#LIVE WITH THE GUILT OF BEING THE ONE TO. MOST LIKELY. KILL HER ONE AND ONLY DAUGHTER | Explore Tumblr Posts and Blogs

mrsnancywheeler · 3 months

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the river (1) // finnick odair x f.reader

summary: the Capitol has taken you away from Finnick, the life you've been trying to build together and now he has to fight to get every part of you back

the end of a trilogy

the lakes previous chapter

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masterlist

7.2k words

warnings: angst, fluff, mental illness, suicidal ideations, self hate, young finnick and reader dynamics, a love triangle that was never a love triangle, smug finnick, it's so cheesey, pining, this is not a slow burn, implied soulmates, unedited, no use of y/n, allusions to trafficking, mentions of torture

𓈒⠀𓂃⠀⠀˖⠀𓇬⠀˖⠀⠀𓂃⠀𓈒

Finnick’s been staring blankly at the hovercrafts’ walls for longer than he can imagine, since it had stopped waiting and left you for dead in the dilapidated arena. He knew if he reacted the way he wanted too they would sedate him and currently he needed to live with his guilt. He should've refused to let you go with Katniss, or have torn out your tracker himself. Most importantly he should never have told you about the rebel plan, of course he only revealed the basics on how you were to get Katniss out of the arena and go to District 13, but that could seriously jeopardize any semblance of sympathy the Capitol would have for you.

He imagined you on the beach, devoting your life and love to him, and how before Snow broke or killed you, maybe even both, he'd never given you a proper wedding. All the traditions from back home, in a proper ceremony, with a dress would never happen. A large part of him didn't even feel like fighting the rebellion for you, since there was a probability that if the rebels one, you wouldn't be there on the other side to greet him. What was the point of a life if your future, the happiness, the children you could have had if all of this was behind you, if you were gone forever.

Plutarch begins to say something, but Finnick raises his hand as if to indicate he can't listen or speak right now. He's trying not to snap, not to take control of the ship so he can immediately perform his own rescue mission. Of course people were going to get hurt, even die, in the cause of the rebellion, but it was never supposed to be you. Why was he cursed to love someone who refused to patiently wait for him, who needed to be a part of the action? That's what had always been so magnetic about you though, the way you refused to fall into any constraints about how your life should be lived. Maybe, if you hadn't been left consumed by guilt after your first Games, you would've heard his plea and helped the rebellion from home, or he would've never told you about it at all to keep you safe. But that was wistful thinking, instead compassionate, worried, steadfast, beautiful you was in the grasp of the Capitol.

He decided he couldn't stay quiet any longer, he doesn't care if it's futile, what type of husband would leave his wife behind? For years you'd been fragile, like a bomb waiting to detonate, and he'd done whatever he could for you, he couldn't just give up on that now. You would have done it for him, you would have thrown yourself out of the hovercraft to save him, and knowing that hurt him and made him love you more. Finnick had spent years trying to prove to you that life was worth living even if you refused to admit that you felt that way, which in truth, caused him to grieve for the version of you from before the Games. The you that longed for a life that wasn't expected, to be lead by her heart and the wind, to be excited, until suddenly it was the you who didn't think she was worth being trusted, the you who stayed up wishing for death, and the you who wanted him, but felt guilty for it. Snow had taken that away from him, away from you, and now would take more from you. Finnick couldn't help but wonder how much was left to take, you had your compassion, your humor, your love, and if that was gone you'd be a husk of paranoia that he would desperately work to restore. Maybe death would have been kinder.

“Communications are down in seven, ten, and twelve. But eleven has control of transportation now, so there's hope of getting some food out." Plutarch says to Haymitch and Finnick can no longer be quiet.

"We have to go back.” His voice is hoarse, cracking with each syllable.

"I'm sorry, you know we can't do that. Her tracker was still in, they've definitely got her by now.” Plutarch tries to sound somewhat sympathetic, but it doesn't work.

“She's smart, she'll think of some way to pretend she knows less about the rebellion. If she can convince them of that, then she'll be used as bait.” Haymitch sounds so sure of himself, but Finnick isn't. You hadn't known too much, but not only were you willing to do anything if someone threatened him, you were like a glass sitting on the edge of the table, with one nudge you'd shatter.

Finnick starts shaking his head, “No, we have to-" Whatever plea he's started to make is interrupted as Katniss bangs through the door.

“Done knocking yourself out, sweetheart?" Haymitch focuses on Katniss, “So it's you and your syringe against the Capitol? See, this is why no one lets you make the plans." He's chuckling slightly, but only Plutarch would also want to laugh right now. “Drop it." He's forced Katniss to get rid of the syringe and sits down by Finnick, who's been infested with thoughts about how if he hadn't let Haymitch convince him of putting Katniss and Peeta first, he could've focused on you.

They're rambling an explanation of the rebellion to Katniss and Finnick is left once again wondering if he could hijack the ship. Snow probably wants him to, expects him too. You probably don't blame him, but Finnick knows your self-destructive ways. First, you'll try to find ways to end it all, and do nothing but mourn him, then you'll start to convince yourself maybe he left you on purpose, that you weren't stable or trustworthy enough to help with the rebellion, but you still wouldn't blame him, you'd tell yourself it's what you deserved. Finnick needed to be there to intercept the doubt before you ate yourself alive. Additionally, he didn't know how long he could last without you as an anchor, his sweet girl, refusing to acknowledge her own problems while trying to keep him afloat.

“I still don't understand why Peeta and I weren't let in on the plan." Katniss is saying, her voice just as broken as Finnick's had been.

“Because when the force field blew you'd be the first ones they'd try to capture, and, the less you knew, the better.” Haymitch explains.

"The first ones? Why?”

"For the same reason the rest of us agreed to die to keep you alive.” Finnick finally chimes in although he resents the words he's saying. He should've instead let you work your magic, try to convince someone to volunteer for him ahead of time, and stayed at home with you. If he stayed there was a higher chance you would too, yet maybe you would've gone over his head and decided you still couldn't live with yourself if you didn't volunteer.

"No, Johanna tried to kill me.” Katniss argues.

"Johanna knocked you out to take out the tracker from your arm and lead Brutus and Enobaria away from you.” Haymitch is seemingly getting exhausted and annoyed from all the explanations he owes her.

“What? I don't know what you're-"

Plutarch interrupts her, “We have to save you because you're the Mockingjay, Katniss. While you live, the revolution lives."

More words are mumbled and Finnick's head buzzes, it wasn't worth fighting the revolution if he couldn't do it with you. There was no way he could stomach it without your help, there's no way you would admit to it, but you kept him from drowning.

The way Katniss hisses at Haymitch helps Finnick zone back in, “Where is Peeta?" She's finally caught on, that her survival is without the person she loves safety.

“He was picked up by the Capitol along with Johanna, Enobaria, and-" Finnick hits the table interrupting Haymitch's train of thought. No one can be outraged at him for long though because Katniss has launched herself at Haymitch, screaming, and scratching, he's screaming back and Finnick is forced to leap into action. Katniss is only doing what he so desperately has been holding back on, how dare these people not understand that you had to be saved too. Yet he's dragging her off, back to her bed, to be tied down, sedated.

“Katniss. Katniss, I'm sorry. I wanted to save all of them, but I couldn't move." Finnick whispers, he doesn't know when he started crying, but he has. When the lighting hit the tree and Katniss' arrow had flown, the burst of electricity had left him helpless, frozen on the ground when he could hear you in the distance, screaming for him. “It's better for him, they'll figure out he doesn't know anything pretty fast. And they won't kill him if they can use him against you.

“Does she know too much or will she be used as bait, Finnick?" Katniss' voice is hazy in the mess of the sedation, but it's clear she's not very empathetic with her statement.

Finnick lets the tears take over him, weeping for you, how he couldn't save you. “I wish she were dead." He quietly admits, probably echoing something you'd agree with. "I wish they were all dead and we were too. It would be best.” Katniss is far gone, but Finnick can't stand his own thoughts any longer. He's basically begging to be sedated until they let him, he wants for it to stop the thoughts, leave him in a world where he's still with you. Even if you haunt his dreams.

𓈒⠀𓂃⠀⠀˖⠀𓇬⠀˖⠀⠀𓂃⠀𓈒

He knew of you, from school, from the similar social scenes, and you were well liked enough, but although he'd never admit it, Finnick Odair had never been confident enough to talk to you. Maybe it's because so many people spoke highly of you, but you'd never approached him. Shamefully he was a passive admirer, watching as you laughed at parties, nursed drunk friends, charmed customers at the markets. Maybe though he was scared that the person who everyone considered genuine would reject him as a person worth being around, see him the way he saw himself.

One sunny day in the market though he decided he had to take the step, see if were really the way people described you as, and possibly put to rest the infatuation he'd had for you. One that had really sparked when one of fair-weather friends, Beckett, had mentioned how you'd basically saved his life when he was drunk by a dock after another party. Kind, but brazen especially when Beckett tried to pay back the favor the next day by walking you home. Eventually the same night he told Finnick about you, he'd left to find you at the party and your magnetic company. You just seemed to draw people to you, a charm that Finnick couldn't resist much longer.

So there you were, flashing your tooth bearing smile to every potential customer. He'd talked to plenty of pretty girls before, but usually they introduced themselves to him, and the fact he barely existed to you certainly made you more intriguing. The moment the customer you were with was gone he forced himself up to your booth, one that was full of crates with huge crabs.

“Most of what the Capitol serves is from here anyways, so it's certainly not a downgrade." Your sweet, peachy voice spoke first and Finnick was somewhat taken aback, unintentionally sending you a quizzical look. “The crabs." You smiled, probably wondering why he didn't pick that up the first time.

“Oh, yes, of course, the crabs." He feigned interest in one, picking it up.

“You know, if you're not here for the crabs you better say something before I start listing off facts." Finnick decided he wouldn't mind that, your voice soothed his ears, but more importantly he'd been given a piece of who you were.

“Who says I'm not here to talk about crabs?" His natural playfulness shined through any persona he was scared he would have to put on if you weren't like he'd been told about, observed. For less then a second there was a flash of what must have been embarrassment in your eyes that quickly subsided with a shrug of your shoulders.

“They're caught in the-" Finnick couldn't stop himself from laughing when you diligently started on your promised list.

“No, please, you'll bore me to death. Guilty as charged, I'm not here to talk about crabs." He put down the crab he'd been holding, hands in the air.

You leaned on the counter, hands propping up your face, “Okay then, what are you here to talk about, Mr. Odair?"

“Finnick." He said almost too quickly for his liking, “Just wanted to talk to you." It was cocky the way he said it, but he couldn't help himself when you seemed so ready to bite back.

“Flattered, Finnick." You paused, like you were waiting for him to say something, “I'm working."

“And I'm a customer."

“Are you planning on buying anything?" Your hands moved from your face to the counter top.

“Maybe." He shrugged, his usual smug smile making its appearance.

You sighed like you were defeated, but your body language said otherwise. Maybe you'd wanted to talk to him just as much, but he'd been the one holding out on you. He'd like to think that even if it was presumptuous. “So, what does the Finnick Odair want to talk to me about?”

He didn't really know what he wanted to talk about, just that he wanted to talk to you. "The party, tomorrow night, are you coming?” It was a stupid question, you were at all of them, but much to his amusement you shrugged.

"Depends.”

"Depends on what?”

“Do you want me there?" You were bold and your aura exuded that even though if he stared deep enough into your eyes he could sense it hid other feelings.

“Are you flirting with me?" He clicked his tongue, head shaking as if it wasn't what he wanted.

“No."

“I don't believe you."

“Well it's your party, your house, I'm just asking permission." Your eyes widened, feigning innocence, and he decided you were nothing in short of perfect. Maybe he was just clouded because someone finally wasn't oooo’ing or ahhhh’ing at him. Or because he'd admired you from afar for so long that anything you said would be enough to draw him in. He also didn't really care because he'd made up his mind about liking your presence, more than that off any of his fickle friends.

“You've never asked permission before." The look on your face told him he'd caught you, that was your brain racking for a response before your face could slip back into its soft smile.

“You've never talked to me before." Maybe your words were even, but the way you fiddled with your necklace spoke measures to him.

“So you just show up at the houses of men you've never talked too?" Finnick teased, but he knew you'd always had plenty of invites from other people unlike the crazy fans who'd try to push their way into his home. Regardless, the parties were a way for him to keep up Capitol appearances and drown out his sorrows, so extra guests with actual connections to his social group hardly bothered him.

“If you wanted to talk to tell me it feels like I'm intruding, then you can just come out and say it. I get it and I won't go." You maintained a somewhat playful sound, but were so genuine it shocked him. So willing to give up your entire social scene if it made him slightly uncomfortable.

“No, I do want you there." He felt like he said it much too quickly, but he didn't regret it when your smile widened.

“Okay." You bit your bottom lip when another presence was ducking into the booth beside you. The local healer who whispered something to you. “You know you can have as many as you want for it, we can't thank you enough." You said earnestly. He handed you a couple of bottles of some type of medicine that you shoved into a netted bag before grabbing him a smaller box.

“Four or five?" The man said quietly and you filled the box with crabs before handing it to him. “Thank you, now you tell your mom I wished her the best and let me know how she's doing."

“Will do." You smiled as the man scurried off. “Sorry about that." Your attention was back on Finnick.

“Is your mom not well?" It was an obvious question but he wanted to show he cared, you just waved your hand in dismissal.

“She's okay, don't worry about it." So he respected the fact you didn't feel like opening up about it and moved onto playful banter again. “If you want me there and already knew I'd be there, why are you talking to me now?" You led the conversation back and it was obvious to him that it was a sore subject, perhaps you were one of those people who didn't like to trouble others with their problems.

“I can't talk to a pretty girl?”

"You talk to pretty girls all the time, Finnick Odair, and you've never talked to me before.” Your hands settled back up to support your face.

He leaned in closer, “Don't tell anyone, but maybe I needed to hype myself up before I talked to the prettiest one." Your laugh was addictive and he wished he could've seen more of how your face scrunched up when you buried it in your hands.

“God, you're treacherous." One of your hands decided to nervously play with an earring and the other went back to the necklace. “I bet that's what you tell all the pretty girls." Finnick's ears were blessed with another nervous laugh.

“Just you." He winked, grateful that he'd found an easy rhythm in talking to you. You were teasable, but would bite back, for the first time in a while he was glad he trusted his observations.

“You know flirting with the girl at the market to get free food only works for people not famous all across Panem."

“Good thing that's not why I'm flirting with the girl at the market then."

Your face was once again buried in your hands with a giggle, "You're dreadful. Is this how you usually entrap a girl, don't speak to her, and then it's all sweet talk?”

Finnick wished he could say it's because seeing you around gave him unexplainable butterflies deep within his stomach, but that wasn't a very suave explanation. “I had to make sure you didn't have a boyfriend first.” His voice was low and he could tell it was giving you goosebumps, or maybe you were just cold in your sundress.

"Oh, you're bold." You guffawed, “Besides you already have a hole in your story, there isn't a single person anyone would think I'm dating.”

"That's a bold-faced lie, sweet girl, most people think you do since he's always trailing around like a lost puppy.” If he was lucky you would melt at the pet name and you somewhat did before you scoffed.

"Who?" You didn't seem like the oblivious type, but so earnestly confused.

Finnick's eyes dragged over to a nearby booth where the subject stood, sulking and your eyes followed, “Looks like he might attack."

“Conway?" You shook your head so earnestly it made Finnick feel like he could blush from how ardently you wanted him to know you weren't taken. “No, no, no, no! God, no, he's just my friend. We're friends.”

"Have you told him that?” He smirked.

You were so cute, when you were biting back, when you were nervous, when you were embarrassed, he didn't know how a person could manage to be so adorable all the time. “Yes, he knows that, he's just, well he's just Conway. It's just a phase, he'll grow out of it." You rubbed your neck as a much more forced laugh escaped those perfect lips.

“Hopefully, looks like he's coming over to rip my throat out. Please come to my funeral, front row, no roses on the coffin, lilies preferably." Finnick pulled a faux terrified face as he clasped his hands together with his plea, successfully turning your laugh into a much more genuine one.

“Hi, Princess." Conway approached the booth and Finnick wondered how you could ever think he was getting over you. Behind the brunette's back he shot you a look, teasing you for as much which you seemed to instantly understand as you bit your lip with a shrug.

"Hey, Conway. You guys finished up?" You asked, that dazzling smile on your face.

“Yeah, mom was wondering if you wanted to come over for dinner tonight? Nixie and Delta had something they were excited to show you.”

“Yes of course! Tell them I have something for them too, and I'll meet you guys after I've dropped everything off at home."

“I'll walk you."

“I'm gonna walk her home." Finnick seized the opportunity, even if you said you were just friends he couldn't let himself lose the build up he was working for. Conway looked at him like he'd forgotten he was there and was angered to have remembered. “If you want me to, do you want me to?" Finnick looked back at you and you genuinely had a look of complete confusion.

"I always walk you home.” Conway said softly and Finnick wished he felt worse for interfering with another person's love, but he couldn't help that he felt a spark just by looking at you and fireworks in your presence.

"You wanna walk me home?” Your eyes were glued on Finnick, like you thought he'd just been bored and was going to leave after finding his enjoyment in flirting with you. He wanted to get inside your head, see why you were so vulnerable, prove to you that you deserved to feel better about yourself.

"Of course I do, sweet girl.” His voice was less focused on being charming and so earnest it rewarded him with the happiest, biggest smile he'd gotten out of you.

“I'll walk you home after dinner though, that way you're not walking home alone in the dark." Conway inserted himself once again and after a pause you shook yourself out of whatever haze you were in to turn to him.

“Thank you so much, you're so kind, Conway. Either way I still have to wait until everything closes or I sell out, so it could be a while."

“Oh, mom sent me over to buy the last half crate for dinner tomorrow,we've got some extra wiggle room, and we're all tired of trout and crawfish all the time. So a little something special until I'm sure we'll all get tired of the leftovers. Do you want to come tomorrow too?" He pulled out the money from his pocket to slip into your hand.

“Lucky you, I hope you all enjoy it!" You took the money to put into the small metal box where you must have been storing the cash. “I've got plans tomorrow or else I definitely would." You picked up a box to move the crabs into.

“Is there a party? You should've told me, mom won't want me to miss tomorrow and you'll have no one with you."

“Conway, as much as I appreciate the sentiment, I don't need to be watched over. I'm perfectly capable of myself." You handed him the crate, “Besides you hate going to them and I don't want to drag you to one just for you to mope in the corner."

“And I'll be there anyways." Finnick raised his hand as if to remind everyone he was still there and you did seem to soften when you looked at him.

“Yeah, Finnick, will be there. I'll be fine!"

Conway took a step closer to you as he filled his box, trying to whisper, but it wasn't hard for Finnick to eavesdrop. "You barely know him.”

You glared back at Conway and mouthed a ‘Stop it!" The much taller man seemed to reluctantly relent as he stepped away. “I just have to close everything up then, and I'll be ready to go." You look back at Finnick who nods and smiles.

“Let me help you."

“Oh no, you don't have to do that!" You quickly assure.

"Angel, I want to.” You seem to respond well to that pet name as well whereas Conway is instantly glaring into Finnick's head. He doesn't mean to be cocky, but Finnick can't resist a cocky shrug to the other man the moment you're going to retrieve your bag and the little metal container of money to shove into it. Finnick’s nimble fingers are quickly undoing the ropes holding the top up.

You exit the structure and walk up to him, “How'd you do that so fast, the knots always take me forever to undo."

Finnick can't hide his amusement with your awe,"Always been good with knots, I could show you sometime.”

You're nodding in agreement when suddenly your mouth is agape and you're playfully shoving him, “Finnick Odair, I hardly know you!"

“That's not what I meant, honestly!" He defends, laughing, and he's being truthful. It hadn't crossed his mind when he said it, he would love to show you how to tie a rope, he'd always found it calming. “Says a lot that your mind jumped to that though." He tilts his head and the way your eyes widen makes him wish he could feel how hot your face must be by now.

“You do barely know him." Conway mutters and Finnick wishes he would disappear.

You seem to regain your composure and point to the left, “I'm about 30 minutes that way, so you really don't have to walk me home if you don't want to, it's long."

“Stop worrying about me, I'm certain I want to walk you home."

You're nodding softly and biting your bottom lip, "Okay.” Swiftly you're leading the way, both men trailing behind and Finnick is annoyed that Conway is still sticking around, before he realizes his family's booth is in that direction. Suddenly you're stopping before basically leaping towards a booth, a fruit booth Finnick recognizes. “Douglas, you have peaches! Why didn't you say anything?"

The older man chuckles and gives you a knowing look, “Because you can't afford them and will barter me for them."

You gasp in mock offense, “So rude and after all this time too, Mrs. Damaris would be astounded by your behavior.”

"You know if you sneak me a couple of crabs tomorrow I'd give you a whole bag.”

"Your father would be angry-” Conway begins some sort of lecture when you're snapping at him like you'd also like to be rid of his presence.

"I know, Conway.” The look you shoot at him could kill, and Finnick feels a weird sense of elation knowing you're more peeved that Conway won't let you be alone with Finnick.

“Then I'm sorry, sweetheart, nothing's going to work on me this time. I've prepared myself."

Finnick is already pulling out his money, “It's okay, I've got it."

“No." Your resistance shocks him, he's used to people begging to be around his wealth and to charm you he's more than willing to she'll it out. “You're not buying things for me, Finnick. I'm serious." He says nothing, but doesn't return his money back to his pocket.

“Come on, princess, you'll live without one." Conway manages to still sound so kind and you purse your lips, refusing to satisfy the man you feel pestered by with a response. Finnick is busy trying to silently communicate with the vendor that whatever you try to barter he'll give him the money right after.

“My ring?" You hold up your hand, waving the finger around and the older man shakes his head.

“I can't accept every piece of jewelry you find on the beach."

You sigh dramatically and Finnick thinks he's finally been able to indicate to the vendor. “Mrs. Damaris would love this necklace, look it's got an actual ruby in it and I didn't find it. Someone gave it to me, it's worth a lot more than a peach and I only want one.” The man reluctantly exhales, glasses at the end of his nose, “Please Douglas, we barely ever get them here.” Your pout has to make you even more adorable and Finnick wonders how you can be so perfect.

“Fine!" The man grumbles with a sly smile and Finnick can tell the man would've taken the necklace even without the money he was about to give.

“Thank you, thank you, thank you!" You gush as your fingers rush, struggling as you unclasp the necklace. Putting the necklace on the counter as the man hums. You take your time picking out the perfect peach before grabbing one, “I love you so much, Douglas, Mrs. Damaris is a lucky woman!" You began to walk off.

Douglas nods, “Sure she is, take care of yourself and bring some actual money next time." The moment your back is turned Finnick is putting the money on the table, with a little extra.

“Thank you." He mouths with a smile, grabbing the necklace.

“No, thank you. I've got no use for the necklace, or anything else she's given." The old man is shaking his head with a smile, grabbing the money. “You take care."

Finnick nods, catching up to you where he can hear another tense conversation between you and Conway. “God Conway, it doesn't matter. Tallulah gets me a gift every time I take care of her during a hangover because she feels bad, it doesn't matter. Yes it was pretty and I really liked it, but I'll tell her it fell off in the ocean and she'll buy me a new one.”

"You're just so careless sometimes, it's a fruit.” Conway shakes his head in disbelief.

"And it's just a necklace, what's your problem? It's not even from you, and it's not a big deal. I liked it, I'll probably miss it, but I might not have a peach for another year and Tallulah will have given me another gift by the end of the week for the hangover she'll definitely have from tomorrow night.”

"She's not a bank for you, and that trade was so uneven.”

"Why are you trying to make me feel guilty? That's not how I see her, I've been her friend for years and it's just how we work! You're being so weird about this and it's none of your business. I don't take her money, or ask for it, or let her pay for things, she just gives me them when I help her out!” Finnick finds himself being enraged at Conway for the way your voice shakes as you defend yourself, for the way he's making you seem selfish when you adamantly refused to let Finnick buy you something as small as a piece of fruit.

Finnick is suddenly standing beside you holding up the little heart necklace, it swinging in front of your face. You stop dead in your tracks, “Finnick." Your voice is so soft it makes him want to melt, "You don't even know me, Finnick. I don't need you to buy things for me, you don't have to do that. I traded it for a reason, go give it back.”

"He's much happier with the money, anyways, sweet girl. I have enough money to drown in, you're hardly breaking the bank with a peach. And I know you enough to want to do that for you. Can't a man buy things for a pretty girl?” You look like you might cry, but you don't allow yourself too and Finnick comes to the conclusion that you're not used to being helped, to have someone willing to just do things for you without some sort of transaction involved, and he's intent on changing that. "Red looks good on you, angel, let me put it back on you.” You're playing with your earrings as you finally slowly turn to let him clasp the necklace on. He adored the way you shiver when his fingers brush against your neck as he puts it on and the way you seem to miss his touch the moment it's gone. It's like fate designed the two of you to meet each other, to be perfect for one another and he's only just forced himself to talk to you.

He also gets a sick pleasure from how vexed it makes the other man vying for your affections. Within a few more steps you've arrived at the Delmare family booth and they're ecstatic to see you before they've calmed down. “I'll see you tonight?" Conway asks.

“Yes, of course." You offer a smile even though Finnick can tell you're still seething underneath and Conway nods somewhat sadly. You turn you back to him as keep walking, “So are you-"

“Yes, I'm sure I want to walk you home!" Finnick interrupts with a laugh and you accept the answer and finally begin to eat your peach. “Let me take your bag." He offers, hand reaching for it.

"It's okay I've got it.” You must have decided you're able to slip back into your normal playful tone, and he curses Conway in his mind for making you anxious enough to ever stop in the first place, “I know you must be used to women throwing themselves at your feet, but we are in fact strong enough to carry our own bags."

“You have an indent in your shoulder from it." He remarks, with what he's sure must be an infuriatingly smug smirk. You don't look at him as you seem to reason in your head that it is quite heavy and slowly pry it off your shoulder. He's grabbing it from your hand before you're even reaching out and although it's nothing for him, he's surprised by the weight. “Good thing I want to carry your bag even if you're a woman throwing yourself at my feet." He clicks his tongue as the two of you stroll down the cobblestone street.

You elbow him softly, “I'd say you're throwing yourself at mine."

“I'd agree and say I'm glad I am."

“Finnick." Your voice is suddenly much more serious.

“Yes, angel?"

“Seriously, why are you talking to me?" He assumes you must be trying to protect yourself and it hurts him to think you'd ever imagine that his intentions were anything less than true.

“Because I like you."

You laugh so delicately it could be carried into the breeze, “No you don't! We've never talked before, I mean you don't really know me at all."

“So you don't like me?" He teases, a glimmer in his eyes.

“No, I do, I mean, I just, that's different." You stutter through it, hands moving as you speak.

“How's it different?"

“Because you're you, you're Finnick Odair, everyone likes you and if they don't they're stupid. And I'm just, I mean I'm just some girl, who you've been trying to fluster."

“People talk about you too, I see you around, listen to you, what you say, what people say about you, and I've decided that I like you. And I think that if you didn't want to be flustered, you'd tell me. That's it, that's the explanation, and I'm talking to you so I can really know you.”

There's a silence where you must be deciding if you're satisfied with his answer, "What do you want to know about me?” The walk to your house seems to go by too fast with the stories and banter, the way you sass him back and then get ruffled when he makes flirty remarks before you make them back, and the way you savor each bite of that peach like you'll never have one again, which he'll make sure you will. He's already mourning your company when you're walking up to the door, “This is me, I know, it's not much to look at." It's a dilapidated little house, cracked, white brick and he can tell it used to be nice. You're slowly walking up to the door and he hopes you feel the same way he does.

"Go out with me tomorrow.” Finnick says abruptly.

"What?” You turn to him, trying to not act as giddy as he can tell you are.

"Tomorrow, just you and me, an actual date. It's a Sunday, so the market will be closed. We can picnic by the water, there's a lovely, private piece of beach in Victor's Village and we'll swim, we can do whatever else you want too.” He tries to sound nonchalant as he runs his hands through his hair.

"Okay.” You nodded, fingers running up and down the chain on your necklace. "Yes, I'd like that.”

"Okay, good, that's good.” He doesn't mean to seem desperate for your time, but he is. “I can be here at noon? I'll walk you."

“Yeah." You muttered, by now you're both standing at your front door. Staring at him and he prays you'll never go inside and just stand here with him. “My bag."

“Sorry, yes, your bag!" He pulls it off his shoulder and feels more embarrassed than he ought to be, “Sorry!" But you just laugh it off as he hands it to you.

"It's okay.” You're back is to the door, slowly pushing the handle. He wants to kiss you, but he's already moving so fast with everything else, he figures that he better let you have something to wait for even if it's disappointing to you know, it disappoints him too.

"I'll see you tomorrow, at 12.” He reiterates, feeling like a magnet being pushed away from his other half as he steps away, ready to fly back forward.

You do look somewhat let down as he moves away, but he has to be resilient,"Thank you, Finnick! Have a good night.”

"Have a good night, sweet girl!” He flashes his Panem adored smile and forces himself to turn his back towards you. Finnick decides he's glad he listened to the caverns of his soul when they called him to you. He can't help himself from being so forward with you when he's already so sure, like he's been with no one before, that you must be meant to be and he's running back to the marketplace praying that Douglas hadn't yet closed down shop.

𓈒⠀𓂃⠀⠀˖⠀𓇬⠀˖⠀⠀𓂃⠀𓈒

Doctors occasionally hover above him and the ceiling is white, which is all he knows when he's in his sedated state. Sometimes they let him be without, but he can't process their questions, not when he's thinking of you which sometimes leads him back to being sedated when he starts lashing out at the nurses and doctors. Screaming, insisting you need to be saved. He's not sure when he asked, but at some point they give him a piece of rope which he diligently ties knots in to calm himself. It always seemed to work until he thought about how hard he tried to help you master different knots, but your hands would fumble. At some point he'd become sure that you did it on purpose so that his fingers would be by yours and his back pressed up against you, but he didn't care, it was heartwarming. Then he would fly into a fit again.

The same thing had happened when they'd brought him some type of dry oatmeal usually with a mix of berries that made it barely tolerable, once he could've sworn he caught a whiff of peaches in it that had him desperately trying to inhale the scent. Sobbing over the bowl until his nose was so stuffed he could no longer smell it, smell you and the sobbing became too uncontrollable. The doctors couldn't calm him down and he was once again sedated.

For weeks that's all his life was. Haunted by you, what could be happening to you, all the things he missed about you and trying to stay calm enough that he wasn't being restrained or returned to a cloudy state. Although the sedation sometimes brought back good memories he could dissociate into, other times all he could picture were all the things the Capitol, that Snow could be doing to you.

What if you were still being sold off like some kind of doll on top of what you were having to endure. And you'd have no one to comfort you at the end of the day which would drive you to insanity. Or he could picture you hypothermic on the floor. Or being taunted with jabberjays screaming in his voice. Or it could be a violent torture. He could picture thousands of unpleasant things that made him wish the rope was long enough to be a noose.

Sometimes he'd picture the last time he saw you, begging with him to not be upset when you parted ways with Katniss' insistence. Each time he thought about it he'd come to a different conclusion. Most of the time he blamed himself for letting you go, for not fighting harder to stay together or not tearing out your tracker right before you left even if it alerted someone of the plan. Sometimes he'd blame Katniss for forcing your hand in the first place, why couldn't she have just followed the plan that had been so carefully structured out. And on a rare occasion he blamed you for trying to follow the objective of keeping Katniss safe and leaving him, for not remembering to take out the tracker, for not keeping your promise. Which would then make him sick with himself for thinking anything slightly negative about your actions when you were probably enduring unbearable lengths of pain for him, for the rebellion.

On the lucky occasion where he wasn't heavily sedated he'd been anxiously tying small knots into the rope when the television began playing some mandated report from the Capitol and there was Peeta. Proclaiming how he and Katniss knew nothing about the rebel plan, that Katniss had coincidentally shot her arrow into the dome when the lighting struck, and how there needed to be a ceasefire. Finnick wished he hadn't told you about the rebel plan, that you would just be bait, not someone trying to hide that they had some semblance of information regarding the rebel plan to get out of the arena. He'd signed your death warrant and delivered it straight into the Capitol's cold hands.

Finnick got swept up in his thoughts of what he could've done differently, how much he despised himself for not doing so when suddenly it was your voice on that television screen.

𓈒⠀𓂃⠀⠀˖⠀𓇬⠀˖⠀⠀𓂃⠀𓈒

so exited to start the river with you guys and to explore reader and finnick's past more. thank you all so much for the endless support and for continuing to read my little series, ily all. as always reblogs, comments, and likes are super appreciated, and my ask box plus request are open even if they take a hot second more me to get through. again endless thanks to you all and love you 💋

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theabigailthorn · 5 months

Note

Hey I’ve been a fan for a little while now, and I just wanted to say that you’ve been an inspiration for me, a younger transfemme. But I do wanna also ask: what’s it like being a trans woman with her life together? I’m 19 (as of sending), been on hrt for almost 5 months, and have been trans for a year and change. But I’m scared. So, I guess, I wanted to ask: does being trans ever become the norm, my baseline? What’s it like after 2-3 years? And does it get any less confusing or scary?

I think there are a few things going on here.

I don't have my life together as much as it might seem; I just don't show you all the ways it's not. I don't talk publicly about the auditions I don't get, or the things I try and fail at, or the insecurities in my own head that hold me back sometimes, or the handful of decisions I've made that were bad calls and which still keep me up occasionally. I've talked about trauma and mental illness in the past, but I only ever discuss stuff I'm comfortably over - when I'm overwhelmed or in the middle of a crisis I don't post about it. I don't set out to deceive you by presenting myself that way, I just keep my most private stuff private. Everybody has failures and regrets and insecurities: "it's a sign of having lived," as my friend Phoebe told me today. But you see a curated version of me that appears not only more together than the real person, but more together than any real person.

Also, if you're 19 a lot of your life hasn't been in your control until pretty recently and a lot of it still might not be. I'd say it's okay to not feel like you have it all together. You just transitioned, which I think is one of the hardest things a human being can do: you can give yourself credit for that even if you feel like you're not settled into it yet. Congratulations!

As for it becoming the baseline, I mean yeah? Kinda? At least for me. Sometimes I forget. I had a moment today in the gym where I saw a man and I was like "Oh yeah, I used to be one of them, sortof? Weird!" The first year is the hardest, or so they say. I wouldn't say I get less confused or scared now, just scared and confused in different ways. I worry less about getting attacked in the street than I did in my first year, for example. (I'm lucky and privileged in that regard.) But I worry a lot more about other people. I struggle a lot with survivor's guilt, which is something only people who survive get! Anyone who's had a drink with me in the last six months has heard me beat myself up because the night of The Prince premiere in New York was the night of Brianna Taylor's vigil in the UK. That wasn't a deliberate decision - the premiere was booked and paid for months before she was even killed - but I've become a lot more sensitive to those sorts of feelings precisely because I spend less time worrying about myself. I'm more aware now of what my transness means for other people. Like, I made an ironic joke when I came out that I'd become The Transgender Princess of TERF Island, and it's kindof haunted me since - I didn't set out to become "a famous trans person" but it's happened a little bit and it's going to happen a lot more next year. That comes with serious responsibilities and a few mild drawbacks, as well as perks, obviously. So I guess that's a longwinded way of saying I might be a weird person to ask this question because, at least for right now, my transness, my whole self, doesn't just belong to me.

Oh also, some great advice I got from my friends: Paris: "Only change the things that bother you on your good days," and Mattie: "Don't believe anything you think about your life after 9pm."

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toomanystoriessolittletime · 6 months

Text

Claimed

Summary: While on the run from raiders and their twisted game of hide and seek you get saved in the last minute by a creature you only thought existed in books. You knew you should be scared, yet you could not find it in you as you looked into the warm brown eyes of a wolf that seemed way too human to be a monster, letting him have you and your body, letting him claim you. Waking up in a cabin the next morning you think it was all a dream, wanting to move on until Tommy and Joel Miller find you in that cabin, offering you to stay in a town called Jackson.

Pairing: Werewolf! Joel Miller x fem. reader

Rating: E

Wordcount: 5.4k

Warnings: monster fucking (dub con -> enthusiastic consent; basically she's really into it once she's awake) angst, threats of SA, violence, death, smut (Somnophilia; oral sex f receiving; unprotected sex, knotting, cumplay), successful breeding, so much guilt, fluff, Joel is bad at feelings

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You were cold. Cold and hungry. Exhausted and, most of all, scared.

You didn’t know exactly how long you had been running. The four men pursuing you had found you and your group a day (or three?) before, had killed everyone except for you, telling you to run for your life after stripping you of most of your clothes.

Like some sick fucking game.

Then again, ever since the outbreak, everything seemed to be a game of life and death. It wasn’t long until humanity showed its ugly face, and (mostly) men lived out their sick, primitive fantasies without the fear of any kind of punishment.

You could hear them outside, laughing and snickering, fantasising about the sick things they would do to you if they found you. How they would decide if you were allowed to stay alive and become their pet, or if they would kill you.

The sun had set hours ago, the only light source outside the full moon high on the cloudless sky. You were hiding under a trapdoor in a barn that looked like it might collapse the next time it rained. Though if you had to guess, you think it’d snow before it rained.

It had to be November by now, Wyoming cooling down to a fucking freezer overnight, your teeth clattering as you shivered.

They had only left you in your shoes and underwear. You had picked up an old jacket as you ran into an abandoned cabin the day before. Then you found a thin blanket that you currently had wrapped around your cold legs, the smell coming from it making it hard to breathe without feeling nauseous.

Your fingers were wrapped around a rusty piece of metal you had found down here, not really knowing if you’d use it on the raiders or yourself before they got their hands on you.

Though the thought crossed your mind that you being dead probably wouldn’t stop them from…

You closed your eyes, taking a deep breath. In your head, you hummed the lullaby your mother used to sing to you whenever you felt anxious as you were growing up.

You didn’t dream of seeing her again one day anymore. You buried that hope after twenty years of whatever life you had lived since the outbreak. You liked to imagine she had a quick death once things started going downhill. You had been on vacation with your best friend in New York City when it all happened. You still had no idea how you made it out of there alive.

“Come out, come out, wherever you are…” one of the men mocked you, his voice way too close for comfort. You wrapped a hand over your mouth, trying to be as quiet as possible in hopes he would just move on and leave you here to… probably die from hypothermia. Still a better death than what they had planned.

You heard the footsteps getting closer before there was an earth-shattering scream outside, followed by growling.

“What the fuck is going on there? Did the bitch cut your balls off, Clark?” The men who must be standing right above you right now yelled outside. There was a roar followed by a howl outside, and you closed your eyes.

“Clark? Will?” The man above you called out, but there was no answer.

“You better not be fucking with me, you assholes,” he said, his footsteps moving away from you. You allowed yourself to release a shuddering breath, pulling the blanket tighter around you.

Another scream outside, followed by a loud howl, before there was only silence.

Minutes went by, and you were pretty sure whatever was out there had probably killed the men that were after you. Yet you couldn’t bring yourself to risk getting out of your hiding spot to seek shelter somewhere else. Or find another blanket.

You had no idea how to survive out here on your own. You hadn’t eaten in two days, only barely found something to drink while running.

Maybe whatever was out there would make your death quick, and you could rest. The thought of getting a good night’s sleep made you sigh as you felt your mind slowly slip into darkness.

Yet before you could let your mind rest, the trapdoor above you was ripped open, and you jumped, suddenly blinded by how bright the moon illuminated the night. You blinked against the sudden light, gasping when you found a creature looking down at you, big brown eyes fixated on you.

It was standing on two legs, fur covering the whole body, the teeth sharp, reflecting the moonlight.

It looked like a wolf. A huge fucking wolf, yet there was something human about it.

You should have been scared, you should have been screaming, but somehow you didn’t, overcome with the feeling of being safe the longer you looked into its eyes.

“You’re so pretty,“ you mumbled. “Are you here to kill me?“

The creature’s eyes widened before his massive head shook from side to side, as if saying no. You smiled softly at that.

“You’re a good doggy,” you sighed, your eyes slipping closed. And you could swear the last thing you heard was an amused roar before your mind slipped into unconsciousness.

You felt…. Warm.

You didn’t know the last time you felt warm, which left you to the conclusion that you must have died.

You were lying on something soft, surrounded by warmth.

A satisfied moan slipped through your lips in the next moment, still half asleep, and you felt your body shuddering. Your hands ran over your body, your fingers slipping down your stomach before your eyes opened slowly, looking down just in time to see why you woke up, your pussy throbbing as an orgasm rushed through your body, making you arch your back and cry out as you looked between your thighs to find big brown eyes looking up at you.

You thought you dreamed the wolf you remembered saving you before, but it was him.

“You’re… You’re real…“ you whispered, your hand hesitantly reaching out, your fingers meeting the soft fur of the animal between your legs. It was real. He was real. The wolf was real, and he was here, and he was…

The wolf seemed to lean into your touch, his eyes seemingly trying to communicate with you, his expression torn before he growled, his eyes closing.

“Oh shit,“ you whispered, slowly noticing that you were stripped completely naked, big strong and furry arms wrapped around your thighs, keep you lying on the mattress beneath you.

You should be scared, you know you should. Yet you weren’t. Instead, you felt the safest you ever did. The big nose of the wolf nuzzled against your pussy, and you moaned quietly, your chest heaving as you took a deep breath.

You should fight, run, scream, yet you wanted more.

You wanted this creature to own you, to claim you. To be his. It seemed like the only thought in your mind the longer you looked into its eyes.

The wolf kept his dark eyes on yours, his cold nose nuzzling against your pussy until you felt his big tongue lick through your slit.

“Oh fuck,“ you let yourself fall back down against the ground, the hand that had been touching the wolf coming up to your breast, squeezing it, playing with your nipple, noticing something… sticky on your chest. Bringing your fingers up, looking at them and the creamy substance on your fingers, your eyes found the wolf, finding him watching you intently.

The long warm tongue kept licking you almost softly, the wet nose rubbing over your clit.

Keeping your eyes on his, you brought your fingers to your mouth, your tongue darting out to taste it. The wolf growled, his eyes seemingly getting even darker as you tasted what you thought was his cum. You hummed, licking your fingers clean, the wolf’s tongue moving faster, making your legs twitch.

His big claws dug warningly into the soft skin of your thighs, before his tongue forced its way inside your pussy.

Your lips parted as you cried out in ecstasy, the feeling foreign yet so fucking good as the big tongue of the wolf moved inside of you.

Biting your lips, you tried to keep quiet, panting for air as his tongue brushed over something inside of you that made you cry out in pleasure.

“There… Fuck… Right there,“ you whined, trying to move your hips under his grip, but he growled, his tongue fixated on that one spot inside of you until you moaned loudly, your whole body shaking as you came hard, soaking the wolf between your legs as you squirted for the first time in your life.

With your chest heaving, you slumped back against the mattress, panting as you tried to process what just happened.

The wolf licked you clean softly before his claws let go of your thighs. You opened your eyes, watching him when you felt his tongue licked over your upper thigh, only noticing now that one of his claws must have nabbed your skin, drawing a tiny bit of blood he licked off.

You were watching him, your eyes widening as the wolf slowly got on his feet, towering above you in his full height.

He was breathtaking. Literally.

Your eyes dropped to his cock, leaking with pre cum and standing proudly against his stomach.

It was… definitely not human.

It was dark red, at least 9 inches long. You probably could not close your fist around it, the girth was too big. But it was the knot that made you suck in your bottom lip, worrying.

He was breathing deeply, his eyes fixed on your form, almost pleading to you, but you did not know for what.

“It’s… It’s okay,“ you whispered, slowly sitting yourself up. It was almost like the wolf was shaking his head.

“It’s okay. Take what you want.“

The moment those words slipped out of your mouth, Joel knew he had lost the last bit of control he had over his actions. He got on all fours, his face hovering over you and your beautiful eyes.

You didn’t know the inner fight he had put on for hours since bringing you here.

Joel was a man who always made more than sure that whatever he did with the person he was with, they were giving him enthusiastic consent before he touched them.

But right now, Joel wasn’t a man.

He was a creature of the night, his instincts reduced to his animalistic primal needs.

He had made you cum twice before you even woke up, high on your taste, wanting more and more. Fuck he had even jerked off, shooting his cum all over your body like the animal he was.

He’d never fucked anyone in this form before, and while a part of him hated the lack of control he had over how he behaved right now, another part was ready to be inside of you.

“Mhhh….“ he heard you hum, your fingers stroking through his fur, and Joel was sure he’d purr if you continued to touch him.

But his cock was aching, and you were oh so soft and wet.

And ready to breed.

He leaned down, his nose nuzzling against your neck, inhaling you deeply before he looked deep into your eyes, ready to take what was his.

The wolf began to lick your upper body, focusing on your breasts, making you whimper, your fingers pulling on the fur of his arms. Slowly you let your hand slip down your body, your eyes widening when you came in contact with his cock, gasping softly.

The wolf looked up at you, grunting as you tried to wrap your hand around it, your hand too small.

You felt the wolf lick your cheek, and you looked up at him, wondering what he was thinking.

Taking a deep breath, you laid back, parting your legs for him even wider.

The wolf was actively looking between your pussy and his claws, and you wondered if the man inside him would be putting his fingers inside of you if he was able to. He closed his eyes as you guided his cock towards your pussy.

“Try to be gentle, yeah? At least at first…“ you hummed and sucked your bottom lip between your teeth, your eyes falling shut as the tip of his cock entered you ever so slowly. You stopped breathing. You didn’t know if it was seconds or hours until your pussy was stretched around his hot cock, the knot just outside of your pussy.

He waited until you relaxed, letting you get used to his size.

The wolf leaned down, his fur brushing against your skin, looking deeply into your eyes before he bottomed out and began to move. His cock slowly dragging through your walls, the foreign shape stretching you out and hitting all the right spots.

You held on to the broad shoulders of the creature fucking you slowly.

“Harder,“ you moaned quietly, trying to move your hips up, but the wolf growled, pinning you against the ground. He stilled inside of you before he pulled out of you.

Before you could react, he had you turned around, pulling you up so you were on your hands and knees, his cock entering you from behind in one hard thrust, making you cry out.

He fucked into you deeply, pumping his cock inside you, his claws holding on to your hips, keeping you where he wanted you.

“Oh fuck,“ you cried out, letting yourself fall down to your elbows, your head falling against the mattress.

The wolf howled, and you felt his cock throbbing, the pointed tip kissing your cervix, making your legs shake.

You felt so fucking full, his cock stretching you just right.

“I’m gonna cum,“ you whined, meeting his thrusts, and you screamed when you came, clenching around his cock. Fucking you through your orgasm, he leaned over your body, his fur brushing over your naked back. Aftershocks of your orgasm were still running through your body when you heard the wolf growl, the cock inside you seemed to get even bigger before he howled, his knot pushing inside of you, filling you with his cum and keeping it inside of you.

You felt his strong, soft arms wrapping around your middle before he slowly pulled you to your side, his cock still stuck inside of you, steadily filling you with his cum.

Breeding you.

You shuddered at the thought, feeling him lick your neck softly, pulling you even closer, keeping you warm.

The last thing you remember thinking before you fell asleep was that you wished you’d known his name…..

When you woke up, you found yourself under a mountain of blankets. Your memory was a little foggy, but you knew someone… or something had saved you. And from the soreness you felt all over your body, you were beginning to think you did not dream of the wolf who had taken you last night.

Your lips parted as you realised there was a fire cracking in the small fireplace. You sat up, looking down at yourself, noticing that you were now wearing a soft Flannel. You brought the fabric up to your nose, surprised when you found it smelling clean with a hint of… wood. It reminded you of how your uncle had smelled when he returned from his job at the local wood factory.

“Hello?” You called out, silence meeting you.

There was a full bottle of what looked like water next to the old sofa you had slept on. Opening the lid carefully, you smelled it, confirming it was water. It could be drugged, your mind provided. But you were too thirsty to care, almost chugging the whole bottle down before slowly pushing yourself up to stand.

You were wearing thick wool socks, your legs still naked. You brushed your fingers over a mark on your inner thigh.

Confused, you began to explore the room.

It had been cleared out, but for some reason, you did not think someone actually lived here. There was, however, food on the table. Just a can of old beans and a fork.

Narrowing your eyes, you eyed the can, your hands gripping the back of the chair that was tucked against the old wooden table. Looking down at your hands, you had grabbed something soft, finding yourself looking at an old, worn pair of sweatpants.

You began to feel like you were in the twilight zone, waiting for someone to jump out of a corner.

For him to find you in whatever form he was this morning.

Sucking your bottom lip in, you looked around again before you slowly slipped your legs into the sweatpants, finding them way too big. But they were warm and soft, and you sighed in relief.

Which didn’t last long, because you heard voices outside.

Frantically looking around, you found the rusty piece of metal you had with you when you had hidden the night before, grabbing it.

You moved behind the door as silently as possible, the voices coming closer.

“We’re not here to kill you,” someone called out. A man.

You heard that before.

“I know you have no reason to trust us. But we’re here to help.”

He could smell her.

Her and her flowery scent that seemed to drive him to insanity ever since he crossed it two days ago.

Due to his… other self, his senses were always better than those of an average human, but in the week leading up to the full moon, they seemed to sharpen even further. It was why he and Tommy always went out on their monthly trip to the radio tower that lasted three days when they really just used the full moon to hunt down infected and people who would potentially bring harm to Jackson.

He had been tracking three men, raiders, their scent full of adrenaline and arousal, when he came across your scent. Frightened, dehydrated, but so flowery and sweet that it was the only thing he could think about.

Still in his human form, he had seen you, almost naked, running frantically through the woods. Away from them.

He had kept an eye on you, the animal in him taking over, his urge to protect you taking over. Yet he waited until the next night, his wolf form making him stronger, to take your attackers out one by one, making it as painful as possible.

And then you were in his arms. Cold, unconscious, yet so so beautiful.

He brought you to the cabin he and Tommy had cleared out the month after he got to Jackson, setting you down on the couch.

Pulling a blanket over you, he was thankful for the fire Tommy must have lit when he had been here earlier, carefully putting another log of wood into the fire to keep it going.

Making his way back to you, he was overcome with the urge to have you back in his arms. Carefully, he pulled you against him, and you seemed to seek his warmth, your fingers digging into his fur.

Looking out, he counted that he had around three hours until the sun came up, and he’d change back to his human form.

He knew he should have left you there. He should have gone out, leaving you safe and unharmed.

He wished he could blame everything that happened in the cabin on his wolf side. The wolf side knew he had to have you because you were ready to breed. It’s why you smelled so sweet and irresistible for him. You were ovulating and ready to bear his offspring. But Joel was still inside. He knew what he was doing. And he tried to stop initially, but it was a fight he quickly let himself lose, getting lost in you. And the worst part was he enjoyed every single second. The way you held on to him. The way you tasted. The way you looked when you came. The way you smiled as he pumped you full of his cum, just before you passed out again.

Joel sighed, following his brother as he approached the house slowly. Joel could smell you. Adrenaline cursing through your veins.

“I’m Tommy, and this is my brother Joel,” Tommy stopped in front of the house, holding his hands up.

“We come from a community not far from here. We have water, electricity, food…”

Joel’s heart seemed to stop the moment he heard your voice.

“How do you even know I’m here?” You asked. Tommy’s eyes found Joel’s.

“We have cameras set up around the patrol route, and we saw you on one of them,” he lied easily.

Joel and Tommy had talked about what to tell you. Tommy knew from the moment they met up after the moon disappeared, smelling you all over him.

He did not ask questions when Joel told him they had to go get you from the cabin.

They both had their fair share of things they weren’t the most proud of, both as humans and werewolves. Tommy knew better than anyone else how hard it was to keep yourself in control when all the monster in you wanted was to claim someone.

It was how he met Maria.

Thankfully it all turned out for the best in the end, but still, Joel felt like a fucking monster.

The door opened, and you stepped out carefully, holding up the piece of metal he had found you with last night in front of you. You were wearing his shirt.

Mine.

His pants.

Mine.

He could smell himself all over you.

Mine.

He wondered if he was still dripping out of you.

“Cameras? You… You know how I got here?” You asked, your heartbeat quickened.

Tommy shook his head.

“No. The cameras only activate once you’re inside the cabin.”

“Oh,” you nodded, hesitating.

“Did you…. See something weird?”

“Just you pretty much passing out,” Tommy lied again.

“Weird,” you whispered to yourself, but both Joel and Tommy could hear it.

“So… what do you say? Care to join us?” Tommy asked.

“I… I should not trust strangers. But these last days have been… I’m still not quite sure how I survived…” you shook your head, your arms hugging yourself.

“You are welcome to wait out until patrol gets here. My wife will be with them, she’s kind of the leader of our little community,” Tommy said.

Your heartbeat slowed down.

“You’re married?” She asked with a small smile. Tommy nodded, his smile wide.

“Married and about to become a dad. Well… still a couple months to go, but, yeah.”

You nodded.

“What about your brother? Joel, was it?” You asked.

There was something familiar about the broad man standing just behind Tommy. He hadn’t looked at you directly once, but something told you you knew him.

“It’s complicated,” he said, and a shiver ran through your whole body, hearing his voice.

You swallowed.

“I haven’t heard that since college,” you joked.

“You went to college?” Tommy asked.

“Yeah. I was 19 when the outbreak happened,” you said.

“Did anyone make it?” Tommy asked.

You closed your eyes, shaking your head.

“Whole family is dead. The people I was with… Raiders killed them before they made me…” you shook your head, missing the way Joel’s whole body stiffened as he tried to control his anger.

“I’m so sorry,” Tommy said, and you sighed.

“Well. I should have learned not to get too attached to people. It’s a luxury nowadays to have someone.”

“Maybe you’ll have more luck in our community,” Tommy winked, and you took a deep breath. What other choices did you really have?

You were tired and weak, and maybe you had hallucinated having sex with a… wolf?

Because if they had cameras inside the cabin and last night really happened… You felt your cheeks growing warm, a throbbing between your legs.

You looked at Joel again, his eyes now on you. Brown eyes that seemed to look right into your soul, making you part your lips in a gasp.

Was it him?

He closed his eyes, taking a deep breath, not looking at you again.

“What do you say, darlin’?” Tommy asked, and you did not miss the way Joel’s head snapped to look at his brother, glaring at him.

Tommy smirked.

“I think I would kill for a hot shower,” you said with a small smile.

“When are you gonna stop hovering like a mother hen and go tell her?” Joel almost jumped as he heard his brother’s voice behind him. He was hiding out of sight from you, watching how you helped Maria with some garden work.

It had been 16 nights since he had you, 15 days since you moved into the house next to his, and it had been pure hell. Being so close to you but not touching you. He took care of you in his own way, from afar. Meals showing up in front of your door, so he was sure you ate. Sending his brother over to fix up the house, because he did not know if he could hold himself back if he was so close to you.

He had done some reading the day before, not understanding why he felt like this.

Now, there wasn’t, like, some kind of How to be a Werewolf for Dummies book around, but what he found made him realise that you probably were his mate. He never felt like this before, his body physically hurting when he did not know where you were.

He wondered if you felt it, too. If you felt the changes…

“Tell her what?” Joel grumbled.

“You could start with telling her that you’re sorry that you behaved like a dick, then start with explaining to her that once a month you turn into a werewolf and that yes, it was you that fucked her. And then you could congratulate her that she’s pregnant,” Tommy listed, and Joel growled.

He had known he had bred you the moment he had changed back the morning after, his guilty conscience killing him ever since.

Not only that he took advantage of you, no, he claimed you, bred you, and it took everything in him not to make you his officially.

Joel shook his head.

“She’s gonna hate me. And fuck… A baby? I’m way too old to raise a child…”

“I don’t know, big brother, you’re doing a great job with Ellie. Any kid would be fortunate to have you as their dad,” Tommy said surprisingly softly.

Joel took a deep breath, watching you wave Maria goodbye as you walked down the street towards home.

“Okay,” Joel said, straightening his shoulders before he followed you home.

You were surprised when you came home and did not find food on your doorstep, if you were honest. You had asked Maria if finding food was normal. It wasn’t.

You had a suspicion as to who it was leaving it, but you had not found the confidence to ask him.

It was like every thought was filled with Joel since you saw his eyes. And even though it sounded insane, you were almost certain that the wolf from the night who claimed you and the man who seemed unable to look into your eyes afterward were the same person.

He felt familiar, like you knew each other, and it was getting harder each day to not be with him. You had never felt like this before, pining over a man who was not only much older than you but who you had never really talked to before.

Shaking your head, you stared at your reflection in the mirror before you washed your face. Tomorrow, you would start working at the greenhouse, and you wanted to make a good impression, which was why you decided to go to bed early.

You were brushing your teeth when you heard a knock on your door. Frowning to yourself, your body buzzing as if it knew who it was, you spit the toothpaste into the sink before you pulled the shirt you had from the cabin over your head and walked towards the door.

His eyes were on you as you walked over to your door, a nervous flutter in your belly as you slowly pulled the door open.

He closed his eyes, taking a deep breath before he looked at you, his jaw flexing.

“Hi Joel,“ you said quietly, your hand wrapped around the side of your door.

His eyes seemed to soften as he looked at you.

“Can… Can we talk?“ He asked.

Taken by surprise, you nodded.

“Would you like to come in?“

He could hear you in your kitchen, cluttering as you prepared him some tea. You had only been in this town, this house, for a week, and it already felt more homey than the house he lived in for the last years. Ever since Ellie moved out, he did not like spending time alone in his house. Something was missing.

You were missing.

“I hope you like peppermint,“ you said as you came back into your living room. He didn’t, but he would never tell you.

“Thank you,“ he said, nervous all of a sudden.

You sat down on the other side of the couch from him, pulling your legs against your chest as you looked at him.

“What did you want to talk about?“ You asked.

He took a moment to think about what to say, not really sure how to start.

“Is it about the… the night we met?“ he heard you ask carefully, and he turned his head to look at you, surprised.

“I thought it was a dream at first. How I woke up during the night. I thought I might be losing my mind, but… But I wasn’t, right?“ you asked.

He took a deep breath, before he shook his head.

“You weren’t. I.. I saved you. I killed those… monsters, only to…“

He felt your hand on his.

“Is that why you were ignoring me? Because you…“

“I took advantage of you! You smelled so sweet, and you were so soft… And I usually can control myself, I know what is happening, but I couldn’t around you. I had to… I have to have you. It’s like…. “

“Like you don’t feel whole when you’re not around me? Yeah. That’s how I feel too,“ you said quietly, and he raised his eyebrows in surprise.

“You do?“

You nodded.

“You’re not… scared of me?“ he asked.

You giggled, slipping closer to him.

“Joel, you saved my life, and then you made me cum four times. Was I a little out of it? Maybe. But I don’t regret it.“

“Good… That’s… That’s… good…“ he mumbled, closing his eyes as he felt your warm hand on his cheek, turning his head towards you.

“You’re so pretty,“ you mumbled, and he chuckled.

“That’s the first thing you said to me that night,“ and he was still surprised about it.

“It’s true. It’s… I always knew there was more out there than just us. Well and walking mushrooms that are trying to kill us. And I might have read my fair share of fantasy books.“

“Yeah?“ he asked, his hand coming to rest on your thigh. You nodded.

“It’s hot,“ you shrugged before you leaned in and kissed him softly.

He rested his forehead against yours, breathing you in.

“I have to tell you something else,“ he said.

“What?“ you whispered.

“The reason why I couldn’t control myself was because my senses are heightened when I’m in my wolf form. And I… could smell that you were ovulating, which is why everything in my head screaming at me to… breed… you….“

Your lips parted, and he could practically hear you processing what he had just said.

“And… And…. Would you… Would you know if you bred me?“ you asked.

He nodded.

“Then I guess I should tell you that twin pregnancies are common in my family line,“ you said.

He huffed a laugh before he felt you climb into his lab.

“I think you should take me out on a date,“ you mumbled.

“Yeah?“

“Yeah,“ you nodded, before you leaned in and kissed him.

#my fic #Joel Miller #Joel Miller x fem. reader #Pedro Pascal #tlou fanfic #fanfiction #fanfic #fan fiction #werewolf au #werewolf joel miller

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marragurl · 7 months

Text

Listen. Look. I know- I know that this is in no way true and that Wriothesley’s real crime is probably something serious, like idk the bribing case or he killed someone idk-

POINT IS THO-

It would be fucking hilarious if it’s not something that serious and is instead one of Fontaine’s stupid rules, like the flying object one

I propose it’s the naming a pet after Furina

Like, imagine if you will

Wriothesley taking in some stray husky and naming it Furina because believe me- I’ve seen so many huskies and they are such playful stupid boys.

No thoughts, they just silly despite looking menacing - oh hi Furina parallel of being an archon but being an absolute silly (I love her so much-)

You cannot tell me it wouldn’t be hilarious if he named his pet husky Furina - and it’s not even a puppy, but a full grown dog - and that’s why he gets arrested

Neuvillette is dead silent during his trial? He’s in deep thoughts because of how serious it is?- wrong

He’s trying to stop busting out laughing because Furina is obviously the prosecutor of this case, but anytime someone mentions her name in the opera house during the trail, Furina the husky starts barking and happy tail wagging and doing cute dog things and it infuriates Furina that a dog is getting more attention than her

Wriothesley admits guilt because he straight up didn’t know that was a law and “my bad lady Furina” and that’s why Furina hates him now and thinks he’s boring.

And Wrio just accepts it and moves on.

Furina the husky is being kept with Neuvillette because Furina the husky is still somehow better behaved and actually listen to Neuvillette better than his actual archon.

(And he misses Wrio and the husky reminds him of him shhhh)

Even better idea:

Wriothesley’s constellation is Cerberus right?

Imagine he has THREE huskies (how does it feel to live my dream???) and he names each one “Fu” “Ri” and “Na” because he never claimed to be the most original

So when he’s out and they all run away to play in the park he just yells “FURINA” and they all run back and that’s how he gets arrested

The whole trial is trying to figure out if any of his actions are actually illegal since no “one” pet is named “Furina” but the trail goes on too long and it’s been hours since he’s last had his tea so Wrio just admits guilty to finish the trial.

#genshin impact #Wriothesley #husky #huskies #furina #focalors #Neuvillette #wriolette #bc why not #furina the husky #I live for Wriothesley being shit at the law and just accidentally commiting stupid crimes #watch his character quest completely Yeet this #but furina the husky will live on

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nevertheless-moving · 3 months

Text

unable to stop dwelling on the discworld trouser leg of time where, in the penultimate fight scene in Nightwatch, Carcer manages to kill teenage Sam Vimes.

Which means that the future that Duke Vimes came from can no longer exist, which means he can’t go home. Meanwhile you’ve got a bunch of history monks with stored up temporal energy, a prepared space outside of time, and the need to do some desperate damage control before the Auditors get involved. Death shows up, reality is unweaving, Sam is reading Carcer his discworld miranda rights because what else is he supposed to do.

and finally, with little other option, the monks de-age Sam so he fits the time period and send him back out into the fray.

(they didn't call it deageing of course. His memory is hazy, splintered during that terrible in between moment, They....took the time out of him? Sanded away the edges of his self for a terrible, workable fit? It...wasn't a good feeling.)

Just—damn. Sam Vimes having to live his whole crapsack life over again, but this time as his disillusioned-reillusioned, unwillingly-character-developed, noir-epic, Duke of Ankh, Commander Sir Samuel Vimes self.

Younger (Older? He's never felt so Old, His steps so Childlike, reality twisting in his gut like one of Dibbler's pies) Sam Vimes walking around in a haze after the revolution. Desperate to go home, knowing he can’t. Wanting to drink. Knowing he can’t.

The whole precinct feels pity, he really took Keel’s death hard, hardly speaks except to do his job. Eventually he has to grit his teeth and start being present, because what else is there to do?

Resists the urge to drink until Colon takes the whole watch out to celebrate because -he’s going to be a father!

Come on Sammy, one drink won’t kill you— and after the first drink he’s cracking jokes and after the second hes smiling and after the third hes honestly the life of the party and sometime after that he’s crying about how he was going to be a father and my wife would be ashamed if she saw me drinking like this and—

Oh shit, Did anyone else know he had a wife?? A PREGNANT wife??? What—aren’t you like 12—no you're 17 now aren't you but when did—

You guys n’ver met ’er—oh gods none if you ev’n know ‘er, is jus’ me...

What—when did you lose—

I lost her the same damn day I los’ ev’rythin else, whadya think...bleeding Carcer...the fuckin revolution...

So! That! Sam only vaguely remembers the night, but rumors travel faster than light on the disc, so by the next day the whole damn city knows about poor Sam brung low by the loss of his poor, tragic, pregnant wife, so young to be a widower, and the Seamstresses nod because they already knew, don’t ask them how, somethings you just have to know in that trade.

And his mother—I don’t know, sue me, I’m a time travel fiend but there’s something deeply intriguing about a man meeting his dead parent, who is somewhat younger than him, and stepping into the old relationship like a badly fitting thing that's supposed to fit well. She would know, right? How would she deal with her son’s impossible grief? Maybe she wouldn’t know—he spent most of the time out of the house, running with different street gangs, maybe he avoids her until she dies and lives with the guilt twice over. God, we don’t even know her name. There’s just so much narrative and emotional potential that I don’t even know where to start.

When he’s on duty, which is most time - it’s agonizing because at first he remembers cases, saves lives that would have been lost. But the more time passes, the hazier his memory because in the original timeline he was becoming an alcoholic. Fuck! A kid dies and he could have saved her if he hadn’t been such a drunk, if he had just remembered where the asshole lived, but it’s all a haze, and he wants to drown out his guilt, but that’s what caused this in the first place.

Good young Sammy, who spends his rare off-time in dusty libraries (and yes, the irony that he’s apparently Carrot now is not lost on him) reading gods-only-know.

It’s not like he can ask the wizards for help, cutthroat and vicious as they are now in the not-so-distant-past.

Good young Sam, who...talks to the Broken Drum’s pet Bouncer like he’s a real person and not a dumb rock? That’s a bit weird, but he’s a bit of a funny guy.

Good old Sam, who believed the testimony of the dwarf who said the humans were trying to rob him and let the dwarf go??

the PROBLEMS this man would cause, good grief. Can you imagine a moderately progressive middle aged man with some degree of begrudging diversity and equity training that he did, for all his sins, pay attention to, suddenly going back to like, 1990, going back just 30 years, and going...oh damn this is kind of fucked up, no man you can’t say that, holy shit.

Except Sam’s lived through even more rapidly shifting social moroes! There’s no seamstress guild, there’s no women allowed inside the university, there’s no black ribboner’s society. People hunted trolls for their teeth! But Sam can’t just unlearn everything, and he can’t shut up, and he has no real luck and anyway he would absolutely get himself (temporarily) fired.

FUCK. Sam has no idea what to do with that. None. Zero clue. Wanders around in a haze until that dwarf he saved from police brutality finds him and insists on repaying the debt. No, he insists, do you have any idea what debt means to a dwarf?

“Sort-of?” he replies hesitantly, and that honest admission of incomplete knowledge shows a hell of a lot more respect and understanding than any self proclaimed dwarf-expert ever did.

Gets a job as a surface man, hauling rocks into the city. It’s backbreaking work, but, in true Discworld fashion, it’s also one hell of a workout (again the irony of being Carrot is not lost him. he freezes for a minute while hauling a rock cart, when he remembers he's technically Lost Nobility too, in a strict sense, but someone curses at him in the street and he's comfortingly grounded)

And here is where this au slides into a SPECTACULAR romantic comedy, BEAR WITH ME. Because in his time on the Watch he’s already done noir, action adventure, war story, detective who dunnit, psychological horror, but guards guards only allowed him to be a romance protagonist in an extremely limited context.

Give me righteous, twenty-something-looking, can’t-say-he-doesn’t-have-style, young Sam Vimes, not an alcoholic, being fed three square meals a day by his dwarven forced found family, hauling rocks. He is startled to find him bumping his head on a low hanging bar that he doesn’t think used to be there, eventually realizing that he’s an inch or two taller than he remembers. Huh. Guess all that bearhuggers really did stunt his growth.

Still doesn’t get what some of the looks from women he’s getting are about, sure, he’s dirty but so is everyone else. Fine, he took his shirt off, but it’s hot out, there’s far wrinklier than him hauling heavy loads, get a life.

Happens to glance in the Ankh one day when it’s particularly slow and shiny and is startled to realize that he might be turning heads for a different reason. Oh. Right, not that he was ever a heartbreaker, but he did alright for himself... when he was a younger and his face hadn’t been broken so many times. Which...it isn't now.

Is mildly disturbed by the revelation.

Especially once things blow over at the precinct and what with high mortality rates, he ends up with getting hired again. The boys are delighted to have him back, nevermind that he’s an odd one, noone is ever quite in your corner like Vimsey, absence makes the heart fonder, no one else works that hard, and he’s not even competition for promotion. All around great guy, we should set him up with somebody and just, no.

It just keeps getting worse! He’s literate! He’s a feminist! He believes abuse victims! He’s got a tragic backstory! He’s unreasonably good in a fistfight! He’s kind to animals! Word gets around that there’s a good man on the watch and he’s just waiting for a good woman to come snap him up. The widower excuse doesn’t hold people off completely, and for some it’s its own sort-of appeal.

Things REALLY become stressful after he rescues that carriage full of noblewoman.

What’s he supposed to do? Let them get robbed? Or worse? Chasing down and beating up 10 goons is as easy as beating up one, when they’re that stupid, getting separated like that, drunk and distracted, and he knows these streets better than anyone, really it’s nothing. And oh lord he’s Modest too.

I mean, they were genuinely greatful, as genuine as people like that are capable of being, the skill having grown rusty. And then there is something...magnetic about the man. An air of command.

So, soon enough you get Lady Marigold of Marigrave calling on Treckle Road for that gallant young officer who rescued them, she really needs to thank him. And Viscountess Elanor Thitzferal specifically requesting that he guard her at her next soiree. And Baroness Julieta van Shoeholten insisting that he come to her home while her husband’s away, for... manly protection.

Aaaah just zero sympathy from the guys. None. 'It’s become a competition, they’re just trying to see who can get me into bed first, it’s like I’m a piece of meat, you can’t send me sir, the Marquess greeted me in a nightee last time you made me go to—' and 'small gods Vimes are you even listening to yourself, shut the hell up'.

Simultaneous to this, (again this is several years into the timeline) swamp dragon accessories come into style. Which means abandoned swamp dragons scrounging on the street. Vimes takes one back to his apartment, blows his paycheck on dragon medicine, and eventually, heart in his chest, brings it to the Ramkin estate. The sunshine orphanage doesn’t even exist yet and he’s just standing outside the gates like an idiot, what is he thinking. Turns around, but her carriage is pulling up and—

well. they meet. it's cute. he's never felt so young. he's never felt so old, too old for her, too poor—

and certainly her thoughts linger too long on the awkward, kindly, handsome young commoner, but is it any wonder she doesn't quite connect it to the stern, dangerous, sexy young guard the ladies seem to be in some quiet, cuthroat competition over?

i have this gorgeous, absurd scene in my head in which Vimes is strong armed into standing guard at some high society soiree and one of the pushiest ladies insists he dance with here, or, if he prefers, if he's not confident about his skills, he can dance with her in-private at her home and he’s like [grinding teeth, looking for a way out, seeinf one] “I would be honored to dance with you.”

Steps right into some ultra-complex dance with multiple partner swaps (she never thought he'd pick this one, devilishly intimidating to one not strictly trained, and you barely spend anytime with your first partner).

But he does alright. Better than alright, for a common man, sometimes misstepping but his hands and feet always end up where they need to be. Raises several eyebrows part way into the song because he's throuwing in some slightly scandalous, no innovative, extra lifts and twirls that wouldn't become fashionable for another decade or two. Who even is that guy? Some out of towner? No, no he's in a guards uniform...how very strange.

Gets to Sybll and she's used to embarrassment during these dances, she tries to get out of them when she can... but can't always. Men awkwardly skipping the lifts, or worse, trying and failing. But him — oh it's him, the one who helped little Erold, and looked at her like—like—well like she was someone beautiful. And he's doing it again, and he's strong and there's a quiet moment where she's in the air, they lock eyes, and the rest of the room melts away.

And then the partners change again, the moment ended.

Just...living throught it all again. To the left, a dance he almost knows the steps to, throwing others off balance with erratic moves , honest mistakes, and delibrate stepping on toes. Improvising. Ruining. Improving. Getting far, far too much attention.

Hes almost excited when the first assassains start coming after him. It's like a hobby.

Everyone tells him he should get a hobby.

Interactions with young vetinari...I don't have the energy to write it all down, the slow circling in on each other, both burning with the need to fix the city, save it, their city.

needless to say he ends up fired again, life under real threat after offending some high lord.

Conveniently enough he has an employment opportunity- bodyguard to fucking Vetinari on his 'grand sneer.' The bastard knows vimes isn't what he seems, though sam is pretty sure that he doesnt know the exacts.

Vetinari hypothesis:(the ghost of keel? Keels son, with some hereditary curse? Or a larger spirit of justice possessing a string of unrelated souls? He knows things he shouldn't- mind reader? Fortune teller? Havelock once arranged for a wizard to bump into him on the street, the magical fool gave an odd double look and then muttered something about destiny looping in on itself giving him a headache. Destiny? Lost noble? And hes far too familiar with sybyl, one of the few bearable noblewomen in this city. And his thoughts on guilds, when havelock can trip him into speaking... Most of all, if hes reading him at all correctly (for all the mystery hes not that hard to read, unless thats a very clever cover) then it seems that behind those dark haunted eyes is Respect. Loyalty. For vetinari. What an interesting man. A puzzling asset. An intriguing threat. )

Did I mention the timeline is changing, healing slowly around the place where it was torn? Healing enough around scars to perhaps get some flexibility back, with some painful stretches and...massaging of said scar tissue?

And hes heading to unresting uberwald, a place where a werewolf pack still hunts humans and, truely unrelated but perhaps equally exhausting, an eldritch spirit of vengeance just might be looking to stretch its legs in a hapless vessel?

Opening drabble Vimes Vetinari Meta (Unwell)

#discworld #sam vimes #discworld au #nightwatch au #i literally drafted this post in December 2021 #and i know it was living in my head for years already at that point #i have more somewhere aging like cheese in the back of my mind #discworld fanfic #night watch #Let this be free from my mind #Perhaps someone else will write it #BE FREE ANCIENT AU OF MY SOUL #For all my obsession with discworld I have but this one (1) AU though it tears at me like the seam of a pair of pants #The songs I have permanently associated with this au are slightly bonkers by the way #My au #Seriously there's like two full novels worth of content up here. Sybyll running away from home and living as a commoner #To mirror Sam joining upper class in original timeline you see?#Some early discworld murder Wizard nonsense when they try to poke at the temporal anomaly and the universe goes brrrr #Eventually catching up with color of Magic city burning bs and vimes is mad as fuck #Weird year that never was protecting people during sourcery #And when we start catching up with where he left #Oh ho ho you can't to forward to something that doesn't exist but maybe you can go sideways to a place that's got a tear in it #A sam vimes shaped tear #And his pregnant wife from 30 years ago in the other trouser leg #AND that's not even mentioning how carcers trial got taken to a...higher court

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eddie-van-munson · 2 years

Text

Peanut Butter Cookies (Eddie Munson x Reader)

***********

Requested by @cupcake-de-abacaxi

Summary: The reader gets jealous when she meets a friend of Eddie's: a gorgeous, smart metalhead that's infuriatingly perfect for him. Little do you know, he's not interested in this 'friend' in the very least.

Warnings: Cursing, Drug use (Weed), Jealousy, Saucy Kisses, Implied Sex, Slight Angst (Happy Ending), Fluff.

(I will get a "Read More" cut on this ASAP. Requests are OPEN.)

***********

Her name was Juliet. How the hell were you supposed to compete with that? Fucking Juliet.

That was the most romantic, gothic, wicked ass name you'd ever heard.

She had thick black curls and glossy lips, painted dark and curved like a doll's. She wore a dense chain around her perfect porcelain neck and tall, studded boots.

You couldn't have found someone more suited to Eddie if you had drawn her yourself, but there she was. Draped across his living room couch.

"Who's this, Eds?" She cooed, as you wandered into the trailer. Your stomach churned. Eds. Only you and Wayne were allowed to call him that.

"Huh?" He glanced over from the kitchen where he was rolling a joint. "Oh! This is Y/N. She's mine. You'll love her."

She waved at you, smiling. You waved back shyly, slightly comforted by the phrase "she's mine" even though you knew what he meant was "she's with me".

"I'm Juliet." She sounded friendly enough. "Brownie?"

She held out a tray brownies, which were definitely edibles, and patted the couch beside her. You politely declined, but sat down, fidgeting with your hair.

"Oh god, Eds." She giggled, blushing as she covered her face with her brownie-free hand. "Do you remember the last time we made treats?"

Eddie grinned, smoke pluming from his lips when he laughed. It seemed he'd gotten the joint lit. "Jesus, I'd forgotten about that. We both ate one and thought they didn't work-"

"So we both had two more!"

"Holy shit. I thought the damn ceiling was talking to me."

Juliet laughed, wiping a tear from her large, shockingly blue eyes. "I thought Wayne was going to kill us!"

Jealousy boiled in your stomach. Wayne. She knew Wayne now too, apparently. And she and "Eds" had made "treats" together before.

Juliet sighed, polishing off her brownie. "Oh shit! I have something for you, Eds! I'd completely forgot! Let me grab it!"

Eddie chuckled as he sat beside you, "God, I've missed her." He sighed. "I haven't seen her in years. She said this time she might stay."

"S-Stay? In Hawkins?" Your heart stopped for a minute.

"Yeah! Isn't that amazing!"

You nodded, trying to save face for him. He was grinning ear to ear, and your heart hurt the more you admired him.

Juliet was back to quickly for your liking, holding a paper shopping bag. "For you..."

"Wait!? You bought me something?" Eddie's eyes went big.

"Just open it, silly!"

He gracelessly pulled the item from the bag. A brand new cassette. "Holy shit, is this?"

She grinned, nodding.

"Master of Puppets? This came out like, two days ago! How the hell did you?? Jules!!" He jumped up off the couch, pulling her into a hug as she giggled. "God, you're the best!"

Again your stomach churned, but this time from the feeling of being left out. You'd never been a metal head. Sure, there were a few songs you knew...a few you'd liked. And you loved hearing Eddie ramble about his favorite songs and bands, but it just wasn't your style.

Just the same, you had known Metallica was coming out with a new album. He'd mentioned it offhandedly about a week ago. You'd been saving up to try and get it for him for his birthday.

"Oh man, I've been dying to hear this. You have no idea."

Juliet grinned, "Pop it in!"

He headed for his player, but paused. "Nah. You know what? Let's save it. It's not really Y/N's thing."

Your heart sank with guilt.

"Oh man, really?" Juliet didn't sound judgemental, just surprised, but it still made your jaw clench a little. "I started dabbling in Black Sabbath a few years ago. I've never gone back."

Eddie laughed, "She knows fucking everything about this shit, Y/N. Any band, any song, any album, and she could give you the whole deal."

You gave a weak smile, nodding.

"Christ, it's so good to talk to someone who listens to actual music Eds. All my friends back home just listen to the fucking Beatles. You know, all the slow, sweet shit."

You loved the Beatles.

Eddie shot you an apologetic look, his eyes trailing to the little tin you'd brought with you. "What did you bring, N/N?"

"Is it speed?" Juliet gasped happily.

"Oh no...it's...um...Peanut Butter cookies."

Your mom loved Eddie. He was over at your house often, and everytime he was, he went on and on about her cooking.

This is good shit, Mrs. L/N.

They don't make 'em like you anymore, Mrs. L/N.

Damn, Mrs. L/N! You keep this up and you'll have me looking like the Philsbury dough boy!

He buttered her up like a slice of fucking toast. Hence, now everytime you went over to Eddie's, your mom sent the whole damn kitchen with you. Eddie didn't mind at all. Actually, you knew for a fact that was what kept him coasting when Wayne worked late. But for some reason, this time, you were mortified. Thank god you'd managed to talk her down to just the cookies.

"Oh!" Juliet said, her voice sweet, but still a little uncomfortable.

"M-My mom sent them for Eddie."

She frowned a little, "Peanut Butter Cookies? Eds, I thought you had a peanut allergy?"

Eddie's cheeks went a little pink. He scratched his neck, "Oh, well...it's just a minor one, really. It's not a big deal."

"What?" You'd known Eddie for years now. Literal, actual years. Never once had he ever mentioned a peanut allergy. "You never told me."

"It just...never came up." He shrugged.

Why were you angry at him? Why did you want to yell?

"Eddie, mom has sent over granola, before. Granola with peanuts."

His eyes were wide, "And Wayne loved it! It was great!"

"That's not the point!" You said a little too loudly, tears welling in your eyes. You stood from the couch, throwing your bag over your shoulder.

"Where are you going?" His voice was so soft. He sounded hurt.

"Nowhere. I'm sorry I'm just...tired or something."

He frowned, "Don't leave."

Your heart sank as you dug the tin from your bag, setting it on the counter. "It's alright, Eds. I'm alright. I'll catch up with you later ok? I promise."

You turned to Juliet, who was looking a bit bewildered where she was sitting on the couch.

"It was nice meeting you."

And with that, you shut the door behind you.

***********

You were in tears by the time you got home, mad at yourself for making such a stupid scene over his stupid peanut allergy, of all things. Juliet probably thought you'd lost it.

You put on a Beatles tape, completely out of spite, and crawled into bed with your clothes still on. Hot tears rolled down your cheeks.

How dare she. How dare she swoop in and be beautiful and perfect for him. And know every little detail about him on top of that. How dare she like metal and wear edgy clothes when you didn't. How dare she be endearing enough for him to give her a nickname. How dare she.

You'd cried until what little makeup you had on had stained your pillow case, and then you cried some more, because that was your softest one.

You flipped your pillow to the dry side, chest aching with sadness, and promptly fell asleep.

***********

You woke up to the feeling of the bed dipping. A warm, familiar smell enveloped you as you felt your covers being tucked in around your body. A fingertip grazed over your forehead, brushing baby hairs back from your face.

A soft voice sang along to your tape.

Making each day of the year... Changing my life with a wave of her hand... Nobody can deny that there's something there.

His hand cradled your face, grazing back and forth over your cheek lovingly.

Running my hands through her hair... Both of us thinking how good it can be... Someone is speaking, but she doesn't know he's there.

Your eyes fluttered, and you knew you had to be dreaming as a pair of big brown eyes came into focus.

"Hey, baby."

His thumb swiped at the trace of mascara left beneath your eyes and your nose scrunched, making him smile.

"H-...How do you know it?" You slurred, still half asleep.

"Know what, sweetheart?"

"The song." You whined, pitifully.

He gave a soft chuckle, "Because I like this song."

"No you don't."

"Yes I do."

"No you-"

"Jesus, how are you this stubborn when you're half asleep?"

You made a face, which immediately melted away when he continued petting your hair lovingly.

"I like this song..." He held your gaze, stubbornly. "Because it reminds me of you ."

You stared back at him, brow softening.

He smiled, "What can I say? I guess sometimes I'm into the slow, sweet shit."

Tears welled in your eyes, and you immediately covered them so he couldn't see. Your voice trembled ridiculously with tears. "Why didn't you tell me you had a peanut allergy?"

"Aw baby..." He chuckled sweetly, pressing a kiss to your temple. "I'm so sorry I didn't tell you."

You gave a pitiful laugh through your tears, letting him move your hand away to see your red, puffy, makeup stained eyes.

"God, look at you." He giggles softly, brushing his thumb beneath your ringed eyes again. "You're a raccoon." You rolled your eyes and he laughed, admiring you for a moment. "Do you forgive me?"

You nod, pulling him down into a hug. "Do you forgive me?"

"Nothing to forgive, princess."

You frown a little, pulling back to see his face. "Yes there is. I got angry and jealous."

He hums sweetly, "Well in that case, you're forgiven." You comb through his curls, tenderly. "I wouldn't worry about Juliet either, ok? You've got nothing to be jealous about."

"No Eds, I..." You took a deep breath, mustering your courage. "I want you guys to be together."

He quirked his brow, laying back on your bed and propping an arm behind his head. "Yeah? Why's that?"

You rest your chin on his chest, "Because you're perfect for each other. She likes the same music and she dresses like you and she knows so much about metal..."

He rubs a hand up and down the small of your back looking amused. "I don't think things are gonna work out between me and Juliet, babe."

You frown, "W-Why not?"

He smiles, "Well, I know I'm pretty backwards sweetheart, but as far as I know, it tends to be frowned upon to have a good 'round in the sheets' with your cousin."

You froze, a shit eating grin on Eddie's face.

"Cousin?"

He nods slowly, "That's right. Juliet Munson."

You were still processing, "Juliet Mun-..."

"Wayne's daughter. She lived with her mom. Came back down to visit now that she's over eighteen."

Juliet Munson. Eddie's...cousin. Christ.

You buried your head in his chest and he burst into bright, clear laughter.

"Eddieeee."

He brought a hand to his face, gathering tears from his eyes as he tried to steady out his giggles.

You gave him an embarrassed look, "You're never going to let me live this down, are you?"

"Never in a million years, Princess."

You were holding back laughter now too. You sat up, giving him a playful shove. " Well, I don't think it's funny, Eddie Munson. You-"

"Oh, Com'ere you."

He grabbed the collar of your shirt, pulling you down into a messy, needy kiss. You straddled him, letting his hands slide up over your neck to cradle your face. He sat up on his elbows, chasing your lips when you moved. His breath was heavy and hot as he hummed against you, "You...didn't have any...of those cookies did you?"

You tugged his curls in retaliation, making him give the most delicious whine. "No, asshole."

He chuckled as you gave him another tug, his head falling back so you could kiss down his throat. He cursed, grinding his hips.

"So the whole 'feeling like I can't breathe' thing and the lightheaded-ness...fuck...that's normal?"

"Yeah." You rasp, nipping at his collarbone. "I feel it too."

Eddie chuckled, pulling off his shirt, and you pulled back to admire him, tracing your fingertips over his tattoos.

He moaned, pressing up against your touch. "You have no idea what you do to me."

You chuckled softly, "Well as long as it doesn't involve me making you break out in hives..." You rocked your hips lightly, and his hands gripped your thighs. "I'm down to find out."

***********

#eddie munson #eddie the freak munson #eddie munson x reader #eddie munson x you #stranger things #stranger things imagine #stranger things imagines #eddie munson imagine #eddie munson imagines #eddie imagine #eddie imagines #eddie x reader #eddie x you #stranger things x you #stranger things x reader #eddie munsen x reader #eddie munsen imagine #eddie munson x female reader #eddie munsen

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farfromstrange · 1 month

Text

Interview With The Vampire | Vampire!Matt Murdock x F!Reader

-> Main Masterlist

Pairing: Vampire!Matt Murdock x F!Reader (she/her)

Summary: You are the first journalist to interview Hell’s Kitchen’s resident vampire vigilante after he requested you personally to tell his story. He’s offering you a way out of your miserable job—to make your voice be heard. You’re desperate and curious, so you decide to take the risk. Most people only know him as Daredevil, but you are about to learn who’s really behind the mask. How hard can it possibly be? As it turns out, interviewing a vampire is a lot more complex than you expected it to be, and Matthew Michael Murdock has set his mind on ruining you for any other man to come.

Warnings: SMUT (18+ MINORS DNI), alternative universe, blood play, marking, scent kink, slight Dom!Matt, unprotected p in v, oral f!receiving, biting, vampirism, angst, religious imagery & symbolism, Catholic guilt, mentions of violence, allusions to suicidal thoughts, lots of plot, age gap

Word Count: 12.2k (this is a beast)

Other Characters: Vampire!Elektra (mentioned), Ben Urich (mentioned)

A/n: I finally got this one edited. This is a beast, y’all! I drew inspiration from Anne Rice’s Interview With The Vampire, but particularly the 2022 AMC series (I fell in love with it then and there), but it’s not based on it, so I just played around with the idea and this came out. It’s a lot, but it wasn’t enough for a full-blown series, so you’re getting a big ass One Shot instead. I used my usual Smut tag list, but since this is slightly Dead Dove Do Not Eat, heed the warnings and proceed with care! Don't read it if you don't want to. Anyway, I hope you like it!

Read Me On AO3!

The sun has long set over the Big Apple. Artificial neon, cars, and ceiling lights burning in the highrises along the riverfront cancel out the darkness that has befallen the country’s east. Noise melts into a flood that rolls over people’s senses, but most in New York City have grown numb to the city that never sleeps.

Sirens follow cacophonies of screams. Teenagers get into clubs with their fake IDs, adults get drunk in bars or go to work the night shift at their underpaid jobs, and the other half cry themselves to sleep, knowing they will have to get up in the morning and go through the same hell all over again.

Life has become a miserable existence, and it leaves human beings wondering, ‘How much longer do we have to endure this before we all finally drop dead?’

The system fails them. The law fails to protect them. All they can do is lie down and wait to die. And they will die sooner or later. That’s inevitable.

In Hell’s Kitchen, in a penthouse with a view of the Hudson through colored windows that gloss over during the day and show the city throughout the night, resides someone who most of the city only knows by an alias—Daredevil.

If anyone crosses him, he will suck them dry. It’s not a metaphor, I’m afraid; his reputation precedes him. Criminals fear the red eyes that come with fists and a sharp set of teeth that will surely run them into the ground. The rest of the city feels a little safer with him, but so far, no one has dared to question his nature.

Fear is known to work as a paralytic. And this man living in the penthouse by the Hudson is the personification of what one might consider fear-inducing. Without the fear of others, he would not be thriving.

An apex predator like him lives for the thrill of the kill. When the adrenaline spikes, it makes the prey start running and the blood taste so much sweeter. It is to a creature of his kind what a good glass of century-old red wine would be to a human being; he savors every last drop of it.

Two years out of your Master’s degree at Columbia University, you have become one of those hard-working adults who fall into bed later than they should, and you lie awake at night, wondering how much longer you have to exist before you can live.

You interned at the Bulletin; you ran the true crime and mystery column for over a year before the newspaper shut down. A billionaire from downtown Manhattan bought it to start his own magazine, and you were the only employee he didn’t fire. Instead of relying on your top-tier education and experience though, he has banned you to the lifestyle and beauty column. He’s a beast if you have ever seen one.

On a Monday in June then, after the sun has risen and is now falling again, you find an envelope on your desk. You glide your fingers over the fancy paper. The letters are written in handwriting that resembles the old letters from the 18th century you had the pleasure of using as research material for your Bachelor’s thesis.

Your heart skips a beat. Could it be…

It is no secret that vampires exist.

Over two decades ago, scientists published papers on the existence of blood-sucking creatures after years of valuable research, and now governments around the world have set out to burn the inhuman species out before they can cause any more damage. Vampirism though is older than humanity itself and unless law enforcement has evidence of homicide, vampires have the right to exist amongst humans.

They are excellent at hiding their true nature, that much is true. The lore that has been passed down since the beginning of time is only partly true. They know how to adapt and rise from the ashes like elegant phoenixes. The misconceptions surrounding their existence stem from fiction, horror, and fear, but they persist.

And a rule has been established in society ever since the truth was revealed: don’t talk about vampires!

Don’t talk about them unless it’s in a fictional context. Don’t put your research out there. Don’t fraternize with them. Don’t risk becoming prey. Don’t be fascinated by them, and God forbid, don’t you dare write articles about them for the public records. If you want to know about vampires, you have to dig, and you have to do so quietly or society will deem you crazy and a freak.

The worst thing to be is not a flying android or a super soldier with a shield; the worst thing you can be, in this day and age, is a vampire.

You were a curious child who turned into an even more curious adult. At times even a bitter one because she couldn’t get the answers she yearned for and had to do it herself. So, of course, the We Don’t Talk About Vampires rule came across as rather absurd, learning about it back when you were merely a teen.

You started researching, and you found out more than you thought you would—more than you thought you could. You wanted to cover the issue in the Bulletin back when you still worked there, but since humans were raised to fear the very mention of vampires in the real world, no longer romanticizing the concept but rather running from it, the truth shall remain hidden. Again, that seemed absurd, but you had to accept it to get ahead.

You kept researching to the point you convinced yourself you could be one of them if you tried. You felt like you understood them, but nothing could ever fully answer all of your questions to the point it felt truthful. Honest. Real.

Growing up, everyone told you dead things aren’t supposed to walk. They aren’t supposed to breathe and exist among the living. They are cruel, and vampires are killers that leave trails of bodies the government is hiding from us. Greediness exceeds common sense. The human mind tends to get sick and twisted, and those who don’t fit in hardly ever stand a chance.

Hell’s Kitchen is particularly quiet on the issue. Rumor has it that the vigilante chasing criminals at night and leaving the worst of them dry at the shore of the Hudson while, at the same time, surrendering those he deems worthy of rehabilitation to the authorities, is one of those vampires.

They call him Daredevil; the savior of innocents and the downfall of the vile. Only a handful of people know who he is. The truth is caught in a spider web of lies, unable to come out unless someone were to tell his story for the world to hear.

That Monday in June when you open the mysterious envelope on your desk, everything changes.

He addressed you personally. Your name resembles a masterpiece, the letters swirling at the edges.

You don’t know me, but I know you.

It’s strange to read your name out of the mouth of a stranger.

I must admit, Miss, I’m a big fan of your writing. And I’m not talking about the lifestyle and beauty column Mr. Doherty of the ‘Silver Lining’ has confined you to.

No, I am a big fan of the work you used to do for the New York Bulletin. I remember your name headlining many articles on crime here in Hell’s Kitchen—a column my late friend Ben Urich used to call his home.

It’s a shame that the paper was shut down. I tried to prevent it, but the disappearance of half of humanity and Wilson Fisk’s irreparable damage to the city’s foundation tied my hands.

The token female journalist reporting on unsolicited beauty advice and lifestyle choices no one is going to follow in the days of social media and fake marketing. It must be frustrating, right? Not having a story to tell. Not getting recognized for your impeccable talent. The Bulletin gave you a platform, but Mr. Doherty and his goons took that away from you.

What I’m asking myself is, are you satisfied? You were probably imagining a different future for yourself. A woman of your caliber must want to be more than a mere object used to make a bottomless magazine look better on the market.

Excuse my overstepping. I read one of your essays on the magical and the mythic—lore versus reality—the other day, and it inspired me. My life has been taking quite a few turns lately, so I required some new… let’s call it insight.

You don’t know me, but I am one of those creatures you are fascinated by. I’m the kind of creature people have been telling you not to write about because the weak minds of the public would not receive it well. The Catholics, the church, the fragile and fearful human beings that can’t imagine anything in fiction being real and want to remain the superior species—trust me, I know what it feels like to be backed into a corner. To be abandoned. To be underestimated. Not quite like you, I admit, but I have a few years of experience in and with this world to show for myself.

I imagine you’re tired of your position. I imagine you’re dissatisfied with human idiocy. You crave answers to your questions. Questions you have been asking yourself ever since college failed to answer them. My kind is being censored—partly for good reason—but that doesn’t sit right with you, does it? To live life in a monotone line with no clear way out of this boring rhythm you have had to fall into?

I can offer you a different path. A story. Answers to your questions. And the unfiltered truth of a 242-year-old man.

You are going to find a card with my address attached to this letter. I can assure you, sweetheart, we both want the same thing. I will wash your hands if you wash mine. Think about it, and come find me when you have made your decision. Preferably after the sun has set.

Yours sincerely,

The paper crumbles in your hands, but only at the corners. Your eyes are glued to the lost drops of ink, the blue blood of an old fountain pen caving under too much pressure.

He chose his words carefully. Every paragraph circles around your head. You breathe in, and it suddenly feels as though the whiff of the unknown is an inhalable drug, twisting your brain inside out.

The pull threatens to submerge you in a stormy ocean. You’re flailing your arms around helplessly, but there is nothing for you to hold onto. All buoys have drifted into oblivion, leaving a sea of utter emptiness behind, and in the midst of it, there you are, drowning.

In a moment of clarity, you fold the letter back down on the desk. It lands with a thud, and you look around frantically, checking if anyone is watching you. They aren’t.

M. That’s all he’s giving you. And the fact he is over two hundred years old proves the rumors to be true. He’s standing by it, but only to you. He wants to reveal himself to you, show you his true face for a story, but he’s a vampire.

You’re alone. You can wash his hands, but is just showing up enough for him? You don’t even know him.

You’re in trouble. This time though, you didn’t even do anything. You did your job, and he caught an interest in you. How does that work?

Your heart skips another beat. It should not, but it does. The danger is exciting. It shouldn't be exciting. You hate what your body is doing, but how can you make it stop? You can’t. You can’t do anything but take it.

This stranger has got you in a chokehold, but in his hands, you might as well surrender to your certain demise. You don’t consider vampires inherently evil, but there is a reason people warn you not to walk alone at night in Hell’s Kitchen. He’s dangerous, no matter his nature, and he is not supposed to lure you in the way he does.

But you’re a curious kitten, and he is offering you the holy grail of answers to questions you have been grappling with for years. He hit the nail right on the head. And it doesn’t even scare you how well he knows you.

This is a gold mine. Realistically speaking, telling a vampire’s story could make or break your career as a journalist. If you do it for the magazine, you’re done before you can even bring your words to print, but if you do it individually and you do it well, people will certainly eat it up. The question is just, are you going to play your entire life safe, conforming to your boss’s view of you until you get the freedom you crave, or are you going to take the risk and fly?

The answer is as clear as day, but it takes you a moment to process. It’s as though someone is in your head, steering you in the direction of whoever this M is. Daredevil. This vampire who wants you to interview him, and for what? That’s still an open question you don’t have the answer to. But you do know what to do.

You scramble for your laptop, your notepad, and the letter in the envelope. The clock strikes four. You have another two hours on the clock, but you can’t be bothered to stay.

Upon hearing the sound of your shoes hurriedly scraping against the linoleum floors, one of your colleagues turns in her chair. “Where are you going?” she asks.

“I, uh, have somewhere to be,” you tell her as you brush past her.

“What, now?”

“Yeah. I forgot I had an appointment.”

“What about Mr. Doherty?”

You stop on your way out, looking back over your shoulder. “If everything works out,” you say, glancing through the window to his office at the other end of the hall, “He’ll have my letter of resignation by the end of the week.”

She gasps softly. “You’re quitting?” her voice is barely above a whisper.

Almost sinisterly, you chuckle. “That’s the plan, yeah.”

“But—”

“Tell your daughter Happy Birthday from me. I gotta go.”

Your steps echo for minutes still, but you are long gone with the wind.

Silver linings are considered an advantage that comes from an unpleasant situation. The name has proven to be entirely unfit for the magazine that replaced a big piece of Hell’s Kitchen’s history. The Bulletin had cultural value as much as it was laden with decades of the city’s stories told to the average person.

Wilson Fisk was the dynamite that sent New York alight. The Bulletin’s destruction was mere collateral damage in the fight to get the city back on track. You have had so many reasons to leave presented to you, yet you never took them. If you had, maybe you wouldn’t be here, making bad decisions on what started as just another Monday in June.

The fact is though, you didn’t leave, and you are here now. Facts are what matter. They count. Your hypothetical past, present, and future have no place in this reality because you can’t travel back or forward in time. Vampires may exist, and the Avengers time-traveled to save the world, but things aren’t quite as easy once you look at the bigger picture. You are not a superhero, you’re just a journalist chasing the kind of story that will finally make her voice be heard.

You know that Ben Urich, at least, would be proud of you.

His address weighs heavy on the small card you pulled out of the envelope earlier that evening. You passed it on to the cab driver, and he began to navigate the dark streets of Hell’s Kitchen. The luxury condominiums in this part of the city can be counted on one hand. You know exactly when you’re there.

The sun has once again set over New York City. You’re wide awake, not quite sure though if you’re ready to face what you are walking blindly into. Even your driver refuses to take you past a certain point, and that is how you know that you’re not dreaming. This is real, and it’s supposed to be terrifying.

How come you’re not scared then?

You slip twenty dollars to the cab driver, then climb out of the backseat. The salty air from the Hudson River a few blocks down wafts around your sensitive nose. In the distance, you can hear waves crashing into the docks as the wind picks up in speed. The boats must be moving wildly by now, swaying from side to side and possibly even making the fish in the depths of the water seasick. You would be if you were them.

With every step, you grow closer to your target. On second thought, maybe you should have brought more than just a pathetic bottle of pepper spray and your precious laptop. You could have brought your grandfather’s cassette recorder, at least that would leave a mark if you hit someone over the head with it.

Do vampires get concussions? That is another question you can add to the seemingly endless list in your mind. It’s a confusing place as of late, and the weird sense that someone is playing with the controls won’t leave you alone. Either you are overthinking, or you are worse off than you originally thought.

The apartment complex the card directs you to stretches high above you. You look up, seeing not a single light on. That’s odd, you think, but then again, you are meeting with the city’s most notorious man. If he is who everyone says he is, and if the rumors are even true, that is.

As you are about to approach the entrance, your fingertips start to burn. A gasp escapes past your lips. Staring down, the cubical piece of paper goes up in flames. You are mere feet from the door, nowhere near close to an open source of fire, and the card starts to burn like a wildfire.

You pull back, your heart hammering against your ribcage. The ashes fall to the ground, but before they can hit the asphalt, they vanish.

“What the–” before you can finish, the doors before you swing open toward the inside. The lights turn on. Someone even has called the elevator for you.

Another step forward, and a voice stops you. “Fourth floor, down the hallway, first door to your right,” the voice says through the speaker. Only then do you notice the lack of a doorbell.

Everything in you is screaming for you to run, but you are rooted in the spot. He dragged you here with a mere letter, and you were more than ready to jump. Desperation was the only thing that drove you here. Your brain seems incapable of rational thought.

What if that is what he wanted all along? To get you complicit by playing on what you so desperately need, which is a story and a way out of this boring everyday life that is threatening to slowly kill you.

He’s like a siren, luring you into his deadly trap, but even knowing all of this, you still can’t find it in yourself to run.

The second you enter the building, the door shuts behind you, and your only way out is officially locked. You made the decision; you have dug your own grave, possibly quite literally, and now you have to lie in it. It’s better to die chasing a good story than dying at a desk in an office that doesn’t respect you.

You are a disgrace, you can hear your father’s voice in the back of your mind. He always warned you not to be too reckless or your bad decisions will eventually catch up with you. He always taught you not to trust strangers, and to stay the hell away from those who disgrace God, but you have never cared much about being a good girl.

Your thoughts are as morbid as your obsession with the walking undead. It is time you embrace what people are already saying about you.

The elevator ride feels like an eternity. It goes up and up and up until it finally stops on the fourth floor. The walls smell like nothing but a faint hint of bleach. It’s clean, parquette not carpet, and the walls are kept in a shade resembling a mixture between crimson and maroon, and it is blending into a sort of marble.

The metal doors slide open. Again, you hesitate. A sweet whisper echoes in your ear, dragging you toward the edge. You breach the border between the elevator and the hallway that waits behind it. The voice is distant, and it doesn’t sound human—it reminds you of a siren’s song, calling for you. He is calling for you, and a fog settles over your mind. You’re not in control anymore, he is.

You imagine him to be an old man, possibly middle-aged. Vampires stop aging when they’re turned. Their mind doesn’t. You’ve read the research plenty. They are wise beings, more intelligent than human beings could ever fathom. That makes them dangerous.

Their venom rivals the intoxicating feeling of heroin, you’ve heard, and it heightens your senses to the point all you can feel is the one who bit you. Research suggests it’s a million times stronger than an orgasm, for both the vampire and the human being.

Part of you has always wanted to try it. Part of you wants to know what it feels like to be sucked dry. You want to know what it feels like to be carried into a new dimension by someone who knows how to play the human body like a fucking piano, eliciting the sweetest melody through your very essence and the symphony of your moans.

This M—Daredevil—is inherently dangerous. He’s as mysterious as they come; a man in a mask lurking in the dark corners of Hell’s Kitchen every night, turning the fight for justice into his hunting ground.

It’s as though he curled his fingers, and you followed.

You walk the dark hallway down to the door on the right. Paintings litter the walls. Masterpieces, blotches of white, red, and color. You recognize the red marble as a decorative theme on the wallpaper. Tracing your fingers over it, the rough drywall scratches at your skin.

You reach out a shaky hand toward the golden knob. Before you can turn it though, the door already flings open. It must be witchcraft.

Red appears to be his favorite color. At least judging from the hallway, that is true. When you step into the room with a pounding heart and blood pooling in your cheeks though, the inside of the room is a lot more… human. You wouldn’t have guessed it from the gloominess surrounding you on your way there.

A leather couch and armchairs stand in the middle, facing toward the window front. Colored windows, as you have gathered from the rumors. They are see-through now though, showing the city skyline and the moon up high. The chandelier on the ceiling is the only piece of furniture you would consider old. Browns meet hues of blue and dark green, a forest at midnight, and you suck in a sharp breath. The apartment is beautiful.

You look to your left and see a bookshelf stretching the length of the wall. You can’t help but run your hand over the backs. You would have expected original editions from the 18th or 19th century, but when your fingers trace over the bindings, you are met with the bulging of Braille underneath the elegant golden writing of the titles. None of them seem to have collected dust. It surprises you to only find a mere handful of classics that haven’t been transcribed in Braille and a realization you did not expect starts to crawl its way forward.

“I stole that one from a library in Paris.”

Your racing heart stops beating. The book you’ve been holding falls to the ground, its worn-out leather cracking further around the spine. The thud is deafening. You gasp, turning around. Your shoulders fly up as the tension ripples through every last muscle in your bone. Your bones ache just from how stiff you’re standing, but you can’t move.

The man before you moves as quietly as a mouse. You didn’t hear him coming. The moonlight reflects off his dark brown hair, making it appear almost ginger. He’s wearing a simple suit without a tie, and the white of his shirt is as pristine and clean as the cut of his beard. You can see chest hair poking out from underneath the two open buttons, as dark as the locks on his head. His jawline is irresistibly sharp, leading up to a pair of plump lips he is wrapping around the brim of a crystal glass filled with rum.

Your heart remains frozen. Not a single drop of blood pumps through your veins, yet your cheeks burn brighter than a bonfire on a pitch-black night.

But his flawless appearance is not what catches your attention the most. Looking up into his eyes, wanting to know whether they are as red as those set into the devil’s mask, you find nothing but your terrified reflection staring back at you. It’s as blurry as the picture of your face in a still ocean’s water, your wide eyes staring back at yourself.

The red glasses are all you can see. Round with a black rim. Silver would have looked better on him, or maybe even gold. The black reminds you of an endless pit, a sinister embrace of vampire stereotypes, but you can’t look away from the maroon that won’t allow you even a glimpse into his eyes. They are shielding him from the world, and his eyes from curious, stupid humans like you.

He nods toward the ground. “You gonna pick that up?” he asks. His voice reminds you of rumbling gravel.

He looks like a man. He talks like a man. If you didn’t know better, you would say he is human. There seems to be blood in his cheeks and air in his lungs.

You have to pull yourself together. Clearing your throat, you bend down and pick the book back up.

“Thank you,” he utters your name. “It’s been a while since I’ve received visitors that don’t work for me.”

You put the book back on the shelf. Your lips are sewn shut; you can’t find the words. Every time you open your mouth like a fish on dry land, you close it again, and it is embarrassing to be standing in front of him with your guard down.

“Welcome to my home,” he says. You wish you could see his eyes to know if he’s mocking you. “Do you want a drink, or do you need another minute to process?”

He is mocking you. His tone is gentle, as is his voice, but he smirks like a smug motherfucker, and your anger boils to a tipping point. The candle is about to burn out.

“I–” you stammer. Internally, you curse yourself for being such a fool.

“Another minute it is then.”

You don’t need a minute though. “You’re blind,” you blurt out.

The beautiful—deadly—stranger nods. “Yeah.“

“How?”

“Accident when I was a kid.”

“But you’re…” you leave the missing part of that sentence hanging in the air like a noose.

“Say it,” he murmurs. You want to say it sounds like a growl, but you’re not sure. He isn’t asserting dominance or trying to force you into submission by scaring you away, but he is toying with you regardless.

You take a deep breath. The word, the truth, numbers your tongue and your lips with its weight. “A vampire,” you say, your voice barely above a whisper, matching his.

His smirk broadens. He pushes his tongue against the inside of his cheek for a moment, then releases it as it darts out to wet his bottom lip. “I’m a blind vampire, yes,” he answers. “We’re rare, but we do exist.”

Blind vampires. In all of your years of fascination, that has never crossed your mind. You used to believe that they had healing abilities that far exceeded your own. You were wrong. He lost his eyesight before he got turned into a vampire. He lived as a blind human being and didn’t regain his most crucial sense when he died.

He came back to life, but he died. It is surreal to stand across from him. He’s not just letters on a piece of paper, he is very much real. And he’s blind.

“Oh, my God,” you curse.

That elicits a soft chuckle from him. “I was starting to think you wouldn’t come,” he says.

“I was considering not to.”

He sees right through you with those empty glasses. “That’s a lie.”

“How would you know?” you counter.

“I can hear your heartbeat. The blood pumping in your veins…” His head tilts ever so slightly in your direction. You take a step back. It’s an instinct. “Your pulse picks up when you lie, or when you’re nervous, or both,” he states. “When you first saw me, your heart skipped a beat. It did again when you lied to me.”

Your eyes trail down to his thick thighs perfectly fitted in his tailored trousers. His thick digits pat the rhythm with his fingers on the fabric. Thud-thudthudthud-thud. You place a hand on your chest. He wasn’t wrong; your heart is racing.

His smirk turns into a smile, but only briefly again. It’s a glimpse of humanity he doesn’t want you to see. “I like that sound,” he says. “Has anyone ever told you that you smell good? Sweet, sour, and a little salty. Natural. You don’t use a lot of artificial perfume, but you like cherry chapstick.”

You swallow, taking a whiff of your arm. Besides your deodorant masking the scent of your nervous sweat, you smell nothing. How good must his nose be? His hearing? His sense of taste?

“Right now, sweat is dripping down your back, and your muscles are tense enough to strain against your bones every time you breathe. Your heart just skipped a beat again. You find it weird,” he muses. “I can’t turn it off, but I get it must be strange for you.”

“You–” The blood has collected in your head, pushing the temperature in the room to an all-time high. “Get out of my body!” you snap.

He laughs. “That’s a sentence I never thought I’d hear.”

“And I never thought you would ask for an audience with me, but here we are.”

“Here you are.”

You want nothing more than to wipe that smirk off his face. He looks so smug, standing there with his drink, wearing a suit too fancy for his own home. He’s fully in his element. It’s scary how alluring he is, too. You don’t want to think that way, but as soon as your eyes gaze upon him again, your chest contracts, and you forget how to breathe.

He’s a wolf, and you’re a lonely little sheep that doesn’t know any better. That lonely little sheep just wants to be a part of something bigger, even if that means surrendering herself to the big bad wolf. He wants a taste of her, and the sheep would give him that in a heartbeat if he just asked.

You blink. There is a voice in your head, and it isn’t your own. Far from it. You don’t want to be associated with this stranger. She thinks she knows you. She thinks she knows what you want—the sheep in the eyes of her natural enemy. This voice is the most irrational you could be, and you need to stop letting her win.

And yet you—not just the voice of the lonely sheep you appear to be—would follow this man anywhere, even to hell if he asked you to.

Your eyes drill knives into his skull, but they are also full of curiosity. Can he hear your thoughts? Your heart beats in your throat. You can taste it on your tongue. If you bit your lip, you would bleed, and he would probably fall into a frenzy. Still, your teeth dig into your bottom lip. What if he can hear your thoughts—hear how fucking needy you are? You’re pathetic. What he must think of you, standing across from him, smaller than human life itself.

You want to read him, but he is far from an open book. He’s not Braille you can run your fingers over, and even if he was, you don’t know how to read it. He’s an enigma. His face is set in stone; an iron mask you can’t penetrate.

His chest heaves with another chuckle. He sets the crystal glass down on the coffee table, taking a step forward. “No, I can’t read your mind,” he says.

You flinch. “What?”

“Your breathing pattern. The way you look at me. I can sense that you’re thinking about something.” He adjusts his glasses. “It’s just… Most humans ask me if I can read their minds, you know. I can’t. Some vampires can, but my senses are the only heightened ability I have.” This time, when he chuckles, a hint of bitterness dances in his voice.

“At least you’re not in my head then,” you say.

“No.”

“Good.”

A pregnant pause follows. You clutch your bag to your chest, your fingers digging into the frame of your hidden laptop.

“Can I offer you a drink?” he asks, pointing to his empty glass.

You wave him off. That’s the last thing on your mind. “No, thank you.”

Sometimes at night, you fantasize about diving into the abyss of darkness. It looks and sounds a terrifying lot like him. You want to know him. You need to know him. When it comes to him and this—whatever this is—the lines between want and need are blurring into an unidentifiable mess. It’s an ocean of emotions with no land in sight. A total eclipse of the heart, if you will. You’re losing your mind.

“What you can do–” You straighten your shoulder, hoping it will add height to your beaten confidence. “You can tell me your name. Sir,” you say.

He nods. “I suppose it would only be fair, wouldn’t it?”

“Yes, it would.”

“Matthew. My name’s Matthew.” The softness of his features as his lips move to the rhythm of his words takes you back anew. His eyebrows raise slightly, and you catch a glimpse of a pair of beautiful, unfocused hazel eyes that steal your breath away.

Matthew. It is a name that easily rolls off the tongue. It suits him.

You repeat his name aloud. “That’s an odd name for a 200-something-year-old man,” you point out.

Matthew scoffs. “My parents were both Catholic.”

“I suppose you’re not?”

You hit a sore spot. His head dips, fingers running over his nails and tongue tracing his teeth. “Not anymore,” he says.

God died for him a long time ago, and all churches burned down.

Your grip on your bag loosens. “Then why Daredevil?” you ask.

His lips part. “I, uh, have the Bulletin to thank for that one. After centuries of existing in this world, and being despised for no matter what I do, I’ve decided to embrace it. I am Daredevil, not even God can stop that now.”

Matt grabs his glass, turning away from you. He doesn’t use a cane to navigate from the couch to the mini bar on the other end of the room. You carefully follow his movements. One of his hands remains at his side, snapping his fingers as he navigates the familiar terrain of his home.

He uncaps a half-empty bottle of Whiskey to pour himself another glass.

“You know, Matthew,” you prompt, daring to step forward an inch, “as big as your reputation is in this part of the city, Silver Lining is not the kind of magazine that would cover your story.”

“You still came,” he says.

“I could lose my job if anyone knew I came here.”

“And yet you’re here and not where you should be.” He turns his head over his shoulder. “You wouldn’t risk losing your job if it wasn’t important to you, would you?”

You stammer, “I–” He’s got you. You’re a fish with a hook in her mouth.

“If Silver Lining Magazine won’t cover my story, why are you here?” Matt turns back to you, leaning back against the shiny Mahagoni of his minibar. It offers a beautiful contrast to his strong physique and the slight paleness of his skin. “Could it be because you’re fascinated by the mythic?” he asks, teasing. “By werewolves and witches and vampires?”

It’s your turn to scoff. “I won’t confirm or deny. My boss wouldn’t let me write a vampire vigilante exposé even if I begged him to.”

“And that’s why Mr. Doherty doesn’t deserve you.” Your body visibly recoils when he pushes forward, moving just an inch toward you. “Your curiosity is a virtue,” he purrs. The moonlight sets your reflection in his glasses alight.

“Is that why you lured me here?” you ask him. “Because my curiosity is a virtue and you consider yourself better than the people in my life?”

“I didn’t lure you here, and I think you know that. That’s not what this is.” The distance between you starts to shrink, backing you into a corner. “I believe you came here because the thought of interviewing a vampire and sharing your findings with the world on your account excites you,” he says. “You want to be heard. You want to be taken seriously as a journalist, and you want to make people happy.”

The only way for you to come out of this with your pride and dignity still intact is to put up walls before the already existent labyrinth of walls keeping your heart guarded and your soul safe. “Again,” you ask, “why me?”

“Why not you? As I stated in my letter, I’m a fan of your work.”

You roll your eyes. “Yeah, about that. How did you write that if you’re blind?”

“I didn’t, my secretary did.”

“Of course.” Of course, he has a secretary. “I… I just don’t get it,” you say. “You’ve been hiding for so long–”

Matt cuts you off with an urgency you didn’t expect, “Things have changed. Circumstances…” he trails off.

“Wouldn’t it be a suicide mission?”

His answer is silence. You let out an exasperated sigh. “If you want me to interview you, you have to be honest with me.”

“I’m not on the record yet.”

“Right. Maybe you can answer this though—off the record, of course—how can you be certain I didn’t call the cops or the FBI before I came here?”

His eyes crinkle. “I’m not stupid, sweetheart,” he says.

He’s amused. You’re amusing him.

“Don’t call me that,” you growl.

He’s spreading you open, holding up a mirror for you to look into. It’s your miserable self in all its glory, and he knows you better than you know yourself.

You ignore the sharp pain in your left ribcage as you pull the arrow out of your heart. “Unless someone holds up a sign that they are pro-vampirism, how would you even know I’d listen to you and not just refer you to the Journal of Psychiatry?”

“Are you telling me you don’t believe in vampires?” Matt quips.

“That’s not… Answer my question!”

The sound of your heartbeat must sound almost like the rapid firing of a machine gun, that’s how fast your pulse is racing. Your veins threaten to burst with the excess blood. It’s a heat like no other. You’re a witch at the stake, and Matt is holding the torch to your gasoline-doused body.

He clears his throat. Your face falls at the words that tumble out of his parted lips, and the rapid firing turns into a deafening silence and a monotone line on a heart monitor.

“After what I’ve learned from reading Dr. Rice’s research on the phenomena of vampirism, I can confidently say this species is no different than an animal like the great white shark or the Homo sapiens sapiens—our kind,” he recites. “Vampires are a medium of fiction and propaganda to induce fear, but they are also a widely misunderstood species that is being silenced rather than heard. Our species, the human species, likes to consider themselves superior, even when we’re in a position of being someone’s natural food source. Dr. Rice’s research is based on a comprehensible set of facts, and isn’t that what we have been relying on ever since the beginning? Our psychology makes it possible for us to change the narrative in our favor, and more often than not, we ignore the very facts deemed by humans as an intellectual importance to spread the message of an entirely different agenda. Dr. Rice’s research only proves that egotism and humans themselves will be humankind's certain downfall.”

“My investigative journalism essay,” you breathe out.

“Published by Columbia University.”

Your heart restarts with a rush of adrenaline. “How… how do you know all of this?”

“I may be blind,” Matt says, “but I know how to read between the lines.”

“That doesn’t answer my question.”

The alcohol in his drink seems to have little effect on him. “I know you have questions, and I’m willing to answer them if you promise to publish a detailed report somewhere other than Silver Lining Magazine.”

You look down at your bag, then back at him. “Ben Urich could have told your story in a way that would’ve made people listen,” you murmur. “I don’t have an impressive career like him.”

“Yeah,” he smiles, “but you could have easily written ‘Attack on NYC’. Ben was a good man, an even better journalist, but he could not have written your college essay. And he could never have been you.”

Your name rolls off his tongue—not a pretentious nickname that makes you want to vomit but your name, and it flicks a switch within you.

You glance around the spacious living, pulling your laptop out of its confines, and you bridge the distance between you, finally. You notice he smells of sandalwood cologne and scentless soap. “Okay,” you cave. “Where do you want me to set up?”

Session 1.

The spacebar clicks underneath the tip of your index finger. The white of your screen fills with a series of red sequences as the microphone takes in every little sound around you. Except for the two of you and the fading footsteps of one of Matthew’s assistants though, the world has fallen silent in the dead of the night. He’s sitting across from you, legs crossed, head tilted; your life is about to change.

“So, Mister Murdock,” you begin, “tell me. How long have you been dead?”

His mouth opens in a wide grin. “242 years,” he answers.

“And what happened the year you died?”

“Well, it was 1782. I was a good few years out of law school. I was a good lawyer, but I wasn’t successful. That year, I met a beautiful woman at a banquet. I wasn’t rich—trust me, I was beyond penniless—but she had been adopted into a wealthy family, and that made her one of the richest women in the room. Everyone wanted her, but when I sensed her across the hall, she only had eyes for me. And she was the first woman to not see me just because I was blind.” He chuckles sadly. “I thought she was the woman of my dreams, the love of my life, but a few weeks later, after letting her into my life, I realized that she didn’t look at me that night because she was interested. She was hunting me. El— Miss Elektra Natchios…”

The year 1782 becomes apparent before your inner eye. As he tells you about the night he met her, you can see the dark-haired beauty making her way across the ballroom. Red lips and a gown to die for. Her dark eyes were full of mischief, but the passion in them could have knocked a grown man off of his feet. And that is just what she did to poor Matthew.

“I was going to marry her,” he tells you.

He went to church regularly. His knees were bloody from praying, his senses already heightened before he died. God’s soldier, that is how he puts it. He was told that the accident that left him blind happened for a reason, and he had to fight a war that went beyond the country’s fight for independence.

That summer, Elektra drained him. He didn’t know what she was. She fooled him. He was obsessed with her. Her dark eyes he couldn’t see lured her in, and it was the venom in her blood that became his downfall after she dug her teeth into him.

Matt tried to beg his priest for forgiveness, but he didn’t even make it past the marble stairs before the doors locked. He knelt in a pool of blood—both his and that of the first human he ever sucked dry to survive as a newborn vampire—offering an eternal sacrifice to Catholicism, but God abandoned him on his doorstep.

The church walls would have been set on fire if he had touched them from the inside.

You look up from your notepad to find him now standing at the window. He’s not looking out, of course, but he seems so deep in thought, the memories that aren’t your own but his start to dissipate, and you’re brought back to the here and now.

Matt poured his heart out to you. You expected answers, but not this kind, and certainly not of this magnitude. You see him in an entirely different light. He’s vulnerable, fragile, and human. He has endured trauma that killed him, but he couldn’t die because the woman he loved made him immortal. It’s a bigger curse than growing up with the belief that an accident made you God’s soldier.

He lost everything. For centuries, he has had to live with that. It’s killing you, feeling his pain, the pure agony that radiates off him.

Your voice is quiet when you ask him, “What was it like?” You don’t have to say it out loud for him to know what you are referencing.

Matt chuckles, the sound a mere breath in the atmosphere. “Like she took my soul from my body, setting fire to my belief system and already heightened senses,” he says.

You swallow. “That sounds… overstimulating.”

“It was. Is. My heart stopped, but when that happened, something else awoke inside me. The hunger… the hunger was the worst part. It’s insatiable. One hour passes, and you feel like you’ve been starving for weeks.”

“Like you’ve been possessed by a demon?”

“Like I am the demon.”

“But you’re not.” You should stop the recording. You’re not on track; you’re incorporating your feelings into Matt’s story, but you can’t help it. The words tumble out of your mouth without a second thought, a train that cannot be stopped.

He raises his eyebrows, you can see it in his reflection in the windows. “Are you religious?” he asks.

You shake your head. “This isn’t about me.”

“Are you?”

The veins on the back of his hands bulge as he balls them to fists at his sides. Your throat is a desert, and your heartbeat resembles a storm that burns right through it, sending the sand flying in all directions of the horizon.

You adjust in your seat, crossing one leg over the other. He takes a whiff. He’s smelling you, and that doesn’t help the speed of your pulse to calm down.

Tapping your pen on your notepad, you watch the red sequences fill the white space of the recording program. It moves with the sound of your voice when you finally dare to answer. “It’s a complicated question because there is a difference between believing in God and believing in the church,” you say.

“Do you believe in God then?” Matt asks. It’s as though he’s trying not to seethe at the mere mention of someone he used to worship. You make a note of that.

“There is so much bad in this world. So much cruelty. I can’t…” You take a deep breath. “I don’t know how to believe in a God that would let the things humans do to each other happen. If God existed—if he was as merciful as Christians like to claim, he wouldn’t let this happen. And I’m so sick and tired of people using their faith, and their beliefs in God and the church as justification to be disrespectful. I don’t understand it. How can anyone? Why is someone who has to drink blood to stay alive—someone who didn’t even choose this life—worth less and the devil’s breed when humans do worse things to each other? Why would God allow us to start wars that kill innocent people? Children? It’s just not fair that we treat ourselves and others as though we are already in hell, and we’re just supposed to accept that God doesn’t care—” You stop yourself, the tears burning behind your eyes.

Matt turns back around. You can’t look away. “When I was still human,” he murmurs, “I used to believe everything that happened to me was God’s will. The accident, God’s will. Me going blind, God’s will. I went to confession, prayed until my knees were bloody and bruised. I tried convincing myself that every scream I heard from down the block, every person who lost their life or their innocence was my responsibility. God made me this way for a reason, right?” The scoff is as bitter as the liquor in his glass. “I fell apart, you know. I was a kid, so I didn’t understand. I didn’t understand what was happening to me,” he tells you.

You hold your breath. The glasses slip from his eyes as he takes them off with shaky fingers. You are met with the most beautiful pair of hazel eyes. Emotions dance a heated tango in a tornado. If you look closer, the green specks bring life to his eyes. It’s human nature in the purest sense of the word.

Your reflection stands in his irises, his unmoving pupils, and the tears glisten in his eyes. They’re as red as blood, watered-down crimson essence. You want to reach out and stroke his cheek, but that would be crossing a very big line that you can’t bring yourself up to touch.

“I studied law because I thought it would change something,” he continues. You listen. It’s the only thing you can do—listen. “It wasn’t enough. Nothing I ever did felt like it was enough. I lost my father. Jack. I didn’t know my mother until it was too late. Maggie. I had no one. No money, no prospects, just me and those voices in my head, telling me I was supposed to be God’s soldier.”

“You’re not,” you cut in.

He shakes his head. “I prayed; I crawled up the stairs of the church, and I spent hours repenting for my sins. I bled myself dry for Him. I sacrificed myself. I sacrificed my youth, my heart, and my soul, and I got nothing back. I begged for help until my voice was sore, but nothing… God, nothing was ever good enough. Until Elektra came around,” he says.

“She changed everything for you. It makes sense. She turned you into a vampire, but she also loved you.”

“She did love me, in her own twisted way.”

“It’s what you deserved,” you say.

He isn’t yours, but the pang you feel in your chest is treacherous. Your heart cracks like a porcelain vase, jealousy creeping in like a parasite of toxic waste.

In response, Matt only chuckles bitterly. “She made me believe again, then took my soul and crushed it in her hand.” The correction makes your shoulders slump. “Instead of feeling like my world ended though, I felt at peace when she sucked the blood out of my veins and fed me her venom,” he says. “It’s sick, I know. I was aware I died that night, that she turned me into a devil who could only survive if he drank the blood of others. The Catholic in me struggled to accept it, but I had no choice but to embrace what she made me.”

“And where is she now?” you ask.

“Gone.” The light in his eyes has fully disappeared now. “I stayed with her for a while until she died in my arms. She showed me what love is, and she showed me heartbreak. She made me hungry for blood, awakening the devil I’ve been trying to tame. She taught me how to feed, how to hunt, and how to chase. But she also cursed me,” he says. “I only exist for myself now. I only bleed for myself. No God, no church, and no more religion. I’m not Jesus, I’m Judas, and I retired the cross the day I was crucified.”

You have run out of questions to ask. Too overwhelming is the sight of his walls crumbling down, this stranger you now know better than any living being seems to. You no longer see money in this, or a story to chase, you only see Matthew, and the halo above his head he still believes is a pair of horns. The world broke him. His faith in God broke him. It crushed him, and he lost everything. How broken he must be.

“Not such a pretty story when I say it out loud, huh?” He scoffs.

The spacebar clicks again. The recording comes to a sudden halt. One hour and fifty-eight minutes, the first session of your interview with the vampire. You need to put a halt to it now because what you are about to say or do as you reach your hand out to brush his cold, dead skin is not something that should be found on a record. And you won’t ever tell.

Matt pulls away when your warm fingertips brush his. You’re standing across from him now, so close he can smell, hear, and feel all of you at once.

Your touch is the holy water that burns his skin, but the fire sustains him and shoots straight to his core the same way the blood rushes to yours.

“It’s not a pretty story, no,” you say, your voice barely above a whisper, “but it did tell me what I already knew.”

“And what’s that?” he asks.

“That you’re not evil. You’re not the Devil. You’re misunderstood. You’ve been beaten; you’ve been abandoned, hurt, and broken. That doesn’t make you a monster. Trying to make this city a better place does not make you a monster.”

“If you only knew the things I’ve done…”

“I know the rumors suggest that you were the one who fought Wilson Fisk and got this city back where it needed to be. You’ve saved countless women from the worst of fates. You are the reason the innocent people of Hell’s Kitchen feel safe. By picking up that mask, you became a hero, not a villain, and that is the story I want to tell.”

In lightspeed, he has moved you from the window to the other end of the room. Your back hits the wall.

Matt towers over you in all of his intimidating glory. His eyes spark red, but you hold his unfocused gaze. He has such beautiful eyes. This pull between you is far from human; it’s unhealthy, and it is exactly where he wanted to get you. You’re trapped, pinned underneath him like a deer caught in headlights.

Exhaling, your breath strokes his cheeks. He closes his eyes, savoring the taste of you. Every particle in the air, he inhales. His tongue darts out to lick his lips. Oh, what you wouldn’t do to suck that tongue into your mouth.

Your pheromones play his head like a puppeteer pulling the strings of his marionette. He growls. “Do you have any idea how dangerous I am?”

The moonlight catches his sparkling white teeth. This time though, you come face to face with the sharp edges of his previously concealed fangs. Your jaw drops open. He’s ethereal.

“I could snap your neck—” Matt places his hand on your neck, “I could make that heart stop beating, take the air from your lungs. I could eat you…” He traces the vein in your throat from your jaw to your collarbone. “I could bite you and suck your blood until you’re empty. I could kill you, sweetheart. My kind is your natural enemy. You shouldn’t be here.”

You shudder. His nose brushes the sensitive skin below your ear. He’s so close you can smell him. On inhale, and his scent consumes your senses. He is all you can feel now. You reach out to hold onto his arms, his muscles tensing under your teeth. He’s big and strong, and those hands have a mind of their own as they begin to wander but never where you need him most.

You shouldn’t be here, yet you came. He asked you to him, and you complied. Is this your fate now? Chasing after your big bad wolf like the helpless sheep that you are?

Your walls clench around an agonizing emptiness, your swollen clit brushing against your soaked underwear. Whatever he is doing to you, it’s the cruelest form of torture.

A strangled noise breaks out of the back of his throat, rumbling in his chest. “You have no idea how badly I want to taste you,” he breathes.

“Do it,” you beg. “Taste me.”

He utters your name again. “Stop.”

“Please.”

Your tone shatters him. When he kisses you, finally, fireworks explode in the universe around you. All the stars seem to finally align. Your heart opens, and it sucks him right into you. Your soul yearns for him. He’s so close yet so far away.

The moon stands between you, but you cross even that ocean as you push against him, forcing your tongue into his mouth. He takes like heaven and hell; he’s the apple Eve bit into and cursed her for all eternity. But he’s also the snake, the one who compelled you to take this journey of bad decisions and jump right off the cliff’s edge. You melt into him like a broken candle.

He pulls away. Those fangs are alluring, as sharp as a knife’s tip. You want to know what it would feel like gracing your skin, digging into your as he thrusts his cock into your tight cunt. The thought alone sends your mind into a spiral.

Your lips are swollen, but he has yet to draw blood. Matt looks as though he wouldn’t dare, his eyes darting around in a darkened conflict he feels might cost him more than your dignity. You are begging for it, as is your body, but he’s holding himself back. He’s the one who tied himself to an invisible pillar, keeping his hands locked behind his back. But that is not the Matt you want.

You lean your head to the side, exposing the length of his neck. All control has slipped from your fingers. It’s in his hands now—you are. He cups your head gently. A mere few inches lie between your fountain and his lips.

You press a kiss to his calloused palm—a desperate and needy kiss, tracing your tongue over the lines that tell his life’s story in a way no interview can retell—and it is then he is forever done for. He’s doomed, and you are the second woman to pull him under the pits of hell.

Saliva drips from his fangs. You hold your breath. He hisses, a weak admission of surrender; the words die miserably on your tongue when his lips close around your pulse point with all his might, and his teeth drive home.

You moan aloud. Your fingers tangle in his hair, forcing him deeper as he sucks the dark red essence out of your vein. The sensation is more than you bargained for. It’s a drug that wrecks your system. The synapses in your brain backfire with all their might, and what follows the initial explosion of pleasure shooting white hot through your being is complete and utter silence as this God of a man feeds on you.

The invisible string between you glows a bright crimson. It slings around you, tying you together like the roots of a tree. It’s an eternal sacrifice. You are giving your all to him, the very core of your existence that is now flowing into his mouth. You swear you can hear his thoughts mingle with yours. Yes, more, please. You taste so good. Your knees buckle, but you remain standing strong. He makes sure you don’t fall. Don’t slip away from me. I need you.

A tear rolls down your cheek. You could sob. It feels so good—too good to be true. In that moment, you become one. There is no telling where one begins and the other ends. The coil in your stomach tightens, and the only pain you feel is the pleasure threatening to overwhelm you. He’s taking everything as you give him everything, but it is not enough. It has never been enough.

When your body struggles to catch up with the lack of blood, he pulls away. His fangs drag out of your neck agonizingly slowly. You whimper at the sudden loss.

Matt catches you as you stumble into his arms. “You okay?” He cradles your face, brushing the hair out of your face. Your blood stains his lips. Blinking up at him, the force of your metaphysical connection slaps you awake.

You cease to exist in all solar systems but his.

He pokes the tip of his index finger with the sharp edge of one tooth, sliding it over the two holes that are pulsating with the work of your heartbeat.

“I shouldn’t have—” he begins.

“No,” you say. “You did exactly what you should have.”

“I couldn’t stop.”

“But you did.” You wipe the blood from his mouth. “And I felt you. I only felt you.”

The living room passes by you. Before you know it, your back lands on something much softer than a concrete wall. He’s not a monster, that one, but he surely is an animal.

You taste your blood on Matt’s luscious lips as he devours your tongue. It tastes of copper and a little bitter, but that is what makes him moan. That sound is the last thing you could ever grow tired of.

His palm rests on your chest. Your heart pounds against his palm. “You’re so alive,” he says.

You cradle his face in your hands. “And you’re more human than you think.”

If he wanted to pull your heart out and hold it, you would let him in a heartbeat.

He leans you back. He strips you bare. He kisses down your body like you are a fucking masterpiece for him to explore. That is how he sees you.

Your head falls back. The kisses wander from your hips to the inside of your thighs. Every kiss brings his breath closer to your center. Matt pulls them apart. He opens you up to him. Your scent clouds his senses, and he groans, but he doesn’t touch.

His fangs graze your skin. “Mine,” he growls.

You gasp. He bites into the sensitive flesh. Hard, passionately. Your legs wrap around his head, trapping him there. He sucks, and he sucks, and he drinks, and the wetness pools out of your cunt in an obscene amount. This is foreplay to him. It drives you toward the edge leading to an abyss you are afraid you might never be able to crawl back out of. There is no bottom, it is just a pit, and he’s pushing you closer and closer, and—

Your back arches, but he pulls away before the coil can snap into a million butterflies. He pries your legs away from his head, spreading them further on the mattress, as far apart as they will go.

Breakfast, lunch, and dinner have been served on a silver platter. He breathes in. The scent of your soaked pussy sticks to the hairs in his nose. It isn’t enough. He breathes in again, your arousal sweeter than fiction. You’re everything and more. He wants to taste that part of you more than anything, suck up the slick that is soaking the sheets—and you didn’t even think that was possible—but he waits because he needs to savor it. He doesn’t want it to be over too soon. neither for him nor for you.

The blood is still dripping from his tongue and his fangs, and the raw inside of your thigh. He runs his finger through it. The sting runs from the wound to your folds, then back down. Still, he doesn’t touch. He plays with the blood, sucking on his fingers until they’re clean, and then he dives back in for a taste. He doesn’t bite, he kisses and sucks, but he doesn’t push it further. He doesn’t hurt you.

You’re his saving grace; he has to worship you. Pain only has a place in pleasure.

“Matthew,” you moan.

He chuckles, kissing where his fangs left deep indentations. “No one will ever touch you again,” he purrs. “I’ll make sure of that.”

You try to protest, but the words die on your tongue when he leans in, capturing your clit with his hungry mouth. The wound on your thigh closes. The blood from his lips mixes with your juices, and you cry out at the intensity of it all.

He eats you with the ferocity of a man starved for weeks. He eats your pussy like he ate your blood, savoring every drop but still feasting for the taste to spread out in his mouth like wildfire. Sour, sweet, and copper. He sucks your sensitive clit into his mouth. His tongue drags through your folds, up and down, and then the tip slides inside, tasting your walls. He grows bolder as your moans accelerate.

Matt cradles your thighs. He forces your hips back down to the mattress, stronger than the average human man. You have to endure his beard scratching and burning, and the pace he has set.

The orgasm creeps up on you. Before you know it, he has plunged his tongue into you, and your body convulses around him. You scream into a pillow as you come.

You are each other’s forbidden fruit. No prayer in the world could keep you apart.

Faintly, you can hear him say, “Good girl.” Your legs quiver. He pulls away, then comes right back like a boomerang.

He’s warm now. He was cold before, but when he kisses you this time, he’s warm. He’s hot. You run your hands over his bare chest, the scars that lie under the dark strands of hair. You tug at it, and he moans. You can tell he is a little insecure, but by pressing your lips to one of the cuts on his shoulder, he relaxes.

What he must have endured, what he must have lived through before he died and was resurrected in the same breath, just without a beating heart—you don’t want to think about it or you will break, but you can still feel him through the crimson tie that holds you together, and you know that he has suffered enough for more than two lifetimes. You wish you could take it all away from him. You wish you could have saved him before it was too late, loved him more than the woman who turned him, but turning back time is an impossibility. You are both acutely aware of that.

“Hey.” Matt tilts your head toward him. “Where did you just go?” he asks.

“Thinking about you,” you murmur.

“Me?”

“You.”

“Why?”

“Because I want to be your salvation.”

You. His salvation. He kisses you, softly this time. He pours gratitude into his lips and bleeds them out in poetry as they slide into your mouth, and you swallow every last drop.

If someone had told you a week ago where you would see yourself on that particular Monday, you would have laughed at them. And if someone had told you a week ago that you would be making love to the devil, you would have called them crazy. But it’s happening.

He thrusts into you without a warning. His thick cock fills you like nothing and no one ever has before. Your cunt has been molded to fit him, you’re sure. You take him in, and you moan at the stretch. It’s a pain so delicious you could fall apart right then and there just from the feel of him inside you.

Every thrust drags the tip of his cock along your sweet spot. Every added sensation drives you closer to your death.

Your body tingles. He explores your face with his lips rather than his fingers, moving to your neck again. You cling to him, oh-so-desperate for him. He likes you like that, and you like him like that.

“You’re fucking with my head,” he tells you. “Offering your pussy to a vampire. Letting me drink your blood. Begging me to fuck you. You’re in my head, baby. Can’t get you out of my system. Fuck.”

You are his downfall, his salvation, but he is all of those things to you as well—all of those things and more. If he could read your mind, you would tell him that. Words can’t do justice to how you feel. Not right now, maybe not ever.

“Bite me again,” you beg.

His thrusts falter. He searches your body for any sign of regret. His fangs come out, and he buries them deep in your jugular vein. The floodgates open wide. Your walls clench around his cock, your clit pulsates, and the wave crashes into you.

You come as he devours your neck and your blood. You transcend into another dimension, far away from everything and everyone but never him. Never Matthew.

The sensation of you wraps around him like a weighted blanket. His balls tighten, your blood unfolding its taste on his tongue. You are all over him, inside of him, everywhere at once. He falls head-first, dragging you down with him.

He comes with a shout that is only muffled through his teeth buried in your flesh, his cum spurting into you and filling your cunt to the brim. Your eyes roll back. You’re flying and falling all at once.

Oh, how good it feels to be consumed by him. To be fucked and sucked dry. You would have never expected this to come out of your week, let alone your life, but now that it has happened, you are floating on cloud nine.

Dizziness threatens to take over, but before you can pass out, he forces himself away, allowing your heart to catch up with the lack of blood in your system. He collapses on top of you. His cock softens, but he stays inside. You need him there. You want him there. And that is the only place he wants to rest tonight.

He heals the wounds on your neck. “You have a mark,” Matt rasps, tracing your skin with his finger.

You choke out, “Yours.”

“Yes, you are.” He kisses you there. Once, twice, even a third time. “Mine,” he says.

You’re his. He’s yours. It doesn’t get any better than this.

The minutes tick away on the obnoxious clock on the wall. Matt pulls out eventually, wrapping you up in a blanket. He coaxes you to drink, but you’re barely lucid. Only when he begins to stroke your hair you start coming back to yourself. You thought you might regret it, but as you look at him, his almost guilty eyes staring back at you, all you can do is reach out for him.

“Session two tomorrow?” you ask.

He chuckles and retorts, “Have I not scared you away?” There is some truth to it though.

He’s covered in your blood. It sticks to his lips, his hands, and his chest. It’s sickeningly intimate, in a way.

You shake your head in response. “You could not possibly.”

He listens to your heartbeat. You’re as honest as they come.

“Okay,” Matt says. “Session two tomorrow then.”

That night, you fell in love with the Devil, but he also fell in love with you, his angel in the form of a reckless journalist, and the only blood he ever wants to taste again until the end of his miserable, cursed days.

Matt Murdock (Smut) Tag List: @shouldbestudying41 @theradioactivespidergwen @cheshirecat484 @1988-fiend @acharliecoxedfan @gpenguin666 @linamarr @mcugeekposts @itwasthereaminuteago @norestfortheshelbywicked @yarrystyleeza @littlenerdyravenclaw @etanordoesbullsh1t @thychuvaluswife @harleycao @schneeflocky @imjustcal @pipsqueakkitten @merlinbtch @sya-skies @amberritonicole @ravenclaw617 @pigeonmama @bohemianrhapsody86 @a-girl-has-n0-name @winkev1 @callsign-ember @chittaphonstar @buckyyyismahhlife

#matt murdock #matt murdock x reader #matt murdock smut #matt murdock x fem!reader #matt murdock x you #vampire!matt murdock #matt murdock angst #daredevil #x reader #interview with the vampire #charlie cox #alternate universe #reader insert

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tieronecrush · 9 months

Text

part of me, apart from me

rating: E (18+ only, MDNI)

word count: 14k....its a whole thing okay?

summary:

kindly requested from a lovely anon "You and Javi had one kid together when you were very young, maybe you broke up due to his work schedule. You reunite at their college graduation 👀"

javier & you had daughter right after he graduated college, you with a couple years left yourself. when she was 15, he got the call to head to colombia, deciding with you to pursue his career and leave the two of you in the safety of laredo. seven years later, your daughter is graduating from college and javier is back home for good after cali, forcing himself to face what he finds are his failures, and hold out hope that you still feel the same as he does.

warnings (SPOILERS): BIG self doubt, self deprecation, heavy guilt, separated relationship, co-parenting, javier being in unrequited love, chucho being a king and a great grandfather & father, strained familial relationships on mother's side, discussions of death/violence/drugs, smoking, alcohol use, mentions of food/eating, use of spanish, javi has total DAD moments, he is a DILF ofc, dirty talk, oral sex (f & m (briefly) receiving), unprotected sex, unplanned pregnancy, becomes established relationship, etc.

a/n: i don't think the anon who requested this realized what it would do to my brain, but i have created a whole universe for this fic. i am in love with their little family and they will live forever in my head and heart. a huge thank you to my bestie el @northernbluess for screaming about javi, this fic, giving me the title for this, and beta-reading this long ass fic for me. love you friend!!!! hope you all enjoy, and that you love them as much as i do!

The engine of Javier’s truck cuts as he turns the ignition, the loud rumble of its mechanics quieting to reveal the sounds of birds chirping. For Texas in May, it’s a pretty mild day, sunlight shining bright against the blue sky. There’s a handful of wispy clouds above him as he opens the door and steps down from the cab, shutting it with a metallic click. He rolls his shoulders and swings his arms to loosen up, the sweat at the nape of his neck is from his nerves more than the temperature.

It’s been two years since he has seen his daughter, Liliana, in person. He’d come back from Colombia after everything that went down with the Cali cartel and the government only a mere 48 hours ago. He’s exhausted, but he made the drive from Laredo to College Station to see his princesa, the light of his life for the last twenty-two years, graduate from college. Specifically, his alma mater, Texas A&M University.

He has been counting down the days until he was back for this occasion, after repeatedly reminding everyone in the embassy that he would be out of the country. It just so happens that he doesn’t need to return to Colombia as he had originally planned.

A deep inhale and slow exhale attempt to calm the jitters that are trembling his fingers.

Fuck, he really wants a cigarette.

But Lili would kill him if he showed up smelling like burnt tobacco when he had promised a week ago he was on the Nicorette thing.

Instead, he shakes his head to himself and hooks his sunglasses in the open chest of his light blue short-sleeve button-up. Out of habit, he reaches to his lower back to feel for his pistol, his touch brushing denim.

Another inhale, slow exhale.

He can do this.

It’s you and his daughter. Two people that he loves. Two people he’s been working for.

Maybe that’s why he’s so fucking nervous.

How can you welcome him back every time he makes a visit? How can his daughter be excited to talk to him every week from across the equator? He’s been gone for years. Most of her teenage life, and nearly all of her college career. He’s only been back once since she moved to university. Once.

What a fucking asshole.

Certainly not a good father.

His boots tick against the pavement of the front path up to the dingy, weather-worn two-story house. He remembers getting photographs of Liliana in front of this house a couple of years ago, sent from you and stuffed in an envelope along with photos retelling her entire summer. That one of her standing proudly in front of this house hung on his fridge until he packed it up two days ago.

Every day he looked at it, he wished nothing more than to have been like one of her friends’ dads that helped with moving in and fixing up the house, maybe slipping her a hundred dollar bill to spend on groceries or alcohol on his way out to the car after saying goodbye.

Instead, he was stuck in Colombia under the thumb of the U.S. government and sleazy CIA agents that were controlling him like a puppet.

He’s here now, though. And he’s trying so hard to get over the tightness in his chest, to clear the lump in his throat, and to dry his sweaty palms when he gets up the creaky wooden steps and up to the front door. His middle finger presses the doorbell aggressively, taking a step back and shaking out his shoulders again.

Gaze focused on his shoes, he looked up as he heard the door unlock. A wide, genuine grin breaks out on his face when he sees Liliana in the threshold, that same smile copied and pasted onto hers, even down to the dimple on his right cheek.

“Tata (Dad)! You’re here!” she exclaims, jumping out of the door and hooking her arms around his neck. He laughs as he catches her, one arm wrapping around her waist and his other hand reaching up to hold the back of her head. He pets her long, brunette hair, squeezing her in a tight hug against his chest.

“Oh, Lili Pad. Missed you so much, mija.” He kisses the side of her head before loosening his hold on her, taking in the sight of his daughter after seeing her only through photographs for years.

“Tata, I’m graduating college tomorrow. Not little Lili Pad anymore.”

Her eye roll gives Javier’s attitude a run for its money.

Damn, she really got a lot from his gene pool.

The same deep brown eyes with hints of amber, softened and round give away their every emotion. The same mouth that finds a perfect pout, combined with those eyes he was always pushed over when she was younger. Anything she wanted, he would give to her. Even now.

She has your nose, though. Your ears. Your feminine facial structure. Your charming, warm personality.

“You’re always gonna be Lili Pad, amorcita. Always gonna be my babygirl,” he presses another kiss to her temple, unraveling her from him, “But you have grown into such a beautiful woman, Lili. You remind me of your mamá when she was your age.”

“There’s that Peña charm.”

He looks over his daughter’s shoulder and sees you leaning against the banister, arms crossed over your chest with a smirk playing at your lips. His heart rate increases to double speed, his now dry hands clamming up again as he drinks you in from head to toe.

Years away and he is still so fucking in love with you.

Another reason to curse his time in Colombia.

It was a mutual decision, to split up before he left. There was no timeline for how long he would be gone or when he could come back that first time he went down there.

And there was no way in hell he was putting the two most important people in his life in the middle of what was basically a fucking warzone.

So, that was that. Co-parents, and close friends.

And an agonizing ache every time he saw you since he left.

He grins right back at you, Lili waving him inside after her. Crossing the entryway to you, he opens his arms with a quirk of his brows.

Your smirk reaches its full stretch, shifting into a gracious smile as you drop your arms and step into his, snaking your hands around to his back. He holds you tightly, a shorter embrace than the one with Liliana but long enough for your signature scent to pull him back to being a young, dumb college student who was madly in love. A chaste kiss is pressed to your cheek before he pulls away.

“I’m pretty sure she gets that from you, amor. I don’t recall a time when you weren’t able to get what you wanted — everyone you meet thinks you’re a delight.”

“See? More charm. Laying it on a little thick, Jav,” you tease, hitting your fist against his bicep gently.

He glances at your arm when you lower it back to your side, catching the glint of the bracelet with Liliana’s initials in gold charms that is always on your wrist. He gave it to you after she was born, once she was taken home from the hospital and the two of you were standing over her crib watching her sleep. Ever since then, he’s never seen you without it.

“Alright, alright. Enough of the weird, complimentary back-and-forth you guys do. Do you wanna see the place before I move out, viejo?” Lili cuts in and Javi’s eyes leave your wrist to look at her with a smile.

“Ay, no soy viejo, princesa (Ay, I am not old, princess). Now lead the way and no more making fun of me,” he nods for her to walk ahead of him, taking a few steps and glancing back at you, “You not coming on the tour, amor?”

You shake your head and give Liliana a look that says ‘Care to explain?’. Being on the receiving end of that look many times, he knows it a bit too well coming from you.

“Mom is being amazing and helpful and wonderful like Mom always is and is packing my closet for me.” Lili cringes as she admits it to her father, Javier shaking his head and letting out a long exhale.

“Liliana, you have known you’re moving for months and you’ve waited until the day before graduation to pack? Dios, somos demasiado parecidos (God, we are too much alike),” he nods for her to continue walking as you laugh behind him, the sound traveling as you walk upstairs and bringing a faint smile to his lips as he follows his daughter.

He hovers around Lili’s room as you pace from her closet to the cases laid out on the floor, organizing everything and folding as you walk back and forth. Your daughter is downstairs, tasked with packing up her items from the kitchen and the living room. Javi’s been given the whole tour, now dropped off to “catch up with Mom”, as Lili put it.

Across the surfaces and walls, he spies the little gifts he’s sent her over his years away: all of the birthday cards he’s hand-picked and written letters in stacked in a box on her desk, the mola depicting lilies framed and hanging on her wall, the brightly colored Wayuu mochila that he’d bought from one of the open air markets in Bogotá hanging off of the door knob to her closet.

There’s a sharp pain in his chest when he sees the small picture frames sitting on her nightstand. He sits on the edge of her bed and picks them up one by one to study them. The first is a photo of you and Lili, smiling from ear to ear. He recognizes the photo as one he took on his visit before last, the one he made before Lili went to college. The pair of you are standing in the middle of an overgrown field on the Peña ranch, sun setting in the background. Lili insisted on watching the sunset all together on Javi’s last night at home, and he snuck the camera out with the three of you.

He has a copy of the photo right next to his bed, too.

Setting the frame down delicately, he picks up the next one, this one of Lili and him alone. It’s from years ago, the wide smile on Lili’s face showing off her missing front tooth. Javi grins back at his little girl in the photo, his eyes combing over to the younger version of him, way back when he was a sheriff in Laredo. It must have been during the holidays — there’s a shiny plastic red gift bow on his chest and Lili is wearing a knit sweater with a snowman on it.

Where did all the time go?

The last photograph grows the lump in his throat and the ache in between his ribs. It’s a photo of the three of you, one from his most recent visit a couple of years ago. Dressed up for a Dean’s Award ceremony that Liliana was nominated for. She looks like the spitting image of you, and you are absolutely glowing with pride for her. You two are so beautiful. He looks exhausted, anxiety in his eyes that never seems to have left since his first year in the DEA. It was around the time when he thought he was going to be able to stay, to be around for Lili and for you. He told you what happened in Colombia that got him sent home; you understood, of course, you understood why he did it all. And he admitted it all with the faintest smile on his face, the thought of getting to settle was appealing more and more to him.

And then he got the call.

He battled with the decision.

He talked to you about it.

You said, “We’re always gonna be here, Jav. You need to go. What’s a few more years?”

Everything. A few more years was everything.

He missed so much.

“You okay, Jav?”

He looks up from the photo in his hands, eyes focusing back on the room instead of a million miles ahead. You are kneeling next to one of the suitcases, carefully placing some of your daughter’s clothes in neatly. Those eyes you’re giving him turn his brain to mush, all of the escalating thoughts dripping away.

“Yeah, yeah, all good. Reminiscing,” he nods to himself as he turns the photo for you to see before setting it back down, pulling a grin onto his face, “Do you remember when the three of us would all go out to dinner or meet up with my tíos and tías when Lili was a baby? And they would always ask us when we were getting married?”

A gentle laugh comes from you as you think back, knowing how many times you got asked the same question over and over again.

“Yes, I definitely remember that. I also remember you getting so annoyed one day that you just—”

“Lied and said that we got married at the courthouse?”

“Yes! I got such an onslaught of questions after you said that. That news, which wasn’t even news, spread like wildfire throughout your family.”

“Well, at least it got people off our backs, esposa,” he winks, grin lifting to one side to meld into a smirk.

You roll your eyes dramatically, the wide smile peeling your lips apart making Javi’s heart race faster.

“You want some help, amor? Feel like an imbécil not doing anything,” he slaps his hands on his knees as he stands from Lili’s bed, taking the handful of steps that separate you. One knee is bent to bring him down to the ground, huffing out a sigh as he gets fully onto his knees.

“Sure you’re gonna be able to get up from the floor, viejo?” You raise an eyebrow at him as you continue to put rolled clothes into the luggage. Javier rolls his eyes, shaking his head.

“I think I can handle getting up from the ground, bromista. Been jumping off of roofs and trekking through fucking jungles for seven years.” He doesn’t wait for your response, grabbing one of the unfolded shirts from next to you and attempting to fold it as neatly as you’ve done with the rest of them.

“Alright, alright. I believe you. How about I roll, you organize what I hand you into the suitcase? Sounds good?” You hold a hand out for the shirt in his hand, a small laugh as he resigns his attempt and passes the fabric over.

“Sí, jefa (Yes, boss),” a soft grin pulls one side of his mouth up, deepening the dimple on his right cheek. You look at him with your own tender smile when you hand him a rolled pair of jeans to put away, reaching your hand up to poke the little crevice in his cheek like you always do — like you always did.

The two of you work quietly for a few minutes, falling into a rhythm. Liliana makes noise from downstairs, cabinets open and closing, sounds of bubble wrap being ripped echoing throughout the house.

“How’re you doin’, Jav?”

The question strikes him, slumping his shoulders and training his gaze on the shirt in his hands as he rubs his index and thumb over the softened cotton.

It’s a simple enough question; he expected you to ask when you first saw him. In a greeting, he thought it would be easy to brush it off, tell you ‘Estoy bien’ or that he was happy to be home.

But right now, packing up his daughter’s clothes to move her out of college and back into your home — the day before his little girl’s graduation — it feels too difficult to lie.

Sitting alone here with you, the mother of his daughter, the beauty that gave him his greatest gift, the woman — the strong, commanding, warm, gentle woman that he is still so incredibly in love with — is drawing the truth out of him before he can fully catch up with what he’s admitting.

“Feeling like a real pendejo. I missed so much. Too much, amor. I’m sorry.”

“Jav. You are here now. You always show up when she needs her Tata. Even if it’s not physically, you show up for her every day. No more of that talk this weekend, do you hear me? You’re here. That’s it. Not missing anything.”

How do you always know what to say to him?

How did he ever walk away from you?

Javier nods his head, pressing his lips into a tight line as his fingers twitch for nicotine. He would kill for that slow drag of smoke filling his lungs, relaxing his racing mind and heart with a break that lasts as long as the burning paper and tobacco.

Instead, he stands on his knees, grabbing the plastic pack out of his pocket and popping out a chiclet of gum, tossing it into his mouth, and chewing furiously. The look on your face is observational, a twitch of your lips into the faintest grin calms him nearly as much as a cigarette would.

He sits back on his haunches, one of his hands reaching to touch you, faltering when your head turns down to fold the item of clothing in your hands.

“Te quiero, esposa,” his hand grazes his fingertips along the denim covering his thighs, twitching to move the hair curtaining your face, “Thank you.”

“No need to thank me, Jav,” your head shakes back and forth subtly, eyes lifting from your lap and softening as you smile at him, “Love you, too.”

“Jesús Cristo, Liliana, you have a lot of shit. I went to college with a suitcase and a duffle bag — and left four years later with just the duffle bag,” Javier shakes his head as he carries the last piece of luggage downstairs to the living room where the rest of her packed belongings are accumulating to pack up in your three cars the day after her graduation.

“God, Jav, you sound like my father. ‘I walked twelve miles to school with rocks in my backpack and in a foot of snow’,” you drop your voice to mock him, laughing with your daughter as she walks in from the kitchen and stands next to you, “Getting to be an old man, Peña.”

“Mamá is right, Tata. You’re the youngest dad out of all my friends and you sound the oldest right now,” Lili says through a wide smile, and you laugh with her now, sending Javier a brightly teasing grin.

He grumbles and rolls his eyes, waving a hand at both of you dismissively.

“Yeah, yeah. Enough from you two bromistas. Y’know, I didn’t miss you two ganging up on me — it was one thing through the phone, but in person is just too much.”

Your tongue clicks and you walk over to him, pinching his cheek as you pass by him, “Aw, Jav, it’s all love. You’re just easy to rile up, makes it fun.”

You wink at him with your back to Liliana, slipping out of the room to grab more of her boxes from the kitchen. At your touch and the minuscule flirtation, his heart rate thumps louder in his ears. His eyes follow you out of the room, snapping back when Liliana asks him a question. He shakes himself out of the trance, looking over to his daughter and stepping over to where she’s stood in front of an open box.

“Qué pasa, mija? (What’s up, my daughter?)” Javier reaches an arm up and wraps it around her shoulders, holding her against his side as he presses a kiss to her head. His eyes drop to what’s held in front of her, a chill running down his spine when he sees a photo of Escobar across the front page of the newspaper, the headline reading ‘ESCOBAR KILLED IN MEDELLÍN’.

“Do you want this copy, Tata? I kept two of them, but I think the other one is already packed away and I don’t know if I need both anymore really. Kept one to show my professors all about you,” Lili turns her head and looks up at him.

Javier shakes his head, a tight smile facing his daughter before he drops his arm from her shoulders.

“No, no thanks, mija. No need to keep the other one either. I wasn’t even there for that, amorcita. I think I was actually about to come over to Mamá’s house to see you when I got the call,” he tasks his antsy hands with sealing a cardboard box with packing tape, “May as well toss them out. Or send them to Mr. Murphy if you want them to be kept safe.”

“I don’t want to get rid of the other one. I want to keep it. Even if you weren’t there for it, you still did so much work to get to that point, Tata. I mean, you doing all of that in Colombia is what made me want to do criminal psychology,” she carefully slips the newspaper into one of the open boxes, closing it up and holding her hand out for the tape roll.

“Mi princesa, you—“

“I know, Tata. I promise I am not going to be running on rooftops or caught in the middle of shootouts with the DEA. No fighting cartels, viejo. I just want to work with profiling and behind-the-scenes stuff.” She takes the tape, closing up the box completely as Javier’s heart cinches in his chest.

He is so incredibly proud of his Lili Pad, but he can’t deny how angry he got when Liliana chose her major finally — of course, it had to be criminology. She explained she was drawn to it because of his work, but assured that she is not interested in doing the same thing he has done for years. Behind the scenes, possibly going into forensic psychology or helping to profile criminals. Office jobs, for the most part. But he couldn’t shake that anger inside for months; never been angry with his daughter, and he knew she was as headstrong as him and would achieve what she wanted. He was angry with himself, for even planting any sort of seed, even unknowingly, for Lili to get into this type of work. He knows that eventually her end of the promise might not be kept — he knows her, how easily excitable she can get with new opportunities. She’ll likely end up climbing ranks or even getting into some agency like the FBI or something.

The thought of her out there, in a tac vest or with a weapon, makes bile burn his esophagus.

“Alright, I think we’re done here for today. Better go check into the hotel and we can get ready quick, then we can swing by and pick you up for dinner, Lili.” Your voice pulls him out of his spiral, stare focusing back into the room and glancing over at you in the doorway from the kitchen.

“Sí, jefa. Sounds like a plan,” he pats the pockets of his jeans and feels for his truck keys, “You gonna be ready if we come in an hour, princesa?”

Lili rolls her eyes, crossing her arms over her chest and popping her hip out, a stance all too familiar to Javier.

“Sí, Tata. Besides, I’m not the one you should be asking that to. Mom is always the one who takes longer to get ready.”

Javier laughs when you walk over to your daughter, pinching her side playfully. He shakes his head and gives Liliana a knowing look.

“Mija, I have known that fact about your mamá for longer than you’ve been alive. I’m guessing it will be an hour and a half until we’re back, but wanted to make sure you were actually ready. An hour to you women is at least an hour and fifteen to the rest of the world.”

Javier smiles with a loud laugh as both you and Lili approach him and swat his arms, pinching his sides without causing any pain whatsoever. There were protests on either side of him, his daughter and her mother annoyed with the judgments on their time management but all three of them knew he was right.

“Alright, alright, I apologize…” he surrenders from the assault with his hands up, taking deep breaths as he recovers from his laughter before continuing with a smirk, “But we all know I’m right!”

Javier makes a quick exit out of the room and through the front door before any other hits or pinches can be given to him, hearing the stifled laughter from you and Lili from inside the house.

“Yeah, you better run, Jav!” you call out as you gather your purse and fish out your car keys, saying a quick goodbye to Lili and following his path out of the house, “Now I’m gonna be ready in an hour just to prove you wrong.”

“That would only make me overjoyed. Maybe we could make our reservation in time then,” he waves goodbye to Liliana before turning to continue down the front path of her house, to his truck parked in front of your small SUV.

“You wanna follow me over there?” he asks as he unlocks the driver’s side door, watching you open yours and nod to him.

“Yeah, sounds good to me. Don’t be driving like a bat out of hell, though, Javier.”

“Hey, I can’t make any promises. Used to driving all around Colombian cities, it’s a lot different on those roads,” he jokes before making sure you get into your car, hopping into the truck, and listening to the engine turn over before he leads you both over to your accommodations for the rest of the weekend.

“You have got to be kidding me.”

“I’m so sorry, Mr. Peña. We would normally be absolutely willing to find a solution for you, but we’re fully booked for the graduation weekend. We only have one room for you.” The front desk receptionist looks terrified of Javier at this moment, his glare that he has perfected, normally reserved for serious criminals or dirty agents, is aimed directly at the young college student working here.

When the two of you were trying to check in, they had been informed that the reservation Javier had made for the two of you, two standard rooms, had been double booked, resulting in the parties involved only getting delegated one room each.

His jaw notched to the side, hands gripping the edge of the front counter with his arms wide and head dipping down in annoyance. He picks it up, addressing the hotel employee again.

“I made a reservation months ago. I called from fucking Colombia — I paid about forty dollars wasting twenty minutes on the phone with whoever was working that day just to get this booked—”

“Jav,” your hand finds his chest as his eyes find yours, the rapid heartbeat thumping in his chest definitely not slowing down at what was supposed to be your soothing touch, “It’s fine. We can survive with one room for two nights. It’s either taking this or sleeping on the floor at Lili’s.”

Holding your gaze, he can see the words unsaid in the look you’re giving him.

Shut up and take the room key.

And there’s no way he is continuing to argue with the kid in front of him as he squirms under your own stern stare. With a grumble, he straightens up, your hand leaving his chest and cool, conditioned air chilling the spot that was covered in your warmth. The rest of the check-in process is painless, with Javier paying for the stay and taking the room keys. He turns around to face you, handing you one of the access cards and nodding toward the elevators.

“Let me take that, amor.” He leans down and grabs both duffles from the floor, one his and one yours, following your lead over to the elevators. The two of you stand and wait for the doors to open, the familiar ding alerting them to which one will be taking them up to their floor. When the doors slide apart, a large group of people started to spill out into the lobby. You step back to avoid a collision with a man not watching where he is walking, and Javier’s hand immediately finds your lower back to steady you. It lingers as the rush of people clears out — he makes no move to take it away until he guides you into the small square space, dropping his touch to press the button for your floor.

Once the two of you make it into the room, he sets your bags down on the desk and dresser, walking over to the thermostat to turn it down for you without a second thought.

“You remember,” you observe with a grin, rifling through your bag to find your toiletries and a change of clothes for dinner.

“Course I do, always had to have the air blasting in our apartment or the house. You never could sleep without a massive blanket and your toes under my legs. Never did understand your need to be freezing, always,” he chuckles at the memories of every night with you, until the separation when he was assigned to Bogotá.

“I dunno why either, just was always the most comfortable. Felt cozier, plus it always gave an excuse to cuddle.” Your giggle sends a tingle from his ears down the back of his neck and across his shoulders, a shudder easily blamed on the intense fans of the air-con.

“Go ahead and take the first shower, esposa. I’ll wait so that you can have more time to get ready and all that,” Javier crosses the room, saddling up next to you to rummage through his own weekender bag. In his periphery, he can see you flash a smile as you gather your things in one arm, using the free hand to brush across his shoulder blades when you walk behind him.

“Very kind, Jav. I’ll be quick, I promise.”

You stand in the doorway of the bathroom and he picks his head up, turning it to look at you. Head to toe, he scans you quickly before settling on your face, shaking his head.

“Take your time, amor. We both know I can be ready in ten minutes if I need to be,” he sends you a wink and half a smirk appears when you laugh, shutting the door behind you.

He hears the water run, kicking off his boots and sitting at the edge of the bed with an extensive sigh. Rubbing his eyes of exhaustion, he’s still for a moment. Shoulders drop, limbs feeling heavy as the day catches up with him. Moving, packing, even fighting with himself has drained him over the course of the day.

He loved spending time with his Liliana again, seeing her eager to walk the stage tomorrow and collect her diploma. And being around you again, drudging up all of the feelings and desires and words that he has tamped down for the last seven years. But it all comes with reminders of how absent he was, thousands of miles away, how undeserving he is of being welcomed back into the arms of you two, how his daughter was so proud, idolized him so much that she chose to study a major that puts her in the same field of work. He deserves distance from her, a cold shoulder from you — aloofness of some sort for the choice he made.

At least that’s what he’s told himself over and over for nearly the last decade. No matter how much you or Lili continually proved those thoughts wrong, they always came back.

He glances at his watch before standing and moving toward the bag again, hearing the water shut off and moving to grab his toiletries. Taking out the leather Dopp kit jostles something else in the bag loose, flinging it out onto the floor. Bending down with a sigh to retrieve it, he’s faced with the metal badge emblazoned with the DEA seal and ‘USA’ carved into it. It must have been in the bag from his plane ride earlier this week, and it serves as a blatant reminder of what he needs to talk to you about on this trip. What he needs to tell Liliana, too.

The badge gets thrown back into the bag and he walks toward the open bathroom door, stopping short within the threshold. You’re standing at the counter, products splayed around you to do your makeup. Even after living with you for 15 years, he barely has a clue what any of it does besides lipstick and mascara. He’d spent many mornings and evenings listening to you explaining your routine, but never quite getting down all the product names. There’s a pang in his chest, felt deep in the bones of his rib cage; the sight gives him major deja vu, nostalgia wavering over him. Even his subconscious longs for a time when you were his.

A humorous smile reflects back at him with your eyes glued to his in the mirror. Your fingers tap a rogue-colored product across your cheeks, giving you a bit of a brighter, subtly flushed look.

“Sorry, Jav, promise I’ll be out of here in like five minutes. I am trying to be quick.”

“Cálmate, amor. No hay prisa.There’s no rush, really…” he clears his throat, setting his toiletry bag down on an open space at the counter. He leans one hip against it, body facing you and studying the motions of painting your face while his mind works up the courage to bring up the pressing conversation.

“I, um, I actually have to tell you something.” His eyes cast down to the side, the grout of the tiles suddenly interested him.

“What is, Jav? You can tell me anything, you know that.” The compact in your hand is forgotten, clicked closed, and set down next to you as you mirror his stance. One hip against the counter, facing him.

“I know. I know. There’s just—It’s kind of a big thing and I wanted to tell you as soon as it all happened but I didn’t know how things would exactly shake out…”

“Javier. Take a breath,” you instruct him, hand against his chest with purposeful pressure, taking a deep inhale along with him and letting it out slowly. You don’t remove your hand, and he’s grateful for the gesture.

“I retired from the DEA two days ago. The morning before I left to come home. So, uh, I’m back at the ranch with Pop and I’ll be here now.” A mess of emotion comes out of his voice — fear, anxiety, relief, disappointment. Painfully, he drags his eyes up to your face, seeing your eyes wide with surprise and your brows relaxing from shooting up at the news. It’s an unreadable, unfamiliar expression; he watches as it all morphs behind your eyes before sympathy washes over every feature of yours, tender tone speaking up in the tiny bathroom.

“What happened?”

Everything was spilling out after that — information that was surely spreading across the US over the last 48 hours, not that he paid any attention to the news right now. Ambassador Crosby told him that he had won, that the Cali Godfathers would be locked up, at least for the foreseeable future. How dirty he felt when Crosby said the words, “You played the system like a goddamn fiddle…” The ledger proving the Colombian president’s campaign donations from the Cali cartel in exchange for immunity, the knowledge that the US government allowed all of it to occur, how he had spoken about it all to the reporter from El Tiempo.

“Javier, Jav, oh—I’m so proud of you.” The air is knocked him his lungs when the sound of those words reaches his ears, the next second being wrapped up in your tight embrace. It takes a moment to register your hug before he relaxes his weight against you, tension melting as you speak to him right next to his ear, “You told the truth. You helped every single Colombian citizen know what their government was doing to them. Just, holy shit, Javi. That’s fucking badass. I’m so, so proud of you, honey.”

Kindness, understanding, and comfort ooze around him and break down the stoicism that he’s been masked with for the last two days, tears welling in his eyes and spilling a few over that he quickly wipes away.

How can you always seem to find endless compassion for him? He’s just told you he quit his job with no real backup plan and all you said was how proud of him you are.

You’re a really good friend.

A great friend, actually.

Fuck, he is so in love with you still it hurts.

“Thank you…I don’t deserve your pride though, I did so many bad things,” his voice is hoarse on the last word, tightening his arms around you to quell his emotion.

“None of that, Jav. You uncovered a whole fucking…political scandal. Told people what their governments were doing. That’s honest; it’s ethical and respectable. You did the right thing, Jav.”

The last few words grow the lump in his throat, a slow nod against the side of your head. His lips brush your ear, confiding as if it is something he hasn’t said many times before, “Te quiero, amor.”

The smile is evident in your voice despite the fact that the hug keeps your face from his sight, and the saccharine sweetness of your voice sends his heart racing again, “Love you too, honey.”

At dinner, once there’d been a few drinks and some food served, Javier told Liliana the news he broke to you in your hotel bathroom. Albeit, it was an abridged version, details of his mistakes and pains of guilt left out for his precious daughter’s sake. She was eager to get out into the world and make a difference, and he had all the faith that she could, unlike him. He didn’t want his story to taint her view of what she was going to be able to achieve with her sheer determination.

He had that at one point. Probably lost it sometime in the last few years, slowly and then all at once when those tapes were found.

Liliana was understanding of her father resigning, chalking it up to his years down there catching up with him and teasing him for being an old man now. He took it gracefully, laughing along with the two of you and riffing on his own, with self-effacing jokes. As the conversation wrapped up, questions from Lili were answered by him — he was home, for good, living with Chucho and helping run the ranch. He would absolutely be around to help her get ready for her first day at work and help her move into her new apartment in San Antonio. And yes, he would be delighted to come over for dinner once or twice a week to spend some time with her, and you. Liliana had formulated the idea herself, earning a nod of approval from you and a warm invitation seconded.

After he accepted, Liliana changed the subject to rant about whoever the university had chosen for the commencement speech and how random of a choice it was. He listened intently, always hanging on every word from his Lili Pad, but he couldn’t help but be distracted by your hand coming to the place on his thigh closest to his knee, resting there for a moment before giving him a supportive squeeze. Nothing was spoken about the gesture, no looks were exchanged when your hand stayed there until the food came.

Sitting in the booth, observing and listening to his girls bounce back and forth in conversation, he finds the first moment of resounding comfort that he’s felt in seven years.

The last conversation he had with Spencer just days ago after the recent trial in D.C. rings in his mind, the two men standing at the displayed photos of Special Agents from the DEA.

He had asked Javier, “What else is a guy like you gonna do?”

At the time, Javier wasn’t too sure.

But now, with two of his favorite smiles beaming, one identical to his own, and the chorus of laughter that soundtracks his life, and his heart racing, the heart that bleeds for his family sitting here with him, he knows what he’s gonna do.

Be a father.

Be a partner.

Be a friend, a son, a lover, a teacher, a student, a listener, a provider, a protector.

Be everything he hasn’t been for nearly a decade.

He is going to be there for you two. No matter what.

The two of you are back in the hotel room, Liliana dropped off safely at her home and promptly reminded of the schedule for tomorrow. Javier threw her a, “Don’t be too hungover,” that you rolled your eyes at, the faintest of smiles on your face, knowing exactly how Javier was at his own graduation. You, unknowingly pregnant with Lili at the time, were feeling sick and extremely nervous to be seeing his parents the next day, so there was no drinking for you that night. The next morning you were rubbing his back as he threw up before dragging him into the shower and then dressing him like a doll.

He remembers the only thing he was thinking that morning was how much he loved you, how much he was going to miss you after moving home to Laredo to become a sheriff while you were finishing school the next year.

Life seemed so simple back then; only had to worry about visiting his girlfriend at the weekends, showing up for work on time, and taking care of his parents.

A few weeks later, you told him you were pregnant.

God, how fast was time moving? He feels like that was merely last year.

“Bathroom’s all yours, Jav.”

He looks up from his duffel to see you walking out in your pajamas, a smirk crossing his face at the faded Texas A&M shirt he recognized from his own closet from years before. With a nod to you, he unbuttons his shirt halfway before talking to you over his shoulder.

“I can take the floor, amor. You take the bed.”

A loud laugh from behind turns him around, and you look at him like he’s got about four heads.

“Javier Luis, you’re not going to be able to get up in the morning if you sleep on the floor, viejo. If it’s weird for you to sleep in the bed with me, I’ll be the one to take the floor.”

“No, you’re not. And it’s not weird for me, I just didn’t know if you would be comfortable with it.”

“Don’t know if you forgot, but we have slept in the same bed together before, Jav. It’s kind of how we have a daughter, you dork,” you snort and climb onto the plush mattress, slipping under the duvet and leaning up against the pillows.

“Hey, I was trying to be a gentleman, no need for the name-calling.”

“You are always a gentleman, hon, no need to try. Plus I have to call you names, who else will keep you humble?”

“Our daughter. That’s who. I think she’s worse than you with the jokes,” he laughs.

Your smile widens, laughing along with him and shrugging, “I wonder where she gets that from.”

A wink is sent his way, stirring his stomach before he clears his throat and nods to the bathroom, “Gonna get ready for bed, you all done in there?”

“Yeah, yeah. Go for it,” you wave toward the bathroom, grabbing your book from the nightstand.

Javier makes quick work of brushing his teeth and the rest of his night routine, avoiding his tired reflection before shutting the lights out and going back into the bedroom. Book still in your hand, he stands in his jeans again, rubbing the back of his neck. Without looking up you pat the spot next to you.

“I know you sleep in your boxers, just get in the damn bed.”

Ever since you became a mom, your power of reading his mind has gotten way too good.

Well, maybe it isn’t perfect cause if you could read his mind, you probably wouldn’t have suggested sharing a bed again with the amount of time he spends thinking about you.

“Sometimes it makes me mad how often you know what I’m going to say,” he grumbles and shucks off his jeans leaving them at the side of the bed and climbing under the covers. He stays comfortably at the side of the bed, sighing deeply as he closes his eyes.

“Comes with experience.”

“Why can’t I do it for you then?” He opens his eyes and turns onto his side to look at you, “I’ve known you just as long as you’ve known me.”

The book in your hands is closed, and laid in your lap, looking down at Javier and shrugging, “You have your own way of it. I might know what you’re going to say, but you always anticipate everyone’s needs and you’re always one step ahead of me. I mean, you always see like four steps ahead. You saved Lili many broken bones at the playground growing up and you always used to be able to cheer me up and fix whatever was making me sad or angry before I really even knew what it was myself.”

A grin slowly pulls the corners of your lips apart, one of your hands reaching over to tap the top of his head.

“Well, I quickly learned the signs of your hangriness. That was most often the reason you were upset,” he chuckles, one side of his mouth ticking up as he relaxes further into the bed.

Comfortable silence falls over the two of you as you read your book for a few more minutes, Javier lying next to you and trying, half-assed, to fall asleep. He really was just sneaking glances at you every time he adjusted positions, admiring the concentrated look on your face, engrossed in the story.

At one point, the book was shut for the night and set on the nightstand, the lamp clicked off and you relaxed back into bed. You turned on your side to face him, voice whisper quiet, “You asleep, Jav?”

He hums lowly, vibrations absorbed by the mattress before his eyes peel open and adjust to the darkness.

“Not yet. Qué pasa, amor?”

“Did you quit smoking?”

“Uh, I guess so, yeah. Why are you asking that now?”

“Just curious. I didn’t see you dip outside to smoke at all today and you got a non-smoking room, too. Very un-Javier.”

“Oh, is that all I am to you, esposa? A smoker?” He has a lilt of teasing in his voice, raising his eyebrows as you laugh faintly.

“Shut up, I didn’t say that.” There’s a gentle shove to his shoulder before your hands are back by you, tucked under your chin as you curl up again.

“I was going to congratulate you on quitting, but now I’m not sure if I want to, meanie.”

“You’re the one randomly questioning me about my habits! Meanie.”

“I am not a meanie, I had no bad intentions!”

“Sure, and what would you have said if I told you I didn’t quit?”

Javier gives you a satisfied smirk when you’re silent, shaking his head to himself.

“Knew it,” he rolls onto his back, hand resting on his stomach and turning his head to the side, “I quit ‘cause Lili called me before I came home and asked me to. She’s asked for a while, but I kept putting it off with the stress of work and everything. Thought now’s the time after I resigned.”

In the darkness, he suddenly feels your hand on his bicep closest to you, rubbing up and down slowly.

“You’re a good dad, Jav. The best. Glad you’re the one I got to have a kid with.”

If he says anything now, it will come out incoherent from the lump sitting in his throat. Instead, he hums in response, nothing else spoken until you’ve fallen asleep.

“I’m glad it was me, too.”

It is hot as fuck.

He’s trying so hard not to sweat his ass off while in the cattle of people funneling into the arena at this moment, attempting to keep his light beige button-up dry. He was going to wear his normal uniform of jeans and a short-sleeved shirt when he heard the weather report on the TV this morning, but your face when you saw him pull out navy slacks and his long-sleeved shirt that he packed, was too excitable and adorable to not wear anything else — “We’ll be matching! Our pictures will be so cute with Lili in her white dress.” Standing in your floral, mid-length navy dress, who was he to deny you those coordinated photos?

Things had been much more…familiar since last night and this morning. It was the back and forth that was effortless, the fall into a perfectly choreographed routine — him anticipating your moves and you knowing what he was thinking before he could even ask a question. The close quarters of the shared room suddenly felt much too large to Javier; he was desperate for too small of space so he could stay close to you, but with 15 years of experience living together, and even longer dating, you moved too in sync with each other to collide.

He was close to you this morning, though, waking up at the sound of the alarm clock next to his side of the bed; his arm moved to shut it off, coasting along your hip and thigh before reaching behind him to stop the noise. A grumble from you pulled him back, positioning himself again on his side and adjusting the arm that ended up underneath your head, his chest enveloping your back when his other arm slung around your waist. If he closed his eyes, he could swear it was any other morning from before Colombia, stretching all the way back to his bed in his shitty college apartment that you tolerated spending nights in.

There isn’t a thing in this world he wouldn’t give to be able to have this wake up every day from now on.

He knows he needs to talk to you, to tell you all that he is feeling, but he can’t bring himself to do it now. Not before his daughter’s college graduation when the two of you are getting along like old friends. The peace shouldn’t be disrupted by you potentially rejecting him.

Which has brought him standing behind you in the crowd of parents and families, a hand on your lower back to keep a tab on you as everyone filters in through the doors. He keeps his eyes scanning out of habit, searching for a danger that surely isn’t there, while you chat away with Chucho walking directly next to you.

His attention is elsewhere, anxiety creeping into his bones at the masses gathering here, impossible to keep tabs on everyone. The three most important people to him are in this building, and he has no means to protect them if something happened—

No. Enough. This isn’t Colombia. There are no sicarios here.

It’s supposed to be an enjoyable day.

The thoughts circle in his mind as a mantra while the three of you find seats, Javier tailing with you in the middle of him and his father. You sit at the end of one row, holding the same order when you finally take your seats.

Smoothing your skirt, Javier watches as you turn to Chucho, giving him an update about something that was recently repaired in the house.

“Wait, you had to get a new water heater? Why didn’t you tell me you needed one?” he interjects with an edge, brow furrowing as he grills you.

“Jav, it was fine, Pops helped me call around for quotes and we found a good deal. It was solved in like two days. It didn’t seem like it was something I needed to make a long-distance phone call for,” you sigh defeatedly, leaning back and looking down at your nails, fidgeting with your fingers at his harshness.

Javier rolls his eyes, grumbling under his breath, “I should have known. Could’ve helped with it…Eres tan terca. Nunca pides ayuda, incluso si la necesitas. Terca. (You are so stubborn. You never ask for help, even if you need it. Stubborn.)”

Chucho stretches an arm behind your back, hitting his shoulders to sit up and addressing him with a stern tone.

“Mijo, no te pongas tan quisquilloso. Ella no quería preocuparte todo el camino allí abajo. Disculpas. (Son, don't be so oversensitive. She didn't want to worry you all the way down there. Apologize.)”

His jaw ticks to the side, sitting up straight, and shaking his head. With a sigh, he turns to you, leaning closer to speak without his father overhearing.

“I’m sorry, amor. I didn’t mean to be rude; I get frustrated not being around to help you with stuff like that. Shouldn’t have taken it out on you like that. ‘M glad Pop was there to help if I couldn’t.”

Your hand rests on his thigh, patting lovingly as you respond at the same level as him, “Next time, I’ll call you first, Jav. And then you can be the one to call Chucho for actual help.”

A smirk grows at your jest, and he falls back into his seat with a scoff.

“God, you are ruthless. Always with the jokes, esposa. Don’t know if I should be sticking around if it’ll be like this,” he chuckles, stretching an arm behind you and resting it on the back of your chair.

“Yeah, yeah. We both know you’re gonna be around a lot more now.” His head snaps to the side to see you looking ahead with the faintest of smiles, biting back a much wider one as you lean back into his arm.

After a processional to Pomp and Circumstance, all three of you waving madly to Liliana when she spotted you in the crowd, the ceremony proceeds with little fanfare. Speeches are made, congratulations extended to all of the students from various faculty members and the special guest speaker. When it finally came time for conferring of degrees, Javier awaits the long line of A though O names. The three of you stand, watching the handful of students ahead of Lili cross the stage.

The dean of her college stands at the microphone, saying with a rehearsed smile, “Liliana Raquel Peña, Summa Cum Laude.”

At the announcement of her name and honors, the three of you erupt in cheers for the young woman crossing the stage. Javier whistles with his fingers, holding out the sound as long as he can before clapping his hands together wildly. Once Lili is descending the stairs and back to her seat, you all wave to her again as she beams up at you and shows off her diploma folder.

The moment he’s seated again, he turns his head to the side, seeing your faint tears streaking your face. On instinct, he reaches for your hand before he can second guess it and laces your fingers together with a gentle squeeze. A pitiful laugh slips out from you when you look back at him, a blubbering smile parting your lips.

Javier leans closer to you, centimeters from your ear to confide, “I think you did an amazing job raising our girl, amor. Thank you.”

In the back room of a local restaurant, the Peña extended family mills about, filling the room with sound from the music over the speakers and everyone chatting and catching up with each other — especially congratulating the guest of honor.

Aunts and uncles and cousins that were available have all flocked together to celebrate Liliana, and despite the overwhelming urge to Irish exit this party because of the constant comments and questions about Colombia, Javier is staying until you’re ready to leave. Which undoubtedly will be until the end of your reservation.

He sits at one of the tables pushed to the side of the room, sleeves rolled up to expose his forearms and crossing his limbs over his chest as he reclines in the wooden chair. Buttons of his shirt have been undone post-photos with the grad, the air conditioning cooling his sun-baked skin. His fingers can still feel the phantom of your linen dress, his hand affixed to your lower back in all of the photos taken.

Easily, with a quick scan of the room, he finds you talking to his mamá’s sister, Tia Rose. You’re smiling brightly, the crinkles at your eyes showing off your joy as his aunt surely is congratulating you or complimenting you on how you raised your daughter.

He really meant what he said at the ceremony. There is no way he could have done what you managed if you were the one to have left for work. You were a fucking hero to him, not himself. He’s been hearing it over and over every time he returns home — “You’re a hero, Javier.”

It’s complete bullshit.

His results were rigged, the system played him as much as he supposedly played it.

When he thinks about being a hero, he doesn’t think about anything close to what he’s done. He thinks about sacrifice, compassion, strength — you have it all. You’ve saved him from himself time and time again, and you’ve done it all while being a working mom and dealing with your partner, your co-parent, being thousands of miles away for years.

“Ay, mijo, estás tu cabeza en las nubes otra vez? (Son, is your head in the clouds again?)” Javier looks up to his right at the sound of his father’s voice, standing to offer him help into the chair next to him but waved off with a grumble from Chucho.

“Is it that easy to tell, Pop?” he asks, a half-hearted smile on his face as he retakes his seat.

“Eh, to me, yes. Probably to your girls, too, but I think anyone else would think you’re doing your sulky, pendejo act.”

“Pendejo act? Don’t think it’s an act at this point, Pop. Been feeling like one more and more.”

“Sí, y por qué es eso? (Yeah, and why is that?)”

“Estoy ausente (I’m absent.)”

“Dios, Javier…” his father sighs and shakes his head, turning his head to look at his son, “You are not absent. Quit telling yourself that, or you really are going to be. You’re home now, so be home.”

“It is a blessing to have Liliana at home for this summer, spend as much time as you can with her…And you know how I feel about mi nuera (my daughter-in-law).”

Javier sighs, leaning forward to rest his forearms on his knees and find you in the crowd again. As if you can sense his eyes on you, you turn toward him and give him a tender smile that quells his near constant nervous energy.

God, it’s unfair how beautiful you are.

And how kind, and forgiving, too.

This conversation is making him want a cigarette. Really bad.

Instead, he pulls the plastic packet out of his pocket, popping out another chiclet of gum and tossing it in his mouth.

He prepares for a lecture from his father; Chucho seems to know a lot more about you these days than Javier. Every week since he left for Colombia, you’ve gone over to Chucho’s house for dinner at least once. With Liliana away at school, you still went. It filled Javier’s heart with a syrupy, oozing warmth whenever he thought about the relationship you have with his father. How you 're always going to be family, a daughter to him, after your parents cut you off those twenty-something years ago.

“She’s still coming over every week, y’know. Didn’t seem to be doing too great until about two weeks ago. Came over after she received a phone call. Was all excited and basically bouncing off the walls. I asked her why, and she said she got some exciting news. You know what it was?”

“Qué?”

“You coming home. I think you called to confirm your flights with her, and she was just so excited, mijo. Cooked your favorite for dinner that night—“

“Pollo asado?”

“Sí, con mole.”

“Mierda, estoy celoso. (Shit, I’m jealous.)”

Chucho laughs from his belly, shaking a bit in the seat as he reaches up and adjusts his cowboy hat.

“It was delicious, as always,” Javier hums in acknowledgement before his father continues, “But I’m not telling you all of that just to tell you what I had for dinner. I’m telling you cause I need you to get your head out of your ass and talk to her. Anyone with eyes can see how in love with her you still are. I wanted you to know that there’s something there for her, too. Hazla mi nuera de verdad. (Make her my daughter-in-law for real.)”

“I’ll talk to her, Pop. Don’t need a wingman, so please don’t say anything to her. Please.”

Chucho stands and shrugs, nonchalantly closing with, “If you don’t do it soon, I’m taking matters into my own hands and telling her myself how lovesick you are. I will not make any promise I cannot keep, so you better keep that one if you don’t want me involved, mijo.”

Javier stays put as his father filters into the party-goers, shaking his head as he smiles to himself.

Maybe he does still have a chance.

The end of the night was fairly uneventful, everyone saying their goodbyes and final congratulations to Liliana. You insisted on helping to set the room up as you had all found it, correcting the tables and chairs back to their usual positions. When you were about to start taking dishes back to the kitchen, Lili rolled her eyes and walked out to the front of the restaurant while Javi grabbed you by your hips from behind and physically directed you out of the room.

“Jav, I feel bad, we made a mess! Let me help!”

“Esposa, you are wonderful and so sweet, I’m sure they appreciate your help. But this is a restaurant, cariño, and you don’t get paid to work here so I don’t think they’re gonna want to be liable for you,” he slides his hands up and down a few inches of your sides, dragging the fabric of your dress up and letting it fall back when he takes his hands off of your sides, placing one on your back.

Javier helps you into the cab of his truck, you taking the middle of the bench and Lili following into the passenger side to be able to get out easier. He drives over to Lili’s house, dropping her off with both of you giving massive hugs and final congrats for the day.

It was a quiet car ride to the hotel, but you ended up back in the middle seat closest to Javier, leaning your head on his shoulder.

Walking into the building, he bit the inside of his cheek as he brushed your hand with his, no recoil from his touch giving him the confidence to take your hand completely in his. Fingers intertwined as you both got in the elevator, tender, unspoken words in your eyes.

Now, Javier sits at the edge of the bed, a short plastic cup in his hand filled with half a mini bottle of champagne. There’s a matching cup in your hand, standing in front of him as he looks up at you with worshiping eyes.

“Cheers, Jav. Good on us for getting our kid through college,” you say with a smile, the sound of plastic crinkling in your hands following your little toast. Each of you takes a sip of the drink, Javier leaning around you to set his down on the desk. His hands move to hover at your waist, your permission granted with a small step to stand between his opened legs.

Javier’s calloused palms catch on your dress again, inching the fabric up as his tongue pokes out to wet his lips. He looks up at you while you return the stare down at him, your free hand finding the curls at the nape of his neck.

“Thank you, amor. For taking on so much more responsibility and shouldering the weight of raising Lili Pad in her teens, and getting her into a great school, and supporting her throughout these last four years when I couldn’t—

“Jav, it was both of us.”

“No, please let me give you the credit you deserve, esposa. You did it all without ever being angry with me, and you always supported me, too. And every time I’ve come back for a visit, you make it seem like I never left with how welcome you make me feel.”

“You’re always a part of our family, Jav. Always.”

He nods, feeling his chest tighten at your words, gripping you tighter as if you’re going to slip away, as if he’ll wake up and this whole trip will have been a dream, as if he will be stuck in Colombia, or forced to go back to the DEA and work in Mexico.

“Thank you, really, thank you for always making me feel a part of it all from so far away. All the photos, all the letters, the birthday cards, and care packages…You are a great mother, and an even better woman. So much better as a person than I ever could be, and I am so lucky that you chose me to have a kid with. Lili is incredible because she’s part of you. Thank you, amor, you have given me a life I don’t think I deserve.”

His head drops, tugging you closer to rest his forehead against your stomach. Silence blankets the room, your fingers running through his hair soothingly. After a moment, you take his chin between your index and thumb, turning his head up to look at you again.

Javier wants so badly to be able to read your mind right in that second, the look in your eyes puzzling him. As he opens his mouth to say something, anything, to fill the air, you’re folding forward and catching his lips in a kiss. It’s light, too faint for his needs, and you’re pulling away much too quickly. His spine elongates, chasing your mouth before you can get too far and locking you in a breathless exchange.

His hands paw at your sides, a desperate attempt being made to pull you as close as possible while also running his hands along your curves. In the surprise of it all, getting lost in his lips, you drop the cup in your hand. Champagne splashes onto your feet, ignored as Javier lifts your mid-length dress to your hips, climbing back on the bed and pulling you over him without breaking your kiss.

Your knees cage his thighs in, settling on his lap as he slots his lips around your bottom one, tracing along it with his tongue. Parting with a gasp, your mouth opens to let him in, melding your tongues together. A whimper escapes from you when he tugs you further onto his lap, feeling his bulge in his slacks press against your core.

Javier pulls away from your lips, dragging his nose along your cheek and leaving a trail of wet, open mouth kisses along your jaw. At the spot on your neck close to your ear, he sucks a mark, smirking against your skin when your back arches and squeezes your chest against his.

“Fuck, Jav…” you sigh, fingers tangling into his hair.

He hums against your skin, pulling away and kissing under your chin.

“You’re so beautiful, amor. I missed you so fucking much. Thought about you all the time.”

“Yeah? What did you think about?” Your voice is shaky when Javi drops his hands to your hips, starting to drag them back and forth against his cock straining against his zipper.

“Mm, thought about how good you smell all the time, how sweet you taste…how much I miss having you in my bed every night. Being able to have you when I need you,” a groan slips from his mouth at your moan, moving your hips faster the more he talks, “I thought about how fucking stupid I was to leave someone like you behind. Mi vida, la luz de mi vida (My life, the light of my life)…felt like I left half of my soul when I went away.”

From above, you lean down to catch him in a passionate kiss, breathy exhales and muffled moans exchanged while your fingers work as the buttons on his shirt. Javier leans forward, shrugging off the materials before his arms are around you again, snaking around your back to grip your ass.

“Jav, I missed you so much. Never felt the same, there was always something missing…I always needed you. I always need you.”

“Mi amor, lo siento (My love, I’m sorry). I’m here now. Never leaving again.” His hands roam to your sides, finding the zipper of your dress on his left and pulling it down. He bunches the skirt of it in his hands and slowly takes it off over your head; he’s faced with you sitting in his lap, no bra and only panties on.

As if magnetic, his hands fly right back to your sides, skimming up until his thumbs lay under your breasts, fingers splayed along your rib cage.

“You’re so beautiful, mi amor, so fucking beautiful. Can I make you feel good, baby?”

“Please, Jav, need you so bad.”

“Oh, baby, mi esposa, I’ve got you. Get on your back, cariño.”

Javier watches as you move off of him and fall back onto the bed, the plush duvet sinking underneath you and pillowing out at your sides.

An angel in the clouds.

No more time is wasted as he tugs you to the edge of the bed, kneeling on the floor and booting your legs over his shoulder to open you up.

“Wait, Jav, here.” You twist to the side and stretch to reach for one of the pillows, giving it to him with a thoughtful smile.

“For your knees, viejo. Not a twenty year old athlete anymore, hon.”

Javier rolls his eyes and moves to kneel on the pillow, already feeling better in his joints from the cushion. He wraps his arms around your thighs and nips close to your panties, rolling out a groan.

“Sometimes, I hate when you’re right.”

“That’s ‘cause you always have to be right, Peña. It’s always been th—“ you trail off into a moan when his fingers prod through your wetness, one hand hooking your underwear to the side.

“I don’t always have to be right, esposa. You know you’re the boss out of the two of us,” he winks before he tugs your panties off of your legs, settling back between your legs.

You nod, sitting up and leaning your weight on one arm to look down at him.

“Mhm, glad y’know your place still, Jav,” you tease as your other hand pushes his hair away from his forehead, a smirk mirrored onto his face, “Make me come, mi esposo.”

You can see his eyes darken, breaths shallowing. Feather light kisses scatter across your inner thighs until he reaches your core, pursing his lips and blowing cool air against your wetness.

“Fuck, cariño, guess you did really miss me. So fucking wet. All for me?”

“Javi,” you whine, scooting your hips closer to him, “Please, need you.”

“I know, baby, I know. I can see how much you need me.” He licks one long stripe from your tightest hole to your clit, groaning at the taste of you. “You want me to play with your sweet pussy, mi amor? Make you feel so good?”

“Please, please, Jav.”

He soothes you with circles on your lower stomach, nodding as he lays his head on your thigh, “Don’t worry, baby, I’ve got you.”

Before you can beg out a response, his lips are attached to your clit, sucking hard before laying his tongue flat against it, moving slow circles around.

His muscle memory guides him to fall into the pattern that he memorized to get you off with his mouth and fingers, pushing one of his thick fingers inside of your cunt knuckle deep and stroking against that same spot he knows drives you wild.

Your back arches off the bed, pressing your clit into his tongue harder. He slurps up your wetness, sighing at your familiar taste that he missed so much. Another finger is added, the rhythm of their thrusts building up faster and faster. Right at the edge, your fingers tangled in his hair tugging hard, he switches positions, tongue plunging inside of you and fingers rubbing quick circles into your clit. Before you can even register, you're coming around his mouth, flooding his tongue and his lips.

“Javi, oh my god, fuck me…”

He leads you through the orgasm, pulling away with a boyish smirk.

“That’s kind of the plan, hermosa. Gonna fuck you.”

You roll your eyes, beckoning him to stand up. Sitting up fully, you strip him of his slacks and boxers, briefly taking him in your mouth before he’s pulling you off of him and pushing you further up the bed. Climbing over you, a heady kiss is shared as he settles between your legs. In the moment, you easily get him onto his back, moving to straddle him as he looks up at you breathless. Large hands hold tightly to your thighs, jaw dropping as you grab his hard cock and easily slip him inside of you, sinking down until he’s full hilt.

“Fucking Christ, amor. Take my cock so well, show me what you can do.”

Your hips find a slow, aching rhythm that makes you both breathless. As you continue to grind yourself around him, you lean forward and press yourself against his torso, skin sticking to skin.

“Jav—Javier, you are such a good man. I never doubted how much you loved me. How much you do love me,” you breathe out, hips faltering for a moment before you recover.

“You were always there for us, and I’m so proud of you for going after what you wanted. Making the world a better place…” you move your hips slowly as you ride him, leaning down to press your foreheads together, stuttering but managing to get the words out for him, “You are a great man and an even better father. I couldn’t have chosen a better partner. I love you.”

Javier whimpers and stutters out a moan when you move your hips faster, your hand on his chin keeping his forehead against you. He squeezes his eyes shut for a moment before opening them, facing you and him whispering back, “Te amo, te amo, te amo. I love you so much, mi esposa. Mi amor. Te amo siempre.”

The sound that leaves you at that moment, hearing his proclamations of love, flips a switch inside of him. The primal need to make you his again, completely. His arm around your hips grips you tighter, feet planted on the mattress behind you. He uses the leverage to meet your rhythm with his own thrusts, sweet sounds slipping from your lips egging him on.

Your nails dig into his shoulders and he looks up at you in awe as you arch your back, head falling to the side as your face scrunches up in pleasure.

“Oh, fuck yes, yeah. Right there, ohmygod, papí…”

“Fuck, that’s right, baby,” he says in a drawn out exhale, hammering his hips up into you, “Say it again, mi amor. Say it again.”

“Papí—Feels so good, papí.”

“Yeah? Haven’t heard that one in a while, baby. Love it coming from you, say it again. Please, baby. Por favor.”

“Papí, papí, papí…Harder, please, want it harder.”

“Anything for you, mi amor. I’ll give you anything you want. Fuck this pussy however you want it, whenever you want me.”

One of your hands drops from his shoulder to the mattress, bracing yourself from his unrelenting pace. You’re a whining mess, opening your eyes and looking down at him under you, sweaty and glistening with his wild hair and mustache shiny from your come. Javier rumbles a loud moan of your name, on the verge of a growl when he feels you clench around his cock.

“Come for me, mi esposa. Let me feel you…” he pulls you flush against him as he fucks up into you, lips brushing your ear as he whispers, “Te amo, mi esposa, te amo. I love you. Love you so much.”

“Pa—Papí, fuck! Oh my god, Javi!” Your head rolls back as you come around him, bounces faltering as you slip against his chest like jelly.

“Fuck, baby, gonna fill you up. You want me inside you all night, mi amor? Want me to make you full of me again?” His lips brush against your ear, whimper and nod in response.

“Yes, yes please, papí. Want you inside.”

“Fuck yes, mi amor. One more time for me, say it one more time.”

“Come inside me…please come for me, papí.”

A moan stutters in his throat as he buries himself fully in you, twitching with each rope he spends. Grip tightening around you, he stays inside of you as he kisses you deeply, pulling away to brush your hair away from your face.

“You have no idea how long I have been wanting to do that again, mi esposa. Te amo, hermosa. I love you.”

“I love you too, Jav. Missed you,” your head lays on his chest, sigh warming his sweaty skin, “Will you be around when we’re home or—“

“Mi amor, you’re gonna have a hard time keeping me away from you and Lili now. I wanna spend every moment I can with you both. My girls.”

It’s a Sunday evening at the Peña ranch, a few weeks after Lili’s graduation. You and her have come over to Chucho’s house for dinner, Javier already there from working the day with his father. He’s mostly over at yours in the evenings, coming over to spend time with Lili, and you, staying for dinner, having movie nights, grilling out. He’s been basking in the slow life, the life of a father that he’s been so desperately craving. It’s been an itch like he has for a cigarette, finally taking an inhale and his nerves melting away as he adjusted to a balance with you two.

Tonight, however, Chucho insisted that you and he keep your weekly get-togethers, despite Javi being home for good now, and the four of you have had dinner around the cozy dining table off of the kitchen. Javier is gathering the dinner plates, Liliana standing to help him clean up.

“Anyone want any dessert? What d’ya have here, Pop?” he looks between his father and you, awaiting an answer.

Before Chucho can say anything, you sit up with a quiet gasp, “Oh, do you have any mangoes, Chuch? I really would love some mango with Tajín. Or some strawberries with honey. Or both.”

You grin up at Javier and he laughs, nodding his head.

“I’ll see what I can do, amor.”

“Y’know, mija, my Lucia always had mangoes around the house when she was pregnant with Javi. She would slice them up and put so much Chamoy and Tajín, you could barely see that it was a mango underneath it all.”

“That honestly sounds perfect right now, I bet Lucia made some kickass mangonadas, too,” you laugh softly, looking up behind you as Javi squeezes your shoulder lovingly.

“Oh, she definitely did. Whole family begged her to make them every time we all got together,” Chucho belly laughs fondly at the memories, nodding to himself, “We thought for the longest time that we were going to have a girl. All Lucia craved were sweets or fruits, and there’s some old wives tale, una fábula, that if your cravings are sweet, it is a girl, and if they’re savory, it’s a boy.”

“Huh, how funny. Guess thinking back, I did crave a lot of chocolate ice cream with Lili.”

“Oh god, I remember being kicked in the middle of the night and having to go to the town over cause they had a 24-hour gas station just to get you some Ben & Jerry’s,” Javier laughs, kissing the top of your head as you shrug.

“And now look, you’ve got the sweetest daughter to ever exist. All thanks to me,” you grin, sending Javi a wink as he finishes gathering the dishes from the table.

He sees his father smiling to himself as Chucho leans back in his chair, Javier retreating to the kitchen to find something for dessert for you while Lili washes up and the two of you at the table strike up some conversation.

Later that week, you gave Javi a call and asked him to come over after he was done on the ranch. He agreed immediately, of course, and couldn’t fight the buzzing excitement he felt to see you again. It took him back to those days before Lili, before the two of you were ever really anything, you calling and asking him over to your dorm room or your apartment. He felt like a giddy teenager again.

He showered quickly and changed before heading over to yours, parking in the driveway of your small three bed house he had bought for you all. At the door, he knocked before using his key to get inside, calling out to you.

“Amor? Lili Pad? Anybody home?”

The pad of footsteps on the tile floors catch his attention, a smile stretching across his face as you come around the corner into the entryway. He kicks off his boots before meeting you in the middle, arms wrapping around you and holding you tightly to his chest. He sighs an exhale, relaxing around your warmth.

“Long day, Jav?”

“You have no idea, mi amor. Had to chase a fucking bull that got loose in the pastures when we were trying to corral all of ‘em. My ass is hurting from having to ride the horse so much.”

You laugh into his chest, pressing a kiss to his shirt before leaning back to look at his face, “Oh your poor butt. You wanna sit on the couch then?”

He hums in confirmation, kissing the top of your head before you lead him into the living room and let him flop down on the sofa.

“Where’s Lili Pad?”

“Oh, um, she’s out with friends tonight. Thought it could be just us…” You join him, sitting with a couple of feet between you two. He can see how tense you are, sitting up straight, fiddling with your fingers, placing a pillow in your lap. Extending an arm out, he holds his hand palm up for you to take.

“I’m more than okay with just us, cariño. What’s going on with you? You seem anxious. Everything at work okay? Everything okay with Lili?” He rubs his thumb across your knuckles after you take his hand, brows knitting with concern.

“Yeah, yeah. Everything is great with Lili. And work is, well, work. No complaints…” your eyes stay trained on your hands together, swallowing before you speak up again, “I actually think it would be easier to show you.”

He feels even more concerned and confused as you stand up, disappearing out of the room for a moment before coming back with a hand behind your back. You don’t sit again, opting to stand in front of him; you bring your hand forward, passing the object to him.

It takes him a minute to register what it is, the last time he saw one this up close being about twenty something years ago.

A pregnancy test.

A positive pregnancy test.

Positive.

“Think we could do as good a second time around?”

You’re pregnant.

He’s going to be a dad again?

He’s going to be a dad again, with you?

He’s going to be a dad again. He gets to have another child with you.

His heart is beating out of his chest, mouth dropped open with no words coming out.

A shake of his head knocks him out of the shock, setting the test to the side and looking up at you with welling eyes.

“I get to be a papá again? With you, mi amor?”

A beaming smile widens on your face, your hands finding the sides of his head as you nod down at him.

“Yeah, honey, you’re going to be a dad, again. Lili’s gonna have a little brother or sister. Much, much younger,” you say with a chuckle.

Javier laughs a little breathless, eyes flickering between your face and your stomach that is eye level with him.

“Oh my god, oh my god, mi amor—Te amo, te amo siempre,” His hand finds her tummy, roaming around in circles, attempting to feel the familiar bump or any side of his baby growing inside there. Soft kisses litter your torso as he pulls you closer, resting his forehead against your ribs.

“I love you too, Jav,” you push back his hair and he stares up at you in wonder, pulling you gently to sit in his lap, “Do you…I mean, I want you to come home. Maybe we can actually get married this time. Have the family life with Lili and the little baby. I know we used to just joke about our fake city hall marriage, but I’ve always wanted that with you, Jav.”

A soft, tender kiss is shared, the two of you holding onto each other. One of Javier’s hands rests on your stomach, his heart already completely overflowing with love for the person growing inside of you. It’s quiet for a moment, both of you sitting with each other in silence. With another kiss, Javi hugs you, your head resting on his shoulder as he whispers in your ear.

“Graciás, mi amor. Thank you — for never giving up on our family. On me. Thank you for giving me everything I could have ever dreamed of. I can’t wait to have another baby with you, they’re gonna be as perfect as you, and Lili. My girls. Te amo, mi esposa, te amo siempre.”

javi's photo board in colombia <3

tagging mutuals that might be interested??

@northernbluess @swiftispunk @johnwatsn @cannolighost @joelsversion @cupofjoel @darkroastjoel @atinylittlepain @beskarandblasters @wannab-urs @jksprincess10 @bearsbeetsbeskar @smokeinherperfume @thetriumphantpanda @atticrissfinch @perotovar @mrsquill @javiscigarette @yazsos @deathwife @pr0ximamidnight @undrthelights @lunapascal @ladamedusoif @haylzcyon

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