#Flipper bag

[beeapocalypse]

rough take on fructis dragons post first failed ascension. the extra flippers+ears kind of push this over from leopard seal-y to sea lion-y. need to make it just a touch more weird

[sophiamcdougall]

I am never going to complain about Greek Duolingo again

I mean, I am. But still.

So, as some of you know, my family has been coming to this tiny Greek seaside village for several years. Just over a week ago I came out here with my mum, under the impression that early September, after the height of the summer heat, would be a good time to have a holiday. ANYWAY Storm Daniel had other ideas about that. Locally things are improving (I'm actually really pissed off about the disaster-porn tone of most English-language media coverage, but that's another post). The power is back on, there's running water most of the time, and though the latter is not drinkable, a truck from the government came and handled out free bottled water yesterday. But we are currently kind of stuck. Can't do tourist things. Can't go home. There aren't any local flights out until Saturday and the road to Thessaloniki is still closed.

So this evening, feeling kind of aimless and depressed, I go down to the nearest beach with a couple of binbags and start cleaning up in an effort to at least do something positive. I always try to do this at least once out here and obviously, after the storm, there's a lot more plastic and rubbish than usual.

At some point I find this large, round bit of metal - some kind of machinery part, I think -- that's too big for the bag, so I take it to the bins on its own, leaving the rubbish bag on the beach. And when I come back for it, something among the stones beside it moves.

Specifically, it pulls its head sharply inside its shell

So, meanwhile I've been trying to learn some Greek with the help of Duolingo.

I currently have a 33-day streak and... I have questions. Shouldn't I be able to use the past or future tenses by now? Shouldn't I be able to say "x is like y"? I can't do those things. But one thing I absolutely can say all day long is έχω μια χελώνα : I have a turtle.

This is far from the limit of Duolingo Greek's turtle-related content. "An obsession with turtles" is my mother's characterisation. I can inform you that the turtle is not a bird, and, improbably, that the turtle is drinking milk. I can introduce you to a turtle in company with a horse and an elephant. As far as Duolingo is concerned, it really is turtles all the way down.

Now this, you may be able to see, is not a turtle. It has claws rather than flippers. It is a tortoise. I know there are wild tortoises in Greece: my aunt once rescued a pair of them shagging in the middle of the road -- but that was up in the mountains. I've even seen one myself, but it was also on a road and very dead.

I am 95% certain they don't belong on beaches. There's nothing for it to eat, except, unfortunately, a lot of plastic. Even if it gets off the beach it will immediately find itself on a road where it could get hit by a car. I'm pretty sure it must have been washed down by the floodwater and has been just sitting there, dazed, ever since.

Now obviously the first thing I want to do on encountering this unusual animal is to go and tell my mummy, so I do. The tortoise immediately brightens her day. She agrees that the tortoise is not happy on the beach and needs to be taken somewhere safe. it gets surprisingly wriggly when picked up so we put it in a carrier bag with some grapes and cucumber and go looking for somewhere to rehome it.

We find a path leading up between the houses towards a likely-looking field, but before we get very far a dog in a yard goes berserk and a man's head pops over a fence and demands to know what we're doing. He does this in English, as evidently we're just that obviously tourists.

"I found a tortoise on the beach!" I explain. "We want to find somewhere to put it."

"A what," he asks.

"It's like a, you know," I begin and then to my astonishment I find myself saying... "μια χελώνα"

"Oh! A turtle!" he says.

"But from the land. δεν είναι χελώνα", [it is not a turtle,] I say, as I am worried he will tell me to put it back near the sea where I found it. As it turns out it actually IS a χελώνα, Greek does not distinguish between turtles and tortoises, but I don't know that; I can't even name the days of the week or identify any colours other than pink yet, give me a break.

The man's entire demeanour changes and thaws. He does not worry about my turtle-that-is-not-a-turtle conundrum. He knows where οι χελώνες come from and where η χελώνα μας belongs. He leads us through a gate into a courtyard area.

"[somethingsomething] μια χελώνα," he explains to the assembled onlookers, of whom there are, suddenly, a surprising number.

"ΜΙΑ ΧΕΛΩΝΑ!!!" crows the throng of delighted small children, who are, suddenly, everywhere.

"μια χελώνα!" I agree, accepting that at least for current purposes, that is what it is.

"Μπορούμε να δούμε τη χελώνα σας; [can we see your turtle?]" asks an adorable little girl, shyly, and I understand??

The children fucking love looking at the χελώνα and showing it to them is kind of magical?

I finally put the tortoise down on the grass of this wild area off to the side of the courtyard, and marvel aloud that it is weird that I barely know any Greek except how to say μια χελώνα.

"I think she will soon run off," a kind lady called Aspasia assures me, seeing I remain slightly anxious about its fate. "I don't know why I'm saying 'she'. I suppose because χελώνα is feminine in Greek."

"Yes! I know that!" I exclaim, thrilled.

"Well done!" she says. And also she asks if we are OK for drinking water after the storm and if we need any help with anything and is just generally incredibly lovely and now we know more of the neighbours!

So "μια χελώνα" has just become, by a long way, my most-used and most understood and all-around most conversationally successful phrase in Greek. So I guess I have to admit I was wrong to doubt Duolingo's wisdom: it is correct to be obsessed with turtles. And I concede that prior to learning how to count to ten or to distinguish right from left, the simple ability to yell the word TURTLE over and over again is, it turns out, a crucial element of the responsible traveller's social skills.

(I am pretty fluent in Italian and turtles haven't come up in conversation even once?)

[javierpena-inatacvest]

Tired

Summary: You had spent weeks looking forward to your date night with Javi, but once the day actually arrives, it seems like everything that could go wrong, has gone wrong. Lucky for you, Javi knows just how to make your day better.

Word Count: 5.8K

Pairing: Dad!Javier Peña x Wife!reader (Reader's nickname is Osita, no use of y/n)

Warnings: SMUT (18+) unprotected p in v sex, bathtub sex (hehehe) vaginal fingering, creampie, praise kink, big ole nasty breeding kink (listen, who am I to deny this man as many children as he wants), alcohol/being tipsy, food/eating, mom guilt, Chucho being the cutest Abuelito, Javi winning the award for dad/husband/dilf of the year 😩🥵

A/N: .... Well. Here we are again 🫠 When I tell you have made a rent free residency in my head... I do not kid you AT ALL. This has been my favorite story for our sweet little family so far. It also may or may not be how Harper is conceived OOPS 🤷🏼‍♀️ I love them, your honor.

Series Masterlist Never Too Late Masterlist

Every day for the past three weeks, you had been counting down to the 19th on your family calendar stuck to the side of your fridge, where the words “date night” had been scribbled in Javi’s messy handwriting. While you loved your girls, it had been a while since just you and Javi had a night to yourselves, so when Chuhco offered to babysit, the 4 of you couldn’t have been more thrilled- You and Javi got an evening alone, and Lucy and Elliot got to spend the night with their favorite Abuelito (Grandpa) at the ranch, getting lots of quality time with the animals, and one too many late night snacks. 

You had been looking forward to this day for weeks, and that’s why when the 19th finally arrived, you couldn’t have been more disappointed that everything that could have gone wrong that day, felt like it had. 

Lucy insisting she help with breakfast before preschool and dropping the rest of the egg carton on your kitchen floor. 

Elliot refusing to nap while Lucy was at school, leaving you with no time to get any of the things done around the house you had planned. 

The dog getting into the bathroom garbage and then throwing up 14 qtips on your carpet. 

The girls having a meltdown at the grocery store because they couldn’t bring home one of the balloons from the end of the checkout aisle. 

Going on an hour long manhunt for Flipper, Lucy’s favorite stuffed penguin she insisted had to go with her to Chucho’s, which ended up being hidden under a blanket in her bed. 

Snapping at the girls out of frustration as they chased each other through the kitchen while you were trying to finish making them dinner. 

Your pounding headache and tired body from feeling like you had been doing nothing but scrambling all day long just to stay afloat. 

And now, with Lucy teaming up with Elliot in their no-nap strike, you hadn’t even had time to shower or get ready for your date by the time Javi had gotten home, leaving you with barely under an hour  before you had to leave to make it to your dinner reservations on time. 

You wanted so desperately to just forget about the shitshow that had been your Friday, but try as you might, you couldn’t help but find yourself in an overwhelmed and grouchy mood. A mood that you did not want to be in on your long awaited date night with Javi, your internal battle of emotions only dampening your spirit further. 

As you heard the garage door open and Javi’s familiar footsteps make their way down the hallway, you fought with everything in you to try and put on the happiest face you could, as if you were going to be able to will yourself out of your funk to enjoy the night with your husband. 

“Hi, Hermosa.” Javi beamed, setting down his bag to wrap you in a hug, pressing a soft kiss onto your forehead before looking down at you in slight confusion, seeing that you were still in leggings and one of his oversized t-shirts, hair plopped up in a messy bun with very little time left before the 4 of you needed to head out to Chucho’s to make it to your dinner reservations. “Listen, baby, you know I think you look absolutely stunning in anything, but I do think the restaurant may be a touch nicer than my 20 year old t-shirt from college.” 

“I know, sorry, it’s just been- It’s been a day. The girls are in the living room playing, do you mind getting their bags and watching them until we have to go so I can shower?” You tried your best to force a smile up at Javi, who was now cradling your jaw in his large palm, tracing his thumb along your cheek. His big brown eyes stared back at you, almost as if he knew there was something off that you didn’t want to get into right now, planting another kiss in your messy hair as you let out a deeper than intended exhale. 

“Of course, Osita. Anything else I can do to help while you get ready?”” 

“No, just that. Thanks, Jav.” 

“DADDY!” Two pairs of tiny feet pattered down the hallway, Lucy and Elliot bolting towards their dad with arms outstretched, Javi now squatting down to greet them with a smile stretched across his face, almost as wide as theirs. 

“Ahhhh, there are my pollitas! C’mere mis amorcitas (my little loves).” Scooping the girls up in his arms, Javi picked up Elliot and Lucy, resting one on each hip, peppering little kisses over their faces, making them erupt in laughter. “Let’s head back to the living room so we can let Momma get ready before we leave for Abuelito’s house, sí?” 

“Okay, Daddy! Will you play horsies with us?” Lucy squealed, wrapping her little arms around Javi’s neck, giving him a hug. 

“Of course, Lucy Goosey.” Javi turned back to give you one last smile as he whisked the girls off to the living room, the sight of him carrying your daughters with such genuine joy and happiness being the first thing that had brought genuine relief today. 

The relief was short lived though, now looking up at the clock to see you were down to 45 minutes to shower and make yourself look like a halfway decent human. You frantically sped through your routine, cranking up the temperature of the water in the shower to as hot as it could go as you tried to wash away the remnants of your day. Unfortunately, the water could have been a million degrees and it wouldn’t have been enough- You forgot you were out of shampoo, having to settle for Javi’s instead, and after trying to speed shave, you realized as you were drying yourself off, you had completely forgotten to shave the bottom half of your right leg. 

You were thankful for the loud fan in your master bathroom, knowing it was enough to drown your tears as you stared yourself down in the mirror, feeling like an absolute mess. You didn’t feel excited, or pretty, or any of the things you wanted to feel before going out on your date. Truth be told, you felt like a shitty, worn down gremlin of a mom who just wanted to do nothing more than curl up in a blanket and hide away from the world for the rest of the night. Taking a long inhale, you shook your head, forcing yourself to wipe the wetness away from your cheeks to finish getting ready, and while with your hair and makeup done, and cute flowy dress wrapped around your body, you looked externally  better than you had an hour ago, internally, you still didn’t feel much better. 

You grabbed your coat and purse, making your way back into the living room to see Javi changed into navy dress pants and sport coat to match, with a white button down underneath, sitting on the couch with one daughter on each side, arms wrapped around them while they read “One Fish, Two Fish, Red Fish, Blue Fish” for what you were sure must have been the 17th time since you had gotten into the shower, considering it was the only book Lucy had wanted to read in the past week. Hearing you step through the doorway, Javi’s face lit up, biting down on his lip as he nudged the girls, pointing towards you. “Pollitas, look. Doesn’t Mommy look so pretty?” 

“You’re so beautiful, Mommy!” Lucy grinned, bolting up off the couch, wrapping her arms around your leg, squeezing it tightly. 

“So pweety, Mommy!” Elliot cooed, toddling over to join her sister, clutching around your other leg. 

You could feel the tears beginning to well behind your eyes again, seeing your little girls attached at your hip and your sweet husband staring back at you, wondering how in the world had given you 3 people who loved you so much on the days you loved yourself so little. You let out a little gulp, trying to choke back your sobs, leaning down to kiss each of the girls on the head. 

“Thank you Munchkins. Not as beautiful as my little chickens or as handsome as your Daddy, but that’s okay. You ready to go to Abuelito’s?” You mumbled through your words, your tone now making Javi’s brow scrunch in concern, giving you that look he gave you when he knew something was bothering you and you were being too stubborn to admit it. With enthusiastic squeals from the girls, they were practically running out the front door to the car, you following close behind them with their overnight bags, Javi following behind you just as closely, desperate to figure out what was on your mind. 

The drive to Chucho’s was fairly quiet besides Lucy and Elliot’s sing-along to the Lion King soundtrack that had been a permanent fixture in your car for the past few car rides. As the girls half babbled the words in the backseat, Javi reached over, resting his hand on your thigh and rubbing soft circles against your skin, giving you that look that said, “I know something’s wrong and you’re not telling me”, you exchanging back with an incredibly unconvincing, “It’s not a big deal, don’t worry about it.” 

As you pulled up to the Peña ranch, Chucho was already outside, waiting on the porch in his rocking chair, his face beaming just as sweetly as Lucy and Elliot’s as they ran out of the car to greet their grandpa. 

“Hola, nietas! (Hi, granddaughters!)” Chucho cooed, letting out a little grunt as Lucy and Elliot barreled into him, squeezing him in their grasp. “How are my favorite little ladies?” 

“Hi Abuelito!” 

The girls giggled as Chucho kissed them both on the cheek, smiling up at you and Javi as you carried the girls bags to the front door. “Oh díos mio, girls. Look at how nice your mamá and papá look tonight!” 

“Thanks Pops.” Javi laughed, setting one of the bags down on the porch. “You still okay if we come pick these two monsters up tomorrow morning?” 

“Monstruos? My sweet nietas? Never.” Chucho laughed, giving the girls a little shake as the two of them giggled at their grandpa. “Come by whenever you’d like. You know I am more than happy to have these two as long as you’ll let me.” 

“Thanks, Chucho.” You nodded, setting another bag down next to the one Javi had placed on the porch. “Do you need us to do any-” 

“Mija, I have everything I need. Don’t worry about a thing. Now go. The two of you deserve a nice night out. Me and the girls will be just fine, won’t we?” Chucho grinned down at Lucy and Elliot, bouncing in excitement. 

“Thanks, Dad. Be good for your Abuelito, sí? I told him if you’re naughty, you’re gonna have to go sleep out with the cows.” Javi teased, kneeling down to the girls level, giving them a little tickle and kiss before wrapping them in his arms. “Te amo, Pollitas. (I love you, little chickens).” 

“Bye girls, we’ll see you tomorrow, okay? We love you.” You joined Javi, crouching down to give your girls one last hug and kiss before they were already halfway through the front door, bursting into Chucho’s house with excitement.

You thanked Chucho again, making your way back to the car, pulling down the dusty, dirt driveway before making your way back on the road. “God, I’m convinced he loves those girls more than anything else on the face of this earth. I’m sure that means he won’t mind keeping them just a little longer tomorrow, huh, Hermosa?” Javi smirked, once again placing his hand on your thigh, giving it a little squeeze before realizing you had been staring out the passenger side window from the moment you had gotten in the car, trying desperately to snap yourself out of the terrible funk of your day you just couldn’t seem to shake. 

You felt the wetness beginning to pool under your eyelids, your breaths becoming shaky and weary, trying to pull yourself together from the tired, guilty and grumpy mess that you were, but it was no use. “Hermosa? You okay?” Javi asked again, confused by your silence, gripping your leg a little tighter, the sweet and gentle tone of his voice being the final straw that broke the camel’s back. You let your tears fall freely, your sobs becoming louder and heavier as you shook your head back and forth, Javi immediately pulling over the truck to the side of the dirt road, unbuckling his seatbelt and pulling you into a hug as you cried against his chest. “Baby. Baby what’s wrong? Hey, shhhh, it’s okay, Osita. I’m here, it’s okay.” 

Javi held you, letting you take your time to cry before trying to prod about the reason behind it, feeling you take long, exasperated deep breaths against him before pulling away, wiping away the tears that had been flowing down your face. “It’s been such a shitty day, Jav. I felt like such a bad mom, and I’m so tired and I’ve been looking forward to this date with you for so long and I’m just fucking exhausted. I’m so sorry. Our date hasn’t even started yet and I’m already ruining it.” It wasn’t long before you were sobbing again, leaning back into the broadness of Javi’s body as he immediately wrapped his arms around you, gently cradling the back of your head as you cried, feeling his own heart break from seeing how hard you were on yourself. 

“Hermosa…” He cooed, pressing you against his chest while he ran his fingers through your hair. “Baby… Listen to me, okay? You are not a bad mom. You are the most wonderful mother in the world to our girls. I have no fucking clue how you do what you do all day long, but there is no one else in the world I would rather have to help raise them with. You are so sweet and patient with them, God, they’re little mini versions of you and I couldn’t be happier. You are an amazing mom, you understand?” 

“It didn’t feel like it today. God, they were so tough today and it was exhausting, I yelled at them today for running in the kitchen and I felt so bad, I just- fuck- being a mom is so hard, Jav. I love it, I do, I love those girls so much, but today I felt like I was running for worst parent of the year award. And now I can’t even pull it together enough for our date that we’ve both been looking forward to. I’m so sorry, Javi.” 

“Osita, you are not ruining anything. Baby, if I get to spend time with you, I’m happy. I don’t care where we go or what we do, if I’m with you, it doesn’t matter. So, that being said,” he paused, tilting your head up towards him, gently wiping away your tears with his thumb, “we’re gonna go home, pick up pizza, open a bottle of wine, sit and soak in the tub for as long as you want to, and then I’m gonna make sweet, sweet love to my beautiful, amazing wife until she knows just how much I love and appreciate everything she does for our family. Okay?” You let out a little huff of laughter, a small smile finally appearing in the corners of your lips as you helped to wipe your tears away. 

“Are you sure? You planned dinner reservations and I-” 

“I’ve never been so sure. I love you, Osita. You are everything to me, and I promise I will spend the rest of my life trying to make sure you remember it.” 

“God, now you’re gonna make me cry even more, you dummy.” You laughed, Javi joining in as you gave him a playful nudge. “I love you too, Jav. You’re way too good to me. I don’t know what I’d do without you.” As Javi’s sweet brown eyes locked with yours, the weight in your chest began to ease, wondering how in the world you had gotten so goddamn lucky. Buckling himself back in, and shifting the car into drive, Javi turned around, changing directions back to home, resting your head against his shoulder. 

“Can we get breadsticks with the pizza, too?” 

“Whatever you want, baby, it’s yours.” 

With an extra large pizza and breadsticks in your lap, the drive back to your house was spent in a much lighter mood than your drive to drop off the girls at their grandpa’s. You switched out the Lion King disk in your CD player for Fleetwood Mac, the two of you happily singing along to “I Don’t Wanna Know” as you pulled back into the driveway of your house. 

You were greeted by your dog, Bear, wagging his tail in delight at your presence from the comfort of the couch, rolling over to show you his belly, Javi gladly obliging in giving him some scratches before Bear gladly put himself back to sleep, curled up against a throw pillow. “Old man could really give two shits about us being home, huh?” Javi laughed, giving the dog one last pat before making his way back over to you in the kitchen, already shoving a cheesy piece of pizza into your mouth. 

“I think he’s just as relieved from a night off from the gremlins as we are.” You laughed, catching a stringy piece of cheese that had fallen from your lips, making you and Javi both chuckle. “Is it bad if we eat pizza and drink wine in the tub?” You raised an eyebrow at Javi, gesturing towards your food, anxious to take a relaxing soak, your tub used more frequently by Lucy and Elliot than either of the two of you these days. 

“Of course not, Osita. Why don’t you get stuff ready upstairs and I’ll bring wine and pizza up? What wine do you want?” 

“I mean… It is date night. Should we break out the nice wine the Murphy’s got us the last time they came over? We did say we were saving it for a special occasion.” You smirked, holding up your half eaten piece of pizza to toast to your failed date night out, you and Javi both shaking your heads in laughter. Javi reached up in the cabinet above the fridge, pulling out the bottle and examining it before getting out a bottle opener and popping off the top. 

“God, the amount of shit Steve would give me to know that this got opened to be drank in our fucking bathtub…” 

“What he doesn’t know won’t hurt him.” You winked, giving Javi a kiss on the cheek before taking the last bite of your pizza. “Meet you upstairs?” 

“Can’t wait.” 

After making your way up the stairs and into your master bathroom, you cranked on the water in the tub, making it hot enough for your liking, but not hot enough Javi would complain about it being the surface of the sun. You thought that you had another set of bubbles to put in the bath besides the ones that you used for the girls, but after digging around in the bathroom cabinet, you had to settle for the bright pink, birthday cake scented bottle Lucy had insisted on getting during your last shopping trip. After the tub was full and bubbles were mixed and foaming, you stripped your clothes, dropping them on the tile floor in a heap next to the bathtub before tying up your hair and stepping into the water, sinking down to your neck and letting out a deep sigh as you closed your eyes in relief. You could feel the tension beginning to ease from your body, taking a moment to sit in the sweet silence before you heard Javi’s footsteps trailing up the stairs, gently swinging open the bathroom door, pizza and wine in his hands and a soft smile on his face.  

“Give me one more second, okay?” Setting down his things on the counter, Javi exited back out of the bathroom, quickly returning with a handful of candles and lighter, placing them around the room and lighting them all before turning off the overhead lights, the light of orange and yellow flames flickering against the walls in a soft, warm glow. 

“Wow, didn’t know I was going to the spa tonight. Very romantic of you, Jav.” You grinned, crossing your arms over the edge of the tub, resting your chin overtop of them as you stared at Javi, now undressing himself of his own clothes, throwing them into the pile with yours. “And the spa has hot naked men bringing me pizza and wine? God, I should come here more often.” You giggled, looking up at him in admiration as he passed you over your plate and glass before grabbing his own and stepping in to join you, sliding down the porcelain on the opposite side of the tub. “Thank you for this, Javi. I know it’s not what we had planned, but I really needed this.” 

“Of course, mi amor (my love).” Javi smiled at you, bringing his slice of pizza halfway up to his mouth before taking an over exaggerated sniff of the bubbles below him. “Why does the bath smell like a birthday cake?” 

“I thought I had other bubbles but the only ones I could find were Lucy and Ellie’s so we have birthday cake flavored bubbles.” The two of you laughed, shaking your heads as you bit down into your pizza, knowing that there was no one else in the world you could be happier to spend a night in a tub full of birthday cake bubbles with. 

After you had finished your dinner and were a few more glasses of wine in, you had shifted in the tub so that you were settled in between Javi’s legs,  resting with your back against his chest and leaning your head back on your shoulder with his hands wrapped around your body, the two of you chatting and laughing away, not knowing or caring how much time had gone by. You had covered everything from Javi’s day at work, to vacation plans, now to Lucy’s interest in soccer, which had been a hot topic of conversation. 

“I know, I was talking to some of the other moms at the preschool about it, and they said they’d have their girls do soccer too, they just don’t have anyone to coach. They’re trying to find one of the dads to do it so they can start in the spring.” 

“Are you trying to get me to coach a soccer team?” Javi laughed, rubbing his hands up and down the length of your arms. “Baby, I know absolutely nothing about teaching 4 year olds how to play soccer, you would be better at it than I would.” 

“Well exactly, they’re 4 Jav, it can’t be rocket science. I think you would be good at it. You know Lucy would whip everyone into shape to make sure they listened to you.” 

“Honestly, she would probably be a better coach than I would.” 

“She honestly would. I’m being serious though, baby! You’re so sweet and patient with the girls. Plus, it’d be good eye candy to watch from the sidelines.” You giggled, tilting your head up towards Javi, biting down on your lip. 

“Good eye candy, huh?” Javi smirked back down at you, sliding his hand down your arm to your thigh, giving it a gentle squeeze. 

“Mmmmhhmmm. I could get to show off my hot, handsome husband and what a great dad he is for his girls. Make all the other moms jealous.” You cooed, shifting your body to face towards him, straddling over his lap, running your hands through the dark curls at the nape of his neck. You could feel Javi’s hands beginning to shift with you, now wrapping his arms around the small of your back, grabbing a fistfull of your ass, kneading the soft flesh in his hands. You tilted your head, letting your lips land tenderly on his before his tongue was swiping in the opening of mouth, the tenderness transforming into a passionate electricity. You let your hands roam down his neck towards his chest, sliding down under the water over his stomach, palming at his dick, already half hard in your hands. “Such a good Daddy, that maybe…” You moaned in between kisses, “Maybe it’s time for you to give me another baby.” 

Javi paused, his eyes going wide at your comment, his jaw almost hanging open as he let out a little gulp, his Adam's apple bobbing in his throat. “Hermosa… Baby, are you serious?” He couldn't help but let a boyish grin escape from his lips, his face lighting up brighter than a little kid on Christmas. 

You and Javi had agreed you had both wanted a third, but decided to hold off until Elliot was past the 18 month mark before trying again. Javi had been dying for another kid, and had been using as much self restraint as he could to keep from asking you every day if the two of you could start trying for your third child after Elliot had turned a year and a half. It felt ironic that the circumstances you found yourself in to ask him if he wanted to have another baby were because of how exhausted you were from the two you already had, but God, after thinking about him coaching that soccer team, there was something about the thought of your sweet, loving husband with another baby attached to his hip that made any ounce of willpower you had left absolutely dissipate. If Javi wasn’t hard enough from your touch, the thought alone of getting you pregnant again was more than plenty. 

“You wanna put another baby in me, Jav?” You smirked, wrapping your hand around his cock, gently stroking it as he groaned, letting his head fall to your shoulder, quietly laughing to himself, almost as if he couldn’t believe his ears. 

“Fuck me…”  Javi hissed, tugging you closer towards him, the sudden movement making water splash over the sides of the tub. One of the hands grabbing your ass snaked around to your front, grazing over your hip and inner thigh before making its way between your legs and circling against your clit. “Fuck, I want to so badly. It’s all I’ve been thinking about these past few weeks, how much I wanna grow our family, give the girls another sibling, see you all beautiful and pregnant carrying our perfect baby again. Will you let me, Osita? Let me fuck another baby into you, Momma?” The pressure of his fingers on your sensitive bundle of nerves had you moaning, letting out a soft whimper as his two fingers pressed deep into your heat, slowly rocking his fingers along the soft spongy spot inside you that he knew made you crumble. 

“Oh my God, yes. Fuck- fuck, I need you to, Javi, please.” You whined, Javi’s mouth now working its way down to your breasts, sucking and flicking at your pebbled nipples as his fingers fucked into you deeper and harder, burying your head in the crook of his neck, the sensation of his tongue and hands making your pussy begin to flutter. The heel of his palm dug deeper into your clit, pressure building in your belly as your hips rocked against his hand, each roll making more and more water overflow onto the floor as you braced yourself, digging your fingers into the skin of Javi’s broad back as that sweet and familiar tingle built at the base of your spine. 

“That’s it, sweet girl, I know you’re close. Give me one on my fingers and then I swear, I’m gonna fuck you so full of me, I’ll get you pregnant tonight.” Javi grunted through gritted teeth, feeling your cunt begin to clench around his fingers, your breathing becoming heavy and shaky as you moaned. Suddenly, you felt the coil in your belly snap, making you cry out as your orgasm ripped through your body, flooding every inch of you with euphoria and pleasure as you reached your peak. 

Javi placed languid kisses and nips down your neck and collarbone as you slumped into him, coming down from your high with labored breaths, finally composing yourself enough to sit up to see the satisfied grin spread across his cheeks, a lustful and mischievous look pooling in the dark brown of his eyes as he stared at your blissed out face. “How much you wanna bet?” You smirked, biting down on your lip before leaning in to tug at Javi’s earlobe with your teeth as you scooted closer over his lap, shifting your body up in the water of the tub to hover over his cock, carefully guiding it to line up with your entrance. 

“Bet what, Osita?” 

“Bet that you get me pregnant tonight?” You mewled, slowly sinking yourself down onto Javi’s length, savoring the sweet sting and stretch of him inside you until you had bottomed out, feeling his tip brush against your cervix. “That 9 months from now, we’ll have one more baby that gets to fill another room in our house?” Gently, you began swirling your hips, letting Javi’s cock stay buried deep inside you, splitting you open in the best way possible, almost making you speechless. 

“Jesus Christ, Hermosa…” Javi sighed, digging his fingertips into your sides, guiding your bottom half as it rolled in his lap. “I’d bet anything, because I’m gonna fuck myself so deep inside you, it’ll take. You want another baby? I’ll give you another baby, Osita. I’ll give you anything you want. My beautiful wife, amazing mom to our girls, fuck- you deserve everything.” 

Moans escaped from both your parted lips as you began to raise yourself up and down along Javi’s length, now punching along the spot inside you that had your mind going numb. His fingers circled against your already sensitive clit as he thrust up into you, the feeling of him all consuming, even as the lukewarm water of the bath swirled between you. You draped your arms around his neck as his free one wrapped around the small of your back, your bodies melting together as one as you pushed and pulled with each stroke. 

You could feel your cunt beginning to clench again, heat blooming in your belly with each swirl of your hips, tugging at the damp curls of Javi’s hair at the nape of his neck as his thrusts became more frantic and sloppy, telling he was just as close to reaching his own high as you were. “Fuck, Javi, fuck- I’m so close baby, oh shit- don’t stop.” You whined into the crook of his neck, pulling yourself even tighter against his body. 

“I’m not gonna stop, Osita. Not gonna stop until fuck you full of me and fuck another baby into you. That what you want, Hermosa?” Javi grunted through gritted teeth, pounding deeper and faster into you with each word, the water from the tub sloshing and spilling onto the tile floor below you. 

“Yes, fuck- oh my god, yes, fuck Javi, oh shit- fuck baby, I’m gonna-ahhhhhhhh.” Once again, your orgasm radiated through every inch of your body, making your legs shake and mind go blank as you cried out Javi’s name, practically melting into him as he continued to thrust into you with a desperate ferocity, close to his own end. Javi’s arms wrapped around your back, caging you against his chest, fingertips gripping in the soft skin of your shoulder blades as he fucked into you, babbling incoherently. 

“That’s it, sweet girl. Fuck, I’m close too, Hermosa. Oh fuck- God, I can’t wait to see you pregnant again. So fucking beautiful carrying our baby. You’re such a- fuck- good mom to our girls, my fucking perfect wife, I’m so luck-ahhhhhhh.” With one final thrust inside you, you could feel Javi painting your walls in his spend, milking himself of every last drop, his breath ragged and heavy as he leaned into you, your chests rising and falling in sync as you came to. 

“Well…” You laughed to yourself, shaking your head against Javi’s shoulder where it had been resting, now lifting up to grin at his blissed out face, “Safe to say we should probably clean this tub out before we let the girls use it again.” 

Javi joined in your laugher, the two of you giggling to yourselves over your antics, peeking over the side of the tub to see the giant puddles pooling on your bathroom floor. “I mean, the water had soap in it, so at least the floor is clean.” Javi smirked, cupping his hand around your jaw, pressing his smiling lips to yours. 

“Clean, really? Not like we need any extra towels or anything to wipe up all the water we spilled all over the floor because now it’s just magically clean, huh Jav?” You teased, giving him a playful nudge, Javi rolling your eyes at your heavy dose of sarcasm. “We probably should get out and wipe all of this up. Any longer in here and I think our future kid is gonna come out just as pruney as we are.” 

“Dork. I’ll clean everything up. Why don’t you go put on pajamas and I’ll meet you in bed, okay?” 

“Javi, I was just teasing. I am half the reason for this mess, I can help clean it up and-” 

Javi silenced the rest of your sentence with his lips, capturing the rest of your words in his mouth. “I know you can, Osita. I want to. Let me clean up. Can’t have you working too hard, Momma. Gotta make sure you stay nice and rested so you can grow baby number 3.” 

“You are ridiculous, you know that? You just gonna magically will me to be pregnant after tonight?” You sighed, laughing as the two of you made your way out of the tub, wrapping yourselves up in the fluffy towels you had left out on the bathroom counter, Javi draping his towel around the both of you as he leaned down to press a soft kiss into your messy hair. 

“I told you, I’d bet you anything. 5 bucks.” 

“5 bucks what, smartass?” 

“5 bucks says you don’t get your period and we find out you're pregnant by the end of the month.” 

“I’ll tell you one thing, if you are anything, Javier Jesús Peña…” You smirked, pressing up on your tiptoes to peck another kiss on his lips, “it’s confident. I hope you’re right, but I’ll take your bet.” 

If Javi was also anything, it wasn’t wrong. Because 4 weeks later, after a missed period and 3 sets of double pink lines on your pregnancy tests, baby Peña number 3 was on their way. So when you handed Javi 5 dollars and a little white box with one of your tests, you couldn’t help but laugh to know that even though your future daughter was the product of a date night gone wrong, it couldn't have felt more right knowing you were lucky enough to grow your family by one more with the man you loved more than anything else in the world.

Taglist:

@cool-iguana @rhoorl @whyjuliaaa @bbiophiliaa @pertinentpostmortem @angelofsmalldeath-codeine @pedrobaby @fatima-marisa @beboldbebravethings @poodlebae @kittenlittle24 @3sriracha @jungchloee @perennialdoll247 @prettyinpunk85 @partyofone3413 @harriedandharassed @pedrohoe04 @theorganasolo @endlessthxxghts @beware-my-thorns @missladym1981 @messinadress @milly-louise @jay-zzle @the-one-with-the-grey-color @persephone-girl @bitchesuntitled @pedropascallvr @millennial-teenybopper

[simsterslife]

 Relaxing Spring Evening ☀️

✼ umbrellas (1)(2)(3) | swing seat | bbq (1)(2)

✼ charcoal bag, sauce, tongs & skewers | picnic table | fire pit

✼ snorkelling mask and flippers & kids swimming pool | buckets (1)(2) | beer crate

✼ melon board & lemons | chairs (1)(2)(3) | basket with blanket*

*early access

Credit goes to amazing CC creators @aroundthesims @maxsus @syboubou @pinkbox-anye @peacemaker-ic @littledica @mel-bennett @s-imagination @myshunosun @felixandresims @soloriya @syboubou @harrie-cc @imfromsixam @plushpixelssims

[saccharineomens]

Laimay Day 24: Selkie AU

I didn’t finish my drawing for this prompt, but I did write a little fic for it! (~1.6k words)

—

Laios had been kicking himself all morning. How could he have been so careless as to forget his notebook on the beach the night before? He’d been half-asleep by the time he’d dragged himself off to his van, but that book was his *lifeblood*. It was more important to him than his next meal, or his parents, or his *sister*.

Well, that was a lie. Nothing was more important to him than his sister. Still, inside that notebook were all the coordinates of sightings, details on all the local legends, contact information of the park ranger, and various jokes and theories he had about the habits of different Cryptids. He couldn’t *believe* he’d been so careless with it, and Laios nearly tripped in his hurry down the rocky cliff side. The tide had come in last night, and with just his luck, it would have waterlogged the notebook if not pull it out to sea. He should have invested in waterproof paper, he *knew* he should have, but working odd jobs every other month didn’t pad his pockets as much as he’d like. 

His camera thudded against his ribs and gravel scattered as he hopped down a boulder and straightened, looking around desperately. He was right in this area last night, observing the bioluminescent algae that washed ashore. Laios caught his breath as he took note of his surroundings. Ahead, the water stretched out endlessly, the waves shallower after the tide had receded. Off to the north, a herd of seals were bathing in the sun-warmed rocks. Laios leaned to look into the reeds beside the path, searching for a glimpse of the tattered yellow cover of his book, but there was nothing but some littered chip bags and a broken beer bottle. 

“*Come on*,” he muttered, eyes sweeping the rocky shoreline as he walked further out to the water’s edge. The boulders were smoother and more damp, here, and his pace slowed. A few seagulls circled overhead, and to the south some were pecking away at something. A glimmer of hope flickered in his ribs as he picked up speed, jogging to where the birds huddled, but as one cawed irritably at him and took off, it revealed they were picking at nothing more than a dead fish. Laios’ stomach sank, heat draining from his face, and he swayed. *No, no.* No despair yet. Laios swallowed and looked back out at the ocean. *Think, Laios, think!* Maybe he’d dropped it on his way to the van, and it was on the trail somewhere? Maybe he’d passed it on his hurry to get back here. 

Laios’ thoughts were interrupted by a dark shape breaking the waves, and he instinctively grabbed for his camera. He hadn’t turned it on yet — *stupid* — and had to take his eyes off the water to find the button with his finger. The screen lit up, and Laios quickly removed the lens cap and stowed it in his bag before lifting his head.

A brown seal was coming up the beach at an alarming pace, round body lunging forward and flippers splashing with every landing. It…seemed like it was coming right towards Laios. Angling the camera, he took one quick photo before stepping aside to keep some distance between him and the animal. Seals could be nasty, and as cool as it would be to see one up close, their sharp teeth was much less friendly than their round, adorable faces. Laios wasn’t expecting the seal to change course, rounding toward him again, and his heart skipped in fear. He started backing up, trying to keep an eye on the beast, but the rocks beneath his feet shifted unevenly. He caught a weird movement from the seal in his periphery, almost like it was going on it’s hind legs like a dog, it’s flipper moving to a shoulder — *seals can’t do that* — and when it pulled away it revealed a pale flash of bare flesh. A blonde head rose, green eyes fixed on his, Laios’ heel caught on a stone and the world spun as he crashed backwards, his shout of pain echoing when his skull banged against cold rock, but he *had to look, he needed to see*—

Laios’ vision swam, he must be hallucinating, because the seal had become a woman — a *naked* woman — scrambling up the shore with eyes wide. Laios kicked at the rock below him, trying to get back to his feet, to run, or attack, or *something*. 

“Hey, you! You, human!” A voice? From the woman. Who was much closer now and *startlingly* nude, a seal’s skin folded over her arm and breasts swaying in her excitement — he quickly averted his eyes to focus on the swift movement of her arm as she shoved something into his face. “This is yours, right?!”

Laios blinked. The woman waited patiently for him to respond, but her grin lit the grey sky. A human woman from a seal. A selkie? *No way.* Laios’ head felt like seaweed in a current, trying to process what was in front of his face. The blonde, pretty!, woman was holding something white five inches from his eyes, and when he squinted he could make out his own handwriting.

“My notebook?”

“Yes, the thing you’ve been writing in this whole time.” The seal woman shuffled forward again and Laios felt his face get hot before she just sat back on her feet, flipping through the notebook with great interest. “You left it out here yesterday. You’re a writer! You’re a, a, what’s the word, a scientist?”

Laios wanted to laugh. He’d dropped out of college before he got anywhere near his degree. “Not exactly.”

“You’ve been studying us, right? You have that thing.” She pointed at his camera. “Humans always have those, but they aren’t like you. They usually take ‘pictures’ and leave, but you’ve been here two weeks.” She lifted the book and pointed at it. “Look. Not a lot of humans come here for *us*.”

It was his page on selkies. “You can read?”

She huffed. “That’s not the point!” She was right. The woman tossed the notebook at him and it hit his stomach with a wet little *plop*. “Look, the way I see it, we can help each other out. *I* l want to learn more about human technology, and *you* want to learn more about *us*, right? We can help each other out!”

Her long blonde hair was plastered to her skin, her pupils weren’t as large as Laios had hypothesized, and she didn’t seem to feel the cold air at all. Laios’ brain finally felt like it was returning to his body, checking the numbers and booting up the right programs to function. The seal’s pelt draped over her arm was fascinating, and had most of his interest, but she turned her body to tuck it behind her as a look of suspicion pursed her lips. 

“Look, do we have a deal?”

Laios hummed and picked up his notebook. The pages were soaked, but the ink was still legible in most places. If he dried it out right, he might be able to salvage most of it. “Why me?” He wasn’t normally one to look a gift horse in the mouth, but curiosity got the best of him.

“You don’t seem as dumb as the other humans,” the woman said, tilting her head thoughtfully. “Your notebook was right about some things. You call them ‘Bigfoot’, but they don’t come to the ocean if they can avoid it. They don’t speak like we do, they aren’t as good at mimicking humans.”

Laios’ eyes bulged. “So you aren’t human at all? And—Bigfoot’s *real*? You’ve met him—them? Them, *multiple*? Where do they nest?! Do they have family groups like apes do? Can you introduce me to one of—“

“*Shhh!*” The woman’s forefinger pressed to his mouth, and he froze. She was smiling mischievously, like she knew something he didn’t, which he supposed she did. “Does that mean you’re going to take the deal? You help me, I help you?”

Laios nodded enthusiastically, and the woman removed her finger with a satisfied smile. “What use does a seal have for human technology, though?”

Her expression soured in suspicion and she shifted away from him again, hand going to her sealskin. “That’s not really any of your business,” she said haughtily. Now that it appeared he wasn’t going to run she seemed to relax more, pulling her hair over her shoulder and starting to comb her fingers through it. “I’m not usually so careless, but when I saw you had come back to the shore I knew I had to hurry before you left again. My name’s Marcille, by the way.”

“Laios,” he responded, and it was hard to know where to look at her. She wasn’t human, according to her, but she still *looked* like any woman off the street at first glance. How did the evolution of selkies that passed as human compare to the evolution of humans themselves? Did selkies come first? Did that pelt of hers look just like a normal skin, or was it visibly magical in some way? Laios sat up, but Marcille froze and she scowled at him, so he raised his hands in supplication. “Can I look at your skin?” When he tentatively reached for it she smacked his arm away.

“Rude! Don’t you know to work your way up to those sorts of questions?!” Her eyes sparked with anger, and Laios rubbed star-struck at his arm where it stung. 

“I can do that,” he grinned. He wrote all his questions in his notebook, but he wouldn’t even need it at this point. Were selkies obligate carnivores, or omnivores? Did it depend on what form they were in? “Why don’t we start with dinner? That’s a common way for humans to get to know each other.” He offered a hand out to her, and after a moment of consideration she smiled and took it.

“Sounds good. Great to meet you, Laios.”

[waywardstation]

Cold to the Touch

Phione Akari AU

As a phione, it's hard for Akari to find anything fun or entertaining to do. But she still manages, even if it's at Ingo's expense.

I wrote this after I got a request to write about something for this AU with lower stakes and let Akari have some fun, after putting out several segments that were pretty stressful and sad for the characters. And if possible, to have her prank Ingo. I did my best hopefully!!!

OR read here on AO3!

AND check out the Phione Akari AU masterpost!

Enjoy!

————

There were many, many things Akari hated about being a Phione. 

Many changes. Many limitations. Many problems. 

But this was not one of them. 

In fact, she found that this was quite fun.

“And if I could have two of those leek salves, and a half-bag of those dried apricorns?”

Choy grabbed two small purple bottles and began weighing out a bag of the nut fruits as Ingo browsed the wares at the storefront, pointing out what he wanted to purchase. While there wasn’t much room with everything out on display, he did his best to keep himself under the protection of the storefront’s awning — the rain was coming down hard today.

And as much as he disliked the idea of dragging all of this stuff around with him in the coastlands, especially in weather like this, he had promised Akari he would actually take better care of himself out there now while continuing his search.

No more sleeping on the ground, or against trees and boulders. No more living off whatever he picked off of bushes and trees. No more foregoing needed sleep for a few more hours of searching. No more sacrificing his health when he didn’t need to.

“Anything else for you today?” Choy asked as he placed them down next to the other items that had been requested.

“Oh, one last thing; do you perhaps have a lightweight roll or sleeping mat?” Ingo searched past the shopkeeper at the storage shelves behind him, leading Choy to look over his shoulder — he could see what looked like a few different sleeping rolls. “Like the ones the Ginkgo Guild members are equipped wITh-!”

An awkward jerk as Ingo scrunched his neck into his shoulder, crashing the sentence with an odd jump. A subsequent squeak from somewhere in his coat collar, quiet enough for only Ingo to hear.

“Everything alright?” Choy looked back from the shelves, giving him a look halfway between confusion and concern.

“I uh, apologize. Unfortunately, too many nights sleeping on the ground has left me with a sore spine, is all.” Ingo tentatively answered, rubbing at his neck. “It… pulls sometimes. I’m sure you can now understand my need for an adequate sleeping mat.”

“Oh yes, of course,” Nodding his head, Choy stepped away from the shelf he had been approaching. “I understand! These rolls might be too thin; I have some thicker ones in the back that might be better for that. I’ll be right back with one.”

Ingo watched the man disappear behind the rows of shelves, making sure he was out of earshot before he hooked his lapel with a finger and pulled it back.

“Miss Akari, please!” He whispered into the collar of his coat. He could not see her and he was too saturated with rainwater to feel where she was, but he knew she was in there somewhere; he could hear her snickering. “You know I’m not fond of that!”

“Phi-phi!” She retorted. While Ingo had no idea what she was saying, the bubbly tone of amusement in her voice indicated she wasn’t taking him seriously.

He was sure it was because of a phione’s adaptability to water and its strange thermoregulatory characteristics — Professor Laventon had said something about it — but whenever it rained, Akari became just as cold as the falling water that mixed with her. Like ice cold. It turned her little flippers into something more like the freezing hands of death. And she unfortunately found it funny to -

“AH!” The frigid touch of Akari’s ribbon-like appendage (now more comparable to the frozen fingers of a froslass) against his neck made him flinch before forcing himself back down into a whisper. “Miss Akari-!”  

“Warden?” Choy called out from the back. “Are you sure you’re alright?”

“Not to worry, it’s simply an instance of my neck bothering me again!” Ingo lied through his teeth. One last quick whisper into his coat collar, towards quiet giggling. “Please-”

“Alright, I’ve got a couple here that you can look at!” Returning from the back shelves, Choy heaved a bundle of various mats onto a display table with a grunt. “All varying degrees of sturdiness, but maybe you’ll like one of them.”

Ingo browsed the mats, pressing down on the different materials and lifting edges to test heaviness. Some were too firm to be kind to his back, and some were too bulky to comfortably carry. None of them seemed very suitable for him, honestly... 

As he browsed, Ingo couldn’t help but notice he was actually being left alone. No icy jabs, no startling coldness. Maybe Akari was listening to him now. it was nice not feeling the freezing hands of death grasping at the back of his-

“GHh-!” Ingo jerked awkwardly again, tucking his chin down against his chest and hissing through his teeth. He spoke too soon.

“Are you sure you wouldn’t like a thicker mat? Or at least a neck roll for support? It seems…” Choy stalled for a moment, filtering his words into something kinder. “Bad.”

“No no, I can assure you it’s temporary! It’s simply rather distracting, ” Ingo emphasized the last word quite forcefully, rubbing at his neck. “I’m confident that’s the last time it’ll happen.”

“Maybe at least have the medical corps look at it before you go.” Choy did not sound any less concerned.

“Perhaps I will make that detour,” Ingo brushed it off kindly. He was going to have to make this quick, it seemed Akari was intent on embarrassing him in public just for some amusement. “I apologize for having you drag all of these mats out, but I may have to go with one of the previous, lighter alternatives.”

“Not a problem,” Choy pushed the heavier rolls aside and turned to pull down one he had initially suggested; a simple green one, tied with wound rope. “This mat’s good then?”

“I believe so,” Already searching through the inner pockets of his coat for money, Ingo only gave the roll a passing glance to confirm. “I think that’s everything I need.”

“Sounds good,” Choy lugged the mat up onto the table, bunching it with everything else he had requested and quickly reevaluating it all. “Alright, together that’ll be seven-thousand six-hundred.”

“Mm-hmm,” Head down, Ingo began counting out what he had in his hands. He should have enough…

“Oh, but wait-”

Thinking something was wrong, Ingo glanced up only to see Choy setting a small box on top of his pile of supplies.

“Just a few honey cakes, no extra charge.”

Ingo blinked, not catching the sudden tiny squeak from within his coat. “No charge? Thank you, and please understand I am not at all ungrateful for the offer, but… I’d like to know why?”

“Well, because I appreciate your business!” Short and simple, Choy clasped his hands together.

Ingo sized up the box; it wasn’t terribly big, but it certainly wasn’t small either. Truely, it was a kind gesture, but to him, all he saw was more cargo to lug around, more weight to tug at his back. And he wasn’t sure he could keep it from becoming soggy in the rain, anyways. 

And he couldn’t help but feel that it was perhaps a pity gesture; he knew Choy had seen him practically drag himself through Jubilife’s gates the other day.

“I greatly appreciate it, but I couldn’t in good conscience, really.” Ingo gave Choy an apologetic, flat-lined smile, putting up a hand. “Those are your wares! Please, keep them.”

Another small squeak, and this time Ingo heard it. He preemptively placed his hand over his neck just before she could touch him, her icy flippers patting his fingers instead.

“Then take it as a gift of support, please.” Choy extended a more genuine tone now, he confirmed what Ingo had suspected about it being a pity gesture. “I know what all of these supplies are for, Warden. You’ve been doing so much to find Akari, and this weather definitely isn’t making things any easier for anyone right now. And I can empathize; all this sudden rain’s been making it hard for Yui today. She can’t seem to shake this terrible sickness that won’t leave her alone, and it’s been really difficult lately to-”

“AAa -HaAH-!” Ingo interrupted with an embarrassingly loud shout, suddenly jerking forward with scrunched shoulders as both hands frantically clamped against his neck. “Just- Ahck! Stop it-!”

“...I’m sorry?” Staring at Ingo in bewilderment, the appalled tone of Choy’s voice was painfully shame-inducing. The heavy atmosphere pressed down on Ingo’s shoulders, the rain in his coat suddenly pulling down on him like heavy weights.

Oh Arceus. Did he really just laugh while Choy was empathizing with him over his sick wife? 

Did he really just say stop it??

“Ahem!” Ingo cleared his throat gratuitously into a fist, his face burning like fire as he realized what he just did. “M-my deepest apologies for that! Illness is terribly unfortunate, and I hope for nothing but a quick recovery for your poor wife! I absolutely didn’t mean to- Please, excuse me for a moment!”

“Right.” Choy crossed his arms, eyes narrowed and brows furrowed as Ingo stiffly hurried out into the rain, rushing around the right corner of the store.

Reaching the bridge that led to the housing units, Ingo stopped and made sure no one else was around to hear. Reaching into his coat collar and fishing Akari out of it, he held her close to his (still very red) face with one hand, sternly shaking a finger at her with the other. “Miss Akari!” Don’t- don’t do that! Just because I said no cold shocks, that doesn’t mean you can start tickling m-!”

“Phi-phi!” She squeaked back at him avidly. He didn’t understand, but with her troubled eyes and tone, he could clearly see she wasn’t laughing anymore — she probably realized how inappropriate the timing of that was, regardless of how accidental it was.

Ingo’s frown pulled, his eyes narrowing from behind the raindrops now dripping off his hat’s brim. “Forgive me if I’m wrong, Miss Akari, but I recall you fervently requesting me to keep you both concealed and inconspicuous while in Jubilife. I’d say this is making it difficult to do either!”

“Phi!” Freezing cold flippers wrapped around his thumb as she hugged it tightly. She often did that when expressing gratitude or apologetics to him, an extension of hugging him as a whole. Her guilty eyes indicated it was clearly the latter reason, this time.

“It’s alright, just please, please, don’t repeat it. I would very much like to complete this transaction in peace.” Ingo accepted the apology. He had planned for that to be the end of it and moved his hand to place her back in his coat collar, but she squeaked at him again.

When Ingo pulled her back, she made an exaggerated motion that resembled eating, holding her flippers up and mimicking taking bites out of something. 

He couldn’t make a guess until she pointed at the side of the general store, then repeated the motion again.

“The honey cakes? You wanted those honey cakes?”

“Phi!” She clapped her flippers together, celebrating his correct guess.

“Just one of those is bigger than your head; it takes you two days to consume one.” Ingo shook his head. “And there are several in that box; I’m afraid they’ll go to waste.”

Akari made a pleading motion and held her flippers together up at him with big eyes, but otherwise she grew quiet, and Ingo’s features softened.

She’s had it very hard. He knew that. These past few weeks had been terrible and frustrating and confusing. And while the last three days had certainly been much happier with his revelation over who she was, it still… it didn’t have much in it to be happy about in general, and he knew Akari was depressed with her limitations.

The giggles she had let out in his coat earlier was the first time he had really heard her laughing or having fun in a long while (even if it had been at his expense… but really, as a phione, there weren’t many things she could do to entertain herself right now).

So what was the harm in getting her some simple sweets? Giving her something to be happy about?

Ingo’s words left his mouth in a cloud of breath, visible in the frigid air. “Alright, Miss Akari. I will get them for you.”

“Phi!” She squeaked, a little surprised, but clearly happy. She hugged her flippers around his thumb again in a gesture of gratitude as he brought her back to his shoulder, tugging the lapel of his coat back.

“But please do your best to finish them! And please, no more cold touches. Or tickling.” He added as she wiggled back into her spot, amongst the folds of his tunic’s hood. “I would not like to laugh at that poor young man’s sick wife for a second time.”

The subsequent giggling at his shoulder was his only response as he smoothed his coat collar back down, but that was enough for him.

Now. To somehow find the strength to go back and face Choy. Ingo took a deep breath, steeling himself as he turned to walk back around the corner of the building. Ugh, he could already feel the blush of shame returning.

“I’d like to once again apologize for that outburst,” Rounding the corner, Ingo took his place back before Choy, who still appeared rightfully upset; arms now crossed, the store owner seemed much less amiable now. “Truely, I didn’t mean to laugh during such a sensitive subject.”

“Was that the fault of your sore neck as well?” Choy reached up to take his glasses and clean a few stray raindrops off them with his hanten. His words were painfully flat.

“Ahah… uhm, no,” Ingo coughed. “My mind simply reminded me of very ill-timed joke. Very unfortunate timing.”

Choy didn’t really believe him, Ingo could see it in his eyes. Regardless, he adjusted his glasses back on his nose, and went to grab up Ingo’s items, sliding them across the display table. “Unfortunate indeed. Here are your items, Warden.”  

“Oh, thank you. Though also, before I depart-” Ingo held out the money he owed, but began searching through his coat pockets again. “I believe I’ve had a track change; I would like those honey cakes after all. But please, allow me to pay for it in full; it’s the least I could do. And again, I do hope your wife recovers swiftly.”

It seemed Choy’s hardened features softened a little as Ingo dropped the money into his hand.

[honeylikewords]

cubs. (jack russell)

halloween brings all the little monsters out. aka, jack gets baby fever.

(warnings: mentions of pregnancy, planning for children, allusions to sex, descriptions of physical intimacy and making out, and jack smelling his wife, if that counts. nothing technically fully n/s/f//w//, but a bit saucy. word count 2.4k )

Jack’s head tilts sideways before the doorbell even rings, one ear higher than the other to catch something she can’t hear. He turns in his seat on the couch, arm strewn over her shoulder, to look behind them in the direction of the front door, tilts over, kisses her temple, and pops up in the seconds before the slightly-jarring “ding” echoes through the house. He’s already at the door, bowl in hand, beaming down at the gaggle of children and chaperones by the time she’s even stirring on the couch to come to join him.

“Oh, who do we have here?,” Jack coos excitedly, scanning the miniature crowd. “Are you the little one from--”

“Stranger Things!,” yells a small child in a pink dress, blonde wig askew, tendrils of the plastic hair stuck to their face. “I’m Eleven!”

“Yes, sí, can you do the--” --Jack sticks his hand out and makes a face, and the child eagerly matches him, giving him their best furious expression and most powerful psychokinetic pose-- “Yes! That’s so good!”

He quickly glances up at the three adults standing behind and asks if there are any allergies in the group (and there are none, thank goodness) as his wife comes to stand next to him, smiling at the Eleven who is now turning their powers onto their group of friends. Gesturing for the kids to bring their bags closer, Jack begins dropping generous fistfuls of candy into eagerly opened pillowcases and treat sacks, small hands darting out to show off the newest snacks to one another.

“Hey there, Mirabel,” says Mrs. Russell, waving at a young girl in a blue skirt and white t-shirt, sporting a giant pair of glasses and a pink flower in her dense curls. The little one is wrapped up in a purple puffer jacket on this cold October evening, and while it is a truth universally acknowledged that a big coat is the bane of Halloween costumes, the effect of her adorable smile and ‘Encanto’ printed trick-or-treat bag is more than enough to convey the essence of the character. “Is Uncle Bruno with you tonight?” 

The girl shyly shakes her head and wrings the handles of her bag in her fingers but is smiling widely when Jack speaks a few quick words of admiration for her costume in Spanish and passes her a scoop of candy for her bag.

“I’m Ariel!”, adds a small child in a green tube skirt with flared tulle flippers sewn on, a purple strip of cloth tied around their tummy over a slightly off-skin-tone longsleeve tee.

“And I’m Harry Potter!” A wand is brandished at Jack, who puts a hand over his chest in shock.

“I’m Batman!” The petite hero jumps into a pose to show off the padding of his armor, his light-up shoes kicking to life and casting green flashes over the porch.

Jack turns to his wife and grins, gesturing enthusiastically at the crowd of kids. “I think these are the best costumes we’ve seen all night, no?” She nods, and the kids all let out little shrieks and giggles as Jack procures a few extra pieces from the bowl and adds them to their bags. 

The chaperones guide the straggling children into a chorus of “thank you”s before shuffling them down from the porch, past the jack o’lanterns, and on to the next house, as Jack and his wife remain in the doorway. She leans her head on his shoulder and listens to him sigh sweetly, his eyes tracing over the sunset-lit streets swarming with seas of children and their families, all screaming and laughing over one another, racing past on the sidewalks, weaving in and out of lawns decorated with tombstones and inflatable specters, plastic skeletons and felted spiders. 

“You know, at the rate you hand it out, we’ll be out of candy before the street lights come on,” she teases, nudging his shoulder. Jack chuckles and puts a hand on the small of her back, shrugging as he steers her back towards the couch. 

“It’s Halloween, bebé; do you want us to be known as the stingy old couple, or the cool couple that gives out extra candy to the little monsters? Besides, that Mirabel, oh my God--”

“Total heart-melter,” she agrees, sitting and cuddling into Jack’s side as he hooks his arm back over her shoulders and pulls her body close. “I think between her and that four-month-old dressed as Grogu, we may have seen the two cutest costumes in all of North America today.”

Jack lets out a groan at the memory of the adorable baby, who he had greeted at the door with a delighted peal of laughter, and squeezes his wife tightly in his arms, as if hugging her in the baby’s stead. The abrupt squish pushes a small squeak out of her, and Jack giggles, bumping the blunt tip of his long nose into her cheek.

“Sorry,” he murmurs. “You okay?”

His slight frame conceals a rather intense strength, something that comforts her, even if it still sneaks up on her every now and again that he is, in fact, as strong as he is; Jack’s touch is grounding and warm when so few things in the world are, and she’s glad, especially in the cold months, for the over-active heat of his body and the power of his embrace. 

He traces the tips of his broad, tan fingers along the curve of her upper arm, pale nails leaving wake trails of gooseflesh and pleasant shivers. She realizes he’s waiting for a response before going any further with his affections, and she nods, cupping the square of his chin and running her thumb along his bottom lip. When his olive green eyes fix on hers, and his lips part to reveal the brightness of his smile, crooked to the left by the jut of his snaggletooth, she feels heat wash over her face and down her body, familiar and fluttering as he dips his face close and keeps her gaze.

“You know what I’m thinking?,” Jack purrs, voice dropping low and soft as he begins inching nearer. When he’s this close, his breath falls on her skin like a warm fog, sticking sweetly to her neck and cheeks, and the scent of him gets stronger. 

He smells like their bed, she thinks. Cozy, fuzzy, and tinged with a modicum of not-at-all-unappealing sweat, there is also that distinct canine note that can only be detected in this kind of proximity. His arms are still wrapped around her, and one of his hands is coasting, flat-palmed, up and down the length of her side, following the curves of her ribs and belly, while the other finds itself resting on her shoulder, idly fingering an errant lock of hair. His face is so close to hers that she swears she could count each of his eyelashes, individually, and the hairs that form his growing stubble.

This Halloween, Jack has chosen to go as a vampire, which he thinks is exceedingly funny. Dark makeup rings his eyes and the grey in his hair glows almost blue in the low light of the fading day, lending him an unearthly quality that fits his costume well. The powers of the vampire, too, seem to be his: he has her under his thrall, certainly. His smile is mesmeric, and she can imagine that if a vampire were to look like him, there would be no end to the line of people willing to be bitten by that self-same smile.

“What are you thinking, Puppy?,” she asks, trying to redirect her own wandering thoughts. She scratches lightly at the underside of his chin and, on reflex, his head tilts up, eyes fluttering shut as a contented noise rumbles in the back of his throat. He’s so easy to please.

“I’m, uh--” He seems distracted by the sensation of her scratching at that Just Right spot between the back of his ear and the crook of his jaw, a distraction that only worsens when she begins scratching the hair at the nape of his neck. “I was going to say that I… I was thinking we…”

His hands lie still on her, twitching every now and then when she finds a particularly pleasing spot to scratch, and she relishes the sensation of being the one who now has her beloved under her own thrall; Jack leans his head into her touch and follows the motion of her hands, chasing her attentions. A sigh leaves his lips and he unclenches his shoulders, melting into her as she leans back against the armrest of the couch and Jack follows, laying his head on her chest. 

His weight is surprisingly heavy atop her as he lays himself on her belly, slotting between her knees and positioning himself for ease of scritching. He’s not a big man, by any means, but there’s a density to him, and she’s feeling it now as he presses her into the couch with his body.

She pauses her petting briefly as she adjusts to the new position, and her hands still in his hair, which causes a growl of displeasure to part his lips. At that, she looks down at him and sees one green eye peering up at her (the other still shut and squished into her chest), and sticks her tongue out at him before continuing the strokes to his salt-and-pepper pelt.

It’s rather soothing, playing with his hair like this. There’s a therapeutic element to the combination of his body weight, intense warmth, rhythmic breathing, and the texture of his hair under her fingers, and she lets instinct carry her, as salient thought drifts away into the blissful mist of repetitive motion and familiar feelings. She traces the lines of his scalp, watching his black and grey and still, sometimes, brown hair forest up around her fingers, content to just match the tide of his breaths with her own, their ribs pressed together and expanding in synchronicity. 

After a moment, Jack stirs. Turning, he cranes his face so that he can look at her squarely, and she feels the irresistible magnetism of that green gaze tugging her deeper into his spell.

“I want to try for one of our own,” he says, shattering the stillness like a foul ball through plate glass. “Tonight, if you’re ready.”

It takes her a second to blink away the haze that had settled around her head, and when she does at last manage to, she finds herself staring down into Jack’s face, taking him in with utmost fascination. If she heard him clearly, and she believes she did, he asked her--

“A baby, by the way. In case I wasn’t clear.” He flashes her a smile and a breathy laugh, and he pats her side playfully. “I’m sure you could figure that out, amorcita, but I like to be direct.”

“Oh.” 

It’s all she can think to say: not because she is unhappy, or undesiring of the same things, but simply because the effect of Jack Russell, staring up at her with his big, moss-colored puppy eyes, brazenly stating that he wants to try and conceive with her, is flooring. He pushes up on his forearms, and suddenly he is above her, his face lit starkly by the shadows of the setting sun and the television, marking him out in black and white. His eyes glow, even in the darkness.

The wolf’s smile slips into his features as he stares down at her, watching her reactions with delight. He can hear her heartbeat, she knows, smells the minute shifts that not even she is aware of. He knows her, inside and out, and surely knows which way she is swayed, but he waits patiently for her to give him a sign, a command, an enthusiastic yes or a firm no. He won’t move without her urging.

She cups his face and lets out a shaky, excited breath, one that shivers in her sternum and makes Jack grin. There’s that crooked canine of his, sharply glinting in his smile, and she trembles joyfully at the sight, wondering if their child would have their father’s snaggletooth. She hopes they do.

“Tonight,” she repeats. Jack’s eyes widen.

Gently, she tugs him down and presses his pouty lips to hers, and the dam breaks. Jack lets out an inhuman groan of delight, dropping his center of gravity low to lean into the kiss, and uses his blunt incisors to pull at her bottom lip, nipping and sending the wet, lapping sounds of kissing echoing through the room. He uses one hand to hold her jaw in place, then begins trailing kisses down and around her chin, working his way to her throat.

“Look so pretty in your costume,” he rasps, voice low and clouded. “‘S hard for a man to keep his hands to himself.”

Before she can snidely remark that he, in fact, has not been keeping his hands to himself for almost the entirety of the evening, Jack sinks his teeth into her neck: not hard enough to wound her, but certainly hard enough to make her forget every other thought, her mind now focused completely on the reality that her husband is leaving marks all across her throat.

“You smell,” Jack groans, “So good. And, oh, God, when you have our cubs…”

He pushes his face into the crook of her neck and inhales, a series of Spanish and English curses flowing from his lips as they wander across her skin, and his hands begin rucking up the bottom of her blouse when--

“DING.”

Jack’s head whips up, and the two of them stare with wide eyes at one another. His face is flushed a deep umber and his lips are shiny, hair a fluffed mess, and she can only imagine she looks even more sordid and knocked askew. They exchange a communicative glance before the doorbell rings a second time and Jack, ever the gentleman, kisses her forehead, rapidly apologizing.

“We’ll get back to this, querida, I promise, I swear, I want to--”

She waves him off with a smile, and sees him bolt for the door, candy bowl in hand. He throws it open with gusto, and as she watches, she sees the transformation come over him; the brightness in his eyes, the giddiness of his smile, the sincerity of his sweetness. He’s going to make a magnificent father. And she’s going to have a very, very happy Halloween.

[triglycercule]

at the beach so we pullin out the mtt beach headcanons GO

horror buys one of those cheap diving kits with goggles and flippers and always ALWAYS challenges killer to races

killer always accepts because he thinks he can beat horror (he loses EVERY time. horror's just too fast with those damn flippers)

dust goes up to random people's beach chairs when they're away and sits in them and then when they come back he sees how long he can gaslight them into thinking that was his chair from the start

while horror is napping killer and dust will fill up his skull with sand. he doesn't wake up until they're like 75% done

dust likes to fully submerge himself in the water and then pop up and jump scare killer (killer always gets scared no matter how much dust does it)

dust tried to scare horror with this prank but then he was pushed underwater and forced to eat the wet watery sand by horror

dust and horror don't play around with sand around killer's chest because his soul is near that area and killer VISCERALLY hates sand on his soul

killer can mix his eye goop with sand and it creates a toxic determination sand bomb that will literally knock a bitch out

dust will still wear papyrus's scarf even while underwater and then complain about how wet it is

killer will see a boat in the distance and bet that he can swim there with dust and horror. dust and horror end up losing a LOT of money once the boat comes back to shore with killer on board

horror doesn't eat his popsicles like a normal person. he waits for them to melt and then licks the melted juice and dust and killer shit on him SEVERELY for this

dust is such a heavy sleeper that horror and killer had enough time to build a sand grave for him and host a fake funeral service before he woke up. then they pretended he was actually dead when he woke up (it took all of horror's willpower not to laugh)

whenever one of those airplanes with posters attached fly over the beach dust always shoots a bunch of bones at the poster to poke holes in them

killer would build a giant dick and threaten kids to come over and look at his sculpture with his knife. then when the kid sees it killer orders them to tell their parents all about "the long schlong". he doesn't even kill the kids it's just to freak them and the parents out

dust doesn't help out while the set up the tents/chairs. horror has to do all the work and killer tries to help but then just ends up breaking something. but dust helps carry all the bags and chairs to and from the beach and car :3

killer brings horror as far out as he can in the water and then tells him to look underwater (connected to the first headcanon where horror has goggles) and then it turns out that killer took off his shorts and is flashing the fish. horror bursts out laughing underwater and almost drowns and then killer has to save him butt naked while trying to hold onto his shorts

when they finally wash off all the sand at the showers by the beach horror is the only one to really wash off the sand. dust doesn't wanna subject papyrus's scarf to anymore water (hc 8) and killer doesn't trust the shitty water pressure to get all the sand out of his joints

at the end of it they went to this nice seafood place and watched the beach while eating peacefully. and then on the ride home horror and killer slept like rocks (dust had to drive)

[rosewaterandivy]

poolside - the bewilderment of esmé and the unveiling of steve

The Carvers definitely have an in-ground lagoon style pool at the house in Hawkins. But Eddie insists on schlepping down to the local community pool for Zoë’s swim lessons.

Never mind that she is a literal baby, but whatever.

Pale as the day is long, in the most ridiculous swim trunks you’d ever had the misfortune to see, and positively slathered in SPF.

Your doing, to his dismay.

But you don’t mind, lanes to swim in and an hour free of child-rearing while Eddie and the other moms go to the morning tater tots class with their kiddos.

“Esmé?” Someone asks before you can kick-turn and begin your next set of laps.

You pry the goggles from your eyes and squint at the man standing before you.

He is wearing a speedo and has dropped his kit at the end of the lane. The end of your lane. A bright yellow flipper flops out of the bag.

“Guilty as charged.” You say, hoping the tone is enough to convey how annoyed you are.

He squats down at eye-level all loose-limbed ease. His smile is easy and genuine. You almost feel bad for acting so surly.

“Mind if I join? We can circle swim.”

And you’d been hoping to avoid this. Hoped your general off-putting demeanor would be enough to warn the residents of Hawkins off— steer clear, here there be dragons, etc.

But this guy.

Reluctantly, you shove over in the lane and say, “Might as well.”

From across the way in the kiddie pool, you can just make out Eddie with his haphazard bun pouring what appears to be a colander filled with water over Zoë’s head. They’re singing the welcome song and spelling out her name as he does so. She coos and babbles gleefully all the while.

Dean, at least you’re pretty sure that’s his name, has his goggles and swim cap on by the time you glance back.

How does he get all that hair in there? And at what cost?

Setting your watch you countdown 3-2-1 before launching down the lane in a breast stroke, Dean not long behind you.

The rest of the hour passes uneventfully, your swim partner turns out to be pretty decent in the water and keeps up without complaint.

Coming to the end of your cool down, you see another set of feet at the end of the lane, but distinctly paler than the last.

Breaching the surface, your arms come to rest at the edge of the tiled wall, legs lazily cutting through the water.

“How’d it go?”

Eddie shrugs, “Pretty well, she didn’t cry this time. Meanwhile, Harper wouldn’t stop howling for love or money.”

“Is that a fact?”

“Yep,” He says with smirk, “Tried bribing her with a crisp twenty and was met with disdain.”

“Well, the going rate is a crisp fifty now, inflation y’know.”

Seeing your raised arms, he passes Zoë off to you and sits on the damp concrete. He waves to Dean at the opposite end of the pool as you tread water with Zoë in hand.

She clings to your side, wary of her new surroundings, and takes in the sights and sounds of the competition pool. You’ve always been a strong swimmer and don’t have trouble with the new addition.

There’s a distant sound of splashing as Dean swims toward you, Zoë focused on the fast approaching man under the blue water.

Eddie says something in greeting as the other man surfaces. You’ve floated away from the wall with Zoë, softly murmuring reassurances to the babe in your arms.

A call of your name draws your attention back to the men at the wall.

“Is that okay?” Eddie asks, voice raised slightly to carry among the background splashes and whistles of the crowded pool.

“Is what okay?”

He rolls his eyes and waves for you to swim closer.

“Robin and Steve wanna stop by later, maybe a few others.” Eddie says as you plop Zoë to sit on the top of the tiled wall. “A cookout pool party thing, maybe?”

You nod along, mentally going through the schedule for the day. It should be fine, no appointments for Zoë or meetings for you. And Eddie sent off his last round of pages earlier this week for line edits.

“Sure, but who’s Steve?”

Eddie’s resounding cackle sounds like a gunshot through the space. Several people stop their conversations to gawk in annoyance.

“Me,” Dean says, a blush slowly creeping up his chest and neck. “I’m Steve.”

“You never said anything!” You sputter, realizing in horror that you’d been referring to this man by the wrong name in front of him for the better part of two months.

He shrugs, like it’s no big deal.

“S’fine,” Dean Steve says, as Zoë kicks water into his face.

He smiles and waves to her as Eddie begins packing up, chuckling to himself every so often.

“You could’ve corrected me at any time.”

Another shrug.

“You were just so confident,” He supplies.

It’s not enough.

“Yeah,” Eddie clucks, “Confident in her wrongness.”

“Shut it, Munson,” You warn lifting yourself from the pool to sit on its edge by Zoë. “You’re on my shit list.”

He rolls his eyes and shoulders the swim bags, “As if I’d be on any other.”

[sea-stone]

Hey again everyone! Just wanted to update you all and thank you for the lovely reception I got for part one of my weretiger story. It's been so sweet to see people enjoy it so much :3 I can't wait for finish editing part 2 to share with you all!

That being said, I want to share part one ofnmy second story in the series "A Durkmuir County Tale" featuring a more original monster hybrid and another human. This one is much longer and gets pretty horny but not graphic. Thank you again @monstersflashlight and @aftermidnightspecial for being my beta readers this time around, and a special thanks to @aftermidnightspecial for providing much needed editing and positive critique!

Please enjoy!

Swim Lessons with a Siren

Part One: A Fortunate Misunderstanding

(About 4100 words)

Content Advisory: Discussion of Trauma (Drowning), Discussion and Description of Panic Attack Reponse, Brief Discussion of Consentual Sex Work, Horny but no graphic depictions (heheh yet!)

Leon had been lazily swimming around the main pool when he heard the chimes from the front entrance door. He drifted to the side, and pondered as he heard heavy breathing and your footsteps. This was not normally how people entered his sessions, but perhaps you were anxious, having to fight a case of cold feet? He didn’t expect you trotting up, your hair stuffed in a tight, strained bun, carrying a large duffel bag with lime green swimming flippers strapped to the side. Embarrassment dusted your cheeks with color under your numerous freckles, as it had also reddened your visible upper chest. You stopped, leaning over and hands pressed on your knees, to catch your breath. With how deeply you gasped for air, Leon would have thought you ran several miles rather than from the front parking lot. 

Once you stood back up, you gave a small wave and you spoke. “Hey, I’m sorry I’m late.” You wiped your hands on your dark colored jeans. “I got held up at work,” you explained, pausing briefly to consider your words before continuing. “I’ll go ahead and get ready real quick. If I still smell kinda-weird, it’s because I work with a lot of dogs.” You seemed pleased with your explanation, so you gave a quick nod before trotting over to the changing rooms. 

Leon hadn’t felt he needed such a formal explanation, but he wasn’t sure what to think about you in general. Perhaps you felt the need to explain nearly everything because of his look of utter bemusement on his face. Clearly, you were not here for the usual reasons. With an amused sigh, he swam to the shallows and stepped out the stairs. He tried to imagine what you would have looked like had you seen he was actually swimming naked and he chucked amused to himself. “Damnit, Melissa,” he said to himself. “What weird thing did you put me up to? And why was it with someone so damn cute?” He walked to the lounge chair with his belongings on them and pulled up his baggy, black swim trunks. 

When you emerged from the changing rooms, your hair was slicked back in a new, wet bun, and under your arm you carried a dark green towel and bright green swimming goggles. You wore a conservative, dark green one piece with a back zipper. Leon noted that you must have had a change of heart on the flippers as you chose to leave them behind. You approached the stair that led down towards the largest pool with growing apprehension and gave a worried glance before continuing further. Once at the landing, you froze in place. He saw how your chest fluttered like a terrified animal and he was compelled to walk to you. You stared wide-eyed at the pool; and as he drew closer, he noticed you trembled terribly. “Hey, are you alright?” he asked and gripped your shoulder. You didn’t flinch at his touch, not seemingly alarmed by his inhuman skin on yours. It actually snapped you back to reality, and you turned your wide-eyed gaze up to him. Your eyes then softened, recognizing and comforted by the genuine concern in Leon’s expression. A few moments later, you turned away to rapidly blink as if something had been in your eye. 

“I -uh, yeah,” you stuttered, but squeezed your eyes shut for a moment as you took a deliberately long, slow inhale. He kept his grip on you as you breathed out, and you reached up to his hand and gave his hand an affirming squeeze. “It’s been a long time since I’ve been here,” you admitted, a more calm and almost forlorn tinge to your voice. “It’s bringing up a lot of memories, and one particularly not pleasant one.” You returned his eye contact, and smiled softly. “I should have brought this up to Melissa when I talked to her.” 

You released your grasp of his hand, casting your attention to the pool not more than twenty feet from you. You didn’t object when he took your hand into a reassuring hold. He watched you with keen interest, his silence was a strange, welcomed reaction so you continued to talk. “I actually know how to swim, but I had a bad accident a little over a year ago. I fell from a cliff on Viper’s Bend and drowned in the rapids. The only reason I survived was because my two brothers found me not too far downstream from where I hit the water,” He stroked the back of your hand with his thumb. You looked back up at him, sensing he was able to speak.

“You don’t need to force yourself,” he assured you, a sweet warmth in his voice that made you smile gently. “Even being an aquatic being myself, I never dare swim near those rapids. I can’t imagine how that felt, for a human.”

“I’m lucky to be alive, but,” you bit your lip pensively and your eyes lit up with determination. “I’m tired of being scared of something that used to bring me so much joy. I grew up swimming, and I continuously swam every week, no matter the season. My family called me their Little Mermaid. I have so many happy memories. I don’t want that one instance to control my happiness.” 

Leon tried his best not to convey how moved he was by those words, but when your smile deepened, he knew he hadn’t been successful. Your nose crinkled when you smiled, he noted, in such an endearing way. “Let’s take this slow and steady, then,” he said with an encouraging squeeze to your hand. 

You let him walk you around the largest pool, giving it a wide berth, and redirected your attention back to him when it strayed by giving your arm a small jerk. He took you to a separate large room with two shallower pools with a hot tub at either end of the room. He directed you to leave your towel and belongings by a lounge chair, and he waited for you to join him at the edge of the more shallow of the two larger pools. He took both of your hands now, holding them so he had his thumbs on the tops of your hands. “We will go only at your pace, and we can stop at any time,” he assured you. You gave him a nod and watched as he took one step in. Your breathing started to shallow, but you furrowed your brow as you coached yourself with intentional breaths. Gently, you brought your leg up and down, mindful of how it trembled till the sole of your feet touched the cool water. Your toes twitched as you fought back the urge to flinch that would have sent you stumbling back away from the water’s edge.

You peered into his eyes and admired them thoroughly. Despite their uncannily large size, their near perfect circular shape and almost frog-like pupils, you took in every speckle that made up the mosaic of those wonderful green and gold irises with awe. In his enveloping gaze, there shone through so much genuine compassion and patience that it made your chest ache with appreciation and your whole body flutter. No one - not any human or paranormal you’ve ever known - had brought you so much security in the midst of your fear that had drowned you over and over again. 

You didn’t even shy away when heat stirred inside you and dusted across your cheeks. Despite your intense observation, you hadn’t noticed that his expression held a growing admiration, and enamoredness when you refocused your gaze down at your feet. You finally let your foot slip past the pool water’s surface and pressed down until you felt the grip of the concrete against your skin. You couldn’t help a childish smile, though it faded quickly as you tried to refocus. You followed that success you felt and swiftly brought your other foot to join you, touching the textured cement steps. Your mind tried to betray you, reflecting on how the texture reminded you of the rough and unforgiving boulders you crashed into trying to keep your head above water that painful day. 

At such an image, a surge of panic threatened to cloud your vision, the beginning of it distorting the periphery. Leon witnessed the start of your spiral and squeezed your hands, bringing your focus back to him. When your focus finally returned to him, he gave you an affirming nod. Slowly, painfully, you took another step down. The water now softly swayed against his knees, the dark, muddy green of his skin almost looking black against the light blue pool lights. “I’m okay,” you told yourself aloud very softly and you repeated it a few times just to be sure. 

“You are okay,” Leon was beaming up at you. He reminded you each time he was there for you as he stroked the back of your hands with his thumbs. There was a unique texture to his thumb pads that gripped lightly at your skin like smooth ridges. They dragged slightly as they passed over your skin and this helped you stay grounded in the moment. You took the next hurdle quicker with the next step down with one foot after the other in a more fluid succession. With another nod of confidence, he stepped down a moment after onto the last step of the pool stairs. The water now passed his knee, pulling and soaking the bottom half of his shorts. 

“Just one more step.” Leon told you. You took a hard gulp and nodded again. Returning the nod, he continued. “You’ve got this. Nothing will harm you here. I’ve got you, and I believe in you.” Your cheeks warmed at his last sentence, and you cast your eyes to the side as your mouth upturned with a small, shy smile. His eyes widened as he realized his word’s effect and forced himself to clear his throat from embarrassment. “Sorry,” he muttered shyly. 

“It’s okay,” you replied with a similar timid tone and you both looked up to watch each other again. “It was really sweet. I appreciate it.” He nodded, his own cheeks now reflecting his nerves, but his hands were still steady as they held yours. “You ready?” Again, you nodded. You took one last deep breath and stepped down, bracing your legs as water lapped at your upper thigh. You let out a shaky exhale, bringing  your other leg down. Goosebumps crept up your legs, up your back, and down your shoulders to your hands. As your nerves traveled down your chest, your nipples swelled and pressed against the tight material of your suit. You let out a small gasp, alarmed by how much you enjoyed that feeling and bit your lip to stifle any further noise. You leaned back, your vision blurred signifcantly; Leon pulled you forward, guiding you to sit on the steps. 

Somehow, Leon appeared to not notice your confused arousal because the compassionate energy was still present in his gaze. “I guess that’s my limit for tonight,” you remarked, breathy from the growing lightheadedness, trying to hide the hint of disappointment in your tone. Your eyes drifted from his, and you started rapidly blinking again, overwhelming tears threatening to drip down. He lifted a hand and gripped your chin firmly and with a gentle tug, he brought your eyes back to his. 

“Hey, you should give yourself more credit, human.” he said sternly, but the endearing nature was evident. “You’ve shown me more strength and resilience than I’ve ever seen in any of your species.” The firm tone was strange, but in a sigh, he added with great tenderness, “You’re amazing.” 

Your breath hitched as your heart began hammering in your chest. Your face might have finally recovered from your last embarrassed blush, but the heat and color was back again in your cheeks. How much more excitement could you handle before your heart sprung out of your chest? 

After a few seconds, Leon’s whole face flushed as he realized again how intimate his words were. He broke off eye contact and anxiously cleared his throat. You snickered through your nose and he released your shoulders as he smiled with pensive excitement.

The moment was ruined because you were the first to notice the time and your body stiffened upon the realization. He glanced behind him at the large clock, seeing painfully clear that it was past 10pm. He turned back to you with a somber, knowing look. 

“Looks like I should get going. It’s already been an hour.” He continued to not respond and watched you as you tried to stand up. When you couldn’t rise without grasping at the railing, he swept you into his arms into a tight embrace and walked you both out of the pool. You gasped, your breath stolen right out of your lungs at the fact his skin was still oddly cool and damp to the touch and how strange the sensations of cool and heat clashed with your chests pressed so tightly together. Just as suddenly as he brought you close, he released you. His chilling touch only lingering where his fingers had wrapped around yours. He wouldn’t look up at you and for the first time, he kept his gaze from you. You saw how his own chest rose and fell at a quickened pace. You didn’t want to let go of him. The thought of it seemed almost painful. Yet, when he didn’t look at you, when he didn’t explain his actions, you slowly pulled your fingers from his grasp.

  You backed away, but when he didn’t move again, you turned and gathered your belongings. You sighed as you looked towards the front of the swim center. You pulled some money you had folded into your towel. You listened as he approached, his wet feet slapping the floor loudly, and you waited until he had stopped behind you before you spoke again. “Melissa said you preferred cash, but she didn’t specify how much you wanted,” you told him. “If what I have isn’t enough, I can leave the rest with her if you would like.” 

You observed the sounds of his struggling breathing, felt his eyes burrowing in the back of your skin just a few inches above you. You slowly turned to meet his gaze. You hadn’t expected how frantic they would look, how his pupils fluttered as they near-fully dilated, leaving only a thin rim of vibrant color in his otherwise black eyes. You felt your heart racing again, feeling his ragged breath on your face as you tried to understand what he couldn’t say. 

“Leon, what’s going on?” you asked gently. You knew he was panicking but you didn’t want to accept why. The possible ideas made your head spin, your heart ache and swirling in your gut the long forgotten emotion of yearning. You quietly called out his name, to try and bring him back to you. When he didn’t respond, you dared to lift your free hand and cup his cool cheek. His lips silently parted first with an anguished sigh. 

“I can’t take your money,” his hushed yet strained voice finally fell from his lips and his tongue anxiously flicked out of his mouth. Your eyes flicked down to glimpse at his dark, velvety tongue and absentmindedly bit your lip before looking back up at him. You wondered if your eyes shared a similar look, shared at least some of the bewildering wanton desire swelling inside you. “It doesn’t feel right. We didn’t, um,” he stammered, a groan coming from his throat as he tried to speak, “I didn’t perform my-uh-usual services. I don’t want to take your money.” Now he rapidly blinked, straining to find the right words. You waited patiently for him, your own thumb now strumming his damp cheek. “I didn’t do enough for you.” He ended with a sigh. 

“You’ve done so much for me,” you reminded him. “You helped me start to face my greatest fear. I can’t thank you enough for that.” 

“No!” he objected loudly enough for his voice to echo into the high ceiling and down again. You stepped back stunned yet captivated. He closed the short distance, muttering an apology under his breath and pressed his forehead to yours, his eyes tightly shut. He wrapped his arms around your waist and pressed his arms tightly into your back. You tossed your towel and such aside and wrapped your arms around his neck. You closed your eyes too and pressed your forehead against his. You followed his tempo of his breath initially and then deepened your own to encourage you both to slow down. You both held each other with firm tenderness, leaning your bodies together to comfort in your shared uneased state. 

Perhaps a few minutes passed when you heard Leon lick his lips again and swallow hard as he gathered courage to speak. “I want to help you more.” Leon admitted and finally pulled his forehead away to look down on you. Your eyes fluttered open to see his calmer eyes, how they remained dark wells with ambiguity. “I want to help you help yourself and I don’t want to do it for money. I want to help because,” he let his eyelids droop slightly as grazed the side of his nose on the side of yours. “I want to see you happy. I want to see you swim again and I want to see the proud look on your face when you do it.” His words were barely above a whisper. You became aware of the pull to meet his lips. This need burned greatly, the thin skin screaming to embrace what they so craved. 

“Leon, I-” you gasped as his arms tightened even more around your waist, trying to get every bit of himself to embrace you as fully as possible. His chest heaved against you, his heart beat thundering against your rib cage. Even though he had always felt cold, heat was rapidly building at every point your bodies converged. 

“Do you want this?” he asked with wanton lust oozing from his words. A brief exponentially tense moment of consideration passed between you. You answered by clumsily embracing his lips with your own. His lips were slick in a thin film of slime that made your skin lightly throb and excited you more than you expected. Boldly, your tongue burrowed past his lips and swept it across his many serrated teeth. He responded with a deep groan from the base of his throat and you echoed with your own pitiful attempt to match his intensity. 

You two were locked in a growing frenzy as your hands began testing and teasing one another’s bodies. You whined into his maw with each squeeze as each touch unlocked a welcomed sensation and added fuel to the growing blaze between your legs. This passionate embrace threatened to swallow you whole and lose yourself in building pressure of pleasure. You hadn’t realized you had moved until he had pressed you against the wall. He pinned you there as he began grinding his pelvis, his growing hot bulge into your most tender point. You nearly screamed and he pulled away with a small pop. A mixture of slime and drool connected your mouths together.

“What’s wrong?” he asked, gasping for air. You weren’t expecting the carnal hunger in his eyes and how much you wanted to relent to it but the bitter presence of fear in your mouth reminded you of your timidness. His gaze began to cool, to soften with gentle compassion as you strained through wheezing breath what you needed to say.

“I-I’m scared,” you admitted with your overwhelming feelings stinging your eyes. “I don’t-normally do this, especially not this fast. I don’t want to disappoint you.” His calm composure returned with his understanding smile. He released you slowly from his tight hold and gave you some room to breath, choosing instead to intertwine your fingers together. 

“You would never!” he purred, his eyes half lidded with a lazy warmth on his cheeks. “We will go slow and steady, I promise.” You gave an appreciative nod and gave him a light kiss on his lips. He returned it, not pressing further. 

Leon walked you back to the changing room, refusing to let go of your hand until you were at the door. You promised you wouldn’t take long, that you just had to rinse off and put your clothes back on. Your skin itched with excitement and you almost seemed to dance as you hurried your movements. Leon retrieved his own belongings where he left them by the front pool, humming a blissful tune and darted back to where he left you just outside the door. You appeared moments later and gratefully grimmiced when he began sniffing. “Oh, sorry. I’m still wearing my work clothes.” You lifted your arm high for a moment, crinkled your nose and pretended to gag. This effort earned you Leon’s amused chuckle and your cheeks hurt from how wide your smile grew. 

“You smell like a werewolf,” he remarked with an affirming nod. “I couldn’t smell it after you came out with your swimsuit, but now I am sure. But you aren’t a werewolf? Otherwise, Melissa wouldn’t have referred you to me. I have -” he laughed shyly for a moment before continuing, “-more consistent patience with humans than others claim they do.” 

“My brothers are the werewolves,” you admitted and clarified further when he gave you a perplexed look. “They are my half brothers technically, but I’ve spent my whole life with them. My mom met my Wolf father when I was a baby and the boys were born about 16 or so months later.” 

“That explains why you didn’t seem in any way alarmed by me.” 

“Why would I be? You’re incredibly cute!” You snickered and playfully winked, blushing as you did so. Leon didn’t stop himself from planting a kiss on your forehead and smiled again afterward. “I also told Melissa I wanted the best teacher, so she recommended you immediately.” 

“How did you get her number?” Leon asked, but before he could continue, your eyebrows knotted into confusion. “I mean, how else did you talk to Melissa?” 

“I saw her working here at the front desk,” I explained, giving a suspicious look. “I forced myself to go here last week to try and remember some happy memories. When she saw my distress after walking in, she called me over to the welcome desk. I briefly explained to her, like how I did to you, why I looked so upset and emphasized that I needed someone who had a lot of patience and experience to help me. Kind of like Exposure Therapy?” 

Leon was stupefied and when you asked him why, he silently guided you over to the billboard right next to the front desk. There were numerous fliers for local and county-wide swim teams and also independent flyers for private swim lessons. You had clearly seen some of these flyers around town. Leon pointed to a pale turquoise half sheet flier that, in large very ornamental cursive, very plainly said, “Wanna Sleep with the Fishes? Call to schedule a Swim Lesson with a Siren”, and at the bottom was a strip of paper one could rip off to take the number with them. “So, if you understand now, imagine my surprise when I see,” he paused as he turned to you, and broke out in a fiendish, toothy grin. You had reached a new level of self-consciousness, a new deep shade of red as you finally understood what he meant. You could hardly believe it but when you reached out and touched the printer paper, sure enough, it was there and you couldn’t bear to look up at Leon. 

You hadn’t noticed he had leaned in until you felt his lips tickle the edge of your ear, threatening to send you in a lustful spiral. “You know, you blush like a virgin,” he purred. You felt yourself let out an unintentional desperate whimper and you covered your mouth shamefully. You expected him to laugh again but he surprised you when he made what sounded like a teeth clattering chitter, quickly followed by a very deep, very horny sigh. “Oh, don’t you worry, my Darling,'' he said hotly in your ear before moving to press an icy, wet kiss to your temple. “Sooner than later, you will know why many humans paid so handsomely for my special lessons.” 

[mqverick]

st. tropez party girl || ִ ࣪𖤐

“if you hold me tight, it's alright

let the fire ignite.”

─── ⋅˚₊‧ ୨୧ ‧₊˚ ⋅ ───

Jerry fucking Maguire. The man with the vision, the most known sports agent in the town, the guy who could set his mind into something and actually achieve it, even if it meant costing him the money for a once in a lifetime opportunity. Jerry Maguire, who was very openly a flirt, a cocky bastard, a pretentious loser and a little bit of a crazy person with unrealistic ambitions.

That’s who you had to work with and it both physically and mentally hurt you. You hated his guts, always had. You didn’t know a lot about him, just the basics and the ones written on the papers or spoken on the telly, but those few were enough for your mind to build up the rest of his personality, which you were not a big fan of.

God. You hated yourself for being so sentimental, but Jerry had just gotten fired and he looked sweaty and alone and miserable — not to mention how he’d literally fished out Flipper in front of everybody while completely losing every single remaining of his dignity through that ridiculous speech, at which everyone has been holding laughs back from, and you’d found yourself growing rather empathetic to his embarrassment, so you’d yelled out that you were going with him.

All eyes had been on you, strange looks, muffled snickers, even your friends at the office had warned you to sit your ass back where it had been for the past couple of years, with a secure future.

But no, you just had to save Jerry some of the embarrassment. You were currently in the elevator with him, awkward silence building up between the two of you as he fiddled around.

“Thought you hated me,” you heard him utter shyly. You glared at him, noticing the ungrateful choice of words after you’d just publicly humiliated yourself for him.

“Hate doesn’t exist in professionalism, Maguire. I’m strongly opposed against your idealism and quite frankly, not exactly fond of you either,” you replied sharply, not daring to look directly at him.

“Hm, so much for hate not existing.”

“But, I refuse to work for a bunch of fucking hippie hypocrites like Sugar. And you know, if it weren’t for me, no one would have had your back in there. Not even your precious assistant.”

Jerry gave you a weak, tight-lipped smile as he raised the bag with Flipper in it in the air. “From now on, the fish will symbolize a better future.”

You unintentionally chuckled, hurrying to put a straight face back on as you cleared your throat, wondering how the hell he managed to sound so drunk without having had the tiniest drop of alcohol in his body all day.

“You’re stupid,” you whispered under your breath, thankfully loud enough that it only reached your own ears.

“Thank you, you know,” Jerry turned to you, holding out his hand for you to take. “I honestly thought no one would believe in me.”

“Prove to me that you can be alone and then you’ll thank me, Jerry,” you spoke, moving past him and ignoring his hand as the doors opened.

That same evening, the moment you reached your home, you collapsed against the door, face buried in your hands as you mentally slapped and kicked yourself. What the fuck had you gone and done? Trusting Jerry fucking Maguire, Jerry Ma-fucking-uire, as Avery liked to call him. You were screwed, hopeless and at the mercy of the person you swore you wanted to erase from the universe.

But his mission statement had inspired you.

He spoke words that the others back at the office weren’t ready to hear, truths, facts, goals, dreams. That was the Jerry Maguire you quit your job for and maybe it wouldn’t be the messy waste of potential that your brain had pictured.

Except when you thought that things could actually possibly work out, Jerry found out that Cush and his family had signed a contract with Bob Sugar behind his back, and everything had returned back to the crap hole where it had began. With a single client hanging on by a thread, Jerry was wrecked and so were you.

Your life was destroyed, you’d decided.

Maybe acting out on those amateur pole dancing lessons that your older cousin had taught you back when you were 17 wouldn’t be such a bad idea. Jerry’s backup people were falling down like flies. Everyone was dropping him, first his own company, then Cush and eventually — which came as the biggest surprise — Avery.

You and Rod were his only hope.

For days now, you’d been rehearsing in front of your mirror how you’d tell him that you were dropping him as well. You were done, wouldn’t allow yourself to go bankrupt for a petty sad man.

It was either 9 o’clock or midnight, you couldn’t be arsed to check, because your favourite show was on TV and the commodity of your couch and blanket was comfortable enough to have you watching with your eyes half-lidded — when you heard a series of playful yet lazy knocks on your door. You groaned at the noise, not bothering to get into your slippers as you slid your sock-covered feet across the entrance, peeking through the door to see who was feeling rather silly in the middle of the night.

Of course it would be him. Who else?

For a second, you considered not opening the door for him. See if he’d stay there, in that pathetic posture of him, fingers running through his fucked up hair as he shivered just a little from being undressed in such a chilly weather. But then again, you’d already thrown your career away for him, so what gives?

“Hellooooo,” he said happily as you let him inside, grinning from ear to ear. The smell of booze hung in the atmosphere as he lazily wandered through the living room, smiling at your furniture and bursting into uncontrollable chuckles. You wished someone would shoot you — or rather him.

“Have you ever heard of a little something called, oh, I don’t know, calling before showing up at my front yard like the drunk fucking tooth fairy?” you gritted through your teeth. Jerry seemed unfazed.

“Mmm, someone’s… m-mad.”

“What are you doing here, Maguire?” you asked with a sigh, already growing tired of the sight of him. “And care to explain why you’re wearing alien sunglasses during nighttime?”

Jerry laughed as he pointed as his glasses, before removing them to reveal a swollen black eye with a huge cut next to it. You gasped when you saw it, concern washing over you as you rushed to his side for a better look.

“I, um, broke up with Avery.”

Damn, you certainly had not pegged Avery for the violent type. “Too bad, huh,” you mumbled, disappearing into the kitchen in search of an ice tray and a glass of water. When you walked back inside the living room, you found Jerry staring at the fishbowl that was placed on top of your fireplace, muttering something to Flipper, who was swimming without any worries.

“I fucking hate that fish,” he admitted and you held back a laugh as you gestured for him to sit down on the couch.

“What’s going on, Jerry?”

He shrugged. “Honestly? I don’t know. For the past few weeks, I’ve been watching my life fall apart right in front of my eyes. I’m finished. I am fucked! I’m a cautionary tale for everyone, no one trusts me because of that stupid mission statement I wrote after having what I think was two slices of cold, expired pizza and the worst of all is that you and Rod are the only people in my life that ever believed in me. Why are you even still with me? Why haven’t you dropped me yet?”

Your gaze softened and you opted for silence as you carefully let your hand graze the soft skin on his cheek, laying his head back against the couch. You brought the ice cub near his eyelid, feeling him wince as the cold material made contact with the still fresh wound. Jerry closed his eyes, trying to let himself relax against your touch.

“Wanna know why I haven’t left you, Jerry?” you asked and he nodded hesitantly in response. “Because what you think is a stupid memo made me realize that you have more potential than you give yourself credit for. You have something more than a need to succeed, you have a vision. You’re not just doing it for a money and in my brutally honest opinion, you’re more than just a man hiding behind a silver suit.”

You caught him smile at your words.

“You really mean that?”

Your contained smile barely lifted the corners of your mouth as you felt a certain warmth build up on your reddened cheeks. Sure, you’d seen Jerry smile before, but the gentleness and innocence that his soft, genuine beam wore was something you’d never witnessed before in your life. His two front teeth were visible through it and it tugged at your so far cold heartstrings, heating them up.

Your heart was hammering against your chest and your mind had gotten foggy along the way, which was partly the reason why your breath got caught in your throat the very moment you noticed that Jerry’s look had changed. “Do you mean that?” he repeated, this time more lowly.

“I’m still not fond of you.”

“That doesn’t really answer my question.”

You gulped, eyes fixated on his own green ones, which you swore were sparkling under the dim light of your sort of broken lamp. “Yes, I mean it.”

There it was again, that smile. Except this time it had something more to it that you couldn’t read (that you wouldn’t allow yourself to read, because you’d had your own share of drinks that evening and they had left just the right amount of courage in your body to do something stupid and regretful for the next day to feel embarrassed about.)

“What have I ever done to you?”

Jerry’s question sent your dreamy train of thoughts out of the rails, snapping you back into the reality of the things. “What?”

“You don’t like me. Why? What have I done?”

“Frankly, I thought you were just a pretentious jackass like Sugar. Maybe slightly less worse than him, but still pretty much a scumbag. Not to mention that your outbursts make me believe you’ve escaped out of some sort of mental institution centre.”

You never expected Jerry to lunge himself forward and knock the air out of you as his arms wrapped tightly against your sides, squeezing as he buried his head into the crook of your neck. Unsure of what to do, you froze in position, hands stuck uncomfortably on the couch, balling into fists as you bit down on your lip, waiting to breathe again after he pulled away with a hint of disappointment and gloom.

“Not a hugger?” he questioned.

“I just don’t want to be hugging you.”

“Ah, the heartwarming words of kindness.”

“I’m one step away from kicking you out of my house, Maguire. I don’t care if you’re drunk, it’s not my responsibility to take care of you or whatever you think this is. Want a place to crash, then you’re more than welcome to use my phone and third wheel Rod and his family.”

“I like that you’re honest.”

You blinked in surprise. How much had he chugged down before he decided to come over?

“What are you talking about?”

“It’s a quality I’ve never fully owned, you know?”

“You don’t say.”

Jerry didn’t say anything, just looked at you longingly, a silent conversation passing between the two of you. Then suddenly, “No one ever listens to me. When I’m with you, even though you say you hate me, I feel like you understand.”

Gosh, you couldn’t stand him. Was he really so desperate and unable to hold his own that he had to throw himself to whoever showed him the slightest sign of interest? “Jerry, stop.”

“All my life, all I’ve tried to do is talk. Really talk. And it’s not that people don’t listen, it’s that they don’t want to listen. Whatever I have to say just goes straight in and out of their ears. I spoke through my mission statement and you were the only one that actually heard.”

“Don’t.”

You felt your heart momentarily stop as Jerry moved closer to you, his lips alight on your cheek as if a ghost was gently stroking your skin in a silent confession that was so much deeper than what came through the surface.

“I’ll call a taxi. Thanks for not kicking me out. You know, tonight and, uh, generally speaking. I promise I’ll make everything work again and it’ll all be worth it,” he added before placing another kiss on your face, this time on your forehead. Jerry waved goodbye to you as he walked outside and for a strange reason, you found yourself fighting with a newfound desire and urge to both push him in front of a car and never have to see any of him anymore or set fire on the taxi he’d called and invite him back into your home to spend the night. You did neither, didn’t even have the words to say goodnight to him as you heard the door close, signalling that he’d finally left.

What time was it anyway? It felt like he’d been sitting beside you for what seemed like eternity.

The following day at work, you could say that you’d officially lost every will to live. Rod was yelling like crazy, as per usual, which was not helping your raging headache due to the lack of sleep you’d gotten over the night. Jerry Maguire occupying your brain into nightmares wasn’t exactly a chamomile and plate of chocolate chip cookies to help you drift in slumber.

Speaking of, Jerry had just asked you to come into his office, which was the sort of situation you’d been dreading ever since he’d left from your place last night.

“Asked to see me?” you called, voice cracking a little near the end of your sentence, which probably gave you away — fuck’s sake.

“Yeah, um, I wanted to talk,” he tensely replied.

“If it’s about…”

“It’s about last night,” he completed with a jittery tone. “Look, I brought you in a difficult moment. I was drunk and lonely and had no idea what was going on — I didn’t mean to show up like that.”

“Jerry, it’s fine,” you tried to cut him off, putting an end to the already painfully uncomfortable conversation before any other late night actions were mentioned, but apparently, Jerry had plans of his own.

“No, let me finish. I’m sorry I came over without warning and I’m also sorry for taking advantage of… you know, whatever was going through the atmosphere at said moment. But, uh, I feel like I need to let you know that I did and do appreciate everything you said and did for me last night, it was really nice to, um, hear something honest.”

Jerry glanced down at his lap, fingers fidgeting with the pen he was holding. You dared to take a quick look at him, just to see why he refused to meet your gaze, but the lighting from the blinds was dark enough to hide the blooming bush on his cheeks.

“Is that all?”

“Yeah, that’s all.”

“Okay,” you got up from your seat and were about to leave him alone in his thoughts, but your feet subconsciously stopped moving for a second and your body turned towards him as you cleared your throat in order to catch his attention. “Next time you show up at my place in the middle of the night, consider giving me a call first.”

You hurried outside, cursing your mouth for being such a pain in the neck. Whatever professionalism you and Jerry had shared was now long gone.

What you missed, though, was the relieved sigh and small smile that crept into his face when you left the unspoken invitation hanging in the air.

───

It had started getting better with Jerry. A few days (or was it weeks? You couldn’t really tell, because whenever he was around, you’d lose track of time) had passed and what had begun as great hatred for him had turned into tolerance and slight fondness. It was weird how sometimes you’d catch yourself watching Jerry walking away or Jerry smiling or Jerry panicking through the phone — for that matter. The man had gotten under your skin into a worryingly quick time.

For once again, as accustomed to, everything went to hell the moment he came across the struggle of yet another emotional meltdown. Rod was losing and the recruiters and reporters seemed unimpressed with him, which Jerry handled poorly, unable to imagine a scenario where Bob Sugar was laughing at his face for being what his ex fiancée had so successfully described him as; a fucking loser.

He was alone, pissed off with Rod, pissed off with Sugar, with his job, with the company, the circumstances of his daily fucked up life, with you, but mostly with his own self.

You could see he was letting himself have it and this time, you wouldn’t risk it again. So you decided to do what you thought was moral and announce to him that you’d been offered another job opportunity, which you wouldn’t decline.

“You’re leaving me?” he asked in disbelief, wearing that stupid pair of sunglasses again.

“Look at you, Jerry! You’re fucked, how the fuck am I supposed to think you can afford to have me when you don’t even know what you’re doing?”

“Fine! Be like all the others, then, go the fuck on. I don’t need you here anyway. You said it; I don’t know what to do, well you’re fucking right!”

Jerry was shouting and throwing fists at the wall, eyes widened and red, holding back fearful tears.

“You don’t know what it’s like to be me out here. It is an up-at-dawn, pride swallowing siege that I will never fully tell you about, okay? You don’t know anything about my fucking life!”

“And nor am I interested to!” you yelled, throwing your purse across the room, almost hitting him. “You know, if I had even one shred of respect for you before, it’s now kissed goodbye,” you added in a much calmer tone before leaving him, sniffling and holding back hot tears that burned through your eyes. You let them free once you home, streaming down your face like lava.

You didn’t even know what you were crying for.

Last time you checked, you didn’t care about Jerry Maguire raising his voice at you. Last time you checked, you were just a simple accountant who worked for Sports Management International, barely acknowledging his existence.

It was late when the phone rang and after a series of sobs and thousands of tissue packets filling up the rubbish bins, you wondered who it could be.

“Hello?”

“You told me to call.”

He surely heard the hitch sound your breath made when his voice echoed in your head.

“Maguire?”

“Yeah. I know it’s late again and I would be lying if I said that I didn’t want to bother you, because I really, really do. I need to see you, please. It’ll only be a minute, just give me a chance.”

It sounded as though he’d been crying as well, voice raspy, weak, chocked.

“Get lost. I don’t want to talk to you.”

“That’s fine, you don’t need to. I’ll talk enough for both of us. Can I come over? You won’t even notice when I’ll be gone, it’ll be that quick.”

A short inhale, then; “Fine.”

When he arrived, he looked like a mess. His eyelashes looked darker and red, eyes puffy and blurry. His hair was all over the place and you could make out the fact that he was struggling to keep his breathing steady, his lips drawn in tightly. The sight of him in that state almost made you burst into tears all over again.

“Hi,” he greeted lowly, afraid of his voice cracking.

“You have five minutes, Jerry.”

What sort of torture was this? Being just a breath away from breaking down in front of him, making a complete loser move and humiliating yourself, you stared at the ceiling above you, biting so roughly down on your lip that you thought you tasted a bit of blood (but that was just you being dramatic about the whole situation.)

“Five minutes? I’m trying to apologize, I can’t do this being timed! Listen, I—I wanted to say that I was stupid about everything I said earlier, I was having an existential crisis and there were so many emotions bottled up and it just flooded. Flooded all over my brain, which caused me not to think straight, so I took it out on you and—”

Jerry was cut off by the loud thud of your door getting shut. You ignored his restless knocking, walking back into the living room, drawing the thick curtains together when he tried to catch your attention from the windows as well. It took him a great deal of time to eventually give up, motioning to you something that you couldn’t quite understand at first. His hands were moving in a way as though he was saying he slipped something under your door and damn you for believing that the curiosity killed the cat.

When he got out of sight, you tiptoed slowly to the door, grabbing what seemed to be a wrinkly napkin. You wiped your tearing up eyes and read what he’d written on it.

‘You’re right. I do drive people away, but I can’t afford to do that to you too.’

“Jerry Maguire!” you called loudly after him after running outside to catch up with him. Thankfully, he hadn’t gone too far, freezing still at the sound of your voice. He turned around to double check that it wasn’t some sort of mirage his mind was playing on him and let out an exhausted laugh of relief as he walked quickly toward you, grabbing you into a soul crushing hug. He was so tightly pressed up against you that you thought you’d merge into one person, but you couldn’t care enough, returning the intensity of the hug right back.

“Please, just hang on for a little bit more. I’m going to make everything up to you, I can’t fucking lose you, I—” he stopped mid-sentence, stunned at himself as he began pulling away, hands still holding onto your shoulders.

You urged him to continue, clueless about why he’d so abruptly cut himself off just to look at you. It was giving you the creeps, the silence and darkness outside allowing the light breeze to be heard into your eardrums like a loud parade. Jerry was looking at you with such fragility and it hurt that you couldn’t read him, couldn’t understand what was going through that head of his.

His pupils were dilated, blown and dark, causing the green irises to glow under the gloominess of the sky. Jerry was looking at you almost as if…

No. No — this was just your mind being sick.

Jerry left as suddenly and coldly as he’d abandoned his previous sentence, out of any excuses and explanations. You couldn’t bare to question anything, simply leaving it to the way he had, hanging in the air, playing tricks with your imagination, giving you hope for something that you couldn’t fully comprehend either.

Three days later, you accidentally caught yourself shamelessly overhearing him ask Rod how to be able to tell if he’d fallen in love.

───

You were certain that the universe had chosen to make it your destiny to lose and hate Jerry Maguire. It was always one step forward and a whole road trip back. There were moments, many of them, where you thought that the thin line between hate and love had been crossed, but it ended up showing that you couldn’t have been more wrong, ultimately always screwing up — either him or you, you were tired of keeping score at this point — what seemed to make your heart flutter like you were leaving into the dream of a hopeless, predictable romcom movie.

Jerry was hot and cold.

You were up and down.

It was pointless, had been ever since the beginning. You kept losing him, right when your fingers had just grasped him, he kept slipping. It was neither’s fault really; both occupied with the misfortunes of work, trying to psyche Rod up for his big game, consulting endlessly while trying to maintain the already existing deals, raising the prices, focusing on that one client, showing the money — as Jerry liked to put it.

Under the environmental stress of the job, you and Jerry had been unable to connect the same way you did during all those short lived moments, the late night visits, the sleep disrupting calls.

But then, one day he caught you off guard as you’d just finished your duties and were about to take off, making you stop dead in your tracks.

“Do you, um… Are you… I know a great place!”

You stole a quick glance at him and noticed that his fingers were crossed, lips curled into an upward pout, eyes dreamingly bright. There wasn’t much you could say except for pick me up at 8 o’clock. He did exactly as he was told, ringing on your doorbell right on time, but you kept him waiting outside just for a minute, fixing your high heel in a rush. Truth is you’d spent all time trying to figure out the perfect outfit, just for him, just to get to see that one look he’d given you back in that night all over again.

And he did.

When you opened the door to reveal yourself dressed neatly in a velvet black dress that stopped a few inches lower than your thighs, hair flawlessly covering your bare shoulders, Jerry blushed bright red, not sure how to greet you. His jaw was slightly agape in awe, heart pumping fast and loudly against his chest, blood flowing quickly as the butterflies battled in his stomach.

“I— Woah,” he eventually managed. You innocently looked down at yourself, knowing exactly what you were doing to him but deciding to pretend to be oblivious.

“Is there something wrong?”

“You look… Fuck, you look Audrey Hepburn stunning. I feel like an underdressed jerk.”

That was not true, at least not for you. He was wearing a Sacramento colored shirt, with the top button of the collar undone, revealing a white tee. His pants were a simple beige pair of trousers and for the first time, he showed up at your house with his hair looking surprisingly nice.

You chuckled nervously at his comment, matching the scorching redness on his cheeks.

“Are we actually supposed to be nice to each other now?” you spilled out after a few moments, embarrassed by your choice of words.

“I suppose so. Shall we?” Jerry proposed, handing his shoulder out to you playfully. You slapped it away, hurting both his pride and arm, but the minute you realized the disappointment in his eyes, you mentally took a deep breath and linked your hands together, squeezing unintentionally due to the nervousness, but relaxing as you felt his thumb rub circles on the outside of your palm.

The restaurant he’d chosen was beautiful.

He was a gentleman; helping you get seated, pouring water into your glass, handing you the menu. It almost felt like a real date. In anticipation of the food getting served, you went for a small talk, which felt embarrassingly awkward.

“So, uh, how do you know this place?”

“Took Avery here on the third date, I think?”

“Ah.”

Jerry noticed your uneasiness and reached for your hand that was on the table.

“I don’t want to talk about her tonight, though. I’ve got a beautiful woman with me already.”

Your eyes widened comically and you slipped your hand away from his, scratching the back of your neck. “Look, Jerry, I thought this would be a nice way to get to finally know you, you know?”

“It is! I’ll help you get to know me. At work I’ve been all over the fucking place, you probably think I’m insane or something, but, uh, I swear, I’m actually a decent person.”

“Are you? You’ve done nothing to prove me otherwise.”

“I am. Besides, you said that my mission statement inspired you. I wrote that from the heart, put all my thoughts and dreams in there, so I guess I have in fact proven you otherwise.”

“Can I ask you something?”

“Sure, what’s up?”

You gulped in order to gain the confidence to utter the question out, looking deep into his gorgeous green eyes as you tugged a strand of hair behind your ear. “That night, when you came into my house drunk — I just can’t help but wonder why did you come to me instead of Rod? Or anyone else for that matter.”

Jerry tensed up, his Adam’s apple bobbing. He looked as if he was about to confess something and just the thought made your knees jittery.

“As I said that same night, I feel like you understand me in a level no one else does. I was lonely and miserable and had no idea to do with my life and suddenly you were the first person that came into my mind, so I decided to pay you an unwanted visit. The reason I didn’t call was because I know how you feel about me and I could only imagine that you would’ve held a negative attitude if I asked to come over through the phone, so, that’s pretty much how it goes. You’ve been in my mind ever since.”

“Oh, Jerry,” you mouthed in a dazzling tone. No, you couldn’t do this. “Jerry, we need to stop.”

He looked at you through furrowed brows.

“What are you talking about?”

“I’m taking about this. It’s been happening for almost a month now and all I know is that it’s confusing me, but I know for one thing that I can’t bare to put myself through something that I know will end up hurting me. It’s not your fault and it’s not mine either — it’s just our nature. I’m not build like this; I can’t just tiptoe back and forth into whatever the fuck this is, it needs to stop.”

Jerry was more confused than ever, feeling his own eyes well up at the sight of the first tear rolling down your cheek. “What happened?”

“You know what, Jerry — and for fuck’s sake, quit staring at me like I’m your entire world or something!” you said, your voice subconsciously raising. You got up from the chair and roamed through your purse for your wallet, leaving a bunch of money bills on the table as you hesitantly walked over to where he was.

“So what, you just stop talking to me?”

“You and I are both aware that an end needs to be put in this and you’re not strong enough for it, so I’m going to be the one to do it.”

“What if I don’t want you to?”

“It’s not your call,” you whispered, leaning down and taking his head in your hands, pressing it softly against your stomach as you leaned down to place a lingering kiss on the top of it.

“Please don’t leave me,” you heard Jerry choke out, his hands encircling your waist, afraid to let you go.

“You need to focus on Rod. Big game’s coming up and you can both do it. You’ll have a brilliant career, Jerry, I truly believe that and you’ll always have all my support, but you’re just going to have to do this on your own,” were your last words before you walked away, leaving him behind, wrecked, people staring not so discreetly as he held behind the sobs of the following two weeks.

───

Rod was finally getting to be a big deal. Jerry’s career had blossomed again, just as you’d promised to him. Everything in his life was going perfectly — then why did he feel so fucking empty inside? Watching Rod with his family made him hurt, reminiscing about the way you’d left him that day at the restaurant. Hadn’t been able to reach out to you ever since.

Jerry Maguire realised he was in love when his client called him in the spotlight to pose along with him. Nothing like that had ever occurred to him before and it felt so surrealistic, yet so true at the same time. He needed you to be there with him, needed to hear your voice, see you smile. Listen to you say that you were proud of him or even glare at him as if you wanted to burn a hole through his head and finish him.

Jerry was in love with you and it dwelled on him how much he’d actually been missing you.

Not caring about anything, he ran to the airport, knowing he had to make things right. The flight back home was killing him, time passing disgustingly slow for his liking. When he finally got off, he almost tripped towards his way to the taxi station. Precisely forty three minutes and ten seconds, he was finally standing outside of your door, his luggage thrown over his shoulder as he simply stared forward, unable to move.

Was he really doing this?

According to his bachelor video, the only thing he was great at was friendships. But he’d just taken off with his career and he needed to fulfil all the promises he’d made, so there he was, knocking on your door for once more. If you decided you still didn’t want him, then he’d go forever.

“Hello — oh.”

His breath disappeared when he saw you. How long had it really been? You were surprised, not expecting him at all. Your movements were limited, limbs completely in shock as you scooted away to let him in. Your mind was short circuiting as he looked around the place like nothing had happened, like the two of you hadn’t had talked in — was it months? Or just weeks that felt like decades?

“Hello. If this is where it has to happen, then this is where it has to happen,” Jerry began. You cocked your head in confusion, staring blankly at him. “I'm not letting you get rid of me. How about that? This used to be my specialty. You know, I was good in a living room. They’d send me in there, and I’d do it alone. And now I just... But tonight, our little project, our company had a very big night — a very, very big night. But it wasn’t complete, wasn’t nearly close to being in the same vicinity as complete, because I couldn’t share it with you. I couldn’t hear your voice or laugh about it with you. I missed you, I missed having you around. We live in a cynical world, and we work in a business of tough competitors. I love you. You complete me. And I just —”

“Shut up,” you mustered through tears. “Just shut up. You had me at ‘hello’.” And before you even knew what was happening, you were walking towards him, crashing your lips onto his hard with a fervent need you’d never known before. His hands wrapped around your waist, pulling you impossibly close to his body as he smiled through the kiss, feeling you reciprocate the action. Both you and Jerry were still crying, unable to hold back the tears of what could’ve happened ages ago if either of you had had the balls to actually pursue it.

But neither of you cared.

Because you were finally kissing Jerry Maguire and your life felt complete, just as he’d described. He completed you and you completed him and the feeling had you melting against him, knees buckling, mind dizzy from his words and his scent and the way he so perfectly belonged against your lips. Your heart nearly leapt out of your chest as he pulled away, trying to catch his breath.

“I love you so much. I’ve loved you ever since you came with me when I got fired. I wouldn’t be where I am right now without you,” Jerry said, leaning his forehead against yours as he cupped your cheeks, holding you gently and lovingly.

“I love you Jerry Maguire.”

FIN.

i wrote this for my favourite girl @honeymvnt , hope you enjoy beautiful !! 🫶🏼🎀

[ohbo-ohno]

🗑️ tentacle octopus monster/God Simon and scuba diver Johnny.

Johnny is down on his luck decides to visit the beach. Every weekend, he goes out there and searches under the waves for any kind of treasure, something he can sell for a quick buck or two, but the entire place is riddled with garbage: plastic bags, soda cans, he'll he even found toothbrushes.

So Johnny sets up a plan: clean up the beach. Sure, it's less profitable, but he's going to have to take out the trash before finding anything worthwhile underneath, he'll, he might even have his name on a local newspaper if he did a good job (I imagine Johnny craving praise like crazy, even if it's an obscure source like the newspaper or a headline that most people won't even read)

So he starts on the far side of the beach and slowly cleans up the sand, then he goes further under the water and cleans there too.

He notices that whenever he rescues animals caught in plastic, or picks up the metals lying on the local reef, the fish will sometimes crowd a few meters away to watch him. It's the cutest thing Johnny's ever seen, and it drives him to keep going.

Eventually, months have passed and it's gotten to the point where Johnny's having trouble finding anymore trash lying around. The fish are comfortable around him, and don't hesitate to swim towards him when they see him.

One day though, as he's lazily drifting on top of the small waves in the afternoon, he sees something approaching. He quickly ducks underwater to see what it is, and nearly sighs in relief at seeing the tiny seal swimming towards him.

It's fin is caught on a bag, with thin shoe strings tied around its neck. The poor thing. Johnny tries to get closer, but everytime he makes to approach, the seal moves away.

It gets to the point that Johnny has to grab his diving flippers from the sand and race back into the water to make sure the seal isn't gone.

It's there, watching him and as much as Johnny tries catching it, it dances away from his fingers every time.

He's so focused, that he fails to notices the change in scenery, the growing distance between the waves above and the earth below the water.

It's only when he catches the seal that he notices he doesn't know where he is. Worse yet, they're both swimming in fnt of a terrifyingly large cave, the mouth wide and gaping, only darkness within.

He quickly helps the seal, before letting it go. It swims away, but Johnny is too busy curiously heading towards the cave.

The inside of it is worn smooth by the waves, and it's completely submerged. Johnny decides to check it out for a bit, and once he's sure he's going to run out of air soon, he turns around and heads for the entrance, but tentacles grasp his ankles and drag him deeper within the depths. He struggles, but it's no use.

"Would you look at that." A deep voice resonates from the depths. "Are you the little human cleaning up my domain?"

Johnny hurriedly nods, not sure where this is going.

"Then I suppose my thanks are in order. I am Ghost, and you?"

Johnny can't respond, until the creature laughs at him. "Oh, I forgot." Suddenly, warmth burst onto Johnny's neck, and as he struggled in the creatures hold, suddenly able to breathe, though not by his mouth but through his... Gills?

And the darkness that swallowed his vision is gone, suddenly he can see clearly who is before him: a man from the hips up, and tentacles occupying the space below.

"Poor thing," it (he?) coos in a gravely voice. "You must have worked hard. As thanks, I will graciously allow you to bear my-

(I have no idea if oviposition is too much for you so just imagine Ghost says he's going to let Johnny get his cock which he does and promptly rocks his shit till Johnny passes out)

I have nothing to add to this but you should read Where Moonlight Meets the Sea for merman ghost x soap (not dark) and swimming with sharks for shark ghost x soap (quite dark)

[rastro-writes]

58 for Legend and Ravio??

58. Accidental Kisses

Ravio was helping Link pack for yet another adventure, some portal popped into existence on their lawn, and that’s an adventurer summons if there ever was one.

“Did you pack my Fire and Ice Rods? Potions?” Link called from the storage room where he was presumably putting on as many rings as he can fit, and picking out which shield to take.

“Three red, two green, and a blue for good measure. Sword packed?” Ravio called back.

“Sounds good, and in the sheath. Ah! This one! Slingshot? Boomerang?” Link called back as he came into the front room.

“Already packed.” Ravio added. He knew what Link needed by now, he sold him his entire inventory two adventures ago.

Link stuffed the Zora flippers into the bag for good measure.

“Gimme a hand” Ravio obliged and lifted the bag onto his back. He notice the sword was in the sheath next to the door, the door Link was passing right through on his way out.

“Link?”

“Yeah, Rav?”

“Your sword?” Ravio chuckled lifting the blade.

“Oh, that’d be good.” Link ran back, clearly too ecstatic about the thrill of a new adventure, grabbed the sword, pecked Ravio on the cheek, and was out the door.

“Wh- LINK! Link, get back here right now and explain what that was!”

“That was an accident and I refuse to elaborate! Bye!”

“Link!!” But he was already in the portal.

[lateraniansweets]

watchu got there?

pairing: gekko (mateo) x reader

notes: wow i cant believe i come back from an unplanned hiatus with a valorant fic wow (send valo asks pls) n e ways this can be read romantic or platonic tbh

“Gwahgwakwakakk!”

“No no no no shhh,” you put a finger to your lips, shushing the creature squirming excitedly in your messenger bag, “we gotta be quiet Wings.” 

Wingman stops squirming and peeks his head out from the bag, “Gworyaet?”

You nod, “Yep. We gotta be quiet or we’ll get caught.”

Wingman nods, holding out a flipper in front of him–mirroring you, before returning inside the bag. You pull over the bag flap and crouch, eyes sweeping the corridors leading to the common room.

The common room door opens automatically and you step inside. 

Like the hallways earlier it was empty, its usual dwellers away on a mission or in their own quarters. 

You sit yourself down on the couch, swiping away the paint-splattered tools left on the coffee table to make room for your smoothie. Glancing to your right you find one of Cypher’s cameras hidden in the pile of scrap that was once Maxbot.

You give the camera the finger. 

Cypher was probably in his office right now, laughing at your dumbass sneaking around HQ while holding a smoothie. 

“Well whatever,” you help open Wingman’s own drink before taking a sip of yours, “it was worth it–” 

The door to the common room opens, revealing a haggard-looking Mateo “Hey ___ have you seen Wingma-”

“No.” You answer a little too quickly.

“Oh,” He walks inside, checking the nooks and crannies of the common room, “Well tell me if you do! I’ve been looking for him all–”

“Gworehjerhjejwkrherhjwjdsf.”

You both freeze. 

Mateo looks behind him and then under the coffee table, 

“Wings?!” he calls out.

A gurgling noise comes from your bag, two yellow ears peeking out from it. 

“Hey ___,” he gestures to the bag “What’s in there?”

Choosing the worst timing possible, Wingman pops out of the bag, holding a smoothie. 

Again you pull the bag flap over him and look Mateo dead in the eye, “Nothing, just a smoothie”.

note: yes this is based off of this meme

[waywardstation]

okay joke idea but hear me out

PMD: everything is the same or similar except Akari is a Phione. She needs to be careful when playing around with Ingo when he is Thyplosion. Also I believe she would be spitting water at everyone being mean to him.

And once again she becomes a passenger on him as a Phione.

I don’t think things would change too much for the AU if she was a Phione, but some things would definitely be different.

Compared to an eevee, she’d probably be useless anywhere else, but I could see her being pretty helpful in water-based dungeons where Ingo would struggle more, as a sort of trade-off.

I think she would spit water at those who are rude as well; it’s annoying but it’s not harmful. The Miss Fortune Sisters (in the place of Team Skull in this AU) would probably be subjected to that a lot haha. Like you said, she’s just got to be careful not to accidentally douse Ingo’s hot spots on his back — lots of steam, and/or brief difficulty with igniting, depending on how much water is sprayed.

And I do think Ingo would have to carry her around most places. No legs and flimsy flippers make for a very slow pace on land — she’d stick herself to his shoulder like a starfish lol. And maybe stay in the bag/under his hat in hot weather.

[jades-typurriter]

Wife Swap

This was a bit of a chain of inspiration; me and Bowsiosaurus, who have crushes Vanilla and Toriel respectively, joked about switching girlfriends, and then vee drew this rather out of the blue to follow up on it. Vee THEN wanted to pay me to write a story to go with it, but I was feeling motivated anyway after seeing how this came out, so I asked ver to help me design Posie instead. Anyway, this is RIDICULOUSLY self-indulgent. Please enjoy the boundary between realities passing over the two of us at a party!

Jade and Bowsie stood in the living room of a mutual friend, holding plastic cups of fruit punch and catching up about their new relationships. It was a casual affair: a few friends who all happened to be in town at the same time, some movies, bags of popato chisps—chips? no, no, chisps, it was hard to tell for a second—lining the countertop along the side of the room.

“We met when she moved into the apartment next to mine,” the serpent explained as Jade stretched, letting out an appropriately catlike yawn. “A lot of the time we were getting to know each other was me making excuses to help her with things, if I’m being honest.”

“Well, hey! You don’t have to be a man to get to a girl’s heart by being gentlemanly.”

“She does like to call me that…”

“Tori’s little helper, huh?” she teased.

“G-grawawawa!!”

“Heehehehehee! Okay, okay. What sort of stuff does a lady like Toriel even need help with? She seems pretty capable.”

“Well, um! I really like helping her in the kitchen. I’ve learned a lot about baking from her! She also does a lot of community service type things. Did you know she used to be a teacher?”

“Oh? For what grades?”

“Little, little kids, uh, kindergarten and stuff.”

“Oh, wrow,” Jade mrowed, “that’s a fun coincidence! Vanilla has a daughter right about that age.”

“You and moms, huh.”

“Oh, shush,” she snickered.

“It’s true!”

“It is!! It is.”

“So, has dating someone with a kid been complicated?”

“Oh, not at all! Cream and I get along really well, actually. I sit down with her and, like, have tea parties with her little chao. She’s such a sweetheart. She made some cookies for me last week!”

“Uwa!! Well, if you’re getting along well with her, that must be a good sign for Vanilla.”

“I’d like to think so, yeah! If the family likes you, you’re so in.”

“Mhm, mhm.”

There was a lull in the conversation for a few moments. Bowsie looked absentmindedly over ver shoulder at someone messing around at the snacks table. It looked like they were trying to pick something up with a fork instead of just grabbing it with their hand, which was odd—it was all finger food! Or, wait, did the host spring for a chocolate fountain? Had that been there the whole time?? Jade took a sip of her punch, and Bowsie turned back around when she leaned in conspiratorially:

“Alright, so, apart from the obvious—what do you like about her?”

“Grawa??”

“Like!! Any little habits, cute things you’ve noticed. I know she’s an older woman and I know she’s twice your size, like, believe me. I’m shaking your flipper about it. But like other than that.”

“Um… okay, h-her, her ears are really nice…”

“I suppose I’m obligated to shake paws with you on that too.”

“Heehee, yeah, I guess so!”

“So, do we just both have a thing for big floppy ears and we didn’t know it?”

“No, no, it’s more like! Well, her fur is soft all over, but it’s really nice to just touch her ears, y’know?”

“Ohhhhh, yeah yeah yeah. Petting girls is just like a blessed experience.”

“Yeah… It’s like…”

As vee continued the thought, something began to change in the back of ver mind. Literally. Whatever was going on crept over the room from behind them, continuing from the snack table. Ver long, fishy tail began to shorten, fluff sprouting along its length as it seemed to roll itself up like a snowball—and like a snowball it sat, puffy and cute, at the small of ver back. The fins on ver head lost their perkiness, flopping down the sides of ver face, which was also pulling back into itself, snout disappearing in favor of a pink, Y-shaped nose.

The fins lengthened, and more fur began to grow in place of the scales there; soon enough, they stretched all the way down to ver butt, nicely framing the new tail. The tie around ver neck stretched in odd ways: the ribbons at the sides reached around ver neck, pinching itself into the links of a necklace, for which the knot of the tie became a big, bejeweled pendant. From ver tummy sprouted something a lot like the fur cropping up elsewhere, but much tidier—a dress, appearing seemingly from nowhere, sporting cuts at the hips and a hem in the front that matched ver (previous) underbelly pattern. Between the neckline and the pendant was, suddenly, some notable cleavage, and a feather boa cascaded over ver shoulders, seemingly from nowhere.

“She’s just such a cute little thing,” Vanilla continued, swirling the red wine she now held in her paw. “She really thrives on affection! Rubbing her ears is one of the easier ways to do it… she can’t get enough of laying her head in my lap and letting me scratch right between them.”

As the serpent spoke, Jade distantly realized that it was getting harder and harder to tell what vee was saying. It was getting harder and harder to see ver. Maybe the punch had more alcohol in it than she'd realized? She struggled to listen more closely; her ears burned, as if in embarrassment, though she still couldn’t make out any specific words. She felt like she should be flustered by what her friend was saying, but she wasn’t sure why… Slowly, the sensation came into sharper focus, drifting away from feeling exposed and closer toward a sense of scandal, like she was more shocked that this was the subject of public conversation than the subject matter itself. Nervously, she attempted to change the subject:

“Yeah, yeah, totally!” She began, taking the tried-and-true “smile and nod” approach for when you can’t hear someone in a crowd. “So, you were saying earlier about how you help Toriel around the house, right? Do you ever have to help her deal with computer stuff?”

“Oh, dear, you know I’m no good with computers.”

“Well, you know you can ask Annie for help any time you need!” Jade continued, seemingly unable to reconcile the sudden difference in tone. “She’s taught Vanilla a few things before. That’s one thing that’s sorta weird about the relationship, is just, the total difference in skills 'cause of how far apart we are in terms of age…”

She was interrupted by the lengthening of her own snout. The changes approached her from the front—she had been facing the opposite way as Bowsie, after all. Her kitty nose flattened, vanishing beneath the fur of her face and becoming two simple slits; her canine teeth became more pronounced, sticking out from under her upper lip. Her fur began to turn white, spreading from her nose over her face and down along her neck, and the hair that framed either side of her face became less and less fluffy, more and more orderly, until it was two solid masses of fluff: floppy, lop-goat ears that now grazed her shoulders.

Her loose top, once propped up by a single shoulder and a chest full of fluff, became a sleeveless gown, held in place by a chest full of… well, chest. A very full chest, as a matter of fact. Her hips widened, and she grew a head or two taller—she would have towered over Bowsie like this, but Vanilla was actually a fairly tall woman. Her paws grew to match the scale of the rest of her body, and the fluff around her neck receded to reveal a luxurious string of pearls. At her hip, Anodyne—hitching a ride in the phone in her pocket—slowly morphed from silicone transistors and diodes to brass gears and springs, taking the shape of her beloved heart-shaped locket.

Toriel and Vanilla stood in a reputed ballroom, sipping from crystal wine glasses and gossiping about their adorable new partners. It was a rather big-name event: Mobians and monsters who had made reservations months in advance, live music, hors d'oeuvres lining the pristine tablecloths of the refreshments along the side of the room.

“Sorry,” Toriel said, blinking hard over her bifocals, eyes refocusing on her gal pal at the end of her snout. “Where was I a moment ago?”

“You were talking about the age difference between you and Bowties, Tori,” Vanilla chirped.

“Oh! Yes, that is right,” she said, the conspiratorial smile returning to her face. “Now, I am only saying this because you were talking about pressing your partner’s buttons—how naughty, by the way! One of the cutest things about Bowsie, though, is the way that he falls all over himself at the slightest advance.”

“Oooh,” the rabbit tittered, “Not just younger, but less experienced?”

“That is understating it!”

“How flattering, though!”

“Well, sometimes I wish it were less of a momentous occasion when I change my clothes. It can be frustrating when your partner needs to stop and collect himself when you wish you could simply get into things. But, yes, I suppose all the attention is nice… It makes me feel pretty to be able to knock someone flat like that again!”

“Oh, hush, Tori. You look as good as ever! You haven’t aged a day as long as I’ve known you.”

“And neither has our taste in partners, hmm?”

“Goodness!!”

“It is true!”

“It is!” Vanilla giggled. “It is.”

Thank you for reading! If you'd like to see more of my writing, feel free to take a look here and here.