Sammy,” you laughed, “you know I’m not actually dating your brother, right?”

He shrugged his head to the side a bit. “Yeah, but, still. Even best friends need to meet the parents.”

There went that fluttering in your heart, a purely platonic pull, but strong nevertheless, when he referred to you as his best friend. Had it been socially acceptable, you could have cried right there in the bar. As it was not, you simply smiled at him. Interrupting the moment, as always, Josh strolled up to your table, his face returning to that stoic look he always had around you. His smile, and lack thereof, was a constant reminder of the way he felt about you.

When Sam and Hannah took you home, you reminisced on the night of Sam’s party, when Josh’s hands gripped your thighs on the way back to your apartment. You kept up the conversation with the couple up front, but the thoughts never seemed to leave your mind.

Work the next day was a total distraction from everything concerning Josh, and then he texted you in the middle of your shift, asking for details he would need about this lie you would be forced to uphold. You simply told him to meet you at your apartment on Tuesday afternoon, after class, so you could discuss everything. He replied with a curt, “Ok.” and you were left to return to work once again.

You had hoped and prayed that Sunday, and the two days following, would drag out, but they seemed to do the exact opposite. They fleeted so quickly that it created a knot in your stomach. At least I have a few hours before I have to see Josh, or so you had thought. However, at promptly 3 pm on Tuesday afternoon, just as you were sitting down to study with some nature documentary as background noise, a knock resounded through your apartment, and the knot returned.

Josh stood at the door, his face straight as he held out a bouquet of roses.

“Um, thank you?” You were confused.

He didn’t wait to be invited in, explaining, “I don’t want your mom to think that I’m a bad boyfriend. You can just say I got them for you on our last date or something.” You pondered the idea of Josh actually bringing you roses, that sweet smile and a light blush on his face as he handed them to you. Instead, you dealt with the reality of him forcing them into your hands, petals falling to the floor as he demanded you put them in a vase.

Rather than arguing with him, you did just that, and picked up the fallen petals on the floor, placing them on the counter. He made himself at home on your couch, which sort of annoyed you, but not enough for you to speak out about it.

“Nice poster.” Was he…being nice to you?

You smiled at the crooked poster on your wall, “Thanks, it’s my favorite.”

Josh seemed to be taking in every detail of your apartment, like he wanted to commit it to memory. He stood up, walking around the small space before letting himself into your bedroom.

“Hey!” You called out to him.

He turned to you, a deadpan expression on his face, “Well, if we’re dating, it can be assumed that I’ve been in your room, right?”

“W-well, yeah, I guess, but why are you in here now?”

“So that I don’t look like I’m guessing where everything is.” He rolled his eyes at you before turning back to the room. You uncomfortably waited for him until he began to look through the drawers in your nightstand.

You ran over before he could open one, exclaiming, “I don’t see why you need to know what’s in those.”

A smirk graced his face, “Do we have some toys in there, mama?” You shifted your weight on your feet.

Earnestly, you answered, “No, but you don’t need to look through my drawers. Also, I actually think it would be better if my mother didn’t know that you have ‘presumably been in my room’.”

“Aw, does she still think of you as a sweet little virgin, mama?” He was definitely mocking you this time. “If only she knew how you practically begged for my fingers in your mouth.” You closed your eyes, knowing that continuing to look at him would only draw you in further.

It was practically a whine, when you begged, “Please stop doing that!”

“You were so ready for me to fuck you before, though, mama,” he teased, and it was working.

With the last ounce of self control you had in your body, you turned on your heel and walked back into the living room.

“Details, details, details,” you muttered to yourself.

“Okay,” you started, once he had followed you, “I think we can just say we met at the boutique, it’s not technically a lie, since Jita and Kenzi did meet me there, it just skips a few parts. I don’t want my mom to know we met at a bar.” The last piece of information, you weren’t sure he deserved to know, but at the same time, was necessary so he wouldn’t give out any details that contradicted the white lies you had been telling her for weeks.

“No bars, got it. Would you also like me to leave out that we almost fucked in a bar bathroom?”

You scowled at him, answering through gritted teeth, “Yes.”

After a minute, you added, “Don’t mention that we go to bars at all, actually. She doesn’t know that I do anything outside of work and school, really.”

“So you want her to think you’re boring. I mean, at least that part isn't a lie.” The roll of your eyes was involuntary.

“Where do we go on dates, since you’re the one who brought that up?”

Josh gave you a nearly scornful look, as if he had expected you to know everything. “Movies? Dinner? Romantic picnics in the park?” He teased you.

You shook your head, “Movies are too impersonal, too broke for going out, and - well, actually the last one isn’t bad. Bit of a romantic are we, Joshy?” The new nickname caused a sharp intake of breath on his part, and you basked in the glory of having the upperhand for once.

When you pondered for a moment, you told him, “We can say we watch movies over here, that we cook each other dinner, and the park thing - nice touch, by the way. Oh! We also have to say that you help me study sometimes.”

He shrugged, and soon after discussing a few other things, he was gone.

Wednesday was a train wreck - well, waiting to happen. You got up on time for work, having extra time to stop for coffee. Your shift went by faster than it ever had before and your classes all let out early. Even the Titanic started out as a luxury cruise, though. Your mother and sister agreed that dinner should just be the three of you, and you thought for a second that possibly Josh would only add to the degradation of you, in a way that you wouldn’t enjoy. With your experience, you couldn’t imagine Josh to be a sweet, caring boyfriend, no matter what anyone said.

Of course they picked a restaurant that was way out of your budget. Your mother would have to pay for you, and inevitably hold it over your head.

“Hello, darling! Oh, I hope you’re still going to the gym, even with all that walking, you still need the exercise!” What a great start to the evening.

Your sister greeted with a cordial hug, the kind you gave to friends of friends, who you knew but didn’t really. “What kind of outfit is that?” You had opted to wear your favorite bellbottoms, and a vintage bell sleeve shirt.

“It’s vintage!” Your tone was more playful, but still held the defensive edge.

“It’s old,” your sister retorted.

Your mother cut in, “If only your father had left you with a good sense of style!” That caused you to purse your lips. Let it go, you told yourself, it’s not worth it.

Throughout dinner, they continued to get in little jabs at you, and when you finally got back home, you allowed yourself to cry. You thought there was no way you could do this for four more days, it was impossible. Josh was already involved, though, and there was no way you could let that go. Steadying yourself on your bathroom counter, you convinced yourself that it would be okay. If only you could truly believe that.

[randomshyperson]

Attraction and Reaction - Wanda Maximoff x Dom!Reader - Part 2

Prompt based “ WandaXReader where they're always arguing and being sarcastic to eachother but it's just sexual tension. Maybe smth with the lines "why are u laghing did I tell a joke?" "why don't u look inside my head and find out". I think it would be pretty cool. It doesn't have to be smutt though, only If u fell like it (also a dom!reader would be nice)" > Link for part One

Notes: Some people asked me to write a part 2 of this one, and i took me a while but I finally did it. Nobody specified whether they wanted part two for the smut or for the story so I put a little of both.

Warnings>  18+, Smut, language, mentions of past abuse.

Words:  6.243 (Complete)

Marks (I keep forgetting to put this but hope people don’t hate me haha) > @mionemymind​ @wandamaximoffpuppy​

AO3 (Complete / Two Parts)

Maybe you guys had been in the room for a long time.

But you didn't care about the time as you had Wanda riding on your face, and you were licking and sucking her, while she moaned loudly with her mouth open as she forced her hips down and held on to the headboard.

- Fuck! Right there. - She said breathlessly - Don't stop.

A few strokes later and she came apart in your mouth, for the fourth time in a row. The taste only seemed to get better.

And then she was throwing herself on the bed trying to normalize her breathing, and you leaned over to rest your head on her belly while your fingers trailed up her thigh.

But a knock at the door caught your attention next.

- Wanda, is everything all right? - That was Bucky on the other end. - I made dinner, I was wondering if you would like some.

- No, Bucky, thank you. - Wanda shouted back a moment later, disguising her current state well. You let out a giggle, and ran your fingers down her skin, penetrating her pussy afterwards, and she bit back a sigh.

- That's fine. Do you know where Y/N is? I haven't seen her since this morning, and she's not in her room. - He then said and you chuckled softly, as Wanda held back a moan at having you inside her.

- No. - She answered half breathlessly, and forced herself to sound less affected in the next sentence. - I have no idea.

But then you began to rotate your finger against her clit and she sank her face into the bed, gasping for breath. It took a moment, then Bucky spoke again.

- You guys are fucking, aren't you?

- Trying to! - you retorted impatiently, beginning to kiss Wanda's skin.

You can hear Bucky let out a chuckle before his footsteps move away. But your attention was focused on Wanda, coming on your fingers again.

- Fuck. - She mumbled breathlessly, running her hands through her hair. - I don't think I can go on. - She commented with a smile, her gaze lazing on you.

You smiled as you lifted your face to meet hers, and kissed her slowly and sensually, but she really looked tired, even though her hips moved toward you.

- Get some sleep, dear. - You whispered to her, trying not to be startled by how easily the nickname slipped out of your mouth. Wanda smiled, closing her eyes. When her breathing became deep, you pulled back the blankets to cover her naked body, then stood up.

You picked up your clothes from the floor, and when you finished dressing, you left the room.

Bucky was reading something when you entered the room, and you went around the counter to get some coffee.

- Sorry for getting in the way of your conflict resolution. - He said ironically, his eyes still on the paper. You giggled.

- No problem, Barnes. - You replied before taking a sip of coffee.

You walked over to the couch where Bucky was sitting and looked curiously at the papers on the table as you sat down in the armchair next to him.

- What are you working on anyway? - you asked, crossing your legs. Bucky let out a sigh.

- On you guys, actually. - He said, and you frowned in confusion. But he didn't look angry, just busy. - Steve worries that the team works as a whole. He asked me to study your training results and try to find a way to solve your problems.

- I think that's been taken care of. - You sneer, but Bucky keeps a serious expression.

- Sex doesn't solve your problems. - He says and you blink in surprise. - It's just an escape valve.

You laugh ruefully, putting your coffee cup on the table.

- What are you talking about? Wanda and I just needed to vent our anger somehow. There is nothing to work out.

Bucky shook his head in denial, placing the pages he had in his hand on the table.

- Look, do you remember how it used to be with me and Sam? - He asked, and you rolled your eyes, nodding in agreement.

- We're not like....

- Listen first. - he asked with a smile, and you sighed, nodding. - Sam and I used to fight because we couldn't accept the nature of our relationship. - He explains. - And we both looked up to Steve and wanted him to be proud of us. And then we would fight to see who got his attention.

- That's very gay. - You comment humorously and Bucky chuckles lightly before continuing.

- The relevant thing is that when Sam and I first started having sex, we weren't communicating. - He says and you blink in surprise. - Angry sex is no substitute for conversation. It took a while, but we managed to talk about how we really felt, and now we are doing just fine. 

You sighed thoughtfully, leaning your back against the chair as you entwined your hands in your lap.

- I don't know what to tell you, comrade. - You say. - I have no quarrel with Wanda. We're fine. 

Bucky looked at you for a few seconds, and then shrugged his shoulders and turned his attention back to his papers. You began to think that you were repeating that things were fine for yourself and not for him.

//-//

Everything was fine.

The day after the events of the past morning and afternoon, you only met Wanda over breakfast. She smiled and waved you good morning, and you did the same.

And when you two got up to leave the dishes in the sink, she enjoyed being put on the countertop while you stayed on your knees with your head between her legs. Or at least you understood that she did, when she came in your mouth and moaned your name.

Everything was fine. Until it wasn't.

Bucky requested another therapy session with you two, and at the moment you were sitting in an armchair facing Wanda in an empty room, waiting for the soldier.

You were trying not to let your mind wander to the image of the redhead squirming with pleasure beneath you as you looked at her but you were failing miserably.

You cleared your throat, looking away and then Bucky entered, apologizing for the delay and saying that the rest of the team should be back in the tower soon.

- Can we try talking today, girls? - He said as he sat down, and you crossed your arms, shrugging. Wanda twiddled her fingers slightly. - I'd like to try the questions again.

You and Wanda exchanged a look before nodding, and Bucky smiled, pulling his small notepad from his pocket and reading briefly before speaking.

- Y/N let's start with you today. - He says. - Can you tell me something you like about Wanda?

You bite your lip.

- The way she moans my name.

Bucky blinks in surprise and discomfort but lets out a giggle, Wanda blushes softly looking away.

- Great, we've gone from immense hatred to unrestrained horniness. - He wryly chuckles. - Please girls, let's try to make this work.

You let out a sigh, getting thoughtful for a moment. 

- All right, Bucky. - You say. - I... I like how caring Wanda always is.

Wanda blinks in surprise, and Bucky looks happy. 

- That's nice. - He comments with a smile. - And you Wanda, can you tell us what you like about Y/N?

Wanda looks at you for a moment, and then looks away from you to Bucky.

- I like how protective she is of everyone here. - She confesses and you look at her attentively. - Even with me, and even when we are fighting, when we are in the field, she cares about everyone.

You swallow dryly as you look away from Wanda, wanting to ignore the feeling in your stomach.

- That's great, girls. - Bucky comments and you almost forget that he was there. - I would like to ask how this conflict started.

And then you shift uncomfortably in your chair. Because you remember it so well. Clearing your throat, you stand up.

- I don't want to do this anymore. - You say, looking at Bucky, who looks very surprised. He closes his notepad, but before he can say anything, Wanda says.

- So you're just going to run away again?

- Yeah, Wanda, I'm just going to run away. - You retort angrily as you move your feet out of the room, slamming the door on your way out.

//-//

You had been training for a few hours, your muscles ached and your body begged for a rest, but you kept punching the bag in front of you.

- Someone is angry. - sneered Natasha as you entered the gym. You blinked in surprise.

- I didn't know you were back. - You retorted without stopping your punching.

And then Natasha was climbing onto the mat, smiling at you.

- A little bird told me that you resolved your conflicts in the best possible way. - She teased, coming closer and tapping your fists to make you stop. You sighed breathlessly, your body reacting immediately to the lack of movement.

- I don't want to talk about it. - You retorted as you took off your boxing gloves, and walked away. 

- I figured as much. - She said, following you around the gym as you left the ring and looked for a bottle of water. - But you need it, so we''ll talk.

You let out an impatient grumble, and then Nat was touching your shoulder and you turned away abruptly.

- No. - You warned with clenched fists, but Nat was not intimidated.

- I know what happened to you. - She said and you closed your eyes tightly, trying to control the boiling anger rising in your chest. - I know because I saw the red room when she was in my head. But you have to understand that Wanda is on our side now and…

- I know that! - you retorted angrily. - I know that she's just a victim in this whole thing, okay? I just... I don't... - You paused, trying to normalize your breathing, and control your tears. - I haven't seen my family in twenty years. And I don't think about them, I can't remember their faces. I wasn't ready to see them that day, and I can hardly breathe when I remember. I just need time.

- You can't take out on Wanda the anger you had for them. - Nat replies seriously, and you sigh, sitting down on the bench next to you, your face buried in your hands.

- I know. - You say. - I just... God, she is probably the only person who knows everything. I wasn't ready to tell anyone, or deal with it alone, and she just came in and she just knows everything.

Nat sat down next to you and put her hand on your thigh.

- You need to talk to someone about this. - She said. - Not with me, not with Wanda. With a professional who can help you.

You nod, squeezing her hand. 

- I know. - You say with a sad smile. - I will, I just... It all seems so recent.

- You've been burying your traumas pretty well, that's all. - She jokes, and you laugh weakly.

You stood for a moment in silence before standing up. Nat let go of your hand to give your shoulder a squeeze before she left the gym. You sighed, deciding that you should call that contact Sam had told you about.

//-//

When you returned to your room, you had an appointment. You went into the shower, and took too long, trying to calm your nerves under the hot water. 

And then you were startled to get out and find Wanda waiting for you.

- I want to talk to you. - She declared as soon as you came out of the bathroom, sitting on your bed.

You let out a sigh, moving toward your closet. You didn't mind being naked in front of Wanda, it was nothing she hadn't seen before. And then you threw the towel on the bed and put on a loose T-shirt.

- You can talk. - You retorted, turning to her, and bit your lip when you noticed Wanda's gaze and flushed cheeks. - Earth to Wanda? 

Wanda grumbled at your teasing and looked away, you smiled as you picked up the towel from the bed to take it to dry off.

- I don't know what's bothering you. - She says after a moment, and you swallow the discomfort in the pit of your stomach. - But I've talked to Bucky, and he doesn't think it's healthy for us to continue with, well, whatever it is, before you can talk about your feelings.

You hang up your towel and then turn to Wanda with an impassive face.

- Okay, then. Good night. - You tell her sharply, and Wanda blinks in confusion.

- That's all you're going to say? - she asks incredulously, and you let out a dry laugh.

- You're the one who came here to say that you don't want us to happen anymore. 

- I didn't say that.

- What difference does it make? - You retort. - It's not going anywhere anyway.

Your statement leaves your mouth bitter, and Wanda stares at you for a long second before turning and leaving the room. You feel your body boil with anger, but you're tired. So you just throw yourself on the bed and hope to sleep soon.

//-//

Your fights with Wanda stop, mostly because you just don't talk to each other anymore. But Bucky seems to accept this as progress, and releases you from the sessions. And then you are seeing the psychologist that Sam recommended, and things are getting better for you.

She asks about your family, and teaches you to control your anger attacks with breathing exercises and focus. It is enough for weeks, until you have to really face your memories as you use Tony's technology to remember what your parents did to you. Of how they gave you your abilities. 

It is suffocating, and painful, but you survive. And it feels good to breathe normally again. 

You want to ignore the feeling that there is something missing, mainly because you believed that once you were healing, you wouldn't think about Wanda anymore. But now that the anger is gone, you just miss her.

Many weeks after your discussion, you are in the Caribbean, trying to investigate an abandoned Hydra base, and you have Wanda as an exploration partner.

- Did you find anything? - you asked as you two walked together into yet another empty room of an abandoned compound. Wanda was going through some drawers, going through their contents.

- Nothing that Tony hasn't already hacked. - She said, and then you turned around when you heard a noise at the door behind you. Raising your pistol in the direction of the sound, you let out an exclamation of surprise when the door suddenly opened, and a man jumped at you. Clearly a soldier, judging by his clothing. You fought back his blows, and were ready to fight, but Wanda simply used her magic to throw him across the room and he blacked out. You looked at her, and she shrugged. - Sorry, did I step on your moment?

- That sentence is mine. - You heard Natasha's voice interrupt, probably joining you as soon as she heard the sound of conflict. You shook your head, laughing lightly as you stood up. - I'm taking our friend in for interrogation, so finish up here. - She said before dragging the man across the room and out. You were dusting off your clothes as you walked toward Wanda.

- Since we can't find anything around here, I guess we can go. - You grumble, and then let out an exclamation of discomfort, which attracts the attention of Wanda, who raises her eyes in your direction.

- Are you all right? - She asked, coming closer and raising her hands to where you were pressing yours, above your shoulder.

- Yes. - You retorted with mild surprise at her concern. - It was just the impact. 

You watched as Wanda's eyes ran quickly to your mouth, and you felt your heart race in anticipation. 

- Okay, then. - She grumbled, lowering her hands and placing them behind her back, looking everywhere but at you. You bit your lip, bringing your bodies closer together, as Wanda attempted to move away, but slammed her back against a cabinet, and let out a gasp.

- Are you nervous? - you ask quietly as you approach, watching Wanda's chest rise and fall out of rhythm. - I just want to thank you for helping me in the fight. - You whisper as you lift a finger to caress her cheek, Wanda holds her breath. Then you let your mouth come up to her ear. - Thank you, Wanda. You've been a good girl.

Wanda closes her eyes tightly, and her hips thrust forward. You smile smugly, as you turn your face to kiss her deeply. She moans against your tongue, and you push your body against her, pressing her into the cabinets.

Your hands move down her thighs, and as you kiss her hard, you push up the fabric of her skirt, and let your fingers run over her skin.  When you push the fabric of her panties aside and penetrate her, she breaks the kiss with a loud moan, and you sigh as you feel her all wet.

- Wanda, you're dripping, baby. - You whisper against her lips as you move your fingers across her swollen clitoris. - How long have you been waiting for me to touch you?

Wanda whimpers, burying her head in your neck. You swallow dryly, trying not to be carried away by the feeling of having her so hot, and concentrate on keeping the movements steady. And then you pull out of her only to insert another finger, and she bites your shoulder.

She is making delicious sounds as her hips push against your fingers, and you want to kiss her again, so you use your free hand to hold her neck and make her look at you. Wanda gasps in surprise, but matches your tongue in her mouth, moaning against you.

A moment later, she begins to quiver in spasms against you, whimpering as she tries to stand upright. You take your hand from her neck to hold her waist and keep her steady as you increase the speed of your fingers, and then Wanda comes, a loud moan with her mouth open as she digs her nails into your arm.

- What the hell is taking you guys so long? - You hear Steve's question on your communicator, and let out an impatient grumble. 

- We're coming. - You say raising your hand to the device in your ear and look at Wanda trying to normalize her breathing. - Wanda already did actually.

Wanda slaps your arm as you laugh lightly, but Steve doesn't seem to understand. And then you are hurrying out of the room. You like it when she kisses you deeply on the stairs, before you join the team.

//-//

When you all return home, Steve requests a meeting with you. After showering and putting on comfortable clothes, you go to the room where he is waiting.

- Hey, Y/N, what's up? - he asks, sitting in one of the chairs. You smile, nodding.

- Why did you want to talk to me? - You ask, and he lets out a chuckle at your impatience.

- I'd like to know how your appointments have been. - he says after a moment. - You have shown progress in your training. And it's been over two months since you've had any anger episodes.

You shift the weight on your feet, slightly embarrassed.

- It's all right, I guess. - You say. - I've learned to deal with things in a healthier way.

- I'm glad to hear that. - He smiles, and then he hesitates for the next second. - And how is your relationship with Wanda?

- We don't have a relationship. - You retorted snidely, your heart racing slightly. But Steve let out a little laugh.

- Bucky told me that you two have found a way to resolve your conflicts. - He said, getting up. - And you two are not fighting anymore.

- That's what you wanted, isn't it? - You say impatiently and Steve frowns at your hostility. - I don't know what else you want us to do.

- What's going on anyway? - he asks tenderly. - You seem upset about something.

You let out a humorless laugh, running your hands through your hair.

- I am great! Fucking spectacular. - You retort impatiently.

- Y/N...

- Can I go now, Rogers? - You interrupt and he sighs, nodding, and you turn, quickly leaving the room.

As you are crossing the hallway, you bump into Wanda. She looks at you in surprise, ready to apologize, but then you are moving forward and kissing her hard.

Wanda sighs, responding as you press her to the wall. But you slow the kiss and let your foreheads rest against each other.

- I'm sorry. - You say breathlessly. - I can't keep doing this.

And then you pull away, and Wanda calls out to you as you walk away, trying to breathe. 

//-//

Wanda catches up with you outside. You are trying not to punch anything, while focusing on your breathing. 

- Why won't you talk to me? - she shouts as she reaches you. - Tell me what's going on.

You let out a dry laugh, and turn sharply and walk toward her.

- Do you want to know what is going on? Great! - you retort angrily. - This is all happening because of you!

Wanda has a confused expression when you stop in front of her. 

- If you had just stayed out of my head, I would be fine! - You accuse angrily, but don't let her interrupt. - And if you'd stayed out of my bed, I wouldn't be in love with you!

You sigh breathlessly as you sit on the floor, your face wet with tears. Wanda is in shock, and remains standing. You feel terrible.

- Damn it, Wanda, I'm sorry! - you mumble, wiping away your tears, trying to remember your breathing exercises. - It's not your fault what happened to me. I'm being an idiot.

- You are in love with me? - She repeats, staring straight ahead without moving. She seems to be talking more to herself than to you. You let out a humorless laugh.

- Yeah, I... I have been for a while actually. - You tell. - I guess I didn't want it to be true.

But then Wanda is kneeling beside you, and she looks at you with watery eyes. 

- You are a stubborn idiot. - She says, laughing lightly, and you frown. But then she moves in and kisses you on the mouth, and you think nothing more of it. When she separates your mouths, she's as breathless as you are. - We'll make it work, okay? I'm in love with you too.

You smile, and then you are hugging each other. It takes a moment for the rest of the team to get to you two.

- Does this mean we will now hear them having sex instead of fighting? - Tony comments wryly, and you watch as Wanda raises her fingers and casts magic at him that pushes him back slightly.

You laugh, letting your happiness replace your anger completely.

[bunnykawa]

i’m better than you! (oikawa x f. reader)

summary: If there was one thing Oikawa hated more than geniuses, it was your boyfriend.

a/n: thought about oikawa with a glock and it had me feeling some type of way. so here’s 6.2k words of what’s been in my head. also if you love iwa-chan, i’m deeply sorry. (btw someone replied to my last fic saying they were gonna move to the states with iwa-chan and...yeah that was funny cs this was sitting my drafts) 

warnings: 18+, yandere themes, implied character death, mentions of blood/gore, GUNPLAY!!, violence, noncon/dubcon/rape, little bit of exhibitionism?, mentions of cheating, brief mentions of stalking, abusive language/cursing

Oikawa didn’t know when it started.

It could’ve been the first time he ever saw you in school, so quiet and shy, with a pink tinge across your face when you glanced in his direction. Or it could’ve been the first time you spoke to him, with a little tremble to your lips as you struggled to form the right words that would leave a lasting impression. Maybe it was when he started noticing you were always attending his volleyball games, cheering on your school with a big stupid grin on your face.

Or maybe it was a mixture of all these little moments that made Oikawa feel what he felt. It didn’t matter what started it. All Oikawa really knew was that he was so in love with you. 

You ended up spending so much time together and blossoming such a beautiful friendship that others didn't expect to happen. It was a dream for him—seeing you smile and laugh, not caring about how you looked. And when you would tease him, it would make him laugh rather than upset him. Yes, he loved you for that. He loves everything about you. From the way you fiddled with your fingers when you had nothing else to do to your weird outbursts when you get excited. You were nothing like the girls who threw themselves at him in hopes of getting his attention. 

Often times, after you would hang out, Oikawa would pull down his pants in the privacy of his bedroom and desperately fist his cock until thick spurts of white would shoot onto anything that he was able to steal from your room from all the times he came over to your house. A picture, a shirt, his favorite pair of panties that smelled so deliciously like you, one of your socks that he wrapped around his length as he fucked his hand—absolutely anything he got his hands on that once belonged to you—was enough to have him dizzy with lust, desire, and love.

You became everything to him. If he was ever able to hold you close with his own fingertips, he would be able to die happily. He would even suffice with just a sniff of your hair while you’re actually awake instead of when you’re dead asleep in the middle of the night and he sneaks into your room through the window you always forget to lock. You couldn’t know that, though. Not like he would have been able to make a move on you so soon to make you completely his anyway.

But he would do anything for you. You were his best friend after all.

So when for the first time ever in your close friendship, you suddenly show up to his house unannounced with tears running down your cheeks and shamelessly throwing yourself into his arms, Oikawa was frozen in place for a second. 

“He cheated on me, Tooru,” you sobbed into his chest. Oh...all he could do was hold you close, bring you inside, and kiss the top of your head lovingly as your shoulders shook.

“It’s okay, Princess. Let it all out. I’m here,” he cooed.

And, wow...you smelled so good when you were awake. So sweet and pure. Absolutely beautiful...

So why the fuck would he cheat on you? 

Oikawa was angry. He was so angry he could laugh at how incredulous the situation was to him. How could he willingly treat you like shit?

After letting him take you away so easily, so Oikawa was forced to resort to pretending that he wasn’t devastatingly in love with you. After being forced to trust him with your heart, convincing himself that he would never hurt you. After having to deal with the fact that every single moment that you shared with Oikawa, that made him fall so deeply for you, was also shared with him. After hearing you scream his name at every single volleyball game you ever attended instead of "Go Tooru!"

It was true—you really were nothing like Oikawa’s fangirls. You didn’t love Oikawa like the fangirls loved him. Never yearned for Oikawa like how his fangirls did. 

You loved Iwaizumi, the former ace of Seijoh and the target of most of Oikawa’s sets. And you broke poor Oikawa’s heart every single time he witnessed a loving moment between you and Iwaizumi. He didn’t understand. He was taller, maybe even more cuter, just so much better than Iwaizumi. So why didn’t you choose him?

That’s how you ended up here; shivering in fear on Iwaizumi’s bed as he sat on the swivel chair he usually kept in his bedroom. Iwaizumi's hands and feet were tied together and the ghost of a blue bruise was forming on his right eye. The rest of his face was slightly swollen and there was a smudge of dried blood under his nose. Whenever you glance up at him, he was staring down at his hands in guilt, shame, and maybe anger and pain. But he made no move to try to get out of his restraints. It was no use.

Can we talk? Come over soon.

You received that text from Iwaizumi's number, assuming it was him. Anxiety-ridden and curious, you came to Iwaizumi's house, wondering what he could possibly say after hurting you so bad. The door was unlocked so you let yourself in, but you didn't expect a shirtless Oikawa—your best friend ever since you met him—to be sitting on the couch looking as relaxed as ever with Iwaizumi's phone in his lap. The little dry splatters of crimson liquid that kissed his skin were easy to notice.

As he led you to Iwaizumi's bedroom, your heart was pounding. And when you saw Iwaizumi in such a disheveled state, you were frozen in fear. Oikawa forced you to sit down on the bed, and you would've started screaming for help—you could've, but a metal handle sticking out of Oikawa's pocket caught your eye.

"God, I fucking hate you. Ever since you got with (Y/N), you’ve made it so hard not to rip your skull apart.”

Oikawa was standing a few feet away from Iwaizumi. A million thoughts ran through your head and every single one of them was wondering how this happened.

When did your best friend become so violent?

And when the fuck did he own a gun?

"I know. I made a goddamn mistake," Iwaizumi grunts in pain, "It's over now. We're not together anymore so-...so you don't need to be doing this dumb shit."

Oikawa laughs loudly, "That's not the point, Iwa-chan! The point is you hurt her." He's clenching and unclenching his fists in anger.

"I said I fucking know!" Iwaizumi barks. He was breathing heavily, his chest was rising and falling deeply.

Oikawa's face forms into a deep scowl. Suddenly, he pulls the black pistol out of his pocket and strikes Iwaizumi's cheek with it, making him jerk his face to the side, before pressing it against his temple. Blood drips from the side of his mouth from the sudden impact.

"Tooru," you whimper. You were shaking so bad, trying hard to stay as calm as possible in case he would try to turn the gun on you. The sight of blood made you feel sick. This whole situation was disgusting.

"You're lucky I haven't blown your brains out for stealing my girl. But hurting her, too? I should fucking shoot you right now." Maybe Iwaizumi was scared, just like you. One pull of the trigger and he would be gone in an instant. But he also looked so furious, with his jaw clenched and his eyes ablaze.

"Then shoot me, Shittykawa. Fucking do it," Iwaizumi taunts him, "Let (Y/N) see how fucked up you are. Traumatize her."

Oikawa pulls away and presses the pistol underneath his own chin in thought, before he carelessly waves it around as if it was just a toy. Every single time he moved, you jumped in your seat and your heart beat eratically. He was unpredictable. "Fuck that, I don't wanna kill you in front of (Y/N) yet. I'd rather blow her back out than blow your brains out first."

His words send a fearful shiver down your spine and makes your skin crawl. You’ve never seen this side of him before—never even expected him to be like this.

Iwaizumi growls, "You're sick."

"I'm not sick, Iwa-chan. I'm doing what's right for my girl," he said firmly. He spun the weapon between his fingers.

"She's not 'your girl.' She was never your girl!" Oikawa and Iwaizumi continued to argue, as if one of them wasn't holding a gun capable of killing everyone in the room instantly. “If this is what you consider right, then you’re just a fucking psycho!”

Why did you have to be here? In between this mess?

You cover your face with the collar of your shirt, crying and trembling with your heart threatening to pound until it jumps out of your chest and leaves you dying. The thought of someone just... getting their life stolen in the hands of someone else right in front of you was destroying your mind. Somehow, even if this was all Oikawa's twisted idea, it felt like it was your fault. 

"Tooru, I don't wanna be h-here. I... I don't want you to kill him..." you hiccup through your tears. Without you noticing, he slowly walks towards you so that he's directly in front of you, watching you break down. “I wan-wanna go h-home.”

"Put the fucking gun down, dumbass," Iwaizumi warns him.

Looking up from your shirt and desperately brushing away the tears as they fell, you're faced with the muzzle of the barrel pointed straight at you, only a mere few inches away from your terrified face. Behind the pistol was, of course, the man you thought would always protect you.

"Oikawa," Iwaizumi snarled, "Don't you dare fucking hurt her. Are you crazy?"

"Shut up, Iwa-chan! Since when did you ever care about her like I do?" Oikawa snaps at him. You stay focused on the shiny barrel of the pistol.

You could die right now. Right in front of your ex boyfriend and your soon-to-be ex best friend. Bleeding with your brains on the mattress you once shared with the man you spent a whole year loving.

All because of Oikawa.

"Why, Tooru?" you ask in a cracked voice, struggling to swallow the lump in your throat.

Oikawa smiled at you, "I'm gonna make this right, okay? I won't hurt you. I just...follow what I say, okay, Princess?"

“I don’t-” you gulp hard, trying to find your voice, “I really don’t understand any of this. I-...I hate this. I don’t wanna die. Tooru, I’m so-...I-...nng?”

The muzzle is delicately pressed between your lips suddenly, nudging your soft lips apart and cutting you off mid-sentence. You inhale sharply as you stare into Oikawa’s brown eyes, surprised and terrified of his sudden action. It throws you off guard, your body going rigid at the thought of dying at this very second.

What would your parents do? Is anyone even gonna find you? Will Iwaizumi survive? Since when did Oikawa hate you so much that he wanted to stick a gun in your mouth?

“Suck.” 

Wait, what? 

The fear on your face is instantly replaced with bewilderment. Suck? What does he mean suck? You stare at each other, the confusion evident on your face, but Oikawa couldn’t stop smiling evilly. 

“Suck on it, Princess,” Oikawa coos. Is he being serious? Even Iwaizumi, ten feet away and tied up, is looking at him as if he was an alien.

“You heard what I said, (Y/N). I won’t hurt you if you listen to me.” When you don't move, he pulls the gun back only to cock it. Your breath hitches in your throat as he places it back on your lips. "Put those sweet lips around my pistol and suck on it. Make it pretty.”

“What the fuck?” breathes Iwaizumi, gawking at Oikawa’s odd demand. 

With the sound of Oikawa cocking the gun fresh in your mind, and fueling your desire to live, you hesitantly wrap your lips around the gun. You start sucking on it, flicking your tongue against the underside of the barrel and slowly bobbing your head around it as you maintain eye contact with Oikawa through your blurry vision. It wasn’t cold, surprisingly, but the feeling of the metal in your mouth made you wince. You’re squeezing your eyes shut, ignoring your tears and trying to think of the weapon as something else.

Oikawa says nothing, his gaze never leaving you while you take his gun as if it was his own cock. The only thing flashing through his mind is that this view is absolutely perfect. Your saliva leaves a thin coating on the barrel every time you pull your head back, just to nibble on the muzzle and swirl your tongue around it, only to let half of the barrel disappear into your mouth again—and it leaves a satisfied feeling in his lower stomach seeing you attempt to submit to him so you could live. 

Slowly, he starts pushing it deeper into your mouth, almost to the back of your throat, and you recoil before he can reach that point, grabbing onto his hand that was holding the gun with both of your weak hands. “Ah, ah, ah,” he tuts in a disappointed tone, “I wanna see you take in more, Princess.” Instantly, you force yourself to relax your throat to let him invade the rest of your mouth. You hold your breath as he hits the back. You’re still trying to bob your head along the weapon, relying on your nose to give you the air that you need.

There was something really fucked up about this whole situation. A red tint is flushed across your face when you glance over at your ex boyfriend, watching you intently. He’s disgusted, that’s for sure—but when you look up to make eye contact with Oikawa, he’s far from disgusted. And it’s easier to tell, because when you trail your gaze to his lower half...

He’s rock hard—bulging from beneath the fabric of his sweats, sweet smile on his perfect face, absolutely no shame in his erection from getting his pistol sucked.

Iwaizumi always knew he was fucking weird.

But there’s an odd, yet familiar sensation, in your lower stomach—a warmth that you know all too well that only happens when Iwaizumi touches you—that makes you clench your thighs and flutter your eyes shut. Looking up at Oikawa, there’s no doubt that he knows what you’re feeling. A small smirk finds its way across his lips. 

Iwaizumi didn't know you were fucking weird, either.

Yeah, that’s what’s fucked up about this situation. Why was this turning you on, too?

Oikawa suddenly pulls the gun away, leaving a thin string of saliva following your lips to the harsh metal for a second until it disconnects. He leans in, making you hold your breath, and his lips find yours.

Soft—that’s the first thing you think about when he connects your lips. “Kiss me back,” he murmurs. 

So, you do. He feels foreign to you, strange even, and you feel quite awkward kissing him when you never even thought about kissing him before. You were beyond flustered. Despite being in such a stressful situation...he’s gentle. The tip of his tongue trails along the opening of your lips. As a habit, you part your lips and allow him to enter your mouth. 

You’re still scared. Your heart is beating so fast. Your breathing is labored from the anxiety sitting heavily on your chest.  But Oikawa is strangely calm. In fact, if he wasn’t moving against your lips right now and lapping at your tongue with his, he’d be smiling and laughing at Iwaizumi’s face. I’m kissing your ex girlfriend!

And Iwaizumi couldn’t do anything except stare. 

You push your hands against his bare shoulders to pull away. “Tooru, stop it,” you gasp out, “Hajim- Iwaizumi is right there.” You didn’t want him to see you like this. You didn’t even wanna see him in the first place after coming home to find him with another girl.

With his face close to you, he harbors a blank expression. “So, would you rather...do something else?” You pause for a second, remembering that he has a gun that’s a few inches away from you, and you reluctantly nod your head. His expression changes—a small smirk and softer, relaxed eyes, an indication that he definitely has something else in mind. Regret starts to fog your mind, but you also can’t help but be curious.

“What are you planning, Shittykawa?” Iwaizumi asks in an irritated, strained tone. He even sounded a bit...jealous? Was he actually jealous? You furrow your eyebrows in confusion.

Oikawa tilts his head to the side to shoot Iwaizumi an evil smirk.

“I’m gonna fuck your ex girlfriend, Iwa-chan. Right in front of you.”

~

You never thought you'd be in this position.

It's hard to fully take in the situation when you literally feel like you're about to pass out from anxiety and all you want is for everything to be calm. At least go back to the way it used to be or how it should be—spending the rest of your time with Oikawa while eating tubs of ice cream and watching movies until you pass out together.

Instead, you're shaking like a leaf while straddling his thighs, fully exposed, soft skin pressing against his. Oikawa is completely bare, too, and while you always admired his athletic ability and perfect body, you didn't wanna see him like this. Not at all. Especially when his finger is still lazily sitting on the trigger of his pistol with it still pointed towards you, challenging you to do something so he can pull it.

It's that mischievous glint in his eyes that make you tense up the most. You want to be angry. You have every right to be, you think, but it's so difficult.

You're trying to cover up your body with your arms, holding onto the small amount of pride you have left, but it's no use when Oikawa is constantly looking you up and down. At the same time, you're trying to avoid looking down—his cock was sitting upright, hard and pulsating and...bigger than you thought he would be.

Way bigger.

"You can give it a little lick, Princess. If it'll make it easy for you."

You bite your trembling lip, shaking your head side to side, "I don't...I don't feel like it, Tooru." Oikawa moves to place his free hand on your waist, trailing his finger tips up and down, goosebumps rising on your skin.

"Just try it, baby. I won't bite," he muses, "Or would you rather I-" He picks his gun up higher. That small, annoying smile seemed to never leave his face because he knew the power he had over you at this moment.

"No," you quickly interrupt him. A chuckle vibrates in his chest at your response.

"I think I need to take care of you first, hm?" Before you can disagree with him again, he's sitting up to grab your hips. He flips you both over so he's above you. He opens your legs and lifts them up so your thighs are pressing against your stomach, exposing everything to him. You’re embarrassed, covering your face with your hands. 

“Let’s see your face, Princess. Don’t hide,” he insists, “You’re so pretty. I wish I could’ve seen you like this sooner.” You have no choice but to let your hands fall from your face. Oikawa looks so happy. In the corner of the room, Iwaizumi is muttering something under his breath with a flushed, bruised, and bleeding face. 

Oikawa runs his fingers along the skin of the underside of your thighs before placing his palms on each. He was still holding onto the weapon. It’s pressing against one of your thighs. Why did everything feel so cold? 

You flinch when he leans down towards your heat to flatten his tongue and lick a stripe up your slit. Oikawa stifles a groan at the taste of you. This was what he wanted since the first time he met you—an opportunity to make you his. He wraps his lips around the little sensitive nub at the top of your cunt and sucks on it. 

“T-Tooru,” you softly whine in uneasiness. You’re not sure if Oikawa can hear the distaste dripping at your mouth, but he keeps sucking and lapping at you as if you were the last thing he would ever eat. “I really don’t like this, Tooru. This is so embarrassing...”

He looks up at you, locking eyes with you as you silently beg him to stop. He removes one of his hands from your thighs to probe at the entrance of your pussy with his thumb. Your heart drops to your stomach when you hear the familiar slick of your wetness and he spreads it around with the pad of his thumb. “You don’t seem to be that against it, (Y/N).” 

Of course you’d be wet—he’s licking and playing with your cunt. When would he understand that?

You gulp nervously, “I don’t want this, Tooru. Please.”

He hums to myself, seeming to be deep in thought as always, before he mutters, “Oh, I know what you want.” You’re confused for a second, but he moves his other hand to hold the pistol at your entrance and...what the fuck?

What the fuck?

“No! Tooru!” you gasp, moving to sit up. Oikawa quickly pushes you back down by your chest. He’s pushing the gun inside you, slowly, but surely—and you feel every single rough patch and texture on the barrel, breaking through the rings of your cunt. “No, no, no!” You’re trying to reach for him, to stop him before he continues, yet he’s able to hold you back with one arm and pushes the pistol inside your pulsing heat, stretching you with the hard metal. It’s an uncomfortable stretch because of how stiff it is. You can already feel the trigger guard pressing at your asshole from how much he filled you up.

You swear Iwaizumi whispers a “holy shit” from his place.

“This is what you wanted, hm? You wanted to get fucked by my pistol?” Oikawa coos in a sickeningly sweet tone. You’re shaking your head, bracing your arms against the bed sheets and chewing on your lip. No. This can’t be happening. “I saw how you reacted when I let you suck on it, Princess. Bet this sweet pussy was already dripping the second I put it in your mouth. I never knew you were so dirty.” He wanted to laugh. The view from between your legs was incredible. He’s glancing at Iwaizumi, who is trying very hard not to look.

“That’s not true!" you gasp. Oikawa continues to pump the gun in and out of you with slow and deliberate strokes. You hate that you feel every single ridge and dent. He leans down to give a few licks at your clit. You’re suppressing a moan in your throat, because this shouldn’t feel good. Every single time he snaps it back into you, you’re gasping for breath. The walls of your cunt are clenching around the thick barrel and it’s hot—you’re heating up from the unfamiliar object forcing its way inside you, forcing you to react. Forcing you to take it in even if your brain is screaming for mercy.

“I know you better than you know yourself,” Oikawa mutters, “You’ve been mine since the beginning. I just let him have you.” This time, you’re biting down on your fist as he continues his assault. This wasn’t the Oikawa you met and became best friends with; this was an absolute monster. Maybe this was who he was the whole entire time—a liar, a master manipulator, a delusional psychopath who couldn’t understand the chemicals behind truly loving someone. 

But that doesn’t matter right now because fuck—the consistent strokes of Oikawa fucking you with his pistol felt good. The tiny moans you’re letting out proves everything, even as you try to hold them back. It’s so hard to stop your hips from bucking against the hard metal, even harder to stop that stupid fire burning in your pelvis. God, you’re about to fucking explode.

It doesn’t feel good, you’re trying to convince yourself. This is assault. This is rape. This doesn’t feel good. You’re not turned on, you’re just terrified if he pulls the trigger—

“Let it out, baby. The gun’s still fully loaded,” he whispers against your lips with a smirk, suddenly lifting himself up to press his forehead against yours. His words were ringing loudly in your ears, reaching every single nerve in your body. You part your lips in shock, your legs are shaking violently against your chest, and your eyes are finally rolling back into your head. A loud moan erupts from your throat, high-pitched like a scream. Quickly, he connects your lips and forces his tongue inside.

Fuck.

Fuck. 

It almost hurts with how tightly you’re clenching onto the gun still inside you. But it’s one of the best feelings that you’ve ever felt because you’re cumming. You’re actually cumming. Your pussy is hot with so much shame, but you’re still gushing juices, soaking Oikawa’s hand.

You’re cumming on a fucking gun.

The room is silent as you’re coming undone. Iwaizumi is dazed, obvious from the look on his face as he’s staring at the place between your legs and the wet spots soaking the sheets. Oikawa stands upright on his knees, and you notice that his pelvis is wet from your juices. How embarrassing. How utterly fucking embarrassing. He’s pulling the gun out of your cunt and raising it up to his face, examining how your cum is running down to the handle. 

Oh, that’s really satisfying. He could take a picture right now, but he didn’t want to waste anymore time. 

"Cumming just from my pistol?" Oikawa chuckled, "So fucking dirty. I love it. I could get you pregnant right now. Pump you up with my kids, would you like that?" 

“Fuck’s sake, Shittykawa. What the fuck is wrong with you?” Iwaizumi speaks up all of a sudden. Oikawa simply scoffs at the other man before pulling you closer to rest your thighs against his hips. 

You wheeze, completely out of breath, “No, Tooru. I’m done. I need to leave.” With the palms of your hands against the mattress, you weakly try to pull yourself up and away from Oikawa’s grasp. 

“I said I was gonna fuck you, didn’t I?” Oikawa hums, pulling you back against his hips and placing his tip at your entrance. You wanna move away, and you really try to by moving to scoot away from him, but you feel so weak. He’s still holding onto his disgustingly wet gun—wet from you. Has he even put it down at all? 

"I never break promises," Oikawa sighs, with a big smile on his face, "And you’re so beautiful, (Y/N). How did I ever stop myself before? I should've taken you even if that fucker was still with you."

You’re trying to protest. You’ve been trying all night, but Oikawa is so persistent with wanting his revenge—revenge that you never even wanted. But he’s also thinking that this is it—this is the stepping stone of becoming the object of your affection. Not Iwaizumi, the man you loved and who cheated on you. Not anyone else. Just your best friend.

His hands are gripping onto your hips as he arches your back for his hips to meet yours. It’s another uncomfortable stretch as he pushes passed the fleshy walls of your pussy with his throbbing cock. You’re already wet—he has no struggle sinking into your pussy—and the squelching sound your wetness makes and the sharp whine that you let out in response to his movements are music to his ears. 

“Fuck,” he moans, “You’re tight, Princess. I thought Iwa-chan was fucking this pussy every night before.” 

It seemed like Iwaizumi wasn’t in the room at first, even if you were hyper-aware of that fact and it made your whole body become flushed. If you could hear his thoughts right now, he would most definitely be thinking that this fucking sucks. There’s a crack in your voice when you let out a low moan at Oikawa finally sheathing you on his cock. 

“How is it? Bigger than Iwa-chan?” he teases you. He pulls back only to dive deeper into your wetness. The feeling of his cock sliding against your walls makes you tremble. You’re so sensitive from how he fucked you with his gun less than five minutes ago, it’s a surprise that you haven’t passed out from the extra simulation he’s giving you. 

“Shut up,” you groan, looking off to the side. When Oikawa is comfortably settled between your folds, he leans over you to brace his hands on either side of your head. Instinctively, you wrap your small hands around his biceps as he slides in and out of you, squeezing desperately. 

Oikawa cocks his head to the side. “You don’t want to admit it, huh?” He suddenly snaps his hips sharply against yours, jerking your whole body upwards. “You don’t need to say it. I know how you feel, anyway.” It fucking hurts. His cock is longer, thicker, and going deeper than his gun was.

“How would you even know how I feel, Tooru?” you ask in a shaky tone. The anxiety never seemed to go away. Maybe you kept quivering because of your new-found fear of the brown-haired man above you, or maybe it was because you can still feel Iwaizumi burning a hole through you—he probably realized how much he hated you because if it weren’t for you, he wouldn’t be sitting tied up in his own home witnessing his friend rail his ex girlfriend.

Oikawa knew, though, that it was because you couldn’t fight the way your nerves were responding to how he touched you.

“Because if you didn’t like this, you wouldn't be under me right now,” he says lowly. With his hands gripping the sheets next to your head, he forces you deeper into the mattress with his body weight. The gun next to your head would’ve made you nervous, but you were too focused on the way Oikawa’s cock was drilling into your pussy like he was trying to leave an imprint of himself there for you to remember forever.

Every time he thrusts into you with all his strength, you’re gasping and moaning, gripping onto his biceps that flexed so deliciously as he filled you up completely. Your body was betraying you, writhing beneath him, basically begging for him to give you more. To make you cum one more time from just his cock.

“You really think this is funny, Oikawa?” Iwaizumi growls. You tense up at the sound of his voice—the anger dripping in his tone. “Basically raping my ex girlfriend?”

“Yeah,” Oikawa purrs, “It’s so...satisfying.” He’s building up his pace, and pretty soon he’s pounding into you with such a force that you’re struggling to let out moans and end up up letting out breaths of air and whiny squeaks. “Especially since she likes it so much. Right, (Y/N)?” Your eyes are rolling back at the sensation—you’re not even trying to deny it at this point. No matter how fucked up or disgusting you look right now, you couldn’t escape Oikawa and you couldn’t stop your pussy from sucking in his cock hopelessly like he belonged inside you.

“I fucking hate you.”

The area on your pelvis is undeniably hot now. Sweat was appearing on your skin despite being fully naked and exposed to the cold air in Iwaizumi’s bedroom. Oikawa is consistently snapping his hips into yours while you’re trying to control your own hips from trying to buck into his. Trying to hold onto what little sanity you have left before you’re ultimately forced to let go on his veiny cock.

Oikawa is your best friend—was your best friend, you don’t even know anymore. Fuck, he’s evil, giving you a warm, welcoming smile with a gun laying next to your head and ravaging your insides at the same time. This isn’t normal. But damn did this feel so fucking good.

You’re crying now, the tears running down your cheeks in a steady stream. Fuck Iwaizumi. Fuck Oikawa’s gun. Fuck the insecurity, feelings of worthlessness, and guilt that you’ve had inside you for the past few weeks after your failed relationship, crying into Oikawa’s lap every single time. Fuck everything. 

Only his name is forming at your lips, accompanied by wails of pleasure. You’ve never felt like this before, not even with Iwaizumi, who you thought would be the only person making you cum until you’re stupid. 

“F-fuck, Tooru,” you manage to gasp out. All your muscles are clenching involuntarily. It only makes Oikawa groan, your pussy unbelievably squeezing even tighter around him, pulling him inside you.

“Are you okay, my baby? You gonna cum all over my cock?” 

Your head is spinning and you just want it to stop. All you’re thinking about is how roughly Oikawa is fucking into you and the pleasure he’s bringing in waves washing over you. He’s not even touching your clit—the base of his cock is just hitting your swollen nub every time he thrusts inside of you, letting tiny shocks run through you.

“This is my pussy now,” he growls, “I’m gonna fuck this. I’m gonna stretch out this little cunt every day and you’re gonna let me, right? You’re gonna let me fill you up with my cum, too?” 

Let go, every sensor in your body is screaming.

"C'mon, Princess. Tell me. Tell Iwa-chan how much you love my cock inside you. Tell us how much you wanna be filled with my cum," he grins as he shoves his length into you roughly. He nudges your head to the side and attaches his lips to the soft skin on your neck, sucking and biting at the area. You arch your back off the bed and you don't hold back anymore—you're chanting his name, finally, begging for him.

"Tooru-mmm, please," you plead, "Fuck me, please! I'm...I'm gonna cum! I'm gonna cum, Tooru!"

Then Oikawa lifts himself up, bracing himself on one of his arms before bringing his gun against your lips again. You don't hesitate to stick your tongue out, letting it in your mouth this time. God, he could fucking cum at the sight of you willingly sucking on his pistol, swirling your tongue over the metal surface. He won't shoot, he just wants to see you submitting to his gun and his cock like he's a king.

It's taking everything within you to not pass out from violently twitching and spasming on his cock, letting your juices squirt all over him once you open your mouth to cry loudly. His gun is still pressing into the base of your throat, so your scream drawls out into a choking noise. Oikawa is letting out a string of curse words—your juices are coating his skin and spraying all over his cock.

Your thighs feel so sore, and you're a sputtering mess as he pulls his gun away from you. It's covered in your saliva. Oikawa is lifting himself up, panting heavily, observing the erratic movement of your chest and the red flush of your body. He doesn't bother to pull out of your convulsing cunt. Why are you still trembling like that?

But it's okay. Oikawa is so happy, so pleased. You were such a good girl—he knows for sure that you finally accept him and want him.

“Hey, Iwa-chan!” Oikawa sang with delight in his tone to catch Iwaizumi's attention. Damn, you completely forgot he was still there.

Oikawa is finally upright on his knees, leaving you sweating on the bedsheets. Iwaizumi looked up, cringing in disgust and fueled with anger and envy from watching Shittykawa himself take your body so relentlessly as you were cumming beneath him. Oikawa lifts his arm, pointing the shiny metal weapon towards the other man in the room. He was still throbbing inside you, enjoying the feeling of you still twitching gently around his cock from your orgasm. With half-lidded eyes, you look up at him weakly, suddenly admiring his toned, muscular body and the sweat glistening on his abs. You're not sure if he came inside you, but the wetness escaping your hole and the feeling of his length twitching, too, is more than enough proof that he probably did.

"What do you want now, you fucking asshole?" Iwaizumi snarls.

The words that come out next are so snarky, filled with hate and arrogance. "Just wanted to let you know that I’m better than you," Oikawa sneers, "And I don't shoot blanks."

He finally pulls the trigger. The sound of a gunshot is piercing the air and Oikawa jerks slightly from the recoil. Then it's completely silent. Your thighs are still shaking, you’re still struggling to find your voice, and your brain seems to be focusing through the haziness. He leans down to give you the sweetest kiss, as if to say that everything will be okay now. The smell in the air was suddenly pungent—a mixture of sweat, sex, gun powder and...blood? Holy shit.  You're screaming now.

Holy shit, Oikawa.

[fific7]

Into the Darkness / Part 4

The Darkling x Reader

A/N: The final chapter. This does not follow canon, it’s literally just lemon zest 🍋 ... I have a vision of Ben Barnes in his black Kefta and riding boots permanently stuck in my brain right now. Attempting to write it right out of there.

Warnings: 18+ please due to NSFW content. Some dom/sub interaction, being restrained, coercion, questionable consent (thankfully it takes place in a fantasy universe), sexual content including oral, loss of virginity, very rough unprotected* sex. I don’t mention her actual age, but Reader is not underage.

*Irl, please don’t go wild in the country without protection.

[My GIF]

The Darkling looked at you with icy eyes. He took off his Kefta and threw it onto one of the chairs, and began unbuckling his trousers. “Take your clothes off, and get on the bed.”

He was furious. Jealous and furious. He fucked you for so long and so hard that you were weeping rivers of tears by the end of it. He’d stopped several times to pull you into a new position, before thrusting back into you and continuing his attack. Every time you gasped more loudly than usual, he smiled coldly at you.

He was fucking you from behind now. As he was about to come, he grabbed you by the hair and pulled your head back, hissing in your ear, “Remember who you belong to, little dove.” Tugging at your hair, he commanded, “Say it! Say who you belong to!” as he released his come into you.

“You... I belong to you, moi soverennyi!” you managed to say, breathing shakily from his prolonged physical assault on you. That’s what it felt like to you, an assault, a punishment. He’d never been so rough with you before, so relentless while he was fucking you. It was well over an hour since he’d pounced on you when you’d first lain naked on the bed, and he hadn’t let up once.

He rolled off you, got up and stalked into the screened-off bathing area, where you heard him taking a piss. You surveyed yourself while he was absent; bites, scratches and fingermarks - which would surely bruise - were apparent all over your body. Your breasts were sore from his incessant kneading of them, your nipples inflamed and painful from him constantly sucking and biting at them.

Your thighs were marked by his fingers and a pink rash from his beard was already showing between your legs. That same beard had also scratched and irritated your mouth and chin. He’d sucked love bites onto your neck, collarbone and breasts. You groaned and turned over to lie on your back, pulling the covers slowly over your abused body.

He walked back to the bed, pulling the covers back off and barking at you to get up and get on your knees. You sobbed, “Please, please...no, moi soverennyi....” He grabbed your arm and pulled you onto the floor. “Shut up and do it!” You wobbled up onto your knees, aware of his hard cock right in front of your face. “Open your mouth.” You did so, and he thrust into your mouth, pushing in so fast and so deep that despite all his recent schooling of you, you choked immediately.

He didn’t stop or back out, merely began roughly fucking into your mouth. Eventually you managed to draw in a breath, and tried to stop choking as he thrust in and out. You thanked the saints when you felt his warmth flooding your throat, and swallowed it as quickly as you could.

He allowed you to get back into bed, and you sank gratefully onto the mattress, pulling up the covers once more. He joined you, firmly grasping your jaw with one hand, “Never, ever, act like that with one of my men again.” He released you, lying down on his back. “You are mine,” you heard him say in a low voice, “mine!”

»»————————————-———-　⚜　———————————-————-««

It had taken you forever to fall asleep and when you awoke early the next morning, every single part of your body was aching. You were suddenly aware of a pair of grey eyes on you. His head was propped up on his hand, and he was just staring at you.

He rolled the sheet down until your breasts were exposed. Leaning over, he sucked on one of your nipples, grasping your other breast and groping it. You winced, they were so sensitive after all the manhandling they’d endured the night before. He saw your expression, but kept on doing what he was doing.

“I’m the only one who gets to do this,” he said, giving your breast an extra-firm squeeze, which made you gasp. “I’m the only one who gets to do this.” He kissed you, thrusting his tongue into your mouth. “And I’m the only one who gets to do this.” His head disappeared under the covers, and you felt him tonguing between your legs. “And this.” He parted your legs and you felt his cock there for a split second, before it sank into you. He moved fully onto you, pinning your hands on the pillows above your head and began to thrust.

Your eyes were watering as he ground into you, in pain but trying not to cry out. He reached his climax, and pulled out of you, releasing your hands. He lay on his back, staring at the material of the tent above him. “Your body has made me insane. You have made me insane.” You looked at him, “What do you mean?” “I’ve lost my mind over you, you’re constantly in my thoughts. I will .. not.. have you speaking with or being looked at by other men.”

You sighed, “So...what?....I have to remain locked away from everyone? How is that fair?”

He didn’t answer you, but got out of bed and started to get dressed. “Two of the serving women will come to you this afternoon,” he said, “do as they tell you.” He pulled on his boots, shrugged into his Kefta and left the tent.

You had no idea what that was all about. So you ran a warm bath, soaking in it and tried to soothe away all your aches and pains.

»»————————————-———-　⚜　———————————-————-««

The two serving women in their white and gold Keftas arrived after you’d eaten a light lunch. They’d brought an extravagant black silk Kefta with them, along with some ivory silk underwear, and said it was all for you to wear this afternoon. You were completely confused. Why? Wear to what? But you knew better than to ask them.

They cast odd looks at you, lingering on the love bites visible above your robe, and on the fingermarks on your wrists. You felt jealousy swirling in the air, but steadfastly ignored it. You were used to everyone’s wary, jealous and strange reactions to you these days.

However, you soon found yourself in yet another rose oil bath, this time insisting you didn’t need their help. You could only imagine the rumours that would fly if they saw your ravaged body. After your bath, you donned the silk underwear and put your linen robe back on.

Your hair was pinned up in a loose swirl by one of the serving women, you were dressed in the new finery and were then brought by them to the large meeting tent. They left you at the main entrance, so you lifted up the flap and stepped inside.

You could see him pacing beside the large campaign table. There was an unfamiliar man on the other side of it, dressed in the grey of the Oprichniki. The Darkling turned to you as you entered the tent. His eyes looked like a glacier, freezing you with their icy intensity.

“Welcome to your wedding ceremony,” he said.

»»————————————-———-　⚜　———————————-————-««

You’d stumbled slightly as he’d said that. “What?” you shrieked. His eyes closed in irritation, “Be quiet!”

He walked over to you, taking your hand in his and lifting it up as if you were going to dance. “We are getting married,” he stated. “It’s the only way I can still my mind, rid it of this unease.”

“What unease?” you asked. “The feeling that if I don’t make this official, it will cease,” he answered. “That someone may try to take you from me.” You looked at him, amazed. Had this all been triggered by a short, innocent conversation with Ivan? “I was merely conversing with Ivan,” you mumbled.

He laughed, but it was not with amusement. “You’re oblivious, aren’t you? All the men look at you with lust in their eyes, and want to possess you. They are jealous of me because I have you. The women are all jealous of you because you’re with me.”

Your gaze dropped from his. “I never asked for this, it’s your doing.” He nodded, “Yes, I know. But if I marry you, it will still all the tongues from wagging. It will also prove that it’s a permanent arrangement. That you will not be replaced. That I will not release you to be with other men.”

He walked you forward to the table. The Oprichnik, meanwhile, went to the main entrance and brought two more people into the tent. One of them was Ivan, the other unknown to you but also dressed in grey. Ivan looked extremely uncomfortable but gave you a short nod. These were the witnesses, you guessed. The original Oprichnik was also an ordained priest, you were told.

You took a deep breath as the brief ceremony commenced. How were you feeling about this? No discussion, no betrothal, nothing - it was all his decision. Anger boiled up in your veins, before subsiding as you realised - and accepted - that it would provide a high level of protection and security for you and your family. And it seemed you didn’t have any say in the matter anyway.

After the Oprichnik finished intoning the marriage vows, you were both required to respond “I swear an eternal oath to you by these vows.” Neither of you would be able to break this contract.

You were surprised when at this point the Darkling produced two black wedding bands from a side pocket, both of them with his symbol engraved on them. Yours was slightly thinner than his, and he slid it onto your ring finger before kissing it, and your finger.

You placed his ring onto his finger, following suit by kissing it and his finger. And that was it. Ten minutes and you were bonded to each other for eternity in the eyes of the saints. He leant in and kissed you softly. It was in complete contrast to his earlier treatment of you, and you felt even more conflicted about this dark, mysterious and still dangerous man.

There were toasts with kvas, and then you both left to walk back to your tent. You noticed that Kirigan had taken a very long and circuitous route back through the Camp, and he had placed your left hand on his right arm. He’d then placed his left hand over yours, so that both rings were prominently on display. You realised that this was his very public wedding announcement to the Second Army. The whispers and wide-eyed looks you both received as you walked through the Camp were quite something to hear and see.

»»————————————-———-　⚜　———————————-————-««

You were introduced - albeit it briefly - to an entirely different General Kirigan on your wedding night. One who took his time to remove your clothes, layer by layer. One who tenderly stroked your face as you lay next to him in bed, one who very gently entered you after kissing you until you’d run out of oxygen. One who gasped out, “My wife!” as he released his come into you. Who placed kisses on your breasts as you drifted off to sleep after sex. He didn’t disturb your sleep any further that night.

In the morning, he’d brought you tea and sweet bread to wake you with. You stretched, sitting up as he placed the tray onto the bed beside you. “Good morning, wife,” you heard, as you looked over at him. He was already dressed.

“Good morning, moi soverennyi,” you replied, but he shook his head. “You should address me as moi muzh,” he said, “...which is ‘husband’. Also lord, bedfellow, helpmate.” You nodded, “As you wish, moi muzh.” He smiled at you, gently moving a strand of your hair back from your face. “I will address you as moi zhena.... ‘wife’.”

His fingers strayed down to your breasts, cupping one of them and rubbing his thumb over your nipple. “I wish I could spend more time with you ... and these beautiful breasts....” his gaze dropped to where his thumb was, “...but I have an important strategy meeting I must attend. It shouldn’t take long.”

His eyes darkened to stormy grey, “And I’ll then expect my wife to be ready to pleasure her new husband.”

You nodded, “Of course, moi muzh.”

»»————————————-———-　⚜　———————————-————-««

You’d dozed back off, enjoying some alone time and recharging your inner batteries somewhat. Then you felt a hand on your shoulder, shaking you, and the bedclothes were pulled back. Your eyes opened and met his grey ones. He was already naked, moving onto the bed next to you, pulling your nightrobe up and off over your head, his eyes roaming greedily over your body.

His hands, unsurprisingly, went straight to your breasts and began massaging them. You sat up, moving your arms a bit so that he had better access to them. You’d accepted his obsession with them, and now acquiesced to every touch. Apart from anything else, he was now your husband, and you were under oath to obey him in everything.

His stiffened cock was already leaking pre-cum, and you readied yourself. Not a moment too soon, as he then straddled you, parting your legs and sinking into you. You gasped as he started moving on you, back to a fast pace and deep thrusts.

You’d been moaning softly at each thrust, when suddenly you were aware of another presence in the tent. Your eyes widened as you looked over his shoulder; no-one ever came in except by invitation. A sound of a throat clearing, and the Darkling’s head whipped round. It was Ivan, looking both incredibly embarrassed and in great fear.

“Forgive me, moi soverennyi,” he muttered, “you know I wouldn’t normally intrude but there’s been a report of...”

You’d been shielded from Ivan’s sight by The Darkling’s body, but now he also pulled up the bed covers over the two of you. “Get out,” he hissed at him, “I’ll see you outside when I’m finished.”

Ivan swiftly left, and you wondered if he’d also taken leave of his senses. He surely must’ve had a fair idea of what Kirigan would be occupied with when he returned to his tent after the meeting.

Kirigan turned back to you, he’d slid out of you when Ivan had come into the tent. “Where were we?” he smirked. He pulled you back towards him, giving his length a couple of strokes before pushing back inside you, continuing where he left off. Once he’d released into you, he got up and started re-dressing himself.

He left the tent, returning twenty minutes later looking angry. “That was a complete waste of time.” You were sitting up in bed and smiled at him, “Then what was his real reason for disturbing you, moi muzh?” He shrugged out of his Kefta, placing it on the chair, before turning and looking at you. “Why do you think? He wanted to see me fucking you so he can relive it in his dreams and pretend it’s him, moi zhena.”

You cast your eyes down, “He finds me so attractive?” He laughed, “Of course he does! Every time he looks at you, he wants to fuck you senseless.” You looked back up at him, “Are you going to punish him, moi muzh?” Again he laughed, “No! He is already being punished, every single moment of every single day, knowing that you’re mine and that he will never have you. Why do you think I made him one of the witnesses to our wedding?”

»»————————————-———-　⚜　———————————-————-««

A few days later, you awoke to a stiff cock hovering at your lips, so you obediently opened your mouth and lay there as Kirigan thrust far down to the back of your throat. You swirled your tongue around it and sucked on him as hard as you could, just as he’d instructed you. When you felt his warm release in your throat, you swallowed it down, coughing slightly when you weren’t quite fast enough.

He’d then followed his usual morning routine of fucking you a short time later, before dressing and going to his first meeting. Once again, an hour later, an Oprichnik came to your tent and said you were to attend at the meeting tent. Now familiar with what this would lead to, you followed him over there and waited in the side room. Kirigan marched in a few moments later, sitting in the chair and pulling you onto his lap as he unbuttoned his fly. His hard length was inside you in seconds, and you moved quickly on him to bring him to his climax so he could return to the meeting.

He pulled your face to his and kissed you hungrily. He drew back, looking intensely at you but saying nothing. You stood up, rearranging your clothing as you did so and preparing to leave. “Wait,” you heard, and you turned to him. He stood up, re-buttoning his fly, approaching you and placing his hand on your cheek. “You know that this is not just about sex, don’t you?”

You opened your mouth to speak but no words came out. He continued, “I married you because I wanted to fully claim you. But...” he hesitated then went on, “I also feel love for you.” You gasped, amazed at his confession. “You do?” “Yes, I do.”

You were silent. What did you feel for him? Attraction, fear (still), respect for his power, grateful for his protection, possessiveness.... but love? You looked up at him.

“I do have feelings for you, moi muzh. I think love is mixed in amongst them.”

He smiled down at you, “I’m glad to hear you say that. I hope that love will soon be dominant over the rest.”

»»————————————-———-　⚜　———————————-————-««

The next morning after Kirigan had left you, you had to run to the bathing room to vomit into the bucket there. This happened again twice in the afternoon. When this began to happen on a daily basis, he called one of the medics to examine you. Your monthly cycle had been due two days before and it hadn’t put in an appearance yet.

After carrying out a thorough examination and asking several more questions of you, the medic declared that you were indeed pregnant. The Darkling smiled broadly and kissed you, pulling you close against him.

“Well done, little dove. You are carrying my child.”

»»————————————-———-　⚜　———————————-————-««

He was even more attentive to you after that. And as the days and weeks passed, your belly swelled, your breasts became even fuller - much to his delight - and your mood swings were atrocious. Even the Darkling didn’t feel brave enough during those to challenge you, when you said you didn’t feel like sex.

He still got his fair share on a daily basis, of course; since you’d come into his life, the Darkling was no longer prepared to go without sex, so he was still on you at least twice a day but had toned down his dominant preferences due to your condition.

But eventually, one evening you and he were looking at the grey eyes and dark hair of a miniature Darkling, who was named Aleksander.

The Darkling looked at the two of you, a smile on his lips. You saw the love in his eyes for you and this child.

“My son,” said the Darkling, placing his hand on the baby’s head and laying his other hand on your face, “my wife. I love you.”

»»————————————-———-　⚜　———————————-————-««

[itsthestutterforme]

I Thought You Were Dead (Divergent)

Characters: OG! Character x reader, Four x reader

Summary: Four and Y/N see each other for the first time in two years after she supposedly died in his arms. Things instantly became complicated and Y/N fights to move on from the past. Four disagrees. //SMUT WARNING ⚠️ 18+ ONLY

--

Tris, Four and Caleb were running away from Eric and his small posse. They boarded a train that was headed towards the city. Little did they know who was on that train. It wasn't just the factionless onboard. It was someone Four never thought he would see again: his ex fiance. His dead ex fiance.

You died in his arm after taking a shot to your jugular vein. You shouldn't have survived, but your heart beat was so faint, it was almost undetectable. Dauntless gave your body to the factionless to bury and one of Evelyn's doctor was able to revive you. Since then, you became Evelyn's second hand.

You boarded this train to make sure things ran smoothly. This particular train had A grade weapons and ammo in it. "Well hello," Edgar taunts Four, Tris and Caleb. "You just destroyed some of our cargo," "We're sorry, we didn't mean to," "Wait, those are Abnegation bolts right?" Caleb continues his rambling until Tris shot him a look.

"You better listen to your sister, punk." Edgar states. Tris lunged towards Edgar but Four held her back. They held eye contact for a moment before they both started fighting with the Factionless. "Y/N, they're fighting!" A woman tells you. "Who's they?" "Edgar and some stowaways," "Oh you've got to be kidding me."

You stand from the floor and runs through the cars until you reached where to swarm of people were gathering. "Enough! What are you children!" You yell and the entire crowd goes silent.

You makes your way towards the front of the crowd and the closer you got, the more beat up faces you saw. "Damn. Now who was the cause of all this," You ask but no one answered.

"Don't answer all at once," "I did," Four says. When you turns around to face the voice, your heart sinks in your chest. "Tobias. Wait, you go by Four, sorry." "You.. you were dead. You died in my arms."

"If it makes you feel any better, I did die. My heart stopped for thirty seconds," You say with a soft chuckle to lessen the tension.

You were debating on going up to him or staying where you were. Four stares at you like you were a ghost. In his mind, you were. And now you are standing in front of him two years later, alive and breathing. "I kept seeing you around the Square, was that really you or just a figament of my imagination?"

"I-" "Y/N, we're close to drop off," Edgar says. "Alright, all of you make sure you get yourselves clean up before you put away the cargo," You announce. "Yes, Y/N." They all say. "We'll have to talk about this later, I'm sorry," You say before walking passed them and walking to the first car.

"Who is she?" Tris asks, but Four doesn't say anything. You look over your shoulder to see Four staring at you. You break eye contact and close the car door. A few moments later, the train came to a full stop and those who were injured went to the infirmary. The rest unloaded the cargo.

You jump out of the car into your boyfriend's arms. He spins me around and captures your lips in a hot kiss. You hum into the kiss and caress his cheekbone with your thumb. "I was worried about you," he says, his eyes slowly scanning your face. "I can take care of myself, Beck,"

The whole time you were having a conversation with Beck, Four couldn't keep his eyes off you. Tris obviously noticed and stormed off, Four and Caleb followed after her.

"I know, but when I saw Edgar's face, I--" "Edgar is a hot headed and deserved that punch," "Wait, so you punched him?" "No, I wish I did though," you say, making him chuckle. You bite your bottom lip until the skin turned white and you close your eyes for a moment.

"Uh oh, I know that face. What happened?" "Things have gotten a little complicated." "How complicated?" "Tobias is here with some others. He goes by Four now," You say softly, looking at Beck's face for a reaction. "Four? What, was one, two and three all taken?"

You slap the back of his neck and he smiles at you playfully. "Play nice," you scold. "Oh but you love it when I'm mean," he says before kissing me again. "But truthfully, is there anything that I should be worried about?"

"Of course not, what happened between us is in the past." You explain. "But what happened between you was more than just romance. He was the love of your life, Y/N. You were going to marry him. Compared to him, I'm just a booty call." "Hey," You warn.

You jump out of his arms and hold his face in your hands. "Listen to me, you are much more than a booty call. Don't you ever forget that. Not after everything we've been through," You explain. "Y/N," Evelyn calls. "We need you in here," she adds. You press one kiss to his lips and another to his forehead.

"We'll talk about this later," You say before advancing towards the Evelyn's office. You've been saying that a lot lately and it didn't leave a good taste in your mouth. You hated drama and you especially hated when you were involuntarily placed in it.

When you entered Evelyn's office to see Four, Caleb and Tris sitting across from Evelyn. Oh hell. "You called for me?" "I figured that you would be best to explain to Tobias-" "His name is Four," You and Tris say in unison. "Right, sorry," Evelyn says.

"I don't know if I'm the right person for this. I've already caused enough mayhem as it is." "Then set it right. You are the queen of that and many things." Evelyn stands and leaves the room, leave everyone staring at me. "Alright, let's talk," you say with a huff.

"Answer the question, were you actually there at the Square or was that a figment of my imagination?" "I was there-" "Why?" "I had to see you but I was too scared to physically be there," "Why?" "Why wouldn't I?" "So the woman that left me with my abusive father could confront me but you couldn't," he snaps.

"I was going to, until I saw that you were happy with her," You say, referencing to Tris. "You deserved to be happy, so i--" "So you abandoned me? Seems like you took a page out of my mother's handbook," "That is not fair, and we both know what would have happened if I came back!" You state.

"What would have happened?" Tris speaks up softly. You look to her and your heart broke for her. You felt like you just tore her whole world apart. "It doesn't matter because I'm done dwelling on the past. Right now I'm focused on the future and taking down Jeanne." "That's all I am? The past?"

"I knew you when you were Tobias. And you knew me as Y/N/N. We both aren't those people anymore." "Listen to me," Four reaches out and holds my hands and Tris starts to cry. "I was able to move on because I thought you were dead. But I still have nightmares about you, about you dying over and over again."

"I'll always love you, Toby. But things are different now." You pull away from his hands and add, "Your mom and I are willing to go to war to get rid of the factions and to go against Jeanne. With you guys on our side, the chances of winning are that much greater. I'll give you guys some time to think things through and I'll make sure Evelyn doesn't intrude."

You give Four a once over before standing up to leave. "Y/N," "Stop, it's over," You say to him before rushing towards the door. As soon as you leave the room, you release a loud huff. "That bad huh?" Beck asks. You look over your shoulder and smile lightly. He closes the gap between you and places his hands on your hips.

You wrap your arms under his arms and say, "Yes, it was that bad. I think I just ruined their relationship." "What? Why?" he asks. "He just admitted that he still have feelings for me." You explain. He pulls away from you and asks, "Do you still have feelings for him?" "You said it yourself, I was going to marry the guy. Those feelings don't just go away."

"Then why don't you go be with him then?" Beck says before storming off in the opposite direction. "Wait, Beck, please let just talk about this." "There's nothing to talk about."

**

Later that night, you decided to go for a walk to clear your head and to have a good cry. You were on your way back when you heard a twig breaking. You decided to walk slower so the attacker thought they had the advantage. You went into a tunnel and waited on top for the attacker.

When they came out of the tunnel, you jumped onto their shoulders and tackled them to the ground. It wasn't until they turned around that you realized it was Four. "Four what the hell?" You scold. Your body perfectly draped over his. "I'm sorry," he says. "For what?" "For ruining everything,"

"There's no one to blame here, but that doesn't make us feel better about any of it, does it?" "No, it doesn't." "We should get back before Evelyn starts to worry." You say, trying to stand up from him.

He pulls you back down and pushes your hair back. "Four, not here." You warn and his eyes drift from your eyes to your lips. "Then where?" You two stumble into an empty loft from on the higher levels of the compound. You closed the door, and turned around to face Four.

He slowly approached you. He takes your hand into his and caressed the back of it with his thumb. You softly sigh at his touch and you watch as he brings your palm up to his lips for a kiss.

He holds the side of your face and you lean into his hand. You find yourself pressing your lips to his and time slowed down to a crawl. His hands fell to the back of your thighs and you completely let yourself go. He wraps your legs around his waist and your hands fell to the back of his neck. Our lips moved in perfect sync and your eyes fluttered closed.

He walks you to the bed and sat down with you in your lap. His hands ghost of over your ass before turning you around so your back was against the bed. You pull off your shirt and work on taking off your pants. He takes off his shirt and in a second, his body was draping over yours. You happily let his lips devour your neck as pulls off your tights.

He pinches your clit through your underwear and your body jolts forwards. "Four, we can't- I--" He silences you with kiss. "I remember how loud you can get," he says with a smile. He kisses down your stomach and massages your breasts through your bra. A breath hitches in your throat when he kisses your clothed bundle of nerves.

"Just relax, baby," he says, pulling my underwear off and tossing then to the side. He takes you into his mouth and your back arches off the bed. He drags his tongue along the top wall and dips it under the hood of your clit while he circles it with his thumb.

A knot was already starting build in your stomach.You always hated how quickly he could make you cum. He notices your leg starting to close so he presses them down with his elbows. You was helpless under him.

He started to speed up his actions and a loud moan leaves your lips. He pulls away a little to nip at the skin next to my bundle of nerves.

You look down at him and watch as he sends you a loving gaze. You held eye contact with him as he continues to lick and suck at your pussy. He curled his tongue at just the right spot to make you fall apart. Your body went rigid and you breath heavily as you ride out your high.

"You're so beautiful," he says after he sucks your juices from his fingers. He straddles my waist and cups my cheeks as he kisses you. The breath leaves your lungs the more rough his kisses get. You dig your nails into his back and he moans in your mouth. His airy moans makes my folds grow slick and he cups my pussy.

You jolt your hips in attempt to gain friction and he smiles. "Look at how eager you are," "Please, Four, just fuck me already." He attacks your neck with hickeys and you moan softly into his ear. You push him on his back and pull back his boxers. You bite your lip when you see his dick spring free from them.

He grabs you and scoots closer towards the headboard. You stand on your feet and slowly sink on top him. Your head falls back as your expand around him. Once you adjust to him, you rock your hips back and forth. He digs his finger nails into your hips which make you speed up your thrusts.

"Fuck, Y/N, just like that," he moans. You spell out the letter W over and over again until you feel his dick twitch inside of you. You stimulate yourself by rubbing your clit and your second orgasm came crashing over like a wave. His body freezes in its place as his cum fills me up.

You roll off of him and brush your hair from your face. He pulls you into his chest and pressed a lingering kiss on your forehead. As you lay on his chest, you think of how heartbroken Beck is. You told him there was nothing to worry about and later that night, you're sleeping with your ex-fiance.

Tears of guilt prick your eyes and you try to hide it but an unexpected sniffle left my lips "Hey, what's wrong? Did you not want to-" "No, it wasn't about that," You pull away from him and rest you back against the headboard. You pull your knees towards your chest and lean your chin on your knee caps.

"Talk to me," he says as he positioned himself so he is sitting right in front of you. "I feel like a liar," You say, wiping away some of your tears. "Why?" "I told Beck that you weren't a problem and now look at us." You burst into tears and sobs into your knees.

"This isnt your fault," "I ruined something really good, Toby. I mean Four- I'm so- I should just leave," You try to leave the bed but he pulls you back onto the bed. "You can call me Toby, Y/N. You have the right to call me that. You were the only good part of my child hood." He holds the side of your face and you turn away from him.

"All I ever do is hurt people. No matter how hard I try, I'll always hurt people. I can't talk you about Beck and I can't talk t-" "Why can't you talk to me about Beck?" "You're asking me what's wrong with gellinby my ex fiance about my ex boyfriend?"

"Yeah, I see where the problem is," he says with a chuckle. You don't laugh, you can't. You hold your face in your hands. "I'm here you as anything you want me to be. We don't have to have sex to tell each other that we care for each other." You look up from your hands and at him. "I'm serious," he adds.

"Thank you," you whimper. He presses another kiss to your forehead before pulling you closer to him and draping an arm over your torso as you two spooned. And for the first time in a long time, you felt okay.

[amiedala]

SOMETHING DEEPER

CHAPTER 4: An Open Wound

RATING: Explicit (18+ ONLY!!!)

WARNINGS: sexual content, canon-compliant violence, graphic descriptions of violence, mentions of past abuse/trauma

SUMMARY:  “I don’t expect you to follow what I say. I’m not a dictator, and I have no interest in becoming one. But if a single one of you brings danger to this planet you claim to love to hurt me or my wife,” Din continues, and the way his lips shape around the word wife makes something warm and wet unhinge in Nova, “there will be no place in this galaxy where you can hide from me.”

If you're a newcomer, my fic "Something More" is the first installment of this story! <3

AUTHOR’S NOTE: hello my loves and happy Something Deeper Saturday! this chapter is truly a whirlwind, it's hard and sweet and intense and simple all at once. there are very graphic descriptions of violence and death in the one (in the form of Force visions, no one's actually dying, I PROMISE!!!), so please be aware that there is potentially triggering material in what you're about to read. it mentions past abuse and dives pretty deep into current violence, so please just read with caution! i hope you enjoy this journey—i certainly did writing it! more notes at the end!!! <3

*

Mandalore isn’t a ghost town.

Not how Nova originally thought, anyway. The throne room is filled with wary, armored people. Some are the guards that usually stand watch outside, through the giant palace doors. Nova recognizes Koska Reeves and Axe Woves from the brief, charged encounters she’s had with each of them. Bo-Katan is there, of course, regal and pristine, her shoulders pushed back, her red hair impeccable. There are a handful of villagers that Nova’s seen in passing, but besides the few faces she recognizes, most of the people gathered in the throne room have been hidden somewhere on Mandalore, away from this strange Capitol, away from the everyday. Half of them are without armor, without impressive beskar helmets to hide their wary expressions. Bo-Katan’s icy, measured gaze is clearly a popular currency on Mandalore, because every single person in this room looks skeptical at best and enraged at worst. Nova keeps her eyes on Din, who’s decided to stand at the helm of the dais instead of taking a seat on the beskar throne, watching his every movement to ensure he’s safe up there, and that he stays unharmed.

“I want...to be your leader,” Din says, his voice quiet but earnest. He sounds like he’s incredulous at his own words, like he’s reading off a script he’s never seen before. But there’s power hidden underneath whatever’s scaring him, an undercurrent that Nova knows is unfettered, genuine passion. “I wasn’t raised in the way of Mandalore. Not in the ways that you were—”

“Clearly,” Koska whispers, and the Mnadalorians standing closest to her proximity offer uncharacteristic smiles and snorts. Nova steps forward, but Bo-Katan raises her sharp hand at her side, and they immediately fall silent.

Din looks back at Nova, and for the first time, she can see the fear in his eyes. She nods, encouragingly, even though she has absolutely no clue what point he’s trying to make. Every time she closes her eyes, even if it’s only for a heartbeat, she sees the strange, young hologram of her face, with the word MURDER, MURDER, MURDER flashing back at her, a ceaseless and terrible pattern. Nervously, she shifts her weight from one foot to the other, realizing that she’s the only person in this room who isn’t outfitted in Mandalorian regalia. Her black shirt has remnants of dust on the sleeves from the amphitheater. Her pants saw their best days weeks ago. Her shawl, the only proof that she wears any sort of allegiance to the throne, Mandalorian blue and regal, is thrown haphazardly over her rounded shoulders. The boots on her feet are older than her relationship with Din, picked up planets and planets ago, somewhere sunny and warm and an entire lifetime away. When Din’s panicked brown eyes find hers again, Nova smiles, taking a half-step forward, trying to portray anything other than her own frenzied state, the hammering heartbeat that could likely be heard outside of the palace.

“I didn’t ask for this,” Din finally continues, turning back to the crowd. Even from this angle, with most of his face obscured, Nova knows how hard it is for him to stand here, in front of dozens of people, without his helmet, how many rules he thinks he’s breaking, how this must feel like agony. He reaches for the Darksaber hanging on his belt, and when it ignites, every single face in the room is on Din, on that horrific, captivating blade of electricity and death. “I won this in battle. Twice. Both were accidents,” He inhales heavily, studying the flickering, wicked blade. “But they still happened. I wasn’t born on Mandalore. I wasn’t raised here, either. I’ve given some of you this speech before, when I first took the throne.” He exhales through his nose, and Nova wets her dry lips. Her throat feels like the middle of the day on Tatooine, parched and treacherous. “I...I am not a Mandalorian in the way that you’re Mandalorians.” Nova chances another half-step forward, letting the captive, tensioned room blur in her vision as she just focuses on Din. There’s a tremor in his voice, something alive and unsteady, something she only notices because she’s spent over a year studying every inch of him, memorizing Din right down to his bloodstream. “I follow a Creed that you don’t. I’ve spent most of my life trying...trying to be a good soldier, a true Mandalorian. I know I’m not the leader you wanted. I’m not even sure if I’m the leader I wanted. But I’m the one we’ve got, at least for right now. And—” Din exhales sharply, his breath strained, and Nova knows he’s suppressing a sigh, “I swear, I will try my best to do right by this planet. But—but I’m not only the reigning Mand’alor. I’m—”

“Right,” Axe interjects, but there's no malice in his tone. Nova stiffens, crossing her arms over her chest, staring over at him. But he doesn’t look threatening. His smile seems genuine, like he;s just attempting to get Din to lighten up. “And a bounty hunter. A damn good one, at that. He’s caught me twice.”

“Three times,” Nova corrects, and her eyes go wide when she realizes that everyone’s attention is now on her. “But,” she continues, rather nervously, trying to square back her shoulders in a shoddy imitation of Bo-Katan to not display that nervousness, “Din hasn’t been just a bounty hunter in a long time.”

Din sheathes the Darksaber, and instead turns his outstretched hand to Nova. Heart pounding, she slides her hand into his large, gloved one, trying not to show the massive tremble in her fingers. Quietly, he reaches for the Skywaker lightsaber hanging from her belt, and when Nova hesitates, he lets her hand close over the grip instead. Bo-Katan moves forward, so quickly Nova doesn’t even notice, and when she ignites the crisp, illuminated blue blade, half of the people gathered in the throne room draw a weapon. Nova’s expecting Bo-Katan to do the same, but she raises one impeccable eyebrow and turns back towards the room.

“Stop,” she says, and immediately, the majority of the room lowers whatever weapon of choice they’re gripping. Nova manages a tiny, stuttered breath. “She’s not going to hurt us.”

“She,” a voice says from the back of the room, “is wanted by multiple parties. Contacts all over the galaxy will pay a pretty price for Andromeda Maluev, you know. I accepted the cult member as Mand’alor. I accepted you standing down from the throne, Bo-Katan. I will not accept harboring a criminal,” he continues, voice as icy as Hoth, “and a Jedi, at that.”

Din moves forward, all tension, all rage, but Bo-Katan holds up that same, steady hand, and the man making his way across the foreground halts in the same beat that Din does. Nova pulls her own lightsaber back, pocketing it, pulling the shawl higher over her shoulders, trying to unclench her jaw before all of her teeth break off in her mouth. She’s tired. So tired. Exhausted, slogging through this conversation, her heartbeat accelerating, stars shooting out behind her eyes. And still, this time, when she closes them, all she sees is MURDER, MURDER, MURDER.

“Her name,” Bo-Katan returns, measured and cool, “is Novalise Djarin. And yes, she is wanted by both the scum that still survived after the Empire’s demise, and a middleman somewhere in between which we cannot identify yet. Yes, she is a Jedi, or at least is certainly heading in that way. Yes, I stood down from the title. But that wasn’t because I was weak, or because I wanted them on the throne.”

“Bo-Katan—”

“Nova,” Bo-Katan interjects, “I’ve got this.” She steps off the lowest stair on the dias, posture perfect, right arm curled around her distinctive helmet. Everything in her screams royalty, regality. Behind her eyes is a fire so much stronger than the ice in her voice. “I didn’t want this. Neither did you. But Din won the Darksaber, fair and square. And Mandalore isn’t what it used to be. None of us are, either. We’re good at surviving, but we’re even better at fighting. And I believe,” she says, pointedly, glancing over at Din, who’s still coiled in an attack position, “that was the point our Mand’alor was getting to. So let him finish. With your mouths closed.”

The man who spoke, wizened but grizzled, exhales angrily through his nose, but his mouth stays clamped shut. Bo-Katan stands at attention, nodding back at Din.

“War is coming,” Din continues stiffly, and half of the people crowded around the room roll their eyes or mutter under their breath.

“War is always coming,” another woman enunciates, “it’s what the galaxy knows best.”

“War is coming,” Din repeats, and Nova has to force herself to unfurl her palms. Before she can even try to jump to his aid, though, he walks down the steps and presses his flat palm against the holotable. Reflected in the glittering dome above them is thousands of pixels of blue light. Nova’s juvenile mugshot is up there for the entire room to see, but so are statistics from every mission they’ve engaged in, anything even remotely related to the Order. Hundreds of faces swarm the screen, all with interwoven lines connecting them to other profiles and rotating planets. There, at the center of the screen, is the First Order’s name in menacing, large letters. Underneath are the silhouettes of Luke, Nova, and Grogu. When Din opens his mouth this time, his words are vivid and clear. “I know that Mandalore has been razed and sieged. I know that in your eyes, I’m not one of you. I know that none of you signed up for another battle. But I also know that fighting,” Din says, his voice weary, but his dark eyebrow raised, “is what’s in our blood. All of us.”

“I won’t follow a ruler who isn’t a true Mandalorian,” the same man finally continues. He steps towards them, and his face is angry and ghastly in the flickering blue light. His rage is barely concealed, and Nova’s hand flies unconsciously to the lightsaber hanging from her belt. “And I certainly won’t protect a Jedi who doesn’t belong here.”

“Well, then,” Nova says, and she’s so bone-dead tired that she doesn’t realize she’s the one who’s speaking until the second word is out of her mouth, “good thing I can protect myself.” She chances a glance at Din, who could very easily be aggravated at her stoking the fire. The only thing written across his face, though, is pride. Nova’s eyes flicker over to Bo-Katan, who is somehow, unbelievably, wearing the same exact expression.

Din slams his fist down on the holotable, sending all of the blue light back into the atmosphere it came from. The low light of the war room is returned to its usual state, but no one speaks. “I don’t expect you to follow what I say. I’m not a dictator, and I have no interest in becoming one. But if a single one of you brings danger to this planet you claim to love to hurt me or my wife,” Din continues, and the way his lips shape around the word wife makes something warm and wet unhinge in Nova, “there will be no place in this galaxy where you can hide from me.”

Still, no one moves.

“Mand’alor,” Bo-Katan snaps, icily, all of her usual vigor and venom back in her voice, and it’s like she’s given an order no one can deny. Half of the Mandalorians nod in wary agreement, and the other half keep their low mumbles close to their chests, all of them shuffling out of the throne room, presumably to disperse outside. When the heavy door closes shut, with only the three of them remaining, Bo-Katan turns back to Nova. Din is already climbing the steps back up the dais where the menacing beskar throne sits to retrieve his fallen helmet. When he pulls it back over his handsome face, it’s like closing an open wound.

Nova looks at Bo-Katan, who doesn’t look nearly as threatening in this low light. Her hair is slightly ruffled, and the hard set of her jaw is tense, electric. “Bo-Katan,” Nova whispers, and her gaze snaps impeccably back to Nova’s. “Thank you,” Nova continues, earnest, “for defending me. Defending us. You didn’t have to do that.”

“I did,” Bo-Katan counters, but there’s the ghost of a small smile on her beautiful, cold face. “They were wrong, and they needed to hear that. See? I’m not always a total bitch.”

The word—so commonplace, so foreign—sounds absolutely ludicrous coming out of her mouth that it makes Nova laugh out loud. The sound is both musical and jarring, and the tension held in Bo-Katan’s shoulders evaporates, even if it’s only momentarily.

“Noted,” Nova says, smiling. Maker and all the stars above, she’s exhausted. Bo-Katan glances back at Din, armored and impenetrable, and then back at Nova.

“You need sleep,” Bo-Katan allows, pulling her own helmet back over her head. “Both of you. I’ll stay down here and monitor any incoming correspondence. I’m too wired to go to bed anytime soon.”

“You don’t have to—”

“I do,” Bo-Katan interrupts, and her usual edge is back in her tone. “And I will. Go.” She raises that commanding arm again, and Nova’s too exhausted to resist. She wants to take a shower and wash the last few days off of her, and then sleep for three more. Her scar hurts. Her shoulders ache. Her head feels impossibly heavy. Silently, she lets Din lead her over to the heavy double doors, her ears buzzing with fatigue, but before they step into the hall, Nova hears her name chase her across the war room. In tandem, she and Din turn, watching Bo-Katan ignite the blue holotable. There’s something unreadable about her, even under the helmet. “I hope you know what you’re doing,” Bo-Katan says, finally, and the heaviness of her words is louder than the doors when they close on her impenetrable face.

*

Steam from the shower fills the entire fresher. It’s wet and hot, the humidity seeping deep into Nova’s skin, burrowing under the residual ache from the last few days, nestling between her cold bones from the chill back on Ahch-To, the frigidity back on Hoth. Din joins her once he wrestles off the rest of the armor, and before Nova can explain she wants him, but it’s impossible right now with how exhausted she is, how she can barely keep her eyes open, Din wordlessly lathers up his hands with her favorite, clean-smelling soap, gently raking the suds through her hair.

Nova sighs in the silence, letting her shoulders hunch over, her body weight alleviated by sagging against the warm shower walls and by the soft grip Din has on her arms, making sure she stays upward. For what feels like years, they stand together under the warm running water, reveling in the steam, the heat, without either of them needing to say anything. Din wraps Nova’s long hair up in the freshly washed towel, while she dries off the residual runoff down her arms, her thighs.

The room is cool and dark in the blue twilight, that same fog and haze sinking over the horizon. Wherever the rest of the Mandalorians went, they’ve all but disappeared off the face of the planet. Everything is an eerie kind of quiet, no bugs, no animals, no clamor, nothing that signifies any kind of sentient life outside of the castle. Most nights, that kind of awful silence makes Nova wired, like it permeates even into her dreams, but not here, not now. She has what feels like years’ worth of sleep to catch up on, and the second that Din pulls back the fluffy, silk comforter on their giant bed, Nova steps out of the towel and into the soft cocoon. Din’s barely even settled up behind her before she drifts off somewhere peaceful, somewhere that’s not here.

*

She sleeps. For hours, maybe days, Nova sleeps. It’s dreamless and empty, warm and safe. Usually, nightmares flicker and flash through her mind, her legs sprinting away from whatever menace or threat is chasing her, but not tonight. Nothing wakes Nova up, not the strange quiet, not Din tossing next to her, not the immeasurable weight of saving the galaxy on her shoulders. She sleeps, uninterrupted and powerfully, swaddled up under the light blue blankets that are somehow keeping all the bad things away.

In the end, it’s not a nightmare that startles her away, nor is it Din’s unshaven face pressing into the crook of her neck. It’s the sleepy, quiet beeping of her commlink, which has somehow been removed from its usual place on her wrist and is buried under the extra pillows that stand sentinel over their bed when neither Nova or Din is there.

Din, at this very moment, is also nowhere to be found, and Nova rakes a hand through her hair, tries and fails to suppress a yawn, and digs through the array of pillows on the floor until she can see the bright, red light. “Hello?” she asks, her voice still off somewhere in dreamland, and she rubs sleep from her eyes as she collapses down on the bed, body still stuck in sleep.

“Hey,” Nova hears, and it’s halfway through another yawn before she realizes it’s Cara calling. “Listen, I’d love to actually catch up, but—”

“You have news?” Nova asks, suddenly wide awake. She smooths the comforter out under her hand, crossing one of her legs underneath the other. Outside, the sky is dark.

“I have news,” Cara confirms, grimly. “I know Wedge called you to Hoth a week or so ago because there was a prison break somewhere outside of my jurisdiction.”

Nova nods before she remembers Cara can’t see her. “Yeah,” she adds, belatedly. “Yeah, but no one seemed suspicious or in league with the Order, and it was a holding cell full of minor offenders, so it was kind of a dead end.”

“Well, it was,” Cara sighs, “until it wasn’t. We were right, kind of, because no one who escaped was linked to the First Order. But the night after that prison break happened, your photo with your old name and manufactured crimes popped up as a hit from the Guild.”

Nova’s heart sinks. Something suffocating is blocking her airway, and she tries to swallow past the feeling before she can exhale. “What does that mean?” she manages, barely, hand fluttering around her necklace, pressing into the embossed star.

“Someone’s setting you up,” Cara continues, and her voice is gentler than Nova’s ever heard it. “Someone who likely knows you or Din, knows how to get under your skin. The reason why this is so dangerous is because whoever did it knows exactly what they’re doing. I’ve tried, and Karga has tried, but we can’t even identify where the hit originated from, let alone who put it out. We’re not going to stop looking, but it’s going to be hard to figure out who did it. And because the warrant is for you alive or dead…” Cara trails off, the silence buzzing and dangerous.

Nova closes her eyes before she fills in the blanks. “I’m going to be in danger anywhere I go.”

“Listen,” Cara tries, but it’s too late. Nova’s still exhausted, she’s in pain, she has no idea where Din went, and all she wants to do is to bury her face in Grogu’s head and smell his sweet, reassuring baby smell. Her heart aches. “Novalise, I’m not going to let them get to you. You have some of the strongest forces in the galaxy who’ve got your back.”

“Yeah,” Nova whispers, “and I appreciate that, Cara, I do, so much, but—but Mandalore isn’t exactly a safe haven, either. The planet knows I can use the Force, and besides that, most of the people Din’s supposed to be ruling hate our guts. I’m not scared of being left to defend myself, because it’s kind of what I’ve learned to be best at. But with what you’re telling me, there’s not a single safe place left in the galaxy for me right now.”

Cara’s silence is deafening. Nova’s heart sinks just a little bit deeper, swimming around somewhere in her stomach. “It’s not forever,” she says, but her voice is a little too glum to be anywhere near reassuring.

“I’m so tired,” Nova admits, feeling tears bubbling up at the corners of her eyes. “And I can’t rest, because that’s when someone can get me. I mean—what would you do, if you were me, Cara?”

Nova can hear Cara moving, a soft rustle underneath the comm. When she speaks again, her voice is low and clear, like she’s telling a secret that only Nova can hear. “I would do what we both know you’re going to do. You’re the rebel girl, remember?” She pauses. “So rebel.”

Nova watches as the comm clicks off, everything in her body electric, a live wire. Before she can bolt to Kicker, or try to find where Din’s hidden in the chambers of the palace, or call Wedge and tell him she’s coming back to Hoth, the door opens, and Din walks in.

“Hi,” Nova breathes, suddenly very aware she’s not wearing any clothes, which is completely ridiculous, because Din has seen, ravaged, and worshipped every inch of it. “Where were you?”

She watches as Din crosses over the floor, the low light of the day catching on his armor. He sighs, moving closer to Nova until he’s standing in between her open legs. Halfheartedly, he hooks his fingers under the rim of the helmet, but gives up completely the second Nova’s hands reach to pull it off instead. Underneath, his mustache isn’t manicured, his hair has been weighed down by the metal, and he looks about as exhausted as she feels.

“Ruling,” Din says, tiredly, and there’s a flint to it Nova hardly hears. He lets out a small scoff in the silence, and she reaches out the smooth palm of her right hand for his cheek to nestle against. “Trying to get the people of this planet to recognize I’m not here to destroy it, or that you—we’re not the enemy.” He catches his slip almost as quickly as it comes out of his mouth, but still, Nova’s heart sinks deep down in her chest again. “I didn’t—look, Nova, I’m not blaming you—”

“It’s okay,” she whispers, even though they both know it’s not. For a second, Din just stares at her, and then he presses his forehead against hers. The warmth his skin gives off is almost enough to make her forget about where they are, about the people that refuse to see her as an ally, about having to save the galaxy from forces that want her dead or for their own malicious intent. “They’ll come around,” she offers, her voice barely there, and Din shakes his head, his hair rustling against Nova’s forehead.

“What if they don’t?” Din asks, and by the weight in his voice, it’s clear he’s not just talking about Mandalore accepting her as the Mand’alor’s riduur, as an ally, as on their side, but about the infiltrated Guild that’s out to kill her, and the First Order that’s out for worse.

Nova’s quiet for a long time, just listening to him breathe, trying to map both of their heartbeats, yearning for the constellations hiding above the hazy Mandalore sky. “What if we can’t do it?” she whispers, her mouth hollow, her head aching. “Any of this? What if we can’t pull this off, Din?” She doesn’t point out the specifics, the weight of planets hanging over both of their heads. They both know what she means. The silence is horrible, but Nova keeps her eyes closed, just like she used to, predicting every move Din will make in the dark.

“Then we don’t,” Din breathes back, and Nova’s about to resist, tears springing back to life in her eyes, and then Din’s mouth is on hers and nothing else matters. She lets him sprawl her back on the bed, the smooth satin coaxing and cool under her skin. Stars are burning out behind her eyes, the same celestial imprints that flood through hyperspace, something more, something deeper, something beyond this planet, this moment, this darkness. When Din’s mouth leaves Nova’s, her eyes stay shut, and his lips trail down to her ear. “I’d give everything else up but you.”

They both know he’s lying—Din’s heart is too big, Nova’s purpose is too bright—but neither of them say it out loud. Nova keeps his words in the hollow of her mouth, something shiny and devastating, a supernova or a pearl.

Din kisses Nova like he’s never had her before, low and desperate. It’s an echo of what happened in the amphitheater just hours ago, but it’s sustained, huge, warm. His mouth is made to devour, and if he’s whispering anything to feel the silence, Nova can’t hear it. She’s focused on where his kisses are trailing, desperate and hot and everything she didn’t know she needed. It’s freezing in here, but he’s so warm, his body heat louder than the cold.

“Kiss me,” Din whispers, his voice rough, a plea. One of his hands comes up and braces against Nova’s chin, not an order, but a question. She reaches towards his neck, trying to pull him down, to anchor their bodies together. It’s dark in their room. Without the stars shining above, it’s even darker.

She’s so tired. Still, even after all that rest, it’s like the exhaustion has permeated Nova straight down to her bones. She shudders and sighs as Din moves down her naked body, his lips planting kisses that she doesn’t know she needs until he’s already there. It’s easy and devastating and wonderful and crushing all at once. When Nova tries to return the favor, Din gently pushes her down, mumbling something about taking care of her.

It’s sweet. So sweet, even, that she’s on the verge of tears. Nova would do anything to stay here forever, to feel her husband’s lips on her bare skin, washing away all of the horror, the trauma, the darkness. She doesn’t open her eyes, even though she wants to. Din’s spent so much time without his helmet to appear like one of the people that call themselves Mandalorians, and she wants to give him back every single second of the time that prying eyes stole away.

Before long, Nova’s already close—her orgasm bubbling up quietly, without fanfare, without dramatics, just because Din knows exactly how to make her body sing—and when she taps at his arm to let him know, his mouth unlatches from the small hickies he’s leaving on the terrain of her bare stomach, and moves in between her thighs.

Effortlessly, he hold her legs up, hooking both of them around his shoulders so that his tongue can stay anchored in place. Nova moans, a quiet, radiant thing, and Din’s tongue finds exactly where she needs it to go. It pulses there, on the sweetest of spots, over and over again until she’s finished.

Breathless, she claws at his pants again, but Din shakes his head, his mouth dropping to her forehead as he pulls her into bed. “Rest, Nova,” he whispers, his voice faraway, a deep rumble. He pulls her in against his body, warm and soothing, and both of them are out before their heads hit their pillow.

*

Din’s asleep next to her, his slow, even breaths barely anything even in all the silence. Nova wants to fall back to sleep, but she knows she can’t. Her heartbeat is running itself rampant, and she’s a tangle of wants and needs, everything pulled in opposite directions. As quietly as she can, she slides herself out from the protective warmth of Din’s arms and the comforter, gently placing her feet on the floor. Even in the cool darkness of the night, her wardrobe, sleek but huge, has nothing but clothes in the same shades of Mandalorian blue, of beskar silver, but right now, Novalise doesn’t want to be a Mandalorian. She doesn’t want to be royalty, doesn’t want to be a figurehead. She doesn’t exactly want to be a Rebel either, because both titles mean the ultimate fate of the Outer Rim and beyond in her hands, so she settles for somewhere in between.

When she’s all dressed—black monochrome right down to her scuffed boots, in a weak imitation of the Luke Skywalker style—she braids the top half of her hair back, sleek and functional, and chooses a shawl buried at the back of her closet, underneath all of the Mandalorian haze of clothing. It’s a stormy grey that shimmers with the silver her husband wears when the fabric catches the light. If you pay close enough attention to the shawl, small, intentional stitches of rust and orange are woven into the fabric, hidden, furious, tiny flames.

Not exactly Mandalorian, but not entirely Rebel, either. And when Nova looks at herself in the mirror, studying the way her eyes flash with all that fire she was so certain was gone a few minutes ago, she sees herself right down to the quick, the high wire in between—she looks something like a Jedi.

So she pulls the Skywalker family lightsaber out of the hook on her door and pulls it to her belt loop, watching as the metal sways and dances in the low light. The weapon seems ancient, like something from another world. Something holy, even though she knows Luke Skywalker is a man and not a myth.

When she closes the bedroom door behind her, Din doesn’t even move. Usually, Nova’s the loud and clumsy one, worlds more obnoxious than Din’s practiced quiet, but she’s grown into her stealth over the last few weeks, especially living here, in a palace that has more rooms than the planet does people. It’s strange and eerie here at night, down the sprawling marble stairs, and she takes the first corridor she can find, just trying to walk off some of the pressure, to put her head back on her shoulders.

It’s lit only by candlelight, an archaic, flickering warmth, so in contrast to the rest of the steel and metal that Mandalore is made up of. It’s like she’s stepped into something that’s been around for years, even though she knows that it’s not possible. Mandalore was sieged, usurped, sieged again, razed and brought to the ground, destroyed. The planet’s atmosphere is mostly ash and haze, all that leftover war from years ago. But this part of the palace looks older, like a tomb that somehow survived.

It’s too creepy, Nova decides, even though the curious part of her is itching to explore it. She wants to pore through every aspect of it, try to find remnants of lost Mandalore, like her father used to unearth texts, like her mother used to excavate history. Before the war, before the Alliance was necessary, before all this death and darkness. When Nova comes out the other end of the corridor, she’s right next to the intimidating double doors of the war room, the holiest place Mandalore has. She pulls her shawl a little closer to her body, trying to retain the warmth she left back upstairs, trying to hold onto a memory more than anything tangible.

Nova isn’t intending to slip into the war room, let alone walk towards the sprawling dais that holds the beskar throne, but she does. It’s still quiet, so quiet, and the dark is coaxing her closer, pulling her up the steps, something beyond a simple want or need. She has the sneaking suspicion that she’s not supposed to be in here, not this late, not without Din, not when she has no legal or physical right to this place, but when she sits down on the throne, something deeper echoes out from within her chest.

It feels like a hymn and a battle cry. Before she has a second to adjust, to rationalize anything, everything becomes starry and disconnected. It’s been so long since she had a Force vision this immediate, this intense, and it hurls her through the proverbial hyperspace, everything dropping away.

It takes three steps forward in this strange, terrifying liminal space before Nova can even identify what’s scaring her. It’s the same kind of evil she felt way back on Takodana, before she was married to the ruler of a planet, before she even knew it was her destiny to be both Rebel and Jedi. There’s a mask she doesn’t recognize, twisted and devious. Behind its menacing, blank expression is something horrifying. Looking into the visor, it’s like her own soul is being fractured into pieces.

It’s humanoid until it’s not. The figure wearing the mask of destruction is tall, easily a foot taller than she is, horrible and menacing. But when the lightsaber they’re using ignites, it’s scarier than the vision of the person at all. It’s awful. It looks like it was forged out of lava, menacing red, the blade flickering and hissing in a way that’s somehow even more terrifying than the stark contrast of the Darksaber’s blade. Nova gasps, the light too bright, too sudden, and she can feel the residual thud on the floor, even in the vision. She knows when she comes out of it, she’ll be hurt, but the blade is getting closer. It looks like a giant rapier, a sword made only for evil things. At the hilt, spraying out in both directions, the blade extends. When the figure in the mask swings, it’s without remorse, so quick, so terrible.

But Nova’s not the target. She rolls away, out of the strike zone, and then she hears Luke Skywalker’s voice cutting through the darkness. She turns, and suddenly she’s not in the horror of the vision, anymore. She doesn’t know where she is. The ground looks icy, like Hoth, but there’s red powder spit everywhere, vomited across giant salt deposits. It’s so bright that her hand comes up in front of her eyes, and when she lowers it, Luke is gone. She’s gone, too. She turns around, hair whipping in the furious wind, trying to find where her name is being cried, and she trips over a mound on the salty ground, and when she falls to her knees, it’s a person, newly slain. The blood is so red, redder than the powder, redder than the evil lightsaber. It drowns through the lines on her hands, slips through her long fingers. She screams, trying to back up from the body, and then she realizes it’s Bo-Katan, gurgling through the slit in her throat, and when Nova tries desperately, in vain, to buffer the blood spilled, Luke Skywalker calls her name again.

But it’s not Luke. It is him—for a second, for the tiniest fraction of a moment—but then it’s not. His lightsaber floods with red, cancelling out the green light. The hallway flickers, once, twice, and then Darth Vader is charging towards her, and all Nova can hear is her blood pounding frantically in her ears and his heavy breathing through his mask, the sound that used to fill all of her nightmares. She’s slamming on the door at the other end of the hallway, and when it opens, the only person standing there isn’t a person at all, but a small alien baby all of two feet tall, green and adorable, and Nova drops her body around her son, protective and sobbing, curling every single inch of her around his tiny little frame, trying to shield him from Vader’s wrath, but when she cries, the vision changes again.

She can feel the motion sickness bubbling up in her stomach, horrible and nauseating. When Nova lands, she doesn’t open her eyes. She’s seen more than enough. Even right now, in the middle of her Force vision, all she wants to do is go back to sleep. She can feel the ache she slept away burrowing right back into her bones. Her scar is pulsing, enraged and angry. The headache she spent the last two and a half weeks fighting off is back, radiating straight down to behind her left eye. It’s all too much, and she can’t look. She doesn’t want to see anything else.

“Novalise,” she hears again, and the only reason she opens her eyes this time is because it’s her mother speaking. Her mother, who only ever called her Andromeda. Her mother, who spent half her life in the stars. Her mother, long dead. Her mother, who never got to know this version of her daughter, this Jedi-in-training, royal Rebel Girl that just desperately needs a hug from her mom.

“Mom,” she cries, and it’s so white. Everything here is antiseptic and deafening. It doesn’t even look like a planet, or even a room, or anything at all. She’s not even sure if there’s a floor, but Nova starts running like she’s never ran before in her life. Her breath is ragged and coming out in bursts. The jiggle in her chest and thighs burn under her speed, but she doesn’t care. She’s racing towards her mother, towards open arms, towards everything she’s been cheated out of for the last ten years.

It lasts for a second. Just a second. The figure is Piper Maluev, her skin dark and radiant, her hair down to her waist. Her lips are wide open and welcoming, her eyes crinkled at the seams. She’s tall and radiant and strong, and she’s everything Nova’s missed for nearly half her life.

And then it isn’t Piper. It’s not Luke, either, or Darth Vader, or whoever the dark, terrible, masked figure was. It’s not her usual nightmare transformation of Jacterr Calican. It’s not Bo-Katan, convulsing and dying. It’s Din. Just for a moment, a tiny fraction of relief, and then it’s not Din, either.

It’s a woman Nova’s never seen before, and her hand is clamped firmly around Nova’s windpipe. Like it’s nothing, she pulls her right off the disappearing floor and choking the life out of her. Her eyes are light but so terrifyingly menacing, her hair is a mess of a dark blonde. She’s pale and awful and her face is gleeful as she pulls the life out of Nova, a sucking, open wound.

She can’t talk. She doesn’t even want to plead for her life. If she’s this close to death anyway, and she just saw her mother, Nova figures there’s a pretty damn good chance that both of her parents are just over the other side. The woman is so happy to be killing Nova off, she doesn’t want to fight it. When her grip recedes, just for a half a second, Nova chokes out a confession that makes everything else grind to a halt.

It’s four words. Barely anything. Tears are streaming down her cheeks when her lips finally open. “I want my mom.”

Then she’s being dropped onto the floor, which very much exists now, and the light room filled with nothingness curls away, receding like it’s being burned. It’s dark in here, the tiled floor slippery and treacherous. In the background, there’s a makeshift trophy made from what looks like bones. Nova’s gasping for air, fighting back with a newfound vigor, kicking her legs helplessly to try and get some leverage on this woman who wants her dead, when, suddenly, she’s at eye level with her.

“I’ve been looking everywhere for you,” she seethes, a terrifying smile still spread across her horrible, beautiful face. “When I find you, you’re going to be begging for your life instead of your death.”

“Who—who are you?” Nova manages, through agony. Her shoulders hurt. Her headache feels like it’s trying to split her jaw in half. Her scar feels like it’s being reopened. Everything is torture, and she can’t even breathe.

“You’ll see,” the woman whispers, and her voice is so deadly that Nova internally corrects every time she’s ever called Bo-Katan venomous. Bo-Katan Kryze is a flower. One of the iridescent, gorgeous ones, that lined all the brush on Yavin, the ones Nova’s spent years pressing into the pages of every journal she’s ever owned. She’s kind and lovely and Nova’s very best friend, and when she gets out of this alive, Nova’s going to tell Bo-Katan that. “I’m going to enjoy killing you, Andromeda.”

Nova heaves one giant breath into her lungs, trying to muster up anything that she can, even if it’s just more air. “I—” she starts, and the woman smiles again, loaded and dangerous. “I—I already did that, you miserable bitch,” Nova manages, and when she’s slammed into the awful floor, it’s worth it. There’s some kind of desperation behind the woman’s eyes, now and when her hand finds Nova’s throat again, she spits in her face.

And then she’s out of it. Hurtled out of it, actually, like a dying starfighter in the middle of space. She gasps and heaves on the floor, and as her sight comes back, her breathing does, too. Her head is still killing her. Her shoulders feel like they’re trying to carry the entire weight of Mandalore. Her scar is awful, white-hot and painful to the touch. Somewhere, distantly, her knees hurt like she’s fallen to them, and when she gains back her sense of sight and the feeling of her life being choked out of her body subsides, Nova realizes she has fallen to them. She’s fallen a lot, actually, down multiple steps leading to the floor from the raised platform where she was once sitting in the beskar throne. Nova shudders, inhaling through a terrible wheeze, curling her legs up close to her chest, trying to shake off the absolute shitshow that just hurtled her through the most traumatic Force vision she’s ever had.

“You,” comes a booming, rueful voice, and when Nova’s eyes flutter open, she’s expecting it to be the malicious, purple-haired woman from her vision. Her eyes take a second to adjust, her left one throbbing from the horrid ache pulsing behind it, and when she finally locates the source, it’s the miserable man from the gathering earlier.

“Can I help you?” Nova asks, her voice shooting up at the end, on the verge of tears.

“You aren’t supposed to be up there,” he spits, and Nova squints up at the throne she’d just fallen from.

“I know,” she whispers, dully. She presses a shaking hand to the ache behind her eye, trying to shut out this conversation like she wishes she’d ignored the vision. She tries to stand up, but her knees are too bruised to sustain pulling her to her feet, so she just slumps back against the step she’s on, trying to muster all the strength she has in her exhausted body to not break down. “I’m sorry,” Nova tacks on, the words barely there. “I—I wasn’t intending to sit here, or even come in the room, it just—”

“Happened,” he finishes, oddly calm. His voice sounds closer. Much closer. Nova opens her right eye, and he’s only at the bottom of the staircase. There’s something so wretched and dangerous about the energy he’s giving off, and she wants to run, but she’s in no position to even stand, let alone fight him off, so she just sits there, curling her knees into her chest, pulling her shawl as tight as she can against her upper body. “You’re an abomination.”

A laugh, the traitorous thing, bubbles up inside Nova’s throat. It’s not funny. It’s not. It’s pathetic, and likely racially motivated, but she can’t help herself. Her ribs ache, like they got banged up in her distant fall down these sharp, steep marble steps. “That, surprisingly, is not the first time I’ve been called an abomination in my life.”

“Do you know what the Jedi did to our people, little girl?” He’s angry. Nova can hear it in his voice. And normally, it would scare her, trigger her fight or flight reflex, keep her moving, but after her paranormal face-off with two of the scariest figures she’s ever seen, this one isn’t really that high up on our list. “I do. You were eradicated for good reason. You scorched our planet down to nothing, and now you and your cult leader husband come back here and try to take over? Not on my watch.”

Nova can feel him getting closer. He’s so much bigger than she is, up close, tall and buff, menacing and taut. She weakly pulls her hand away from her eye, trying to at the very least give him her full attention, but she’s so fucking tired. It’s in her bones, at this point. She doesn’t want to be royalty. She doesn’t want to be a Rebel. And, in contrast to what the man in front of her is screaming, she doesn’t want to be a Jedi.

She wants to be the Novalise she was on Naator, with nothing but domesticity and yellow leaves and pink skies. She wants to be the protector she was out there in hyperspace. And, for the first time in ten years, she wants to be Andromeda Maluev, fifteen and gleeful, running around Yavin knowing the stars were her destiny and that evil could always be defeated.

“I don’t even want to be here,” Nova whispers, finally, and it’s like something inside her breaks.

“Good,” the man spits, “then we’re in agreement.” And then his hands are yanking away the hood of her shawl and tangling in her braided hair. Nova’s scream gets cut off as she’s thrown down the rest of the stairs, like her body’s giving up. She chokes out something horrible, fighting to get to her bruised, banged up knees, sore from the fall, aching from the blissful time riding Din’s face less than an hour ago, but she can’t summon the strength. Somewhere, she knows Luke Skywalker is yelling at her to use the Force, but Nova’s had enough force today to last a lifetime. When she’s kicked in the stomach, brutal and awful, she just curls in on herself, hoping her death isn’t a slow one. He startles towards her again, ripping her shawl off of her body, clawing at the meat of her upper arm, and something snaps inside of her. If she’s going to die, really die, it’s not because she succumbed to the injuries this rabid Mandalorian is giving her to try and put the blame on her shoulders. She survived Moff Gideon. She survived Din and Grogu leaving her. She survived her parents dying. And she survived the abuse of Jacterr Calican’s awful hands. Novalise can survive this.

When her lightsaber roars to life in her hands, it’s not only Nova swinging. She can feel the weight of what it being the Skywalker family lightsaber, of Luke and Leia before her, of his father before him, of all the generations yet to come to wield this weapon, this holy sword, this impossible thing. It takes all of her energy, a brilliant beam of blue light, and then she falls to the floor, knowing that even if this is where it ends, that she fought back.

Everything next comes in flashes. It’s in these tiny fractals like what happened when the Crest had died right over Dagobah and crashed to the surface. She sees a blade ignite, and in between the rhythm of her fading in and out of consciousness, Nova thinks she’s just watching herself fight the man back. Suddenly, he drops to the floor, his body nothing but dead weight, and she wants to scream, but she’s back out. It’s horrible and deafening. She’s being scooped up, she can feel that. She’s crying. She’s definitely crying. There are voices, loud ones. When she has enough strength to open her eyes again, Din is slamming his gloved fist against the airlock on Kicker, his voice frantic. She can’t make out what he’s saying, though, and another face appears above her. Din gently transfers Nova’s limp body into someone else’s arms, and when Nova looks up, it’s Bo-Katan, her face so panicked it’s almost impossible to recognize who it is.

“Nova, you gotta stay awake,” Bo-Katan whispers, her palm slapping softly at Nova’s cheek. “C’mon, I mean it. If you die here on this planet you hate, I will haunt you in the afterlife. I swear, you have to stay awake.”

“I don’t—” Nova starts, and Bo-Katan shakes her head.

“You literally should not be talking,” Bo-Katan says, her eyesight dipping to Nova’s neck. Her eyes widen for a second and then her smooth fingers ghost over the outline. Nova coughs at her light touch, and she realizes that the marks from the vision she had of being choked within an inch of her life are here, that they followed her back out of the vision and into this moment. “Nova, no, shut up, I’m serious—”

“I don’t—don’t hate Mandalore,” she manages, her voice sounding like shards of glass, and Bo-Katan offers her a hasty, worried smile.

“You do,” Bo-Katan argues, but her voice is so gentle. “But don’t worry, princess, we’re getting you the hell off of it. No complaints now that you’re off Mandalore, you got it? The second you got here, I knew both of you wanted to leave.”

Din’s at her side again, and Bo-Katan kneels down, gently placing Nova in her familiar tangle of blankets and pillows. Nova’s eyes close again, and when they slide back open, Bo-Katan is standing, trading worried glances and hushed tones with Din.

Nova’s head hurts. So bad. It’s splitting down the middle of her skull, actually, but all she can do is press a hand over her eye and try to block out the familiar low light of the ship that smells more like home than this entire planet ever had.

“Listen, about what I told you back on Hoth—”

“It’s fine,” Din cuts her off, and his next few words are warbled. “I get it. Your allegiance is to Mandalore, not to us.”

Nova can’t hear Bo-Katan’s answer. In fact, she’s not even sure if there’s even words being spoken, because the next time she looks up, Bo-Katan is just staring down at her, incredibly concerned, such an obvious change from her usually stoic expression. Nova’s whole body feels like it’s on fire. She’s exhausted. Bo-Katan kneels down again, just for a split second, to pull the loose end of Nova’s shawl over the rest of her folded body. Nova wants to cry.

“Flower,” she garbles, nonsensically. She’s trying to tell Bo-Katan that she’s sorry for all the animosity, that she trusts her, and more than that, she likes her. It doesn't make a single lick of sense to anyone outside of Nova’s head, but Bo-Katan offers a tiny smile anyway.

“Here,” Din says, stiffly, holding out the sheathed blade of the Darksaber to Bo-Katan. Nova’s eyes flutter closed, just for a beat, and when they open back up, Bo-Katan is pushing the weapon back into Din’s grip.

“It’s not mine,” she insists. “Besides, you’re not getting out of it that easy. You’ll be back.”

“Bo-Katan—”

“Take care of her,” Bo-Katan interrupts. Nova blacks out again until they’re up in hyperspace. Din’s body is shielding her from the cold, his limbs draped all over the places that hurt the least. When she opens her eyes, they’re floating through the cosmos, and all her eyes can see is sweet, sweet stardust.

*

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*

[lokilickedme]

The Way

I’m writing horror again.  I guess it’s that time, you know, that time that has nothing to do with Halloween or the seasons or whatever, that time when it just hits me for some reason.  And just like I always do, I’ll say I don’t know why.

Even though I know why, and you know I know why.

Because the truth is always so much weirder and worse and more disquieting than any excuse I could make up for it, and sometimes I just feel the need.

Today I felt the need, and I couldn’t make it go away.

And so I sat down, and words I didn’t want to write were written.

.

8592 words I would rate this Mature 18+ if it was a fic, strictly because of the subject matter.

Warnings: Death, mostly.  Religious trauma, brief descriptions of abuse, mentions of mental illness, domestic violence, grief, familial dysfunction, religious abuse, emotional abuse, medical conditions, brief mentions of drug use/abuse, mild gore in reference to corpse decomposition, psychological unease and mild terror, child abuse (mental/emotional/psychological), brief allusion to physical child abuse, cult references, loss of faith, attempted murder, possible actual murder.

A Note:  I love you guys, you’re always so quick and willing to be helpful and offer advice and suggestions and such, and I adore that about you.  But on this piece of work I ask that nobody offer any theories about what happened to my brother - medical, criminal, or otherwise - and please no suggestions on things we could do to pursue investigation, that ship has long sailed.  It’s been 23 years and he’s a cold case.  We spent years trying to sort it out but in the end it’s just something that happened, and we moved on because we had to.  There are a lot of open ends, a lot of question marks, a lot of suspicious details that never connected to anything - and we tried, we truly did.  If anyone out there knows the truth, they’ve never shown themselves to us.  We do have our theories, but my brother was a secretive person living a life none of us knew about, and the people he knew weren’t people we knew.  Everyone involved is either dead or moved on or got away with whatever it was they did, and there are only three of us who still care.  It’s over.

Until today, I’ve never put these events into words.

It was something I needed to do, finally.

This is PART ONE.  There may not be a part two, unless doing this ends up making me feel better.

Please feel free to comment if you wish.  As you can see, pretty much nothing triggers me.  I just ask that you please refrain from the type of comments noted above.

And thank you.

----------

This is, regrettably, a true story.  Nothing has been changed but the names, because the dead don’t like being talked about, and James was just enough of a shit to haunt me for it.

----------

----------

They made up their minds And they started packing They left before the sun came up that day An exit to eternal summer slacking But where were they going without ever knowing the way

They drank up the wine And they got to talking They now had more important things to say And when the car broke down They started walking Where were they going without ever knowing the way

Anyone can see the road that they walk on is paved in gold And it's always summer They'll never get cold They'll never get hungry They'll never get old and gray You can see their shadows wandering off somewhere They won't make it home But they really don't care They wanted the highway They're happier there today, today

Their children woke up And they couldn't find them They left before the sun came up that day They just drove off and left it all behind them But where were they going without ever knowing the way?

Anyone can see the road that they walk on is paved in gold And it's always summer They'll never get cold They'll never get hungry They'll never get old and gray You can see their shadows wandering off somewhere They won't make it home But they really don't care They wanted the highway They're happier there today, today

You can see their shadows wandering off somewhere They won't make it home But they really don't care They wanted the highway They're happier there today, today

- The Way, Fastball, 1998

.

That was the year James died in his sleep.

Or that’s what they say, anyway.  Asthma, the likely cause based on his medical history, our first and least disturbing assumption.  Undetermined, the official determination based on the hastily scraped-together autopsy, the best that could be done under the circumstances.  We tell people he had breathing problems, and they nod their heads and agree because they knew he did, and now he’s been gone so long that nobody asks.  Most of the people who ever met him have long moved on or disappeared or died themselves, or just remember him as the enigmatic middle son from the Keithley family that nobody really knew very well.  You know, the odd one, the one that showed up at meetings maybe once a year and smiled nervously but didn’t really talk to anyone and always seemed anxious to leave?  The one who died under mysterious circumstances?  That one.

He left the way he always came in.  Quietly, unexpected, without anyone being aware of either his entrance or his exit.

But me and mom know some things, and she’s not talking.  She probably never will.

So maybe it’s time I did.

December 1998.  I’d gotten married two years previous and moved back to the family land with my new husband.  He hated it there, but we had an affordable place to live.  It wasn’t bad.  He’d tell you otherwise.  The land never sat right with him, but I’d lived there too many years to see it.  I’d been fifteen when my father uprooted his large family from the city and hauled us out to the great back door to nowhere, and even though I’d left several times to wander elsewhere, I always came back.

I didn’t realize why at the time, at any of the multiple times.  But now I know.  That place gets you, and it holds you, and unless you’re goddamned devoted to staying gone you will always be pulled back.  It took me till I was 49 to funnel the necessary amount of devotion away from the religious dedication I’d had jackbooted into me and turn it toward getting out, but against a great number of overwhelming odds I finally did it.

But this isn’t about that, not yet anyway.  This is about my brother James, and how he went to sleep one night and found his own way out.

----------

It was snowing, had been for days, a bit unusual but not unheard of.  The part of the state we lived in was notorious for extended ice storms and we knew a bad one was coming, but until it hit we played in the snow like it was a gift and we were deprived children who knew it was all going to be taken away soon.  My brothers and I were adults but you wouldn’t know it, watching us sneak around in the woods staging elaborate commando attacks on each other.  James was the best of us, a stealth king who could stand in the middle of a room for an hour without a single soul seeing him.  Perception bias, he said.  Your brain ignores me because I obviously don’t belong, like those puzzles where you circle what’s wrong but it takes you forever to find them.

He crept around in the forest scaring the shit out of people, dropping his long tall self out of trees, appearing from nowhere to administer a well aimed snowball to the face of whoever happened to cross his path and then disappearing just as quickly.  We called him a wraith and it wasn’t a good natured jibe.  We meant it.  He made people nervous.  He was the stealthy kind of quiet you associate with danger, and he knew how to do things an average person doesn’t ever have any need to know.  It was a quiet cool that we admired him for, because none of the rest of us had it.

The religion we were raised in kept a tight lid on us, but me and James, we never really let it get into our bones.  We were the smart ones, in retrospect.  I went through the motions by force of habit and a sense of self preservation, doing what was expected and demanded of me, following the rules and making myself a perfect example of a young member of the church so I wouldn’t bring shame on the congregation and my family.  But mostly the congregation.  It was always more important than anything else.  And I had behaving down to an art form, but mostly when people were looking.  Usually also when they weren’t.

But sometimes, not quite.

And then I prayed for forgiveness about it later because God was supposed to forgive you if you asked him to, right?  The tenet of willful sin being unforgivable never took root with me even though that was what the church conditioned into us through fear and constant repetition.  They said it from the stage two nights a week and again on Sunday to hammer it home.  Two nights a week and again on Sunday my head silently disagreed.  God’s not like that.  And then I did the praying for forgiveness thing even though I knew I was right, because I was disagreeing with the church, and the church was God’s channel here on Earth, wasn’t it?  I committed a mortal sin at least three times a week on that subject alone, and though the dread of divine punishment was hardwired into me, I never could reconcile the concept of a loving and forgiving God destroying me simply for knowing better.

I’m not sure the comprehension of an overwatching deity ever actually established itself in James’ brain.  A moral code, yes.  But isn’t that what God is, really?  Maybe he understood more about God and forgiveness than the rest of us.  But he was considered an unapproved fringe member of the church because he couldn’t suffer people and noise and being looked at and he refused to preach, and he was soft-shunned as a result.  Because if you weren’t all in to the point of being willing to die at any moment for your faith, you were as good as faithless.

And faithless meant condemned.  And the congregation couldn’t be bothered with condemned people, regardless of their reasons for not having both feet in the water.  The first and only option on their list was to put the person out and let them find their own way back once they realized they had nobody left in the world who cared about them.

James escaped that somehow.  He was supposed to be shunned whole scale, but he wasn’t trying to convince anyone to leave the faith and he presented no threat to anyone’s strength of belief, and so far as anyone knew he’d committed no grave sins other than disinterest.  So the rule that dictated we cast him out was bent enough to allow him to remain living on the family land, though at one point during a fit of overzealous righteousness my mother had tried to have a family meeting to vote on whether or not we were going to let him stay.  I refused to vote and when I walked out of the house the meeting fell apart.

I’ve never forgiven her for that.  Her son’s life being put to a vote with her presiding over the proceedings, vengeful and unfeeling and devoid of compassion on behalf of God himself.  It takes my breath away, the anger, still to this day.  The only thing I ever truly learned from my mother about parenting was a long and intensely detailed list of what not to do to my own children, and I suppose I should be grateful for that.  It’s a bitter thank-you to have to give, but it’s something.

We knew James as much as he would allow us to, and not an inch further.  Which meant the extent of our knowledge of him pretty much stretched to include the singular fact that he was different.  What that meant, I still don’t really know - but it was there from the day he was born, that slight off-ness, the oddly off center calibration that you can’t really see so much as sense in a person.  I know now he was likely on the autism spectrum and he walked through life seeing and reacting to everything differently than most of us, but that wasn’t a thing back then.  You were just weird, or you weren’t.  And I’m not convinced that was a bad thing for him, strictly speaking.  But in the confines of our religion and our family’s devout and sometimes violent dedication to it, it took its toll almost daily.

He stood out, and he was very much a person who didn’t want to.  He wanted to fade into the background, to not be seen, to not be known.  And our religion didn’t tolerate that kind of nonsense, because we were commanded to be bold bearers of The Word Of God, and no exceptions were made.

None.

I’m going to stop calling it a religion now.  I beg your indulgence as I shift to calling it what it is, because calling it a religion is an insult to actual religions that don’t destroy peoples’ lives with callous indifference and murderous glee.

We were raised in a doomsday death cult.  There’s no other name that fits.

And we were trapped in it and its ugly cycle of neverending mental and emotional manipulation and abuse until we were adults, and some of us are still bound to it.  My oldest brother worked his way up to the upper levels of oversight in the local congregation and was solidly entrenched in it until his death, which is a story for later.  My youngest brother, the last remaining living blood sibling I have, is still deeply in it to this day and will likely never leave it.

I took the hard way out, three years ago, by walking away.

James, though.  He took the easy way.  He simply closed his eyes, and he was free.

----------

December 22, 1998.  Three days before Christmas, though that meant nothing to us.  The cult told us Christmas was a filthy demonic pagan ritual that was condemned by God, so to us the season was just a nice chilly time of year with lots of time off from work.  We’d had an unusual amount of snow, the most we’d had in years.  The roads were impassable and everyone was home except my husband, who worked close enough that his boss at the glass shop came and picked him up that morning with chains on his tires.  Lots of windshields had shattered from the sudden violent cold that had struck the previous night and Scott had the only glass shop for sixty miles.

I think it must have been around noon, and likely my mother had sent my dad up the hill to see if James wanted to come down for the lunch she was making.  He and his wife had split up against the strict rules of the church after a few years of suffering through an ill advised marriage, an important detail to this story that will come into the tale later, and he was alone up there at the top of the hill a lot.  Sometimes he forgot to eat, or he got so busy that he just didn’t bother, so our mother always made something for him because even though he was in his 20′s he was still a kid who needed looking after and her zealous fervor against him had died down with time.  I think he let her believe he was helpless because it worked in his favor and there was always lunch waiting for him in her kitchen as a result.

He was different, he wasn’t dumb.

We all lived on the hill back then with the exception of our youngest brother.  He’d moved to the city with his new wife not long prior.  The locals jokingly called the place a commune, and I guess they weren’t completely wrong.  Thirty-eight acres of wooded land far beyond the city limits that we’d painstakingly spent years carving a livable space into, with five houses, all built from the ground up and inhabited by an extended family of well known culties from a well known cult.  It’s almost comical, looking back on it, knowing now how they kept an eye on us for years to make sure we weren’t doing anything weird up there.

They should have run us off with pitchforks and burning stakes at the very beginning.

Things might have ended differently for us if they had.

----------

My grandparents lived at one end of the property, an old couple as simple and solid as salted soup, devoutly religious and devoted to the cult and very much cut from the can survive anything and probably will cloth like so many old country folks of their generation.  They were waiting out the end of days up there in their little wooden house, expecting the final hour of this old system to come long before their own demise.  I liked my grandmother, she had a sweet smile and fell asleep every time granddad started talking about the Bible and she paid me five dollars every Wednesday to drive her into town to get groceries, and years later, when she was dying, she told me she’d had a dream where she met my unborn son.  I was four months pregnant and didn’t know yet that I was having a boy.  She died before he was born, but to this day, fifteen years later, he tells me he’s sure he met her, he just can’t remember when.

I was scared of my grandfather.  Not terrified, but there was nothing grandfatherly to him and I always suspected he never actually liked kids much.  He’d once told us a story about the great Fort Worth flood that wiped out most of the city when my mom was a baby, and how he had told my grandmother to let go of my 2-year-old mother while he was struggling to get them across a rushing flooded creek in water up to their shoulders.  My grandmother couldn’t swim.  We could make another Ruthie, he said.  But I couldn’t get another ‘Nita.

He said it proudly, like he was to be admired for his choice.  I was young when he told that story, but it settled into me that this was evil.

Even when he was old as dirt and dying of a brain tumor in hospice care, he made me uneasy.  I was never close to him.  But for some reason, in his final days, he forgot who everyone was except me.  I had been living in another state for years and he hadn’t seen me since before the tumor started taking his life.  But when I walked into the room he turned his head and looked at me, and he mouthed my name.

He couldn’t speak.  I don’t know what he was trying to say, struggling with words that nobody could hear.  And I felt bad.  I didn’t want to be the last person he recognized.  My cousins adored him and had spent the last few years constantly at his side, and they were angry, maybe justifiably, that I was the one he reached for.

I didn’t want that at all.

I don’t believe he was a bad man, but he never spoke of anything except the cult’s interpretation of the Bible, and it was as tiresome as it was terrifying.  Granddads are supposed to be fun.  Ours quoted doctrine at us in a deep loud commanding voice that you couldn’t interrupt and you couldn’t tune out, and once he got going you had to just settle in and wait for him to run out of zealous steam.  And then he would suddenly stop and command grandmother to turn on a John Wayne movie and bring him some ice cream, and it was over until the next time.

I know my mother resented him.  She knew grandmother was the one that had refused to let her go, the one that had held onto her even though she almost drowned by the simple act of holding on.  She knew her father had been willing to let her wash away and drown.  That he thought she was interchangeable with whatever baby they would have next.  How she could spend her entire life with that knowledge and not be deeply affected by it was something that never made sense to me, but now, when she’s in her 70′s and I’m in my 50′s, I finally understand.  It affected her.  She’ll just be damned if she’ll let anyone see it.  And she had stood there in that hospice room watching him mouth my name with resentment burning in her eyes, though she would have rather died than let anyone know what it was for.  He’d forgotten her weeks ago.

The house in the center of the hill was mom and dad.  The homestead.  The house we’d all lived in together, that we’d built with our own hands, the first thing that marked that wild overgrown hill as a place where people actually lived.  A long path through the woods connected it to the grandparents’ house, and it was the epicenter of everything in our lives.  James and I had lived in the upstairs rooms of that house until we both moved out and married our respective mates years later, a reprehensible act on our part that was never okay with my mother and that she never forgave either of us for.  She’d wanted us all to stay.  We can all live here together until the New System comes, she always said.  That’s how the Bible says it’s supposed to be.  We can all keep each other safe and on the right path until the end comes, and then we’ll all be here together forever.

A decade later when I sat up on the hill watching that house burn to the ground, there was as much relief as grief billowing into the sky with the black smoke.  It was the end of an era, and it was far beyond time for it.

Nobody saw it but me.  James was dead, had been for years.  Robbie was dead now too.  Dad was gone, so was granddad.  Me and my youngest brother David were the last two left of the kids, but he had moved to a neighboring city when he got married and he has never seen things the way I see them.  We were of different generations, we weren’t raised the same way, and he’d never experienced the abuse I lived with for the first half of my life.  And he had dedicated his own life to the cult with all the honesty and lack of guile that I didn’t have when I’d made my own dedication vows at the too-young age of sixteen.

It was the end of an era, but apparently only for me.

James’ house was up the hill, past a clearing where my dad used to keep old cars that he cannibalized for parts.  Our oldest brother Robbie, long married with kids of his own, lived at the bottom on the farthest corner of the land.  And my house was on the slope to the west, built on the spot where we’d cleared off an old half-fallen homestead from the late 1800′s, dutifully paying no mind to the fact that a grave was nestled into the slope, right where the yellow daffodils grew.  The cult told us superstition was tied up with the demons and false religion, so we didn’t have the built-in human instinct that tells most people to stay the hell away from certain things.

We just pretended it wasn’t there, and put no importance on it.  It was just an old grave.  The soil was good and the garden I planted next to it did well, though those strange daffodils always wound themselves through everything I put in the ground.  My husband said something wasn’t right about it, but I didn’t pay any attention to him.  He hadn’t been raised as devout as me.

My dad knocked on my door around lunchtime and I opened it.  He backed up, hands shoved deep into the pockets of his jacket, the fancy leather coat the dealership had awarded him when he was designated a five-star Chrysler technician and given the state’s first and only license to work on the new Vipers that had recently rolled off the prototype line.  It was a cool jacket.  Made him look like the old pictures my other grandmother had shown me of him from the early 1960′s, when he was young and very much a product of a fancier era.  He’d never stopped greasing his hair back and was still so thin that he and I wore the same size jeans.

I’ve never understood the look on his face when I opened the door.  To this day I can’t sort it.  It wasn’t a blankness like so many people who’ve seen death wear without awareness.  It wasn’t grief.  It wasn’t even shock.

He was sorry.

Those were the first words out of his mouth.

I’m sorry.

I stood there, not knowing what he was sorry for.  It was cold.  I couldn’t push the screen door open very far because of the snow blocking it.  And my father was standing at the bottom of the steps James had helped my husband build, his hands shoved down far into his pockets like a penitent child about to get in trouble, telling me he was sorry.

James is dead, he finally said.  He’s in his house.  I went up there and he’s dead.

I didn’t realize it at the time, but I do now - just now, this very moment in fact, I know that I was the first person he told.  He came straight from James’ house to mine and told me my brother was dead.

I don’t know what I said back to him, I just remember sitting down on the top step and feeling the cold bite of the snow through my pajama pants.  There’s a vague recollection of putting my face in my hands, and the embarrassing knowledge that I did that simply because I didn’t know what else to do.  And dad just stood there, nervously stepping from foot to foot in the snow, because he didn’t know what else to do either.

I think I asked How at some point.  He said he didn’t know.  He had something in his pocket but to this day I don’t know what it was.

I don’t know if it was important.  Something tells me it was.  Or maybe it was just the eternally present handkerchief he always kept on him.

I’m sorry, he said again.  He seemed to feel like it was his fault somehow.  I’m sorry.

What do we do?  I asked him.  I’ve never felt more blank.  What are we supposed to do?

I don’t remember what he said, other than he was going to get my older brother.  I remember thinking that was a good idea.  Robbie would know what to do.  He always did.  Brash and blustery and bigmouthed, he got things done while other people stood around debating how to do them.  He would get on it, whatever needed doing.  He would figure it out.

I went back in the house and dad walked away, headed down the path through the woods that connected my house to Robbie’s, hands still shoved deep in his pockets, the big retro vintage Chrysler emblem on the back of his jacket the last thing I saw before I pulled the screen door shut.  I stared down for a minute at the mound of snow it had scooped into my livingroom, still with no clue what I was supposed to do.

No clue at all.

I kicked the snow back outside and shut the door.

----------

It’s an odd thing, watching the coroner’s van drive away with someone you know inside it.  Someone you saw just yesterday.  Someone who was alive.  Someone who should still be alive but isn’t, somehow.  And since there’s really no way to earn a ride in a coroner’s van without dying, there’s an awful unsettling sensation to it that you can’t get away from.  The last time I saw James he was laughing that devious little laugh of his, his eyes red and bloodshot from the ever present asthma he’d suffered with his entire life.  I don’t count the sight of the coroner’s van leaving the hill via our long steep driveway with his cold corpse tucked into a black zippered bag, because I didn’t see him.  I never saw him.  I didn’t see him dead in his house and I didn’t see them carry him out, I didn’t see them put him in the van.  I didn’t see him later, when it was all over with.  And if I try hard enough I can imagine that van empty, with that long black bag tossed crumpled in the back without a body in it, and James somewhere else living his life however the hell he pleases.

I hold onto that.  Some days it helps.  And some days I think I see him, walking by the side of the road or getting out of a car in the post office parking lot, and it makes me happy thinking he escaped.  I see him in every hitchhiker, in every wandering traveler making his way down the interstate, in every tall thin man I glimpse from the corner of my eye as I go about my business in town.

He’s out there.

I hope he’s happy.

The ice storm hit the next day.

----------

For the next two weeks we were stuck on our hill.  Power out, no electricity, no heat, no lights, roads iced over and impassable.  We all piled up in mom and dad’s house, quietly grieving James, trying to stay warm.  Most of the state lost power for days, including the city 150 miles away where his body had been taken to the state coroner’s office.  There was no apparent cause of death, so the state ordered an autopsy.

His body had just been placed into cold storage to wait its turn when the power grid went down.  And then, by some unholy stroke of nightmarish luck, the facility’s generators failed.

Nobody could make it in to work because of the ice.  By the time someone finally got into the morgue the cold storage had been down for four days.

Six bodies melted, including James.

----------

No viable autopsy could be done, though they tried their best I suppose.  The end report was obtained two months later.  It was mostly inconclusive due to the long delay and resultant decomposition of tissue.  There was apparent scarring on James’ heart, but it was old scarring and had nothing to do with his death.  His lungs were scarred as well, but that was no surprise, he’d had severe asthma his entire life.  There was no determinable cause of death, no inflicted trauma, no presence of illicit drugs as far as they could tell from the limited toxicology report they managed with what they had to work with.

No reason.

He’d simply died.

It seemed fitting, to me at least, that the end of him be enshrouded in an unsolvable mystery.  He was a secretive person, intensely private.  He would have loved knowing nobody had a clue what happened to him.

And so we drew our own conclusion as a family.  He’d had an asthma attack in his sleep.  There had been an inhaler next to his bed, but it was new and still in the box.  He simply hadn’t woken up to use it.  Dad didn’t participate in the drawing of this conclusion, his input kept stoically to himself, like he knew something the rest of us didn’t.

We pretended not to see it.

He and mom braved the last of the ice a few days later to make the 150 mile drive to see James one last time.

They came back different.

You couldn’t tell it was him, my mother said.  He was melted, literally.  It was like one of those science fiction movies where they melt you with a laser beam and you turn to goo.

Dad had nothing to say.  He went to bed and stayed there until the next day.

You can go see him, mom told me.  I’ll go with you if you want to go.  But I don’t recommend it.

I decided not to go.

And so I never saw my brother dead.  I never saw any proof that he was gone.  He just wasn’t there anymore.  There was no funeral, he was cremated and his ashes were sent home weeks later, and I went on with my life with the image in my head of James, alive, somewhere else.

----------

Dad was different from that day on.  He’d always been stoic, terse, strict.  My childhood had been spent in fear of him, an eternal dread of making him mad and feeling his temper erupt keeping me from showing any hint of a personality during my formative years.  The cult had forced him to abide by the violent tenet of Spare the rod, spoil the child and there was never any risk of me being spoiled.

James being gone flipped a switch in him.  He was nicer suddenly.  Mellow.  Kind.  After the trauma wore off his humor discovered itself and he was funny.  The dour angry demeanor fell off and revealed a man that I was sad never to have known before.  He and I became friends.  I could sense in his new attitude toward me that he regretted how he’d raised me and respected the way I’d always stood up and been my own person despite it.  But my mother was falling off the deep end and for all the newfound easygoingness of my father, she counterbalanced it with an extremism born of the religious fervor of a mother determined to gain enough favor with God to see her dead child again.  And she was going to make sure the rest of us did too.

We all had to get good and straight on the path, get completely right and stay that way, or we’d never see James again.  He’d be in the New World and we wouldn’t, and how would she explain that to him?  She and I worked together in a law office at the time and as she became more unhinged and unpleasant, I reacted by becoming more outgoing and accomplished.  Our boss changed my work designation from receptionist to Executive Assistant and started teaching me how to do everything from filing papers at the courthouse to photographing accident scenes.  I no longer answered to my mother, the office manager.  I answered directly to the boss.

That didn’t go over well.  She was a control freak with heavy untreated trauma, and the one person in the world she felt the most obsessive need to control was suddenly no longer under her thumb in a workspace where she considered herself the supreme authority.  She countermanded every order the boss gave me and tried to load me up with general office chores that left me no time to do the important assignments he’d given me.  I had no choice but to tell her she wasn’t my superior anymore.

She chose that day to have her nervous breakdown over James, jumping out of my car at a red light on the way home and storming angrily through a shopping mall with me trailing frantically along behind her, yelling for security to arrest me while I tried to get her to calm down.  I ended up telling her she wasn’t the only person who lost James but that none of the rest of us were allowed to experience our own grief because we were too busy catering to hers.

She sat down on a bench outside the sporting goods store and glared at me with a cold hatred I’ve seen on very few other faces, ever.

I knew it would be you, she hissed at me.

That moment changed our relationship forever.  It changed me forever.  That was the day I decided my life was my own, that she not only didn’t have authority over me at work, she didn’t have authority over me anywhere else either.  She could no longer dictate my actions, my behavior, my thoughts and feelings.

For this she disowned me.  It was the first of several disownings over the next few years.  I got used to it.  We went to work the next day like nothing had happened, and I didn’t do a single thing on the task list she slapped down on my desk.  It was a metaphor for the rest of my life, but I didn’t know it yet.

My husband and I moved out of state a couple of months later, away from that hill, away from her increasingly controlling paranoia and bitterness, the first of many small steps toward freedom.

As we were driving away with our trailer full of personal belongings behind us, he said one thing that I tried to argue against, but that somewhere deep inside I knew was probably right.

That land is cursed, he said.

----------

A few weeks before we moved my youngest brother came to town and we went into James’ house together.  It was exactly like it had been the day my dad found him.  The only thing that stood out as different was the bare mattress on the bed - the men from the coroner had wrapped him up in the sheet he’d been laying on and took it with them, leaving just the naked springform mattress James had bought for Jessica right before her final breakdown and their subsequent separation.

It took me a while to go in the bedroom, but I knew from the moment I walked into the house that I was going to end up there.  I needed to see it, the place where James had closed his eyes and left us.

There was a small puddle of dried blood near the foot of the bed, brown and stained into the fabric.  James always slept backwards, with his head at the wrong end.  The blood had come from his nose.

I touched it.  I don’t know why.  It was dry.

He was gone.

----------

David and I laughed a lot that day.  James had been funny in a way that was distinctly him, quiet and of few words, but those words had always counted.  And as we sorted through his things and talked about him and moved some of his stuff into boxes to be stored away, I felt as much awed respect as befuddlement at what was around me.  He’d never been a conformist, which I knew was why the cult had never gotten a firm grasp on him.  He was unknowable and therefore unbindable.  But his house was proof that he didn’t conform to any human expectations either, and nothing in it made sense unless you’d spent time around him.

There was an engine in the bathtub.  I’m not sure what it went to.  Another engine, in the beginning stages of disassemblage, rested on a blue tarp in the center of the livingroom floor, obviously the last project he’d been working on.  There wasn’t much furniture - his wife had taken most of it when she left and it would have never entered his mind to replace any of it.  Jessica’s cookware was in the kitchen cabinets, unused, some of it still in the original boxes, some not even fully unwrapped from their wedding shower years before.  Jessica didn’t cook, she microwaved.  David asked me if I thought it would be okay for him to take a glass Pyrex measuring cup because he’d broken his.  I told him to take it.  It had never been used.

I didn’t want anything, but knew I needed to take something.  One of my husband’s solo CDs was sitting on the entertainment center and the cover, the cover I’d designed, caught my eye and brought me to the CD player to pop the tray open.

Inside was a CD single of The Way.

It was the only thing I took.

----------

My husband told me some time later that my dad and older brother had altered the scene before the police arrived.  After the phonecall from me his boss had rushed him home and he’d gone up to James’ house without my knowledge.  He’d thought it strange that he’d had to step around at least a dozen empty compressed air cans scattered haphazardly around the place as he entered, like they’d been used and tossed aside one after another.  There had been several more on the floor around the bed.  My father had told him to go back down and see how mom and I were doing, and when he returned to James’ house after the coroner’s departure, the cans were gone.  Other than that he said things seemed different, but he couldn’t say quite how.  Just not the same.

He told me my dad didn’t call the police until after he and Robbie had been in there at least an hour, alone with the body.

It’s not something we’ve talked about often, because there’s no satisfactory explanation for it that either of us can come up with.  My mother says they probably didn’t want the police to assume the cans meant he was huffing compression fluid and accidentally killed himself, because Look at the shame and reproach that would bring on the congregation if anyone thought such a thing!  We all knew he used the compressed air to clear the valves on the engines he was working on, all mechanics do, it’s common.  Wouldn’t the police have accepted that explanation?  Dad was the only one that spoke to them.  They wrote down whatever he said, and then they left, and then the coroner came and took James away and that was that.  My father, the most upright straight-and-narrow devoutly dedicated man I’ve ever known in my life, misled the police for a reason that he took with him to his own grave.

The only other person in the world who knew the truth about it took it to his grave too.

At the same time.

In the same car.

Four years later, on October 18, 2002.

----------

The big garbage bag of empty air cans and whatever else that was removed from James’ house that morning had been stashed in my dad’s garage and stayed there until a few weeks after he and Robbie’s joint funeral, when my mother asked my husband’s old boss to come and dispose of it.  Scott was a man who knew people who could do things.

The evidence, whatever it was evidence of, vanished.

----------

The mystery around James never dissolved and eventually no one talked about it anymore, I guess because there was no way we could ever truly find out what happened without him here to tell us.  There were a lot of details that we could never find a way to weave together into anything that made sense and a lot of it was probably inconsequential anyway.  There was a girlfriend that he’d tried to keep hidden from us, a woman that was quite a bit older than him who wasn’t a member of the cult and therefore needed to be kept a secret.  In the end she had convinced him to stop hiding their relationship and he’d bought her a ring.  We met her all of twice before he died, and within days of his passing she left town with her brother and never came back, taking whatever she might have known with her.

James’ ex Jessica had sneaked onto the hill and broken into his house to put a dead raccoon in his kitchen sink a few days prior to his death.  We were shocked when he told us she trespassed on the land often without anyone knowing, and my mother made my father fix the electric gate down at the road so that it wouldn’t open without one of three clickers in the possession of herself, my father, and me.  James would have to come to her house and get hers any time he needed to leave the hill, an arrangement he agreed to because Jessica stole things from his house all the time, she would absolutely take a gate opener if she saw it.

He told us the gate wouldn’t keep her out though, and that she didn’t come in that way anyway.  The only way to protect ourselves from her was to lock her up and he doubted even that would do it.

He died less than a week later, and twenty three years later we still don’t know how or why.

----------

We never felt safe on the hill again.  Jessica was deranged in the worst possible way, we’d known it for a while, and James was her obsession.  She’d threatened to kill him multiple times and had tried twice.  We hadn’t known this, because James, big strong stoic Clint Eastwood type that he was, wasn’t about to tell anyone he was violently abused for years by a skinny little woman that everyone believed was not much more than a meek dormouse with shyness issues and a case of painful awkwardness.  But we knew she was evil.  We just didn’t have any proof.

The first thing my mother said after the initial emotional breakdown of finding her son dead was Jessica did this, I don’t know how but I know she did it.

I believe she was probably right.  But if Jessica was anything she was wily and devious with a strong survival instinct and an uncanny ability to lie convincingly and draw sympathy onto herself.  She’d convinced us for years that she was the perfect combination of sweetly harmless and endearingly clueless, but that only lasted until the day she called 911 screaming that James was beating her and then threw herself face first into a tree in their front yard and sat, calmly singing and coloring in a coloring book on the porch with blood running down her forehead, waiting for the police to arrive.  The act she put on when they got there was one for the Academy, but the officers didn’t buy it.

James calmly rolled up his sleeves and showed them his scars where she’d burned him and slashed him with a kitchen knife.  He pulled up his shirt and pointed out the marks she’d left on him with her teeth and nails.  He hooked a finger into his mouth and showed them the empty hole where she’d knocked one of his teeth out with a baseball bat.  One of the officers asked him why he hadn’t killed her and buried her somewhere on the land already.

She left in the back of the squad car, and my mother took James to the courthouse to get divorce papers started two days later.

Jessica came to his memorial service when we finally had it, several weeks after his death.  She wasn’t invited but we couldn’t keep her from coming.  She wore black like a widow and created a dramatic disruption complete with loud wailing and declarations of undying love, and afterward she stood to one side of the room, smirking at us with the kind of icy malice that you only see on the dangerously deranged, and then usually only in the movies.  Several people commented in hushed voices, asking why she’d been allowed to come.  At one point she started wailing They killed him!!, but everyone with the exception of her mother ignored her.

Her mother, who was still in our congregation, flitted around the room chatting with everyone, sobbing her heart out like it was her own son we’d just memorialized.  She was an ER nurse and had been famously fired from her job at the hospital for taking locked-cabinet medications home by the purse load.  She claimed she put them in her pocket to use on her shift and forgot to return them to the cabinet before leaving.

Jessica had been staying with her for a while.

----------

We fed the crowd at mom’s later that afternoon with my husband and his boss guarding the gate, making sure she didn’t try to come into my mother’s house.  The police were called preemptively, and because this was a town of 300 with not much of anything else to do, a squad car was dispatched and stationed near the inlet to the main drive.

Jessica showed up not much later, like we knew she would.  She drove past the police and parked a few yards down from them in plain sight, just sitting there by the side of the road, far enough away from our property that we couldn’t legally do anything about it.  The officers got out and talked to her, warned her not to cause us any problems, and she fed them a woeful tale about being banned from her beloved husband’s memorial service and denied the right to say goodbye to him.

The officers knew there was no body at that service to say goodbye to.  They also knew her.

My husband came up the hill and told us she was down at the road and that Scott was blocking the driveway with his truck to keep her out.  I told my mother it was time to file a restraining order against her.  She was living in fear and Jessica was known to be trespassing on our property frequently.  No, she told me with tears in her eyes but not a sign of distress on her face.  It was a look I knew, because my mother rarely showed emotion unless she was angry and the rest of the time it was this cold detachment.  That would bring reproach on the congregation because everyone knows what we are.  I can’t do that.  I won’t let her win that way.  I won’t let her cause us to bring shame on God’s name.

God’s name.  I took it in vain that day.

More than once.

I was leaving in a few weeks, moving a thousand miles away.  My husband and I weren’t going to be there to help her keep an eye out, and thirty eight acres of heavily wooded land is impossible to protect and easy to sneak onto from a hundred different directions, James had shown us proof of that.

God will protect us as long as we do the right thing and leave it to him, she said.  He knows what she is.

I think it was just a coincidence that nothing terrible happened in the following weeks, because my faith was getting tenuous and a lot of prayers were going unanswered.  But Jessica quietly disappeared back to her own world after a couple of infuriating weeks of putting herself in our paths every chance she got, and not long after that my husband and I moved away, and as we left the driveway for what we thought would be the last time he sighed and shook his head with the exasperation of a man about to say I told you so.

“That land is cursed,” he said.

I tried to disagree, though I don’t know why.

----------

Less than a mile up the road we passed a man walking.  He was tall and thin and covered in the dust of a long journey with a ratty backpack strapped to his back, and as we passed him I caught his reflection in the side mirror.

It was James, I knew it in my heart every bit as strongly as I knew it couldn’t be.

He was walking away from the hill, toward the west.  The way we were going.  And I swear on whatever holy relic you wish to place under my hand that he raised his head and met eyes with me in the mirror, and he smiled.

.

Anyone can see the road that they walk on is paved in gold And it's always summer They'll never get cold They'll never get hungry They'll never get old and gray You can see their shadows wandering off somewhere They won't make it home But they really don't care They wanted the highway They're happier there today

.

[gh0stfacesho3]

Transfer of Words

Pairing: Jeon Jungkook x Gender Non-Specific Reader

Word Count: +3.5k 

Warning: Fluff, mild angst. Professor x Student (College Au, all characters are +18), language, mention of abuse, mention of alcohol. 

Summary: As a Professor in the states, you were used to transfer students. You weren’t exactly ready for this new transfer student who is the son of the owner of Mike Sneakers (we don’t do free sponsors here ) 

   You were especially used to transfer students because you had a doctorate in linguistics. Being this, you knew a plethora of languages, from English, Spanish, French, Mandarin, Korean, Japanese, Greek, Latin, and a few native languages. You were always fascinated by languages and how people came up with these mixes of characters and words to make beautiful phrases. Since you were a kid you started to learn other languages. You had a French neighbor in your old hometown which is where you picked it up at age 7. Then, when you were 10, your family took a trip to Mexico which is when you became interested by Spanish. You fully understood the language by age 11 due to your prior knowledge of French. Then this process just continued where you would just learn languages mainly for fun. This lead to you being a linguistics professor who also taught second languages and would take in quite a few transfer kids. This lead to the journey of Jeon Jungkook and it was definitely a wild one. 

   You walked into your office at about 9:00 and placed your laptop onto the desk. You straighten up your outfit before settling in and getting to work. As you looked through your emails, you noticed an email that was about another transfer student. You kind of glanced over it, but didn’t pay too much mind to it, assuming it was just another kid from out of country. As 10:00 started to roll around, your students walked in. Some smiled, others chugged some unhealthy energy drink, some even chatted with you before finding their seats. As everyone found their seats, you looked out to see a new student. 

“You, new kid, come up front and do that cringe introduction.” You chuckle, emitting a chuckle from a few kids. He tilts his head in confusion, probably because he doesn’t speak English. Due to your gesture though, he assumes you want him to introduce himself. 

“You don’t already know who I am?” He whispered loud enough for you to hear in his first language. 

“Actually, no, I don’t.” You responded quickly as you clasped your hands before beckoning him to the front again. He was a little shocked that you spoke Korean so well, being he had no prior information on you. You were used to kids who thought they were all that but something about this kid who was ‘dressed to impress’ rubbed you the wrong way. He walks down to the front and rolls his eyes at you. 

“I’m Jeon Jungkook...23. Korean” He said in English the best he could. You smiled and introduced yourself. 

“I’m Professor Y/L/N, find your seat now.” You responded before turning to the large chalk board and continuing your lesson. After the two hour lecture, you dismissed class. Jungkook was asleep in the back, which made you walk up to him and nudge him. 

“Its lunch time, go eat.” You say as he wakes up. He shrugged off your hand before collecting his things. 

“Filthy commoner.” He mumbled as he shoved past you. You would’ve been insulted if it were true, but it wasn’t. You collect your things and head out to your favorite cafe. Being it was a Tuesday, that class was the only one you had for the day so you treated yourself to some coffee. You notice a bit of commotion outside, but you try to ignore it and sneak inside. 

“Y/N Y/L/N!! IS IT TRUE YOU’RE TEACHING JEON JUNGKOOK?!” 

“Y/N?!?!”

“DO YOU KNOW ANYTHING ABOUT JUNGKOOK?” 

You were confused by all the bombarding questions so you ran into the café and shut the door along with someone else. You turned to see the brat himself, Jeon Jungkook. 

“What mess have you fuckin brought me into?” You huffed as your back pressed against the door. 

“I didn’t do anything! I just went for a walk and got lost!” He huffed back at you. 

“Why are you so popular?” You asked as you held your hand on your forehead. 

“Ugh, you’re a horrible teacher if you can’t read a simple email. I’m the son of the owner of Mike tennis shoe company.” He responded. You rolled your eyes as stood up and walked in line, happy to see police shows up to wrangle up paparazzi. 

“What? Don’t care about my father’s company?” He mumbled. You go to order your drink and the barista looks confused. You realized you just ordered in Korean. You apologized before trying again. After you pay, Jungkook walks up and tried to get a drink. 

“C-coffee?” He basically asked, leaving the barista to ask a series of question. Jungkook looks over to you for help, making you chuckle. 

“Why should I help? You called me a shitty teacher.” You faked being offended which made Jungkook embarrassed. 

“I’ll pay for you.” He said, making you more than willing to help him. Being you already bought your drink, he just handed you a 20 like it was nothing. 

“That's way to much money Jungkook.” You said as you grabbed your coffee and went to hand him the money back. 

“It’s nothing to me and my father always says to help the less fortunate.” He said before drinking his coffee, which intern made you laugh. 

“You’re a brat but you’re a cool kid.” You say as you sit down and he follows. You quirk an eyebrow at him and he does the same back. 

“Who said you could sit with me?” Making him tilt his head. 

“Who said you got here first?” Jungkook barked back at you. You held your hands up in defense. 

“You’re going to have to get used to me being I will probably be your living translator...also whos your host family?” You waited for his response as you took a sip of your coffee. 

“I-...I’m not sure.”

“You didn’t check your email?” You teased like he did you which seemed to piss him off. 

“I can’t fuckin read English!” Which made you shocked. How could a school send this kid an email in a language he doesn’t know. You hold your hand out for his phone which he reluctantly gives to you. You mumble out the email before getting to the important part. 

“Your father has entrusted Professor Y/N with your care being they have the most experience with transfer students.” You were used to hosting kids but you thought someone of such class would be with, well you didn’t know, maybe someone the kid knew? 

“With you?” He almost sounded disgusted. You were actually upset that you didn’t read that email but you had a rough weekend. 

You sighed, “Look kid-”

“I’m not a kid!” He fussed. He was right. He said he was 23 and so were you. (Seems young for being a professor right, you’re just pretty smart and graduated early) 

“Okay, sorry. But look, you either live with me for the what, 3 months you’re gonna be here? Or ask your daddy for money to live in a hotel for 3 months.” You teased, making him sigh. 

“I’m not talking to him...that's why he sent me here.” Jungkook looked down at his now empty iced coffee. 

You stood up and patted his shoulder. “Then suck it up buttercup. Lets go get your shit and move you in.” 

“Want me to call an Uver?” The boy asked. (again, no free sponsors in this house).

“Nope. My car isn’t too far from here.” You smiled as you walked closer to the college campus. You turned before getting to campus and walked up to the car park. 

He pointed to an abandoned car that has been there for years, “Is that yours?” he teased. 

You smiled as you pulled out your key fob, clicking the unlock button to see a black lambo unlock. Jungkook stopped in his tracks and stared in awe. 

“Come on pretty boy, not scared are you?” You smiled as you hopped in. He scurried into the car with a wide smile. 

“Here I was thinking you were some poor teacher.” 

“I’m a professor first of all, second” you start the engine with a loud purr, “I have my perks.”  You smirked. 

Its been about a month since Jungkook has been moved in. One day y’all were sitting at the table, awkwardly eating dinner like you guys did every night when he got a phone call. You have never seen him smile since the first time he got in the car and besides that, he’s been a pain in your ass more than anything. Good thing is, he’s actually learned quite a bit of English and can order his food in public. 

You were snapped out of your thoughts when you heard him fussing. 

“No Dad! Please you can’t make me stay here! I am studying and doing my work! This isn’t fair!” He argued, pacing back in forth before heading to his room which was a guest room. “YOU CAN’T JUST KEEP ME IN AMERICA BECAUSE YOU DON’T WANT TO TAKE CARE OF ME. MY PROFESSOR ISN’T MY BABY SITTER, THEY HAVE THEIR OWN LIFE WHICH IS BETTER WITHOUT ME!....you were only right about one thing dad... I’m a bother to everyone around me.” Jungkook finished before in went quiet. You didn’t know what to say. He knew he was being difficult because he wanted to be. He wants you to be upset and kick him out so he can go home. He wants to be out of you hair. You walked to his room and knocked, and saw something you never saw you see. Tears. 

“W-what?!” He sniffled as he turned around and rubbed his eyes. You just walked up to him and turned him around, pulling him into a hug. He was reluctant at first before he finally gave in. 

“You’re a brat yes, but you’re not a bother. And if you’d stop distancing yourself, we might be able to make this extended time more enjoyable.” Was the only thing you could say. 

“I’m sorry I’m so mean to you...I just thought if maybe,”

“Maybe if I got annoyed enough I’d kick you out so you could go home?” He nodded to your question. 

“Welp, I’m a tough cookie to crack.” You smiled as you pulled away. 

“God we are the same age but you talk like a 80 year old.” He laughed as he wiped his face again. 

The two of you then go and talk about him and his life back at home. He explains how his grades are slipping and that is why he is forced to stay here longer. How he doesn’t like going to college because it’s not what he wants to do in life. Jungkook explained that he wanted to be a singer and even showed you a few songs he has covered and composed. They were really good in actuality. You agreed with him if he can get English down pat and pick his grades up, you’d help him peruse his career. 

-

It’s now been 3 months and Jungkook is basically speaking fluent English. He is also passing all your classes and is starting to open up to you a lot more. It was Spring break so you decided to go out with a few friends to get a drink. You invited Jungkook but he said he wanted to finish a paper he got an extension on so you just went out on your own. You and all your friends were dancing in the club and downing drinks like fish. You may have gotten a little too drunk being it was your first night out by yourself. Jungkook recently started to get more friends so you had some free time, but you haven’t gone out since he got here which is why you let yourself get as drunk as you did. It was towards the end of the night and the bouncer would not let you out with your keys due to how drunk you were. 

“Move you b-big bo-ouf...” You stumbled as you tried to squeeze past him. He grabbed your arm and pushed you back. You huffed before pulling out your phone and smashing keys in and calling whoever popped up. 

“Professor? Are you okay?” Jungkook asked, concerned as to why you called him after not responding to his text asking when you’d be home. 

“I-im dr-drunk and this fuckin cunt won’t let me out.” You whined as you still tried to squeeze past him. “Don’t-...Don’t fuckin touch me.”

“Look, I’ll get an Uver and come pick you up.” Jungkook said as he got his things and hung up on you. 

You looked at your silent phone with an angry expression,”...bitch” 

Jungkook came walking in and saw you sitting on the floor poking the bouncers leg. 

“Can you get this parasite off of me?” The large man asked looking down at me. 

Jungkook stoops down and helps you up. You stumble toward him before you turned to look at the bouncer and stick your tongue out. You also flipped him off before Jungkook grabbed your hand and brought you to the Uver. You sat by the window and he did the same. You two finally got to your house and he helped bring you up. You tore your arm away from him as you stumbled up the stairs. 

“I’m not a fuckin baby.” You grumbled as you immediately fell on the stairs. The male huffed as he helped you up. 

“Get OFF of ME Jackson!” You pushed him away as tears filled your eyes. “I’m not your fuckin victim anymore!” 

“Y/n?” Jungkook put his hands up and came to you slowly, “Its just me...Jungkook.” You finally started to calm down as you slowly tried to climb the stairs to your home. Jungkook helped you up and brought you to the couch. Jungkook grabbed a wet cloth and wiped the palms of your hand that were scrapped up. He then wiped your eyes and petted your head. 

After Jungkook helped you that night, there was this awkward air again. He felt like walking on eggshells around you. Who was Jackson and why did you say you weren’t his victim. Jungkook asked his classmates around campus and even a few teachers as best he could. He finally found a teacher who was willing to give him a small amount of information. 

“Now, I’m not going to say a lot because it isn’t my story to tell, but Jackson is Y/n’s ex....and let’s say he won’t be getting boyfriend of the year award.” Dr. Nick explained. Jungkook had enough information to make a firm decision. He was going to show you what a man should treat others like. He wasn’t your boyfriend or even considered you that much of a friend, but he felt guilty for living with you almost rent free (even though the school payed for his stay). 

Jungkook went to the store after he was done with classes and picked up a lot of food to make you dinner as payment for all the times you made him dinner. He bought you your favorite candy, or so he assumed because he’d always find the wrappers in the trash. He even bought you a gift card to the coffee shop you love and headed home. Being it was a Friday, he knew you would be home a little later. The more Jungkook thought about it, the more he realized he knew a lot more about you than he thought. Jungkook started to think about all the little things you did for him. How certain foods would pop up more after he mentioned them. How you would cook different meals just for his liking and make sure he had a decent environment to study in. How you would stay up late and call of work a few times just to help him study. Jungkook smiled as he started to mentally prepare himself for cooking. He also hoped he wouldn’t burn your house down because he had very little cooking experience. 

Jungkook starts cooking a dish he often enjoyed back at home: Spicy Ramen with rice cakes and kimbap. The button down shirt he wore to school was now slightly disheveled and stained. He rolled his sleeve up as he looked at the time-- 5 more minutes. Or so he thought when he heard your keys jingle at the door. He mildly panicked before setting up the food at the table and cleaning up quickly. He ran to the door as you finally started to open it and he stopped you.

“Huh?” You asked looking at his slightly sweaty face. “Jungkook if you’re having sex-” 

“AH No no no!! But I have to ask for you to stand out here for 5 more minutes...trust me.” You don’t know why but you did trust him, and so you stood there for 5 whole minutes. You thought about all the possibilities you could walk into: A girl or a guy running out half naked, your house destroyed, drugs...etc.  Jungkook came back looking a lot more put together and opened the door. You were hit with a mix of smells and were shocked. 

“J-jungkook, did you ? You didn’t- no you can’t cook can you?” You asked as you walked in and admired the kitchen. 

“I noticed you’ve been working more and I felt bad for staying here, even longer than expected... So I wanted to show you that I can be a proper man and treat another human being with respect.” 

“I don’t care the reason as long as it taste good...and it looks amazing Jeon.” You quickly wash your hands and sit down ready to eat. Jungkook sat closer to you which you didn’t think much about being the ramen was in a big shared pot. You start digging in but you try to avoid the kimbap. You didn’t know if it had seafood and you didn’t want to take a chance. Jungkook picked up a piece and brought it up to your mouth. 

“Made without seafood.” He smiled before you opened your mouth and took a bite. You smiled as you continued to eat. Jungkook ate as well before making the perfect bite. You even noticed it and tried to follow what he did, but before you could, he offered it to you. You were about to take in the food before you paused. 

“Where is all this coming from?” You asked before taking the bite You smiled and almost forgot you asked a question until he cleared his throat. 

“Well, like I said I felt bad for staying here and being a brat...I also wanted to give you a taste of my culture since you’ve welcomed me into yours.” He explained with a small blush and a smile. 

“Yeah I get that, but what's with that stuff?” You asked pointing to the flower bouquet lined with your favorite candies and snacks. 

“Oh...well the same reason.” He smiled. You were suspicious but you decided to finish eating. You heart was really warmed but he wasn’t that much of a brat. Yeah it was inconvenient on occasion, but he’s helped you a lot. He helps with chores and keeps his area clean, he is good company since you’re always alone, and well...he’s a pretty boy to keep around. Not to mention he saved you from that club when you were piss ass drunk. The two of y’all were cleaning up and things were going good...until Jungkook said the forbidden name. 

“Y/n...who is Jackson?” You almost drop the plate you were cleaning. 

“I fuckin knew you were up to something...Did you go through my room?! My fucking personal life?!” You started to fuss but by the look on his face, he didn’t. 

“When you were drunk, you called me Jackson and said ‘I’m not your victim anymore’...” He paused, looking down before looking back at you, “he hurt you didn’t he?” 

You stared at the wall, looking for the right words to say. “Yeah...he did. And I’m sorry I did that that night...but I’m not a baby. I don’t need your sympathy or your fuckin pandering.” You huffed as you started to leave the kitchen but he grabbed your wrist. 

“I’m not doing this to make up for him,...Nothing I can do can heal those scars. But I’m doing it to make up for me and my actions. And its my way of showing-....” Jungkook trailed off. 

“Showing what?” You said looking down at his hand holding your wrist. 

“It’s how I show affection to people I care about.” Jungkook said the words without really thinking. You were taken aback and pulled away from him. 

“Jungkook...I-” You started before he cut you off. 

“I know what you’re going to say. I’m not the first kid to say this am I? And you tell them all the same thing. ‘We can’t be together because I risk losing my job’ and all that...I know.” He said looking down at his feet. You were shocked he even had feelings for you. He was completely wrong because since Jackson, you kept these walls up and didn’t let anyone like you. You normally noticed when people would catch feelings and immediately turn them away...but this was different. You hadn’t realized he liked you because you were to busy pushing yourself away from him. You noticed you liked his presence more which is why you stayed later at work, to push yourself away. 

“Jungkook, that’s not it. I actually really care about you too. But there is the case with work that I don’t know if I can get passed...but I do appreciate this. And I appreciate you so much, but after Jackson...” You trailed off. 

“You don’t know if you’re ready and I understand that...but out of all the people I’ve met, your the one person I wouldn’t mind waiting for.” Jungkook admitted. He didn’t realize how strong he felt about you until he was in this moment. You also didn’t realize how strong you felt until you realized you moved closer to him. You always had your guard up around people, but you realized you were more venerable with Jungkook than with anyone else. You peered up at him to see his eyes were red from holding back his tears. 

You chuckled softly, “You’re such a baby.” You teased making him laugh before nudging you. 

“Yeah well this baby just cooked your dinner so whose baby now?” He retorted. 

“There’s that smile...”You mumbled, smiling as you two just stood there looking at each other. Jungkook’s eyes darted down to your lips before saying fuck it. He leaned in and held your cheeks in his hand. You felt this weird tension finally dissipate. You leaned in closer and placed your hands on top of his. 

“If you think about it, I graduate this year in a few months...so if we wait it out, you won’t have to worry about your job.” Jungkook reasoned as he pulled away. 

“That is true...even if you weren’t, I can always find another job.” You smiled, kissing him again. 

A/n: Sorry if this is a little rough, but I have been on a hiatus for about a year now. Writing is something I love doing but I’ve been so busy with school and have had so little motivation. I really wrote this whole thing within 2 days and I’m proud of myself. If you really liked it, hit that like and share button! If this gets enough love, I might open request again. 

[xcodyxfernx]

Incoming long post

I have been here for around five months and in that time I have been constantly bombarded with anons ranging from the obscure to the vile. At certain points I have taken myself away from the group  for mental health breaks as daily hate is not something I have ever had to deal with before. I’m unsure if the person hates Cody or just hates me, but either way they have affect the way I play Cody and who I interact with especially @jonathan-d-groff

As you are all aware Cody and Jon had a fling, both of which have now moved on,( I have clarified with the player that everything between Cody and Jon was ic and they agreed I can post this conversation if required) yet Cody still gets abuse for it every time my anon on, is has got to the point where even interacting with Jon by liking a photo  or replying to a tweet warrants abuse from anon.  When people send gossip in about Cody to the gossip blog it then sets off another stream of hate and when I switch off my anon with Cody, they start sending me hate on Vanessa. That is not what I signed up for. I came here because I wanted to have an enjoyable rp experience. That’s not what it has turned out to be. Whoever the anon is...I cannot fathom why you feel the need to be so offensive. Calling Cody the F word is a slur. Hoping he will die of Aids is gross and uncalled for. I have posted the last six I have received here and I still have around 18 in my inbox which I can create a post of a link to all of them if you want to see them but  they do repeat a lot. The moment you started telling me to kill myself is the moment I decided enough is enough. Here are the last six I have received today. Please be warned they are vile. Pay attention to the last anon and then conversation which was “ accidently sent to me.”

As if that wasn't enough, it seems certain players find it funny to talk about me to other people  behind my back and “accidently” send it to me. 

@brendonisms

Cody has never said he was gay irl. He said he has played a gay man. He has also played a asexual man and he has played a straight man. In real life Cody fern is in a happy relationship with Eric Smith, however he has mentioned that he is in fact pansexual as he doesn't see gender, so “sorry”... your opinion is wrong. He also comments on his friends posts with “bisexual panic” ( I can post the links to that if you would like me too) which is why I asked in my anything else part of my app for him to be bisexual, this way it gives me much more scope of possible ships with male and female characters. I don't think you found it a little confusing, I feel you were talking about behind my back and sent the message to the wrong person and I’m sure I know who it was meant to be sent to so I am calling you out.  At least own your mistake. My name is Kit not she. Since I have been a fan of Cody’s for a long time (since he acted in the last time I saw Richard movie),I know he is a very private person, I know that he finds his female co star from Eden attractive ( he said so on her instagram,  he has never on repeat said he is gay. At his last pride he wore his pansexuality bracelet and when someone asked him about his life he has  explained that he is a fluid person who doesn't like to be categorised. Hope that clears it up for you  and I hope you learn not to talk about people behind their back as its rude.

On that note it is safe to say that there is a undercurrent of ooc drama which is played off as Ic drama and that is something I refuse to take part in. the other group I am in has seen what I have been through and find it disgusting. So I will be going over there now and rping  with people who would rather pull you up then tear you down.  There is a big difference between ic drama and hate and pretending to be ic when you are actually saying things ooc is pretty pathetic. Last thing to say is..  To the lovely people such as @efronzda and @madz-petschtt and others who I have enjoyed rping with, I do have a a personal tumblr account here if you ever need me :)  thats it. People called out for being fake and anons being shown the door all thats left for me to say is

P.s there was also an anon which stated that @jonathan-d-groff​ and @brendonisms​ were going to make me quit. fyi you didn't make  me quit, I just found somewhere better. I could have said a lot more but this is a hell of a lot. BYE! 

[amazingphanisnotonfire-imagines]

Reggie//i can't let you go now that i got it

Request: your last reggie mantle imagine was soooooo cute it was.... BIG FAV i'm still grinning! could you please do one where reader and reggie have been best friends their whole lives? she's super protective and sweet to him and like? she's been in love for years but has been hiding it well?? she gets him to come away with her to college because 'screw this town' and they live together? but eventually she starts going on dates and it makes him realize he's in love with her too?? mutual love confession

hey! so before you go any further trigger warning mentions of abuse, specifically around reggie and his dad. it’s not in detail but it is mentioned a few times so don’t read if that upsets you. the last thing i want you to be is sad. i hope you all have a good day anyway, whether you’re reading this or not! (title is from Børns ‘electric love’)

- For 18 years 

- Reggie Mantle has been the only constant in your life 

- Even when you were babies he was there 

- Your mom’s sat beside each other in baby class, cooing and awing over each other’s kids

- All while 6 month old you stole 6 month old Reggie’s toy

- And then he cried so hard he vomited on not only himself but you as well 

- Which then made you cry even louder 

- And then your mom’s were asked to leave 

- So instead

- It became a weekly thing for your mom to take you to The Mantle’s 

- While her and Mrs Mantle gossiped and drank tea 

- You and Reggie would hit each other with various stuffed toys. 

- As you got older 

- The weekly visits turned into daily ones 

- Especially when you moved three houses away from him

- You and Reggie started to see each other more than your own parents did

- Your mom still went over once a week

- But when she arrived you were always usually there

- Either stood in the kitchen getting a snack 

- Or lying on Reggie’s bed watching an awful movie he just ‘had to show you’ 

- They usually involved a hybrid of two animals

- Sometimes mythical, sometimes not 

- But in all of them they were usually taking over the world

- They also always had the same four actors in

- But despite how much you protested 

- ‘reggie? are you being serious? we watched this one last time.’ 

- ‘no, we watched molemaid last time. this is medusamaid. they’re completely different’ 

- ‘oh, sorry. my mistake’

- You actually secretly loved them 

- Because they made him happy

- You would watch in awe as he laughed at stupid jokes 

- And how his eyes would always light up at a particularly gruesome part, no matter how badly CGI’d it was

- You also listened to the countless of theories as to how ‘hurrik9’ is clearly the prequel to ‘hellhounds’ because ‘they’ve got the same main character! it doesn’t matter if they’re not played by the same person. y/n, they’ve got the same name.’ 

- You also listened to him complain about the inconsistencies between ‘werewombats 1’ and ‘werewombats 2’

- ‘no matter how much the director stands by the decision to make them turn on each other, despite the first film clearly stating that that’s the last thing they’d do.’ 

- But the thing you loved the most about it 

- Was that he was only ever this way with you

- You’d been sworn to secrecy when you walked in on him watching ‘dinocano vs uniquake’ 

- And you promised never to tell anyone about his secret passion

- Or the fact that he had a stack of notebooks filled with plots and mini scripts for his own films. 

- Reggie may have gotten popular

- But to you, he’s still the same Reggie you’ve always known.

- Whose scared of clowns but won’t admit it

- And cried when watching Edward Scissorhands but if anybody asks it was you

- And who hates hot chocolate, but its the only thing he’ll drink when he’s sick 

- He also only eats pink marshmallows in months ending in R

- And white ones every other month 

- But in December he has both...because its Christmas.

- Yeah, you and Reggie are best friends 

- Always have been, always will

- But it doesn’t stop you from wanting more.

- It doesn’t stop the longing looks when you think no one is watching 

- Or the lingering touches whenever he hugs you

- It doesn’t stop your heartbeat picking up whenever he walks into a room

- Or how you forget how to breathe whenever he looks at you

- You look forward to everyday, even if you have a pop quiz or homework you only remembered the night before

- Because he’s going to be there to make you smile

- Even if he isn’t doing it on purpose 

- You look forward to the countless of texts he sends

- No matter how weird or ridiculous 

- Like when he text you at half three in the morning to ask if birds were real because somebody told him they weren’t.

- You then got a text straight afterwards telling you that it would be great idea for a plot

- And you still answer every single one

- No matter how stupid they are 

- It’s really a wonder how you get any sleep with your phone being on loud all the time

- But it’s worth it

- Especially when you get texts like 

- ‘he’s done it again’ 

- Reggie’s relationship with his father complicated to say the least

- You remember when you were younger they used to be best friends 

- Reggie idolized him 

- And you’d have conversations in Reggie’s tree house, about how much he wanted to be just like his dad when he grew up

- But when he did grow up

- And started to develop a personality that didn’t just revolve around football 

- Reggie no longer wanted to be just like his dad 

- He wanted to be the furthest thing from him

- The first time it happened 

- Reggie tried his hardest to hide it from you 

- And for the first time in 8 years 

- You went two days without seeing each other 

- On the third day though 

- You’d had enough 

- So you went round to see him 

- But when you asked his mom if he was in 

- She lied and told you he had just gone out 

- Even though you could clearly see him trying and failing to hide on the stairs

- So you did what any normal friend would do 

- You climbed through his bedroom window 

- With about as much grace and steal as you could muster 

- Which surprisingly, wasn’t a lot

- And you gave him the fright of his life 

- ‘what the hell are you doing here?’ 

- ‘you’re avoiding me’ 

- ‘i’m not. i’ve just been...busy’ 

- ‘doing what? fighting?’ 

- ‘what?’

- ‘your eye’ 

- ‘oh yeah...that’ 

- That was when you knew something was wrong 

- You’ve known Reggie your entire laugh 

- And you know the three things he’ll always boast about 

- Girls, football and fighting 

- ‘what happened?’ 

- When he told you 

- You couldn’t believe what he was saying 

- You wanted to find Marty Mantle and give him a black eye...see how he likes it 

- But Reggie begged you not to do or say anything 

- ‘it’ll only make it worse’ 

- ‘but its wrong. he should be locked up’

- ‘who’s going to believe me?’ 

- ‘me’ 

- ‘see...it was only one time anyway’ 

- So you agreed, reluctantly 

- And you so wanted to believe it

- But then a few weeks later he turned up to school with a bust lip

- A month after that another bruise around his eye that he tried to hide behind sunglasses 

- And by the time graduation rolled around 

- Both of you had lost count of the sunglasses and excuses 

- For three years he’d been trapped in a house with a father who thought hitting was the same as love 

- And a mother who pretended it didn’t happen 

- But now college was round the corner and that meant a chance for both of you

- Or at least thats what you thought

- ‘you didn’t get in?’ 

- ‘i didn’t get in.’ 

- ‘to any of them?’ 

- ‘nope’

- ‘reggi-’

- ‘it’s fine. my dad has always wanted me to work for him. i guess this will make him happy. even if i am the cleaner’ 

- ‘reg-’ 

- ‘please go’

- That summer was the longest one of your life 

- It was even longer that the time Reggie had to get his appendix out and so you couldn’t hang out for a 3 weeks.

- For two and a half months 

- You heard nothing from Reggie 

- You text, called, DM’d and even E-mailed

- But you got nothing 

- You went round at all times of the day to try and talk to him

- And every time Mrs Mantle answered and told you he was either out or busy

- Doing homework was her favourite excuse

- And Reggie has only ever done homework when you were doing the majority of it 

- You even tried climbing in through his window again 

- But he locked it 

- So you watched every morning as he dragged himself into his dad’s car

- Wearing a stiff suit and a miserable expression 

- No matter how hard you tried to get to him before the left 

- How fast you ran or how early you got to his house

- They were always long gone before you managed to get anywhere close to him

- You missed the midnight texts about nothing 

- You missed his stupid jokes 

- You missed watching an entire room light up whenever he walked in

- You missed the way he made you feel, even if he was unaware of it 

- You even missed watching his god-awful movies 

- You just missed him 

- And when he missed your leaving party 

- That was the final straw

- At 7am the next morning 

- You shoved the last of your boxes in the back of your car 

- Said goodbye to your parents 

- And drove away

- Three houses down the street 

- Making sure your parents had gone back inside before stopping 

- You sat outside for a few minutes 

- Trying to think of what to do or say 

- You knew his mom would answer the door

- And that you’d get the same excuses 

- You also knew from the past few experiences that his window would still be locked 

- So you threw rocks at his bedroom window in the hopes that when he’d check to see what it was, he’d leave it unlocked 

- And he did! 

- You watched from behind a bush as he hung his head out the window to look around

- His brow furrowed and hair messy

- Clearly he’d just woke up

- You couldn’t help the smile twitching at your lips 

- You’d missed that face 

- Climbing the window was a lot harder than it used to be 

- Mr Mantle had taken the ladders away 

- Another reason as to why he sucked

- But you managed eventually 

- And you almost died only twice 

- Which is good 

- It’s better than three 

- You landed on the carpet with a loud thud that made him jump half way across the room

- ‘y/n. what the hell are you doing here?’

- ‘it’s moving day. and i must say i’m very disappointed at the lack of preparation on your part. have you even started packing yet?’

- ‘it’s not funny y/n’

- ‘i know. do you see me laughing?’

- ‘i’m being serious y/n. just leave’ 

- ‘no’ 

- ‘what?’

- ‘the last time you told me to leave, i listened and i didn’t see you for two months, so no’ 

- ‘what about college’ 

- ‘what about it?’ 

- ‘it starts in three days’ 

- ‘i know. and if we stand here any longer we’re going to miss it. so get packed and lets go. it’s a nine hour drive and i’m not doing all of that alone’ 

- ‘you know i can’t go’ 

- ‘says who?’ 

- ‘my dad, every single college i applied for and me’ 

- ‘listen to me reggie. you are my best friend, you have been since we were babies. there’s not a part of my life you haven’t been in. do you really think that would stop at college?’ 

- ‘we didn’t spend the summer together’ 

- ‘and it was the worst summer of my life’ 

- ‘same...but that might have been because i was spending 12 hours a day in an office’ 

- ‘rude. but i’ll take it!’ 

- ‘i did miss you though. it was weird not seeing your face everyday’ 

- That makes your cheeks heat up and you have to force the flutter in your chest to go away

- ‘it always cheers me up’ 

- There it goes again and you want to claw at your chest until it’s no longer there 

- Hope is a terrible thing to have when you’ve been in love with your best friend for your entire life

- ‘you always cheer me up’ 

- Oh dear...

- ‘i love you...a-as a friend. this summer has been the longest and most depressing for both of us. i don’t want to live the rest of my life like that. i need you reggie. so please pack your bags, say screw you to your dad and to this town and lets go’ 

- ‘what about money? where am i going to live?’ 

- ‘we’ll figure that out on the way there. just hurry up’ 

- And he did 

- You and Reggie threw the majority of his belongings into any bag you could find

- He took all the money he’d been saving out of the poorly disguised fake plant

- And wrote a nice little note for his parents 

- You also may have added a few choice words to it 

- But what Reggie doesn’t know won’t hurt him 

- And the two of you climbed into your car and never looked back

- The 9 hour car ride was the most fun you’ve ever had 

- It was like you were trying to fit the entire summer you’d lost into those few hours 

- It was filled with off key singing 

- And stories of your summer 

- His favourite being about Archie being tricked into going skinny dipping by himself

- You laughed loudly like nothing had happened 

- And cried silently because everything had 

- Thankfully when you arrived on campus, it was already night 

- So you managed to sneak Reggie into your room

- And when you nervously told your roommate 

- She just grinned at you

- ‘it’s fine, my boyfriend will probably be staying over a lot too’ 

- ‘oh, he’s not my boyfriend’ 

- ‘we’re not together’ 

- ‘...okay’ 

- She said with a knowing smile and you and Reggie shared a look

- And a year filled with adventures started

- Reggie got a job as a bartender with a little help from Veronica 

- And you started your classes 

- But nothing is ever easy 

- At least not when it involves you or Reggie 

- It turns out hiding a whole human is a lot more difficult that you anticipated. 

- It involves Reggie squeezing into your closet 

- And a whole team of people to get him to and from the showers 

- But it was also difficult for another reason

- Because it was easy to hide your feelings from him when you lived in separate house 

- But now you’re sharing a room

- And a bed 

- And every time he would wrap his arms around you 

- And pull in for a half asleep cuddle 

- You’d forget how to breathe 

- You’ve never been more excited to wake up

- Because he’d be all messy hair and parted lips with just a little bit of drool coming out of them that it would be cute instead of gross 

- And when he said good morning in the same deep, tired voice 

- You wanted to live in that feeling forever 

- But then 2nd year rolled around and everything changed 

- It all started when you moved into your own apartment 

- You knew you had to but there was a part of you that hoped you could keep everything the same 

- You found a tiny, two bedroom flat that you could both just about afford 

- Reggie was so happy to have his own room

- ‘i won’t have to sleep next to you and your freezing cold feet anymore’ 

- ‘i’ll just sneak into your bed when your fast asleep and put them on you then instead’ 

- ‘i thought we were supposed to be friends’ 

- It took a few weeks to get used to an empty bed 

- But eventually you started to sleep properly 

- And it was quite nice to have your own space again

- It meant you could study without having to listen to ‘nighthawk nightmare’ 

- Honestly, you don’t really know what the plot of that one is 

- But you’ve still seen it 7 times 

- You may be in love with him but it doesn’t mean he can’t be annoying sometimes 

- And you were happy with going back to admiring from afar

- Your heart can’t get broken that way

- In fact a small part of you thought he felt the same way 

- That one glimmer of hope you felt a year ago

- Came back all of sudden 

- And soon 

- You became aware of the lingering touches 

- And the gifts he’d buy you just because 

- He also asked what you wanted to watch for your movie night 

- And he’s never, ever done that unless you were sad or sick

- And even then, when you broke your arm a few years ago, he chose the film

- The way he looked at you suddenly felt different 

- You would feel him staring, but when you would check he would always be scrolling through his phone 

- And you’re sure the was a little bit of flirtiness in his tone whenever he spoke to you 

- But just because you think you can’t be burnt if you stand far enough away from the fire 

- Doesn’t mean that the sparks can’t jump out and get you anyway 

- Because all of sudden Reggie started bringing girls home 

- And every time you saw a t-shirt that wasn’t yours on the sofa 

- Or a pair of shoes discarded by the door

- You felt yourself die a little

- After a few weeks of this 

- Something in you snapped

- You’d spent the majority of your life pining after some boy who saw you as nothing more than a friend 

- And sometimes a small part of you thought as just an escape route

- So you moped for a few weeks before deciding it was finally time to move on

- Reggie would only ever see you as a friend 

- And that’s fine 

- The only way to move on, is to move on. 

- So you waited for the right guy to move on with 

- And there were a few 

- But none of them were right 

- Until you met Daniel 

- Sweet Daniel with curly brown hair and dimples

- Who studied history 

- And spent his days sitting in the coffee shop on campus

- For a few weeks the two of you spent your short interactions stealing glances and exchanging shy smiles 

- That evolved to small talk with flirty undertones

- Until finally he asked you out 

- And you said yes 

- And you kept saying yes to each date afterwards 

- They were fun too

- He’d take you to museum's and on picnics and at night he’d pick you up and you’d go star gazing 

- He would make you laugh when he’d tell you a joke 

- And make you blush when he’s whisper in your ear while staring up at the sky 

- But he wasn’t him

- And that killed you

- It doesn’t matter how many time he takes you to watch some unknown indie film thats supposed to be the greatest thing ever made

- It has nothing on standing outside the only cinema in town that’s showing ‘sharkcano vs tigerana’ in the freezing cold with Reggie wearing an absolutely ridiculous costumes that Reggie threw together last minute and somehow roped you into wearing too.

- But what hurt even more was watching how Reggie acted around you when you and Daniel started dating 

- He looked hurt whenever he saw the two of you together 

- And you would watch him roll his eyes whenever you mentioned him 

- Until eventually he would just avoid you all together 

- Do you know how hard it is to avoid someone when you’re living in the same 2 bedroom flat that barely gives two foot to yourself? 

- It’s hard 

- But Reggie finds a way 

- Eventually you’re more roommates than friends 

- And you really don’t know how much more you can take 

- You feel like you’re about to break 

- And Daniel can see that too

- So on Friday night he invites you to go drinking with him and his friends instead of staying in and moping 

- ‘bye, i’m going out’ 

- ‘wait’ 

- The speed of which he runs from his room and into the living room where your stood, startles you to say the least 

- ‘what?’

- ‘don’t go out with him.’ 

- ‘why not? what ever george has told you about is a lie. george does that. he once told a bunch of people that you streaked in an old people’s home and almost killed his grandmother’ 

- ‘because he isn’t me’ 

- You’ve dreamt of those words 

- Built them up in your head for years 

- But in all of your daydreams, there’s never been a scenario like this one 

- Not one where you’re about to leave to go on a date with another guy 

- ‘reggie? what are you talking about?’ 

- You need to make sure he’s saying what you think he’s saying 

- Because you can feel yourself hoping again

- And you know if he doesn’t mean what you want him to

- You don’t think you’ll be able to recover

- ‘i love you y/n. you’re my best friend, you always have been, you always will be and i love you.’ 

- ‘reg-’ 

- ‘please tell me you feel the same way’ 

- ‘i-’ 

- In your head you had a full oscar worthy speech planned out just in case this ever happened 

- But now you’re here in the moment. 

- You have no idea what to say

- ‘it doesn’t matter. just leave’ 

- ‘no’ 

- ‘what?’ 

- ‘do you really think i’m going to walk away from you after that? when have i ever walked away from you?’ 

- ‘i-no’

- ‘i love you too by the way. if you care’ 

- ‘shut up...wait really?’ 

- ‘yes i do. i’ve loved you for as long as i can remember so are you going to just stand there or are you going to kiss me?’ 

- ‘i’m definitely going to kiss you’ 

- ‘good’ 

- And he does 

- He’s standing in front of you before you can catch your breath

- His hands reach up to cup your cheeks 

- His lips part as he stares down at you 

- And you’ve never seen him look at anyone the way he’s looking at you

- Like you’re everything good and light in the universe 

- And like he’s also been waiting just as long for this moment 

- Maybe he has 

- Maybe he’s been waiting all his life for this 

- He just didn’t know 

- You feel whatever breath you had left leave your lungs

- His lips are soft against yours, but he gets his point across 

- And you’ve never been happier 

- All the heartache and tears 

- The laughter and stupid jokes 

- The 3am texts 

- The constant worrying 

- The early mornings and late nights 

- The damage to limbs from trying to fit in tiny closets

- And the scrapes on your ankles and bruising on your legs from crawling through his bedroom window 

- They’re all worth it

- ‘are you still going on your date?’ 

- ‘what do you think?’ 

- ‘good. because they’ve just released werewombats 3’

[mosswillow]

Learning To Love - Steve Rogers x Reader (featuring Texas vibes)

Summary: Life always does this thing where it puts you in situations you swore you were done experiencing. You’re done having relationships, but they may not be done with you.

Warnings: Smut, feelings, angst, interrupted assault  (In relation to this, attacker going unpunished, intimidation, stalker vibes.), mature themes, 18+ adult content, slow burn?

A/N: This is a gift for @joannie95 for the Hoelentine’s Day challenge! I hope you like it. This isn’t a dark fic but it is a little heavy, there’s a healthy dollop of anxiety and feelings throughout with a happy ending.

Thanks to  @amythedvdhoarder @chrissquares and @drabblewithfrannybarnes  for putting this whole thing together, it’s such a fun challenge!

By clicking keep reading you confirm you’re over 18. This is mature content, be careful.

Unlovable.

When asked to describe yourself it’s the first word you think of. Your very first boyfriend spent months emotionally abusing you and by the end of the relationship it’s what you truly believed about yourself. Every relationship after has been the same. Your insecurities and inability to trust causing tension that eventually sabotages any chance at making things work; and with each failed relationship your view of yourself becomes more and more loathsome. Self hatred and depreciation surround you in a cloak of misery, convincing you that they’re your friends.  It’s all your fault, you deserve all of it, You’re unlovable.

So you don’t do relationships anymore. You want nothing more than to love and be loved, to hold hands and kiss under the moonlight. You want a partner to share your life with, an emotional connection that transcends yourself, creating a whole new person.

If only you were good enough, worthy enough for love.

But you’re not.

---

“No eating in here Dr. Rogers,” you chide.

Steve looks up at you and gives a smirk.

“How about a little bribe.” He holds up a bag of beaver nuggets. You roll your eyes and look around before sticking your hand in and grabbing a few puffs.

“I knew you couldn’t be perfect all the time,” He teases.

“Don’t you have an office or something?”

“I like it better here, I get to be scolded by a beautiful librarian and don’t have to deal with the other professors.”  

You’ve known Steve for years. He started teaching at the same time you joined the library staff at Rice. He’s genuine and kind. You’ve watched him help countless students outside of office hours. Everyone likes him, including you. You really like him a lot. That’s why you can’t let yourself entertain the possibility of being with him. You can’t lose him. You can’t bear the inevitable conclusion of him looking you in the eyes and telling you he’s done, that you’re too much for him.

“Well you’ll have to pack it up, they’re sending everyone home because of the hurricane.”

“It’s barely even a hurricane, more like a tropical storm,” Steve scoffs.

“Sorry, I don’t make the rules.”

You close the library down before heading to your car. The wind has already started and the sky darkens by the second. You smell the slight scent of sea air and know it’s close. The humidity, which you forgot could even get this bad, causes you to start sweating profusely and you want to get home and take a shower before the storm starts. You have a pint of blue bell waiting for you at home along with a stack of unread books, a quiet night sounds perfect.

“Hey.”

You whip around and see a familiar face, a grad student who visits the library often. Alex, you remember.

“Sorry, I just closed the library down. You'll have to wait until the school opens.”

He takes a small step forward, close enough that your personal space is violated, while at the same time far enough to where the invasion feels almost accidental.

“I’ve watched you around campus, noticed your schedule.” It’s not an accident.

It’s not unusual for students to flirt with you but this is less flirting and more just creepy.

“Oh, um yeah I work a lot.” you take a step back and he follows.

“You don’t have a boyfriend.” He states.

You stare at him and take another step back, hitting your back on your car. You grab onto the handle and he reaches out and grabs your hand.

“Hey don’t be like that. I’m a good guy. I won’t hurt you.”

You pry your hand away..

“One date, say yes.” He says, slowly pushing his body towards you.

“No, I have to go.”  

You press yourself against your car as his body goes rigid.

“You’re such a fucking tease, parading around me for weeks.”

He takes a tiny step back but places his hands against your car, caging you in. You close your eyes and freeze in fear. Your mind screams at you to move but your body just won’t.

He’s suddenly pulled away from you and when you open your eyes the only thing visible is Steve’s back.

“She said no, why don’t you move along and maybe spend some time considering why you feel entitled to women who clearly aren’t interested.”

Alex and Steve stare at each other for a few slow moments before Alex scowls at you and walks away.

“Are you ok?” Steve turns to you.

“I’m fine.” you lie, crossing your arms to avoid shaking.

Steve raises his eyebrows and looks you up and down. You’re not entirely sure how it happens but somehow you end up sitting in the passenger seat of Steve's truck, looking at your apartment building. Rain has started coming down in earnest and you dread running through it.

“Are you going to be ok alone?” Steve asks

“Are you?” You reply.

You look at eachother and your mind clears. His blue eyes stare at you with concern. Steve's hands are still on the steering wheel, clutching on like it might disappear if he lets go. You don’t want to be alone and you can tell that he doesn’t either. You want to feel safe and right now Steve is the only one who makes you feel that way. It would be so easy to invite him in, you know he would say yes.

“You don’t have a car. do you have food? Bottled water? A portable charger?” Steve asks.

“You’re the one that said it’s barely a hurricane.”

Steve sighs and releases his hands from the steering wheel.

“Just call me if you need me.”

You nod and climb out of the truck. The transition from the hot rain to your air conditioned apartment causes you to start shivering and even after you change and cover yourself in a warm blanket you still shake uncontrollably.

---

The storm lasts three days, worse than you were expecting but nothing like Harvey.

Steve shows up at your apartment bright and early a bag of conchas and breakfast tacos in hand. You climb in his truck and buckle your seatbelt. Steve eyes your book bag before backing up.

“You’re not going to work are you?”

“It’s been three days.” you reply.

He looks at you like you’re crazy and you shift uncomfortably in your seat.

“It wasn’t that bad, you got there before anything actually happened,” you say.

He opens his mouth and breathes in before biting his lip and driving you to work without another word.

Steve walks you to your car every day after work. You don’t ask him to, he just does. It’s an unsaid expectation you both have. The first week is awkward, You both say almost nothing to each other. The second week though Steve finally breaks the silence.

“How have you been?”

You shrug.  

“I filed a complaint. He’s barred from the library and promised not to come near me.” you say.

Steve purses his lips.

“Do you feel safe though?”

“No...”

Steve stiffens and you reach out and grasp his shoulder.

“Thank you for walking me to my car.”

“Of course,” Steve closes the door for you and you drive away.

Steve cracked something on your exterior. You had been pushing off the feelings before Steve asked you how you were and now you can’t push them down any longer. You get in the shower and let the warm water wash over you. At first you feel raw and then angry and then for the first time since it happened you cry. It feels silly, to let something so seemingly small affect you so much. It could have been so much worse, it’s not like anything actually happened. Maybe that’s what scares you, not what happened but the implication of what could have. He invaded your space and intimidated you, making you feel small and helpless. If it wasn’t for Steve…

You let yourself fall apart until the water turns cold, then you pick yourself up and wrap yourself in a soft towel.

You look at the woman in your bathroom mirror and see someone who isn’t you. She’s broken and hurting, her eyes swollen from crying. She looks like she’s about to fall over from exhaustion. She didn’t deserve what happened to her. She has every right to feel upset and frightened about it. She didn’t deserve to have her safety threatened, nobody deserves that.

You didn’t deserve it.

You go to work the next day and the day after that. Days turn into weeks turn into months and the fear slowly leaches out of you as you reach out for help. The woman in your bathroom mirror deserves therapy and so do you.

Steve is always there. He walks you to your car every day. He starts texting you and you text him back. You go out to dinner with him, an ethiopian place this weekend and a mediteranian food truck the next. You form inside jokes and slowly you find yourself telling Steve little things about yourself.

“Why are you single?” You ask him one day.

“I had a girlfriend, she’s not with us anymore. After she… I guess I just… I wasn’t in a place for a long time to date anyone, I cringe now at some of the things I did while dating after she passed.”

He leans back and gives you a little smile.

“I’ll know when it’s the right time to jump back in - when it’s the right person.”

You open up about your past and he listens. He tells you about growing up as the smallest kid in his class, how he was bullied and how suddenly people started treating him differently when he hit a late growth spurt. You feel closer to him than you’ve ever felt with anyone.

---

Steve walks you to your car. Tomorrow is your off day and you stop to thank him and remind him you aren’t working the next few days. He’s looking at you and shifts on his feet, you furrow your brows in concern.

“It’s Valentine's day tomorrow.” He blurts out.

You take a step towards your car, knowing where this is going and not wanting it to go any further.

Steve is the one who holds you together, his friendship helping you in so many ways. He holds power over you though, power to throw you aside and break you apart. You can’t be cast away, not again.

“If you don’t have plans maybe I can make you something for dinner at my place?”

You turn away and grab your door handle.

“Sorry, I’m busy.”

“Oh of course, yeah that’s fine.”

You watch Steve bring his hand up to his forehead in the rearview mirror as you drive away.

That evening you write the text, it’s cowardly but you don’t think you can face him.

I don’t need you to walk me to my car anymore. Thank you for your help but I think our relationship should be professional from here on out.

What? No, we’re friends. Are you ok?

You turn your phone off and take a sleeping pill only to be woken in the middle of the night by pounding on your door.

Steve stands in your doorway. His eyes are red and his hair is messy. He takes a deep breath and runs his hand through his hair.

“You weren’t answering your phone.”

“I turned it off.”

Steve stares at you and you look away.

“What is this about?”

“What is what about?”

“We’re friends. I’m not going to stop being your friend just because you don’t want a relationship. I know this isn’t one sided, that you feel the same way about me. Why are you trying to push me away?”

You cross your arms and look down and he leans over, putting himself in your line of sight.

“If I let you in I’ll get hurt,” you confess.

“Why do you think that?”

‘I..” You stutter

It’s not one moment. Not any one breakup you’ve been through. It’s not even what happened months ago during the hurricane. It’s everything. It’s self hatred, overthinking and analyzing. It’s all the anxiety and stress of life that compounds into fear. Fear of failing and of loss, of getting hurt and breaking. You feel like the only way to keep yourself up and moving is by pushing him away.

“You’re so scared of being hurt but Y/N, you’re hurting. You’re doing to yourself the very thing you’re so scared of.”

Tears start forming, Steve brings his hand up and wipes one away before pulling you into a hug and letting you cry into his chest.

He shifts his face close to your ear and speaks softly.

“I have fear too, but you know what I’m the most scared of? I’m scared of not being your friend anymore. We don’t have to be in a relationship but please don’t cut me out.”

His voice hitches and his grip tightens.

“I love you, I care about you and always will.”

You pull back and look at him, a tear escapes one of his eyes and he promptly wipes it away.

“I’m scared,” you say.

“I am too.”

Your heart beats rapidly as you look up into Steve's bloodshot eyes and see the pain that you’re feeling mirrored back at you. Steve holds power over you but for the first time you realize that you hold that same power over him. You never thought you would be willing to put yourself in a vulnerable position again but somehow, here you are. You put your hand over your heart and feel the life pump out if it and through your veins.

reaching up tentatively, you bring your hand to his face grabbing his cheek gently. You stand up tall and slide your hand behind his neck, bringing him in and kissing him. Tension releases from both of you as you press your lips together, embracing in a warm hug. You pull away and he brings you in for another kiss, this time pushing you into your apartment and kicking the door closed behind him.

It’s a flurry of body parts and heat. You’re ripping off each other's clothing. Steve kisses your neck and you bring your hand to his chest and feel down his abdomen. He groans when you get to his dick and the next thing you know you’re on the bed arching your back as he slams into you. You open your mouth to moan but nothing comes out, Instead your eyes roll to the back of your head as an orgasm washes through you and carries you away.

“Fuck, I’m coming,” He says.

He stills on top of you and then looks down making eye contact before rolling beside you and pulling you into a hug.

“That was...” Steve starts

“Amazing.” you finish.

You pry yourself from Steve and walk to the bathroom to clean up, stopping at the mirror to look at your post sex appearance.

Maybe there’s no way around it. Maybe life will stick you in situations and force you forward against your will. You weren’t trying to let Steve into your life but somehow here he is.

For the first time you don’t don’t feel like this unlovable person. You’re not scared he’s going to leave you or that you’re going to ruin the relationship.

You have a feeling you’ve never truly experienced before and now it all makes sense. Somehow in the last few months you’ve learned to love. You look at yourself in the mirror and see someone worthy.

You’ve spent all your time and energy pushing people away when you should have been building yourself up. You thought that taking care of yourself meant hiding away and putting up a wall.

Self care isn’t a bubble bath or a glass of wine and It’s not something that happens out of fear or anxiety. It’s affording yourself the same kindness and forgiveness that you would give anyone else. It’s looking at yourself in the mirror and recognizing that you deserve to love and to be loved. It’s giving yourself permission to feel however you feel without guilt or shame. It’s love in its purest form and you deserve it.

You are not unlovable.

Steve walks up beside you and kisses your temple.

“When you said you loved me...” you start.

“I meant it.”  He says quickly.

You turn and look at him, biting your lip before saying something you’ve been so scared of for so long. You kiss his cheek and smile.

“I love you.”  

[grace-sully]

Why Didn’t You Tell Me?

* this is not my gif; all credit goes to the owner

Paring: JJ Maybank x Fem!Reader

Warnings: mentions of physical and verbal abuse, language, swearing

Word count: 1345

Summary: Reader has a similar homelife to JJ, but she's kept it hidden until she has a bad night and goes to the chateau where they find out

Requested: yes! - Hey, can you write an OBX JJ fanfic where y/n a female pogue is getting abused like JJ and she doesn’t want JJ to know because he is also going through it but one time he sees and she gets really defensive. He can help her through and it’s really sweet and shit 

A/N: thanks to the anon that requested this! I hope you enjoy!! also sorry i took so long!!

*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*

It would happen over the smallest of things and continuously got worse and worse each time. Your parents would always lose control of their emotions, but when alcohol was involved, you would always manage to be pushed into a wall or wake up with a few new bruises from where you had been grabbed too tight. 

The Pogues never knew, and even if they did they didn’t say anything. Everyone already knew about JJ’s family life and how bad it was, and you didn’t want everyone to pity you. You had always managed to put on a smile without making anyone suspicious. 

Hiding your bruises became second nature. Hiding them with makeup or a shirt or just coming up with elaborate excuses on the spot if a bruise was spotted. 

“Jesus, Y/N! Where did that bruise come from?”

“Oh i just fell”

When the injuries were too bad to hide, you would hide away from the Pogues. Making excuses like you needed to work or have chores to do around the house or on the cut.

You knew you couldn't keep this secret forever, but you just hoped that when you turned 18, you would leave school and move out away from your home life and all you knew.

But tonight, your dad's sudden rage was something you hadn't seen in awhile. The hitting was always in a place that could easily be covered up, but tonight it wasn't. Hands gripped your arms and wrists, kicking you till you fell to the floor and spitting words of disappointment at you.

It’s dark and cold when you subconsciously walk the familiar route to the chateau. Your muscles screamed in protest with every small step you took, the bruises that were littered all over your body making it harder for you to walk. You hiss, slightly slowing down your movements and taking deep breaths and threading your hands through your hair.

A loose tear began to fall down your cheek, when you could see the chateau. You felt awful for coming here, but you couldn't take it anymore. You had to get out before something worse could happen.

You repeatedly knock your fist against the wooden door until you hear the sound of footsteps growing across the floor, releasing some of the tension you held in your body.

"Y/N?” John B askes, confused as to why you're at his house this late after not seeing the group in days.

You then saw Sarah come up from the shadows behind him. A small smile was wiped off her face when she saw what state you were in. Her breath left her in a rush. 

“What the fuck?" 

The tears in your eyes began to stream down your face harder as Sarah steps forward to wrap her arms around you.

"I didn't know where else to go," you manage to squeak out. You heard Sarah mutter something to her boyfriend as she begins to lead you into the house and to the couch before sitting you down as you tried to control your breathing. 

With Sarah sitting to your left, It became apparent to you that John B wasn't in the room anymore, but before you could figure out where he ran off to, you heard two pairs of footsteps emerge from the hallway where you again saw John B with JJ.

Setting his eyes on you, he noticed your eyes were red and swollen from your tears that had previously fell leaving stains on your cheeks.

“Y/N?” he asked, confused, more to himself then you. Before he could really process you sat upset on his best friend's couch, you were up and moving across the room to where he stood to him, wandering into his open arms for you and pulling you into a warm hug.

Your head rested on his chest that was covered by the shirt that he always wore making you feel slightly at ease. He rubbed circles on your back and you felt like you could breathe again, surrounded by the familiar scent of him. He just stood there, holding your quivering body, listening as your breaths went from shaky to become more stable. 

Noticing that your body was a little more relaxed, he pulled back to get a better look at your face.

Cupping his hands around your rosy red cheeks, you back away slightly, wanting to hide away from his intense eyes. Feeling the dense tension in the air that you could cut with a knife.

“Where did these bruises come from?” he shakes his head, with a look of pity in his eyes, exactly the look you were trying to avoid, “Please don’t lie to me.”

“It's nothing,” you say quickly, trying to dismiss this conversation and move away from JJ’s grasp and turning so he's facing your back.

It then dawned on you that you and JJ were alone in John B’s lounge, realising that they must've left to give you both privacy.

“Y/N..” 

“It was my parents,” you blurt out.

"Y/N, i'm so sorry" JJ starts, you then turn to face him to see his eyebrows raised in pity with a look of sadness,  "how long has this been going on for?" 

You don't answer, fiddling with your hands that fell in front of you. The silence in the room became deafening until you heard JJ speak up over the sounds of your quiet sniffling.

"Y/N, how long?" He asks again, more forcefully this time, trying to get you to open up to him in any way he could.

“For as long as I can remember,” you admit, ashamed that you had kept something as big as this from your best friends for so long. 

“Why didn’t you tell me?” he says in a low voice. If you were mistaken, you could hear the hurt in his voice also.

“Y/N…” JJ murmurs, there is evident pain and frustration in his voice. Seeing there was something wrong but not being able to get it out of you.

“JJ, please ” you beg, shutting your eyes and looking down at your feet, just wanting this conversation to be over and to sleep the pain away. 

“Just tell me!” you could hear the evident anger in his voice.

“Because I didn’t want to be a burden JJ!” you raise your voice slightly at him, his eyes meet your sad and broken ones, “You go through it enough with your dad and I didn’t want you to have my problems too!”

“But how is that fair on you, I come to you all the time about what my dad does to me”

“I know, but I didn't want to put more on your plate,”

You then began to question why you really kept this to yourself. At first, it was because of the reason you gave JJ, but actually saying it out loud. It was a stupid reason. Not only were you causing yourself more harm by not telling anyone, you were now causing harm by thinking you could handle it all on your own when you had an amazing group of friends who could support you through this.

“Y/N...you’re my girlfriend, my best friend,” he tells you, his eyebrows furrowed and his eyes look sad, “if you were hurting, I want to be there for you like you are with me.”

The tears began to gather in your eyes again. JJ noticed immediately and traveled the short distance to you and wrapped his arms around your frame once again as your tears fell.

“It's gonna be okay, I'm here for you” he promised, kissing the top of your head as you just cried in his arms, running his fingers through your hair.

JJ’s open arms wrapping firmly around you in a warm embrace. You finally let out a sigh of relief when you realised you were okay. Well, you wouldn't exactly say you were completely okay, but you were alive and away from your parents.

“Come on,” He whispers, after you’ve calmed down, extending his hand out to you and leading you to the spare room in John B’s house where he is currently residing.

*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*

Thank you so much for reading! If you enjoyed it, please give it a reblog and leave some love <3

[moldisgoodforyou]

how lucky am I

gif by @toesure​ 

summary: jj and charlie return home to the outer banks after their engagement. jj shows charlie around where he grew up - and sees his dad again after six years. 

a/n: this is set in a post-grad universe (read this for background)! and thank you always to my friends @oopmyheartwent-obx​ and @sunnypogue​ for reading it over for me beforehand!! 

warnings: cursing, emotional abuse, mentions of physical abuse.

wordcount: 4.7k

Charlie and JJ took an Uber from the airport as they flew home for the first time since they were engaged, about six months since when they had come home for Christmas. They entered her parents’ house, leaving their suitcases at the door. Charlie took JJ’s cap from him first, fluffing up his hair and giving him a quick kiss before bringing him into the kitchen. Both her parents were busy in the kitchen with their backs to them, music drifting over the radio. “Hey guys!” Charlie greeted cheerfully. 

Her mom reacted first, whipping around at the sound of her daughter’s voice. “JJ! Charlie!” She hugged JJ first, catching him off guard, but he smiled and hugged her back after a beat. “Hi, Mrs. Walker. Whatever you’re making smells incredible.” Charlie had to resist rolling her eyes as her mom pulled back with her hand to her heart. “I told you, JJ, call me Suzie. We’re family now!” JJ nodded, grinning. “Yes ma’am.” 

JJ then extended his arm toward her dad for a handshake, like usual between the two - but her dad pulled him in for a hug, clapping him on the back. “Good to see you, son. Your flight go okay?” JJ beamed at the approval, nodding. “Yes, sir - uh, Mr. Walker.” He corrected himself. Charlie’s dad shook his head and dropped JJ’s hand. “Mike is fine, JJ. You hungry?” He pulled Charlie into a hug, pressing a kiss to her forehead. “Dad, can we put our bags up in my room first?” Mike pulled back, giving her a look. “JJ’s bag goes in the guest room.” Charlie rolled her eyes. “Dad, we’re literally engaged -”

Her dad shook his head. “Guest room. Go put them away.” She sighed but nodded, pulling JJ upstairs. They could hear her mom berating her dad for not being nice enough as they walked upstairs and Charlie laughed. “The second they go to bed, you’re coming into my room.” JJ shook his head, but stayed quiet as he lugged their suitcases upstairs and into her room. “You good, J?” She asked, kissing his cheek. JJ nodded, a small smile on his face. “He called me son. Your dad.” Charlie softened, not knowing how much that would mean to him. “You’ve been a part of the family for a while now, baby. Now it’s just official.” 

The next morning, the two took advantage of being back in the Outer Banks, visiting all their favorite spots from growing up. They woke up early to surf for a couple hours with the sunrise, then got breakfast with John B and Sarah afterward. Charlie and JJ then drove by the coast for a while, aimlessly. “Can we go by one more place?” JJ asked after a while. “Of course, what are you thinking?” JJ gave her a small, hopeful smile. “You’ll see.” 

_ 

He drummed his fingers on the wheel as they drove closer to the Cut, toward his old house. “We don’t have to go here if you don’t want to, JJ -” Charlie started, but JJ shook his head, cutting her off. “No, no, I want to check it out.” He gave her an uneasy smile, forcing it. Charlie nodded, squeezing his arm gently but stayed quiet. She had heard most of the stories before and had pretty much made up her mind about JJ’s dad - no in-person meeting could change that. 

He pulled up onto the gravel, taking a breath before turning the key and getting out. Charlie started toward the house, but JJ quickly grabbed her hand, pulling her back. “Can - can you just wait out here first, just for a second?” She nodded, biting her lip out of worry. “Of course. I’ll be right here.” JJ seemed to relax slightly and released her hand, then flipped his cap backward before heading inside. 

“Dad?” He called out, tense. He walked through the house tentatively, listening, then relaxed more once he realized his dad wasn’t home. He surveyed the mess and shoved some trash (and a small white bag) into a drawer before heading back outside. “Charlie, c’mere.” 

Charlie was hesitant, taking his hand again once she reached the porch. “He’s not here, but, uh, you can see my room, at least.” JJ offered. He was clearly embarrassed by the house and Charlie tried to conceal her surprise at the state of disarray, holding his hand a little tighter. JJ led her to his room and pushed open the door - then smiled. 

His room had been untouched since he had moved out and into the Chateau with John B on his 18th birthday. It looked exactly like how an 18-year-old boy’s room would look - rumpled sheets, a few lewd posters on the walls, a spare history textbook used to prop up the uneven leg of the desk. Charlie rolled her eyes. “Doesn’t look too different from your freshman year dorm, I’d imagine.” JJ laughed, splaying his hand over one of the posters. “Pretty much.” 

She took a tentative seat on the bed. “It’s not as bad as you were describing it to me. It’s...homey.” JJ scoffed, looking around. “No, homey is how I feel at your place. This is just fucking sad.” Charlie frowned, reaching out for him, and JJ waved her off. “I’m fine, just. Feels weird being back.” 

Suddenly, there was a bang out front and the sound of splintering wood, like the door was just kicked in. Charlie jumped up from the bed, clinging to JJ. “What the -” JJ clapped his hand over her mouth and put a finger to his lips, shushing her. 

A gruff voice rang out. “I have a gun! Better get the fuck out!” 

Upon hearing the voice, JJ relaxed a bit and moved to walk out. Charlie gripped JJ’s bicep tighter, eyes wide and scared. “What the fuck are you doing!” She hissed, yanking him back. JJ shook her off, pressing a quick kiss to her forehead. “It’s fine, Charlie, it’s just my dad. And he’s a fuckin’ liar.” They could hear footsteps coming closer and Charlie’s heart rate quickened, tears welling in her eyes. “It might not be - JJ, please, we should hide.” She begged, stepping away from the door. 

JJ walked out of his room, hands up. “Just me, Dad!” He called out. Once Luke Maybank saw him, he stopped dead in his tracks - no gun in hand, just as JJ expected. “Oh. JJ? Why the fuck are you here?” JJ let out a sad, short laugh. “Good to see you too, Dad.” Charlie peered out from around the corner, tentative, and Luke immediately spotted her, pointing. “You’re 25 and you’re still sneaking girls into the house?” 

At JJ’s beckon forward, Charlie stepped out, standing slightly behind JJ. “He’s 24, actually,” she corrected before she could stop herself. “She’s got a smart mouth like you.” Luke pointed out, smirking. JJ grit his teeth. “Dad, this is Charlie. My girlfriend I told you about - well, actually, my fiancee.” He was still getting used to saying the word. Charlie took JJ’s hand, then took a small step forward. “Hi.” 

Luke eyed the ring on her finger right away, skeptical. “Where’d you get the money for that rock?” 

“It’s my grandmother’s.” Charlie responded before JJ could even open his mouth.

“Hm.” Luke hummed, pulling out a chair and taking a seat. Charlie stayed tense but JJ did the same, pulling out a chair for Charlie first. She hesitated, but he tugged on his hand gently to show her it was okay. “Where did you meet again?” Luke asked, feigning interest - though his eyes kept flicking back to check out Charlie’s ring. He kicked back in his chair, swinging his feet up onto the table. JJ ran his hand through his hair. “Well...in college. We’ve been dating since senior year, remember?” 

“But I grew up here, we knew each other from high school before that.” Charlie added. Luke raised his eyebrows. “Oh? What’s your last name?” JJ squeezed her knee gently underneath the table. “It’s Walker, Dad.” Luke nodded in recognition, then laughed. “That touristy ice cream shop? Marrying into money, then.” He directed his gaze to Charlie, cracking a smile. “How’d he trick you into bothering with him?” 

Charlie frowned, keeping her tone even. “He didn’t trick me into anything.” 

Luke looked smug. “I’ve known him longer than you, kid, I know how he works.” 

“You should be proud of JJ. He’s intelligent, and kind, and loyal as hell.” She paused, lifting her chin a little. “No thanks to you.” JJ set his jaw and nudged her knee under the table, a private sign to knock it off. 

Luke leaned forward, both hands on the table. “Better watch your pretty little mouth in my house, girl.”  

“Don’t talk to her like that.” JJ quickly admonished, tensing. 

“Am I invited?” Luke asked, a small smirk on his lips. JJ paused, trying to process. “To...to the wedding?” He glanced at Charlie, a mix of emotions displayed on his face. Charlie kept her hard resolve. “We only got engaged two weeks ago, we haven’t worked on a guest list.” She stood, trying to make it clear the conversation was over, and JJ followed suit reluctantly. 

“You’re making a mistake sticking yourself with this lazy piece of shit.” Luke told her, gesturing toward JJ. 

Charlie took a quick step toward Luke, ready to retort, and JJ wrapped his arms around her waist just as quickly, pulling her back toward his chest. “Don’t.” He murmured in her ear. She stayed tense in his arms. 

Luke just laughed. “She’s feisty, huh?” 

JJ kept his arms around Charlie, protective. “She’s loyal.” 

Luke nodded, folding his hands behind his head.  “How long are you around? Back home?” JJ fidgeted with the bill of his cap. “Just ‘til Monday. I gotta get back for work.” Luke made a small noise of acknowledgment and stood, pulling a beer from the fridge. “Well. You ought to come ‘round again before you leave, sounds like we need to catch up.” JJ managed a small smile, confused, but nodded anyway. “Yeah, if we have time.” 

Charlie stepped out of his arms toward the door. “Well, uh, we have to go, but. I’ll see you around.” Luke popped the bottle cap off the beer and took a swig. “No one’s blocking you. Door’s open, kid.” 

The tips of JJ’s ears turned red and he nodded, silently following Charlie through the door and out to the car. “JJ, I -” Charlie started, and he shook his head. “Let’s just go.” The two of them got in the car and he gripped the wheel hard as he drove away, jaw clenched. He flicked through the radio until he found a classic rock station and cranked the volume, foot pressing harder on the gas. 

“I’m just gonna drive.” He told Charlie, eyes set firmly on the long road. She nodded, quiet, but was analyzing his every move, noticing the way his shoulders were tensed up to his ears and his knuckles were white against the steering wheel. 

A few minutes later, it was like JJ had a lead foot against the pedal and the car climbed five, ten, fifteen miles over the speed limit. He stared out at the road but was unfocused, radio static in his ears. “J.” Charlie tried again, for the fourth time. She reached out, shaking his arm. “JJ!” He swerved slightly and glanced over at her, blinking, then finally registered her worried expression and slammed on the brakes, pulling over to the side of the road. 

Charlie reached over and pushed the car into park as his foot stayed on the brake, then unbuckled and quickly got out. She opened the driver’s side door and reached over, unbuckling JJ’s seatbelt. “Out. I’ll drive.” He nodded numbly and stood, turning into her touch. Charlie looked worried and gave him a quick kiss on the cheek, but nothing more. 

“Get in and we’ll go home, hon.” He nodded again and did so, wordless. She started the car again, reaching to turn down the radio, but JJ reached for her hand, stopping her. She twisted her wrist to intertwine her fingers with his, resting their hands on the center console and holding his hand tight. 

They stayed quiet as she drove toward her house - but after a glance toward JJ and seeing how hard he was blinking, Charlie turned away from the neighborhood and toward the beach. “You missed the turn.” JJ mumbled, holding tight to her hand. She nodded. “I know. I want to see the beach.” JJ sighed as she pulled toward a secluded lookout spot. “Charlie, I’m fine.” 

Charlie shrugged, putting the car in park and turning the key. “I know. Come on, let’s go sit.” She got out and tugged on his hand, pulling him toward the beach and sitting down with him. After a beat, she scooted closer, wrapping an arm around his shoulders. JJ leaned down into her, taking a deep breath. “I’m fine.” He repeated, shakily. He swiped the back of his hand across his cheek roughly, not allowing any tears to fall. She tightened her grip on him, letting him rest his head on her chest. 

“It’s okay if you’re not, J.” She whispered, stroking his head. He mumbled something into her t-shirt, still for a moment, then slid his arms around her waist, clinging tight. Charlie frowned and pressed a kiss to his head. “Hm, hon?” 

JJ lifted his head slightly. “You scared me.” 

Charlie let out a short laugh, incredulous. “I scared you? He threatened a gun on you!” 

JJ sat up a little but kept an arm around her waist, looking serious. “You can’t talk to him like that, Charlie. He’s unpredictable. He - he could have hurt you.” 

Charlie frowned. “I can handle myself.” 

JJ furrowed his brow, frustrated. “No, Charlie, I’m serious. You can’t talk to him like that - if he did something to you, I wouldn’t be able to handle it.” 

“His words aren’t gonna hurt me.” She replied, stubborn. “If you go back, I’m going with you.” JJ sighed, knowing he wouldn’t be able to get anything through to her in the moment. “Yeah. We’ll see.” Charlie set her jaw, lifting it toward him. “I’m not letting you go back alone, JJ. I don’t trust him.” 

JJ gripped her chin gently, kissing her softly. “You’re too fucking stubborn.” She pulled out of his touch, frowning. “I just want you to be safe.” JJ nodded. “I know.” He glanced down at her phone as it chimed. “We gotta get back for your family thing soon, sweetheart.” 

Still annoyed, Charlie stood, crossing her arms. “I’m mad at you, you know.” JJ held back a small laugh as he stood, nodding seriously. “I know. Think you can fake being in love for the engagement party?” He teased. Charlie rolled her eyes and tossed him the keys. “I still love you. I’m just mad.” JJ smiled and got in the car with her, kissing her cheek. “Good. Love you too, Walker.” 

_

After the majority of her family left, Charlie dragged JJ upstairs by the hand to her room. She instantly flopped back onto the bed, kicking off her heels. “We survived!” She teased, tugged on his hand to pull him down next to her. “Do you think they liked me?” JJ asked, taking a tentative seat on the edge of the bed next to her. 

At that moment her dad Mike walked past, pushing the door open. “They’ll like you better if you keep the door open, son.” Charlie rolled her eyes, turning her head to glance at him. “Dad. Might I remind you we’re 24? And engaged?” Mike just laughed. “And you’re under my roof, and JJ’s staying in the guest room tonight. Again.” JJ nodded quickly, running his hand through his hair. “Yes, sir.” Mike grinned, walking away. “Night, you two!” He called over his shoulder. 

“Good night!” Charlie called back, then sat up to shut the door. JJ pushed her back down, grinning. “Did you not hear his rules?” Charlie smirked, lowering her voice. “I didn’t know you were into the idea of getting caught.” JJ laughed and stood, hands raised in surrender. “That’s it, I’m going to the guest room.” 

“No, stay!” Charlie reached out, hooking her finger in his belt loop, and tugged. “You’re trouble, Walker.” He teased, but fell forward onto her anyway. She grinned, wrapping her arms around his waist and hugging him tight. “Yeah, yeah, but you love trouble. Anyway, I think - no, I know that they loved you. They’ve all met you before, too, so it’s not like you had to make a grand first impression.” 

He shifted to be on his side, facing her, and propped his head up on his elbow. “Yeah, but this was an extra big deal. First impression as your fiance.” Charlie nodded and kissed him, sound. “You did just fine, hon. I think my grandma would marry you herself if she was younger.” He laughed, tucking a stray piece of hair behind her ear. “She was not happy about the last name deal. Mrs. Maybank.” He teased. 

Charlie rolled her eyes. “It’s a totally antiquated belief, and I’m working -” 

“Incredibly hard for your degrees, including your PhD, I know, I know.” JJ cut her off, finishing the speech he had heard quite a few times. “Just teasing you, Char.” She smiled, pleased. “Good.” JJ paused, like he was going to say something, then just sighed. Charlie frowned, picking up on it right away. “What’s up?” 

He ran his hand through his hair, messing it up. “Um. I think I want to go see my dad again before we leave.” 

“JJ…” Charlie sighed. “Why?” 

He shrugged, not meeting her gaze. “Dunno. I’ve barely talked to him in six years.” 

Charlie bit her lip. “There’s a reason for that, J, he’s an asshole.” 

JJ started, then paused. “Well - I mean, yeah, but did you hear him when we left? He wants to come to the wedding? Maybe he’s trying to be better.” 

Charlie frowned. “He’s had six years to try. I don’t know about this.” JJ set his jaw, frustrated. “Well I’m not asking, I’m telling you out of courtesy. And you’re not coming.” She raised her eyebrows. “You’re not going alone.” 

He sat up, crossing his arms. “Yes I am.” 

She did the same. “No, you’re not. I’ll drive you and sit in the car.” 

He swung his legs off the edge of the bed, standing. “Fine.” 

“Fine. Where are you going?” She questioned. 

“I’m going to the guest room.” JJ replied, raising his eyebrows back at her. She rolled her eyes. “J, you don’t have to -” He waved it off, dismissing her. “It’s not because of this, it’s out of respect for your dad.”

Charlie softened, unable to argue with that. “Oh. Okay. Well...goodnight.” JJ offered a small smile and bent down, giving her a short kiss. “Goodnight. Love you, Charlie.” She smiled back, giving in. “Love you too, J.” He gave her a teasing salute as he walked out of the room.

_ 

The next day, they went back to JJ’s house around 6pm. Charlie drove, turning up the radio and humming along softly to their favorite songs, trying to ease JJ’s tension. As they pulled up on the drive, Charlie frowned seeing some broken glass bottles scattered around the yard. “Are you sure you don’t want me to go in?” JJ nodded firmly. “Stay here. Please. He won’t do anything.” Charlie bit her lip, nodding back. “Don’t be too long.” He gave a small, tense smile and a short kiss. “I’ll be okay, sweetheart.” 

With that he got out, adjusting his hat as he walked up to the porch. The scene was all too familiar - empty beer cans scattered across the table, a medicine bottle with some pills strewn out on the glass. JJ nudged open the door and sighed when he saw Luke passed out on the couch, hand curled around an empty glass bottle that was cradled to his chest. 

“God damnit, Dad.” He said aloud, kicking one of the beer cans across the floor. Luke stirred, stretching as he woke up. JJ cursed under his breath, not sure if he wanted him to wake or not. Luke cracked one eye open, shooting at glare at his son. “The fuck are you back here for?” 

JJ flipped his hat backward, running his hand through his hair as he went. “You asked me to come back.” Luke scoffed. “Don’t know why I would have done that.” He leaned over, popping a cap off another beer and took a swig. “Your girl didn’t want to come back?” JJ shook his head, willing himself to not glance at her car outside. “I didn’t want her to have to see this piece of shit place again.” Luke sat up, gesturing at him with the beer bottle. “You should be grateful for this piece of shit, I raised you in it.” 

JJ crossed his arms, jaw set. “Saying you raised me is an overstatement.” 

“You gonna use some of that Walker family money to pay me back, then?” Luke stared him down from the couch. JJ scoffed. “Stolen bread and peanut butter from the store didn’t cost you shit, Dad.” 

Luke stood, swaying a little, and met him at eye level as he took another long drink. “You think the fucking utilities were free, boy? The running water? The A/C?” JJ stood his ground, his fists curling. “We had that maybe half the year, and a fucking box fan in the middle of the summer doesn’t do shit.” 

Luke shook his head. “Still cost money. You’re lucky I even gave you a place to stay.” He knocked back the rest of the beer and twirled the bottle in his hand. “Not sure how you even convinced that girl to stick around for long.” He grinned. “Just watch, she’ll leave too. They always do.” JJ swallowed, white-knuckled, but kept his fists by his side. “Fuck off, Dad, she loves me.” 

The corner of Luke’s lips curled into a sly smile. “Just like your mother loved you and then left in the middle of the night, first chance she got?” 

JJ took a deep breath to steady himself. If he was younger, his fist would have slammed into his dad’s cheek three insults ago - but he reminded himself he was better than that, too old to resort to injury. “She left because of you. We both know that.” 

Luke shook his head. “We got the same blood, boy. What runs in me runs in you.” 

“I’ll be a better husband and father than you ever were.” JJ shot back, chest puffed up and shoulders tall. 

Luke smirked. “That’s what I told my dad too, kid. Now look. Full fuckin’ circle.” 

JJ huffed in frustration, flipping his cap forward again and tugging down hard on the bill. “Fuck you.” 

Charlie had been sitting in the car long enough, anxious, and got out of the car, against her better judgment. Quietly, she walked up to the house, frowning as she heard unrecognizable yelling - from Luke or JJ, she wasn’t sure. Inside, JJ and Luke kept going, flinging insults at each other, the tension rising as they got in each other’s face. Charlie pushed open the screen door, staying quiet - but the hinges creaked at just the wrong moment. 

Luke hurled the glass bottle at the wall just behind Charlie’s head, making it shatter everywhere. She screamed, cowering, and JJ fisted the front of Luke’s shirt in his hand instantly. “What the fuck, Dad, she did nothing!” He roared, shoving him backward hard enough to land him on the floor. 

He ran over to Charlie, who had a small trickle of blood trailing down her cheek from a shard of broken glass. “Fuck, Charlie, are you okay?” She nodded quickly in response, eyes wide, a little stunned. JJ scooped her up into his arms and carried her out of the house hurriedly, not taking a second look back. He set her in the passenger seat, then looked around worriedly. “Keys, Charlie, I need the keys.” She bit down on her lip, hard, gesturing toward the porch. “Keys, Charlie.” He repeated, looking her over with concern. 

“Dropped them. On the porch.” She got out, gingerly touching her fingers to her cheek. JJ cursed under his breath, nodding, and shut the door quickly. He jogged back up to the porch, glancing inside for a split second to see his dad still lying there on the floor. He hesitated just long enough to see his dad stir, no blood in sight, and grabbed the keys and ran back to the car. 

His hands were shaking as he jammed the keys in the ignition, starting it up and driving away quickly. “Fuck, sweetheart, I’m so sorry. God - did he hurt you? Did it hit you?” He asked rapidly, glancing over at her. Charlie shook her head, pressing the heel of her hand to her cheek. “No. Um, just a small nick.” She paused before speaking again, her voice shaky. “I’m sorry, J.” 

“What?! No, no, why are you sorry?” He reached over and took her free hand, pressing the back to his lips. 

“You said not to come in, and I got scared, I thought he was hurting you.” She frowned, her voice small. “I can’t believe he talked to you like that.”  

JJ sighed, softly. “That was hardly anything, honestly.” He bit the inside of his cheek as he drove back to her parent’s house, trying to focus more on her than the thoughts running through his head. Charlie blinked hard, trying not to let any tears fall. “That was harsh, J.” He gave her a sad smile. “Been through worse, sweetheart.” He pulled into her driveway, thankful her parents were out for the night.  

They made it up the stairs and into her room, quiet, both not wanting to be the first to speak. “You’re sure the bottle didn’t hit your head?” JJ asked as he sat next to her on the bed, gently running his thumb over the small nick across her cheek. Charlie had her knees drawn up to her chest, closed off. “I’m sure.” He nodded, but kept a worried frown. 

“I’m proud of you, J.” She murmured, taking his hand. He raised his eyebrows, confused. “For what?” She gave him a small smile, for the first time since leaving the house. “You stood up for yourself.” He shrugged, keeping his eyes trained on the comforter. “Yeah, well. Thanks.” 

Charlie frowned and moved closer, pulling him into a tight hug. “You don’t have to see him again, JJ.” 

“I just -” JJ’s face crumpled and his voice cracked. “I don’t know why he’s not proud of me.” Charlie held him tighter. “JJ…” He pulled her into his lap to hold her closer, then buried his face against her shoulder. “I graduated high school, and college, and I got out of the Outer Banks on my own, I…” he faltered, letting out a single sob. “I don’t know what else he wants from me, Charlie. Am I not good enough?” 

“Oh, hon.” Charlie murmured. She nudged his chin up so he could meet her gaze. “You’re more than good enough, J. You’ve done all those things, but more importantly, you’re the best damn person I could ask for.” JJ pressed his forehead to hers, listening. “But I’m a mess.” 

She shook her head. “No, you’re not. You’re responsible with your job, and hard-working and creative. You notice all the little things and you’re kind to just about everyone you meet.” He ducked his head away in embarrassment, not used to the praise. “Charlie.” 

She continued, giving him a smile. “I can’t wait to be married to you and show you off even more, JJ. I’m so fucking proud of you.” He lifted his head and kissed her, hard. “I love you.” 

“And how lucky am I to experience your love?” Charlie told him, nudging her nose against his. She caught his lips in a gentle kiss, threading her fingers through his hair. “Stop, you’re going to make me cry.” JJ told her with a small laugh, tears welling up in his eyes again. Charlie kissed him again. “Love you always, J, don’t forget it.” He nodded, kissing her back. “Love you always.” 

[herstarburststories]

Meet Me In The Church

Kinktober day 18: Threesome

Suptober day 25: Villain

A/N: I know I'm a couple days late in kinktober, but I'll get there. A Very Supernatural Halloween is here! We are starting with @deanmonandnegansbitch 's request!

Pairings: Michael!Dean x reader, Anael x reader, Michael!Dean x reader x Anael

Warnings: fingering, playing with boobs, violence

“So this is your plan? Just go around destroying things until God shows up?” A strident voice reverberated through the abraded church's walls, causing flinch of yours in response. This place was abandoned, and the maps that Alice, your friend, picked up online didn't mention anything about a room underground. Obviously, that only made you follow the stairs towards the noise. “And then what?”

The response came through a velvet voice, “Even God can die.”

You kept walking, the distinguishing sounds of your friends' laughters being replaced by a louder tone of the two unknown people behind the black door in the end of the stairs. You could see a big crucifix, some word craved in it — an old pray, probably.

You should turn around and call your friends. Maybe even the police. Those people were hiding in a secret room. Not that you and your group were right to break in the old church, but it was for fun and not to plan a murder of God. In the bare minimum, the pair was high, drunk, and wasted.

Yet, you kept walking to the black door. Your legs trembling as if some lasting animal instinct in your body knew that wasn't a good idea. But you wanted to know what was happening, give names to the faces and get a story out of them. Where they actually talking about God or were they using nicknames as a gang? Why they wanted to kill God? What happened to get them to the point of arguing about their plan in a church in the middle of Mexico?

You followed their voices like a sailor would follow a siren cry. You just begged to any holy divinity left in the forgotten church not to let you have the same destiny of the sea men.

You were close enough to hear the loud huff, the woman's next words tangled with incredulity. She laughed like she wasn't able to discern if he was kidding or not. “I thought Lucifer was reckless, but you're literally throwing tantrums to get God's attention and then try kill him.”

“Do not compare me to Lucifer.” He almost howled. Your fingers touched the door, pulling it carefully; you knew those sort of building had many noises. You breached, taling a glance inside the place. The room looked old and dusty, except for the two standing there. A woman and a man, just like you pictured from the voices. You were amazed by their apparency. Tall, beautiful, and dominant. You didn't know why, their postures simply exhaled power. “Pay me some respect. Remember that you didn't pick me, I picked you.” An echo of something being thrown against the wall could be heard next, her body was slammed as she was held by her neck. The mam with a hat didn't seem to care. If anything, the cocky grin on his lips reported his clear amusement. The girl put grabbed his arms, gasping a bit. You couldn't just allow that. “I can easily get another angel to do your job if I find you useless like my brother did. His only mistake was to let you live. Lucifer, always such a sentimental.”

Your dry tongue was capable of pushing a word out of your mouth. It was supposed to come out as a warning when you spread the door open, but the quiet unsteady tone beatrayed you. “Hey!”

Both of them turned to stare at the intruder. He threw her body away with ease, green eyes fixated on you. “It seems like we have a guest.”

“You can't just do that to a woman, you abusive asshole.” You said through your teeth, walking to her and getting on your knees. “Are you okay?”

He rolled his eyes at your worry, but the girl seemed to appreciate it: her glossy eyes by the lack of oxygen were wide as they watched you, mouth slightly open in surprise. Anael wasn't used to kindness of any being towards her. In heaven, she was just another angel. On earth, she was sister Jo, humans were nice to her because they wanted to be cured, and the angels were disgusted by how quickly she manipulated her nature to play among the weaker kind.

But not you... You got yourself in the middle of a argument to assist her. Someone you didn't even know!

Anael couldn't help but welcome the weird sensation through her vessel. She felt shy, but st the same time warm. Was this what being cared about felt like?

“She isn't a human, little one. She's just a weak angel trying to make some sense out of her existence by bring closer to a higher being.” Michael's utterly calm tone brought her back to reality. He scoffed, looking up and down at the both of you. “You're right. That sounds a lot like a human.”

“You are crazy.” You hissed, grabbing the other's arm to help her getting up. Your skins tickled each other together. Your eyes were amiable when observating. “You can come with me. My friends are downstairs, we can take you to the police station.”

“You'd be getting ride of a problem for me.” Despite the disinterest, Michael arched an single eyebrow. You weren't the only curious in the church. He wanted to know more. “But fulfill my curiosity: What are you doing here? Why would you help someone you don't even know?”

“We're leaving.” You said, pulling Anael to go with you. Although she was on her feet, she didn't make a move to walk away with you. “We can keep you good. You don't have to stay here with that crazy.”

She didn't want you to die, the first being that showed her kindness somehow, but she knew better than mess with Michael's ego. Anael had teamed up with Lucifer to keep herself safe. She was a survivor. She could adapt anywhere, in any situation. The angel had to do that here too.

“He isn't crazy. We are angels.” She said, eyes glowing white. You pulled away from her hold with a shocked expression, her human skin almost hurt in response.

“Anael is an angel. I'm Michael, the archangel.” He corrected her, smiling proudly at his title. Michael took steps closer to you. “You didn't answer me.”

His green orbs turned bright blue as he glanced at you. One of his tough hands raising to meet your cheek in a singele touch that didn't seem fitting him, at all. That man looked like danger, still you couldn't stop yourself from leaning into his touch. The magnetic pull of something graceful trapped with his gorgeous being.

“I helped her because I thought she needed help.” You answered. “And I came here with a group of friends. We heard about the abandoned church and just came around.”

Michael nodded, a smuh smile on his plump lips.

“Wrong time, wrong place.”

His hand swiftly went to your neck, trace of goshbumps left behind. Anael knew what was coming next; she could take a couple hints, but you were just a fragile human.

“We could use her!” angel attempted to intervene, hoping Michael wouldn't notice the despair in hee voice. Anael wanted more of the emotions you brought out hee vessel, she wanted to be cared for.

“And have another burden to carry?” Michael huffed, his fingers wrapped around your neck as you watched they speaking. God, how did you allow this to happen? “Anael, I keep you around only to have an eye close to the other angels. Why would a human be useful to me?”

“You think to much.” Anael said, her malicious grin exhibiting a confidence she didn't have. “She could be useful for another things.” Her scooted closer to you two, pressing hee body to your side and biting your ear. You pressed your legs together, trying to contain your arousal. But, how could you? He was marvelous and was holding your neck, and she was pressing her against you as if she wanted to make one out of you two.

“Carnal desires.” Michael stated, considering how your body reacted. Interesting but not peculiar, despite Dean's clear positive noise about it. “I'm not my vessel. I do not require sexual activities all the time.”

Anael managed to pull you to her, while Michael pulled away. “You work so hard to make a better world, Michael. You deserve a break.”

You glared at her breathlessly. All your emotions, all your body were a mess for both the victim and the villain; Anael and Michael. You wanted both.

Anael's lips were tingling as she leaned in, ultimately pressing them against yours. It was sloppy, hurried, and a mess. Obviously her first kiss. But that didn't stop her from grabbing your neck and pushing you against the wall.

She wanted more. Anael invaded your mouth with her tongue, whimpered to your taste. You didn't know how to reach at first, but soon your hands were on her hips. Her chest pressed against yours made you whimper, you could feel every inch of her body.

Michael licked his lips as he watched the scene. Dean's mind has a whole section dedicated to such acts, especially videos including more than one woman. The archangel hadn't seen the appeal until you. You and Anael, two puny creatures, were attacking each other only to make him keep you alive.

Anael pulled away from you, the slick in her panties demonstrating exactly what her vessel wanted, what she wanted. You were not far from that, so you didn't protest when she ripped your shirt off. Good day not to wear a bra.

She let out a whimper, eyes full of adoration when she looked at your boobs. Anael just followed what her body wanted to to, guided by her vessel's memories,— in some of them, the woman that once had control on this body was moaning, squirming even for someone called Yas. She'd moan and whine as her partner played with her breasts. — moving foward, her mouth around your nipple as she sucked it.

You shameful loud scream left your body as your pulled her closer to your chest. You eyes were on Michael, how he watched you both like a predator studying his prey. If Anael was so eager, so rough biting and pulling your boob, you couldn't wait to see how Michael would be.

“Michael—” You whined, the fear of his reaction only soaking your panties more. “Please. I need you too.”

Usually, it was easy to descry his emotion's and Dean's. Dean was often a loyal dog, surrounded by selfless feelings and necessity. Now, though, Michael couldn't tell if it was his vessel or himself that let out a hungry groan at your words. All he knew was that he approached to contemplate the way your expression contoured in pleasure.

Your aura was delivered into delight, beautiful noises that reminded him a lot of his enemies falling left your mouth. Your legs pressed together in a silly try for friction catching his attention. Michael slid his hand inside your panties, fingers in a clandestine meeting with your wetness. It was a pleasant situation for him.

The archangel, just like the angel that had went to taste your other boob, craved for what you could give him. It was almost worship, you offering your body as the ancients did before. Michael put a finger inside you, enamored by how you moaned and moved, how your wetness squeezed his digit so good. He couldn't wait to get his hardening cock there.

But first, he needed to do something else. You seemed worthwhile, but he wasn't one for blind faith anymore. Michael pulled his finger to his mouth, licking it.

You tasted divine.

“No carnal desires? Guess your vessel doesn't agree with you.” Anael pulled away from you to provoke Michael, nodding at the hardness in his pants. You winced in protest.

Michael's answer came as a groan: “Shut up or I won't let you touch her anymore.”

You just wanted them to touch you now, after, and forever. You needed them. You were made to be given to them, you knew it in your bones. And then, they did. And you couldn't ever believe you had actually found a purpose.

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