#I’m just happy to know (and read) about all the fanfics involving This Man

[glubglubism]

i avoid tête-à-tête with Xavier for two reasons:

1. Him

2. H I M .

[loveindefinitely]

༊*·˚ FOREVER WINTER (IF YOU GO) — task force 141 x reader

06 — PULL A TRIGGER, CLIMB A MOUNTAIN

featuring. simon 'ghost' riley + johnny 'soap' mactavish + kyle 'gaz' garrick + john 'bravo six' price + (non-endgame phillip graves)

warnings. nsfw, fem!reader, fmmmm, enemies to lovers, slow burn, polyamory, ghostsoap, pricegaz, alerudy, heavy angst, requited unrequited love, graphic violence

series masterlist. read on ao3. read on wattpad. fanfic playlist.

<- previous part | next part ->

Graves watches you, a sleazy smirk on his face as he sits in the helicopter, blood dripping from his forehead and empty rifle in hand.

With a wink, he chimes in through your channel, “See you when you’re useful again, baby.”

*

Three hours earlier.

*

“Change.”

Looking up, you give the hulking man the most annoyed expression you can muster, cocking your hip and folding your arms over your chest. He, in response, only raises a brow and folds his own arms, a clear mocking of your own stance.

Everyone else is already in the other room, checking over weaponry and making plans. They’re loud enough to be heard here, jovial laughter and quickly-spoken Spanish filtering in. A song plays, too, a nice kind of melody that you find yourself enjoying.

“I usually need a shot or two first,” you snark, making no move to take the folded clothes from the balaclava-clad man. “You buying?”

As he shoves the uniform into your chest, you shoot Ghost a nasty glare.

“We have stuff we need to do without you,” he quips, pushing against your shoulder hard enough to have you taking a step back. “That uniform’s too recognisable.”

“What, the American flag’s too much for you?” You lean in once more, shoving your own hand against his chest. He doesn’t budge. “I deserve to be involved, when I’m giving you intel. This whole exclusion bullshit reminds me of kindergarten.”

“Then change, and stop acting like you belong in one,” Ghost snaps, and with one final look your way, storms out of the main room, slamming the wooden sliding doors shut behind him as he does.

You’re alone, now. 

The room is vast, and at the small table still sits the laptop.

You’d… just. Done that. Threatened the very man who had taught you everything you know, the very man who had practically adopted you after your mother’s death. The very man of whom you’d just sentenced to death by your own hand. Your own lit match.

“Fuck,” you hiss, burying your face in your free hand.

This was the first time you’d had true solitude since. Well. It might’ve only been a day, but everything that’s happened has made it feel like years. Your throat itches from the knife wound, and you can feel your ribs’ bruising when you inhale.

“Fuck,” you curse once more, looking to the sliding doors.

After the call with Shepherd, the four men had been… well, they’d all had a very individualised response.

Soap had brought you in with an arm around your neck, ranting about how ‘badass’ you had been. Gaz had joined in, ruffling up your hair, placing a hand on your shoulder and asking if you were okay.

You’d said yes.

It had been a lie.

Ghost, without a word, had left to check over his magazines. Price had given you a firm nod and a pat on your back before, he too, left to the other room to sort things out.

“Lucky yer on our side, hen,” Soap had joked goodnaturedly. Gaz had rolled his eyes, saying, “You’re just happy your little Sweetheart can take you in a fight.”

Soap had immediately tackled him to the ground, and that was that.

Now, you stood, lone in the vast space of the room. It was still very early morning, the quiet sound of birds outside mixing with the rambunctiousness of the Los Vaqueros on the other side of the doors. Soft light filters in through the boarded up windows, casting over you in an odd haze.

Dropping the uniform onto the table, your brows furrow when you notice not only the 141’s standard uniform, but also a balaclava not unlike Ghost’s own.

The fabric is oddly soft as you run your hand over it, the paint cracking slightly against the nylon. Putting it aside for now, you then look over the uniform. A black long-sleeve compression shirt, baggy beige cargo pants. They’re definitely a bit too big for you, but admittedly, Ghost was right. It’d be too easy to spot you on the field if you were in Graves’ uniform.

Looking around the room, as if to cement the fact that you were alone, you quickly change, swapping out your bloody uniform for the new one.

It’s when you’re about to pull on the shirt that you look down, seeing the bruises lining your stomach. From the fight with Soap, or from one of your confrontations with the Shadows, you aren’t sure. Pressing softly against one, you can’t help a small grunt at the burst of pain.

You pull the compression shirt over your head, the fabric tight against your skin. How he’d had your size for the shirt and not the pants, you weren’t sure, but you weren’t about to look a gift horse in the mouth.

Pulling over the new vest, you transfer all of your old items into it, finding this design much nicer. Not as constricting against your breasts, designed more unisex than Graves’ had been.

Grabbing the balaclava, your feet carry you to the sliding doors, and you open them with little struggle. 

You nearly stumble when you find all of the men within pulling on their own masks, stopping in your tracks at the sight. Ghost and Price’s backs are to you, and when you see Ghost pulling on one of the same masks, everything clicks.

He hadn’t wanted you to see his face – had used getting changed as a distraction.

And yet, here were the Los Vaqueros, some of which had never even spoken to Ghost, having the privilege. It shouldn’t make you angry, you shouldn’t care, but you can’t help the onslaught of rejection that floods your system.

When you step forward, into their line of sight, you straighten your spine and take out your gun from its holster, reloading it in precise movements, not looking down at it once. When the magazine clicks into place, you narrow your gaze on Ghost.

“Are we getting this done or having a fashion show?”

*

“That’s cold,” you murmur, eyes squeezed shut as war-torn fingers swipe grease paint around your eyes, careful in their placement. You sway when the vehicle drives over a pothole, but the fingers continue their ministrations without pause.

Price chuckles softly, wiping his thumb underneath your eye. “Used to do this for Ghost every other day,” he says under his breath, collecting more paint from the pot and continuing to spread it across the upper half of your face.

You’re in the back of a van with both Price and Gaz, Alejandro behind the wheel as you head back to his colonised base.

“You look like one of us now,” Gaz chimes, to your right. Watching you both carefully, his own paint already done, he leans back into his seat. “Uniform, mask… we’ve corrupted you, love.”

You roll your eyes beneath your eyelids. “Good luck with that.”

“Don’t test me,” he laughs, at the same time that Price pulls away once more, looking you over, before deciding that more paint will be needed.

“Feel like a kid at a fair,” you muse, earning a soft chuckle from Price. “Do I get glitter too?”

“Maybe if you’re a good girl,” Price jokes softly, and you let out a laugh of your own. Internally, you register your cheeks heating at the comment, a part of you yearning for such praise from the man. If it didn’t mess up your paint or cause the two to give you weird looks, you’d slap yourself.

“Can’t believe you’re Graves’ Colonel,” Gaz admonishes, and you barely restrain a huff of annoyance. He corrects himself. “Were. Man, he did not deserve you in his ranks. You probably would’ve done better as Commander than he ever could.”

You let your lips curve into a somewhat appreciative smile, eyes still shut as Price continues his studious work. “Believe it or not, we all loved him. Behind the scenes, he treated us pretty well. The guys, anyway.”

You can’t see it, but Gaz and Price share a knowing look, both of them raising their brows. Your eyes remain shut throughout their small, silent exchange.

“How so?” Price asks, gruff, and the tone encourages you to tell the truth.

“Well,” you swallow, unsure of how to approach the issue. You never have, never felt a reason to. “Just. Small things. Jokes, and stuff. I’m the only woman in the Company, actually–”

“What?” Gaz blurts out, not seeming able to stop himself. “You’re serious?”

You let out a somewhat self-deprecating chuckle. “...Yeah? That’s pretty normal in military jobs, y’know. Didn’t think it was that weird. At least I’m a Colonel.”

“You don’t think that’s… weird?” Price asks, and it’s only then that you realise he’s stopped painting your face. You blink open your eyes. “The only woman in his Company, and she’s his Colonel?”

Chewing on your inner cheek, you shake your head. “I was one of the very first to be hired by him. We… He was my partner. In nearly every sense of the word,” you admit, a small truth. “I mean. I don’t think that I loved him. Just. Never really had anyone else.”

“How old were you when you joined Shadow Co?” Gaz asks, slowly, carefully.

You mull it over, before supplying an easy answer. “Eighteen, or so. He was twenty-seven when he started, and –”

“That’s so fucked,” Gaz curses, burying his face in his hands. “Seriously. He’s a fucking asshole.”

You’re desperate for a change of topic, anything else but this. Not now, not when your wounds are too fresh, not when you’re about to come face to face with him again. With a deep breath, you divert the situation.

“Am I done?” You ask, looking to the window and trying to catch your reflection to no avail.

“...Yeah,” Price breathes, “You’re done.”

Easing back into your spot, you find your leg bouncing once more, the adrenaline of the upcoming mission keeping you antsy and energetic. You haven’t slept in over twenty-four hours, but you somehow find yourself more awake now than you had been hours ago.

Resting his hand on your knee, Gaz gives you a reassuring smile. “You ready?”

Letting out a low, unsure exhale, you find yourself nodding. “Yeah. I think so. I know what I’m going to say to him. I’m. He’ll come around.”

Gripping your mask in your hand, you move to pull it over your head, the fabric snugly fitting around your skin. It’s an odd sort of comfort, a way of protecting yourself from the emotional wreck that this mission will create. For the first time, you think that you can understand the attachment Ghost has to it.

“If we kill ‘im,” Price starts, but when you instantly flick your gaze to him, starts to backtrack, “If. If it comes down to it. You can’t hold it against us.”

You just check over your ammo, your cartridges, before simply replying.

“I’ll kill him myself.”

“We won’t make you do that,” Gaz says, adamant and firm as he leans in closer to you. “You don’t have to kill ‘im. I know most of us are wanting to do the honours, anyway.”

“I know Soap and Alejandro are just about begging to,” you acquiesce, but you find yourself focusing on the gun in your hands to reset your mindscape anyways. “But. It’s different. If he’s really done all of this… I want closure.”

“You’ll get your closure. Bloodshed or not,” Price pats your back, and you give him a small tilt of your lips, before realising that your mask covers the movement.

“You still good to split with Price and meet with the other team from the helo, hermana?” Alejandro calls from the front, turning slightly to look to you. You give him a thumbs up, and even with his mask on, you can tell he’s wearing a toothy smile.

“Your gun all good?” Gaz asks, jerking his head to the weapon. “Ammo in your pockets, cartridge full?”

Pulling your free hand into a gun gesture, you smile. 

“Pew.”

*

It’s with the weight of the world on your shoulders that you watch Price’s helicopter get shot.

“We’re hit! We’re hit!” Price calls through your shared radio channel, his voice frantic enough to have you skidding to a stop. Distantly, you think you can hear Ghost say something, but it’s quickly shadowed by Price’s, “Going down. We’re going down!”

You’re about a hundred feet away from where Rodolfo and Soap stand, the two also seeming to pause behind a warehouse of some sort.

When you see Soap move to push Rodolfo up the wall, you run as fast as your legs will take you to their position, calling out to them, “I’m coming with!”

“Thought you weren’t making it, cariño!” Rodolfo calls out as you fall alongside them, your heartbeat raging in your ears. 

“Can’t get rid of me that easy,” you jest, then pause when you see Ghost to your side. Jerking your head to the wall, you ask, “Need a personal invitation?”

“Price and the pilot need help. You three finish this,” he shakes his head, before turning and leaving for the crash site. Shrugging, you spin back to where Rodolfo’s extending his hand to help you up, which you accept, reaching the top of the wall and swinging your right thigh over it, straddling the brick.

Extending your arm down, you pull Rodolfo up, Soap taking his other hand in a firm grip. When Rodolfo swings around to sit between you both, he curses under his breath. 

“Look!” Soap hisses, and when you do as he says, your own stomach falls down to the dirt floor beneath you.

“That’s not ours,” Rodolfo murmurs, and you can barely find your voice.

“A tank,” you say, mindlessly, watching on as a fucking tank pulls into the training area of the compound. “Graves… he has a fucking tank?”

Neither of the two respond, both instead jumping off of the wall, falling into a crouch as they land. They both extend hands to you, more of a supporting gesture than anything, but you don’t take them as you too land on the other side of the brick, entering the training area.

“Ye ready for this?” Soap asks the two of you, a hint of mania creeping onto his blood-flecked face.

“Hell yeah,” Rodolfo breathes, before looking to you with a friendly smile. Ruffling your hair, a familiar gesture, now, he squeezes the nape of your neck. “If you come out of this alive, hermana, we could use you in the Los Vaqueros.”

You bark a laugh, stunned, almost, before shaking your head. “You should talk to your boss about recruiting people, first.”

Rodolfo shrugs. “Ale likes to make me happy.”

“Interviews can happen later, aye?” Soap chuckles, and the three of you look to the tank once more. “Bigger fish to catch, and allat.”

You go to say something else, when –

“Didn’t realise you boys were into kidnapping women now. That’s a bit sketchy, ain’t it?”

Graves. He’s – he’s got a radio, he’s talking, he’s here, he’s. He’s fucking with you, trying to play mind games, trying to break you all over –

“Can’t wait to bake this bastard,” Soap grunts, and you find your footing once more. Sure, you were ready for battle, but your entire reason for being here was to talk to him. Get him to realise his mistakes, come forward, go back to the man you knew.

Rodolfo and Soap are running somewhere, doing their part, and you –

“Is what they said true?” It’s the most important question you have right now. The answer you yearn for.

A moment passes.

“Where did you go, gorgeous? When’d they get ya? Did they blackmail you in Las Almas?” He diverts, and you tighten your grip on your gun, swallowing your litany of curses.

“Answer my questions, Commander. Is. What they said. True.”

“It doesn’t matter, baby. Remember where your loyalties lie,” Graves takes on a sweeter tone, a more… condescending one, you think. 

“Please,” you find yourself whispering, begging for him to just. Break this nightmare, rebel against it, be Phillip. “Please tell me this isn’t really you.”

“Oveja pequeña,” he coos, and you swear your spine erupts in hives, “I’m still your Phillip. You’re the one who’s changed – look at you, running off with the 141. I’m disappointed.”

You erupt, then, like a dormant volcano, finally gathering the final push to let lava reign free.

“I’m going to fucking kill you! You just killed fathers, tore apart families! I fucking hate you!” You yell into the radios, no tears falling, merely anger and vengeance clouding your vision.

“Don’t forget that you are under my orders. Whether you’re in my bed or not, you’re my Colonel,” he seethes back, and like a shot while you’re already down, you realise that this is a hopeless cause. You weren’t going to save Shepherd. You weren’t going to save Graves.

All you had left to save was yourself.

They’d lied to you, an indefinite amount of times, for how long, you weren’t sure. Your whole relationship – was that a lie, too? Was your entire life?

“I’m your second in command,” you finally admit out loud, hiding behind a crumbling wall as the tank shoots just a few feet away from you. “So when you get taken down, guess who comes out on top?”

“Listen to yourself!” He shouts, his voice cracking in his sudden anger, “Listen–”

“No, you listen!” You find yourself crying out, taking a few shots at the tank, allowing Soap and Rudy to do their part. “Listen to me, Phillip. You’re going to regret this – all of this. When were you going to tell me you were under Shepherd’s orders, huh? How long have you been fucking me over!”

“Whenever you first came around my cock is my guess, baby,” he responds, icy and cold.

His words only seem to further encourage you to breaking point, adding more and more fury to rush down your veins like its very own hit of morphine.

“Guess what, Commander?”

“Don’t bull–”

“That first time, and every time since?”

He doesn’t bother to interrupt you.

“I faked it.”

With that, you switch Channels to one shared with all of you.

You had heard everything you needed to, and along with it, realised something of vital importance. A small inconsistency that changed everything.

“Ghost team,” you say, neutral and unforgiving, “Graves isn’t in the tank.”

“What’re ye talking about?!” Soap calls through, exuding exhaustion, the sound of explosions crackling through behind his vocals. “He has to be–”

“He’s not,” you say, firm, absolute in your decision. “I don’t know where he is – but he’s not in there. Not his style, anyway – prefers to be in the spotlight.”

“What do we do then, hermana?” Rodolfo asks, sounds strained just as Soap had.

Your answer is easy. “You guys focus on the tank – I’m taking Graves down.”

With that, you run for the wall once more, and with nothing but your intuition, you know exactly where you’ll find your ex-Commander.

*

As per usual when it comes to your gut-feelings, you’re correct. 

It’s within the hanger on the compound that you find him getting into a helicopter – a wound on his forehead and tactical glasses on. Somehow, he’s already found himself injured – a small, selfish part of you satisfied with that information.

“Commander!” You yell as you break through the small window of the hangar, using the butt of your gun to do it. It’s as the door to the heli shuts that he notices you – and you switch back on to his radio.

“This is your last chance,” he grits out, his voice thin and furious. “Before this becomes more than a… domestic fight.”

You wince as the blades start turning, taking shelter behind one of the cargo boxes, wary of any bullets being shot your way. “The only domestic thing about us was your inclination for treating me like your little wife.”

“Always did think you’d look pretty barefoot and pregnant,” he muses, and oh, have you never wanted to kill a man more in your life.

“Aww,” you mock, as the blades’ whirring gets louder and shots echo around you finally, “See, I think you’d look pretty bleeding out at my feet.”

“You did look rather good at mine,” he retorts, and your emotions get the better of you as you peek, shooting three Shadows behind the heli with easy headshots. You’re barely there for two seconds before a burning pain echoes through the side of your shoulder, and you duck down once more.

“Couldn’t even get off,” you pant, relentless to the very end even as your breaths turn into heavy falls of your shoulders, “Was like fucking a Ken doll.”

“You’ve always been a petty bitch,” he snaps, and you smirk.

“I am a bitch, you’re right. And you know what bitches do when someone taunts them? They bite.”

You raise your gun, and for a scary, short second, you realise that blood is flowing in a stream that’s causing the sleeve of your black shirt to grow sticky and damp. Now isn’t the time to care, however, as you take aim at one of the windows of the heli.

Pulling the trigger, the bullet bursts through the window, glass shattering and falling to the ground. It’s as soon as it does, however, that it takes flight, boosting in its acceleration immediately.

Fully peeking, this time, you watch as the helicopter quickly takes off, and even if you had the capacity to shoot at it, it wouldn’t hit the intended target, not with your trembling hands.

Graves watches you, a sleazy smirk on his face as he sits in the helicopter, blood dripping from his forehead and empty rifle in hand.

With a wink, he chimes in through your channel, “See you when you’re useful again, baby.”

You get one final sentence in, before the radio cuts off. Even though you can’t see him from this distance, you’re sure you’re making eye contact as you deal your final blow.

“My callsign isn’t baby. It’s Sweetheart.”

taglist. @lilpothoscuttings @jng-yuan @iruzias @insatiablekittie @1wh4re1nova @kaoyamamegami @supernaturalstilinski @inthemiddle0feverywhere @msecho19 @nogood-boyo @alfa-jor @lalashhyl @letmeapologise @honeybeeznutz @1mawh0re @oreo-cream @lalashhyl @someonepleasedateme @letmeapologise @uhhellnogetoffpleasenowty @inarabee

author's note. to everyone asking about the covid, its prettyyy bad haha. i can hardly leave my bed and need 3 blankets in the peak of summer!

at least that means i have downtime to write before my life gets VERY hectic. thank you all for your support again, the feedback and praise for the last chapter made me feel 10x better and i genuinely appreciate you all SO much. thank you thank you thank you!

[joekeeryswife]

AHH girl dad! pedro is really just occupying my mind rn….

that one imagine with expecting! reader really has me in a chokehold but just thinking about how sweet pedro would be while your in labor

from the jump, he’d be by your side. the minute you feel your water break in bed and your contractions are feeling a little too real, hes right by your side. his old man brain is definitely a little discombobulated at first bit he’s definitely trying to get you out of your now soaked pjs and into some dry sweats to get you into the car.

thanks to you and all your nesting while pedro’s at work, all the hospital bags were set up and stocked fully for you, him, and the baby, along with the carseat already being installed, you guys were officially set up to be parents!!! pedro knows these contractions are really taking a toll on you so he’d give you all the time in the world to get your bum in the car. as soon as your both seated and settled, the drive over is filled with so much groaning and moaning and squeezing his hand with a freakishly amount of strength, because once again, contractions are indeed, a bitch.

but pedro will let you scream and shout all you need, hes just happy to be there with you. but he cant help but feel some sort of guilt. you both had entered this journey into parenthood but here you were carrying the heaviest load. so he did what he could best. after arriving in the hospital and being sent up to the suite you’d be staying in for the next few days, he’ your number 1 advocate. you want more ice chips? he’s already running down to grab you some more. one nurse isnt following the intended birth plan? best believe he is already asking for a new one. back hurts? hes the first to get behind you and rub it. hes going on walks with you, doing your lamaaze training (which he initially thought was dumb), holding you the exact way you need to be held, whispering sweet nothings, telling you how strong you are and how proud he is of you.

pedro makes it known that he wants to be as involved in the birthing process as possible, however he is needed. when its time to push, hes holding your leg up for you, praising you, helping the doctor count down on the pushes. as terrifying as it sounds, he had never been more glad to make such an effort. getting to watch beautiful, life-changing moment for the both you you. watching your daughter enter the world. i wholeheartedly believe the minute that little girl comes out, hes sobbing. i mean not that you arent but he just can’t express any other emotion what the overwhelming feeling of gratitude he feels. he feels incredibly lucky to have such a wonderful partner. he feels so lucky to have someone who was willing to go through all the troubles and challenges pregnancy presented to you. he feels incredibly lucky to have his heart grown even bigger for the newest addition into yalls life.

the minute your daughter is placed on you chest, it is the first time in a while that everything just feels right, and in place. your heart is more than content. you and your little family.🤍

i have so many thoughts in my mind about dad! pedro pascal, i just have no idea where to put them😭

Labour - p.p

hello angels! i’m honestly fuming because my last pedro fanfic got cut short- idk wtf is up with tumblr BUT… this request was the cutest thing i’ve ever read i don’t even think my writing is going to live up to it. i hope this is okay that it’s a part two to my last fanfic! enjoy angels (p.s dad! imagines are my fave so don’t be shy to put them in my inbox! x) 🤍 ⚠️age gap couple⚠️

taglist (don’t forget to add yourselves🤍) @1-john-4-19 @newtandminhoaretoocute @mavs101 @brilliantopposite187 @mimi-luvzyu (if there’s a line through your name i cannot tag you for some reason x)

"Pedro, get here right now" you shouted as you sat up in bed, looking down at the now soaking bedcovers. he had insisted you go lay down and rest as a few contractions throughout the day had worn you out and now, after an hour of sleep, your water had finally broke. you heard rapid foot steps approaching the bedroom and then the door fly open.

"what?" he looked frantic, and once he saw your anxious look on your face he knew. he walked to your side of the bed and lifted the bed covers off of you and held his hand out so he could help you up which you gently took ahold of. he could see the wet stain on the bedsheet but that was the last thing he was worrying about, he was worrying about you.

he helped you sit up and watched as a contraction surged through your body, making your face scrunch up and a small whimper escape your mouth, you squeezed his hand and tried breathing through it. after the contraction subsided you turned your body so your feet were flat on the floor, getting out of bed had gotten a lot harder and you always had to sit to catch your breath before you could get up.

"i'm sorry" you said as you looked back at the stained bed. he kept his gentle hold on your hand and lent in to give you a small kiss on your forehead. "hey, don't worry. it's only a bedsheet baby, are you okay?" once he saw you give him a small nod and a smile which reassured him enough he let go of your hand and walked to the chest of draws to get you some knew sweatpants then quickly made his way back to you.

"we gotta get you to the hospital love, you've gotta get changed" he helped you stand up which made his heart crush when he saw you breathing through yet another contraction. each one was coming with a whole new level of pain and it broke his heart that he couldn't do anything to take the pain away.

after that contraction finally subsided he helped you get changed into the fresh sweatpants and with that he grabbed your phone and your hand then helped you make your way to front door, he had to grab the baby's bags which were packed by you. you had started packing a month before your due date whilst Pedro was still working/doing interviews and he had never been more grateful that you had done that instead of rushing to do it at near your due date.

the car seat had been installed in the car three weeks ago just incase the baby decided they wanted to show up a little earlier than planned but they didn't, your due date was two days away and it looked like your baby would be coming right on time. once he was sure he had everything he quickly made his way back to you and helped you slip on your shoes and then to the elevator. the ride down to the car park of the apartment complex was filled with groans of pain as the contractions started to get closer together.

Pedro held your hand as the elevator finally stopped on the ground floor and guided you to the car which was luckily not to far away from the elevator, meaning you didn't have to walk far. "babe we have to stop for a second" you said, these contractions were really brutal, so brutal that they actually made you want to cry and that was rare. you had a very high pain tolerance so when Pedro saw you with teary eyes he knew these were really getting to you.

you hunched over slightly as a more painful contraction hit you, this time the pain went to the bottom of your back and lower stomach. Pedro let go of your hand and placed it on your back, rubbing it softly. "you're doing so well honey, so so well" he said as you stood up right again. all you wanted to do was sit down and with the car being in your view, maybe 15 steps away, you knew you needed to get there.

Pedro kept his hand on your back as you both started walking to the car again and you breathed a sigh of relief when you finally made it. he opened the passenger door for you and helped you into the seat. "you comfortable baby?" he asked you and watched you nod your head. you had heard from so many people that contractions hurt but you did not think they would hurt this much. he closed the car door and then made his way to the boot so he could put the bags away.

once he was settled in the drivers side he immediately started the car and started the thirty minute drive to the hospital. the whole ride to the hospital was filled with you groaning in pain with each contraction that came and with that came the soft words of encouragement Pedro spoke to you. this was probably the softest you'd ever heard him and it made your heart swell with love as he tried his best to make you feel better, 'you're doing so well my love, keep breathing that's it' 'you're gonna be such a good mama, you're doing brilliantly honey'

"mother fucker this hurts so much" you said as you squeezed Pedro's hand tightly. he took his eyes off of the road for a split second to look at you. he didn't know why but he felt guilty. you were both becoming parents, both on this pregnancy journey together yet you were the one that had dealt with the morning sickness, crazy hormone changes, cravings, back pain, and now contractions. "i know sweetheart but you're doing so well, we are almost there, five minutes tops" he lifted your hand to his mouth and placed a small kiss there for comfort.

-

you were finally at the hospital in the room where you would give birth to your baby. the nurse had checked and you were only 7cm dilated meaning you had another 3 to go. you were hunched over the bed, trying to get some sort of relief from the pain in your back, laying down did not help at all so you had to stick to this. Pedro was behind you, massaging the bottom of your back as you groaned in pain.

he watched the monitor which was tracking all of your contractions and saw that this one was a lot worse than the other ones. "that's it honey, well done. you're doing amazing" his words of encouragement filled your ears as your hand grabbed onto the bed sheets, keeping them in a tight grasp until the contraction subsided.

"that one was so bad" you said as you stood up straight and turned to face Pedro. he had a sympathetic look on his face. "i know" he opened his arms and you immediately 'fell' into him, needing one of his hugs. they always calmed you down somehow and right now you needed to calm down. "i'm so hungry" you said with a sigh.

you, for some reason, were only allowed to eat ice chips and all you wanted was a burger and actual chips but you couldn't, not until after you'd given birth. "we've run out of ice baby, let me go get you some" and with a kiss on forehead he pulled away from you to go find a nurse. within 5 minutes he was back with more ice chips. "here you are" he said lifting the spoon filled with ice chips up to your lips so you could eat them. "thank you sweetie" you said as you chewed on the ice. he lent in to kiss you on the lips and said a small "you're welcome" before feeding you more ice.

Pedro had been a bit weary of one particular nurse, she was in her mid 30s and was the most judgemental person he'd ever met. she was just not listening to a thing you had suggested and she was just one of those nurses who never listened to their patient, whatever the nurse wanted to do that's what was happening with no debate.

Pedro finally had enough of her when she almost made you cry with her harsh words and judgmental stares which lingered a little to long so she knew you'd notice. you both got judged on a daily basis on social media for your age gap but you had never had any bad experiences in real life, people were always so kind to you and in the thousands of judgemental people where were thousands of supportive people who always said how cute you guys were.

he had waited until she left before he slipped out of the room to speak to someone about getting a different nurse. you were in so much pain and having a nurse who wasn't making you feel any better was not something he'd ever want you to go through. luckily, there was an older nurse who was more than happy to take over. she must of been in her 60s. she followed Pedro back to your room and introduced herself to you. already the atmosphere had changed, she was so sweet to both of you and there was definitely no judgement coming from her.

"y/n, i think because you've been stuck at 7cm for the past two hours you go for a little walk around the ward, it doesn't have to be a long one but it could speed this up a bit and it also means you don't have to be stuck in this room" Mary, the new nurse said to you with a smile. she left you and Pedro alone and with that you both started walking around the maternity ward, hoping that this would finally speed up the process and will allow you both to finally meet your baby.

-

"that's it y/n you're doing absolutely amazing, keep that push" Pedro was holding your left leg and looking at his baby being born. you let go of the push and let your head fall back onto the pillow for a second just so you could catch your breath. "well done sweetheart" you heard Pedro say as you felt a small kiss on your forehead.

"and again y/n, push with this next contraction. well done" you heard Mary say as you pushed as hard as you could through the pain, groaning and the pain became almost unbearable. "that's it sweetheart, keep going" he was still holding your leg but was now by you, comforting you as you pushed. "okay stop pushing sweetie, that was amazing pushing y/n, i can see the head" Mary smiled and your heart swelled at the thought of your baby being here any second.

"okay, another contraction coming, give this one a big push y/n. this will probably be your last one" and as soon as that contraction came, your chin was to your chest as you pushed. you groaned as you felt your baby finally coming out. Pedro was now up again, wanting to see his baby come into the world. as soon as you heard that loud cry coming from your baby, instant tears started falling down both yours and Pedro's cheeks.

"you did it baby, i'm so proud of you" he said, tears rolling down his face as he kissed you passionately. "congratulations you two, it's a girl" Mary quickly put the baby on your chest and you looked down at this beautiful bundle of joy. Pedro thought he could never love anything more than he loved you, but as soon as he set eyes on his daughter his love for her grew, no words could describe how much he loved her.

"hi my angel, it's so nice to finally meet you" you whispered to her as you gently grabbed ahold of her tiny hand. she was beautiful. utterly perfect. Mary took your baby to the other side of the room where she would be weighed and would have all the regular checks any baby had, leaving you and Pedro alone. you moved over in the bed, allowing him to lay down next to you and as soon as he did he pulled you into his embrace.

"thank you" you heard him whisper as a few small kisses were planted on your forehead. he was grateful, grateful that you'd you went through this entire pregnancy and carried your baby, grateful that you'd chosen to do this with him and grateful that you'd grown your baby and now she was here with you both, where she belonged.

you looked up at him and saw that his tears hadn't stopped, they were still flowing freely down his flushed cheeks. you reached your hand up to wipe the tear streaks and smiled. "you don't have to thank me-" "no i do. you have done so much these past 9 months and i'm so grateful for that. i could have never done what you have and and i'm just really really lucky" he said, leaning down to kiss you again.

after a few short minutes of it being just the two of you, Mary brought over a wrapped up bundle of joy who was looking around the room with her dough eyes. "8 ibs and 6 Oz. she's really healthy. i'm going to leave you two alone for a while to give you time to adjust but just ring the buzzer if you need anything. again congratulations, she's absolutely beautiful" after she passed you your baby, you both said thank you and watched as she left the room.

"she's got so much hair" you whispered as you looked down at her, running your hand carefully over the top of her head. she was the most precious thing you'd ever seen. Pedro watched the two of you together, he had never in his left felt like this. he just felt pure love and adoration for the two of you. "she looks just like you baby, she's so beautiful" he kissed your forehead and let his hand stroke her cheek. this was love and he was so excited for the journey ahead.

[thoughtfullyrainynightmare]

Request: heeeyaaa Laura.. I hope you're doing fine. I'm here again for request, sorry can't get enough with your writing. It always makes me happy whenever i read here in your account..i hope you don't mind me asking a request again and again.. For my request can i have a HC for Nozel, Fuegoleon and Julius being needy and wants to have sexy time with s/o and trying to give a hint to them. If you're not comfortable on doing this it's fine by me.. Don't stop writing because i know a lot of your followers not just me is in love your works...^^

A/N: Hiya! I’m doing okay. Uni is easying on me, but I will have about a week where I will be working, while still having a couple of exams. But y’know. It’s life ^^’ 

We haven’t had smut on this blog for a good while, so it’s more than the time for it. So, I do hope that you like these! ^^

Pairing: Nozel x gn!reader, Fuegoleon x gn!reader, Julius x gn!reader Fanfic type: Headcanons Genre: smut Total length: ~1.0k Warnings: suggestive themes, the guys are being needy but are trying to be subtle about it (or then not), minors DNI

Nozel

Nozel has always had trouble expressing, verbally, what he wishes. It is merely a matter of not finding the right words, as they can sound rather vulgar in his mind. ‘Vulgar’ in the sense that he doesn’t want to sound like he’s insisting, like he’d have such desires. While in fact he does.

If he sees that lustful twinkle in the corner of your eyes, he has no issue with taking charge and merely scooping you into his arms, taking you by the hand, and ravishing your neck while leaving hungry kisses all over your skin. And at times, when he’s feeling devoid, the gracing of his teeth.

But when it comes from him, from his own carnal desires, taking charge seems too straight forward. Too insisting. Unfitting for a noble. He is not a brute, mind you.

The trouble is, that he grows so frustrated from it. To not know how to approach you about it, when all he’d really need to do is whisper ‘I want you’ into your ear. But to him it can’t be something so simple. And even in that there is the idea of insisting to him. Which he doesn’t wish to do. It is not something for him to insist.

So, you’d see him growing more irritated, which in all honesty could be about anything. It could be about work, about politics, someone irritating… Or… then it could be about how the fabric of his trousers seems to be growing too snug…

His eyes would narrow into a near glare, and his jaw would be tense, which would be only really visible when he winds up close to you… So, very very… close~

And there is the hint. In how he lingers around you, nearly over you, with those hungry eyes and a tense jaw while struggling to withhold from shifting in his seat. Which he does.

“Hmm~” you’d need to hum, and look at him with a smirk, and he’d know, that you know.

Fuegoleon

He wouldn’t have an issue with speaking out a gentle love confession to your ear, or perhaps even whispering something deliciously lustful into your ear… but such words are reserved for the bedroom, and not for places where anyone can hear. Because your private life should be private.

Thus, he dares not approach you too keenly, too much with intent. Because surely there is time, and opportunity, later. Surely.

But there is such sweet anguish having to simply look at you, there, being so irresistible, especially when he may not. Or should not. Or… perhaps he’d may and could, and it’d be a wish, a desire of a mere mortal man that he was, and a wish that involved his beloved, so it was more than mere carnal desire but… Still. He could think and try to reason to himself about it endlessly, but it’d do very little to quench the passion within him.

He is a man of passion, after all.

So, he’d need to be content in watching, and waiting. Because he does have self-restraint. He can wait. He might not like it, but it doesn’t matter. He’s not controlled by his desires.

But… you could see how his brows would be furrowed, and his breathing would grow heavier, nearly animalistic. Like a lion growling under his breath. And you’d recognize those eyes, the gaze he’d give you; his bedroom eyes that seem to tell you ‘I must have you’.

And if you’d want to tease him further, you could. You could see him practically squirm in his seat, while it’d be only internal. Under that surface of calm, would be a storm, for which you’d pay, later, in the best possible way. With your gasps and moans~

Julius

Julius is a tease, and knows it. And he knows that you know it. But there’s a fun in it, in being a bit of a tease.

He’s start with a smirk that would be… a bit smug, a bit more than the smirk he usually gives. And it’d be accompanied with a compliment of any kind. “You look lovely today”, “you’re having a good hair day today dear”, “is that a new shirt, looks good on you.” But in them there would be a hidden depth, the kind that you’ve never been able to quite put your finger on. Like there was a sentence left unspoken. Such as “and you’d look lovelier on the bed”, “but you make bedhead look amazing”, “but you’d look better without any.”

And he knows that he has time magic on this side, so he could just steal you away any time that would seem suitable. Not even necessarily convenient, but suitable for the two of you.

He’d touch your hand, or arm, place his broad hand onto your back and just… smirk at you. And in that smirk there’d be a hint of sins heaven has to offer.

Especially when he leans closer, and whispers to your ear “want to go somewhere? For a moment…?” And he’d click his tongue, just enough to make butterflies flutter in your stomach and warmth course through you.

But he’d always pull away at a convenient moment to look composed and non-suspecting to others. Another thing that comes with his teasing.

The delicate balance of a teasing touch, a smirk, and words whispered in a way that they’re whispered to only a lover. He’s both a very subtle, and a non-subtle man. Which makes it infuriatingly delicious.

[tricksterlatte]

Akeshu Holiday Heist Special WIP

This was going to be a oneshot sequel to my completed Persona 5 Akechi/Joker fanfic, Chase the Joker, set nearly one year after the ending. While I still have a few oneshots set in their future planned, this one's entire concept was changed, and the fic was scrapped. Since I had fun writing their banter, I'm going to post the WIP here anyways. You can read underneath the cut! As it's incomplete, there is no concrete ending to this segment at this time.

Sometimes, life could feel just like a Christmas movie. One could find the true meaning of holiday cheer amidst the chaos, no matter who they are or where they came from. It was a special time of year, and whether people celebrated or not, sometimes beautiful magic happened. 

Joyful moments could be shared underneath the tree as families discover the true meaning of the holiday season, whether related to Santa Clause, the meaning of life, or Kentucky Fried Chicken. True love could be discovered underneath the mistletoe, all while some coworker’s annoying as hell kids at the office Christmas party went ooh or help me or perhaps ew, gross much? On occasion, the stars aligned just right each December, and picturesque moments captured in the mind’s eye forever would feel just like the more diverse Hallmark movies. All three of them, if you were being generous.

It was at these times one must remember Die Hard was also a Christmas movie…which was the evidence Akira needed to utilize for their current situation, no matter how Goro denied it, all while they drove towards some rich bastard’s Christmas bash on a hellbent mission.

Car rides anywhere were enjoyable as long as they were with each other, and in the end that was all Akira could ask for. As Goro rambled on and on about cultural variations of the holiday, and how supposedly none of them involved homicide, Akira just held back laughter while applying the reddest lipstick known to man. He hadn’t ever worn a cocktail dress before today, but no one could deny he looked incredible. He was dressed to the nines in luscious red, a silky wig, and enough makeup that not even his own parents would recognize him, and yet it wasn’t technically for a date. What a homophobic shame dealt to him by the gods themselves.

…Okay, his parents hadn’t seen him in years, and the last time had been Goro punching his father in the face. It was better stated that not even his cat would recognize him, but Akira didn’t want to think about that either. So instead he just bickered with the man he loved.

“Honey, listen,” Akira countered, after Goro ranted for the entire length of some bubbly kpop song about being merry and happy. “I know you pride yourself on being right about everything, and I support you unconditionally, but have you ever considered you’re totally wrong about literally everything? We are living out a Christmas movie right now. I’m right.”

“Stating I’m wrong without providing actual evidence as to why again, Akira?” Goro said with an eye roll, though his rolling eyes struggled to stay focused on the road when Akira’s dress kinda showed his upper thigh. “You would not have lasted one week in a university setting’s debate team, and it shows.”

“Hey, neither of us went to college, on account of me being a sexy criminal superstar and you being sexy and also super dead. At least I read dozens of books on mythology and cultural figures when we still had the Nav,” Akira said right back. “I’m a master debater–”

“I swear if you say ‘and also a masturbator,’ I’m hitting the brakes at mach speed.”

“I mean no, I don’t need to do that when we’re in the same room twenty-four hours a day. Wow, you have such a dirty mind, did you know that?”

Goro finally stared not at the road nor Akira’s legs, but a secret third thing–his smug, stupid face, so he could shoot Akira the nastiest of glares. “Quite the talk from someone who made a kidnapping roleplay joke months after literally being kidnapped.”

Okay, that had been one time. And they were not talking about it. Not if Akira could help it. He finished applying the last of his makeup and examined himself in the mirror. If looks could kill, Akira wouldn’t need a knife tonight. Tragically, he still needed a knife, but at least he was pretty. 

“I never joked about that again, give me and my coping mechanisms some credit. Anyways, enough talk about my abduction. Ever heard of Krampus? He’s like the Mementos Grim Reaper used to be, except real, and festive, and I’m pretty sure he murdered children. How’s that for Christmas cheer?”

“I appreciate the sentiment behind a morally dubious Christmas special, but…Krampus aside, the holiday genre as a whole is ill-suited for activities such as murder, once we put aside frequently debated titles. There is a reason films such as Die Hard and American Psycho are commonly dismissed from a place among happy-go-lucky Christmas movies, and that’s due to them only portraying the holiday as background noise in favor of an action plot. It’s only a timestamp when all is considered, nothing more.”

God, Goro was so pretentious. No wonder Akira was in love with him. Here they were, driving towards some multimillionaire’s holiday party with a heist in mind and also assassination if push came to shove, and yet Goro was blasting some American artist’s holiday music on the Jokermobile speakers and discussing American fucking Psycho versus the concept of Christmas cheer. If he wasn’t wearing nondescript black clothing and gun holsters, Akira would blame the irritated snarl gracing Goro’s face on this Michael Buble person singing some no homo anthem about his buddy Santa.

Akira just giggled in his best falsetto, preparing himself for whatever crossdressing shenanigans he had to pull for their mission tonight, and flipped his wig over his shoulder. Brief little moments of domestic bliss were nice after everything, even if most people wouldn’t get it. 

“Okay, ignore the murder then. We’re still living in a real life romcom whether you think my jokes are funny or not, since my entire life is a joke.” Another unimpressed squint as Goro kept his eyes on the road. The self-deprecation didn’t hit like it used to for either of them. Damn their efforts to rebuild Akira’s self-esteem. Those efforts were getting in the way of dark humor! “It’s December 24th, we’re on our way to crash a Christmas party, and we are romantic and comedic. We even took that don we now our gay apparel song to heart, come on!”

Goro snorted, ever the long-suffering, disgruntled man in the face of whatever the fuck Akira was doing. “That can be said for your outfit tonight, but I don’t recall a black turtleneck ever winning one of those ridiculous ugly Christmas sweater contests.”

“No, see, you’re just dressed like the gay goth cousin who sits at the kids’ table during family gatherings because he hates his homophobic relatives.” Akira knew this because he had once been the gay goth cousin who sat at kids’ tables during their rare family gatherings because he hated his homophobic relatives.

Goro looked from Akira, to the road, to their GPS. His brow furrowed and he bit his lip once he saw how little time was left until their arrival. The plan had been for Goro to park the car and follow behind closely, and Akira would do the actual infiltration with a fake identity and a fake adoration for being surrounded by the rich and pompous. The flashy getup was excessive, in Goro’s opinion, but plenty of Shido’s affiliates, and therefore Goro’s whether he liked them or not, were occupying this little gala. Of the two of them, Akira was less likely to be recognized, especially when dressed like this.

That didn’t mean Goro was fond of the idea whatsoever, but that was only one stressor among the many weighing them down tonight. As Goro parked the car, Akira finalized his appearances one more time, double-checking his heels were just short and thick enough that he could still run in them, and that not a hair looked out of place.

He only became aware of his nervous expression when Goro turned off the radio. Turning to face his partner in crime, he saw anxiety reflected back at him, and Akira gulped down a lump in his throat. “Hey,” Akira said, reaching over to grab Goro’s hand as it held the steering wheel in a vice grip. “I know this time of year is stressful for everyone, but I’m going to be okay–”

“Are you okay, though?” Goro cut him off, flexing his fingers before letting go of the wheel. He squeezed his eyelids shut and visibly fought to unclench his jaw. “You’ve spent the entire car ride cracking ridiculous jokes and making up your own lyrics to every damn orchestra cover that played on the radio, but if you’re trying to hide how nervous you are, you’re not doing a great job. I thought we talked about this.”

Akira winced. Keeping secrets hadn’t been his goal at all, but he couldn’t blame Goro for that train of thought. Old habits die hard, whether trauma was involved or otherwise. He flopped back against the headrest, shifting their hands so their fingers intertwined. Even with gloved hands, the grip grounded both of them. “I wasn’t doing it on purpose. I just know if I think too much about the worst case scenarios, I won’t be able to focus on anything else. I’m worried about you too, though. What’s wrong? Is it about splitting up?”

The telltale twitch of Goro’s hand was all the answer Akira needed. He stayed silent and gave Goro a moment to find his words, taking in his harrowed expression as Goro’s thumb brushed across the various scars all over Akira’s hand. Goro had always wielded words masterfully on television and even in battle, whether they were honeyed vinegar or vulgar curses, but words conveying his innermost feelings still didn’t come easily. Akira wasn’t good at sharing his burdens purposefully either just yet, but they were trying. 

They were both getting better about trust and honesty, but sometimes Akira worried parts of them would always be trapped in the past, terrified of losing one another, or maybe in some long-lost Palace there was Goro, kneeling on some bloody floor or panicking in a hotel room, or there was Akira, trapped in a diner or tied to a chair in that hellish basement or crawling across frozen earth in a desperate rush because he couldn’t let him die, not here, not again–

“You know you don’t have to do this, right?” Akechi’s voice broke Akira out of the spiral before it could properly start. Suddenly Akechi’s head gently bumped into the side of Akira’s, and his thumb rubbed circles against Akira’s knuckles. Right. It was December, in the present day, almost a full year after three no good, very bad days. They were alive. They were okay. “I’ll admit I’m not fond of splitting up. I…I can’t lose you again.” Okay, so maybe Akira wasn’t the only one spiraling over that possibility. “If you no longer wanted to mingle with Shido’s trash, I would gladly take our little getaway car and drive wherever you wish–”

“Nope, I’m still going,” Akira butted in. He wasn’t offended by Akechi’s offer, but he didn’t want to back down now, and he knew Akechi didn’t either. He could do this. It wasn’t like he had to kill a million people, all he had to do was break into some big wig’s computer with a flash drive and then get the hell out of there. Hopefully no one paid attention to him, once they got over the dress and heels. “I have a dagger and I’m not afraid to use it, and I have my earpiece just in case. You have a sword and multiple guns and an actual sniper rifle. Give the both of us some credit! I killed a god three Christmases ago. A little breaking and entering is what the kids call small potatoes.”

Akechi said nothing, but at the rate he was stressing, he would fracture every bone in Akira’s hand, induce heart murmurs faster than you could say four Five Hour Energy shots, and go bald by age twenty-three. Refusing to let the man who was essentially his husband lose all his hair, Akira indulged in their old favorite vice: deflecting and changing the subject. “Also, this isn’t the getaway car. Stop besmirching the good name of our dearly beloved Jokermobile–”

“It’s not a good name at all, Akira,” said Akechi as he forced himself to relax. He didn’t buy the facade, but Akira wasn’t trying to fool him. They both just needed to calm down before they did anything reckless…even if a heist was also reckless. “Your habit of naming inanimate objects is getting out of hand. This isn’t the Jokermobile, it’s a black 2016 Toyota Highlander, and you only named it that because you wanted to make rear-ending jokes.”

Well, it was a good thing they had only been rear-ended by an actual car once, then. Akira took full responsibility for that one, it was his fault for trying to drive with a broken leg. Pour one out for the fire hydrant, the greatest victim of that hit-and-run besides Akira’s psyche. “And yet you never thought of a better name. Checkmate.”

“You’re insufferable,” Akechi sighed. 

“I think you meant irresistible, honey,” said Akira.

“Oh, pardon me. I meant to say you’re irritating and irresponsible. My mistake.” 

Goro didn’t give Akira time to reply before he unbuckled his seatbelt and inspected his holsters. “Do you have the flashdrive ready to go?” Akira reached into a side pocket of his dress and showed Goro the flash drive, shoving it back inside once Goro nodded. “And your dagger?” He flipped his skirt completely to the side, exposing lacy black underwear on top of the dagger strapped to the thigh lacking a dress slit. Goro forcibly ignored that and interrogated him again like the bastard cop he once pretended to be. “And your earpiece?”

Wow, not even a verbal reaction to his underwear of choice? Bummer. Akira rolled his eyes and gently swept the wig away. Barely visible inside his ear was the earpiece, but it was in place just as planned. Smiling and hoping the red lipstick wouldn’t smudge onto his teeth, he flashed Goro a thumbs up. “Yes, Goro, I’ll hear your illustrious voice loud and clear. What about yours?”

“I put mine on before we left. I came prepared, unlike you.”

“It’s not a competition, Goro.”

“Akira, we turn everything into a competition whether we like it or not.”

God, could Goro stop making good points tonight? He was beating Akira in the argument category of the Rivalry Olympics. Fucker. Conceding for now, Akira pouted as Goro let go of his hand to climb into the back. “Do we have any of those canned coffees left?” he asked while Goro inspected his ammunition.

“I grabbed extra at the 777 earlier, along with some other beverages,” Goro replied, briefly ignoring his mission prep in favor of caffeinating the idiotic love of his life. As Goro reached into their cooler, he continued, “Some are black, some have cream or sugar. How do you want your coffee tonight, my dear Joker?”

“Black like my soul, Crow,” Akira replied, fondly recalling his dear pal Satanael on the anniversary of a god’s death. Goro gave him a long, hard look, then hurled a bottle of milk at Akira’s face. Naturally, Akira caught it with all the proficiency in the universe. Then he hurled it right back at Goro, who snatched it from the air without even looking. Well, if Satanael wasn’t allowed, then Arsene better be. “Fine. Something with French roast, also like my soul.”

[marblemoovt]

Recipe For A Good Time - Jeff The Killer/Reader

Masterlist

Rating: Mature

Word Count: 9k

Warnings: None, just good ol’ fluff.

Summary:

You own a bakery and Jeff decides to tag along one day to learn how to bake a cake.

Aka: a JTK fanfic that's actually fluffy and wholesome??

------

“Don’t forget that promise you made,” Jeff says.

You open your closet and pick an outfit for the day. Looking over your shoulder, you ask, “What promise?”

Jeff chuckles. “Are you kidding me? You forgot already?” He’s out of bed now and comes up behind you. His arms wrap around your waist, and you feel his chest against your head.

You look up and smile sweetly. “I didn’t forget. You’re just terrible at reminding me.” He leans down, his hair tickling your face.

Jeff hums. “Oh sure, blame it on me.” He plants a kiss on your forehead. “You promised to teach me how to bake a cake today.” You soak in the affection, your brain still processing his words. Wait…. You did what??

Note:

A majority of the creepypasta reader inserts I see don't involve healthy relationships or there's always the risk of death. If you've read any of my works, which I highly recommend if you haven't, you'll notice that I am partial to fluff. So since I couldn't find what I wanted to read, I wrote it instead. I hope anyone else that's looking for some nice fluff with Jeff appreciates this. I honestly didn't expect the word count to go this high. The story just kinda ran on its own. But hey, more fluff for you guys.

I also recently learned that Jeffrey Woods is actually a fanfic based on Jeffrey Hodek (insert the more you know meme). The Jeff in this fic is the Hodek one, but it doesn't impact the plot too much. I spent a while in the deviant art rabbit hole trying to learn as much as I could about Jeffrey Hodek (who belongs to sesseur), but I'm honestly clueless how to capture his behaviour. I do prefer the Hodek version if anyone was curious. Mainly because that Jeff has a lot more depth to him and his overall story feels more believable.

Happy reading! (＾Ｕ＾)ノ

─── ⋆ ｡ﾟ☆: *. ☽ .* :☆ﾟ｡⋆ ───

Thump. 

Thud. 

Thunk. 

You shift in your sleep and roll onto your back, bringing the blankets closer when there’s a sudden draft in the room. Footsteps slowly rouse you awake. When you crack open an eye, a heavy weight pins you to your bed. You grunt and try to sit up, but it’s no use. You’re fully awake now, but the darkness in your bedroom robs you of your sight. The metallic scent of blood fills your nostrils, and you groan when you barely make out the eyes staring back at you. 

“I could slit your throat, and you wouldn’t be able to do anything about it.” Jeff’s accent greets your ears. You do not have time for his bullshit right now.

“I told you to stop climbing through my window in the middle of the night,” you chastise. Fumbling around, you reach the switch at your bedside and turn on a lamp.

“Hey, beautiful.” Jeff’s straddling your hips, and he’s heavy. Your sleep paralysis demons have nothing on this man. You rub your eyes to adjust them to the light, and you can clearly see the shit-eating grin on his face. A pang of annoyance twinges in your chest. 

“Fuck off.” You roll your hips to buck him off, but he grabs your waist and clicks his tongue. 

“How about I fuck you instead?” He wraps a hand around your throat, and his nails press against your skin. There isn’t any pressure, but his hold keeps you in place. Jeff doesn’t usually throw himself at you unless he’s come back from a kill. 

“You’re high on adrenaline, aren’t you?” Your nose scrunches in distaste at the state of his clothes; they’re definitely going in the wash first thing in the morning. “I have work in a couple of hours.” Owning a bakery means waking up at ungodly hours because you have to wake up before the early risers. 

Jeff smirks and squeezes your throat gently. “All I’m hearing is that we have enough time for multiple rounds.” You stare at him. It’s three in the morning, and you need to be up at six to get ready for work. There’s no way you’re going to let Jeff’s horny ass interrupt your sleep. 

You firmly grab his wrist. “No, Jeff. Now go shower; you stink.” He releases your neck and pouts. It doesn’t have the desired effect since it still looks like he’s smiling. 

“What? You don’t like the smell of blood?” He tugs on his sweater and admires the red stains. 

You groan and try to shove him off, but he doesn’t even budge. “I don’t like cleaning it off my sheets either. Shower or leave. Your choice,” you say, giving him an ultimatum. You’re hoping that this will force him off of you. Otherwise, you’ll be sorely tempted to punch that smirk off his face. 

Jeff hums and strokes his chin. “You drive a hard bargain, doll. What if I say no?”

You shrug your shoulders. “My house, my rules.”

Jeff puts a hand over his heart. Once again, the downturn of his lips does nothing for you. “Don’t I live here too?” he asks. You scoff, getting cranky from being kept awake.

“Excuse me? Do you contribute to rent? What about the bills?” You place your hands on your hips and frown.

Jeff puts his hands up in surrender and crawls off of you. “Geez, mom. I’m going, I’m going.” You continue to glare at him the entire time he walks to the bathroom, which is located on the other side of your bedroom. You glance at the clock, which you know you shouldn’t do, and curse when you see it’s almost four in the morning. You pull the blanket over your head and shut your eyes. You try to make the most of the two hours you have left. 

─── ⋆ ｡ﾟ☆: *. ☽ .* :☆ﾟ｡⋆ ───

“Babe.” Poke. “Baaaaabee.” A harsher poke this time. You grunt and peek out of the blankets to see Jeff lying next to you on his side, his hand propping up his head. He waves lazily at you. 

“You are an absolute menace.” You blink to clear your bleary vision. The sunlight streaming through the curtains is not helping.

Jeff looks amused. “That’s the thanks I get for making sure you don’t sleep in?”

You bolt upright and glance at your alarm clock. 6:15. Shit. “Thanks,” you say, genuinely meaning it. You ruffle Jeff’s hair and add, “you're still a menace.” He rolls his eyes, but the pleased smile on his face is hard to miss. You lean over to kiss his cheek before getting out of bed.

“Don’t forget that promise you made,” Jeff says. 

You open your closet and pick an outfit for the day. Looking over your shoulder, you ask, “What promise?”

Jeff chuckles. “Are you kidding me? You forgot already?” He’s out of bed now and comes up behind you. His arms wrap around your waist, and you feel his chest against your head. 

You look up and smile sweetly. “I didn’t forget. You’re just terrible at reminding me.” He leans down, his hair tickling your face.

Jeff hums. “Oh sure, blame it on me.” He plants a kiss on your forehead. “You promised to teach me how to bake a cake today.” You soak in the affection, your brain still processing his words. Wait …. You did what??

“I did? How did you get me to agree to that?” Your tone is full of disbelief. You love Jeff, but he can be a hot mess in the kitchen. You’re assuming that this will translate to baking.

Jeff laughs again, and you feel the rumble from his chest. His arms pull you closer to his body. “Ouch, sweetheart. I ain’t exactly a Michelin star chef, but how hard can a cake be? It’s cake.” You don’t think Jeff realizes how much precision baking requires. You think you’ll have to clean up the mess when he learns the hard way.

“I don’t know. You always find a way to surprise me,” you remark on his uncanny ability to cause trouble.

Jeff shrugs and grins. “I’ll take that as a compliment.”

“Yeah, yeah. Let me get ready, and then we can head out.” You turn around and kiss him. Pulling away, you begin stripping and changing into the clothes you picked. Jeff is already dressed, and you suddenly remember that you need to do the laundry before you leave. You head into the bathroom and grab the hamper of dirty clothes.

Jeff follows you and asks, “Can I drive?” You open the washing machine and toss all the clothes inside. Neither you nor Jeff wear much white, so you don’t bother separating your laundry by colour.

You worry your bottom lip with your teeth, remembering what happened the last time you let him drive. Some guy didn’t signal properly and cut him off. The road rage that the incident induced was… interesting. You had to convince Jeff not to do anything rash, refusing to take over the wheel when he wanted to get close to the other car so he could jump over. “...I’ll think about it,” you finally say. Grabbing a Tyde pod, you toss it in with the clothes and shut the door. With one push of a button, the wash cycle starts, and you need to get your ass in the car now if you don’t want to be late. Being your own boss has its perks, but most of your regulars show up around opening, so being late is not an option.

Jeff increases his strides to keep up with your pace. “I promise I won’t get into an accident again! It’s not my fault someone decided to give licences to idiots.” You give him the side-eye, and he shrugs with both hands up.

“Mhmm. Explains why they gave you one, then.” You elbow his side, and he recoils. He holds your hand after you lock the front door.

“I’ll have you know I’m far better than those bozos. I actually have more than one brain cell,” Jeff states.

“Heh. Whatever helps you sleep at night, baby.” You unlock the car and flush when Jeff leans in to whisper into your ear.

“Nah, just need you.” 

─── ⋆ ｡ﾟ☆: *. ☽ .* :☆ﾟ｡⋆ ───

The car ride is short. You actually end up letting Jeff drive, and miraculously, no accidents occur. Of course, it was helpful that there were barely any other drivers. Waking up at six means beating traffic and rush hour. 

Jeff pulls over and parks in the small parking lot beside the cafe. He’s wearing his usual pair of sunglasses and a face mask. 

“See? No accidents.” You can't see his face, but you can hear the pride in his voice. 

“Good job, baby,” you compliment him. The tips of his ears and his neck are noticeably red. Jeff doesn’t respond and instead gets out of the car. You follow after him, silently laughing at how stiff his walk is. 

You enter the cafe through the back door, which leads directly to the kitchen. There’s a faint smell of cinnamon and nutmeg in the air. It’s Fall, and that means pies and pumpkins are very popular right now. Luckily, pies are easy to prepare the day before. 

Jeff sticks out in the kitchen like a sore thumb. You’re tempted to take a picture. It’s like someone’s poorly photoshopped him into a stock image. You take off and hang your jacket on the coat rack, rolling up your shirt sleeves. Washing your hands, you tell Jeff to do the same. “Oh, and you can take your glasses and mask off,” you add. He hesitates at that. “Only if you’re comfortable. I do enjoy seeing your handsome face.”

“Shut up,” Jeff grumbles. His appearance has always been a sore spot. There are good days and bad days. Some days Jeff will cover himself up and not leave a single inch of skin exposed. Today seems to be a bad day. You hope to change that.

“Maybe at least your sunglasses so you can see clearly?” You reach out to him. He flinches, which causes you to freeze. You bring your arm back and cradle it to your chest. Clearing your throat, you continue the conversation. “I need to prepare some things for opening. Do you want to help?” You turn around and grab an apron each for the two of you.

“Sure,” Jeff responds. He’s closed himself up behind his walls again, and you have no idea how to get through them. Biting your lip, you hand him the apron, your hand lingering in the air for a while before he snatches it from you.

“I have some frozen cookie dough you can put in the oven. I need to put together the pies and bake those too.” You spin around the kitchen. There’s a nagging feeling that you should be doing something right now. You gasp, “Oh! I can’t forget about the macarons in the fridge!” You spin again and see pie shells littering one of the counters. You spend the next ten minutes frantically travelling back and forth between the kitchen and storefront with cases of macarons.

Jeff finds your stash of cookie dough and looks for a baking tray next. There’s a whole rack of trays next to the oven, along with a box of parchment paper. Grabbing a sheet, he lines a tray and evenly spaces out the unbaked cookies. “Is it always this hectic?” he asks, watching you fuss and complain about how ‘there’s so much to do!’ It reminds him of his mother whenever they had guests visiting.

“Not normally.” You reach over Jeff’s shoulder and preheat the oven. “Those bake for 15 minutes, by the way. Anyway, where was I?” You scan the kitchen, and there’s still the nagging feeling that you’ve forgotten something important. 

“You were going to teach me how to bake a cake?” Jeff suggests, to which you shake your head. The cookies are in the oven, and the macarons are on display. What did you forget this time?

“I will, but not now. What else am I forgetting?” You notice the minefield of pie shells on the counter, and none of them are filled. “How strong are your arms?” You eye his arms, and though he may not be ripped, you know that Jeff works out. 

Jeff examines his arms and shrugs. “I would say they’re pretty strong. Why?”

“I need you to mix enough filling to make 20 pies,” you say. Jeff stands there, stunned for a few seconds before he realizes you’re dead serious.

“What kinda army are you feeding??”

You shrug and casually answer with, “Capitalist slaves.”

Jeff’s eyes are still hidden behind his sunglasses, but you can still feel the disappointment in his stare. “I’m gonna ignore whatever joke you were trying to make. What am I mixing?”

“Apple, mixed berry, and pumpkin!” you list off, counting with your fingers. Your lips quirk into a sly grin. “It’s the season where people treat pumpkin spice like it’s crack, and we’re taking advantage of that.” It’s an unspoken rule that people go crazy over pumpkin spice during Fall. Your latte and pie sales always go through the roof during this season. 

“Exploiting addicts? That’s a sleazy move, doll.” There’s a lilt to Jeff’s voice. The grin in his tone makes you feel all fuzzy inside. “I like it.”

“I knew you would approve. I’ve set up all the ingredients; you just have to mix them together.” You walk him to another counter with three gigantic bowls and their respective recipe ingredients. Everything is already measured and weighed. Jeff only has to follow the recipe and mix the right ingredients together. If he can meticulously plan a murder, then surely he can do this. A recipe is basically just a set of instructions. Except, instead of a corpse, you end up with something delicious! Although, you suppose murder can still be delicious if you’re a cannibal….

Jeff stares at the ridiculous amount of apples, berries, and canned pumpkins. He whistles lowly and looks at you. “Shit. You weren’t kidding about 20 pies.” The mountain on the counter has become a regular sight for you. To put it into perspective, an average apple pie uses about five apples. Multiply that by six, and you have a lot of apples (you didn’t feel the need to use actual math, so ‘a lot’ is the correct answer).

You tilt your head to the side. “Why would I joke about that?” You like to mess with him, but your paycheck is riding on these pies.

Jeff shrugs. “I dunno. To fuck with me?”

You shake your head. “Nah. 20 Is the bare minimum right now.” You have flashbacks of customers getting angry at you for running out of pies. Especially those who come near closing. You’re not some magician who conjures a pie whenever someone wants to buy one. There’s a limited amount for each item you can bake in a day. Honestly, food service sucks because customers can be such idiots sometimes. The second perk of being your own boss: you get to kick people out whenever you feel like it. 

Jeff’s question pulls you out of your thoughts. “How much do you normally make?”

You drum your fingers on your thighs and blow a raspberry. “At least twice as much, sometimes more.” You give him a rough estimate, but once again, he looks like he’s waiting for the punchline of a joke. “People really like pies,” you say with a shrug. 

Jeff picks up a bowl of flour and inspects it closely. “You’re not secretly slipping in cocaine or something, are you?” As if this city isn’t crazy enough. You’re pretty sure that if you laced your products with drugs, some riot would happen. OR , you would create a world-class drug cartel that uses cafes as a front. You think you could pull off a suit and—oh right, Jeff just questioned your baking skills. Offended. You were feeling offended.

Pushing aside any schemes to raise a drug empire, you scoff and cross your arms. “Rude. Is it so far-fetched that my baking is amazing?”

Jeff sets down the flour and leans against the counter. You can feel his gaze wash over you like he’s trying to figure you out. “I don’t know, sweet cheeks. I guess I’ll find out today.” Despite dating for a year, Jeff hasn’t tried any of your baking. He says it’s because he doesn’t have much of a sweet tooth, and you would never push him to try. Anytime he takes baked goods home, it’s for his niece and nephews. 

You grimace at the pet name. “I told you to stop calling me that,” you say, and Jeff snickers. He thinks it’s funny because you’re a baker. And while you have to agree with some of his points—you do have a nice ass, thank you very much—the amount of embarrassment it causes is lethal.

“I think it’s fitting.” He appreciatively pats your bottom. You swat his hand away and ignore the heat in your chest that spreads up your neck and face like wildfire. 

“Then you need an equally fitting nickname,” you say. Maybe if you come up with something so embarrassing, he’ll have no choice but to stop calling you that horrid name. 

Jeff crosses his arms and nods. “Alright. Hit me.”

You stare at him, cycling through the various names in your head. You finally settle on one. “How about hot stuff?” (And no, you’re not making fun of him for that one time he accidentally spilled acid on himself.) 

Jeff shakes his head and shuffles his feet. “You can forget about it.” Once again, the tips of his ears glow red. It’s a shame you can’t see the rest of his face. 

“Oh, come on. It’s not that bad,” you say. “Would you prefer if I called you Ghostface?”

Jeff clicks his tongue. “Wrong killer, doll.”

“It was just an example,” you say with a dismissive wave of your hand. Maybe pleading would work? Yeah! All you have to do is bat your eyelashes at Jeff, and he’ll become putty in your hands. You walk up to him and pout, giving him puppy eyes. Jeff groans and looks up at the ceiling. You hear him mumbling to himself but can’t make out what he’s saying. 

Jeff lets out a sigh. “Fine.” His shoulders slump. The counter is supporting a majority of his weight now. 

An amused smirk flashes across your face. “Really? You caved in that easily?” You honestly thought he would put up more of a fight. Jeff can be really stubborn at times. A part of you was actually hoping for a challenge.

“Just don’t use it in public. If Liu finds out, I’m never gonna hear the end of it.” You deduce from the groan Jeff lets out that he’s already thinking about the consequences.

You rub his back in a comforting gesture. “If you can handle a few bullets, then a little embarrassment won’t kill you.” You probably should feel bad, but it’s not often that Jeff will let you get away with teasing him.

Jeff chortles. “I think you’re underestimating emotional damage.” And damn, do you try hard not to think about a meme you saw on the internet. You plant a kiss on his jawline and tell him to call for you if he needs anything. As you start to turn, Jeff stops you.  “Hey, could you take off my sunglasses for me? I can’t read the recipes with them on.” Before you can ask him why he can’t do it himself, you see that his hands are a mess of sugar, berries, and cornstarch. You’re beginning to think that maybe you expected too much from Jeff because the whisk is sitting on the counter, untouched and clearly visible.

“I told you that you wouldn’t be able to see a thing,” you scold, but it’s lighthearted, and you know he’s rolling his eyes while trying to hold back a smile. You reach up and gently slide the sunglasses off his face, careful to not poke him in the eye with the temples (who decided to name the little arm thingies ‘temples’ anyway?)

His green eyes are striking, and you can’t tear your gaze away. You always did like how pretty they are. You don’t realize you’re staring until Jeff decides to break the silence.

“Hey,” he whispers. His voice is huskier, and you wet your dry lips with your tongue.

“Hi,” you respond in an equally hushed tone. You continue staring, burning the image into your memory. Jeff’s eyes flicker to your parted lips, and a magnetic pull draws you closer to him. Your hand is still firmly gripping his sunglasses while the other has wandered up to his face. You trace where the edges of his mouth are beneath the fabric. You hear his breathing deepen. Deciding to tease him some more, you plant a kiss on his mask.

“Don’t,” Jeff pleads. He sounds so vulnerable that it throws you off for a second. His arms are wrapped around your waist. He’s looking at you like you hung the moon and the stars in the sky. You can feel the love and adoration he holds for you, and you also know how hesitant he is to show it. While Jeff doesn’t believe that emotions make a person weak, you know that he struggles to communicate his feelings and how to cope with certain ones.

You stroke his cheek, and the mask is smooth under your thumb. “Don’t what?” you ask, feigning ignorance.

“Don’t make me regret keeping this stupid mask on,” Jeff replies. His eyes are begging you now, and it takes you everything not to pull his mask down and shower him with kisses. His hands are rubbing circles into your waist, and now it’s really hard not to kiss him silly.

You brush some of his hair out of his eyes and grin. “Sounds like you’re already regretting it if you’re calling it stupid,” you point out.

“Can I kiss you?” Jeff’s question is abrupt but straight to the point.

Your fingers toy with the ear loops of his mask. “I was going to if you weren’t.” And that’s all the confirmation he needs. Jeff tugs his mask down and kisses you with fervour. You manage to set his sunglasses on the counter, and your hands instinctively thread his hair. He groans, and you take the opportunity to slip in your tongue, which he enthusiastically greets with his own. It’s all so warm, and the little noises Jeff makes are so pretty, and the way he protests when you tell him that…. It makes you want to spoil him rotten . It’s no surprise that years of little contact with other people has left Jeff with some ‘side-effects’. You know he doesn’t want to label himself as ‘touch-starved,’ so he tries to cover it up with other terms to lighten the implications. But the signs are unmistakable. 

Whenever you’re sitting on the couch, Jeff will sit next to you, only to end up with his head in your lap and your fingers massaging his scalp. Every night you find yourself in his embrace, pressed flush against his chest. Sometimes he’ll cling to you in the kitchen while you cook dinner. It was difficult at first to navigate while Jeff clings to you like a baby koala, but now it’s become second nature. 

You leave a trail of kisses down his throat, stopping to suck on his pulse point. As you’re making your way toward his shoulder, the oven timer goes off. The sound jumpscares both of you, and you accidentally bite down. Jeff hisses, and you pull away to apologize profusely. Jeff’s arms keep you from moving too far back. You take a moment to admire your handiwork. His lips are swollen, and you’re sure yours are too. His entire body looks flushed, and you can still hear him panting. You smile as you trace the hickey that’s starting to form on his neck. Then you see the bite mark. Oh god . Right between his shoulder and neck are a shallow imprint of your teeth. And honestly? It’s kinda hot.

Jeff clears his throat. “I, uh, better start mixing.” His fingers run over where you tried to take a bite out of him moments ago.

You glance at the clock on the wall and notice that the cafe is supposed to open in ten minutes. “Yeah, yeah. I’ll… I’ll bring everything else to the front.” Your head is still feeling a little fuzzy.

“I need you to let go of me if I wanna use my arms.” Jeff’s voice brings some clarity to your mind, and you notice that your hands are still gripping his arms. His very muscular arms. You give them a squeeze, and Jeff coughs to catch your attention. 

“Sorry!” You bring your arms to your side and drum your fingers against your thigh again to keep them occupied.” Let me know when the fillings are done, and we can start baking the pies. And please use the whisk this time.” 

“You got it, boss.” Jeff salutes with two fingers and presses a kiss to the side of your head before you leave. You remove the cookies from the oven and bring them to the front to cool before you put them on display. Your reflection in the glass display case is a mess, which means you look like a mess right now. You try to smooth out the wrinkles in your clothes and tidy your mussed hair. 

A loud clatter resonates from the kitchen. It sounds like someone smashed a giant gong. 

“Don’t worry about that!” You have to stifle your laughter at the slight panic in Jeff’s voice. 

He’s a bigger mess than you are. 

─── ⋆ ｡ﾟ☆: *. ☽ .* :☆ﾟ｡⋆ ───

The day continues like usual. Your regular customers show up on their way to work and often leave with a drink and a pastry. Jeff managed to mix all the pie fillings in twenty minutes, so now all the pies are sitting on display. They’re selling out like you expected, which is why you set some aside for Jeff. You saw him eying the pies while they were baking, but he declined when you offered him a slice. Declining food when offered the first time seems to be some unspoken rule most humans follow. So now there’s a pie slice of each flavour in a container that you put in the fridge. Jeff stays in the back, mostly because he doesn’t feel like being subjected to the stares he knows he’ll get. You did tell him that you would kick out anyone that looks at him funny, but he only thanked you and said that would be unnecessary. 

It’s about time for lunch, and you just finished convincing an elderly woman that you cannot sell her all the pies you currently have because there are other people wanting pies. She argues that it shouldn’t be a problem if she has the money to pay for it all. You manage to compromise on a third of your pies. But still, what does one do with seven pies?? It’s honestly hilarious watching this old woman shimmy out of your cafe with a stack of pies that tower over her. Hopefully, she doesn’t drop any of them on the way to her car. You flip the little sign on the door to ‘closed’ and untie your apron.

“Jeeeeeeeeeeffffff. I have time to teach you how to bake a cake now,” you call out, making your way to the kitchen. You don’t get a response. “Jeff? Helloooo?” You hang your apron by the door and step inside. “You didn’t die while messing around in my kitchen, did you? Cause that would be a really sad way to die, considering how hard it is to kill you.” The fridge starts beeping, and you notice one of its doors is ajar.

“Shit. Would you shut the fuck up? I’m trying to be sneaky here,” Jeff hisses. He’s not talking to you. He’s scolding the fridge.

“And just what are you doing?” You walk up to him and peer behind the door to see what he’s up to.

The fridge slams shut before you can see much. “Just, uh, enjoying the scenery,” Jeff says. If the context wasn’t so ridiculous, you would believe the nonchalance in his tone. 

“Of my fridge?” You give him a skeptical look. 

Jeff nods solemnly and pats your fridge. “It’s a really nice fridge.” And it is. You managed to snag it while it was on sale. But that’s not important right now. What’s important is the open container you saw inside the fridge. 

“You’re not eating the pies you said you didn’t want?” You narrow your eyes, and Jeff shifts around on the spot. 

He looks away from you. “Why would I eat something I didn’t want?” 

The evidence outweighs his logic. “I don’t know. Why is there whipped cream around your mouth?” You point out the remains of pie on his face. There’s also a fork haphazardly sticking out of his pocket, but you’ll let him have at least a little bit of dignity. 

Jeff shrugs. “So I had some whipped cream, big deal.”

“And the pies underneath the whipped cream from the looks of it.” You go to open the fridge, but Jeff leans heavily against the door. 

“It’s not my fault that they’re so addicting. You must be slipping something into your pies!”

You stare at him, unblinking. “Yes. I thought we established that it was talent and skill. Do you want to learn how to bake a cake or not?”

Jeff straightens his posture. “I do.”

“Then say I’m the best baker ever, and you love my pies,” you demand with a smirk. 

“What? Why?!” Jeff’s face scrunches up, and you school your expression,

“Humour me,” you say.

Jeff’s eyebrows raise, then furrow, followed by a devious grin. “I’m the best baker ever, and you love my pies.”

You shove him playfully and roll your eyes. “Smartass,”

“I’m kidding. Your baking is witchcraft, and your pies are delicious.” He pulls you into his arms and kisses the crown of your head. 

“Close enough.” You look at him and silently beg for more kisses. Jeff’s expression softens, and he places another kiss on your forehead. Fuck does this man make you soft. “Did you have any specific type of cake in mind?” you ask, playing with the collar of his shirt. 

Jeff ponders. The vibrations from his humming tickle your skin. He replies with, “Something chocolate, and maybe with fruits?” You nod your head. A classic combination. 

“Have you ever had a black forest cake?” you ask, not seeing any recognition in his eyes. 

“What kinda name for a cake is that?” He rubs a spot of flour from your cheek and takes in your serious expression. “No. I haven’t.”

You place a kiss on his hand in thanks. “It’s basically a chocolate cake with cherries. Does that sound good to you?” The smile on Jeff’s face is infectious, and he’s radiating with warmth and energy. Your chest swells with affection. You would have tried to teach him how to bake earlier if you knew this would be his reaction. 

Jeff’s eyes are bright, and he squeezes your waist in excitement. “You had me at chocolate and cherries.”

You grin and kiss his cheek before pulling away. His scar is rough against your lips, but you don't mind at all. Heading to the pantry, you grab all the necessary ingredients and assemble them on the counter. You grab a scale off the shelf, along with a few bowls. 

“Ok, so this is a scale. We’re going to use it to weigh our ingredients. Have you ever used one before?” you ask Jeff. He comes up behind you and latches on like a baby koala. The warm, spicy scent of his cologne envelopes you. 

“Not for, uh, food,” Jeff answers. You don’t want to know what he’s used a scale for. There was this one time when the grocery store forgot to label the weight of the beef. Jeff grabbed one of the packages and bobbed his hand before giving you a near-perfect estimate. You didn’t want to ask how he developed that particular skill. Instead, you thanked him and made roast beef for dinner to preserve your sanity. 

“The process is pretty much the same. You can measure all the dry ingredients and mix them together. I’m going to mix the wet ingredients.” Jeff reluctantly releases you and carefully measures the flour and cocoa while you mix the vanilla and oil in a separate bowl.

Jeff pours some sugar and stops when the scale reaches the right weight. “Is there a reason we’re not using measuring cups?” he asks.

“You can, but I prefer weighing. Less chance of messing up,” you reply, adding buttermilk to your mixture. “I do use measuring spoons for stuff like spices.” Jeff nods and reaches for the measuring spoons on the table. He adds baking powder and soda, along with salt, and mixes the dry ingredients together,

Jeff stares at his bowl and then looks at you, lost. “What do I do now?”

“Now we’re going to slowly combine the wet and dry ingredients.” You slowly add the dry ingredients while Jeff mixes. “Yeah, like that. Good job, baby!” you praise him, and the whisk clangs harshly against the metal bowl.

“I’m just moving a whisk. I don’t see what’s so special about that.” Jeff continues to mix aggressively, but it does nothing to hide the redness of his cheeks.

You tilt your head to the side and smile at him. “But this is your first time baking a cake, and I think you’re doing fantastic!”

Jeff gives the batter a final jab before setting the whisk against the bowl. “W-what’s next?” You don’t acknowledge the wobble in his voice and head to the fridge.

“Next, we add the eggs in one at a time. After that, we pour them into pans and pop them into the oven.” You crack in an egg, and Jeff combines it with the batter. This repeats another three times until the batter is a good consistency between thick and runny. 

“That’s it?” Jeff furrows his brows, and you bite your lip to hold back a dopey grin. 

“Yep,” you nod. Jeff stares at the dark, glossy batter with a searching look. You refrain from saying anything and opt to hum to fill the void of silence. He immediately recognizes the melody of Reflection and shoots you a half-hearted glare. You smile and wave at him.

“I always thought it would be more… complicated,” Jeff admits. There’s something hilarious about how he struggles with domestic activities when he’s an accomplished killer. The man can commit murder and evade the police, but god forbid he has to cook or bake. Although, he is proficient at cleaning—like really proficient. Again, you don’t ask. You’re just thankful the house is always clean when you come home from work.

“Baking can be pretty simple,” you say. Jeff divides the batter between two lined pans and puts them into the oven you preheated earlier.  “While those are baking, we can make the whipped cream. I already have some cherry jam and syrup we can use.”

“Can’t you use the stuff they have in cans?” Jeff’s question is innocent enough, but he unknowingly asked you to commit a baking sin.

You let out a horrified gasp and firmly place a hand on his shoulder. “My dear Jeffrey. Fear not. I will show you the wonders of whipped cream made from scratch.”

Jeff chuckles at your determined expression. “When you tell me to fear not, I will fear anyway.” He boops your nose, causing you to scrunch it in response 

You grin and push him towards the shelves. “Can you grab the hand mixer while I get the cream and sugar?”

“Yes, boss.” Jeff mock salutes and marches the five-step journey to the hand mixer. You giggle at his silliness, and the way his expression brightens does not go unnoticed.

“Alright, we’re going to add some sugar and vanilla to our cream before we whip it.” You eyeball the amount of powdered sugar and add a splash of vanilla extract.

“Ooh, sounds kinky,” Jeff teases. You shake your head, but you can’t stop the smile stretching across your face.

“Pay attention,” you admonish. “This is the step where you can make the final adjustments to the taste.” You dip your pinkie into the mixture and pop it into your mouth. The cream is sweet but not enough to make your teeth ache. The rich taste of vanilla is always a delight. You hum a noise of approval and turn towards Jeff.  “I think it’s sweet enough. What do you—”

Jeff kisses you, taking the opportunity to slip his tongue into your mouth. He pulls away and licks his lips. “Mhmm, tastes good to me.” His smug grin douses gasoline on the fire consuming your body.

“Jeffrey Hodek, you are an absolute menace.” He’s going to be the death of you, and he won’t even have to stab or shoot you to do it.

“Always the same song and dance with you, doll. I know you liked it.” And to prove his point, he kisses you again. The way his tongue runs over your gums elicits a moan from you. He pulls away, and you avoid eye contact. The smirk on his face is baiting you for another kiss. 

“Whip cream. Now .” Your tone is firm. Any more teasing and you might just combust.

“Alright, alright.” Jeff picks up the hand mixer and sets it into the bowl. He’s about to turn it on but pauses. “And how do I know when to stop?”

“When you get stiff peaks.”  And you immediately realize what you’ve done. Jeff snickers and you become increasingly embarrassed.  “It’s not funny!” You cross your arms with a frown.

Jeff bumps his hips lightly against yours. “C’mon, sugar. You have to admit, baking sounds like it has a lotta euphemisms.”

“Just hold the bowl upside-down over your head. If you don’t get drenched in whipped cream, then it’s ready.” If the whipped cream can hold its shape, it should barely move in the bowl. 

Jeff blinks and says nothing for a few seconds. His brows furrow and he searches your face. “You’re fucking with me again, right?” He sees the saccharine smile on your lips. “Oh, you’re definitely not fucking with me. What kinda method is that? What if I spill cream everywhere?”

“What was that? Was that… a euphemism ?” You let out a dramatic gasp. “Then I would say you need more practice,” you add with a grin. 

“Piss off.” Jeff grunts and turns on the hand mixer. 

“Ok! I’ll come back then to check on you during my next break!” You kiss his cheek and make your way back to the front. 

Jeff freezes. “B-but the whipped cream?” His voice pitches and you feel a slight pang of pity. He did tease you a lot earlier, so the feeling is soon squashed. 

“Stick it in the fridge when it’s done and you’ll be fine!” you say over your shoulder.  You give Jeff a thumbs up, and he only replies with an indignant noise. 

─── ⋆ ｡ﾟ☆: *. ☽ .* :☆ﾟ｡⋆ ───

“Mrs. Smith, I told you that you can’t buy all my pies.” The old lady who bought seven pies from you is back, and she wants the rest of your stock. 

“I’m too old for ‘Mrs’ now, dear. Everyone calls me Granny. As I was saying, I’m holding an annual crochet competition, and I need your pies.” She offers no further explanation, fully expecting you to give in to her demands. 

“I’ve already sold you seven pies. Surely you don’t need all of them,” you say with exasperation in your tone. Your reasoning only increases her determination. 

“Baker, I am going into a crochet competition, and I need all your pies.” You can only assume the pies are for herself, and what does someone even do with 20 pies?

“You can’t eat all those pies, Mrs. Smith. There are too many,” you tell her. But it seems your insistence is only agitating her. 

“I’m telling you, dear, I’m going into a crochet competition! I’m going into a crochet competition, and I need all your pies if I’m to win!” She is hysterical now. Are pies to old ladies who crochet what steroids are to athletes? Even if it is for a group of people, seven pies seem like a reasonable amount to you. 

Still, you refuse. “I can’t give you all my pies because they’re not meant to be sold in bulk! If I let one person buy all the pies, then that leaves nothing for everyone else.” You could make some quick cash if you sold her all your pies, but there’s something clearly deranged about this woman. Your gut is telling you not to sell her any more pies. 

“Well, then that’s it, Baker. I’ll go elsewhere for my pies.” She storms out of the cafe, and the bell above the door smacks against the wooden frame. 

“What a weird lady,” you mumble to yourself, unable to shake off the feeling of déjà vu. You glance at the clock and notice it’s 5pm. “I think that’s enough for today.” You untie your apron and drape it across the counter. “Hey, Jeff! I’m closing up the cafe now!” You begin counting the money in the cash register. 

“You want any help?” Jeff asks, poking his head from the kitchen doorway. 

“Yes, please.” And so Jeff cleans the tables and puts up the chairs. You sweep the floor while Jeff puts away whatever leftovers he can for the next day. Anything that’s not good after a day is often donated to the nearest shelter, or Jeff will take it for the kids to eat. Once the front is cleaned up, it’s time for the kitchen. You walk ahead of Jeff, but he gently grabs your arm and tugs you back. 

“Wait here,” Jeff commands.  He shields the doorway with his body. 

You look at him with suspicion. “You didn’t break something in my kitchen, did you?” Kitchen equipment is stupidly expensive, and you don’t want to replace anything right now. 

Jeff scoffs. “I’m not that incompetent.” He takes both of your hands and squeezes them. “Close your eyes.”

You shake your head but follow his instructions. “I’m closing them.” Your shoes squeak as they transition from wood to tile. Jeff leads you steadily inside the kitchen. He lets go of your hands and tells you to wait. You stand there patiently, hearing the rummaging of utensils and plates. You fidget with the hem of your shirt, curiosity turning into anticipation. 

“Surprise.” At Jeff’s words, you open your eyes. He’s holding a small bundle of the skewers you use for tiered cakes. At the tips of the skewers are strawberries cut into the shape of roses. 

“Jeff… how did—they’re beautiful!” You marvel at the delicate knife work that went into cutting each petal. 

Jeff pushes the bouquet towards you. “I got bored after making the whipped cream.  Saw the strawberries and thought I could put my knife skills to use,” he says with a shrug. 

You reach out to accept the bundle of strawberries but pause. “Your hands!” One of your hands takes the bouquet while the other holds Jeff’s hand. You examine the skin and see small slices. You chew on your bottom lip and look at him for an explanation. 

“Just some scratches,” he mumbles and avoids your gaze. “Turns out cutting fruit into flowers takes a lot more dexterity than stabbing people.” He shrugs in a carefree manner. You think back to how long you left Jeff alone and unsupervised. A few hours, at least. 

 You drag him with you. “I have some bandages in the bathroom—and disinfectant! We need to clean your wounds and—” Jeff stills, and suddenly, you can’t move him. He grips your shoulders. 

“Relax, sweetheart. I’m fine.” Jeff shows you his hands, turning them over.  “See? They’re already sealed. I won’t say no to you kissing them better, though.” His eyes look at you pitifully, and the slight pout on his lips is irresistible. 

You make grabby motions at him. “Well, bring them here, then. I’ll give them many smooches.” Jeff puts his hands in front of your face, and you shower them with kisses, cut or no cut. He looks at you like you’re everything to him, and you melt on the spot. This man is too adorable for his own good. “Thank you for the ‘flowers’. It’s very sweet of you.” You resist the urge to eat them right away; the guilt you would feel during the fallout would be tremendous. 

Jeff shakes his head and kisses your forehead. “If anyone’s sweet, it’s you, sugar. You could give me a toothache with your sweetness.” You flush under his attention. They say that the human pupil will dilate when looking at a person they like. Jeff’s eyes are a ring of green swallowed by black right now, and you’re sure it’s the same for yourself. There’s something intimate about maintaining eye contact with someone for an extended period of time. You stand there, unable to tear your gaze from his. His thumb brushes against your bottom lip, and you pull him in for a kiss. You can feel him smile, and a giggle bubbles in the back of your throat.

You pull away first and place another kiss on his wounded hand. “Alright, hot stuff. Enough flirting, more decorating.” You lead him to the counter where you’ve set everything up beforehand. The ‘flowers’ are placed in a mason jar to keep them upright and out of the way.

Jeff looks intimidated by all the different tools on the counter. You tried to select the bare minimum required for cake decorating. His shoulders loosen when he sees the encouraging smile on your face. “I’ve never decorated a cake before. I’m honestly fucking ecstatic right now,” Jeff says.

“I’ll cut the cake, and you can assemble the layers,” you say, grabbing your trusty knife.

An amused smile crosses Jeff’s face. “I’m the one with the exceptional knife skills.”

You shake your head. “Nuh-uh. Not after you cut yourself up making strawberry roses. Besides, I don’t want you to feel disappointed if the layers end up lopsided.” Cutting a cake into layers can be hard . Why else are there so many hacks and gadgets specifically made for this? There was a time when you used the dental floss method (unflavoured because an unintentionally minty cake is yucky). Now that you’re experienced, you can perfectly level and cut cakes with a knife. 

Jeff ponders and says, “So if the cake gets fucked up, it’s your fault.”

“Jeff!”

“That’s basically what you said!” Jeff throws up his hands. 

You scoff and shove a baking spatula into his chest. “I’m going to make you eat your words.” 

The smirk on his face fans the flames. “Challange accepted, doll.”

“Now shut up and start layering,” you command, already slicing through the second cake.

Jeff examines and turns over the spatula in his hand. “You haven’t told me what to do. Do I just slather shit on the cake? Throw cherries at it? Commit a blood sacrifice?” He pokes you in the ribs, and you jump, nearly stabbing him with the knife you’re holding. You give him the side eye, and he grins like he wasn’t this close to being levelled himself.

“Brush some cherry syrup on the cake before adding a layer of whipped cream. Then add some cherries and the next layer of cake. Rinse and repeat until there are no more layers.” You break the layering down into simple steps, adding any tips you think he would find helpful. Jeff nods, but you can already tell that most of what you said went in one ear and out the other. “Normally, I sacrifice a virgin at the end, but I ran out of stock yesterday,” you say, shrugging in a what-can-you-do manner. Jeff straightens. Well, he definitely heard that step.

Jeff chuckles and begins painting the top of the layer of cake with syrup. “You are fucking adorable.” The smile on his face is full of fondness. Next, he spreads the whipped cream and adds the cherries. “This is oddly satisfying,” Jeff comments, finding the process therapeutic.

“I know, right?! I love decorating, but sometimes I'm too lazy to bake anything.” You laugh at the irony of your statement. You notice Jeff was struggling earlier at spreading an even layer of whipped cream. “Here, let me show you something.” You inch closer, and he takes the opportunity to wrap an arm around your waist. Grabbing the plate of the turntable, you spin it as you smoothly spread whipped cream on the cake.

Jeff’s jaw drops. He looks at you in bewilderment. “It sPiNs?!?!” 

You giggle at his reaction and nod. “Pretty cool, huh?”

“No fucking way. I told you. Witchcraft ,” he hisses the last part. Jeff spends the next minute spinning the cake in one direction before spinning it again in the opposite way. He finishes all the layering, and what’s left is a naked cake. “Do we get to add more cherries?” he asks.

“Yeah, give me a minute to pipe some whipped cream at the top,” you answer. You also decide to give the entire cake a thin coat of whipped cream. When Jeff sees you pipe whipped cream, he insists on giving it a try. His first attempt results in a ginormous blob. You smooth it out with the spatula and comfort him while he sulks. The next few attempts have much more control and turn out decent. “Do you want to add more chocolate? I can quickly shave some.”

Jeff grins. “Do you even have to ask?” And so you shave some chocolate while Jeff carefully places the cherries on top of the cake. 

“It’s a monstrosity,” you say when you look at the finished product. For some reason, you thought it would be a good idea to give Jeff control over how much chocolate is added. You can barely see the whipped cream beneath all the chocolate shavings. Thankfully, the top is left untouched, so only the sides are buried.

Jeff puffs out his chest. “Yeah, but it’s our monstrosity. I don’t know about you, but I’m starving.” He cuts himself a slice and takes a bite. Too bad this isn’t a cooking anime. You would have liked to see Jeff’s soul dramatically leave his body or whatever weird stimulation the characters go through when they taste a dish. “Holy shit, this should be illegal.”

“Good?” You cut yourself a slice, already knowing his answer.

Jeff takes another bite and closes his eyes. “Fucking delicious .” He moans, and you nearly have a fit over how sexual the sounds he’s making are. You eat your slice slowly, content with watching Jeff enjoy the cake. When he finishes, he immediately goes to cut a second piece.

“Are you going to take the rest to Liu and the kids later?” you ask. If there even is anything left to take. He’s going to demolish the cake at this point. 

Jeff grins sheepishly. “Would it be selfish of me to keep this for myself?”

You shrug and wipe away the whipped cream at the corner of his mouth. “I won’t judge you, but the kids will give you hell for it if they ever find out.” Never underestimate the wrath of children. Especially when they discover you withheld sugar from them.

Jeff exhales loudly. “Fuck, you’re right.” He points his fork at you. “I have to get rid of any witnesses to prevent them from finding out.” You lean forward and eat the piece of cake off his fork. Jeff gapes at you while you smugly chew. The mock betrayal in his eyes elicits a giggle from you. 

“I can always bake you more, which I won’t be able to if you get rid of me,” you say.

Jeff kisses the side of your head. You whine and try to shove him away, much to his amusement. “You’re contractually obligated to keep that promise now,” he says.

You blink slowly, brushing crumbs out of your hair. “But I didn’t sign anything?”

Jeff caresses your cheek and says, “It’s a verbal agreement.” His words hold a tone of finality. 

You hum and lean into his touch. “But what are the rules? The duration? Honestly, this is a terrible contract.” You smile brightly despite desperately trying to frown.

Jeff leans his forehead against yours, bringing his lips tantalizingly close. “Don’t act like you hate the idea of spending the rest of your life with me.” His warm breath fans over your mouth.

You hum and decide to tease him some more. “Jeffrey Hodek, are you proposing? How unconventional of you.”

Jeff chuckles in disbelief and bites his lip afterwards. “Sweetheart, I don’t need a ring to know I’m yours. But that’s a conversation for another time.” He pecks your lips before darting to the fridge. You feel bamboozled until you recognize what he takes out. “C’mon, it’s getting late. I sneaked out earlier and bought a bottle of your favourite drink. How about we stuff ourselves with more cake while you vent about your day? I’ll even run you a bath, and we can cuddle after.”

“That sounds amazing,” you admit. The aches and pains in your body feel more prominent at the mention of a bath. Jeff packs the rest of the cake, and you remember to grab the strawberry roses before you leave. The idea of candying the strawberries did pop into your head at some point. You think Jeff would be interested in the process. But for now, you just want to go home and cuddle with Jeff. He holds your hand on the way to the car. “There was an old lady today who was very adamant about my pies….” 

You continue to tell Jeff about the notable interactions you had today. You remain unaware of the box he’s fingering in his pocket.

 ─── ⋆ ｡ﾟ☆: *. ☽ .* :☆ﾟ｡⋆ ───

End Note:

The first fanfic I ever wrote was for JTK (I never posted it and never will), so this is kinda a redemption for my younger self. I'm honestly just glad that I managed to finish this so my eyes don't have to glaze over anymore when I read it for edits.

Personally, I do not find the yandere trope attractive, specifically for reader inserts. I don't mind if it's for other characters, but when it's a reader insert... I just don't understand the appeal. I can enjoy it when it's in a comedic context, but it's a complete turn-off for me in romance. I respect the trope, but I don't think I'll ever understand why people like it.

So a question for people who read/write those kinds of stories: What about it appeals to you?

See you guys at my next hyperfixation! ヾ(￣▽￣)

Reblogs are appreciated!

[drabbles-mc]

Help Wanted

Juice Ortiz x F!Reader

Request by Anon: Ok. To go off of you SOA post about the guys taking care of a dog. I love the idea of them running a doggy daycare (maybe after Jax is prez) as part of their “legitimate business l endeavors. Would you be interested in writing something like that? It seems so comical & fluffy at the same time! Maybe throw in a Juice/reader love story, like she gets a job working there and she has dog experience that those “big bad bikers” don’t lol. Cue dog whisperer & Juice being all heart eyes 😍

Warnings: 18+, language

Word Count: 7.8k (idk what happened please don’t ask)

A/N: I won’t lie, the fic that I intended to write for this request is not what ended up happening. Idk where the hard left turn happened but I’m not upset about it! I hope you enjoy where this all went. All I know is that I hope that Juice and reader have a life full of happiness and puppies together. Also I love Jax in this because he’s such a goddamn nudge lmao

SOA Taglist: @garbinge @masterlistforimagines @espieviolet99 @mijop​ @chibsytelford​ @thanossexual​ @xladymacbethx​ @i-just-read-stuff​ @bport76​ @toni9​ @unicornucopia-fuckers​ @buckybarneshairpullingkink​ @shadow-of-wonder​ @punkgoddess-98​ @paintballkid711​ @black-repunzel99​ @lexondeck​ @jitterbugs927​ @fanfic-n-tabulous​ @mijagif​ @frattsparty​ @winchestershiresauce​ @bellisperennis0​ @crowfootwrites​ @redpoodlern​ @beardburnsupersoldiers​ @mveggieburger​ @xeniarocks​ @choochoo284​ @littlekittymeow​ @withmyteeth​ @beardsanddetectives​ @juicyortiz​ @bruxasolta​ @i-love-scott-mccall​ @be-my-dear​ @passionatewrites​ (If you want to be added to any of my taglists, let me know!)

“I don’t know why you guys thought this was a good idea,” Juice shook his head as he pored over the paperwork spread out on the table in front of him.

Tig rolled his eyes, scratching behind the ears of the dog in his lap, “Because it’s dogs, man. Can’t go wrong with dogs.”

Juice looked up from his laptop screen, “But we know nothing about running a business like this.”

“We don’t have to. That’s what we hire other people for,” Tig reached, slapping Jax lightly on the chest, “Right?”

Jax chuckled, nodding because he knew that he’d lost this argument against Tig and Happy the second that it got brought to the table, “Right.”

Juice huffed out a sigh as he dove back into everything that was in front of him. It wasn’t the idea that he had a problem with. A Sons-sponsored doggy daycare sounded exactly like something that would get set up in Charming. It was a bit ridiculous, but it could work out just fine and be a perfectly good new way to make money. People spend ridiculous amounts of money on their pets, a point that Happy had made less eloquently when the idea first got brought up in church. The idea wasn’t the problem. Executing the idea was where they were going to run into a bit of a mess. Everything else that they got involved in, they already had people lined up to run it and keep things going smoothly. Not this. This was just a pipe dream that Jax wasn’t looking to deny anyone. And yet somehow Juice was the one left scrambling to put it all together.

“You guys gonna help me with any of this?” Juice asked, “Or are you just gonna sit around and watch me work?”

Jax stood up off the couch with a laugh, walking over and clapping Juice on the shoulder as he walked by, “You’re the brains behind this one, bro. You’ll be able to handle it just fine.”

Juice wasn’t in the mood to get in an argument about it, so he let Jax walk away without another word. He knew, though, that despite Tig and Happy being the ones who brought it up, they weren’t going to be doing any of the legwork in getting it all started. That wasn’t their area of expertise. It wasn’t Juice’s either, truth be told, but it looked like it was going to have to be.

They already had the space. The club had bought up a few properties along the way and one of them actually had a decent amount of yard space in the back. They threw a decent fence up and Juice had found a crew of guys to help transform the inside of the building to make it more dog-friendly. The cosmetic stuff was easy enough, but hiring people, figuring out how to run the day-to-day of it all while they were still getting it off the ground, that was going to be the hard part.

“What would the requirements for this even be?” this wasn’t the type of job posting that the club was usually putting out there, and Juice had no idea what to put. He buried his face in his hands, wishing that he could pawn this off onto someone else and be done with it but he was too invested now—he’d put too much work into it. He was halfway tempted to write, “Must be nice to animals” and call it a day just so he could get it over with and try to move on to the next thing.

There was a knock on the glass front door moments before the sound of it sliding over the welcome mat filled the room. Juice lifted his head, confusion flooding over his features as he took in the sight of you. You looked around the room, looking just about as confused as he did, and he couldn’t help but to wonder if you were lost.

“All good?” he asked.

You looked over at him, letting out a nervous laugh, “Yea, uh, hi. Sorry. I just,” you gestured over your shoulder, “I saw the help wanted sign in the window. From the name I thought this place was a doggy daycare. But it looks…well…” you laughed, “empty.”

Juice laughed, getting up from where he was sitting behind the reception desk, “Yea. We, um, we haven’t opened yet. Figured we might need some employees first,” he chuckled as he held his hand out, “I’m Juice, by the way.”

You shook his hand, “Juice?”

“Yea,” there was something about the way your eyes seemed to be searching his that made him nervous, “That’s what my friends…I mean they just, uh, you can call me Juan, if you want.”

You smiled, “Juan?”

“Juan Carlos,” he chuckled, trying not to let his nerves come out to play in a situation where they had no right to be there.

“Nice to meet you, Juan Carlos,” you gave him your name in turn before taking another look around what was currently a large, empty, undecorated space, “So, you said you’re looking for employees?”

“Yea. Are you, um, are you looking for a job?”

You laughed, nodding, “I guess you could say that, yea.”

“Got any experience with this kind of stuff?”

You shrugged, “Yea. I mean, I never ran a business for it or anything. But back home and through college I used to dog-sit and walk people’s dogs as a side-gig. Never had any complaints,” you smiled, “I can whip up some references for you if you want.”

“I know I should ask for them, but I won’t lie to you, I’m kind of in a pinch here,” he took a breath, running his hand back over his head until it rested on the back of his neck, “When can you start?”

“Whenever you get some dogs in here for me to take care of,” you laughed.

He smiled, for some reason feeling a sense of relief washing over him despite the fact that you were just one person, and there was no guarantee that it was all going to work out. For all he knew, you were going to see what a mess he was and how quickly he was pulling together the entire operation and you’d bail. He just had to hope that that wouldn’t be the case. You seemed nice, though, and he just had to hope that that would be enough.

The two of you chatted for a couple minutes. You asked about the plans for the place, what the end-goal was. You could tell by the way that he was talking that he was in over his head, and it made you wonder how he ended up in this position anyway. He was trying, you could tell by all the papers spread out in some sort of organized chaos on the desk. He also had the look of a person who hadn’t gotten enough sleep in a very long time.

You also noticed the kutte he was wearing. Charming was a new place for you, and you didn’t really know all the history and what there was to know about it. But you’d seen enough men around town with the same vest on to know that it must’ve been connected somehow to the building you were standing in, the business that this man was attempting to get off the ground. It should’ve been a deterrent, you should’ve just turned around and walked back out. But you didn’t. Something about his exasperation and confusion made him seem so trustworthy.

“If you don’t mind me saying,” you offered a sympathetic smile, “you seem a little in over your head here.”

He laughed, nodding, “Thanks for putting it nicely.”

You chuckled, “I won’t pretend that I have all the answers, but if you want some help getting this place going, I’ll do what I can. If nothing else, I’m coachable.”

“Yea?” he looked hopeful.

“Yea. And if you give me your budget I can, um,” you looked around the room, “I can get some stuff that’ll make this place look a little more inviting.”

“I’ll take any help I can get. You got any friends who would be interested?” he let out a laugh.

You shook your head, smiling, “If I had any friends here, I’d see what I could do. But it’s just me, unfortunately.”

His lips started to curl into a smile, “Not unfortunate,” he paused, “Look, I know you probably stopped in here on a whim. I’m not gonna try to rope you in for the rest of the day when you probably have other shit to do. But if you wanna come back tomorrow, we can try and get started on this. I’ll fill you in and everything.”

“Okay,” you nodded, “Sounds good. I’ll bring coffee,” you chuckled, “Oh, here, let me write down my number for you.”

Juice scrambled to find you a piece of scrap paper to write on, and you somehow managed to keep your laughter inside of you at that. You quickly jotted down your name and number onto the paper, holding your hand out for one last handshake before you left again for the day.

“I’ll see you tomorrow, Juan Carlos,” you smiled.

“Yea,” he shook your hand, looking down at the paper he was holding as you started walking back towards the door, “I’ll see you tomorrow.”

Over the next couple of days, Juice filled you in on everything that he could. You could tell that he was beyond thankful to have someone else to share the workload with. Considering that he had been flying solo until you came around, he had been doing pretty well. You showed up with your own laptop, a few notebooks, and some other miscellaneous supplies that immediately had Juice assuming that you knew what you were doing. Really, it was just a lot of leftover things from college that you hadn’t gotten around to throwing away yet. Now you were glad you didn’t, since it was all going to come in handy.

“I finished putting together the job listing,” you said as you plopped down in the chair next to his behind the front desk. You opened your laptop, quickly opening the document in question, “I did some trial ones for the main positions that you said you need to fill. If I left anything out, feel free to let me know,” you paused as he looked over what you had written, “Oh, and I’ll need your help going and grabbing some of the supplies from the pet store. Our order finally came in.”

“Finally?”

You shrugged, laughing, “My definition of express shipping is different from theirs, I guess.”

He watched you for a moment, a smile on his face as you looked through your notes on what had to get done in the next couple of days before the interview process started. It was pretty obvious that that was going to be left completely in Juice’s court. You had yet to meet the other men who were apparently part of this entire operation, and you wondered if Juice was doing that on purpose.

“Thank you,” he finally got the words out.

You looked over at him, confused, “Hm?”

“Thanks,” he reiterated as he gestured to the screen, and the paperwork, “for helping with this. I know it’s a fucking mess but having you help has made things a lot easier.”

You shrugged, “No need to thank me—it’s all part of the job, right?”

“Yea, right.”

“But, if I got first pick of the schedule I wouldn’t be too upset about it. You know, if you wanted to say thank you that way,” you flashed him a cheeky smile before getting back to work.

The morning went on and eventually it was time for the two of you to head over and pick up a bulk of the supplies that you needed in order to get the place up and running. Juice had left most of that up to you, asking just to keep it all under a certain price-point. You were able to do that, although you were sure that as time went on you would be able to convince Juice, or whoever else, to swap some stuff out for things that were a little nicer, a little fancier even. You’d just have to play your cards right.

“C’mon,” you fished your keys out of your purse as you both made your way towards the front door, “I’ll drive.”

His eyes widened and he couldn’t stop the laugh that came out of him, “You’ll drive?”

You stopped, scoffing in disbelief, “What, how much do you think you can strap to the back of your Harley, hm? More than we can fit into the bed of my pickup?”

He opened his mouth to argue, but he realized that you had a point. He hadn’t thought to start bringing the van from the clubhouse around, so all he really had was his bike. Sighing, he held his hands up in surrender, “You got a point.”

You laughed, “I know.”

He looked at your truck, “This thing gonna make it there and back?”

You rolled your eyes, “She’s a little beat-up but she runs just fine. Got me here and moved in, right?” the two of you hopped into the truck, and as you were sliding the key into the ignition, you couldn’t help but to say, “If you really wanna drive that bad, by the way, get your own pickup.”

He laughed, “I’ll try to get something that passes inspection.”

After a lot of fumbling around before eventually letting the employees at the store help, the bed and back seat of your truck were successfully packed with everything that you’d ordered. The look of defeat on Juice’s face when he had to resign to asking for help was something you wished that you had caught on film. You just had to hope that the two of you would be alright getting it all out of your truck without accidentally breaking anything in the process.

When you pulled back into the parking lot at the daycare, you immediately noticed that there were a few more motorcycles parked out front. You tried not to be too obvious as you waited for some kind of reaction from Juice. You heard him sigh, saw him give a small shake of his head, but he didn’t say anything about it. You assumed that they were men from the club, but since you hadn’t met any of them yet, you had no idea what you were in for.

“Think they’ll at least help us unload all of this?” you asked with a laugh.

He chuckled, “Maybe if you ask. Do that at your own risk, though.”

Juice never talked about the club, and you never asked, either. It wasn’t a world that you were at all acquainted with, and truthfully, you didn’t feel like you were missing out on much. Once you realized that Juice was involved with an MC, you knew there’d be some crossover, but you weren’t going to try and insert yourself into that side of things more than necessary. If things got messy, you’d have no problem cutting the cord and finding somewhere else to work, different people to associate with. But you liked the potential of everything so far. And, even if you were shoving the feeling as deep down as you possibly could, you had to admit that you liked Juice, too. You knew precious little about the club outside the murmurs and rumors you’d heard, and you knew that you couldn’t believe everything that was said, but if any of it was true, you wondered how someone like Juice had ended up in a club like that.

“I can handle all of this if you need to go and talk to them,” you told him as you shut your door and made your way towards the bed of the truck.

“No, don’t worry about it,” he watched you drop the tailgate, “they can help, or they can wait.”

You didn’t push it farther, instead hopping up into the bed of the truck to start handing stuff down to him to carry in. Neither of you said anything more as you gathered up your first armful of things to bring inside. As you got closer to the door, you saw two men standing by the front desk, one behind it looking over the papers, and one in front of it watching the two of you making your way inside. You could feel the one man’s eyes studying you and you did your best to ignore it.

“Was starting to get nervous, Juicy Pants,” the man who had been watching the two of you walked closer as you both started setting things down, “Haven’t heard from you in a couple days,” he looked over at you, “Surprised you didn’t just up and skip town with your gorgeous friend here.”

You fought to keep your composure, not wanting this man to know that you had any semblance of nervousness in you. Propping the box you were holding against your hip, you didn’t your best to sound confident, “We’ve been busy getting this place ready since no one else seems too eager to help. Something else you need us to do for you?”

A smirk curled the ends of his mouth, “What’s your offer?”

Juice huffed out a sigh, “Tig, don’t.”

He looked over at him, “What? I’m just asking a question.”

By this point, the man behind the desk had given up on looking through the paperwork and had walked over to the three of you. Stopping beside the man in front of him, who you now knew was named Tig, he scanned you over the same way that Tig had. There was something different in his expression, though, in his eyes. You couldn’t put a name to it, though. What you did know, though, was that the President patch stitched into his kutte meant that whatever happened with this job and this building would all be leading back to him in one form or another.

He smiled at you as he started to speak, “Sorry about him, darlin’. We don’t take him out much,” he paused, waiting for you to make another comment, and you wished that you had one, but your mind was blank as you tried to get a grip on the dynamics here. Taking your pause as his cue to continue, he held out his hand, “I’m Jax, by the way.”

You used your free hand to shake his as you introduced yourself in return, “You got a couple minutes to spare, Jax? We got some more stuff to unload.”

Despite the fact that most of Jax’s focus was on you, he was very aware of the way that Juice was watching the two of you interact. Tig wasn’t lying when he said that they hadn’t really heard or seen much from Juice in a couple days, and now Jax knew why. Sure, getting all of this off the ground was keeping him plenty busy, but there was no way that Juice being able to spend all day working one-on-one with you wasn’t affecting how he spent his time.

“Sure,” he gestured towards the door, “You can talk me through some of those business plans while you’re at it. ‘Cause I know that Juice didn’t come up with all of those.”

You smiled, shaking your head as you walked back towards the door, “Juan came up with the framework for all of it, I’ve just been helping fill in the details.”

You missed the exchange of looks between Jax and Juice when you called him Juan, and Juice was beyond thankful for that. He knew that he was going to be getting an earful over that later when you weren’t around.

Jax focused his attention back on you as you hopped into the truck to pass more stuff off, “And what do you know about filling in the details, if you don’t mind me asking.”

“I was about eight weeks away from getting my MBA,” you tossed a box to Jax with a little more umph than necessary, “so I think I’m pretty qualified to fill in some blanks.”

He raised his eyebrows, smiling slightly as he nodded, “Alright then.”

“And,” you slid a few things to the edge before hopping down and grabbing them so you could walk back inside, “not for nothing, if you were worried about my credibility, you could’ve been around to help with all of this. Pitch in on the hiring process and all that,” the smile on your face took the venom out of your words but your point still got across fine.

He chuckled, knowing that an argument wasn’t going to be worth it for anything, “Fair,” he set his box down with the others, “Speaking of the hiring process, where are we with all of that?”

“She put together the listings,” Juice jumped into the conversation, “Gonna post them when we’re done with all of this. I’ll get some printed and sent out, too.”

“We get to help with the interviews?” Tig asked with a smirk.

Juice rolled his eyes, “It’s not gonna be like hiring girls for Redwoody.”

Your eyes widened and you choked back a laugh. When the men turned to look at you, you shook your head and tried to keep your laughter under control, “Sorry, sorry. But…Redwoody? First of all, that name,” you chuckled, “But second of all, how’d you guys go from porn to puppies? I don’t…I don’t get that.”

Jax had to laugh, hearing it phrased like that, “Whatever makes good, clean money.”

“And a lot of it,” Tig added on.

You nodded, not able to argue the very basic logic behind it even if the guys didn’t seem too well prepared for the actual business building side of it, “Right.”

Jax looked back and forth between you and Juice, “You two really need the extra help around here right now?”

You glanced over at Juice, knowing that it was really going to be his call at the end of all of this. You were helpful, and Juice took most of your advice at face-value, but you knew that these two guys weren’t going to be the same way. They weren’t the ones who had been working side-by-side with you getting all of this pulled together so quickly. Juice’s gaze fell to the floor as he contemplated his answer. The extra help would’ve been nice, sure, but he didn’t really want to have Jax or Tig, or any of the guys really, breathing down his neck and yours. The two of you working together seemed to be working so well. There had been moments, over the days that you’d been working together, that he almost forgot that this was all technically a club thing, not just something he happened to be doing and bringing you in to help with.

“We should be good once we get this place set up and the interviews done. Then we’ll be good to go,” Juice nodded, still not looking over at you.

“Either of you any good at interior design?” you asked with a laugh, “We gotta get it all set up and decorated.”

Tig spoke up, nudging Jax’s shoulder, “We should send Gem—”

“No,” Jax cut him off with a laugh, “we shouldn’t,” he looked over at you, “I’ll swing by with a couple of the guys tomorrow, help you set up all this. Put Juicey here in charge of the interviews,” he paused, smiling, “Then you can walk me through some of those plans.”

You knew that smile. You’d seen it on countless men, countless times before. It never meant anything good, and that was the last thing that you were interested in right now. Shaking your head, you said, “I’m telling you, you’re better off talking to Juan about all of that. I just work here,” you tucked your hands into your back pockets, “But I won’t say no to you bringing over some help to get the bulk of this setup done.”

Juice had watched your little exchange with Jax with bated breath. He didn’t want to admit that he felt relieved with the way you deflected Jax’s subtle invitation. Judging by the look that Jax cast his way, Juice had to assume that he wasn’t as good at keeping a neutral expression as he’d hoped.

You saw the three men all looking at each other, and you suddenly felt like you should be doing anything but standing there with them. Clearing your throat, you spoke to Juice, although at this point you were basically speaking to all of them, “I’m just gonna grab the last few things out of the truck. If you’re good to get the listings up, I’ll probably just head out for the day…give you guys a chance to go over some things.”

He didn’t want you to go, but he knew that whatever Jax and Tig wanted to talk about, probably wasn’t something that he wanted you hearing. He fumbled a sentence together, “Oh, uh, okay. Um, yea. Sounds…sounds good. I’ll just see you in the morning, then.”

“Yea,” you shot him a smile, “with a moving crew.”

You made quick work of the few items that were left in your truck. The three of them were chatting about minor things when you walked back in to set the last of your haul down. You said a quick goodbye to the three of them and went on your way. The second the door shut behind you, though, both Jax and Tig turned and gave Juice knowing looks. He rolled his eyes and shook his head, desperately trying not to get roped into that conversation with them.

“What did you guys need to talk about, anyway?” he tried to rein them back to the matters at hand.

It was evident on Jax’s face that he now wanted to spend their time razzing Juice over the blossoming crush he had on his new coworker, but he fought the urge. Resigning with a sigh, he allowed the conversation to stay on a more focused, professional track.

You showed up the next morning with a few trays of coffees from the café a few streets over. You didn’t know how many guys were going to be showing up, but you figured that it would be a nice gesture regardless. When you’d pulled into the parking lot, you saw Juice’s bike, which was the only one you think you’d ever recognize. There were two others, although you couldn’t remember if they were the same ones as the day before. There was also a van parked there as well.

You slung your backpack onto your shoulders before grabbing the drink trays and making your way towards the building. The closer you got, the more you could make out the movement inside. There were definitely more people in there than there had been. It was a far cry from it just being you and Juice together in the vast emptiness of the unfurnished building.

“Holy shit,” you said it mostly under your breath as you walked through the door.

You didn’t think that you’d shown up late. It was about the same time as you usually did. Since you guys weren’t technically open for business and there weren’t any dogs to take care of yet, both you and Juice just tried to get there are a relatively decent hour in the morning. Truthfully, you didn’t think that any of the men who were in the MC would be early birds. Apparently, you were wrong.

It looked like an entirely new place. All the stuff that you’d gone and picked up the day before was all set up. Kennels, pens, all manner of toys and mats, all of it was set up. The reception area didn’t look half bad, either. You looked around, trying to weave your way through the men as quickly and quietly as possible. More than anything you just wanted to talk to Juice and find out what happened.

Before you found Juice, Jax found you. He looked different than he had the day before, just a t-shirt on underneath his kutte and a backwards baseball cap on his head. You figured that the outfit was what passed for “casual” wear since he and the crew of guys had presumably been setting things up all morning.

His smile stretched a little wider as you wordlessly offered him a coffee from the tray in your hands. He took it, starting the conversation before taking a sip, “Not too bad, right?”

You chuckled, setting the tray down and letting your backpack fall off your shoulders, “Not bad, no,” you took your own coffee from the tray, “I guess I underestimated you guys a little bit.”

He shook his head, “We’re just trying to make up time.”

“Oh? Was the guilt trip effective yesterday, then?” you chuckled.

His lips curled into a smirk, “Something like that.”

You paused for a moment as you looked around again, “Juice here? I thought I saw his bike out front.”

His expression shifted as he tried to bite back a laugh, “Yea, yea, he’s here,” he nodded towards the door that led to what you assumed they finally turned into an office, “Got an interview going on.”

“Oh,” you nodded a sip of your drink, “Nice,” you paused for a beat, “When the hell did you guys get here?”

“Early,” he took a long sip from the cup in his hand, “Thanks for the coffee.”

You shrugged, offering a polite smile, “Sure.”

“Can I ask you somethin’?” he waited, and when you motioned for him to continue, he did, “What the hell are you doing working in a place like this? Thought you said you had a degree?”

You shook your head, “Not that simple. I, um, I needed a fresh start somewhere. Ended up here,” you looked around, “No buyer’s remorse yet.”

“Yet?” he chuckled.

“I’m still new in town. We’ll see,” you gave him a small smile.

It was surprising, yet not, how quickly you all completed the final stretch once the rest of the club started pitching in a little more. It seemed like in no time they had hired a decent number of staff and wrapped up the last few things so that the business could actually open. And then it did.

The entire vibe changed once things were up and running. You were still Juice’s right hand, and it was interesting to see the way that he stepped up to the plate a bit, but it was just as interesting to see the way that the rest of the club actually let him. You couldn’t say that you knew the members or understood the dynamics super well, but it didn’t take a rocket scientist to figure out that Juice was somewhere near the bottom of the totem pole in the MC. Still, they let him man the ship, and it was all working out well because of that.

You were in your glory. No matter what you thought your life was going to look like a few months prior before you’d stumbled into Charming, it wouldn’t have compared to this. No amount of degrees or internships or whatever used to be in your plans could’ve beaten out the pure happiness and excitement that came from running the doggie daycare with Juice. It was absolute chaos every day. Semi-organized chaos, but still chaos. And you loved every second of it.

You were sitting inside the pen with a couple of the smaller, much younger dogs that now frequented your daycare. They were just a little too young, a little too small, to be let into the larger pen with the bigger dogs. You didn’t mind that one bit, though, taking any free time you got to sit and play with them. You were in the midst of being lovingly clobbered by an army of little paws when you heard someone clear their throat behind you.

Jax smiled, shaking his head at you, “Hey, darlin’.”

Despite the roll of your eyes, you smiled, knowing that you could spray him with the water bottle a thousand times over and he would still call you by the pet name he seemed so attached to, “What’s up, Teller?”

“Juice around?”

You spent more time with the club members than you used to, especially since they seemed to pop into the building more often to get their own dose of dog-time, but you still never picked up using the nickname they had for the man who had very quickly become one of your favorite people in Charming.

You nodded towards the back door, “Juan’s out back with a couple of the dogs,” you paused, searching Jax’s face, waiting for his expression to falter, “Everything alright?”

He shot you the same slick smile he had weeks before, “Everything’s fine. You worry too much.”

He was right, but could he really blame you? It wasn’t worth the argument, though, “Keep proving me wrong and we won’t have a problem,” you joked, but not really.

“Yes ma’am,” he leaned down, scratching one puppy gently behind the ears before heading off to find Juice.

You watched him as he walked away, wondering what their conversation was going to be about. Before Jax could make it out the door, Juice came bounding back inside, a pair of dogs at his heels. He and Jax both laughed as they tried to maneuver out of the way and not trip over the dogs who were eagerly sniffing at Jax’s sneakers.

“You got a sec, bro?” Jax asked.

“Uh, yea,” things had been going extremely well, but that question still sent a jolt of anxiety through Juice’s system. Gesturing towards the office, the two of them started to make their way. Once Juice shut the office door behind them, he turned back to Jax, trying to look more confident than he felt, “What’s up?”

“Things are running smoothly here, right?”

Juice shrugged, “Uh, yea, I think so. It’s been…it’s been great. Why?”

“You think you still need to be here to manage the day-to-day?”

Juice’s heart dropped into his stomach. He hadn’t thought about the fact that things going well would expedite him being pulled and put onto whatever project the guys decided to get into next. Truthfully, working with you made him completely forget that this wasn’t the endgame for him. You’d become such a fixture in his routine. He also knew, though, that if the club pulled him for something else, you would be able to handle it. The transition wouldn’t be too difficult, especially since the two of you pretty much ran the show together at this point anyway.

Jax could see the thoughts running through Juice’s head. Tucking his hands into the pockets of his jeans, he shrugged, “If she’s not ready to take over, I get it. I just need—”

“No,” he cut him off, not wanting Jax to think that the hesitation was born out of a lack of faith in you, “That’s…that’s not it. She’s great,” he looked towards the door even though he couldn’t see you through the small window in it, “She’s…fuckin’ perfect for this, honestly. She’s good with the dogs, good with the people,” he gestured vaguely to the paperwork on the desk, “good with the books.”

“Good,” Jax nodded, smirking slightly as he waited for Juice to get to the conflict of it all. He studied Juice’s face for a beat longer, “Why do I feel like there should be a but here?”

Juice let out a deep sigh, “It’s not…her,” running his hands back over his head so that they landed, interlocked on the back of his neck, “I like it here.”

Jax stopped fighting the smirk, letting it take over his expression, “Do you?”

Juice rolled his eyes, “Don’t be like that.”

Jax chuckled, “C’mon, Juan, anyone with a goddamn set of eyes can see why you like it here. You ask her out yet?”

Juice scoffed, like it was the most ridiculous notion in the world, “I’m not gonna ask her out.”

“Why not?”

“Because she works here?”

Jax laughed, “Don’t act like you care about that, bro.”

“If she says no…”

“I don’t think she will.”

“Yea,” Juice shook his head, “because you know her so well.”

“I’m just saying, that the girl who is currently sitting out there letting herself get mauled by puppies, doesn’t seem like someone who is gonna shoot you down. She’s stuck around you this long, right?”

It wasn’t like Jax was the person that Juice would ordinarily seek out for relationship advice. But Juice had to admit, that this was probably the first time in recent history, if ever, that Jax was actually optimistic about a girl Juice was interested in. He wondered if that was a good sign or a terrible one.

“I’ll put a pin in the conversation about pulling you off of this if you ask her out,” Jax offered, a mischievous glint in his eyes.

Juice let out a laugh of disbelief, “You can’t, you can’t do that.”

Jax shrugged, “Sure I can,” he stepped back and pulled the office door open, “Think about it,” he let out a quiet laugh as he exited the office.

Jax made his way back towards the front of the building, back towards the door to leave. You’d extracted yourself from the pile of puppies that you’d previously been buried under and were back behind the reception desk. You still had a small dog cradled in your lap as you typed on the computer, and Jax couldn’t help but to shake his head at the sight.

Looking up, you raised your eyebrows at him, “All good?”

He nodded, “Yea, so stop asking that,” he laughed, pausing for a moment before asking, “Any of my other guys still here?”

You shrugged, “They filter in and out a lot. Your sergeant at arms was here not too long ago, getting his ankles bit by a chihuahua who has no use for him.”

He nodded towards the dog in your lap, “That one?” Jax laughed when you nodded in response, “How’d Happy take that?”

“Not well,” you laughed, “I think he might’ve left.”

Walking up to the desk, he leaned against it so that he was directly in front of you. He waited for you to stop typing and look over at him before he spoke up, “You still liking it here? Planning on sticking around?”

You shrugged, nodding, “Yea, I don’t see any reason to leave. Why? You hear rumors?”

He chuckled, shaking his head, “Nah, just making sure you still don’t have any buyers remorse.”

You smiled, “I don’t.”

“Good,” Jax rapped his knuckles against the desk as he made his way to leave, “’Cause I don’t know what Juice would do without you here at this point.

It was the end of the night, all the dogs had been picked up by their respective owners, you sent the other employees home a while before. The whole building was quiet, which felt strange these days. It used to be nothing but silence in the beginning when it was just you and Juice, but that felt like such a distant memory now that it was usually filled with the hustle and bustle of dogs and puppies and workers and the men from the MC popping in and out all the time. The comfortable chaos had become home, and when it was quiet now, it almost felt wrong.

You were closing out a last few things from the day, trying to get a head start on the schedule for the following week. You knew that Juice was still there, that he was wrapping things up in the office, but you still jumped a bit when you heard him clear his throat to get your attention.

He let out a nervous laugh, an apologetic smile spreading across his face, “Sorry.”

“No,” you smiled and waved off the apology, “Don’t be. I just get in the zone sometimes, you know?”

“Trust me, I get it.”

Taking a deep breath, you ran your hands down your face before finally admitting that maybe it was time to call it a day. Shutting down the computer, you looked over at Juice, “You alright?”

“Yea,” he nodded, although the look in his eyes was less convincing, “Yea I’m good.”

“You sure?” you hopped out of your chair and grabbed your bag off the floor, “Everything go alright with Jax today?” he nodded but you could sense the hesitation, “What’d you guys talk about?” you knew it wasn’t really your business but you couldn’t stop yourself.

Juice was telling you the truth before he thought better of it, “We were talking about pulling me off this project.”

Your chest tightened more than you thought it would at news like that, “Oh.”

“He’s not,” he quickly amended his statement, “We’re not. I’m not going anywhere yet.”

You let out a quiet sigh of relief, “Oh, good.”

The two of you walked towards the main doors, “You probably could run this place on your own, though, you know,” Juice said.

“Please don’t make me do that,” you joked as you locked the door once the two of you stepped outside.

“You’re not dying to get rid of me?” the boyish grin on his face made your heart melt.

“Of course not,” you toyed with the keys to your truck, “You’re like, my second favorite thing about working here.”

“Second?” he laughed.

You chuckled, “First is the dogs, obviously. Second is you. But a very close third is watching the rest of your biker buddies flounder and get chased around by everything from chihuahuas to rottweilers. Great entertainment.”

“I wouldn’t be mad if I came in third to that, honestly,” he joked.

There were a few beats of silence as he walked over to your truck with you. You couldn’t help but ask, “You thinking of leaving?”

His eyes grew wide as he shook his head, “No, no, not at all. Jax was the one who mentioned it. I, uh, I told him I didn’t want to leave.”

“Really?”

“Yea,” he nervously tucked his hands into his pockets, “I just, I really like working here. With you.”

The last part he said so quietly that you almost missed it. Your heart skipped a beat in your chest as you smile, “I like working here with you too,” you paused, chuckling, “I still can’t believe you hired me based off me saying that I used to dog-sit as a parttime gig in college.”

“Really?” he laughed, “I totally believe it.”

“I’m glad you did,” you nodded, leaning back against the side of your truck.

“I love all this,” he nodded towards the building, “what we got going now. But I do, I dunno, I do miss when it was just the two of us all the time,” his face felt like it was on fire and he instantly regretted saying the words.

Your face warmed at the sentiment, “It was fun, huh? Despite the fact that we didn’t know what the fuck we were doing.”

“Speak for yourself,” he laughed, “I still don’t know what I’m doing.”

You smiled, shaking your head. You waited for a moment, watching the tiny shifts in his expression, “What’re you thinking, Juan?”

“Nothing,” he shook his head, but it wasn’t convincing.

“Liar,” you laughed.

He smiled but still couldn’t quite look you in the eye, “No, it’s, I just, I don’t wanna say something and make things weird.”

“Well. Now it’s gonna be weird if you don’t say it. So you might as well,” you reached out, resting your hand on his shoulder for a fleeting moment, “What’s up?”

“I really like you,” it was like the brief contact forced the words out of him. His eyes blew wide open as he realized what he said, “I don’t, it’s not like,” he took a breath to try and get his words together, “I know you probably don’t feel the same way, and, and that’s fine. You’re just really funny, and smart, and honestly after watching you with all the dogs here I’m not totally convinced that you’re not secretly a Disney princess,” he laughed nervously, “I just…I think you’re really great.”

You wouldn’t have been able to dial back the grin on your face even if you tried, “I think you’re really great too.”

His expression brightened, “Yea?”

You laughed, nodding, “Yea.”

“You think I could take you out sometime?”

You smiled, “I think I could make that work, move some things around in my work schedule.”

He laughed, “I think I know a guy who can help with that.”

You bit down lightly at your bottom lip in an attempt to contain your grin, “Oh really?��

He wanted to kiss you, but he knew he wasn’t going to be brave enough to do it. His palms were already starting to sweat just from telling you that he liked you. There was no way he was going to be able to survive anything more without driving himself to a heart attack.

“I’ll, um, I’ll let you get home. I’ll see you tomorrow?” he sounded hopeful, like it wasn’t a guarantee that you’d be there.

You laughed, “That’s a pretty safe bet, yea.”

“Cool,” the shy, dorky grin on his face made your heart melt.

He turned to walk away and you shook your head, reaching out for his arm as you spoke, “Juan, wait.”

He turned back, caught between focusing on the heat from your hand as he soaked into his arm, and the look in your eyes as they locked onto his, “Yea, what’s—”

You cut him off, leaning in and pressing your lips to his. He was surprised at first, hesitant, but once he realized that it was really happening, he leaned right into it. He could feel the way your lips curled into a smile as he pulled you in closer, tighter, like it might be the first and last time he got to do that. Your thumb grazed along his cheek and he melted into your touch like it was second-nature.

When you finally pulled away, you were both out of breath, faces warm like you were two teenagers sneaking in a kiss goodbye past curfew. Resting your palm on the leather of his kutte, you said, “I’ll see you in the morning, okay?”

His smile was bright as his heart pounded inside his chest, “Can’t wait.”

[ouatsnark]

saw two more stupid sq fics that need to be debunked one with emma crying over regina at the coronation and they both make hope "theirs" because hook was more in love with the idea of a baby than the real thing (like he isn't over the moon to be a father and loves hope with all his heart) and one where emma was thinking of regina when hook proposed the first time but she practically asked him to propose to her when she found the ring, the delusion is insane

Ok so I am gonna combine these asks and make a new tag for “What the hell kinda fic did that Regina Apologist just write” cause geez people! I’m gonna preface this again by saying I know the purpose of fan fiction is to explore different scenarios… but it sounds like the majority of Regina centric fics have everyone so out of character! Like what is the point? Go write your own story with your own characters at this point. Anyway. Let’s dive in.

It’s NOT Hope Swan-Mills, people, her name is Hope Swan-Jones!

I love how they are so comfortable with taking a child away from their biological father but the moment you say “Regina isn’t fit to be called Henry’s mother because she illegally adopted and abused him” they flip out on you like you’ve physically harmed them by being “anti-adoption”. So it’s perfectly acceptable when they’re anti-birth parent (they even go as far to disparage Emma’s relationship with Henry) but don’t you dare point out how bad of a mother Regina was!

Ok sorry, that was a tangent. Back to the point: Hook being in love with the idea of having a child but not the real thing is 100% fanon and not supported by canon at all and seems like a really stupid reach to me. But as always they have to make Hook into the abuser when in show canon Regina was the abusive one. You can go back to Hook’s time with Bae and see that he always wanted to be a father. This becomes even more apparent with how he was so involved in Henry’s life. And no, that wasn’t just to get to Emma. He genuinely cared for Henry. And Henry cared for him.

The CaptainSwan proposal fic

That must have been a total rewrite because as you point out it’s Emma that pretty much proposes to Killian! And if it wasn’t a total rewrite then that is one pretty big delusion because it doesn’t make logical sense. If Emma didn’t want Killian to propose then wouldn’t she have hidden the ring instead? Why would she run down the stairs all happy and present it to him and tell him she’d say “yes?” Was she having a hallucination that it was Regina? Like come on people.

How do you all read this garbage and still think you’re reading about characters in OUAT?

Fanon fanfic Hook running out and abusing pregnant Emma and Henry

Right because the man who risked his life over and over for Emma and for Henry is going to suddenly run out on them? There is absolutely no chance that Hook abandons his children like his father abandoned him and the proof is in what I mentioned above. And yes, I count Henry as his because he was a father figure to Henry and his step-father. Killian stopped running the moment he believed he could be a part of something again. He is not going to turn his back on that now. He found purpose and meaning with Emma and Henry. Why on earth would he give that up to be alone and miserable again? Also Killian Jones fought multiple times to get to Emma. And now he’s gonna walk away? Yeah. No. That makes no sense.

And as for the abuse… there is absolutely 0 canon evidence of Killian Jones abusing Emma. So unless he’s cursed again to be someone he’s not, that is completely and absolutely out of character.

But you know who would abuse Emma and Henry as she has a history of doing so even after her redemption? Regina Mills. You know who else would run off on Emma because he has a history of doing so? Neal Cassidy.

Fanon fanfic Emma a cheater?

Ok this I laughed at. I can’t see Emma as a cheater. She didn’t even want to play dirty to win the spot as the sheriff in season 1. That’s just not who Emma is. It is who Regina is though. She has no issues taking what she wants no matter who it hurts.

[parcequecestnotreprojeeeet]

Hi, it’s me, Fanfic Anon #2. I’ve had a really, really bad day, but the visual that you, EMT, and a couple of lovely Anons have put out there of Emmanuel buying Brigitte a tiara not only inspired a truly needed laugh, but this piece. Take it as my thank you for your very important public service. It’s more of a silly piece from me. Hope you all enjoy.

"So it’s official, then?" she asked that night at dinner, after she had been handed the initial planning dossier by her staff that morning.

"What’s official?" he asked, a little confused.

"The British are coming," she replied.

"Oh! Yes! They are! End of March, I think."

"Ooh, getting them before the coronation. Quite the coup!"

"Yeah. Well," he blushed, a little embarrassed by the insinuation.

"Chéri, I think it’s lovely that everyone wants a State Visit with you. I mean, I don’t love the big public spectacles that involve me, heels, cameras, and crowds -"

"You always do so well at these things, Brigitte," he reassured.

"But, I love how much they love you. You’re such a good man, such a profoundly honest and true man, and I’m so very glad that the rest of the world sees that too."

"They love you too," he told her, reaching over and grabbing her hand. "Trust me, there are a lot of people who prefer you to me, or their spouses prefer you to me. And I really don’t think we’d be getting these invites no matter how much they like me if you weren’t you."

"Charmer," she deflected.

"Truth teller," he insisted.

"Anyways. Now I have to get started looking for a dress."

"Ooh! I have some ideas," his eyes lit up at the thought.

"No."

"Oh, come on, you don’t even know what I was thinking!"

"I don’t need to know."

"Aren’t you just the tiniest bit curious?"

"The woman with the biggest collection of fine jewelry I can think of will be coming to dinner, so, knowing you, I already have an idea of what’s going on inside your head."

"But-"

"No. You are not buying me a tiara."

"But what if I want to!"

"Do I really need to explain to you how much worse the whole ‘Marie Antoinette’ thing will get if you literally put me in a crown?"

"But you are a Queen!"

"I’m not even a First Lady, really."

"Fine. You’re my Queen!"

"Just like you are the King of my heart. But, mon cœur, you are not, under any circumstances, to buy me one. Do you understand?"

"Give me one good reason that isn’t about how the public would perceive you."

"You mean one good reason other than making your life difficult which is the thing I have tried my hardest to avoid for these last almost 6 years? How about I don’t have the hair for it," she volleyed back.

"There’s always hair extensions."

"It’s too expensive for something I’ll only wear once,” she stated.

"What if I want to see you wearing it around the house?" he flirted, a naughty image coming to mind.

"You’re crazy!"

"Crazy in love with you!"

"I love you too, but -"

"No tiara. Point taken.” He waited for a minute, letting her think she’d won, before he ventured back into the verbal boxing ring, “how about new earrings?”

Helloooo fanfic Anon #2! ❤️

Really sad to hear you had a bad day, but happy that coming here and read the things we comment, still managed to put a smile on your face ❤️

Hahahaha love how Brigitte could see right through Emmanuel’s intentions even before he said anything 😂

Emmanuel fantasizing with Brigitte wearing the hair extensions (and probably with the tiara too) around the Élysée hahahaha that naughty mind just never stops 🤭😂

Thank you so much, fanfic Anon #2! ❤️❤️❤️

(Hope you get some rest and feel better tomorrow ❤️ )

[ddarker-dreams]

Your Johan fic oh my god...Im so happy I got to live the day to witness you actually writing it. My week is made fr. The way you wrote the monologue is one thing but the actions after is a whole different thing. Not only where you able to completely craft the dialogue between Johan and reader but also the impact those words do. they're terrifying strong and you managed to pitray it perfectly. Actually while reading what he said to reader it made me feel similar and very sad to the point I started tearing up mid way through the story 😭 but I genuinely think reader response is so beautiful, it's something that I relate to and you managed to convert such a crisis and long term pain with it's conflict into one fanfic that is just beautiful beautiful beautiful work. I honestly don't know how you do it. I have been following you for maybe 3 or more years and the way your writing has drastically improved makes me feel so proud even tho I am beginning to get scared on how well you depict these kind of characters lol. You have changed and became something so much bigger in such a short span of time it's beautiful. I am so proud of you and this recent fanfic reminded me of it honestly. this genuinely is one of my favourite stories now I'll have to mark it down and add it to my list and I hope one day you'll realise some books that I can add more to

i think i need to like ,, lay down because WOW what a message. my heart is genuinely touched by this and i’m struggling to figure out how to put that into words (any ability to write just flew out of my body). writing this story was surprisingly therapeutic for the reasons that you mentioned. i knew that to write an effective johan story, there’d need to be some of him verbally digging into the reader. i decided to pick a topic i’m extremely sensitive about to be able to capture that psychic damage he’s capable of inflicting (aka why i made this post). i was worried whether or not the warning “manipulation” could fully cover everything, because if you can even slightly relate to the way johan was coming for reader, it’d be ouch ouch. but i was hoping reader’s response would somewhat mitigate that. 

carl jung’s discussion about the shadow is what i was mostly basing johan off of in the story, specifically the discussion of it in this quote: 

"The shadow is a moral problem that challenges the whole ego-personality, for no one can become conscious of the shadow without considerable moral effort. To become conscious of it involves recognizing the dark aspects of the personality as present and real. This act is the essential condition for any kind of self-knowledge.” 

i think it’s imperative to come to terms with the more unsightly aspects of yourself, since without acknowledging them, they remain permanent blind spots. i was plagued pretty intensely with social anxiety disorder (along with GAD) in my teenage years, and something that came from that was like. this visceral want to be needed by others. the equation in my mind was people need me = i’m not annoying and it’s justifiable for me to be around. 

it took some later reflection to realize my obsession with self-martyrdom to solidify my place with others is Not in fact good, but at the same time, an urge i shouldn’t beat myself up over. of course we long to be wanted! who doesn’t? so long as we can check our motivations and keep this part of ourselves in line as much as possible, i don’t think it’s an ugly thing. i hope that anyone who struggles/has struggled with something similar can read the story and come to a similar conclusion. 

man maybe i’m gonna cry now 😭😭 thank you for supporting me over three years, that’s actually insane to think about?? it really has been that long hasn’t it... my understanding of evil has definitely improved from writing all these dark stories, i wonder if that’ll ever come in handy . mayhaps mayhaps. probably not. sometimes we need useless skills. i’ll keep working to improve my writing, i feel like the biggest help has been how often i do it and the fact i’m actually reading published books now JKGEMR i don’t know why i avoided doing it for so long. i’ve been so pretentious in thinking they had nothing to offer me omg. 

ANYWAY i am beyond grateful that you sent this in, thank you so so so so much!!!!!! 💖💖💖💖💖💖💖💖💖💖💖💖

[riyuyami]

Okay.

I’ve had time to think this over (I slept on it because working a night shift while emotionally overwhelmed is not great), and decided to put my thoughts down on all this in a much better way than my previous posts.

In December of 1999, the day I moved from the states to Germany, my dad got a magazine that talked about games, comics, cartoons, movies, things like that, and said my older sister and I would like it. Of course we would, it had Ash and Pikachu on the cover.

Well, inside was an article about a new series that would be coming to the states sometime in 2000-2001.

The image they used for this new anime was of two teenagers, one dressed in green, the other in shiny, blue and black leather. Blond hair, weird star-shaped hair, and they were holding cards.

This image is the cover of the fourth Duel Monsters era book, and was my very first introduction to YuGiOh.

And I fell in love instantly.

I wanted to know everything about this series, about who these two guys were, why they were playing card games, and what that ancient Egyptian puzzle one of them was wearing had to do with the plot.

When the show finally aired over on an American channel while I lived in Germany some time later, I was hooked. I wanted to watch the adventures of Yugi Mutou and his friends every week.

I remember being so upset when, during the Pegasus and Yami Yugi/Yugi duel, the channel stopped airing the episodes for the series and I had to wait a few months to see the end of season one.

I remember my dad got my sister and I our very first issue of Shonen Jump (it was the second volume) in 2003, by then I was already watching the show, collecting the cards, but seeing the manga changed something in me.

I saw more games, I saw how much of a little shit Yami Yugi was, how cool Yugi could be at times. Joey was a total badass, Kaiba was prepared to kill a man over a card game. Tristan and Tea had more personality to them, Mokuba was a gremlin, Ryou and Bakura felt more fleshed out.

Later on in that year, the worst year of my life, I was in the hospital for a month and my sister brought my ygo manga for me to read and it brought me joy. 

I was in love and the manga and show greatly influenced me into drawing more than just Spongebob and Powerpuff Girls are as a little kid.

I wanted to draw cool action things, I wanted to draw monsters, I wanted to draw characters... well... kissing.

Because I ended up getting involved on the online fandom scene in 2005.

And everything changed from there.

I met people outside of my small group at school that liked the series. I could talk to them about the characters, not just the card game, the ships I grew to like, the cool stories and comics people created, the aus! I met people who became my friends, I met my first ever girlfriend in this fandom.

My art improved the more I drew these characters, I still have influences in my art from this series (mostly in how I draw clothing and certain hair and eye styles, but whatever). I cringe at my old art, but I’m happy to see how it improved the more I drew these characters.

I still had fanfics printed from the good old days of not having internet on a phone.

I still have fanart printed too, all in folders.

There’s a framed Joey on my desk right now, making The Face, that’s a bit of motivation for me. 

I’ve cosplayed characters, I was the third best duelist in my high school, I had/have so much merch still. I’ve watched all of the series fpr DM, including the Capsule Monsters mini series (my favorite season), read all the manga. Hell, I nearly killed my computer watching season zero a while back, but it was worth it. 

I’ve watched DM, and some of GX, in multiple languages because youtube used to let you do that, and I had German and Italian channels where I could watch the series that way. 

I saw Bonds Beyond Time in theaters in a theater filled with people like me who grew up with the show, and we were all cheering and freaking out during the movie.

When DSOD came out, I was not in a great mind state, but that movie really helped me bring up my mood and started my second era on the internet as a ygo fan.

I made more friends here on tumblr with this account, so many people were/are interested in my aus and nonsense. I drew so much more fanart, you guys put up with my dumb crush on Timaeus and his thighs. So many of you were there for me when I went into the hospital again in 2018.

Hell, a lot of you were excited when I showed you guys my cartouche tattoo of the pharaoh’s name! 

I’m not as active as I was when I was in college, but I’ve never stopped loving this series. I’ve been in love with this series since 1999, and I doubt I’ll ever stop.

Kazuki Takahashi left one of the biggest impacts on my life these past twenty-three years, and I am so thankful for that. I wish I could have met him, but I’m just happy that I was able to have some of the best fun I’ve ever had in a fandom because of his attempt at a horror/action manga centered around games.

Thank you, KT, for everything, from the past, the present, and into the future.

[sunlitmcgee]

Somewhat Belated HWHBH Chapter 85 Behind the Scenes!

Hello, hello! This was meant to come out very soon after this chapter was posted, but as you all know, stuff happened with dear Mister Technoblade, and I was too upset over it to write it, especially about such personally touchy themes that this chapter involved. But hey! Better late than never.

This post will have discussions of all the triggers this chapter had, mainly those around themes of neglect, abandonment, and references to spousal abuse/mistreatment. Please be mindful! And be safe :)

with that all said...

this chapter was a very heavy one for me personally. Heavy in a way much like chapter 81, but different in that while that chapter was about the overall effects of lifelong trauma, this one was about a very SPECIFIC kind of trauma. that of course being trauma caused by failure/negligence/abandonment by a parental figure...specifically one you never properly met.

Tommy never knew Willow before the events of this chapter happened.

Tommy never knew that Willow even EXISTED until she was talked about to him by XD when Jordan and Lani came to Snowchester. 

Tommy only knew 2 things before he went into that diner: That Willow was his birth mother, and that she left him.

Willow, on both a story and a meta level, is meant to be a stranger. She is an OC. A character spawned purely from my brain that I made to fill the role of HWHBH!Philza’s ex-wife instead of Mumza, because as you all know HWHBH!Phil is an abusive bigoted piece of shit, and because of that I didn’t want to subject Mumza to him, so I simply made an OC to act as her narrative meat-shield.

Willow is not from the canon DSMP story. And because of this, you as readers don’t have anything to draw from when it comes to her behavior or personality like you do with other characters. You all know c!Tommy will always be a loud yet kind-hearted young boy. You know c!Tubbo will always be calculated but very warm underneath. You know c!Ranboo will be a shy anxious yet very sweet young teen, and that c!Wilbur will always be a well meaning dick while c!Sam is a loveable yet pitiful wet rag of a man. You have your references and predispositions. That’s how the DSMP and fandom is in general on the fanfic side of things.

 But you guys didn’t get that with Willowinnit.

She’s a stranger to all of you as much as she is to Tommy.

That was important to keep in mind for me when I wrote her. I wanted her to feel like she didn’t belong. A puzzle piece that can’t fit into the picture Tommy’s made of his happy, idyllic. A one off(but not completely) character that you’re not intended to get attached to, but are rather meant to sit and stare at in a sort of silent, unabashed, slightly disturbed wonder.

You’re meant to go “Wow. This lady up and abandoned her two kids to live with a man who abused her and never came back to get them for all of 16 whole years. that’s really quite fucked up.”

then that thought is hopefully followed up with-

“but, well. she was also abused by her former husband. so that certainly played a role in it.”

Originally, I had plans to describe the kind of abuse Willow went through. I was either gonna have them mentioned by XD in passing or shown in a few choice flashbacks. I still want to have those scenes at some point in the fic, but I decided to hold off on them this chapter, because this chapter wasn’t about Willow’s abuse and trauma, but was instead centered on Tommy’s pain from her abandonment.

This chapter wasn’t about her.

It was about Tommy’s pain from her.

This was just an introduction.

If that makes any since.

This chapter really, really deeply hurt me. It hurt much like the first chapter centered on HWHBH!Phil is. I’m with a few of y’all when you say he’s uncomfortable. He is. And there’s a reason for it that I think I’ve been able to guesstimate thanks to reading a handful of comments and reflecting on my feelings about it.

I think that the reason HWHBH!Phil and anything related to him causes so much discomfort is this: HWHBH!Phil is an everyday kind of monster.

He isn’t a cunning mastermind.

He isn’t a spiraling and pitiful poet.

He isn’t a powerful hog with the strength of a god.

HWHBH!Phil is just an old man. An old. bitter, nasty, bigoted, snarky, smarmy piece of fuck that’s stuck in his ways and is too stupid to even think to try to change. Maybe once there was hope for him to get help in overcoming his own inner demons. But now it’s too late, and even an Angel of Death looking into his soul can see that he’s just as rotten as the man who beat this awfulness into him.

As I once said, HWHBH!Phill will be getting his own backstory-type fic. 

 This is why this chapter was so painful for me. It hurts to look into HWHBH!Phil and the themes that are connected to him. It hurts, because it’s personal for me in a way that the rest of this already deeply personal fic just quite isn’t. In a way that hits a bit deeper. Bit closer to home, if that makes much sense.

Willowinnit is a parent who left her children for dead. Maybe not intentionally, but she knew better than anyone what Phil was really like. She knew that he was going to hurt them. But still, she left.

And now one of her sons is dead.

And her ex-husband did murder him.

And now one of her sons is alone.

And now he fucking hates her.

And now she has to live with that. She has to live with that.

I’m proud of this chapter. It’s gonna be a long long time before I write another one like it.

I hope you all enjoyed it! I hope you all enjoyed this and seeing my thought process. It’s always hard to put all these thoughts and feelings that I have about these characters into words, but I love to do it, and I love when these posts get reblogs or comments where people add on or share additional thoughts that they didn’t comment on the fic.

That’s one of the reasons I made this blog in the first place :) lol

anyway! that’s all I had to say! hope you all have a nice day or night or whatever! I’m gonna try to go to bed so I can get up early and work on the rest of the new chapter. hope to have it posted soon! maybe before sunday :”)

byeeee!

[meowzfordayz]

love language(s) — himejima gyomei

Author’s Note: my thumbs are not green. 🥀 Gyomei would be disappointed in me... can’t keep a plant to save my life. Actually: if my life were on the line, then prob would survive — my competency isn’t that horrid. Other than that drastic scenario, however... rip any plant placed under my care. 😵 

love language(s) — himejima gyomei

Himejima Gyomei x Reader

Word Count: ~1,800

CW: mild sexual content

Request Fulfilled: hello hello! may i request some gyomei hcs :> like,, what would be his love language/s [giving and receiving] hehe thank you!!

~faqs~

Giving

Hold up

Physical touch

Quality time

Gift giving

Verbal affirmation

What’s the fifth love language again ?? Trying to recall from memory…

AHA!

Acts of service (should be “5.” but tumblr formatting’s picky af)

So I must confess that I haven’t read any KNY manga 😬

Which means my perception of Gyomei is from the miniscule amount of screentime he got in s2 plus any fanfics about him that I’ve read

That being said, I feel like Gyomei gravitates toward giving Quality Time and Verbal Affirmation

Altho the softie in me *technically* imagines all the Hashira as cuddle bugs (albeit some more highkey than others) I am not touch starved tyvm Okay maybe just a little 😕

Gyomei just strikes me as particularly simple

Not like, simple in the noggin 😶

Just

Simply spending time together

And constantly announcing how splendid you are

He’s not into flashy gimmicks *cough* Tengen *cough*

I see him as someone who deeply values his alone time

Mind you, being alone on missions is different from having undisturbed time to oneself, ya feel?

Not to mention: it’s gotta be, to some degree, mentally exhausting to be moved to tears all the time — even when the tears are happy ones

So like, this man needs loads of time to decompress

And prob seeks out lower stim environments when socializing 

At the very least, he’s gotta suffer from dry eyes

Have you ever cried so much that your eyes hurt?

Now imagining crying a lot

I presume eye drops exist in Demon Slayer?

If Shinobu can regrow Zenitsu’s limbs, then eye drops must be canon 😤 

Welp, Gyomei definitely has a vial of dry-eyes-be-gone on him 24/7

I’m getting sidetracked

Himejima Gyomei’s the guy who’d rather read a book in bed with a mug of herbal tea vs go out with the other Hashira for drinks 

And by other Hashira I’m thinking mostly Kyojuro, Sanemi, and Tengen (Mitsuri only goes when Shinobu does, and vice versa)

Initially, you’d be hesitant to encroach on his alone time

He’d never exactly uninvite you, but he didn’t necessarily invite you either

Until one day when you semi jokingly remark while returning from a joint mission, “Gyomei-san, are we even romantically involved? We hardly do anything together. Unless you count fighting demons?”

And suddenly, he’s inviting you to practically everything he used to do alone

Book in bed with a mug of herbal tea? He wants you there ✅ Begins stock piling your favorites

Morning meditation? Invitation sent ✅ Whether or not you wake up in time to join him is entirely up to you 😴

Watering his plants? ✅ Begs you to come along, which, you almost regret bc he has sooo many plants and it’s stiflingly humid in his greenhouse yes this man has a private greenhouse, author makes the rules and he takes foreeevvverrr to water them bc, “They each need 30 seconds of water, 3 times. Okay, [y/n]-san?” buuut he’s a cutie 🌻 so mostly you just feel honored that he trusts you to care for his plants

As much as he enjoys being deployed on missions with you, he does not consider fighting demons to be quality time 🙄

You lowkey wrecked him asking if y’all were “even romantically involved” bc ?? 😭 He adores you ?? 💖 Cherishes you ?? 💗 Loves you ?? 💝

You’d literally sent him in a tizzy

“What if [y/n]-san breaks up with me?” Oh wait 😐 They don’t even know whether we’re together

Dw, he wasn’t frustrated by you

Mostly just distraught at his own lack of recognition that you needed ✨attention✨

P.S. The morning after your fateful remark, you’d awoken to a letter slipped under your front doorstep inviting you most affectionately and hopefully to join Gyomei for an evening stroll 💌

Srsly tho

He has the time to water a bajillion plants on the daily

—Logistical plothole here what with frequently being away on missions: I’m aware 🙃

—But that’s what hiring gardeners is for 🤗

But the most important plant was wilting before his very own eyes and he didn’t fricking notice ?!?!

You’re his prettiest-flower-that-isn’t-a-flower

Ofc, he doesn’t douse you with water

He douses you with thoughtful compliments

Exhibit A: “The color of your haori truly highlights the gentleness of your eyes.”

Exhibit B: “Your fingers are so elegant plucking the dead leaves from my hostas. Thank you for pruning them with me.”

Exhibit C: “Your laughter is a butterfly’s wing against my cheek — so light and tender, and capable of granting me endless joy.”

He douses you with encouragement and pride

Exhibit A: “Thank you for cooking dinner [y/n]-san. You’re doing a wonderful job! I’m sure you won’t overcook the rice this time.” And if you do, then he’ll try his best to only cry a little, just for you

Exhibit B: “I’m so impressed you beheaded that demon before me, [y/n]-san! May I watch you train sometime? It’s been a while since we sparred, and I believe I could learn a thing or two from you.”

—He really didn’t let you have it

—No, really 😌

—It was all you baybee 🥳

—Okay so he might have accidentally absolutely unintentionally moved a tad slower than you so you could reach it first

Exhibit C: “I know it hurts, [y/n]-san, but I know you can handle it.” this will remain appropriate, unfortunately “A wayward sprain could never restrain your resilience and spirit.”

—He still cries as you hobble around adorably, then cries bc he just wants you to okay, and cries some more bc he gets to scoop you into his arms and tuck you into his bed — the injured must rest!

And most annoyingly significantly, he douses you in nonstop-when will it stop-plsmakeitstop-he really doesn’t have to continue feeling so guilty about it reassurance of your romantic involvation I don’t think “involvation” is a real word oops

Exhibit A; Random Day | Random Location | Random Time: “Do you know who my romantic partner is, [y/n]-san?” he smiles widely. You sigh. “You are, [y/n]-san! You are my romantic partner.”

Exhibit B; Random Day | Gyomei’s Greenhouse | Early Afternoon: “Do you know what romantic partners do, [y/n]-san?” he leans down and pecks the top of your head cheerfully. You groan. “They nurture nature together! And [y/n]-san — we nurture nature together!”

Exhibit C; Random Day | Gyomei’s Bed | Nightfall: “Do you know what the worst part about having a romantic partner is, [y/n]-san?” he murmurs softly, bookmarking his page as he angles his body to face yours. You lay your book aside as well, quietly placing your hands over his. “It’s knowing there could never be enough clothes, rope, string, anything, to escape the depth of your devotion to them,” he pauses, struggling to collect himself, “But that is also the best part. You are my partner, [y/n]-san, and I am devoted to you.”

—

Ahhhhh

Gyomei, devoted, to you

His time spent, on you

His words spoken, to you

What a gem 💎🥺

Receiving

Time to give myself emotional whiplash transitioning from that bucket of fluff to another bucket of fluff

—

Imo, the language that screams GIMME the most for Gyomei

… as in, he’s screaming “GIMME” 😂

Is Physical Touch

Except he’s actually suuuper bashful about it

And never screams for it

—That’s his job

—To make you scream for it 😳

—That was an attempt at what I’d hoped would be a hilarious innuendo

—Guess not ☹️

It took you a while to figure him out

He doesn’t exactly shy from your touch

More like melts into it ☺️

But the only physical touch he’s naturally comfortable asking for is… 🥁🥁🥁

Holding hands 🤝

Beyond holding hands, Gyomei relies on you to lead the way

Creating a sort of catch 22, because you try your best to be cognizant and respectful of his upbringing

Which, his upbringing ≠ Physical Touch

Usually, you initiate touch in bed

Not like that

Yeesh

I already told you this will remain appropriate, unfortunately 👀

You initiate touch in bed, away from curious eyes, immersed in the soothing glow of cerulean and lavender lanterns — hand painted by you and Gyomei

Toasty, sweet aromas of sobacha and kuromamecha tea cling to his olive green kakebuton, a gift from you to him  “just because”

As the moon peers above the horizon, you’re tentative, knee leaning lightly into his thigh, your arm barely skimming his, the turning of pages floating pleasantly between you

Sitting in his bed, beside him, because he wants you there, is achingly meaningful

You move like honey as the moon ascends, a brush of your elbow against his ribcage here, a tap of your fingertip on his hip there

Not teasing, not seducing — easing him into your closeness

The pressure of your knee leaning on his thigh increases and increases, until he gently murmurs, “I’d feel very happy if our legs were fully touching.”

When the moon reaches and rests at its highest point, you press your mouth delicately to his shoulder

Gyomei’s focus wavers, book falling from his grip to his lap, a low, contented moan vibrating in his throat

“Another. Please. [y/n]-san. Touch…”

“Touch, Gyomei-san?” you smile tenderly

“Mm…” he doesn’t elaborate

Doesn’t have to

You have him figured out

“How does this feel?” your fingernails scratch faintly along his jawline Mm

“And this?” you playfully flick his ear Mm

“You’re warm, Gyomei-san,” your body adjusts itself Mm

Taut as you stretch to kiss the corner of his eye

Familiar as you exhale slowly, breath leaving a quiet trail of goosebumps from his cheek to his neck to the edge of his collarbone; your fingers wrap reassuringly around the strength of his wrist, lifting his palm to your nose; you nuzzle cutely, nipping at his callouses; then, you grip his hand with both of yours, his fingers straightening as you peep at him through them

“May I?” you whisper

Mm

You release his hand, sleepily settling further into bed, rolling onto your side

So casually, so safely, you tuck yourself into his sitting form, hugging his nearest forearm to your chest as you pull your knees up

—This is how you fall asleep, clinging to Gyomei

His heart hums, a constant, mellow bliss

As he picks up his book, and continues to read

…

Before you even ask-

Yes, he fumbles his book every so often

It’s hard to read with just one hand holding (the book) AND turning (the pages)

[homo-sex-shoe-whale]

Online shipping, the fetishisation of gay men, and the romanticisation of queer trauma

An essay by me!

Word count: 2.8k

A link to the Google Doc version of this essay.

A big thank you to my friends Nathan @themeerkatnate, Mav @not-mavv , and Duke @dukedark-ness for reading this essay and giving me their thoughts as mlms on the topic. Make sure to check out their blogs and give them a follow!

So I was on a lovely website by the name of Twitter.com yesterday, just scrolling through while having my afternoon cup of coffee, when I saw that viral post of a girl reading a Larry fanfic through a classroom projector. I'm sure most of you have seen it. It's gone viral on Instagram, TikTok, and likely Tumblr too, and if you haven't come across it I'm positive you will soon.

Now, after getting through my initial reaction to that post which was, holy fuck, that's so embarrassing, I had a second reaction of... wait, this ship is still around?

And after I had some thoughts on the incredible permanence of some online ships and the weird obsolescence of others, I did get to thinking of how lots of these popular ships seem to stem from the same types of perceived relationship dynamics and homophobic stereotypes.

These online fandoms often seem to have an obsession with objects of queer trauma, such as having to hide a relationship, lying about sexuality for self-preservation, and even social rejection. So, after some opinions from my followers and the great archive that is the internet, I've decided to discuss some of the most popular examples of online shipping and the particular nuances they came with.

NOTE: Out of respect for all these people, I won't be sharing viral images or videos of them in perceived romantic proximity (or even kissing, as is applicable for some examples), but I will be describing certain moments I deem to be relevant. So even if you're unfamiliar with them, you won't be confused as to what I'm talking about.

NOTE 2: Although not all people within these fandoms were/are toxic, this essay is focused on the overall toxicity of the fandoms, and how they are toxic more so as a "hive" than as a group of individuals. When I refer to a fandom I don't mean every person involved in the fandom, but rather the collective impact of the group.

 1. Harry Styles and Louis Tomlinson 

This is arguably the most popular example of online shipping. The absolute permanence of this ship, and how its fandom never seems to fully die off even beyond the lifespan of One Direction as it once stood, is downright impressive.  

I'm going to be the first to admit I was never in the loop with this fandom. My childhood best friend was actually a massive Larry shipper and asked me to beta read one of her fics, but that was before I even knew who tf Harry and Louis were! Not because I avoided the fandom or even because I rejected the online shipping, but just by coincidence, I delved into the world of pop punk music right when One Direction began gaining its popularity. I bought my first ever album, Riot by Paramore, in 2011- only a year after One Direction made their X-Factor debut. So, this fandom just bypassed me by a sort of weird coincidence.

But I don't need to be in the loop with this fandom to know the astronomical obsession with these two men, no, these two BOYS, was extremely toxic. In 2010, when One Direction made their debut, Harry Styles was only 16 years old. And Louis Tomlinson wasn't much older at 19! This made the two of them incredibly young when this unprecedented wave of shipping hit the internet, and although that must be traumatising for anyone, I cannot even fathom how overwhelming it must've been for two boys that young.  

I'm 18, almost 19 now, and I cannot begin to imagine how scary it was for the two of them to have their every interaction nitpicked within an inch of its life by thousands upon thousands of people online. I do not know this myself, but from numerous recounts by some of my followers, this massively impacted Harry's and Louis' nondescript relationship in real life, seemingly driving the two previously close friends apart. 

Now, before we move on, there's something we need to talk about. And that is the obsession with the dominance/submission dynamic within the world of gay shipping. 

With almost every popular mlm (an acronym meaning man-loving-man) ship based on real people, it seems that fandoms have a particular fascination with power imbalances in these relationships. You don't even need to look at the insane amount of fanfictions based on BDSM to figure this out. In almost all of the examples I'll be citing today, there is an age gap within the perceived relationship and a person the fandom has seemingly decided to be the top/dominant figure. 

Harry Styles and Louis Tomlinson are 3 years apart in age. Although it isn't all that relevant now, an age gap of 3 years when you're in your late teens is a lot more significant. In 2012, for example, when this shipping really started gaining traction, Harry Styles was 18 and Louis Tomlinson was 21. That power imbalance, albeit not that significant, is enough for a fandom to latch on to. We'll see this a lot more in the coming example with Dan and Phil.

 2. Dan Howell and Phil Lester

It's impossible to have a discussion about internet shipping without talking about Dan and Phil.

 Dan Howell and Phil Lester, although being popular YouTubers individually, are arguably one of the internet's most iconic duos. The two creators published their first videos together in 2009, and while their relationship was already a motive of speculation back then, the peak of the "Phan" shipping definitely came in the 2013-2016 era of Tumblr.

Now, I'm going to admit… I was actually on Tumblr when that happened. 

The 2013-2016 period perfectly aligns with my middle school days (I started middle school in 2013 and high school in 2016), and I was not only on Tumblr back then, but I was on Wattpad too! Again, this wasn't a fandom I had much contact with as I had a huge anime phase in middle school and I was on Tumblr posting mainly photography and Soul Eater content more than anything. 

But I did watch some of Dan and Phil's videos! And the occasional "Phan" content did not completely evade me as one of my closest friends in middle school had a fanchat for them. I wasn't involved in the fandom myself but they were actually one of the few English-speaking YouTubers I watched once in a blue moon (back then I watched mainly Brazilian YouTubers). One thing I did in fact notice over the years, around 2014ish perhaps, was that the two of them seemed to grow increasingly "awkward" around each other, in a way that many folks on the internet thought was reminiscent to Markiplier/Jacksepticeye, two YouTubers who also dealt with extraordinary amounts of shipping.

I'm not the only one who thinks this. The change in Dan and Phil's relationship, at least to the outside world, was clear to almost anyone who watched their videos for a while. I cannot blame them at all. The shipping was nuts. Between the countless fan videos, speculative comments, and insurmountable number of fanfics, there's no way the two of them didn't feel the weight of the shipping. The term "demon phannie" made its way into internet vernacular and there it stayed for years. Even Shane Dawson, who was one of the largest creators on the platform at the time, made several videos speculating on the nature of Dan and Phil's relationship and their sexual orientations. 

There was even porn made in which actors with similar appearances to the creators were made to have sex on camera. 

Now, this is actually a rare example where the two people involved in the ship actually came out as gay once the shipping seemed to die down. I'm incredibly happy Dan and Phil both reached a point where they were comfortable being publicly out, but I hate to say I'm shocked this day ever came. If I'd gone through what the two of them did, I don't know if I'd ever trust the internet. 

And again, this ship's fandom definitely had an obsession with the power dynamics they thought existed between the people within the ship. Dan Howell is 4 years younger than Phil Lester, and was only 18 in 2009, when they started making videos together. From my personal understanding, the shipping was often quite focused on this dominant/submissive dynamic especially in discussions from their early relationship. And this is in no way exclusive to Dan and Phil.

This general fascination with the older man/younger man dynamic, in my opinion, plays into the homophobic stereotype that gay men are predators. The idea that gay men usually seek younger men, and somehow "convince" them to engage in homosexual relationships, is popular homophobic rhetoric. The popularisation, exaggeration, and fetishisation of these power imbalances, in age and/or in relationship dynamics, is directly harmful to the mlm community. 

Not only that, but the romanticisation of a "hidden/forbidden relationship" is also detrimental not only to gay men and the mlm community, but to queer people as a whole. Queer people face huge trauma having to hide their relationships; queer attraction is already a societal taboo. And acting like this is good, or even desirable, is harmful to queer people as a whole, regardless of whether or not it's actually applicable to the people being shipped. It normalises this trauma not only to cisgender, heterosexual people, but to impressionable queer youth who grow to believe this type of trauma is to be expected. 

3. Frank Iero and Gerard Way

This is another example where the perceived power imbalances between the two subjects of the shipping were directly exploited online. Now, this ship did precede the others mentioned above. If we're looking at this topic chronologically, this particular ship did come first in the shipping timeline. It's closer to the origin of the shipping extended universe, if you will.

In case you aren't familiar with them, Frank Iero and Gerard Way are both members of the American emo band My Chemical Romance. This ship is the first one here of which I don't recall the full popularity. It really peaked in popularity around the late 2000s, circa 2008. And I don't remember this moment online as in 2008, I was only 6 years old and believe it or not, I wasn't really all that concerned with rumoured homoeroticism as a first grader. 

However, the popularity of this ship did carry over into the 2013-2015 Tumblr shipping boom. The emo fandom (or "bandom" as it was called) involving not only My Chemical Romance but other similar bands such as Fall Out Boy, Panic! At The Disco, and Pierce the Veil, found its hub on Tumblr. 

During this time, I did in fact listen to this style of music, but was focused a lot more on the anime side of Tumblr as mentioned earlier. Of course, I wasn't 13 years old like, "hey, this type of content might be harmful and can inadvertently perpetuate homophobic stereotypes," I just happened to care more about my silly little anime and ended up not getting involved. 

This ship does involve a discussion that the others don't, however. With Frank Iero and Gerard Way, there is quite often a certain sentiment of, "Oh, they brought this upon themselves!" as the two band members very famously kissed during a show in 2007. In my opinion, though, this doesn't really justify all the obsessive shipping. If you look at Green Day, a band often grouped in with MCR as another famous pop punk group, the members don't follow too different of a trajectory. Billie Joe Armstrong has, on numerous occasions, kissed both of his fellow band members onstage- particularly Tré Cool, the drummer. And Billie Joe Armstrong is openly bisexual, which none of the members of MCR seem to be but some, or even all of Billie's bandmates, are too. 

You'd think Green Day would face a lot more shipping as the more persistent onstage homoeroticism and Billie Joe's openness about his sexuality would warrant more "substantiated" speculation. However, Green Day faces nowhere near as much shipping as My Chemical Romance. Why is this? I actually don't know. It might've been because Green Day has been around for over a decade longer and generally has an older fandom, but I really am not that sure. 

 It could also be because of the lower lack of potential for forced relationship dynamics. The members of Green Day are all less than a year apart in age and are even similar in height. However, Frank Iero is 4 years younger than Gerard Way, who is not only the frontman of My Chemical Romance, but also considered to be the group's intellectual and creative "leader". Even beyond that, Gerard Way is quite visibly taller, and the perceived power difference between the two of them definitely did not elude their fans. 

This difference could even be partly due to the lack of a "mystery" with Green Day. There's not as much to speculate as, well… the members of Green Day are already open about their sexual orientations. It might be that shipping in the Green Day fandom has less of a forbidden appeal for most people. 

Of course, I won't just keep repeating myself, but my previous points about forced relationship dynamics still stand.

4. Martin Freeman and Benedict Cumberbatch

Better known for their roles in BBC Sherlock as Sherlock and Watson, Martin Freeman and Benedict Cumberbatch unfortunately had their roles follow them well into real life. This is the example I know least about, so have these thoughts from a follower by the name of @indubitably-a-goblin, who had the following to say:

"the main issues i had with it were:

a) they were both married at the time, freeman to amanda abbington and cumberbatch to sophie hunter (in which both had children)

b) the main reasoning for it was their chemistry in the many projects they've done together. which is, shockingly, their Whole Job. They're actors! That's what they're supposed to do! if they weren't good at interacting then they wouldn't be good actors! i don't know how people can't understand this.

c) they're real people. we don't know them. we aren't friends with them. we aren't their family members. we have zero right to be pushing this onto them and ruining their friendship by doing so. (this one relates to most of the ships you've mentioned though)

d) healthy friendships between two men are ignored so plainly in most medias and in fandom. its obvious that these two men have a relationship, but that doesn't mean it's a romantic one.

e) its fine to ship their characters, but actors shouldn't be treated as less-than-human or some sort of prop. they're doing a job, and once they are off-screen, they aren't here for your entertainment."

I believe she did a great job of summing it up on her own, and for the sake of avoiding redundancy, I'll leave it at that!

5. Corpse Husband and Sykkuno- an emerging yet subtle example

I am absolutely positive you remember how popular the game Among Us was a couple of months ago. And with the popularity of this game, some of its most prominent content creators became the targets of online shipping- as is the case with YouTubers and streamers Corpse Husband and Sykkuno. 

Although the shipping involving these two creators is nowhere near as strong as it was/is with the examples above, I do think there is once again a reemergence of a common theme here. Whilst Sykkuno is known for his happy-go-lucky, almost "innocent" persona, Corpse Husband is the antithesis of this, known for his much darker and moodier personality. 

Do I even have to mention what the common theme seems to be?

Again, although the popularity of shipping - at least with real people - seems to have died down a bit since the Tumblr shipping boom of the early to mid 2010s, I do believe this example is worth mentioning. Even though the creators are still close, they have in fact expressed discomfort regarding the shipping, and I can only hope the internet as a whole lets their friendship blossom and exist naturally without obsessive speculation. 

My final thoughts

As explored in the essay:

The romanticisation of objects of queer trauma as a part of online shipping normalises queer trauma to both cishet and queer youth. 

Online shipping, especially at a high intensity, can end up negatively impacting the very relationships they pine over. 

The relationship dynamics often forced on mlm ships perpetuate homophobic stereotypes about non-heterosexual men. 

If anyone else has thoughts on this matter, do share! This essay is moreso an opinionated observational piece and isn't meant to be taken as fact but rather just as my thoughts on the matter. I hope it was useful as a reflective piece regardless!

Date of posting: June 16th 2021

[cupofangst]

Ok so here’s this little fic idea that’s been swimming around in my head the last few days now. Whether or not it becomes a fanfic remains to be seen, and I don’t know that people would even want to read it, but i’m just putting it out there to get it off my chest because it’s bugging me lol

So this idea does focus a lot on Dar’s character, but Jason and Salim are also heavily involved. In this particular story, Dar survives, buuut everyone else besides the main five are dead. And this is toootally not payback for all the ‘everyone lives’ fics where Dar is left out. Nooo, not at all. What are you talking about? *whistles innocently*

So an idea struck me that as Salim and Dar are leaving after the big showdown during the eclipse, the two sort of have a heart to heart. The subject of Dar’s wife comes up again and he reveals to Salim that she is 2 months pregnant. Imagine Salim’s shock, as he hadn’t even known until just a few hours ago that his captain was even married. This sort of prompts Salim to chew him out, as he can’t believe this man would be running off to keep fighting a war that was already done when his wife was sitting at home with a child on the way.

Dar confides in Salim that he feels like he’s not cut out to be a father, that he’s already too old. And to make matters worse, his wife tragically dies shortly after giving birth due to complications, so now he’s left alone to raise this child, unable to properly grieve for his wife because now he has this tiny little being who depends on him twenty-four-seven and he just doesn’t know what the fuck he’s doing. He inevitably reaches out to Salim, desperate for help. By this point, Jason has come to live with Salim, so when both men show up at his home, Dar doesn’t know whether to be shocked or surprised that this foul-mouthed jarhead is now shacking up with his former lieutenant. And under normal circumstances, he would have promptly slammed the door in Jason’s face and told him to go fuck himself, but he’s tired, depressed and can’t summon the strength to give a fuck right now. He’s certainly not happy about him being there. Oh, no. These two butt heads quite often, with Salim having to always be the adult in the room during their squabbles.

So Jason and Salim take it upon themselves to help Dar raise this child, as he is suffering greatly with depression and can barely take care of himself at this point. They both end up growing quite attached to her, Jason especially. Dar sees this and starts wondering if it’s in his daughter’s best interest to just give custody to Salim and to let him and Jason raise her, since they’re pretty much doing that already.

Things get so bad for Dar that it gets to the point where he doesn’t have the money to care for himself and his daughter. He can’t get a job and his savings are dwindling fast. On the verge of having to live in his car, Salim insists that he come to live with him and Jason.

Does Dar develop feelings for Salim? Yes. Does it worsen his depression because Salim is clearly head over heels in love with Jason? Also yes. And while there’s still that distrust and hatred simmering for the American under the surface, it becomes a lot harder as time goes on for Dar to keep hating him. A foundation of respect was laid down when Dar saw Jason go back into that hell to save his lieutenant. And this allows them to both warm up to each other and grow closer as time goes on...even if they still may bicker like children from time to time.

But yeah...that’s the jist of it. Haven’t started actually writing it and i don’t know if I will. It’s just one of those ideas that hits me hard...though it may not go anywhere. I get a lot of those ideas sometimes.

Working title: Three Idiots and a Baby (lol)

Bonus:

Dar: *holding his daughter* Say ‘baba’! Ba-ba! You can do it!

Baby: Fff...Fff...

Dar: No, baba! Say ‘baba’!”

Baby: Ffu...Fuck.

Dar: *slowly turns to glare at Jason*

Jason: Wweelllp, guess I better be hittin’ the ol’ dusty trail!

[tinyhistory]

Hey! Love your stories so much I just had to ask! Do you have any favorite drarry authors/stories? I sometimes compare the quality of other stories to ROA (oops!) because ROA is just that good. My personal favorites are ROA (of course!), the Foundations Series (saras_girl), the ordeal of being known (louisfake), denouement (the_never_was), Good to Me (And I'd Be So Good to You) (AWickedMemory), and To Hurt and Heal (cassisluna). Have you read these? Have a wonderful day! :)

Thank you, so glad you’ve enjoyed my stories! And thank you for so patiently waiting for a reply. I haven’t been online much in the past couple of weeks. Unfortunately I haven’t read any of your recs, but I’m always happy to add another fic to my to-read list.

I did a rec post a few months ago, but I’ll post an updated version now. The Skyhawke Archives appear to be down, which is crushing news. I’ve had to update a lot of the links.

So here are my favourite Drarry fanfics:

And We Are At Our Apogee (PG-13) by angelgazing

Summary: Draco wanted revenge, but it didn't work out that way.

My notes: Californian beaches, supermarkets, road trips, and a bittersweet ending.

-

A Reckless State of Mind (T) by Lomonaaeren

Summary: Draco is a Psyche-Diver, and his newest patient is Auror Potter, who’s been a pathological liar for over a year—and has just tried to violently end his own life.

Notes: The plot alone guarantees inclusion on this list. Probably the most creative fic I’ve ever read, and the twists and turns will keep you guessing.

-

Berlin, In the Year of Our Lord (PG) by Are

Summary: Harry is a green-tea addict. Draco stalks him.

Notes: Probably my all-time favourite fic, along with Blue Vase. It’s sparse and minimal and I love that writing style.

-

Blue Vase (M) by ivyblossom

Summary: Let’s pretend.

Notes: Draco finds an amnesiac Harry and befriends him, pretending they were once lovers. It’s pensive, short, and bittersweet.

-

The Boy Who Only Lived Twice (E) by lettered

Summary: Harry Potter is an Unspeakable. Draco Malfoy is the wizard who shagged him. Adventure! Intrigue! Secret identities, celebrities, spies! It's all right here, folks.

Notes: Action-heavy fics are damn hard to write, but lettered nails it. The action scenes are breakneck speed, the conversations are threaded with double meaning, and even the silences are tense.

-

Draco in Darkness (T) by Plumeria47.

Summary: Following an accident in his seventh year, Draco loses his eyesight.

Notes: This is one of the first fics I ever read (when it was over on FF in 2003) so it’s probably here just for nostalgia points alone. I read it when I was a kid and just thought it was a lovely golden fairytale, the best romance I’d ever read in my (very short, thus far) life. I love reading it again, even years later as an adult when I can see the tarnish on it; the things my childhood eyes didn’t notice. I don’t care. It’s my soft and fuzzy comfort fic.

-

The Flesh is Frail (NC-17) by wildestranger

Summary: None

Notes: Draco has injuries from curses and spells, and Harry keeps him company. Draco is angry; Harry is stubborn. They argue their way into a grudging relationship. It’s a short read and well worth your ten minutes.

-

Good-bye to Yesterday (NC-17) by furiosity

Summary: Draco felt ready to face even a million years in Azkaban as long as it meant that at the end of it all, he would make Potter pay.

Notes: It’s not a dark fic, but it certainly dips in and out of the shadows. If you like your romance to be sharp as a razor and bitter as black coffee, give it a read.

-

Hymn to Color (PG) by Lomonaaeren

Summary: Months after Draco cast a curse that took Harry’s eyesight, Harry is still trying to come to terms with it. Draco still wanted forgiveness, which was probably the problem.

Notes: Probably my very inadequate idea of “fluff”. It’s a quiet, introspective fic. Draco and Harry are well-written.

-

Kings among runaways (PG) by enderxenocide.

Summary: Later, the toast will be slightly overcooked, Draco will burn the eggs, and there will be another fist fight in-between the living room and the front door, but they’ll eat breakfast with second-hand plates and Draco’s great-grandmother’s silverware.

Notes: Dreamy descriptions, abstract scenes, and the characters are lovingly delineated. Beautiful writing.

-

On Broken Glass (PG-13) by coffeejunkii

Summary: After the final battle, Draco is holding the shards that are left of his and Harry’s life.

Notes: Established relationship. Harry’s forgetful and seems to suffer both short-term and long-term memory loss; Draco stays by his side through six years of post-war amnesia. Very short, just a tiny ficlet. There’s sequels (in bite-size pieces) but I prefer to read the first ficlet and leave it there.

-

Paper Dolls (M) by cupiscent

Summary: In the final year of the War, Draco gets a letter, makes a choice and pays the price.

Notes: Short, succinct, and packs a punch. No character deaths, in case the summary has you feeling nervous.

-

Portrait (PG-13) by Silent Blast

Summary: None.

Notes: Dorian Grey, but Drarry. Of course it’s going to be good.

-

Shattered (NC-17) by femmequixotic

Summary: One damned accident involving one too-lucky curse, and suddenly you'd think he was five again, with their Harry, be carefuls and their quick Levitating charms ready the instant the potion gives way and his rebelling hands lose hold of whatever's in their grasp.

Notes: Draco’s an artist. Harry’s intrigued by his sculptures and paintings.

-

Snatch (PG-13) by didntyoupotter

Summary: Harry is comatose, Hermione and Ron aren’t much help, and Draco isn’t sure about anything anymore.

Notes: The opening scene fools you into thinking this will be a light read with a streak of good humour. Don’t fall for it. By the third act, you’ll be hanging onto every word and feeling a lot of emotions. Also, back in the day, this was one of the Draco/Harry fics. Everyone knew of it. Pay your respects to your fandom history and read this beloved classic.

-

The Stages of Acceptance (T) by Lomonaaeren.

Summary: Harry, already happily married to Ginny, receives the news that he's Draco's mate. Law and custom don't give him the option of ignoring the news. The stages of his reaction, one by one.

Notes: This is not a romance, and I love that the author just casually chucks all the Veela tropes in the bin and says “nope”. In Lomonaaeren’s own words, this fic is more practical than romantic. Harry is unfamiliar with the Veela concepts and hates the very idea of being “shackled” to someone; he rejects Draco at once. Draco is miserable and lonely. They do eventually come to understand each other better, but it’s a huge struggle with lots of setbacks. The general air of pessimism and misery does make the small glimpses of compassion and empathy feel so well-earned. I love a fic that rations out its happiness.

-

The Stately Homes of Wiltshire (E) by waspabi

Summary: Malfoy Manor has mould, dry rot and an infestation of unusually historical poltergeists. Harry Potter is on the case.

Notes: This one needs no introduction. The writing is polished, the characterisation perfect, and the dialogue is fun. I love the humour woven throughout it.

-

Then Comes a Mist and a Weeping Rain (E) by faithwood.

Summary: It always rains for Draco Malfoy. Metaphorically. And literally. Ever since he had accidentally Conjured a cloud. A cloud that's ever so cross.

Notes: Another one that most of us know. It’s a lighthearted and fun read.

-

Tomorrow, and Tomorrow, and Tomorrow (M) by novembersnow

Summary: In the war-torn years after Hogwarts, one man has no knowledge of his yesterdays.

Notes: Another classic back in the feverish heyday of the Harry Potter fandom, when books were still being released and everyone had worked themselves up into a shipping frenzy. And no wonder this fic was an instant hit. Draco has lost all his memories and Harry’s investigating as an Auror, but the longer you read, the more you start questioning everything. Good twists and turns that lead to a tender ending.

-

Turn by Saras_Girl

Summary: One good turn always deserves another. Apparently.

Notes: An inevitable inclusion on any favourites list. I think my favourite thing about it is the characterisation. Everyone is so well-rounded; the characters are brought to life and feel like old friends. All their habits, styles, mannerisms, even the way they walk or talk. While I love everyone in this fic, I have to admit that Blaise is just amazing. Of all the thousands of Blaises imagined by fanfic writers, I love this one the best. “Old bean” indeed.

-

Under the Ivy (PG-13) by coffeejunkii

Summary: It is impressive how much you can learn about someone by simply sharing a few rooms. They don’t spend time together, not really, but Harry still knows that Malfoy prefers raspberry jam over strawberry, that he hums along to the Wireless when he thinks no one is around, and that his leg is bothering him more than usual when the temperatures drop below freezing.

Notes: Another old, old favourite of mine. It’s like snuggling into a soft blanket. Remus owns a cottage and Harry moves in after the war. Later, Remus lets a room to Draco, who is an outcast after the war and has limited housing options. Harry isn’t happy at first with the new lodger, but he eventually warms up to Draco. A slow and gentle romance.

-

Vale Sanare (M) by rurounihime

Summary: Draco’s world gains a new component, just when he thought he’d sorted everything out.

Notes: London nightclubs, one-night-stands, loud music and lonely nights. Draco has seizures due to a curse from the war, and the seizures have led to a fear of intimacy. Short and sweet.

-

The Way Down (T) by lettered

Summary: Malfoy’s all, “Come out of there,” the way you say to a cat who is badly behaved. And Harry’s all like, “No, what, I’m a hermit! And I have a chest-monster! And I am crazy magically powerful!” and Malfoy’s all, “We all have problems, bub.” (thoughtfully) “You are crazy though. I’ll give you that.”

Notes: I just adore this fic. The fic starts well-grounded, giving you a solid backstory and matter-of-fact context, but as it goes on, it slowly unravels into dreamy scenes, lush settings, and repeated motifs. It’s just such a beautiful story.

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When Love beckons to you, follow him (PG-13) by megyal

Summary: Draco wakes up, lost, somewhere in a forest. He has no idea where he is or how he got there. As he is blundering around trying to find his way home, he hears Harry's voice in his head, telling him what to do.

Notes: I generally like my fics to be bittersweet or with a bit of heartache — but this fic is just a little cloud of softness. If you need something light and lovely without being syrupy-sweet, this is a good choice!

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The World of the Living (M) by fourth_rose

Summary: A traumatised war hero and a convicted criminal under the roof of an eccentric journalist make for a rather odd ensemble, but Luna has never had a problem with oddities as long as they make sense.

Notes: The story is told from Luna’s perspective, which gives everything a lovely dreamy quality. She takes in a couple of strays after the war — first Harry, who is avoiding his other friends and has quit his Auror job — and then she offers a room to Draco right after his trial. Draco is rude, angry, and ungrateful; Harry is churlish, withdrawn, and moody. Luna doesn’t seem to mind in the slightest, and over the course of the next few months, her house guests slowly warm up to each other.

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Voices From the Fog (E) by noeon

Summary: After years of running away, Harry crosses paths with an all-too familiar face and follows him to Amsterdam.

Notes: Harry drifts across Europe, trying to forget the war. He ends up in a woodworking shop in Amsterdam, alongside a moody Draco. Atmospheric settings and solid characterisation.