#Now to actually go and...................................................................................................

[melioristicbeast]

they're on a boat

wanted to capture the serenity of being out on the water on a warm afternoon

(they're listening to derek's playlist for once, rec under the cut)

[find this and my other sterek art on Redbubble!]

Had this on repeat while drawing it, thought the melancholic vibes fit ♥

[rosetowers]

If Biden had them flown in (he didn't) they they were let into the country legally...

[themintman]

He's doing his best okay.

[pantheratigrisaltaica]

'some zoos pair their cheetahs up with dogs' is one of the worst things to have ever blown up on tumblr

[professorspork]

idk how to word this properly but wrt the fanfic thing you reblogged earlier. Why do fanfic writers have such different expectations than any other content hosting platform?

Like lets take youtube as a point of comparison, Engagement like comments and likes largely exists to boost the works place in algorithm, thats why youtubers put in calls to action and other engament bait. Few with decent reach even read the comments and the audience shouldnt try to develop any weird parasocial relationship with the youtuber. Fanfic authors ask for likes (kudos, because the websites gotta use nonstandard language for some reason) and comments despite them not having any impact on an algorithm, and seem to want the audience to try and develop a relationship with the author based on tumblr posts like that one.

Why the radical difference in behaviour away from the norm? And honestly with all the (usually) metaphorical blood spilled online about parasociality why are authors really surprised that the audience tries to keep their distance as is best practice with any other content producer?

okay I am going to answer this as kindly and as calmly as I can and try to assume that you are asking this in good faith. because my friend, the fact that you feel the need to ask is, to me, The Problem.

[this is, for the record, in response to this post]

fanfiction writers are not *posting content.* (I also have reservations about engaging with the term "content producer" or "content creator" but let's put that aside for now, I'll circle back to it.) you say "they seem to want the audience to try and develop a relationship with the author" as though it is strange, off-putting, and incomprehensible to you, when in fact that is the point of writing fanfiction. it is a way of participating in fandom. it is a way of building community and exchanging ideas and becoming closer with people.

if authors wanted to solely ~generate content~ that would get them attention (?? to what end, the dynamic you have described seems to equate algorithmic supremacy as winning for winning's sake, as though all anyone wants to do is BUILD an audience without ENGAGING with them, which I cannot fathom but let's pretend for a moment that is, in fact, true) then like. if that were the case why on earth would they choose a medium in which they categorically cannot succeed and profit, because it isn't their IP?

you are equating two things that are not at all the same thing. to the degree that parasocial relationships are to be avoided, and "that person is not trying to be your friend they are trying to entertain you, please respect their boundaries" is a real dynamic -- which it is!! -- like. you have to understand that the reason that is true for the people of whom it is true is because it is their JOB. they are storytellers by profession, and they are either through direct payment, or sponsorship, or advertising, or through some other means, profiting off of your attention. i don't say this to be dismissive, many wonderful artists and actors and comedians and any number of a thousand things that i enjoy very much go this route but they do so as a *career choice.* and so when you violate the public/private boundary with them, you are presuming to know a Person rather than their Worksona. the people who work at Dropout or who stream their actual play tabletop games or who broadcast on TikTok or YouTube are inviting me to feel like i know them to the degree to which that helps them succeed in their medium and at their craft, but there MUST be a mutual understanding that that's a feeling, not a fact.

however.

a fanfiction writer is not an influencer, not a professional, and is not looking to garner "success." there is no share of audience we are trying to gain for gain's sake, because we are not competition with one another, because there is nothing to win other than the pleasure of each other's company. we are doing this for no other reason than the love of the game; because we have things we want desperately to say about these worlds, these characters, these dynamics, and because we *want more than anything to know we are not alone in our thoughts and feelings.* fanfiction is a bid for interaction, engagement, attention, and consideration. it is not meant to be consumed and then moved on from because we are NOT paid for our work, nor do we want to be. the reward we seek is "attention," but attention as in CONVERSATION, not attention as in clicks. we are not IN this for profit, or for number-go-up. there is no such thing: legally there cannot be. we are in this because we want to be seen and known.

like. please understand. i am now married to someone i met because of mutual comments on fanfiction. our close friend and roommate, with whom i have cohabitated for over a decade now, is someone I met because of mutual comments on fanfiction and livejournal posts. that is my household. beyond my household, the vast majority of my closest personal friends are people with whom I built relationships in this way.

you ask why fanfiction writers want THIS and not "the norm," but the idea of everything being built to cater to an algorithm to continue to build clout, as though the only method of reaching people is Distant Overlord Creator and Passive Receptive Audience being "the norm" is EXTREMELY NEW. this is not how it has always been!! please think of the writers of zines in a pre-internet fandom, using paper and glue and xerox to try and meet like-minded people in a world that was designed for you to only ever meet people in person, by happenstance, in your own hometown. imagine the writers of the early internet, building webrings from scratch to CREATE a community to find each other, despite distance. imagine livejournal groups, forums, and -- yes, indeed, of course -- comment threads IN STORIES -- as places where people go to *converse.* in the past, we had an entire Type Of Guy that everyone knew about, the BNF ("Big Name Fan") whose existence had to be described via meme because it was SO DIFFERENT THAN THE NORM. treating fellow fans like celebrities or people too cool for the regular kids to know was an OUTLIER, and one commonly understood to lead to toxicity.

in the past, I have likened writing fanfiction to echolocation. i am not screaming because I like hearing the sound of my own voice, though i can and do find my voice beautiful. i am screaming so that the vibrations can bounce back to me and show me the world. the purpose is in the feedback. otherwise it is just noise.

does this make any sense? can you see, when i describe it that way, why an ask like yours makes me feel despair, because it makes us all sound so horribly separate from one another?

perhaps I will try another metaphor:

a professional chef who runs a restaurant will not have her feelings hurt if you never fight your way into the kitchen to personally tell her how much you enjoyed the meal. that would, indeed, violate a boundary. professional kitchens are a place of work, and you have already showed her you enjoyed the meal by paying for it, or by perhaps spreading your enjoyment by word of mouth to your friends so they, too, can have good meals. you show your appreciation by continuing to come back. if a bunch of people sitting around randomly happen to have a conversation about how much they love the food, it wouldn't hurt that chef's feelings to not be included in the conversation. however: EVEN IN THIS INSTANCE, it is ADVISABLE AND APPROPRIATE to leave a good review! you might post about how much you like this restaurant on Yelp, and it would probably make the chef feel great to see those positive comments. but the chef doesn't NEED them, because the chef is, again, *also being paid to cook.* that's why she started the restaurant, to be paid to cook!

i am not being paid to cook.

i am at home in my own kitchen, making things for a community potluck where i hope everyone will bring something we can all enjoy together. some people at the potluck are better bakers, some better cooks; some can't cook at all but are great at logistics and make sure there's enough napkins for everyone; some people come just to enjoy the food, because that's what the party is for. and if I, as this enthusiast chef who made something from my heart for this reason alone, learned after the fact that a bunch of people got together in the parking lot to rave about my dish but no one of them had ever bothered to tell me while I sat alone at my table all night, occasionally seeing people come by to pick up a plate but never saying anything to me -- of course that would bother me, because I am not otherwise profiting off the labor I put in. this is not a bid to be paid, because if someone WERE to say "hey, great cake!! here's five bucks for a slice" i would say no, friend, that is not the point and give them the money back. i'm not trying to Get Mine. I am in it to see the look on your face. I'm in it so you can tell me what about it moved you, so that I can say back what moved me to make it in the first place. so we can TALK about it.

because what happened in the first place is this: one time I had a cake whose sweetness, richness, flavor, intensity, and composition moved me so much that I *taught myself to bake.* so I could see how much vanilla and sugar was too much, so I could learn how to make things rise instead of fall flat, so I could even better appreciate the original cake by seeing for myself the effort and talent and inspiration that goes into making one even half as good.

learning to do so is a satisfying accomplishment in and of itself, yes.

but I also did it because at the end of the day we should EAT the cake. and it's a lonely thing, to eat alone when a meal was always designed and intended to be shared.

so, to answer your last question: i'm not surprised, i'm just sad. because somehow two things that were never meant to be seen as the same have been labeled "content," and thus identical. and it diminishes both the things that ARE intended to be paid for AND the things that are not, because it removes any sense of intimacy or meaning from the work.

i hope you know i'm not mad at you for asking. but i'm frustrated we've come to live in a world where the question needs to be asked, because the answers are no longer intuitively obvious because we're so siloed.

[madamechrissy]

Worst Behavior

Art in the center by Houhai673 on lofter

pairings- stepbrother! Sukuna x f! Reader (lil bit of Toji/reader)

summary - Sukuna’s dad married your mom while you were in high school, and you hated each other on sight. He endlessly picked on and tortured you. So much so that he became a fucking YouTube sensation from prank videos starring you! You come back home for summer break after a bad breakup, and of course annoying ass Sukuna is there, with his stupid smirk, ready to pick on you again, only to be derailed when he sees you're going out with his old friend Toji for a date. Turns out, Sukuna has had it bad for you for a long time, and making you hate him was the only way to guarantee you stay far away, but can he keep up the act?

content/warnings - MDNI, tw- stepcest, lots of pining, kinda one-sided lol, Sukuna is an asshole to you, reader hates him. Enemies to ????- ton of sexual tension, jealous ass Sukuna. This chap - fingering, Toji saying what's up, Sukuna masturbating and being just depraved and pathetic tbh, panty stealing, taboo relationships

part two (coming soon)

part one

It was junior year of high school when your mom remarried, and you can't forget that day, the first time you met that pretentious little shit Sukuna. Who was now your 'family' you guess?

He was a couple of years older, already in freshman year of college, he'd come home on break and torment you endlessly, a whole fucking bulky. He'd hide shit high where you can never reach it, jumpscare you constantly, woke you up to fuck with you, and even filmed his pranks and put them on YouTube.

The jerk was actually YouTube famous from the amount of pranks he'd pull and your golden reactions. A mix of throwing shit at him, cursing him out or smacking him while he held his phone and recorded it. There was no doubt in your mind you just hated the giant asshole of an older 'stepbrother’ you had.

Now you're graduating this year, back home for summer break, and luckily Sukuna almost never visits anymore. He's running his stupid YouTube channel and banking on it, on being a dumb little prankster for his millions of subscribers, so now he lives pretty far thank God.

Let him prank everyone else.

You both don't talk whatsoever aside from holidays and family functions, and then it's just Sukuna picking on you. Not much has changed in five years, maybe his tactics are better. A little sneakier.

You smile and hug your mom, and your step-dad. He's actually pretty fucking cool, and your mom and him are cute together. "Hey hunny, I'm so glad you're here!" Your mom is going on and on about a party she's throwing, as you settle into your room, nothing's changed really. Your mom keeps it all the same.

"Mom, you don't have to keep all this out," you tease, looking at your old posters that adorn the walls, scattered Polaroids pinned to your corkboard. "You could make it a guest room?"

"We have a guest room, we love having your stuff here. And Sukuna's room is the same."

"Ugh don't say his name, you'll summon him!" Your mom laughs a bit as you shiver in feigned disgust.

"He's family honey."

"Not even. I get dad, I really do, but I think Sukuna and I will never get along."

"Ah shit that hurts sis." You hear his pretentious voice and panic as he leans in the doorway, stupid fucking smirk on his far too attractive face. You glare at him.

"Yuck don't call me that, weirdo." He flips you off behind your mom's back, putting his hands away as your mom comes up and hugs him tightly. He smirks over her shoulder as you flip him off back. 

"She's so mean to me, why can't she be nicer like you," he pouts, and your mom laughs a bit, leaning on her tip toes to ruffle his light pink locks. 

"You're both mean to each other. Maybe a couple weeks at home will help you two learn to get along."

"He's staying for a couple weeks!? Ugh." You sigh and he scoffs. Your mom shakes her head and looks at you both.

"Dinner in thirty. Get settled and don't kill each other."

Sukuna eyes you then, ever so slowly up and down, while you start setting things down. "Really filled out huh?"

"I'll punch you." He grins again, you wall up and shove at him, pausing when you feel just how hard his chest is. Blushing a bit, he notices apparently, raising a brow.

"Feeling me up?"

"Gross no. Gym rat." He glares now and you smile right back.

"Yeah how's that loser boyfriend of yours?" He asks so casually. Walking in your room and touching all your shit like he does. You follow him and put everything back in its place as he skews every position of any item.

"We broke up," he pauses at your tone, eyeing you then. You're so pretty you make his heart pound in his chest, not like he'd ever fucking tell you. He calls you a gremlin and worse, knowing you're a whole knockout. "Yeah, rub it in."

"Wasn't gonna," you pause then, as his ruby eyes glint and catch yours. For a moment you see a rare softness in them, making you falter. "He got tired of your bitchiness?"

"Oh fuck off." You roll your eyes, sinking on the white day bed, hands brushing the soft sheets that smell like your mom's favorite fabric softener. But you also smell him, Sukuna, so manly and taking over your space, he leans on your dresser, eyeing a picture of you.

"What happened?"

"Like you care," you lay back, shorts sliding up your thighs. Revealing far, far too much skin, he barely tears his eyes away. "He left me for my best friend."

"Oh shit..." he doesn't know what to say, all he's ever done is pick on you, prank you. Be a whole ass. How does he... comfort you? Without getting too close, feeling shit he can't?

What you didn't realize, is Sukuna has had it bad for you for years now. He knows he can never act on it, so the next best thing was to make your life a living hell. To make you hate him and stay far, far away.

It worked, you hate him.

But it's still not enough to stop the raging thoughts always inside him, of the filthy things he thinks of when he's alone. Stroking his cock to memories of you rather than porn, finding himself comparing others to the traits he loves about you. Traits you'll never know.

He can never ever tell you.

"I've got a date this week though. Old friend of ours." You lean up on your elbows, eyeing him then. He feels that familiar pang of fucking jealousy he also can't feel, remembering the ridiculous amount of men he's chased off over the years.

"What old friend?" He asks curiously, you smile a little then.

"Toji. Weren't you two super close?"

"Toji!? You are not going out with Toji." You sit up and glare, Sukuna crosses his thick arms. "Absolutely not."

"I'm twenty one. I'll do what I want, but don't you like him?"

"Tch, you're such an annoying fucking brat," his words make you stand up, as he sets down your polaroid, it's a pretty picture that's always burned in his brain. You at the beach all happy and pretty, he'd been so hard that day he'd had to jerk it in the fucking bathroom stall.

Why do you have to be so pretty? It's so annoying, and your shit attitude. Toji would be all over you, he always found you hot, but he never dared make a move once Sukuna let him know you were off limits. Was Sukuna not as imposing now that he's a YouTube star? Toji acted as if he couldn't still beat his ass down.

“Put the picture back, you’re so weird.” He holds it up high, smirking down at you, while you jump up and try to grab it, his big grin growing on his face, while he runs around your room with it.

“Too short, aww.”

“Anyone is short you giant, lord of the rings ent.”

“Nerd!”

“Give it!” You’re bouncing again, and he’s far too enamored by your pretty tits jiggling for a moment, his hand falls as his eyes catch them, you snatch your picture up then. “Hah! Now go.”

“Like I wanna be in here.” He’s scowling as he walks out, you lock your door with a little click when Sukuna stands in front of it, sighing and resting his back on it.

Why is it worse than usual seeing you? Typically he could hold his composure somewhat, why do you have to smell so good and - 

Shit he needs to stop.

*****

Dinner with Sukuna is the worst. He's devouring everything on his plate before leaning over, starting to slam down your food too. You scoff and shove the whole plate at him. "Yuck, just have it, now it's covered in Sukuna germs."

"You should count yourself lucky to have any of them from me, brat."

"Will you two stop," your mom and Sukuna's dad say it simultaneously with a big sigh, it's an automatic response when you both have to be in each other's vicinity.

"Why don't you just stay somewhere fancy, rich boy?"

"Tch, you really would miss me if I didn't come over, can't have you all upset." You roll your eyes as your mom gives you an entire other plate of food. Sukuna's already downed your plate and eyeing the new one.

"Let me eat holy shit," you turn away from him, about to stab him with the fork when he goes for a piece of chicken. "Sukuna!"

"Stop it, go get another plate." Sukuna's dad instantly has Sukuna resigned just a bit, he rolls his eyes and leaves your plate alone. The two of them look more like brothers than father and son really, he's a spitting image of him.

Sukuna is handsome, you suppose, though he knows it and is so pretentious about it, that it's just annoying. You'd never tell him he was, either, not when he calls you a little gremlin. That started the first year you lived here, along with dweeb, shrimp and brat, he was a classic bully.

You nibble a bit as you stare at your phone, swiping away the annoying notification that he posted, only for him to eye it, smirking. "Aw you do love me, following me and everything!"

"You wish, I keep ignoring it and it won't stop. Conspiracy or some shit."

"Honey, no cussing at the table."

"Sorry mom," she laughs at you two, shaking her head, while Sukuna leans over, peeking at the phone you're now bringing to your chest. "Will you fuck off."

"Language honey. Ow!" You stomp right on his foot, earning a scowl landed at you. "Brat!"

"Jerk! I don't want to eat, I lost my appetite." You stand up then, plate almost entirely untouched, walking up the stairs as your mom asks you to come back down.

God you can't stand him.

You get a knock later, and he's holding a plate in his big ass hands, frowning a bit. "What, dad yell at you?"

"Just eat," he shoves the plate at you, you notice it's been warmed up when the glass touches your skin. You blink a bit in surprise. "You didn't eat anything."

"You ate all my food like an ass, and I'm not hungry." You shove the plate back at him and his eyes narrow, your fingers touching as you try to put it back in his hands.

"Will you just eat? Now."

"You don't tell me what to do.

"You're such a-

"Brat, I know." You tug the plate back, rolling your eyes now. "I'll eat if you leave me alone."

"I don't want to hang out with you anyway," he says, lying his fucking ass off - god he wants to just spend time with you, not that he ever would say it or do it for that matter. “You better eat it all.”

“Oh Jesus.” You shake your head at him, sighing and nibbling some of it when he walks away, you hate how good his ass looks in those stupid gym shorts. He catches you staring damn near, looking back at you with a raised brow, you quickly scowl and shut the door.

Why does Sukuna look so good? You can’t think the shit.

After eating you’re washing up, bumping into Sukuna as he heads to the bathroom, shirtless just to distract you, surely. You’re breathless when you see his bare chest - has he gotten more chiseled? More tattoos? There are many sliding across his chest, his flat brown nipples, dipping down his rib cage and tracing his obliques. For a moment you can’t even say anything, just standing there.

“Did you eat?” You blink a bit, looking up and nodding a bit. “Nothing smart to say?”

“I’m just tired.”

You’re far, far too close to him then, just standing there, cheeks heating up at the proximity. He’s always been gorgeous, he’s always been buff, it shouldn’t bother you now so much. Without another word, Sukuna walks into the bathroom and you head out of it, shoulder brushing one of his biceps, the contact alone making your tummy tense.

The fuck was going on with you lately?

You’d be lying if you said you didn’t originally have a crush on Sukuna when you met him, how couldn’t you? He was so hot, especially to a younger you, before you realized what an ass he was as soon as he opened his mouth. After that first prank you knew he was just your enemy, not that you could have ever acted on your stupid crush anyway.

He’s family now, honey.

You cover your face with the blankets, avoiding any thoughts of that tattooed body on top of you. Maybe it’s your break up, maybe it’s the date coming up, maybe you’re ovulating, fuck… Whatever it is, you’re undeniably clenching around nothing from being too close to that asshole.

*****

Your date with Toji is tonight, you had a little crush on him when he’d come visit with Sukuna over the summers, but of course he never left you alone with Toji. He was annoying as can be when it came to making sure no one talked to you, because no one wanted to fuck with Sukuna, it’s just now gotten easier, since he’s out of college and some of them have gotten a little braver.

He hated your last boyfriend when you brought him over, on sight, though you have to admit he may have been onto something with that one, he really was a complete dick now that you look back on it. But he hated everyone you dated, making sure if he ran into them on campus to threaten them for no good reason, most of them just gave up.

You ran into Toji the other day randomly, and he was looking really good. He's that dangerous bad boy that your mom tells you to stay away from, but you never listen. Good guy you were just with fucked your former friend however, so you’re truly not so sure what everything means right now. Giving him a chance for a date seems like the perfect way to forget two things.

One, your shitty ex.

Two, your annoying step brother.

You’re eyeing your outfit in the mirror, turning this way and that, before brushing your hair out, you’re dressed in a lacy little black bustier and a pretty pleated skirt, you two are going to a concert so you figure you’ll look cute for it. You’re popping on a little gloss, slathering it over your lips until they’re glistening, doing a little spin and then checking Toji’s text.

You’re running down the stairs, hand on the rail, cool under your touch, when you pause, almost running into Sukuna and nearly tumbling off that last step. Sukuna  curses, catching you quickly, until you’re pressed against him. He is steadying you with his hands, huge fucking hands that feel way too good on your skin, when you’re eye to eye with his chest, looking up at him slowly.

“Clumsy brat…” He grumbles, pushing you back then, but his touch lingers for a little too long. When he looks at your outfit slowly, you feel those ruby eyes like a physical touch, slipping down your body and making you tremble just a bit.

Sukuna never looks at you like that.

It’s quiet for a moment, it goes on way too long, his gaze trailing down your breasts in that top, seeing the way your nipples press up like they’re dying for him. You look too good, too pretty, too much of that body revealed, and for another dude to look and touch? His old friend at that- it fucking infuriates him, his fists clenched on either side.

He barely composes himself, while you’re just looking at him under your lashes, doing too much to his brain, his heart pounding in his chest as desire hits him right in the stomach. He’s seen you in all sorts of shorts, bikinis, you name it, but he’s never really seen you dressed like this, and it’s fucking his entire mind up, short circuiting momentarily.

He finally composes himself, crossing his arms and scowling as you smile at him, arms behind your back. “Like the outfit, Sukuna?”

“Like it, fuck no. What’re you trying to dress like that for?”

“Because we’re going to a concert!”

“Tch,” he goes to the coat stand then, yanking his down from it and scowling right down at you. “Put on the jacket, now.”

Sukuna’s throwing his jean jacket over your shoulders again, you yank it off and shove it at him, pretty breasts just heaving in that slutty little fucking top again, he’s torn between being furious anyone sees you like this, and irritated it affects him this bad. What he thought was shoved far down is prominent as ever, fuck it was even worse than before.

“No! Don’t want your stinky jacket.” He is stepping even closer, when you inhale him - and you hate to admit the fucker smells good.

“This cologne is a hundred bucks a spray, you know it smells good.”

“I don’t give a fuck, it’s nasty. As is your giant jacket, it’ll swallow me, he won’t see my outfit at all!”

“Good, no one should.” You scoff at that and shake your head at him.

“You’re fucking ridiculous.”

“Am I?”

“Yes! You’re not some big brother, and I’m grown. I’ll wear whatever I want- I look hot actually.”

“You look slutty.” His whisper is too close, you haul back and smack him then, hurting your hand and gasping, shaking it out as the tingles shoot through it, while the asshole smirks. “Hit like a little girl.”

“Oh fuck you, with your big ass head.”

“Honey! Ready for your date? He’s um…” your mom looks outside as she walks up to you two in the entry way,, where Toji is revving up his mustang. “He’s here… I guess.”

“Can’t come to the fucking door?” Sukuna says, you scowl at him.

“Like you do that for girls.”

Sukuna raises a brow. “Like you know what I do for girls.”

“I’ve heard plenty,” he smirks then, shaking his head. “Oh you’re notorious, how many girls have you dated? Manwhore.”

“Me, a manwhore?”

“Mom,” you turn to her now, as she still eyes Toji standing outside of his mustang, you can tell all her motherly instincts are telling her to intervene, but she has always let you make your own decisions.

“Yes sweetie?”

“Tell him I’m fine in this,” your mom pauses, lips parting as Sukuna’s dad comes out, and looks at you briefly before he takes off his jacket from the rack, earning Sukuna’s chuckle. “Really now!?”

“It’ll be cold,” he tries to play it off, clearing his throat as he covers you up with his jean jacket instead. “You’ll catch a chill. And why isn’t he at the door?”

“Exactly-”

“Shush.” You put your finger to your lips as Sukuna is about to gloat at the fact that your parents are in agreement. “Suck up.”

“Me? You!”

“Okay,” your mom takes off the jacket, earning the two men’s scowls. “She’s an adult, she chooses what she wears. Even if… she should wear a jacket.”

“I love you.” You kiss her cheek, grabbing your purse and phone then, walking outside. Sukuna walks to the porch with you, much to your irritation, glaring over at Toji who’s whistling across the yard.

“What’s up, Sukuna?” Toji’s voice makes Sukuna want to take him down, he’s grinning as he looks at you in ways he shouldn’t. “Long time no see. Oooh, don’t you look hot, doll.”

You’re giggling, giggling!? Sukuna is about to lose his mind.

He grabs your wrist, long thick fingers with black painted nails taking it over, you pause at the warmth, at the rough palms, looking up then. The night is humid but there’s a breeze tossing around his light pink locks, as he grips just a little tighter, making you turn to him.

“What is it?” You ask then, your voice for a moment is soft, Sukuna looks at you, then at Toji, sighing. “I’ll be fine.”

“Right.” He lets you go then, you’re bouncing down the stairs practically, Toji’s hand is at the small of your back, his fingers itching to break them, while you hug Toji and he wraps you in his big ass arms.

You’re opening your door, it’s not like Toji would do that, shit Sukuna’s not one to do it half the time, but the fact that it’s you makes him unreasonably angry. You look at him across the driveway, expression unreadable before you slip in the car next to him. Toji zips off so quickly Sukuna’s also worried about you driving with him.

He’s been jealous before, many, many times, but today is just too much, seeing you again, and knowing you’ll never be his, hits harder than it should. He stomps back in the house, your mom thanks him for being so caring - hah - if only she knew what he really thought about you.

Sukuna really isn’t proud of any of the next thoughts or actions that night, no he really isn’t. When he heads up to his room but lingers by yours instead, staring into it and seeing black lace on the ground. He knows he’s just horrible when he walks in and shuts that door quietly, eyeing everything in there, the sweet lingering scent of your perfume hitting his senses.

Sukuna is also not proud when he’s in your room, when he takes those panties you slipped off before you left, just sitting on the carpet by your dresser. He’s not very proud when he picks them up to his face, inhaling your scent - fuck, his ‘stepsister’ has the sweetest pussy. He has done this before, and you just get sweeter tasting, as he desperately laps your slick off them.

He’s so not proud when he’s right in your bed, putting them to his face and releasing his thick cock then, red tip leaking precum and smacking his stomach as it’s released. He knows this isn’t a good thing to do, he’s Sukuna, he could have any woman he wants, they’re all after him, and he’s stealing panties and jerking it on a friday night.

He’s furious that Toji gets to touch you.

If Sukuna touched you, he’d grip your breasts, squish them in his hands, have you littered with his hand prints, show you what it is to really get fucked, and fucked so good you’re delirous from it. Bend you over, grip your wrists with one of his hands, stretch your cunt the fuck out. God he bets it’s so pretty, too, his mind vividly pictures it as he touches his tip, exhaling.

What is he reduced to from you!? In your bed, so big he hardly fits on the fucking thing, sprawled out with his long limbs as he strokes his thick, veiny cock slowly. Your panties are right against his face, he’s perverted and depraved for doing it, especially in your bed, but he can’t stop himself. He’s moaning softly into them, as your scent fills his mind, while his hand jerks it faster and faster.

He’s whispering your name, sweat slicking his muscled body, a thin sheen glimmering under your pretty fairy lights while he’s being fucking filthy on your bed. Picturing your tummy bulging with him, stroking slowly in and out, making you squirt cum all over him till your sheets were soaked. He’s jerking faster and faster, wishing it were you, so desperate and pathetic you make him.

He hates you more for making him this way, him, fucking Sukuna, pathetically cumming in his ‘step - sister’s’ bed, as if he could call you it. He barely knows you, aside from being a dick every break, pranking you to watch your pretty face so angry, getting off on it in far, far too many ways.

He didn’t have to be home for the summer, he actually put himself out doing it, just to see you, to fucking torment you, but it’s you who torment him, when he imagines tasting your pussy from the source. He’d lap his cum out of your cunt, then fill you up again, over and over, until there was no room for anymore, just messy and dripping all down your pretty thighs.

“Fuck,” he whispers it, muffling his moan with that fabric, as his cum pumps from his huge length, dripping in white ropes down his hand, pulsing in his hold. He’s gasping at the release, picturing putting it inside your bratty little fucking mouth.

He’s cleaned up then, right with your panties, whimpering the tiniest bit as they hit his sensitive tip, jerking as he lays there now, sooty pink lashes fluttering, furious as he thinks of you on your stupid date. You’ll never know what he really thinks, it has to be that way, but it doesn’t make it easier, not when he’s cuddling with a pillow that smells like your shampoo.

*****

“I had fun!” Toji smiles, that scar curving up just a bit, his big hand on your thigh as his engine hums.

“You did, huh?”

“I did, I needed that.” He chuckles and leans close, tilting your chin up now, inky locks falling over his brow. “Thank you for tonight.”

“Don’t thank me yet,” he practically purrs the words, you gather their meaning quickly, heart racing just a bit as his lips descend. “Been thinking of this all night.”

Toji’s kiss is nothing like your ex, it’s a rough kiss, his tongue tracing your lips and slipping in your mouth when you gasp a bit. You hear his moan when he drags one of your thighs closer, spreading you, you feel your body reacting quickly, a mix of nerves, thoughts, and clearing your pussy is reacting too. She’s already been soaked for two days, and now she’s way too excited.

“God, doll,” Toji hums as he kisses you deeper, you’re trembling when his fingers slip up your thigh carefully, teasing and leaving goosebumps everywhere. His dark green eyes lock with yours as he pulls back. “You feel s’good, ya know that?”

“Do I?” You tease, he moans and kisses you again, while in front of your childhood home, it feels so… thrilling but terrifying.

Was Sukuna watching?

No way…

And if so, what would that make you feel?

You’re contemplating that as Toji finds you over your panties, you moan softly when rough fingers slip up and down them. “So hot, fuck…”

“Mnh!” You’re spreading your thighs for more, he feels so good, kisses taking over your addled mind, and you wonder if it can shove down the thoughts you’re having about your dumbass step brother. Thoughts you can’t have, shit you can’t do - even if either of you did want to.

Sukuna would never want you like that. He’s never called you pretty, not that he should, but he’s said the opposite all the time. He doesn’t know, calling you a fucking gremlin or whatever sucks sometimes, you don’t expect his compliments, but deep down a part wants them anyway. You get looking extra pretty for him, a fact you’ll take to your fucking grave.

Toji slips under your panties, you’re gasping when he touches your wet slit with expert fingers. “Soaked, huh doll? Need me to make ya feel good?”

“I’m… ah! Toji…” you grip his wrist, his thumb is circling on your clit now, it feels really fucking good, twitching against his touch. “Mnh…”

“Wanna cum f’me, pretty?” He’s rolling quicker, more pressure now, while he drags messy kisses on your neck.

“Um, I don’t fuck on the - ngh - first date, Toji.” He pulls back now, a smile tugging on his mouth.

“Was just gonna have you cum on my fingers - fuck, mouth if you want,” you’re blushing and he notices, chuckling again. “You’re cute.”

“Cute, huh?” You wonder what it would be like, you’ve always pictured it with Sukuna, his long fingers and black nails in your cunt, things you should never, you shove it back, focusing now. “You wanna finger me?”

“Wanna have you cum,” his voice is gruff, he’s not fucking around when he slips a finger in your soppy little cunt, your nails press into the leather of his jacket as he kisses you again. “Mmm, that’s it.”

Your eyes shut as he massages your cunt with his fingers, stretching you out and making you tense, thighs trembling on either side. For whatever stupid reason you can’t get fucking Sukuna’s body in a towel out of your damn mind, no matter how many times you shove it down, instead just getting wetter. You focus on kissing him, on feeling him, the squishing wetness loud in his car still running.

“That’s it, cum, I can feel it.” Toji’s words urge you on, as he sucks along your shoulder, sinking his teeth in as his fingers curl just so, and you feel yourself cum then, pressure building and releasing in your tummy.

“Ah!” You’re whining out, earning Toji’s grin against your skin, you feel his teeth lines along you, breaths coming quicker and quicker. “Toji, god…”

“You’re so wet.” He puts your panties back, a hand entangled in your hair now. “See, I wasn't gonna go that far.”

“Are you a gentleman?”

“Fuck no,” you giggle a bit. “But we don’t have to rush things. Are you gonna go out with me again?”

“I’d like that.” He kisses you once more, you’re a little dizzy, from your thoughts, your mind, when you walk back to the porch and Toji takes off.

Why do you feel bad?

Surely not for his ass.

Surely not for a man who is just… a jerk, who’s hot sure okay, Toji is too. You need to shove it down, all of it. You try to do just that, it’s still warm outside so the jackets were a silly idea, you unlock the door with your key, stepping inside and sighing as you feel the cool air conditioning hit your skin.

You slip off your shoes by the front door, picking them up and carrying them as you walk back up the stairs, yawning a bit. You know it’s late, so you try to be quiet when you finally walk into your room. You’re taking off that top and skirt, fingers touching the knobs of your dresser so you can find some comfy clothes to sleep in. Mom has everything you’ve ever owned in here still, so you have to sift through the old clothes.

Suddenly, you hear a rustle behind you, making you jerk and eye the mirror, nearly fucking screaming as you see something turning under your goddamn blankets.

“What the fuck!?” You walk over there now, seeing the tints of pink hair in the dark, as none other than Sukuna is in your goddamn bed.

You shove at the big lug of a fucking man, only for him to stop snoring and peek at you with eyes almost black, you tense as they hit you, as you realize you’re just in a bra and panties now. They drift down your body, when he leans up, yawning now, his look making you feel even wetter, even more needy than earlier.

“Are you pranking me? Get up…” Your voice is quiet, as he yawns, gripping your wrist then, tugging you until you almost straddle him over those sheets. You gasp at it, at how his hand brushes across your shoulder.

“Let him mark your perfect fucking skin?” He demands in a scratchy, husky voice, shocking you so much you blink, leaning back. You’re far too close to his hard length you feel under those sheets, against your inner thigh.

“Are you having some weird dream? Sukuna, it’s me…” You say your name, but he hears nothing with the blood rushing in his own ears, as he eyes that damn mark Toji left on your pretty shoulder. His thumb brushes it, while he pictures leaving marks everywhere. “Sukuna?”

He tugs you closer, until you’re sprawled over him, and he’s too fucking tired to stop it, to stop how badly he wants you - the girl he shouldn’t but can’t fucking help but want over anyone. You have no clue, he sees it in your shocked gaze, when he eyes your other shoulder, pristine and free from any marks.

“Did you like it, brat?” He asks softly, you don’t know what to say at that moment, you just look at him, at his lidded eyes and parted lips.

What do you say to that?

“Would you be mad if I did? I’m a grown up, y’know that?” He scoffs then, huge hand slipping up your bare spine, watching as your eyes flutter shut. “Sukuna…”

“Can’t answer, brat?”

“What’re you even doing in here?” You tug back a bit, but he just drags you back down, and soon you find yourself completely straddling him - Sukuna, your enemy, your… what is he exactly?

tagsss- @sukubusss @yamadramallamaqueen @quinny23 @flowerymenendez @valleydolli @gradmacoco @lolliibunny @chosolover32 @tiredasiandaughter @nanam1nz @sukunabish @valentinegab3 @heichouaack @throwmethroughawindow @mizuwki @omkookie @lemonadesforsale @dannaya @maybe-a-bi-witch @fl4weriesworld @karvokr @pillkits @yummycastiel @fl4weriesworld @kitty-yaps @kitassecretgf @deathrye @musiclover2119 @goldenfawnwriting @sttaejoon-blog @lil-cinn @keiiate @sageosimps @paradisestarfishh @ohohostinkyyyyy @blitziwitch @b0nez9 @sukunaforlife @mihauh @gojodickbig @ashlantismorning @erenspersonalwh0re @uncertainlyours @t4ters @msniks @seellove @lnette04 @salemsays66 @chxngminji @poopooindamouf

[tricktster]

trying to buy a house is sick. it’s for sickos.

you see a house that looks cool online and it’s JUST in your price range and you have to perform a fiscal colonoscopy to get a lady to write a letter that says you have enough money that the bank will probably let you borrow more money at 6.9% interest, which you have to show to another lady so you’re allowed to look at any houses at all, and then you go to the house with lady 2 and there’s a literal stream of groundwater rushing through the basement IN THE TRENCH THE PRIOR OWNERS DUG TO DEAL WITH THEIR PESKY BASEMENT WATER PROBLEMS and all the floors are on 15 degree incline slopes and the stairs are all moments from collapse then lady 2 seriously stares at you expectantly like “is this great or what”

and then you look at like 15 more houses online and you’re like hey lady 2, can we look at these houses and she’s like “oh sorry, those have been on the market for 23 entire minutes, those are sold now actually”

and then you find another house that you actually want and you know other people want it bad enough that you offer 10k over what the seller’s asking for and somehow that is not enough

and then you find another house that hasn’t sold and you like it a lot but it needs work and the asking price is too high so you’re like hey how about like 5k less than asking so i can like use that money to cool this house during the summer somehow and they say no so then you’re like okay cool how about the exact amount you are literally asking for and they’re like HMMMMMMMM LET ME MULL THIS OVER LET ME FIGURE OUT IF THE PRICE THAT I SPECIFICALLY ASKED FOR TO BUY THIS HOUSE IS A FAIR PRICE

This is a pervert’s game. I’m not cut out for this.

[azzie-tangerine]

Okay while I'm absolutely getting my ass kicked on the Roaring Knight boss trying to actually beat it, I noticed something and I decided to talk about it.

So, in this fight, Kris does the least amount of damage to the Roaring Knight when attacking.

Despite Ralsei, supposedly, having a lower attack stat than Kris, even he's doing more than Kris. But Chapter 4 proves that in some way, they are involved with the Knight in a way. So it's obvious what's going on. They're holding back their punches. And, in a way, so is the Knight. When KO'd, Kris is more often than not set to -80 hp, while Ralsei and Susie are often set to -999. The Knight- whatever it is and how it's related to the Holidays- sees Kris as an ally and someone to not seriously hurt. And vice versa.

Well, except for once condition.

When both Susie and Ralsei are KO'd, and Kris is left standing.

Suddenly, it seems that Kris' attack significantly spikes. Now doing more damage than Susie typically does, who is the strongest one of the trio. Doing more than double the damage they were originally doing to their supposed ally.

The ONLY condition of this damage spike, at least from what I've seen, is when Kris is the only one of the group still able to fight. nothing else.

This tells me a few things. One: that Kris genuinely does care for Ralsei and Susie. Both of these are already proven both before and after this fight, but for Ralsei in particular the evidence was rather limited. It's only Chapter 3 onward (debatable) that they show care for Ralsei, when pre-Chapter 3 there was hesitance. Gesturing to the Ralsei tea. Kris caring for Susie, in comparison, is a lot more obvious thanks to their more frequent moments alone together.

What's more important to me is the second thing this says: That when put in the situation to choose, Kris will prioritize RALSEI and SUSIE'S sake rather than the Knight.

I've been a "Kris is not evil" believer since the start, and I feel like this is evidence for that. While we as the SOUL don't fully know what's going on with Kris, what we do see is Carol and/or the Knight having some type of hold on them. Something about a "promise". They know more than we do, possibly as much as Ralsei knows, and will fight to prevent us from knowing more. And yet, when put in a fight that already shows them holding back, they suddenly stop when they're the last ones protecting their friends.

They may claim otherwise in the future. But actions speak louder than hidden dialogue. If they had to choose between the Knight, someone that you could argue they have a history with, or their new friends?

It's Ralsei and Susie they'd choose.

[batsandbirdbrains]

Look I don’t care how implausible it is, I don’t care how ridiculous it is. Dick is eight years old when he becomes Robin. It’s the funniest fuckin thing and I refuse to ever make him older than eight when he bullies a grown ass Bruce into letting him go out at night with him.

Does Bruce take him on kiddie runs until he’s a little older? Maybe. Does Batman stand menacingly behind a brightly colored little bird to threaten the goons while Robin can’t see him? You know he does.

But Robin is still actually terrifying when he first appears on the scene, because he’s a teeny tiny fluttery little thing that does cartwheels and handstands and makes puns then launches himself full force to kick a man in the nose and then cackles when he bleeds. His laughter makes goons shiver, they hear it bouncing around warehouses and half of them bolt, because they learn very quickly what happens when a feral Robin appears.

The Gotham rogues all immediately have beef with a literal third grader because he took the bats attention away and also because he’s roundhouse kicked them all in the shins at some point and that shit hurt like hell, and then he laughed in their faces while making a pun about their villain name.

Majority of the rogues everywhere hate Nightwing because they all know he used to be the feral child that they all thought Batman should have put on a leash, half of them have been straight up bitten by him before he lost all his baby teeth, and they’re all so bitter about the fact that they’ve been beaten by an actual elementary school student. And now he’s all grown up? He’s fucking terrifying.

[shima-draws]

Just got back from seeing the live action HTTYD movie!! Now let me say that I had pretty high expectations for this movie as the original still remains my Favorite Film of All Time Ever and I was actually SHOCKED at how good it was. Disney take notes bc THAT is how you do a live action movie. It was so faithful to the original down to the actual shots, music and camera direction, I was actually in awe at how they essentially just copied the original film practically line for line. Ofc there were a couple changes here and there, some added dialogue and character interactions, but overall it was super close to the original. I had legitimate goosebumps during the test flight scene AGH they captured everything so well and as a diehard HTTYD fan since 2010 I’m so so happy with how well they captured the essence of the original 😭

Anyway if you’ve been debating over going to see it after being disappointed time and time again by Disney’s shitty live action remakes PLEASE give this one a shot. Dreamworks did it right and they should be praised for a fantastic job well done 👏

[heavenlybodies333]

No Body, No Crime -S.R

Spencer Reid x Hotch’s daughter!reader

You weren't spoiled. You were just… strategic.

That’s what you told yourself, anyway.

Because if your dad—Aaron Hotchner, SSA and reigning king of emotional repression—was going to bury himself in work and try to parent you like you were one of his agents, then he didn’t get to be surprised when you played the game better than he did. You didn’t ask for much. Just little things.

Like getting to “shadow” him at the BAU during your gap semester. Like choosing Quantico over Georgetown for undergrad because it kept you closer. Like getting him to increase your credit card limit when you maxed out the card. Or convincing him to overlook the tiny infraction of “borrowing” his SUV for a weekend road trip with friends.

You knew exactly how to tilt your head, how to time a tear, how to nudge just enough guilt into your smile that your dad would cave—every time. You weren’t evil. You weren’t even selfish. You were just surviving. Managing the rules of your world. And it wasn’t your fault he adored you too much to see the game for what it was.

But the one person who never seemed to fall for your act?

Dr. Spencer fucking Reid.

He always saw right through you, sharp eyes flicking up from some obscure case file or book you couldn’t pronounce, narrowed in suspicion like he was mentally cataloging your every sin. Which, knowing him, he probably was.

You noticed it the first time you visited the BAU after college started—your dad had you shadowing agents over the summer like it was some kind of behavioral bootcamp, as if watching grown men argue over blood spatter was going to build your character.

You tossed him a saccharine smile. “Hi, Spencie.”

His eyes narrowed at the nickname. “What do you want?”

“Relax.” You took a slow sip of your coffee. “Can’t I just come say hi to my dad?”

“Sure,” Spencer muttered, turning back to his paperwork. “After you manipulate him into giving you whatever you want.”

You blinked, still smiling—but your jaw tensed beneath it. There it was. You stepped closer, heels clicking deliberately against the floor. “Excuse me?”

"Shouldn’t you be at Georgetown?" he said, deadpan. "Or did you drop out to ruin your father's life full-time now?"

"Oh, Spence," you said sweetly. “Love the hostility. You been working on that in therapy?”

He exhaled slowly, lips twitching like he wanted to smile but couldn’t let himself. “I just don’t get what you’re doing here.”

“I’m taking Dad to lunch,” you said innocently, ignoring how his jaw flexed. “Thought I’d cheer him up. He’s been tense lately.”

Spencer’s eyes were sharp. "Tense because he's dealing with cartel-level stress and also trying to keep you from wrecking yourself."

You stepped closer, tilting your head, faux-thoughtful. “You always get this mean when you’re jealous?”

“You know,” he said, folding his hands on the desk like he was about to read you your psychological profile, “most narcissists hide their manipulation better. But I guess you wouldn’t need to when your dad’s too busy trying to keep you from falling apart.”

He pushed. Of course he did. He had to. It was how he coped—with rules, with logic, with little glass jabs that he didn’t even know were personal until you cracked him wide open with a look.

“Maybe if you stopped playing the victim in your own fantasy,” he snapped, “you’d actually see that you’re hurting him.”

That one stung.

So you stepped closer, toe to toe, until your perfume hit his senses and he realized too late you weren’t backing down. Your voice dropped. “And maybe if you pulled your head out of your Harvard-educated ass, you’d realize not everyone had a dad to hero worship growing up. Some of us had to learn to survive by being clever.”

His breath hitched. You were so close.

“Now if you’re done psychoanalyzing me for sport,” you whispered, “I have files to copy. And a lunch to guilt out of my father. So kindly, fuck off.”

But Spencer didn’t fuck off. Not ever.

You turned on your heel, hips swinging with righteous satisfaction, fully expecting Spencer to do what he always did: grit his teeth, stew in silence, and pretend he wasn’t dying to argue with you.

But not today. Spencer followed you—faster than expected, footfalls hot behind you—and grabbed your arm just as you stepped into the copier room. The door clicked shut behind you like it had been waiting for a showdown.

You spun, voice sharp. “Touch me again like that and I’ll scream HR.”

He scoffed. “That’d be rich, considering you’ve probably got them all under your spell too.”

“Oh, right,” you snapped. “God forbid someone actually likes me.”

Spencer’s eyes were wild now—glinting, furious. “This isn’t about being liked. This is about watching you twist the knife every time your dad tries to connect with you.”

You folded your arms. “Is that what this is? Some weird Freudian thing where you can’t stand me because I have the relationship with him you always wanted?”

“Don’t flatter yourself.”

You smiled like it didn’t sting. “Don’t project, Spencie.”

“Don’t call me that.”

“Why not?” You leaned in close, almost smug. “You hate it?”

You were standing close enough to Spencer that you could see the gold flecks in his eyes, close enough that your voice was barely above a whisper when you hissed:

"You know what your problem is, Spencer? You're so desperate to be the smartest person in the room that you can't stand when someone else plays the game better than you. So why don't you take your three degrees and your superiority complex and shove them up your—"

"What's going on in here?" Your blood turned to ice. That voice. That tone. The one your dad used when he walked into interrogation rooms and needed immediate answers.

You spun around, and there he was. Aaron Hotchner, standing in the doorway with case files in his hand and an expression that made your stomach drop to your shoes. His eyes moved between you and Spencer—taking in the proximity, the tension, the way Spencer looked like he'd been slapped.

"Dad—" you started, but he held up one hand.

"I asked what's going on." His voice was deadly quiet. "And I'd like an answer."

Spencer cleared his throat. "We were just—"

"I wasn't talking to you, Reid." Hotch's gaze never left your face. "I was talking to my daughter, who I'm hoping can explain why she just told a federal agent to shove his degrees up his ass."

Your cheeks burned. "You didn't hear the whole—"

"What did you just say?"

Your mouth opened and closed like a fish. "I didn't—that's not—"

"You didn't what?" Hotch stepped into the small room, and suddenly the space felt suffocating. "You didn't just curse at Dr. Reid? You didn't just tell him to shove his education somewhere anatomically impossible?"

Spencer had pressed himself against the copier, looking like he wanted to disappear into the machine itself.

"Dad, you don't understand," you said, hating how young you sounded. "He was being—"

"I don't care what he was being." Hotch's expression was stone-cold professional now, the same look he gave suspects who tried to lie their way out of evidence. "What I care about is the language that just came out of my daughter's mouth."

You tried a different approach, the one that usually worked. Eyes wide, voice small. "Daddy, it wasn't what it sounded like—"

"Don't." The single word cut through the air like a blade. "Don't you dare try that with me right now."

Your stomach dropped. He'd never spoken to you like that before. Never looked at you like that—like he was seeing a stranger wearing his daughter's face.

"Apologize," he said quietly. "Right now."

"But he—"

"Right. Now."

The authority in his voice made you flinch. This wasn't your dad who let you get away with borrowed cars and extended curfews. This was SSA Aaron Hotchner, and he was not playing games.

You turned to Spencer, who looked like he wanted to melt into the floor. "Spencer, I—" Your voice caught. "I'm sorry. What I said was... it was uncalled for and rude. And you didn't deserve it."

Spencer nodded quickly, clearly uncomfortable. "It's fine—"

"No," Hotch interrupted, his voice still that terrible, unfamiliar cold. "It's not fine." He looked at you, and the disappointment in his eyes made your chest ache. "I have never—not once—seen this kind of behavior from you. The language, the disrespect, the complete lack of professionalism."

Your eyes were starting to burn. "Dad—"

"I'm talking." He stepped closer, and you automatically stepped back until you hit the wall. "I don't know who that was, but it wasn't my daughter. My daughter doesn't speak to people like that. My daughter was raised better than that."

The words hit like physical blows. You could feel tears threatening, but his expression told you they wouldn't help. Not this time.

"I hope," he continued, voice dropping to barely above a whisper, "that I never see that person again. Because if I do, we're going to have a very different conversation about respect and consequences."

You nodded mutely, not trusting your voice.

He walked out without another word, leaving the door open behind him and a silence so thick it felt like the air had turned solid. Spencer didn’t move. You didn’t breathe. The copier let out a mechanical sigh, like it too had been holding tension.

You wiped your face before the tears could fully form, dragging your palm across your cheek and hating yourself for letting any of this get under your skin.

Spencer shifted.

You turned on him before he could speak. “Don’t. Say. Anything.”

He held up his hands like he was surrendering, but his eyes didn’t lose that look—half apology, half the same sharp scrutiny that started this whole mess.

“I wasn’t trying to embarrass you,” he said quietly.

You laughed, short and bitter. “Oh, congratulations then. Mission unaccomplished.”

You were still smoothing down your skirt when your phone buzzed with a message from your dad.

Dad: “Reid needs your help pulling Rhode Island cold case files from storage. Top floor file room is incomplete. Check sublevel 3. Serial code #R-0449 through #R-0510.”

You stared at it for a second. “You’ve got to be kidding me.”

Spencer peered over your shoulder. His lips twitched. “Cold case hell. Sublevel three.”

You groaned. “That’s like ten miles of asbestos and dust.”

Spencer shrugged, already buttoning his shirt. “Hope you wore comfortable shoes.”

Cold case hell lived up to its name.

You followed Spencer down a staircase with cracked linoleum and flickering fluorescent lights, the walls narrowing like they were intentionally trying to squeeze all the joy from the room. It was ice-cold, the hum of neglected air systems echoing like ghosts. Filing cabinets lined the walls like a maze of bureaucratic tombstones.

“Jesus,” you muttered. “Is this where joy goes to die?”

Spencer, already scanning labels, didn’t respond. You took that as a challenge.

The first few shelves were just wide enough for one person to pass through at a time, which was—of course—why you didn’t wait your turn. Every time Spencer found a section he wanted to comb through, you slid in behind him, brushing close, your chest grazing his back or your ass brushing low and deliberate against him as you squeezed by.

The third time you did it, you felt it. He was getting hard.

You bit your lip to keep from smiling, eyes gleaming with delight as you bent to “check” a lower shelf, ass pushed back just slightly more than necessary.

Spencer hissed softly behind you. “Could you maybe not—”

“What?” You looked back over your shoulder with mock-innocence. “You’re in the way.”

“It’s a single-person aisle,” he said through gritted teeth. “You could wait.”

“But waiting’s so boring,” you whispered, brushing past him again—and this time you pressed. Hard enough to make him swear under his breath.

“You’re unbelievable,” he muttered, voice wrecked. His hands were gripping a cabinet drawer like it was the only thing keeping him grounded.

You paused beside him, lips parted like you were about to apologize—but your eyes were anything but sorry. You stepped in closer, chest brushing against his arm, and leaned down low, voice a feather-light whisper against his ear.

“I know.”

He turned to face you, jaw tight, eyes scanning you like he was trying to build an FBI profile just to survive the next five minutes.

“You’re doing this on purpose.”

You smiled slowly. “Doing what?”

He exhaled through his nose. Controlled. Like he was counting prime numbers in his head. “You’re not even pretending to be subtle.”

You hummed thoughtfully. “Why would I pretend, Spencie? You’re clearly enjoying it.”

His eyes dropped—traitorously—to your lips, then lower, to where your shirt had ridden up just enough to flash skin. Then he clenched his jaw and looked away again.

You brushed past him again, this time even slower, your hip grazing the front of his slacks—and there it was: a low, stuttered inhale. You bit your lip to keep from moaning just at the sound of it.

You turned back around with mock concern, fingers lacing behind your back. “You okay?”

He didn’t answer, just opened another drawer. His hands were shaking a little.

You let the silence build as you stepped into another tight aisle. Then, just as he turned to join you, you stopped right in front of him, pretending to scan the file tabs with exaggerated care.

He had to halt, nearly colliding into you—and there it was again: the perfect excuse.

You bent forward painfully slow, ass grinding deliberately against the hard line you could feel pressed into the front of his pants.

“Jesus Christ,” he muttered under his breath.

You pretended not to hear. But when you straightened up again, you didn’t move. You stood there, flush against him, your back pressed to his chest, swaying slightly like you didn’t know exactly what you were doing.

And his hands—God, his hands—hovered just shy of your hips like he was one second away from giving in.

“You gonna move?” he asked, voice strained.

You turned your head slightly, letting your breath ghost against his cheek. “Are you gonna ask me to?”

“Don’t push me,” he said, barely audible.

You reached back—just enough to brush your fingers over the bulge in his pants like it was an accident.

He flinched.

You turned around slowly, chest pressed to his now, face smug. “Sorry. Didn’t realize you were so uncomfortable down here.”

“I swear to God,” he whispered, “you’re fucking playing with me.”

You tilted your head. “You haven’t stopped me.”

You reached for a box just above his head, your body stretching, back arching—fully pressing against him as you rose on tiptoe.

His hands snapped to your waist. Tight. Finally. “Enough.”

You barely had time to gasp before he had you pressed against the shelving unit, cold metal biting into your back as his hands roamed lower, greedy and impatient.

“You really want to do this here?” he rasped against your neck. “Where anyone could walk in?”

“Only if you stop talking.”

He hiked your leg around his hip and you felt the sharp edge of him through his slacks, all that brainpower suddenly laser-focused on ruining you.

“God,” he muttered, “you are so fucking infuriating.”

“And you’re still hard,” you whispered.

His laugh was low and wrecked, right against the shell of your ear. “Of course I am. You’ve been torturing me for the past twenty minutes.”

You grinned, lips grazing his jaw. “You make it too easy.”

Spencer’s grip tightened on your thigh as he rocked his hips forward, letting you feel exactly how not sorry he was.

He kissed you then—finally—mouth crashing against yours in a way that made you forget your own name. His hands tangled in your hair, his body caging yours against the shelf, and God, he kissed so well. All that precision and focus he used at work? It translated perfectly. His tongue was slow, deliberate, coaxing rather than demanding—like he was tasting you, cataloging you, memorizing every reaction.

You whimpered into his mouth and he swallowed the sound, deepening the kiss until your head spun.

He pulled his hand away just long enough to unbuckle his belt and shove his slacks down. The second he was free, you reached between you both, fingers curling around him with a sinful smile.

“You always this hard when someone calls you Spencie?” you teased, stroking once—slow.

He bit your shoulder in retaliation, and you moaned at the sting. His hand found its way down your panties as his fingers softly teased you before sliding one through your slick. You moaned as he added a second finger.

“Shh,” he whispered, mouth at your throat, “unless you want your dad to hear.”

That shut you up fast. He curled his fingers inside you like he knew exactly what he was doing—because he did. Years of behavioral profiling, pattern recognition, hyper-observance… all of it was focused on you now. On every stuttered breath, every tremble of your thighs, every twitch of muscle.

“Say please again.”

You whimpered. “Spencer—”

“Say it.”

You squeezed your eyes shut. “Please.”

He pulled his fingers out and you didn’t get a chance to look—just feel as he slid in, slow and devastating, one hand braced against the wall above your head, the other gripping your hip like an anchor.

“Oh fuck—” You tried to stay quiet. Failed.

His hand slipped around to cover your mouth as the sound of skin on skin echoed in the hallway.

“If you get us caught,” he whispered into your ear, “I swear I’ll finish and leave you dripping.”

You bit his palm. He fucked you harder pulling your leg higher, adjusting the angle until he hit that perfect spot, and you gasped so sharply he had to press his hand harder to your mouth to muffle it.

“Fuck, you feel good,” he gritted out, sweat dotting his temple as he drove into you. “So goddamn tight—been teasing me like this for weeks. Thought you were so clever.”

You moaned into his palm, squeezing around him at the praise and the venom twisted into it.

Spencer chuckled darkly, breathless. “Oh, you like that? That I’m pissed off and still this deep inside you?”

You nodded frantically, thighs trembling as he hit that spot again and again. You came—hard and fast, clenching around him with a choked cry into his palm. Spencer groaned, buried deep, and followed with a stuttering curse, hips jerking once, twice more before stilling completely.

For a long, breathless second, neither of you moved.

Then Spencer let his hand fall from your mouth and pressed a kiss to your temple—soft, unexpectedly sweet.

“I still hate the nickname,” he muttered.

You snorted, breath catching on the tail end. “Sure, Spencie. Whatever you say.”

Then, slowly, carefully, he withdrew—gently fixing you up, tugging your skirt down with more care than you'd expected from someone who’d just railed you in an FBI basement.

You leaned back against the cabinet, trying to catch your breath, your pulse still skittering wildly.

“So,” you said finally, voice wrecked. “Still think I’m a narcissist?”

Spencer gave you a look that was somewhere between exhausted and exasperated.

“I hate you,” he mutters, zipping his pants with shaky hands and avoiding your victorious smirk.

“You came,” you counter sweetly, hopping off the BAU filing cabinet you’d just been railed against. “Twice, technically. So who really won?”

He gives you a glare that says this is not over —but you’re already smoothing your hair, grabbing the manila folder that started this entire mess.

You hand it to him with a grin. “C’mon, Doctor. Let’s go give Daddy the files.”

His entire body goes rigid. “Don’t say it like that.”

You’re halfway to the stairs when he groans, voice sharp with dread. “You have a hickey.”

You glance over your shoulder, wicked. “You gave it to me.”

And before he can argue, you’re already opening the conference room door.

Hotch doesn’t look up from his paperwork. “You two took a while,” he says flatly, holding out his hand for the file.

You drop it into his palm, unbothered. “We were being thorough.”

Spencer chokes beside you. Hotch flips open the folder. Doesn’t even blink. “I expect better time management in the future.”

“Yes, sir,” Spencer says, voice hoarse. He sounds like he’s about to vomit.

You turn to leave and catch your reflection in the glass wall—lipstick smeared, collar wrinkled, pupils still dilated. You wink at Spencer just as the door shuts behind you.

And that’s when Hotch glances up. “Reid.”

Spencer freezes mid-step. “Sir?”

“You missed a button.”

Spencer swears under his breath. You keep walking.

You weren’t spoiled. You were just… strategic. And damn, it worked every time.

a/n: anytime anywhere baby

⋆•★⋆ MASTERLIST ⋆★•⋆

[thehoneybeestings]

𝐬𝐰𝐞𝐞𝐭 𝐚𝐬 𝐡𝐨𝐧𝐞𝐲 𝐩𝐭. 𝐢𝐢

𝐚𝐥𝐩𝐡𝐚!𝐬𝐞𝐯𝐢𝐤𝐚 𝐱 𝐨𝐦𝐞𝐠𝐚!𝐫𝐞𝐚𝐝𝐞𝐫

୨ৎ 𝐩𝐭. 𝐢

‧₊˚── Synopsis: A year of the baker by Sevika's side, but the baker still has no bite. This bodes questions from certain ill-intentioned alphas, and Sevika must decide if she's ready to answer them.

Word Count: 5.7k Content/Warnings: omegaverse! if it's not your thing don't read it; nsfw, top!sev, bottom!reader, soft dom!sev, reader is referred to w fem terms/pronouns, reader has female anatomy, sev has a dick, breeding kink, brat!reader if you squint, sub space if you squint, dom drop if you squint, blood, reader is harassed but nothing intense or explicit A/N: holy hell. note to self: do not write a fic you actually really like or you will drive yourself crazy trying to make it's sequel perfect. anyhow, here is said sequel after nearly two months! i'm so sorry this took so long, but i truly do love this series and care just as much about the character exploration as i do the smut, so i really hope the wait was worth it! thank you SO much for all of the love on pt. i, and as always, enjoy!

𝐋𝐨𝐯𝐞, 𝐁𝐞𝐞 ୨ৎ

 ──˚₊•୨ৎ•‧₊˚──

Sevika slides into the booth tucked in the bar’s back corner.

In a practiced manner, her eyes scan the room. Over her shoulder to the stairs leading up to her apartment. To the wrought iron door at the front of the room. Left to the bar, right to the bathrooms. 

She smirks in approval of The Last Drop’s Friday night debauchery, settling in like the foundations of a home well-loved. She reaches for the leather-bound cigar case you’d gifted her a few months back. She keeps the note that had accompanied it in her wallet; a folded piece of pink stationery scribbled in handwriting she’d learned so well after over a year of watching you furiously jot down recipes and grocery lists. “consider this a token of my gratitude and an apology for making you stay up until midnight to taste cupcakes… it most definitely will happen again. :) <3” 

Her cigar teeters in her mouth as a wicked grin spreads across her lips. “You boys are so screwed,” she mumbles, lighting the cigar as she glances down at the game of blackjack in progress. “Whatever,” one of her future opponents jeers, “we’re just warming up. Waiting for your ass.” She chuckles through her nose, relishes in the smooth burn of smoke escaping with it. 

“Yeah? Well, yours is about to get handed to you. Give ‘em here.”

Oxidised copper glints in neon green light as she reaches for the deck of cards to deal a new round, accompanied by the grumbles of her competition claiming she’s “just going to rig the game again.” 

She chortles again, blows a ring of smoke out of her mouth, inhales, and, The smell of honeysuckle. 

She turns back to face the stairs again, a nearly untraceable smile gracing her lips as she awaits your descent. A voice like honey to match as you round the corner, beaming when you finally catch sight of her. “She’s out like a light,” you declare, recalling the sight of the girl you'd just put to bed, all snuggled up and holding her favorite blanket as tight as she had been when Sevika found her. “She’s had a big day,” Sevika shrugs. 

It had been a big day for the now six-year-old, what with all of the birthday celebrations that had ensued. 

Just a few months ago, it dawned on Sevika that Isha had been around for over a year now, but that they’d never celebrated her birthday. It’s unbeknownst to most that tucked away beneath all of her brooding and brawn lies Sevika's firmly held belief that every birthday should be celebrated. She still tries to feign indifference to the occasion, but after a long night of experimenting with different buttercream frosting recipes and a few-too-many glasses of red wine, you’d learned that since her parents’ passing, Sevika always tries to do a little something to honor each of her years. She’d finish off a bottle of her father’s favorite whiskey in her darker days, or recreate her meal from her mother’s recipe book when things felt lighter. 

More than anything, her birthdays were a chance to pay homage to her parents. An acknowledgment that not everyone gets the privilege of another year; a promise that she isn’t wasting the time she’s been gifted. That she's using each and every year she gets to make them proud. 

This past year- and for the first time since she was 15- Sevika wasn’t alone for her birthday.

Instead, she pulls at the chain of the neon “Open” sign in your bakery’s window, switching it off as you lay eyes on your planner one last time. 

You tsk, shaking your head and grabbing a pen to jot something down on the color-coded calendar. “I have to get powdered sugar tomorrow,” you muse, “don’t let me forget.”

“10-4,” she replies, sauntering over to you with an amused grin as she watches you chew your bottom lip; something you always do when you’re focused. She leans down to mirror your position, placing her elbows on the counter and her chin in her palm. 

“Oh- and it’s Doris’s birthday on Sunday! I’ll swing by and drop something off for her… she really likes cinnamon rolls…”

You’re talking to yourself. Sevika still hangs onto every word. A smile stretches across her lips, slow and lazy. Her eyes follow your mindless ministrations; the way you twirl your pen with your dominant hand, the way the other taps rhythmically on the cool granite beneath it, the way you click the pen twice every few moments-

“When is your birthday?”

The question pulls her out of the trance she'd unwittingly fallen into. “Oh… uh…” She knows she’s about to get in trouble for not having told you. She also knows that following the trouble she’s about to get into, you’ll immediately make a fuss about making sure the day is properly celebrated, that she feels properly appreciated. The thought makes her heart ache. You already make her feel that way every day. She can’t stand to ask you for more. Alas, she knows better than to rob you of the opportunity to dote. She grabs your wrist- gentle and gingerly as always- and peers down at the watch face adorning it.

“Well, I was born at 7:02 p.m., so technically, it’s in… 42 minutes?” A bashful smile breaks out on her face, her hands coming up to cover it. 

“Sevika!”

Her name on your lips. She’ll take it any way she can get it, even if it means you’re scolding her because now, you don’t have time to make her favorite dessert. So, she lets you fuss, lets you sing her happy birthday and demand that she make a wish before she blows her candle out, and ends up crying over a slice of carrot cake because it’s been over 20 years since someone cared about this day as much as she does. It wasn’t long after that night that Sevika had her realization about Isha’s own birthday. She spent the next few weeks searching high and low for a certificate of Isha’s birth, or even just information on where she came from; who her parents were, where they lived, and if they might have had relatives who might know about Isha and when she was born. You never had the heart to tell her that she was setting out on a mission made nearly impossible by Zaun’s lack of record-keeping; partially because you figured Sevika could use any and all slivers of hope when and wherever she could get them, and partially because you figured that deep down, she already knew it was a lost cause. 

The two of you are folding laundry on a Sunday afternoon when she finally concedes that she may be out of luck. Her shoulders are slouched in defeat, and her lips are pursed in thought as she thumbs over the silk tag on Isha’s favorite blanket. I get why she does this, she thinks. It does feel nice. 

Her gaze falls down to the silk tag between her thumb and pointer finger, and suddenly, she sits up straight. 

Your anticipatory gaze is already on her when she speaks.

“She turns six next week.” 

Your brows knit together in confusion. 

“Are the prophetic visions new? Or…” Sevika doesn’t answer; just thrusts the blanket toward you, and lo and behold, there it is. Written in black ink on the butter-yellow baby blanket’s tag:

Isha

5-15-2019

The revelation unearths a side of Sevika you’ve never seen. By the time May 15th rolls around, her apartment is covered in confetti, balloons, and stuffed animals wearing party hats; all Sevika’s doing. But, naturally, a birthday party for Isha is nothing without a batch of her favorite blueberry muffins, and you’re more than happy to deliver. 

The recent memory of wiping sugared blueberries from the corners of the girl’s mouth pops into your head, and a warm smile appears on your face. 

“She sure did,” you agree with Sevika, placing a hand on her shoulder as you take your seat beside her. “I’m gonna get a drink in a second; do you-” Sevika’s eyes are still trained on her cards as she slides a vodka-cranberry over to you. “You take such good care of me,” you purr, and she glances over at you with a smirk and a cocked brow that says, ‘Careful.’

You know exactly what you’re doing. You know she gets off on taking care of you.

You innocently shrug your shoulders as you wrap your lips around the two tiny straws in your drink. She chuckles, as always, because, “you know those are for stirring, not for sipping, right?”

Tonight, she makes no comment, letting you sip through your too-small straws in peace in exchange for focusing on the cards in her mech hand and the grip the other has on your thigh.

The grip that tightens a few rounds later when the table’s sore loser is replaced by a newcomer. 

He’s a patron she’s yet to come across. An alpha she's yet to come across. It's unusual. Unexpected. Sevika isn’t fond of the unexpected.

She’s less fond of the way his eyes seem to be drinking you in, and the way you seem to stiffen underneath his ogling.

“Mind if I join?” he queries. 

She might have already slapped this man's cocky grin off of his face if you weren’t to her right, already noticing the clench of her jaw that he doesn’t yet know is a threat. 

You wrap your arm around hers, thumb rubbing circles into the taut muscle of her forearm. ‘It’s okay,’ your touch says. ‘Calm down. I’m okay.’

You read her so well that, sometimes, she thinks you might be telepathic. She relaxes under your wordless comforts so quickly that you think the same of her. 

All she offers the man is a grunt and a single nod toward the empty seat in front of him. Her eyes don’t leave him for a second as he sits. She’s determined to solve this man like her morning crossword, and you nearly mistake the soft whir of her prosthetic for the sound of wheels turning in her head. 

She shuffles the cards, deals two to each player at the table, lights a new cigar. She doesn’t take her eyes off of him once. She’ll kick herself when she finally does, because as soon as her icy gaze relents, he’s got questions, and they aren’t about the rules of the game. 

��She yours for the night?” He asks. He cocks his head toward you, but the inquiry is for Sevika; an inquiry that earns him a deep scowl. 

“She’s not a whore. Walk down the street and hang a left for that.” 

“You would know, huh?”

Strike one.

The look she gives him this time around is scarier. It isn’t one of annoyance, of being mildly agitated. It’s chiding. Stony. The look she gives Jinx and Isha when the answer is no, and you’d better not ask again. 

The man raises his hands in surrender, leans back in his chair with a lazy grin, and says he’s sorry, but you both know he’s happy to be making trouble.

“Just play the damn game, man,” another player bemoans. The rest of the table’s occupants are just here for whiskey and a card game, not to see Sevika beat the shit out of some random prick; and they all know the latter is exactly where this interaction is headed. 

Unfortunately, it seems that said prick wants to get the shit beat out of him more than everyone else wants their whiskey and a card game.

“She’s real pretty,” he drawls, looking down at his cards. 

“She’s not interested.”

Sevika notes a second strike, huffing out a laugh as dry as your words. 

“Mouthy, too, huh? Back in my day, they didn’t let whores talk this much.” Three strikes, and you’re out. Sevika leans back with an eerie calmness. The rest of the table has already begun rising from their seats. 

“Honey?” she purrs, pinching her cigar between two fingers and placing it on the ashtray at the center of the table, “You wanna go get us another round?” Sure, you’ll make yourself busy doing that, but that isn’t what she’s really asking you. 

What she really asks is: “Can I beat his ass yet?”

Your sweet hum of confirmation says, “Yes….” 

The kiss you place on her cheek before you head to the bar adds, “...And don’t go easy on him.”

You’re not even two feet away before you hear the sound of his chair scraping against the floor, his cries of protest as she grabs him by the collar of his leather jacket and drags him out to the dumpsters behind the building. 

“New guys,” the bartender sighs, shaking their head as they get to work on a vodka-cran and whiskey served neat. “They never know when to stop.” 

You’re already halfway through your drink when she returns, walking over to you. To the naked eye, she’s completely unassuming; you’d think she just went to take a piss. The splatter of blood on the collar of her shirt says otherwise, but it’s not like she’d let anyone but you get close enough to notice it. 

The blood stain isn’t what grabs your attention, though. Instead, it’s the look in her eye, the furrow of her brow, the small frown pulling down at her dark lips. 

Uncertainty. 

Sevika is never uncertain after a fight. 

“What’s wrong, baby?” You ask, your voice low and urgent. 

She clenches her jaw, shakes her head, exhales sharply through her nose. 

“Nothing. Just tired.”

Your eyes narrow. 

“I think I’m gonna call it a night. I should probably stay at my place with the girls tonight. You know, make sure they get to Doris’s alright in the morning.”

You nod, letting her get away with thinking you take her words at face value, but the entire point of having Doris watch the kids was to spend time with each other; to be together, not apart. For all intents and purposes, Doris was like a mother to you, and for all intents and purposes, you’d become something like a mother to Jinx and Isha yourself, so Doris had offered to start keeping the girls every other weekend.“Let me watch the grandbabies,” she’d warmly insisted, “You two deserve the break every once in a while.”

That was the point. That the girls would go off to Doris’s for a few days, and you and Sevika would indulge in some much-needed alone time. But now, for the first time in over a year, Sevika’s asking to sleep alone. 

You let her. You know better than to push too hard when she’s closing up. 

But never, in her guardedness or uncertainty, does Sevika neglect to take care of you, and when she still insists on walking you home, a weak smile breaks out on your face. 

 ──˚₊•୨ৎ•‧₊˚──

You let Sevika sulk for two days before you show up at her doorstep with a slice of carrot cake and a stern request for an explanation. 

You’re not ignorant of the drawbridge Sevika tends to raise when she feels powerless, but this is the longest you’ve ever waited for it to come back down, and you can’t help but worry that, maybe, you’ve done something wrong. 

Her face falls when you admit this, and she knows it’s time to let you back in. You sit across from each other at her small kitchen table, her eyes downcast, but her hand still stretching across the unstained wood to grasp your own. You rub slow, firm circles into the back of her hand, the motion steady and reassuring. Exactly what you are to her.

“You remember that asshole at the bar the other night?” “Unfortunately,” you deadpan. “You fucked his shit up, right?” She snorts, her lip curling up into a smirk. She doesn’t need to tell you that of course she did.

Her smirk falters. There it is again; uncertainty. 

“He just, uh… he said something that kind of got under my skin.”

He was already pinned up against the wall and his nose was already broken when he got these final words in:

“You fight like she belongs to you,” he'd jeered, “but I didn’t see a bite.”

To say this got under her skin was a massive understatement. It rocked her. So much so that she felt the ground underneath her feet quake, and the world she’d built around you fracture. 

She realized in that moment that she holds you the way she does, so gentle and gingerly, because she’s afraid she’ll drop you and you’ll shatter. That everything you have will crumble, that she’ll realize none of this is real;

Because he was right. You don’t have her bite. You aren’t really hers. 

“How so?” you ask, your voice so soft amidst the one she’d been chastising herself with for the past two days. 

She rubs her temples, mulling over your question with a deep sigh.  

“I don’t know… I mean, don’t you feel like we’re just playing house sometimes? I mean, don’t get me wrong, It’s not that I-” She interrupts herself with a huff, and you squeeze her calloused hand, encouraging her to continue.

“It’s not that I haven’t wanted to be with you; to be around you, and for you to be around the girls… but I just… I don’t know.” She does know. She’s just terrified to say it.

You give her a knowing smile. 

But you don’t fill in the gaps; you don’t finish the sentence for her. 

You’re going to make her say it. 

And finally, she does. 

“I want more.”

Your hand freezes, but your grip remains firm. Your eyes are glued to her own.

You’re still here. You’re still steady, still constant, but you need her to be sure. 

“You want more?”

Her shoulders slouch as she sharply exhales, her brows knit together, and you swear you hear her whine. 

“I don’t want to play pretend anymore. I want you to be mine.” 

You nod, slow and knowing. A pregnant pause settles over the kitchen table until,

“Bite me, then.”

Her expression doesn’t change, but her pupils blow wide and her jaw ticks. 

“If you want me to be yours, make me yours.”

Her voice is damn near an octive lower when she speaks again. 

“And you know what you’re asking for?” “If I haven’t made it clear that I want a life with you, then I’m sorry for not being forward enough,” you chortle. “I want to be yours, Sevika. I want you. Now.”

She stands with a relieved chuckle. “Now?”

“Right now,” you repeat with a giggle, rising to meet her.  

“Right now? Right here? And ruin my handmade kitchen table?” 

She’s bending you over it anyway.

“You seem to have made up your mind already,” you challenge, pushing back against broad hips. She grabs at the flesh of your own, leaning down to place a kiss on your jaw before she mutters, 

“I’ve had my mind made up since the day we met, sugar.” Her hands smooth over the swell of your ass, kneading at the juction of your thighs just below it before sliding the soft fabric of the white sundress she’d bought you up to pool around your waist.

And then, she’s kneeling before you; like you’re her altar, and she’s come to leave an offering. 

She tugs your underwear down and tastes you like it’s worship. 

Her hands find purchase wrapped around your legs, and her tongue works through dewy petals in slow, purposeful strokes, lapping up the nectar pooling at your core. She swirls her tongue around your clit like the cubes of ice she’d put in her vodka-cran earlier. She hates vodka-crans, but she missed you more, and when she tries hard enough, she can convince herself she’s tasting the too-sweet cocktail on your mouth instead. 

But nothing makes her tispy quite like tasting you does, and she doesn’t stop until she’s drunk off of you. 

You cry out, high-pitched and broken, and she pulls her mouth off of you with a pop.

She stands up, turns you around, looks down at you with lidded eyes and glossy lips tugging up into a smirk. “Why’d you stop?” You pant, brows pulling together. 

“Missed your face,” and she’s so dizzy off of your pussy, she’s damn near slurring her words.

You scoff in amusement, pulling her in for a taste of your own arousal. “You’re such a lover boy,” you muse against her lips. 

“I’m whatever you want me to be,” she replies. 

“Is that right?” 

She quirks a curious brow at the sound of your wicked purring.

“And if I want you to be inside of me?”

Darkened eyes peer down at you with a new hunger. 

“What you say, goes, baby.”

She reaches down to tap the back of your thigh in a wordless command, and you wrap your legs around her waist. She buries her head in the crook of your neck, shamelessly inhaling the scent of honeysuckle and musk as she carries you to her bedroom and lays you out onto soft sheets and silk pillow cases. 

“They’re so much better for your hair,” you’d excitedly explained as you shoved them into the cart. 

“What you say, goes.”

She’d said it and meant it then, too. 

Your hands are tugging at her belt now. You pull her in, muttering something about how much you missed her, how badly you want her.

She yanks it off in one quick, fluid motion. You make even quicker work of unbuttoning her pants, sliding them off of broad hips and long legs, and throwing them toward the pile of clothes already discarded on the floor. 

When she sits back on her heels to take her shirt off, you do the same, reaching for the hem of your pretty white dress. 

“Uh-uh,” she suddenly chimes, “leave that on.”

You chuckle, leaning back on your elbows as you watch her strip her last layers of clothes off. 

She’s a bronze statue, sculpted by the Gods themselves, glimmering in the golden hour light spilling through her windows. Your jaw is slack, eyes heavy as you drink her in. They dart from feature to feature; the stray tendrils of thick, black hair falling around her strong jaw, the glittering scar spreading across her skin like lightning, the swell of her breasts and the cut of her waist, the dark trail of hair leading straight down to her length, hot and heavy, already weeping for you.

Your eyes snap up to meet her own, and when they do, she pounces.

Just as ready to ruin you as you are to be ruined.

You gasp into a kiss that’s all teeth and tongue. She only pulls away to breathe, dazed eyes drinking in your features. 

“You’re so fuckin’ pretty…”

She plants a kiss on your nose. “You know that?” Another on your cheek. “Such a pretty girl.” Chaste kisses trail across your jaw, teeth find the lobe of your ear, an open-mouthed kiss is pressed against your neck. “Can’t wait to watch you fall apart. So fuckin’ pretty when you fall apart.”

A broken whimper escapes you. You feel her smirk against your throat. 

“Yeah?” She croons, tongue darting out to slide over your windpipe. “You want me to take you apart, baby?”

You whisper a “please,” subtle as the twitch of your hips.

It’s all the begging she’ll let you do for the rest of the night. Being loved by Sevika means wanting for nothing, and she’ll be damned if you ever have to beg for the pleasure she was put on this earth to give you. 

She reaches over for the bottle of lubricant on the nightstand, and you’re already spreading your legs for her. 

“Somebody’s eager,” She teases, stroking her erection and spreading the clear gel over its length. 

“Just missed you,” you pant, all but drooling as you watch her prepare herself for you.

A pang of guilt shoots through her. She knows you don’t mean anything by it, knows you aren’t trying to make her feel bad for closing off, running away. 

Still, she feels bad anyhow. Knows you didn’t deserve that. Props herself up with her free hand, lines up with the entrance of your heat, and vows to make it up to you. 

She drives her hips forward, bottoming out inside of you. You both gasp, and she stills inside of you, gritting her teeth and trying her best to stay calm despite the rhythmic pulse of your walls around her cock begging her to ravage you.

She sure as hell could- and she sure as hell wants to- but just as always, she puts you first. 

Your breath quickens as the sensation of being so full proves overwhelming, and her hand snakes up from your hip to splay across your chest. 

“Breathe for me, sugar,” she lowly coos. “You’re okay.” 

She gives you a soft smile and gentle praise when you obey, her palm warm against your skin as it trails up to cup your jaw. She leans down, body caging your own.

“You ready?” She asks, her mech hand reaching down to hook your leg up and around her waist.

The pulse of your heat around her speaks for you.

“Janna above,” she chortles, letting her head fall down to nestle into your shoulder, “I’m really trying to keep it together, here.”

You lace your fingers through the soft strands of hair at the nape of her neck and turn to place your lips on the shell of her ear. Then, you whisper, low and dangerous.

“I don’t want you to keep it together. Fuck me like you mean it.”

A growl against your neck, sharp canines scraping the skin, and the delicious pressure of the head of her dick against your cervix, all at once. 

If this is how it starts, you can’t wait to see how it ends. 

Your grip on her tresses tightens as she sets a punishing pace, snarling in your ear.

“You gonna tell me if it’s too much?”

“Uh-huh,” you manage through airy moans.

“Good. You gonna remember you asked for this when you can’t walk straight tomorrow?”

You giggle, dazed and blissed-out.

“Answer me, baby,” she warns, gripping your jaw like a vice, the metal cool against your flushed cheeks.

You bite your lip, bat your lashes, and nod with wide eyes, feigning innocence. 

You’re being testy tonight. It isn’t the first time it’s happened.

Out in public, you’re the picture of patience. You never lash out, you never raise your voice, you’re never petty or passive-aggressive. Unyieldingly, frustratingly patient.

She quickly discovers why. Learns that it isn’t for your lack of a backbone, but because you’re patient enough to wait for moments like these, when all she wants is your surrender, your submission. 

That’s when you bite back.

It’s not like she can blame you. She knows you're upset that she all but left you for almost three days, and knows this is your way of telling her.

And if you want your apology in the form of being fucked dumb, it’s not like she’s going to say no. 

She chuckles back, grabs the back of both of your thighs, presses them to your chest, and pounds into you until you scream.

It isn’t long before you’re a mess underneath her. Legs trembling, eyes rolling back, blabbering. She watches you slip into euphoria, and quick strokes turn languid. 

“Look at me, love,” she rasps, setting your calves on her shoulders; and when your eyes flutter open, you find her staring back with pure adoration.

“You okay?” She nods.

“I’m okay,” you nod back. “Love you s’much…”

And her heart nearly breaks. 

She leans down, shushing you softly when you mewl at the feeling of her sinking even deeper into you. 

She’s pressed right up against your womb. You can feel her twitching inside of you. 

That’s when it happens. That’s when you picture her filling you up, being swollen with her seed, and then with her babies; and suddenly, you’re reaching down to rub at your own clit, fingers working frantically, hips bucking desperately.

And you’re pushing her head down into your shoulder.

“Use your words, honey,” she pants, rutting into you. “Not until you use your words.”

She doesn’t let you beg. Only makes you say it once. 

“Bite me, Sevika.”

And what you say, goes. 

Sharp canines sink into soft skin. Suddenly, you’re standing behind the counter, wiping flour-covered hands onto a blush-colored apron, letting her know that Isha’s safe. Then, you’re sitting on a barstool in your kitchen, sipping wine and writing down an updated recipe for your famous carrot cake, because she swore it was better with more cinnamon. Next, you’re giving her a slice of that same cake for her birthday, and then you’re doing laundry together, knocking over piles of folded clothes to make out like a couple of teenagers. 

Finally, you’re curled in up in ball on your bed, surrounded by every pillow and blanket you could find, and the hand that rubs soothing circles in between your shoulders ends up pressing you down into the sheets as your velvet walls spasm around her length. 

The flash of memories is so vivid, she nearly forgets that she’s seven inches and two canines deep inside of you, but the cry of her name from your lips sobers her like a splash of cold water in the face, and when she finds you just as inundated in an earth-shattering orgasm, her own is quick to follow. 

She cums with her teeth still planted in your neck. Doesn’t pull away until both of you are boneless and breathless. 

When she does, her eyes are glued to the mark she left. Droplets of dark red bead up on your skin in the shape of her bite. You don’t miss the way her eyes widen, the way her breath hitches, and when she brings her fingers up to her lips to feel for blood, you realize she’s afraid she’s hurt you.

“Hey, hey,” you quickly plead, reaching up to tuck a strand of hair behind her ear, “I’m okay, Sev. I’m not hurt. You didn’t do anything wrong.”

“You sure?” She exhales, eyes still locked onto the fresh wound as she lets you pull her in to lie on your chest.

“Look at me, angel,” you coo. 

She tears her eyes away from the bite and cranes her head to look up at you with glassy eyes.

You’re not surprised that Sevika seems so overwhelmed; that she trembles in your arms, that her breath comes out shaky as it evens out. You’d always heard that giving a bite can be just as intense as getting one, so you went into this more than ready- more than willing- to walk Sevika through whatever that looked like for her. 

You stroke her hair, trace the strong lines of her face, press your thumb into the tight muscle of her scarred shoulder. 

“I’m sure,” you finally respond. “I promise.”

She finally relaxes in your hold. Settles in like the foundations of a home well-loved.

You fall asleep first. She’s careful as she stands to make her way to the bathroom, where she dampens a rag and grabs a first-aid kit. Her heart feels so big she’s afraid it’ll burst as she gently wipes away at the mess between your thighs and disinfects the bite on your neck. 

She lies back down next to you, drapes an arm around your waist, and for the first time since she started taking them, she wearily eyes the bottle of suppressants on her nightstand. 

 ──˚₊•୨ৎ•‧₊˚──

The discovery of Isha’s 6th birthday meant the realization that it was time to send her to school. Sevika knows it’s a necessity, an important milestone, an inevitable part of life when you choose to raise a child. 

That doesn’t make it any less difficult; doesn't change that tears prick her eyes as she walks out of Piltover Elementary, having just dropped the bright-eyed and bushy-tailed girl off for her first day of first grade. 

“Don’t cry, mama,” you smile, squeezing her hand as she turns once more to look up at the opulent school building. It hadn’t been easy, deciding to enroll Isha in a school Topside, and Sevika would be lying if she said her ego hadn’t been a bit wounded for it. Still, she’d be damned if Isha didn’t have access to the best education there was in the safest place there was, and right now, that was Piltover Elementary. 

You promised her it’d be just fine, that she’d be right across the street all day at the Council’s headquarters, and she promised herself to use all of that time fighting for better education in Zaun. 

She knows it’s the right choice. Knows Isha will do great. But no one prepared her for how hard it’d be to have a piece of your heart walking around outside of your body. 

She didn’t think she’d ever have that; didn’t even think she wanted it, but now, she’s watching a line of Pre-K students with bookbags too big for their tiny bodies trail up to the front doors of the school, and a smile is tugging at her lips. 

You read her mind. Nudge her arm. When she looks over at you, you wear a knowing smile of your own. 

“What?” She mutters, looking away bashfully. 

“You want more babies, don’t you?”

She’s getting ready to scoff and brush off such a ridiculous assumption, but then, one of the kids figures out how to blow a raspberry, and a chorus of high-pitched giggles rings out.

She sighs in defeat.

“I want more babies.”

──˚₊• 𝐄𝐍𝐃 •‧₊˚──

Taglist: @mewl3tte, @tsubiki, @lia-winther, @mommyissuesismypersonality, @hbwrelic, @ahintofchaos, @djstinkyfartz, @sevikaswifeomm, @rareanduselessbird, @livslifeonline, @sevikas-baby, @strawberrylipglossx, @sillylittlejellyfish, @sevikaovipositee

(i tagged everyone who expressed interested in pt. 1; if you'd like to be removed, just shoot me a comment or a message and i'm more than happy to do so, no hard feelings!)

[dykebehaviour]

okay, so, uh… how do i put this on?

loser lesbian!ellie strapping you for the first time

cw: smut, first time strap on sex r!receiving, established relationship, top!ellie, bottom!reader, awkward but sweet.

you weren’t expecting ellie to be this nervous.

scratch that, you were.

you were absolutely expecting her to be exactly this nervous.

she’s standing at the edge of your bed in a worn nasa t-shirt and boxers, holding the strap-on like it’s a piece of alien technology. it’s still in the black drawstring pouch it came in, which she has half-unzipped and is now peering into like she’s expecting it to bite her.

“i feel like this thing should come with a manual,” she mumbles, scratching the back of her neck. her ears are flushed, the tips glowing pink, and she looks anywhere but at you, despite the fact that you’re sitting in front of her, already half-naked and very ready.

you smile, biting your lip. “you watched, like, twelve youtube reviews on this, ellie.”

“yeah, well, they didn’t show this part!” she whisper-yells, motioning dramatically to the strap. “they just talked about, like, material and suction and… girth.”

that last word makes her physically recoil, like it personally offended her.

you laugh; genuine, warm, and scoot to the edge of the bed, reaching out for the harness. “here. gimme.”

she hesitates, then hands it over, still not making eye contact. “sorry. i just… i wanna do this right. i wanna make it good for you.”

your heart actually aches a little at that. she’s trying so hard. so ellie about it - awkward and earnest and somehow both endearing and annoying at the same time.

you kiss her, gentle and slow, a hand coming up to cradle her jaw. “hey. it will be good. you’re here. i’m here. and you-“ you grab the harness again, smirking. “-are about to become a total menace.”

“oh my god,” she groans, burying her face in your neck. “don’t say it like that. i can’t feel cool when you say it like that.”

“you’ve never been cool a day in your life.”

she pulls back just enough to look at you, squinting. “rude.”

“true.”

you both break into quiet laughter. the kind that fills the room in the spaces where nerves used to be.

ellie takes a deep breath, steadies herself. “okay. i’m doin’ it.”

and she does - clumsily at first, buckling it backward the first time and swearing under her breath, but eventually getting it on, adjusting the straps with all the seriousness of someone gearing up for battle. she looks down at herself once it’s on, eyes wide.

“…huh.”

you tilt your head. “you okay?”

“i don’t know. i feel like i should salute someone.”

you snort. “please don’t.”

“i feel like i should have, like, a badge. or a license.”

“ellie.”

“I HAVE THE POWER.”

you grab her hand and pull her onto the bed before she can spiral any further. “c’mere, soldier.”

the laughter dies down slowly, replaced by the kind of silence that hums with electricity. she’s looking at you now, really looking. her eyes go soft, mouth parted slightly like she’s about to say something and forgot how.

you touch her cheek. “you good?”

she nods. “yeah. yeah, i just… this is kind of a big deal, huh?”

“yeah,” you breathe. “it is.”

she kisses you again. slower this time. more deliberate. her hands are on your waist, your thigh, your hip. she moves with more purpose now, like something has clicked into place. the jokes are gone, replaced by a tenderness that makes your chest ache in a different way.

“god, you’re so-fuck, you’re soft,” she breathes, dragging her hand down your side, over your hip, between your legs. “can i?”

you nod, already breathless. “yes. please.”

she touches you first - fingers sliding slowly through wetness, testing how ready you are, and her eyes go wide.

“holy shit. that’s for me?”

“no, it’s for the pope.”

“shut up,” she laughs, and then her mouth is on your neck, your collarbone, nipping and kissing a trail lower. her hand never leaves you.

“tell me if anything feels weird, okay?” she says softly.

“ellie.”

she meets your gaze.

“i want you.”

her expression melts - turns open and overwhelmed, like she’s never been told that before, even though you say it all the time.

she lines up carefully, letting the tip brush against you first, back and forth in teasing little strokes that make you shift your hips with a whine.

“okay?” she checks again.

you nod, gripping her arm. “yes. i’m good.”

she presses in slowly. not all the way at once, just enough to make you gasp, then pause to let you adjust. her eyes are glued to your face, watching every little reaction, every twitch and breath. she’s completely focused on you, eyebrows knit like she’s trying to memorise how this feels for you, not her.

“oh my god,” she breathes when she’s fully in. “you’re so tight, holy shit-“

you moan quietly, nails digging into her bicep. she holds still for a beat, leaning down to kiss you again. it’s sloppy now, needy, less careful, her hips rocking slightly like she can’t help it.

“move,” you whisper. “please.”

that’s all it takes.

she starts a rhythm; slow at first, cautious, her hips grinding down at just the right angle. the harness presses against her pelvis, and she lets out this stunned little groan, like she’s shocked she can feel anything from it.

“is that okay?” she pants.

“so fucking good, ellie. just like that.”

her confidence builds fast. the thrusts get steadier, deeper, more sure. she adjusts your legs over her hips, one hand gripping your thigh, the other laced with yours by your head. she’s panting now, her voice wrecked.

“you’re doing so good,” you whisper, clinging to her. “so good, baby.”

her eyes flutter shut and she lets out a broken moan. “fuck, i-don’t say stuff like that, i’m gonna melt.”

“please melt. melt inside me.”

“babe-!”

you’re both laughing a little even as things intensify. her thrusts get sharper, more deliberate, each one landing perfectly, building that fire inside you until you’re arching into her, gasping, grabbing her ass to pull her closer, deeper.

“ellie-right there-”

“yeah?” she groans. “i got you, i got you.”

she presses her forehead to yours, driving into you with a steady rhythm that has you falling apart fast. your legs tremble around her, your mouth falling open, and you barely manage to choke out her name as you come, clenching around the silicone, body shaking with the force of it.

ellie slows down immediately, still kissing your face, whispering breathless praises against your skin.

“you okay?” she murmurs. “that was-fuck, that was so hot.”

you pull her down, kissing her slow and deep. “you were perfect.”

she collapses half on top of you, sweaty and glowing and so smug you could slap her.

“so…” she pants. “was i a menace?”

you laugh, threading your fingers through her damp hair.

“absolutely.”

perm taglist: @yasmilks , @natsheretic , @lovemiraamira , @ellies-real-wife , @wewerewildandfluorescent , @jullsii , @eyesttokill , @dmenby3100 , @bunchogravie , @oneinameliann , @intheshadowofthestars , @pariiissssssss , @vanpalmertruther , @madsxh1022 , @rbnvrnxoxo , @firefly-ace , @alyaserrax , @silly-pigeon69 , @glassofgreenteapls , @pearlsiie , @aj0elap0l0gist , @sincerelyherz , @imsiriuslycool <3

[hatethysinner]

ᴍᴀɴ ᴛᴜʀɴꜱ ᴀɴɪᴍᴀʟ

ʀᴇᴍᴍɪᴄᴋ x ʙʟᴀᴄᴋ!ꜰᴇᴍ!ᴀᴄᴄᴏᴍᴘʟɪᴄᴇ!ʀᴇᴀᴅᴇʀ

ꜱᴜᴍᴍᴀʀʏ: He loved you too much to share. So he took everything else. Your friends, your family, your freedom, all slowly melted away. Now it's just him, the house, and you. And he promises that's all you'll ever need.

ᴡᴄ: 15.2k

ᴀ/ɴ: title taken directly from this incredible song. i loved and hated every second of writing this but i just NEEDED to get it out of my system. while i don't think i particularly delved into anything dd:dne (PLEASE MIND THE WARNINGS AND DNI IF DARK FICS AREN'T YOUR CUP OF TEA <3), i definitely channeled my most unhinged ao3 reads for this. this'll probably be the only time i write a full fic of dark!remmick, but if this really blows up i may actually consider doing more. as always, white girls i promise you can have your fun with this too ❤️. enjoy reading divas! i don't do taglists personally, so just follow me if you want to be updated when i post c:

ᴡᴀʀɴɪɴɢꜱ: unapologetically dark fic(!!!), exposition dump, obsession, murder, body disposal, vampirism, biting, blood, bloodplay, dark!remmick on steroids, lovebombing, manipulation, isolation, toxic relationship (somewhat established), emotionally/mentally abusive behavior (!!!), threats of violence, codepency, lowkey unreliable narrator, extremely dubious consent (!!!), noncon (!!!), heavily abused power imbalance, dom!remmick, sub!reader, reader is going through it, remmick loves tormenting her, angst, praise kink, light degradation kink, breeding kink, proper use of a gold chain during sex, babytrapping (!!!), p in v, cunnilingus, fingering, overstimulation, dacryphilia, biting, sadism, monsterfucking, religious mentions, loss of virginity, no happy ending, divider usage, written on demon time

You were the kind of girl folks counted on.

Always had been.

Ran your daddy’s general store with a steady hand and a sharp head for numbers. Never late to open, never short on change. You knew what folks needed before they asked. Darning needles, cane syrup, extra tobacco for the older men who swore they were quitting but never really tried. Folks came in more for you than the goods, if they were honest. You smiled easy. Listened well. Learned their names, their kids’ names, and how they liked their goods bagged.

You had a tight circle of friends, girls you’d known since church bonnets and petticoats. Played games on the porch after Sunday school and swapped lipstick behind the store when your daddy wasn’t looking. They called you the smart one. The grounded one. The kind that could hold a whole household together with one hand while balancing the day’s receipts in the other. They said if any of them were gonna marry a good man, it’d be you.

But somehow, that wasn’t the way the road bent.

You were always the one they leaned on. The one who helped fix their hems and cooled their heartbreaks and made sure they got home safe. But when they talked about love, the soft parts, the burning ones, the kind of hunger that made your hands tremble, they never looked at you.

You weren’t the girl men chased after. Just the one who made things easier.

And still, somehow, you were the one he chose.

He came in on a Tuesday.

Dead of night, just before closing. Long shadows bleeding in through the windows, sun already tucked behind the treeline, store mostly empty save for the sound of your broom brushing across the floorboards. You’d flipped the sign but hadn’t locked up yet. Wasn’t late enough to feel nervous.

Not until the bell over the door chimed, and he stepped through.

A white man.

Tall. Pale. Not from around here. And not the type of man who came this far across town, not without a reason. He didn’t belong on your side of the county line. Not unless he was lost. Not unless he meant trouble.

But if he was aware of how out of place he looked, he didn’t show it. He walked in easy. Calm. Hands in his coat pockets and a smile that curved slow and deliberate. He looked right at you, only you, and said,

“Evenin’, miss.”

Polite. Warm. Like this was a place, a side of town, he frequented.

He asked for flour. Then matches. Then something sweet. Said he had a long road ahead of him, but never said where it led. Moved like he had all the time in the world. Studied the shelves like they held more than goods. Like he was trying to learn something about you in the way you stocked your soap and stacked your salt.

His accent was Southern, but different. Smooth, syrupy, with a twist to his vowels, like every word had traveled through someplace older, foreign, before landing in his mouth. He didn’t speak like a man passing through. Spoke like a man digging roots. And when he left, he touched two fingers to the brim of a hat he didn’t wear, like tipping it to you was instinct.

You locked the door behind him. Stood for a moment, broom still in hand, wondering what to make of it.

Then he came back the next night.

And the next.

Always right before closing. Always alone.

He brought little things each time. His name, Remmick, the second time around. An odd name, you thought.

A ribbon he said reminded him of your favorite dress, even though you hadn’t told him which one it was. A book of poems with pages marked and underlined, left at the counter with a quiet “Thought ya might like this one.” A jar of thick, dark honey that looked more like molasses, wrapped in cloth and twine like a gift.

Remmick never lingered too long. Never pushed for more than you were willing to give. Just watched. Listened. Laid compliments at your feet like offerings. Not greasy or crude, but precise. Gentle. Like he meant every word and had studied you long enough to know they’d land.

Said you had a voice that sounded like morning.

Said you were the only person in town worth a real conversation.

Said you smiled like it meant something.

You rolled your eyes. Called him too much.

But you didn’t tell him to stop.

No one had ever looked at you like that before.

Like you were worth slowing down for.

And piece by piece, the walls you’d built without knowing cracked beneath the weight of his gaze.

And slowly, your world started to tilt.

Not all at once.

Just by degrees.

Like a house shifting its weight before the foundation gives.

Your friends never met him. Not once. But they could tell something had changed. The way you smiled at nothing when they were mid-sentence. The way your gaze would drift toward the door, or to the windows, or to some place in your head they couldn’t reach. You weren’t sharing like you used to. Not your stories, not your time.

Still, they were happy for you. At first. Said it must be something special, if you were keeping it close. But even then, there was a pause in their voices when they said it. A little squint in the eyes. A little too much emphasis on the word special.

They’d always said you were the one who’d settle down first. The one with the good head. The one who’d choose someone kind and steady, someone who knew what it meant to take care of a woman like you.

But you never gave them a name.

Never said what he looked like, what he did, where he came from.

And eventually, they stopped asking.

Your parents noticed the shift too.

Your mama stopped by more often. Just to check in, she'd say. But her voice always started a little high-pitched when she'd talk. Like she could see something in you she didn’t have the words for. Your daddy didn’t say much at all, but you could feel his silence stretching between you every time he stopped by the shop and found you humming without noticing, sorting flour bags with a smile that didn’t quite reach your eyes.

You told them everything was fine.

Told yourself the same.

And it was. He said it was.

Remmick always had a way of making the world sound simpler than it was.

He made you feel beautiful. Sharp. Like the only person in the room worth speaking to.

Like his person.

And the things he said. God, the things he said.

Said you had the kind of soul people wrote songs about. That no one else had ever understood you the way he did. That all your life, people had been trying to water you down. Make you smaller, quieter, more convenient.

But he saw you.

And you believed him.

Of course you did.

He didn’t like your friends, though. Said they talked too much. Said they didn’t get you. Said you always came back from seeing them with your shoulders a little tighter, your voice a little more unsure. That they didn’t want you to grow. That they only loved you when you stayed the version of yourself they could manage.

He said it so sweetly, like it hurt him to say it.

Like it was breaking his heart.

And when he asked, gently, softly, with his fingers stroking the inside of your wrist, if you could spend a little less time with them, it didn’t feel like control.

It felt like care.

He missed you, after all.

He needed you.

And you wanted to be needed.

God help you, you did.

So you let them drift.

One by one.

Until their names felt strange on your tongue.

He said your parents were too involved. Too nosy. Said you were grown now. Said their worries weren’t yours to carry. And when you stopped accepting your mama's visits, when you quit your job at your daddy's general store despite the heartbroken look on his face, it didn’t feel like abandonment. Not then.

It felt like love.

Like a cocoon being spun around something precious.

When he asked you to come stay with him, it didn’t feel like a decision.

Just the next step in the story he was writing for you both.

The manor was beautiful. Isolated. A pristine, white-columned thing hidden deep in the Delta, so far from town it didn’t even register on some maps. Every plank of wood polished. Every curtain soft and silent in the breeze. The kind of place where your voice echoed even when you whispered. Where the sky stretched endless above you, dark and wide and brimming with stars you hadn’t seen in years.

He said it would be safer this way. Quieter. Easier to breathe.

You believed him.

You believed everything he said.

And he rewarded that belief.

The room he gave you was sun-soaked and clean, decorated with strange antiques and velvet-upholstered chairs that looked too expensive to sit in but felt right under you. He stocked the closet with dresses in your size before you ever mentioned needing new clothes. Or giving him your measurements. Set your favorite tea on the windowsill beside a stack of your favorite books.

“Just figured ya’d need some comfort, darlin’,” he said, planting featherlight kisses on your hands. “A woman like you deserves softness.”

You told yourself it was kind. Thoughtful.

You didn’t think to ask how he knew what you liked.

Not until later.

By then, it had already begun.

The soft steps outside your door at night.

The feeling of being watched. Not cruelly. Not even threateningly. But deliberately. Like the world outside had narrowed down to two hearts and one house, and all of it was his.

He made sure you loved him. Or at least that you needed him too badly to leave.

And if someone asked you when the line was crossed,

You couldn’t say.

You never even saw it pass beneath your feet.

Until the night he came home with blood on his shirt.

Not a smear. Not a spot.

Soaked.

Dark and wet and clinging, like the cotton had drunk its fill and was still greedy. His cuffs were stiff with it. His collar painted red. There were flecks on his throat, droplets drying like freckles, and his hands dripped steadily onto the hardwood, drawing crimson lines in a path that led straight to you.

He didn’t speak right away.

Just stood there in the doorway of the sitting room, chest rising slow. Watching you.

There was no panic in his eyes. No guilt. Just a feverish gleam, like he’d returned from something holy and wasn’t quite ready to step down from the altar.

You froze where you were. Half-curled on the sofa, book in hand, mouth parting without sound.

He stepped inside and told you the man's name. Simply. As if announcing the weather.

You blinked.

He smiled. Small. Serene.

“Didn’t suffer long.”

You screamed.

Loud. Unfiltered. Scrambled back until your spine hit the armrest, and the book hit the floor with a thud that didn’t register beneath the roar of your pulse.

He didn’t flinch.

Didn’t apologize.

Just watched you with that same slow-burning affection he always wore, like this was something you would come to understand in time. Like it was natural. Expected. A truth you’d learn to live inside.

When your voice cracked from shouting no, when your sobs doubled over into heaves, he knelt.

Right there. Blood and all.

He didn’t bother to wash his hands first. Didn’t even take off his coat. He just knelt at your feet like a knight returning from battle, like something ancient and humbled and sure of its place.

“Don’t cry, sugar,” he hummed, reaching for you.

You pulled back.

Didn’t matter.

He closed the gap gently, slowly, as if calming a startled animal.

“Wasn’t for no reason,” he said, voice low and honey-thick. “Ya believe that, don’t ya?”

You shook your head. Weak.

And still, when his bloodied hand cupped your face, you didn’t pull away fast enough.

“There’s things ya don’t know,” he whispered. “Things I can’t tell ya yet. But ya don’t need to know them to be mine.”

You tried to twist free. Failed. His grip was firm, but not cruel.

He pressed his forehead to yours.

The wet heat of him radiated through your clothes as he leaned in close, shoulders still trembling with leftover adrenaline. You could smell it. Copper and something else. Something rich. Like old rust and soil and bone. Like the breath of something deep in the earth that hadn’t surfaced in a long, long time.

He exhaled slow.

“I ain’t want to scare ya,” he said. “But I had to show ya.”

You didn’t speak.

You couldn’t.

“Because this is me,” he continued. “This is what I am. And if ya love me, if ya mean what y’said, then ya have to see all of me.”

“I never said I loved you,” you almost answered.

But the words didn’t come.

Because his hand moved then.

Not to your neck. Not to hurt.

But to your collar.

He brushed the fabric aside, dragging the edge of his sleeve across your skin.

And the blood marked you.

He wiped it deliberately. Across your jaw. The hollow of your throat. The slope of your collarbone.

You gasped, jerking instinctively, but he only shushed you like he was soothing a frightened child.

“Shh,” he cooed. “Just want ya to wear a little of me. That’s all.”

His voice was trembling now. With restraint. With something else.

“I’m not angry,” he added, and it was true. “I’d never hurt ya. Not ever. You’re the only thing in this world I couldn’t break if I tried.”

And you believed him.

That was the worst part.

He leaned back finally, just enough to look you full in the face.

You were streaked in red.

Your cheeks damp with tears.

And he smiled.

Not wide.

Not cruel.

Just soft.

Like it was all going to be okay.

“Y’don’t have to help,” he said. “Not tonight.”

You didn’t answer.

He rose, slow and deliberate, and walked to the kitchen to wash. You sat frozen. Couldn’t bring yourself to look down at your hands.

When the water ran, you heard him humming again. That same lullaby cadence he always used when he thought you were asleep. And when he called your name, voice gentle, it wasn’t a summons.

It was a question.

And you answered.

You stepped into the kitchen on legs that didn’t feel like yours, and you helped him mop the floor. Scrub the blood from the baseboards. You didn’t ask what he did with the body.

You didn’t want to know.

But you watched the way he scrubbed his nails clean, the way his eyes softened whenever he looked at you.

And you didn’t leave.

Not that night.

Not the next.

Now, months later, the blood doesn’t shock you like it used to. You don’t ask who. You don’t ask why. You just wait by the door with towels and vinegar and steady hands.

You still don’t watch him do it. Never have.

But he always leaves the door cracked open.

Just a little.

Just in case.

The house is quiet now. Filled with the sound of dripping water, your own heartbeat, and the hushed, weary creak of the manor’s bones.

He doesn’t pretend to be human anymore.

Not around you.

He lets the teeth stay long, the nails a little sharper. Lets you see the red light behind his eyes when the moonlight hits right.

And still, he kisses you goodnight.

Brushes your curls back from your face.

Tells you you’re the best thing that’s ever happened to him.

And when he says it, you believe him.

You are the best thing he’s ever had.

And he’s made damn sure you’ll never leave.

You woke to the feeling of being watched.

Not the vague kind. Not a creeping hunch. No. This was the real kind. Deep and certain, rooted in the marrow of your bones like an old warning. It had shape now, weight. You knew it as easily as breath.

And sure enough, when your lashes parted and the room slowly unblurred, there he was.

Remmick stood over you like some towering monument carved out of shadow, tall and still and all but glowing in the thin streak of dawnlight filtering in through the curtain seam. His shirt hung half-open, pale chest streaked faintly with water. He must’ve bathed again before slipping in. His hair, dark and heavy, was still damp at the ends, dripping in slow intervals down the edge of his throat.

His jaw was slightly parted. And at the corner of his mouth, just barely catching the light, sat a thick bead of drool.

Not blood.

Just spit.

But too much of it. An unnatural amount.

Like he’d been watching you sleep for a long, long while and hadn’t once closed his mouth.

Sizing you up.

You didn’t flinch.

Not anymore.

Instead, you shifted slowly beneath the blankets, tucking your arms beneath your cheek. Your voice was low, rough with sleep. “You been there long?”

His eyes lit like someone had sparked a fuse. And then that crooked grin curled across his face, proud and toothy. Too many teeth for such a soft expression.

“Couldn’t help it,” he drawled, voice slow and lazy at the edges. “Ya look so pretty when you sleep.”

You huffed quietly. It wasn’t really a laugh, but it wasn’t a complaint either. You didn’t pull the blankets higher. Didn’t hide. Just turned your face into the pillow to block the light.

Behind you, the mattress dipped under his weight.

He climbed in slow, but sure. As he always did, never asking if you needed the space. You felt the heat of him even before he touched you. Always too cold when he wasn’t holding you, always too much when he was.

One arm slipped under your waist. The other folded over your middle. And then he was there, wrapped around you like a vise, breath ghosting against your neck, chest rising and falling in sync with your own. You could feel the edge of his belt buckle press into your lower back, the weight of his thigh hooked over yours, the solidness of his body where it pressed along every inch of you.

You should’ve felt caged.

Sometimes you did.

But this morning, you just felt still. Heavy. Grounded.

He kissed the back of your shoulder. Once. Then again, slower.

You closed your eyes and listened.

“Made breakfast,” he murmured against your skin. “Berries. Biscuits. Got that jam ya like. And tea. Not the bitter one. The kind with the hibiscus.”

You didn’t answer right away.

Didn’t move either.

Just lay there with the weight of him curled around your body, his words threading through the fog in your mind. Your limbs felt like wet cotton, and your heart… well, it didn’t race anymore when he held you like this. It just kept time. Careful. Steady.

Some mornings were like this.

Gentle. Sweet. The world in perfect balance, even if it was only for a breath.

Others weren’t.

There were days where something in him just… shifted.

No warning. No clear offense. Just a quiet closing of the door between you. A change in the air.

He wouldn’t look at you.

Wouldn’t speak.

You’d move through the house like a ghost in your own skin, tiptoeing around the silence. You'd replay every moment from the days before in your head like a broken record, trying to pinpoint the crack. The wrong word. The wrong breath. You whispered his name sometimes, just to see if he’d flinch.

He never did.

And the longer it lasted, the more desperate you got.

You’d sit at the edge of the bed, fingers clenched in your lap, watching the door anxiously. Or trail behind him through the house, trying to make yourself useful. Fixing his tea, folding the blankets, laying out the towels just the way he liked them. Hoping he’d notice. Hoping it’d be enough.

It never was.

Sometimes you cried.

Most of the time, you did.

Not loud. Just soft and constant, curled into a corner of the couch, the fabric beneath you growing damp from the weight of it all. You didn’t ask him to come back. You just wanted him to see.

And eventually, once the sun had vanished and the stars were out, once you were past the tears and into the shaking, silent part of grief, he would return.

Not from outside.

Just from wherever he’d gone inside himself.

He’d find you there, face raw, eyes swollen, mouth trembling with all the things you couldn’t say.

And he’d kneel.

Press his hands to your knees. Pull your face up to his.

He used to wipe your tears, once. With the pads of his thumbs. Gentle. Sweet.

But not anymore.

Now he licked them.

Dragged his tongue across your cheeks, pleased sounds always escaping his mouth as if he was tasting a delicacy.

“Ain’t mean it,” he’d whisper. “Ain’t mean to go so cold, darlin’.”

You never asked why he did it.

You just nodded.

And let the licks turn into kisses.

You tried not to think too hard on those days.

Because when he was good to you?

He was perfect.

Like now.

You felt his fingers shift under your nightdress, splaying wide over your stomach like he was anchoring himself with the shape of you.

“Ya smell like sunlight,” he whispered, almost in awe. “Like warmth. Like somethin’ I wanna keep forever.”

He didn’t say it to get a rise out of you.

He meant it.

He always meant it.

You could feel the edge of a smile pull at your mouth, but it didn’t quite reach the surface. It never did on mornings like this. You couldn’t tell if it was dread or hope that kept it from blooming fully.

He kissed your hair.

“Ya awake?”

You gave the smallest nod.

He chuckled, breath warm and steady against your ear.

“Come eat, baby. Gotta keep ya strong.”

You nodded again.

And let him pull you out of bed.

Because that’s what you did on good days.

You let yourself be loved.

He led you down to the kitchen like you were the only woman in the world who’d ever deserved to be walked anywhere.

His palm rested against the small of your back, guiding, not pushing, and he moved with slow, deliberate steps like each one was part of some silent ceremony only he knew the meaning of. You didn’t rush. You never did, not with him. It didn’t feel right to.

The kitchen was already warm with sunlight slanting through the curtains, soft and hazy, painting the wooden floorboards gold. The stove clicked gently as the kettle cooled. Something citrusy hung in the air alongside the hibiscus. Orange peel or lemon zest, maybe. It was always hard to tell with him. He had a way of combining scents until they no longer smelled like anything but home.

He pulled your chair out for you.

Waited for you to sit.

Then served your plate himself.

He’d made the biscuits from scratch. Just the way you liked them, topped with honey and butter. A few berries had burst open on the side of the pan, their juices bleeding into the crust like bruises, and he placed those pieces carefully at the edge of your plate, like he knew you’d want them last.

There were eggs, too. Soft-scrambled, barely set. And jam. The good kind, dark and smooth and homemade.

He didn’t eat, of course. He never did.

But he sat across from you, arms folded on the table, chin resting on one hand as he watched.

Not like a man waiting for praise.

Like a man watching a miracle.

You didn’t feel self-conscious anymore. Not the way you used to. Not even when he studied the curve of your fingers or the way your mouth parted slightly with each bite. Not when his eyes lingered on the bridge of your nose, the full shape of your lips, the high frame of your cheekbones. Features that other men overlooked, or worse, tried to make smaller. Not when he traced your every movement like he was trying to memorize it.

Just warm.

Maybe a little shy.

But warm.

“You’re gonna spoil me,” you said after a few moments, tone light and quiet.

His mouth curved. “Good.”

You raised a brow, chewing. “That all you gonna say?”

He leaned forward slightly, elbows on the table. “What else is there? A woman like ya’s worth spoilin’. Worth feedin’. Worth watchin’. I get more outta sittin’ across from ya than most men get in a lifetime.”

Your breath caught.

You didn’t mean for it to. You knew he liked that kind of reaction. Thrived off it. But still, it happened. He had a way of saying things that left you undone. Like he meant them. Like there wasn’t a doubt in his mind that it was true.

You swallowed and looked down at your plate.

Let yourself smile.

Just a little.

That was the danger of mornings like this. The sweetness. The calm.

You’d forget, just for a moment, what he was.

Let your guard slip.

And he’d let you. That was the worst part.

He never forced it.

Never had to.

“I’ll be headin’ out later,” he said, finally breaking the stillness. “Just before sundown.”

You glanced up. “Errands?”

He nodded. “Might be a while.”

You waited, hoping he’d elaborate.

He didn’t.

You didn’t press.

Not because you trusted him, not completely, but because you wanted to. Needed to. Trust was a gift, and he treated it like one. Collected it. Stroked it. Cradled it in his arms like something he’d stolen.

He reached across the table and brushed his knuckles down the side of your face.

You leaned into it.

Didn’t mean to.

But you didn’t pull away either.

He tilted his head. Studied you.

“I’ll bring ya back somethin’ nice,” he said. “New necklace, maybe. Somethin’ that'll bring out that pretty mouth of yours.”

You blinked. “You don’t have to-”

“I want to.” His hand slid down your arm, resting over your wrist. “Ya always act like ya ain’t allowed to be treated soft. But I told ya already, anybody that didn’t see your worth before me was blind.”

You didn’t respond.

You didn’t have to.

He leaned in and kissed your forehead. Soft. Gentle. Reverent.

And for a second, everything felt so normal.

So painfully, heartbreakingly normal.

Like this was just a house.

Like he was just a man.

Like you were just a girl in love, waiting for the evening to fall.

You let yourself stay in the moment a little longer.

Finished your tea in slow sips.

Let him watch you.

And prayed that the quiet wouldn’t turn. That tomorrow wouldn’t shift. That tonight, God willing, tonight would still be kind.

You knew better than to believe in quiet mornings.

Not here. Not with him.

Still, the stillness of the day had tricked you. It had crept in through the floorboards and settled into your chest, soft as fog, convincing you that peace might last. That today would stay gentle. Safe.

He’d been kind all morning. Sweet, even. Kissed your shoulder while you dressed. Detangled your hair with slow, worshipful hands. Called you baby in that voice like melted sugar as he danced with you to a jazz record. It had been so easy to believe in the calm, to believe he meant it.

But peace, in this house, was never given.

Only loaned.

You’d spent the day in the parlor, patching a hem that didn’t really need fixing, listening to the wind scratch against the shutters. He passed through every hour or so, always with something to say.

“Ya look so soft in this light.”

“That color’s real pretty on ya.”

Always with a kiss to your hairline. A graze of his fingers at your elbow. And you let him.

You let him.

Because it was a good day.

Until it wasn’t.

Remmick lit the lamps earlier than usual. Shadows hadn’t even grown long across the floor yet, but he moved like he couldn’t stand the dim. A low, strange hum sat under his breath. His movements were slow but measured, pressing the collar of his shirt, combing his hair with surgical care. He changed into a dark button-up, freshly pressed, the fabric stiff and lined with faint charcoal pinstripes. He didn’t fasten the top button. Let his collarbone show. The buttons themselves were a pale ivory, too round and too polished to be anything but bone.

He didn’t speak while he dressed.

Didn’t look at you, either.

But when he passed you near the kitchen door, he paused. Tilted your chin up. Kissed your forehead like a benediction. His lips were too warm, too careful.

“Be good while I’m gone,” he said.

And that was all.

The door opened hours later, at a time when you had long retired to your bedroom.

Not with a knock. Not with warning.

Just the quiet creak of the front door swinging open.

You didn’t recognize the man who entered. Not at first.

Older. White. Expensive. That was the word that came to mind first. Expensive. The coat, the cane, the posture. He moved like he owned everything he looked at, and when his eyes slid over the staircase where you watched from just out of view, he barely registered you at all.

He smelled of clean money and fragrant cologne. His voice, when he spoke, had a practiced warmth. Used to making deals, used to being obeyed.

Remmick welcomed him like an old friend. No introductions. Just a nod, and a hand at the man’s back as he ushered him toward the parlor, the two of them murmuring low between each other. You didn’t catch what was said. Didn’t want to.

You slowly closed your door.

But that didn’t stop your heart from picking up.

Didn’t stop the feeling crawling into your bones. The kind that knew this was punishment, even if you didn’t know what for.

You hadn’t said anything wrong today. Hadn’t wandered too far. Hadn’t said no.

He’d kissed your forehead. Cooked for you. Danced with you.

So why?

Why this?

You sat on the edge of your bed, hands pressed to your thighs, jaw clenched until it ached. You wanted to pace, but you knew better. He hated when you fidgeted.

Time bled slowly by. A drip of unease with every second.

Then the parlor door clicked shut.

You couldn’t hear much. Just muffled voices beneath the hum of the hallway light. At first, it was civil. Calm. Two men talking. Glasses clinking. Something poured.

You stared out your window.

And then, a sound.

It didn’t come as a cry at first. Just a thump, low and heavy.

Then another.

And then it began in earnest.

The screaming didn’t start with words. It started with breath. Ragged, sharp, begging. Then the voice rose. Screamed so hard it cracked, pleaded, cursed. The sound of it ricocheted through the walls like thunder. One drawn-out, blood-curdled no, followed by a scream that didn’t end, just collapsed.

You covered your ears.

Pressed your palms so tight it made your head ring.

But nothing could drown it out.

Your whole body trembled.

Not from shock.

From knowing this was intentional.

Because he didn’t need for you to hear it.

He wanted you to.

This was never about the man in the parlor. Not really.

It was about you.

What you’d said. Or done. Or failed to do.

You didn’t know what you were being punished for.

But you felt it, in your gut.

Your punishment had a heartbeat, a voice, a body now. And it was breaking somewhere below your feet.

The screaming stopped eventually.

But the silence that followed was worse.

Because silence didn’t end anything in this house.

It only marked the beginning of the next thing.

You waited.

Not just for the screaming to stop. Not just for the silence to settle. But long after.

You waited until the walls stopped humming with sound. Until the floorboards cooled beneath your feet. Until even the wind outside held its breath.

And then,

You heard it.

The soft groan of the parlor door unlatching. A low creak. A shift in weight across the boards.

His footsteps were quiet.

Measured.

Too soft for a man who’d just done what he’d done. Like he was walking through a church. Or a dream.

You didn’t move. Stayed curled in on yourself at the edge of your bed, arms locked around your knees, eyes fixed on the door like it might rattle open any second. It didn’t.

Not yet.

You heard the stairs instead.

One. By one.

Each step slow and steady, deliberate. Like he was giving you time.

Time to compose yourself.

Time to prepare.

Time to realize nothing was going to stop him from reaching you.

The knob turned.

You hadn’t even realized your door was unlocked.

It opened with a click and a hush, and there he was.

Standing in the threshold like a vision from a fever.

Blood soaked the front of his shirt. Thick and wet in some places, half-dried and flaking in others. It clung to his throat, painted his collarbone, pooled beneath his nails. His sleeves were still rolled, but the pale skin of his forearms was nearly lost beneath the spatter. There were streaks along his jaw where he’d tried to wipe his mouth clean. Too late. Too messy. A smear of it curved across his cheekbone like a smile.

And his claws, long, edged, still drawn, glinted in the low light of your bedside lamp.

But what knocked the breath out of your chest was his face.

Calm.

Completely, terrifyingly calm.

His eyes, those strange, shifting, ancient things, shone soft in the dim. Not wild. Not frenzied.

Just… peaceful.

“Darlin’,” he said, soft as a sigh. “Can ya come here?”

His voice sounded like the morning.

Like nothing had happened at all.

You didn’t answer.

But your body moved.

You hated it. How your limbs betrayed you. How your feet swung over the edge of the bed and touched the floor. How you stepped closer to him, one foot, then another, then another, drawn toward him like gravity had chosen sides.

He didn’t move to meet you.

Just waited.

Like he knew you would come.

And when you reached the doorway, when your bare feet kissed the hallway light, that’s when he touched you.

Both hands to your face. Fingers gentle, claws grazing soft against your cheeks.

Blood smeared warm across your skin.

You flinched.

But didn’t pull away.

His thumbs brushed just beneath your eyes. Not to wipe your tears, there weren’t any yet, but to cup the place where they would be. Where he knew they would be.

“Ya did somethin’ wrong,” he whispered. “Ain’t ya?”

That broke you.

“No,” you whispered, voice breaking.

The tears came all at once. Thick. Hot. Your chest heaved and you shook your head, hands flying up to press against his wrists. “No, please- Remmick, please, I didn’t- I can’t-”

“I know,” he said.

But his grip didn’t loosen.

Your knees nearly gave. Your breath hitched.

And he leaned in close, lips almost brushing yours.

“I’m scared,” you sobbed. “Please don’t make me-”

That’s when he said it.

Soft. Sweet.

Final.

“Y’ain’t got a choice.”

The words weren’t cruel.

Weren’t laced with threat.

They sounded like a lullaby.

And then, he kissed you.

Slow. Deep. Full of pride.

The blood on his mouth smeared onto yours, warm and metallic and thick enough to make you shudder. You didn’t kiss him back. Couldn’t. But your lips parted. And that was enough.

He made a sound, something like a purr, and pulled back, smiling like you’d just said I love you.

“There ya go,” he whispered.

Then, lower: “C’mon, now. Just a little bit of help.”

You shook your head, tears streaking your cheeks.

His thumbs smeared them. Not away. Just… further. Down your face. Into your mouth. Into the collar of your nightdress.

“Remmick, please-”

“Ya can,” he said again, voice even gentler this time. “Ya will.”

And when he kissed your forehead, it didn’t feel like comfort.

It felt like surrender.

He led you to the rear hall.

Step by step.

The floorboards creaked beneath your feet, slow and drawn out like they knew what was coming. The air back here always felt colder. Damper, too. Like the walls remembered every secret ever whispered against them.

One clawed hand pressed low to your back. Not shoving. Not dragging. Just guiding. A lover’s touch, if you ignored the sharp curve of his nails and the way they caught on the cotton of your dress.

The other hand gripped something heavy. Bundled tight in a canvas sheet. Edges stiff with dried blood. You didn’t need to ask what it was.

You didn’t want to know how long it had been wrapped like that.

You didn’t want to know anything.

“Take the feet, darlin’,” he said. Soft. Encouraging. “That’s it. There ya go.”

You hesitated.

Stared at the length of fabric that formed the shape of shins, then ankles, then shoes that had once gleamed polished and proud beneath the parlor light.

The man’s feet were cold.

You flinched as your fingers made contact. Felt the stiffness through the layers. The weight of it settled like stone in your stomach.

You choked.

Your knees bent beneath you, buckling under the weight of it, legs shaking, arms burning.

“That’s alright,” Remmick said quickly, already crouched beside you again. “You’re strong. Stronger than ya think.”

He didn’t offer to take it from you.

Didn’t let you drop it either.

Just walked backward, slow and steady, leading you through the back door as the hinges groaned open.

Outside, the air hit sharp.

You breathed it in too fast. Coughed once. The scent of blood clung to your face, your hair, your hands. And beneath it, rot. Curling at the edges of the canvas like the world had already started reclaiming him.

You swallowed hard.

Walked blind behind Remmick.

The trees pressed in around you, branches brittle with late summer’s death. Moonlight pierced the canopy in sharp slivers. The path was narrow. Familiar. You’d taken it before, but never like this.

Never carrying someone.

Remmick hummed as he walked.

Low and tuneless, like it was something he didn’t know he was doing. A sound of habit. Of focus. Of ritual.

You didn’t ask how he knew where to dig.

You didn’t ask how many times he’d done this before.

You just stood there, trembling, as he knelt in the clearing and began to carve the earth apart with his hands.

Not with a shovel.

With his claws.

They split the dirt like butter, curling soil and root alike with mechanical ease. He worked fast. Efficient. With a kind of composure, almost, like he was preparing a bed, not a grave.

You stayed frozen until he glanced up at you, face slick with sweat and moonlight.

“Almost done,” he said. “Just a little more, sugar.”

He stood.

Wiped his brow with the back of one hand, smearing dirt and blood across his temple.

Then he turned to you, lips stretched into a smile.

“C’mon,” he said gently. “Let’s lay him down.”

The canvas landed with a heavy thud.

You flinched again.

He unwrapped the top half. Not all the way. Just enough for the face to show. Slack-jawed, eyes glazed, neck at the wrong angle.

Your stomach turned.

Remmick crouched again, slipped his arms beneath the man’s shoulders.

He looked up at you. Expectant.

“Go on,” he said, nodding toward the legs.

You hesitated.

“Remmick-”

Your breath caught.

“I said, go on.”

So you did.

You took a deep breath, grasped the ankles again, and followed his count.

One, two, three.

You heaved.

He lifted.

And together, you laid him in the earth.

It wasn’t graceful.

It wasn’t clean.

You gagged once and turned away, bile stinging your throat. He didn’t chastise you. Didn’t rush you. Just stood there in the moonlight, waiting, the grave yawning at his feet.

When you finally turned back, your face pale and your hands filthy, he pressed a kiss to your temple.

“Almost done.”

The dirt came next.

Heavy, clumpy, wet.

It stuck to your fingers and your wrists, coated your forearms, gathered beneath your nails like it wanted to crawl inside you.

Remmick packed the final mound himself.

Then stood.

Brushed his hands together with a soft clap.

And turned toward you.

Smiling.

Like you’d just exchanged vows.

Like something had been sealed tonight, sacred and unbreakable.

His eyes shone in the dark, wide and wild and glowing faintly red.

He cupped your face again, blood dried into the creases of his knuckles.

“Ya did good,” he whispered. “So good f’me.”

And you didn’t correct him.

Didn’t move. Couldn't.

He reached into his coat.

The gesture was slow, deliberate. Like everything with him. He could’ve pulled out anything. A blade, a scrap of skin, a love letter scrawled in someone else’s blood, and part of you would’ve just watched, quiet and ready.

But instead, his hand came back gloved in shadow and something glinting beneath a soaked cloth.

He held it out to you. Waiting.

“I brought ya a gift,” he said, voice low and soft, almost shy. Like he was offering you a bouquet.

You didn’t answer.

Just stared.

The fabric, silk, maybe, once cream, was red now. Mottled. It clung wetly to whatever was wrapped inside, dark lines seeping into the seams.

He unwrapped it slowly.

Bit by bit.

Like unveiling something sacred.

A necklace.

Sapphire, deep and cold, surrounded by a constellation of diamonds so small and fine they looked like frozen tears. The pendant caught the moonlight, sparkled like a drop of river water in the sun.

But the chain, thin and gold, was streaked with blood. Still tacky. Still warm.

He held it up between both hands, letting the pendant sway gently between you.

“Belonged to his wife,” he said.

His eyes never left your face.

“Don’t worry. She didn’t put up much of a fight.”

Your breath hitched.

He said it like a kindness.

Like a mercy.

You didn’t ask what he meant. Not exactly. Didn’t ask if that meant she begged. Or wept. Or just stood there, quiet, waiting for her turn.

You didn’t want to know.

You never did.

He stepped closer.

The necklace still dangling in his hand, catching on his fingers. Blood smeared his palm now. Streaked down his wrist. You didn’t move as he reached up, lifted the chain, heavy and wet, and looped it behind your neck.

His fingers were careful.

Precise.

He fastened it with a soft click, the clasp brushing the nape of your neck, cold as a knife.

Then he stepped back. Just a little.

“There,” he whispered, his voice nearly trembling. “Look at ya. My beautiful girl.”

You didn’t look down.

Didn’t touch it.

You felt the weight of it though. The cold metal against your chest. The stick of half-dried blood just beneath your collarbone.

He kissed your cheek next.

Then your jaw.

Then your mouth.

Soft. Tender.

Loving.

Like a reward.

Like a promise.

You didn’t kiss him back.

Didn’t turn your face away, either.

You stood there like a statue. A monument to something twisted and holy. Let him praise you. Let him touch you. Let him cover you in devotion and blood and the sweetness of a love that could burn down a world if it meant keeping you in the ashes.

You weren’t sure what you were anymore.

Not a prisoner.

Not exactly.

Not a partner.

Not fully.

Not a killer.

Not yet.

But his hands, slick and reverent, cradled your face like you were sacred. Like you were his altar. His salvation.

Because you were.

You could see it in his eyes.

He’d ruin himself for you. Had already ruined others. And he’d drown you in that same ruin, over and over again, if it meant keeping you his.

He kissed you once more.

And whispered your name like a hymn.

His girl.

His gift.

His only.

The morning was red.

Not pink. Not gold.

Red.

The kind of light that made the dust in the air look like something alive, like smoke rising off a battlefield no one ever won. It filtered through the bedroom curtains in streaks, bleeding across the wooden floorboards, catching on corners like dried rust.

You stood in front of the mirror with your fingers curled around the edge of the sink, knuckles white, wrists aching from how tightly you gripped. The weight of the necklace still hung heavy on your collarbone. It hadn’t come off. Not when you undressed. Not when you bathed. Not even when you’d scrubbed at it with a rag soaked in rosewater, trying, foolishly, desperately, to pretend that was all it was. A speck. A blemish. A piece of someone else's story, not yours.

But it was yours now.

All of it.

And it wasn’t just blood that had soaked in.

It was his voice, still echoing. The way he whispered encouragements as you dropped that man’s arm into the grave. The way his smile widened when you didn’t run.

The way the man’s eyes stared up from the dirt in your dreams.

You hadn’t slept. Not really. You’d closed your eyes and drifted just long enough for the screaming to follow you in. His scream. Ragged. Human. Then the wet sound of Remmick tearing into him. Again and again and again. It kept looping, each time more vivid than the last.

You looked at your own face now, and all you could see was that man’s.

Mouth open. Arms limp. That flash of horror when he realized he wouldn’t make it out of this house.

Your breath hitched, low in your throat.

Tears stung your eyes.

You blinked them back.

You didn’t hear him come in.

You never did. That was the trouble. He moved through space like something meant to haunt. Silent, smooth, inescapable. The door didn’t creak. The floor didn’t shift.

But you knew.

Your body always knew before your eyes did. The hairs on your arms rose. The air cooled. The stillness deepened into something you could taste.

“Y’ain’t even touched your tea,” he said gently from the doorway, voice all breath and softness. “I kept it warm for ya.”

You didn’t answer right away. Just stared at yourself in the glass, hands trembling against the porcelain. You tried to draw a breath that wouldn’t shake.

Behind you, he stepped closer.

“I’m not mad,” he added. “If that’s what you’re wonderin’. ’Bout last night.”

The words landed like stones on water.

You didn’t respond.

His reflection didn’t show in the mirror.

It never did.

But you didn’t need it to. His voice wrapped around your waist like a second pair of arms, like silk stretched over barbed wire.

“Y’did so good. Did exactly what I needed.” He stepped closer. Slow. Deliberate. “That ain’t small, y’know. What I asked of you. It was big. It meant somethin’.”

You blinked hard, but the tears still clung stubborn at the corners. You clenched the sink edge tighter, like maybe it could tether you. Anchor you. Stop you from suffocating in what you’d done.

“I didn’t want it to mean anything,” you said.

But it cracked when it came out.

Your voice. Your face. Your control.

It cracked all the way down.

You pressed your lips together to keep from making a sound, but your shoulders betrayed you, shuddering once, sharp and tight.

You felt him move in behind you, his presence stretching out like a shadow cast by firelight.

“I know, darlin’,” he comforted. “I know.”

But he didn’t say sorry.

Not once.

And the necklace stayed right where it was. Cool against your skin, glittering like something beautiful, something earned.

Something permanent.

He was behind you now.

You didn’t hear him move. Not a creak of floorboard, not a shift of breath. But suddenly, his arms were around your waist. Strong, steady, certain. Like they’d always been there. Like they belonged there.

You startled, just a little.

But he only pulled you closer, pressing his body to your back with the kind of patience that wasn’t really patience at all. Just control. You could feel the way he held himself, as if something inside him had to be kept still. Contained.

His breath ghosted over your shoulder, cool and damp like a lingering mist. He smelled like clove. And sage. And copper. Always copper.

He rested his chin near your temple, nose nudging lightly into your hair.

“I can take it off,” he offered, voice low and humming. “The necklace. If it’s too much.”

You didn’t answer.

His fingers brushed lightly over the jewels. A whisper of a touch, reverent and slow. He let it linger.

“But I hoped ya’d keep it.”

Your eyes stayed locked on the mirror. On the glinting sapphires. The dried blood now fully gone but not forgotten. You swallowed hard.

“Why?” you asked, barely above a breath.

He leaned in.

Close enough that his lips brushed your neck this time, not your temple. A soft, trailing kiss pressed just beneath your ear. Not hungry. Not rough. But not gentle either.

His voice sank into your skin.

“Because it looks right on ya.”

The words were quiet, but they landed like a hand on your throat.

You didn’t flinch. Not outwardly. Your face stayed calm in the mirror. Your shoulders held.

But inside?

Something gave.

A small, buckling thing. Like a part of you that still wanted to believe you could carry this without changing shape.

He kissed your cheek once, slower now, mouth warm and oddly careful for someone so often careless with your breath.

Then he stepped back.

“I’m headin’ out,” he said, already turning toward the door. “Won’t be long. Won’t go far. Just need to stretch my legs.”

You nodded once.

Didn’t meet his eyes.

You heard his boots on the stairs.

The front door creaked open.

And like always, he left it ajar.

Just enough.

Not enough to invite the wind in. But enough to make a point.

You’re not locked in.

You’re free to go.

But you never did. Not because you couldn’t.

Because he’d folded himself into your bones. Threaded his voice through your thoughts. Left kisses on your pulse like warnings.

Before the door closed behind him, his voice drifted back up the stairs. Just loud enough to reach you.

“I love ya.”

The words sat heavy on the floorboards.

You didn’t say it back.

And you knew he’d remember that.

Would carry it like a splinter under his skin.

Would mention it again someday.

Long after you’d forgotten it.

Long after you’d wished you hadn’t.

You drifted to the garden.

The one Remmick had planted for you, despite his disdain for sunlight. He never called it a gift. Never made a show of it. Just started tending the earth one day, sleeves rolled, mouth quiet, movements deliberate. No shovel. Just his hands. Just his claws, raking slow furrows into the dirt and patting them soft again like he was taking care of something fragile.

You’d watched from the balcony that day, unsure if it was kindness or authority. Maybe both. With him, it was hard to tell where one ended and the other began.

It was overgrown now.

But beautiful. Wild.

The vines curled over the trellis like they were reaching for something they’d never touch. Lavender bloomed in thick patches near the roots. Moonflowers tilted their faces upward, shy but greedy. He must’ve come through while you were sleeping, added new things. Nightshade, maybe, or something less honest. Plants you didn’t recognize, but that hummed with some secret you weren’t sure you wanted to know.

You crouched beside a clump of jasmine. Ran your fingers along a bloom. Soft, white, too perfect for this place. You et your breath shudder out.

This was what he did.

He gave you things. He built them into your days. Little comforts, stitched between the horrors.

And they worked.

He loved you.

In his way.

It was obsessive. Demanding. It carved pieces out of you, asked for silence when you wanted to scream and closeness when you needed distance. But it wrapped around you, too. Warmed your tea. Laid your slippers out. Whispered your name like a prayer in the middle of the night.

And you.

You didn’t know what you felt.

Not entirely.

But it was real.

Not soft. Not easy. But real.

Real enough to stay.

Real enough to clean up bodies.

Real enough to wear the necklace. Still cool against your skin. Still shining in the light.

You traced the petal again. It trembled slightly beneath your fingertip.

You stood there until the sun dipped low again, until the cicadas started to hum and the air went thick with evening. That slow, syrupy hush that pressed against the back of your throat like a warning. The garden dimmed into blue shadows. The wind stopped moving.

You didn’t need to look at the sky to know it was time.

You went inside.

Back through the back door. Back into the red quiet. The warmth that never left the floorboards. The smell of sugar and copper that clung to the curtains like an old friend. The faint creak of the stairwell. The clock ticking too slow, or maybe just loud.

Back into his house.

Your house.

Home.

And there, waiting for you by the parlor door, was a new pair of shoes.

Sapphire blue.

The exact shade of the necklace.

They didn’t look expensive. Not flashy. Just thoughtful. Too thoughtful. A little too perfect. The soles hadn’t touched ground. The leather looked like cream. Soft enough to bend, strong enough to last.

They were still wrapped in tissue paper. Still perfect.

And on top, a note. Folded twice, edges crisp.

For when you feel like walkin’. But only if I’m with you.

You didn’t cry.

Didn’t smile, either.

You just sat down in the chair beside the box, touched the ribbon. It gave under your fingers, like it had been tied gently. Like it had been placed there just moments before.

And maybe it had.

Maybe he was watching.

Maybe he never stopped.

You looked around the room once. Let your eyes pass over the mantle, the mirror, the empty hallway. Then back to the shoes.

Blue as blood in moonlight.

He wanted you to wear them. To remember him every time you moved. To know you weren’t alone.

That you’d never be alone again.

Even if you wanted to be.

You rested your hands in your lap. Smoothed your palms over the hem of your skirt. And waited.

Because you knew he’d come through the door soon.

And you needed to be ready.

Two bodies.

That was all you saw at first.

The front door swung open on its silent hinges, just wide enough to catch the night air and let in the swamp’s low, humming breath. Then, dragged across the threshold like afterthoughts, came two bodies.

Ankles gripped in Remmick’s fists. One man. One woman. Limp. Unceremonious. Their shoes scraped along the steps with dull thuds, their limbs sagging like broken dolls. Their heads knocked once, twice, against the frame as he yanked them forward over the threshold, then across the floor, right over the woven runner you’d cleaned just yesterday.

He didn’t pause to readjust his grip. Didn’t hoist them up by the arms or cradle the neck. Just dragged them straight across the polished pine, the hem of the woman’s dress catching on a nail, the man’s cuff leaving a damp smear along the grain.

You were already sitting when the door opened. Curled at the far end of the parlor sofa, one leg tucked beneath the other, a book open in your lap. You’d read the same page three times now. Or tried to.

The fire had gone soft, more glow than flame, and the air smelled faintly of lemon oil from the furniture polish you’d used that afternoon. The quiet had stretched long enough to feel foreign. The kind of quiet you always thought maybe, just maybe, meant a reprieve.

But it never did.

And deep down, some awful part of you had known.

You knew it when he left without telling you where.

You knew it when the sun dipped low and the shoes sat untouched beside the door.

You knew it when your fingertips hovered over the necklace at your collarbone, blue and cold and impossibly bright against your skin.

The quiet of the day had been too full.

The stillness too practiced.

The gift too kind.

Now, he was back. And he brought proof of it with him.

Remmick looked up as he stepped inside. Not hurried. Not sheepish. Just calm.

Casual.

As if he’d been returning from a stroll through the garden and not some carnage-stained errand that ended in slaughter.

And he smiled.

Sharp. Crooked. Gleaming even beneath the gore.

His shirt, what was left of it, clung to him in soaked folds. Torn across the collar. Split open down the front. Dark with blood and something thicker beneath. His trousers weren’t better, stiff with drying stains, the cuffs tracking flecks of mud across the parlor floor.

But it was his hands, claws, that made your breath catch.

Those clever, expressive things.

They were soaked up to the elbows, glistening red at the knuckles, sticky across the nails, the fingers flexing slightly as if trying to forget what they’d just done.

The blood hit the floor with every step. Slap. Smear. Slap. The sound seemed to echo, loud against the hush of the house.

And around his neck,

The gold chain.

The same one from all those months ago. When he first walked into your life, quiet and strange and smiling with teeth too white and eyes too old. The chain had caught the afternoon light back then. Made you think of warmth. Of wealth. Of good manners and good shoes and someone just passing through.

Now, it caught nothing.

Just blood.

Draped against the hollow of his throat, the metal barely glinted beneath the gore. But you knew it. Recognized it in a way that made your stomach twist. Not with fear.

With memory.

Back then, he’d brought honey. Compliments. Ribbons.

Now he brought bodies.

And not once, not even as he stepped closer, dragging the corpses across your freshly scrubbed floors, did he look ashamed.

He didn’t stop until they were halfway into the parlor, just a few feet from where you sat.

Close enough that the stink caught up to you. Metal and dirt and something that curled the back of your throat.

You stared.

At the man. At the woman. At Remmick.

At the man who said he loved you.

At the one who’d kissed your neck that morning and murmured, Won’t be long.

At the one who’d bought you shoes.

And finally, finally, looked at you proper.

Then, he smiled again.

Like this was nothing.

Like it was love.

“I got greedy,” he said with a smile that pulled too wide. Too sharp. The kind of smile that didn’t look right on a human mouth. “Ain’t proud of it. But-”

He dropped one of the ankles with a wet thud and dragged a blood-soaked hand through his hair, slicking it back from his brow. The strands clung there, heavy and dark with something not yet dry.

“-damn, if it didn’t feel good.”

The book slipped from your lap.

It hit the floor with a soft thud, pages bending inward like they were trying to hide. You didn’t look down.

Couldn’t.

Remmick tilted his head. The firelight caught in the red sheen along his jaw, the crimson glint in his eyes, the blood on his lashes, the teeth brazenly bared behind his smile. His gold chain lay across his collarbone, no longer shining, just soaked.

“Now don’t start with that look,” he said gently. Like you were being difficult. Like this was a misunderstanding. “Ain’t nothin’ different about this than last time. Just… more.”

You opened your mouth.

Closed it again.

Your throat tightened. Heat rushed up from your chest to your face, fast and dizzying.

“I can’t,” you said. Too soft. A ghost of breath.

He blinked.

You swallowed, tried again, louder this time, firmer. Your voice broke on the last word.

“I can’t do this.”

His smile didn’t disappear. It tilted. Softened. Confused. Like he’d misheard you, like you’d offered a strange joke in poor taste.

“Sure ya can,” he said with a little chuckle. “You’ve done it before.”

“No- Remmick, I mean it.”

You stood too fast and stumbled backward, shoulder bumping into the arm of the couch. Your hands shook. Your legs wouldn’t stay steady. Something inside you wanted to bolt.

“I-I thought I could prepare for this. I thought I’d be ready if it happened again. I tried to be ready.” You gasped, the tears rising too quickly now. “But it’s too much. It’s too much, I can’t- I can’t do it again.”

You covered your mouth with both hands as the sob came. Hot and involuntary. It made your knees buckle.

He didn’t say anything.

Just stood there in the parlor’s golden light, two bodies behind him, the blood still dripping from his sleeves. His shirt was open, clinging to him in places and torn in others, revealing streaks of red drying along the lines of his ribs. The bloodied gold chain at his neck looked too bright against it. Almost sickeningly bright. Like something holy lost in rot, just as defiled.

And yet he watched you.

Like you were the only thing that mattered in the room.

Like the rest of the blood didn’t exist.

Like he liked this. Your shaking, your fear. Or maybe it wasn’t that. Maybe it was something worse. Maybe he needed it.

He dropped the second ankle.

The bodies sprawled in opposite directions, lifeless and heavy, arms twisted beneath them. But his gaze didn’t follow them. Never once did he glance away from you.

He started walking.

Slow, deliberate steps. Not rushed. Not angry. As if trying to convince you to not run away. Even though he knew you wouldn’t.

His claws hadn’t retracted yet.

You could see them now. Long and sharp, extending clean past his fingertips like polished blades. Shimmering wet.

You backed away until your spine met the bookshelf, hands splayed behind you against the wood.

“I’m not mad,” he said gently.

God, why was that worse?

“I just thought ya might help.” he went on.

He was close now. Close enough to breathe in. Close enough to taste the iron in the air. His outline looked too tall in the firelight, too narrow at the shoulders, too still.

You turned your face away, but his hand came up, bloodied, clawed, and cupped your cheek with the same reverence you remembered from quieter mornings. His thumb smeared a tear away.

“You’re cryin’,” he murmured, and it almost sounded like it surprised him.

Then, instead of licking it away, he kissed it. Softly. Slowly. Like he knew that was what you needed. As if that made it better.

You sobbed harder.

“Please,” you whispered, barely able to speak past the tightness in your throat. “Please, Remmick. Not this time. I-I can’t.”

He leaned in, brushing his lips against your nape, his breath traveling hot and sticky down your neck.

And then, in the sweetest voice you’d ever heard:

“Sometimes I think about killin’ ya.”

Your whole body went still.

Not in fear.

Not in surprise.

In something worse.

Recognition.

Because you knew. Knew without needing a second breath, that he meant it.

The words didn’t drop like a bomb. They slid in like a knife. Quiet. Precise. Familiar.

He tilted his head, brushing his knuckle down your jaw like he hadn’t just said the most horrifying thing you’d ever heard.

“Every day,” he whispered. “Mornin’ and night. Before ya wake. After ya sleep. When you’re liftin’ the kettle, or brushin’ out your curls, or sayin’ my name like it still means somethin’ soft.”

His eyes were wide now, blue burning red at the center. Hungry. Hollow. A flame with no wick.

His hand drifted down your throat. Light as a feather. He traced the line of your pulse with the back of his knuckle, sighing at the flutter under your skin.

“Don’t mean I want to,” he said. “Not in the way you’re thinkin’. I’d never do it to hurt ya. It ain’t about that.”

You didn’t move. Couldn’t.

He stepped in closer, just close enough that your breath bounced off his shirt. Soaked and stiff with blood, the collar dark and curling at the seams. You could smell it all over him now. On his breath. In his hair. On the chain pressed tight against the hollow of his throat.

“Sometimes,” he started, “I see ya sittin’ there with a book in your hand, brows furrowed, lips pursed, and I think: God, I’d like to still that moment forever. Seal it. Keep it. Bury it right inside me so no one else ever gets to see it.”

His hand dropped lower.

Over your ribs.

The curve of your waist.

“Sometimes,” he went on, his voice still syrup-sweet, “I think about your blood spread out over the floor like a paintin’. The kind of red that don’t fade. The kind that says y’were mine.”

You whimpered.

And it made him shiver.

“But then ya smile at me,” he said. “And I think, no, not yet. Not yet. Let her smile again. Let her ask me what I’m hummin’. Let her scold me for trackin’ dirt into the kitchen. Let her keep bein’ good.”

His hands moved again. Gentle. Worshipful.

He wrapped them around your hips and turned you, slow, pressing you backward until your thighs brushed the edge of the sofa.

Until you could see the bodies again.

Still sprawled on the parlor floor.

Still leaking onto the wood.

Your knees locked.

Remmick lowered you down like you were made of glass. One hand cradling your spine, the other smoothing your skirt beneath you. He sat beside you, far too close. Turned to face you as if there was space to spare.

His claws scraped your knee where the fabric had risen.

“Y’see, darlin’,” he said, cupping your face again, “it ain’t about cruelty. It’s about closeness. I love ya so much I can’t figure out what to do with it. It don’t burn clean. It don’t settle.”

His eyes gleamed.

“I wanna take ya in. Swallow ya whole. Wear your name on the inside of my mouth. I want ya with me, inside me, forever. That’s what this is.”

You were shaking now.

Tears welled, but you couldn’t blink them away. They just sat there, blurring the edges of him. Of the room. Of the lifeless shapes still cooling on the floor.

“Ya think I don’t see it in ya too?” he lied, so confidently that you almost found yourself believing it. “That same want? That same ache? Ya look at me like I’m already inside you.”

You made a choked sound. Couldn’t tell if it was protest or grief.

He kissed the corner of your mouth again.

Then lower.

Your jaw.

Your throat.

His hands roamed with reverence, but they were still stained.

And it was still happening.

“Sometimes,” he breathed, lips brushing the shell of your ear, “I think I’ll wake one mornin’ and do it. Just let it happen. Let my love finish what it started. But I haven’t yet.”

He leaned back just enough to look at you.

His kissed a tear from your cheek.

“I haven’t,” he said again, softly. “Y’should remember that.”

You should’ve screamed.

Run.

Shoved him back.

Instead, you stared at him through tear-glossed lashes. Silent. Spinning. Unmoored.

He leaned in once more. Kissed your cheek like it was something fragile.

“Y’don’t ever have to be afraid of me, sugar. Long as ya stay.”

And for a moment, just a moment, you almost believed him.

Remmick’s lips brushed yours, feather-light at first, a barely-there caress that left you reeling. You could taste the copper tang of blood on his mouth, feel the warmth of it against your skin. Your breath caught as he pulled back slightly, just enough to feel his breath against your face. A soft huff of air, a reassurance.

But then his hand slid up your spine, blood smearing across your dress, and all softness fled.

This time, when his mouth met yours, there was no gentleness. No hesitation. Just hunger, visceral and consuming. He kissed you like he wanted to devour you whole, his lips slanting over yours, his tongue pushing into your mouth and claiming every inch of it as his own.

You whimpered, fingers groping at his shoulders, but whether to push him away or pull him closer, you didn’t know. Your thoughts were muddled, thick with fear and revulsion and a deep, wrenching want you couldn’t name. He tasted like death. Like sin. Like every dark fantasy you’d ever had but never dared speak aloud.

He yanked your head back to bare your throat, kissing down it, hot and open-mouthed, his tongue flicking out to taste the salt of your skin. His other hand, which had been stroking idly up and down your side, slipped under your skirt. You tensed, a protest rising in your throat, but he shushed you before you could voice it.

“Shh, now,” he murmured against your throat, fangs ghosting over your skin. “You’ve been achin’ for this. Starvin’ for it. A man’s hands. A man’s mouth. And ain’t it a mercy it’s mine givin’ it to ya?”

His fingers brushed your inner thigh, dragging through the wetness that had gathered there. You could feel the scrape of his claws, even through the fabric of your panties. A shudder ran through you, and you hated yourself for it. Hated that some twisted part of you wanted this, wanted him, even like this, covered in blood and filth and the evidence of his crimes.

He teased you through the thin fabric, his touch light and maddening. Circling. Flicking. Dipping just inside the edge before pulling away again. You whined, hips bucking of their own accord, desperate for more. More pressure. More friction. More something, anything to ground you in the midst of this debauched nightmare.

“Please,” you gasped, not even sure what you were asking for. For him to stop? For him to keep going? For the world to open up and swallow you whole, so you didn’t have to reckon with this unfamiliar depravity?

He chuckled, dark and indulgent. “Greedy girl,” he chided, his breath hot against your ear. “Don’t worry darlin’. I’ll give ya what y’need.”

He punctuated his words with a hard press of his fingers, rubbing rough circles over the damp fabric. You cried out, back arching, lungs seizing with the intensity of it. It was too much. Not enough. Your thoughts were fragmenting, splintering under the force of your need. You felt like you were drowning in it.

In him.

And still, he whispered filthy things in your ear, coating your skin in his words. Telling you how much he loved you. How much he needed you. How he’d do anything to keep you, even this. Especially this.

Remmick sucked at your throat, slow, deliberate, letting the warmth rise, letting you squirm. Then, without warning, he bit down. Deep. Sharp. A growl rumbled from his chest at the sound you made, part gasp, part sob, and he shivered like it thrilled him. “That’s it,” he breathed, lips glossy with blood and spit. “Sing for me, sweetheart.”

He growled as he left a map of his obsession on your flesh, fingers finally shoving your panties aside to slide through your slick folds.

Inside, something was screaming. Screaming for you to run, to fight, to do anything but this. To not let him take you like this, stained with the blood of innocents, surrounded by the evidence of his madness.

But your body... your body was betraying you. Arching into his touch. Soaking his fingers. Trembling with a heat you’d never known before. A heat that was as twisted and all-consuming as he was.

He pushed his fingers inside you, and you cried out at the stretch, the burn of it. He was big, bigger than you’d ever had, and the scrape of his claws against your inner walls only added to the intensity of it. It hurt, God, it hurt, but with every flex of his fingers, every curl and twist, you were hit with a new pang of euphoria, a pleasure so sharp it was almost painful.

You were so close, teetering on the edge of something huge and shattering, when he suddenly pulled his fingers out, leaving you achingly empty. You whimpered, hips bucking, seeking, but before you could even form a protest, he was pushing your legs apart, baring you completely to his gaze.

And then, without warning, he was on you, his mouth hot and wet and voracious. He ate you out like an animal, fangs still bared, growling into your flesh like he wanted to consume you whole. The sounds he made were obscene, wet and slurping, echoing in the quiet of the room like some kind of debauched symphony.

You thrashed beneath him, fingers tangling in his hair, pulling, pushing, trying to get him closer, get him away, you didn’t even know anymore. The pleasure was cresting higher and higher, coiling tighter and tighter, a spring on the verge of snapping. You felt like you were being flayed alive by it, torn apart piece by piece by piece.

And when you finally broke, it was with a scream that tore from your throat like a wound. You came so hard you saw stars, your vision whiting out, your lungs seizing, your body convulsing. And through it all, he just kept lapping at you, drinking down every drop of your pleasure like it was the finest wine. Like he couldn’t get enough of your taste, your need, your everything.

Your breath came in sharp pants, thoughts equally scattered. Fragmented. Lost in the haze of pleasure and horror that clouded your mind.

And then, with a monumental effort, you pushed him away. Or tried to. Your arms felt weak, your muscles trembling with the backlash of your climax.

He looked up at you, his face soaked with your arousal, a feral smile spreading across his lips. “I’m not done yet, darlin’,” he growled with a low rumble that vibrated through you. He tore at his clothes, ripping the blood-soaked shirt over his head, exposing his crimson-streaked torso. You tried to protest again, but he shushed you with a kiss, a deep, consuming kiss that left you tasting yourself, him, and the metallic tang of blood.

He lined himself up at your entrance, and you could feel the heat of him, the thickness, the promise of what was to come. You tensed, a flutter of panic in your chest. “Remmick, I-” you started, but he cut you off with another kiss, his hips surging forward, impaling you in one swift, brutal stroke.

You cried out, a sound of pain and pleasure mingled together, your nails digging into his back as he filled you completely. He was nothing you could’ve prepared yourself for, stretching you to your limits, the sensation was nearly unbearable. He started to move, his hips rolling in a rhythm that was both primal and precise, each thrust driving him deeper, harder, more relentlessly than the last.

“God, ya feel so good, sugar,” he moaned against your neck with a huff that made you shiver. “So tight. So wet. Y’were made for this. Made for me.”

You could feel the soreness building, the ache of being stretched, of being taken so ruthlessly. Your body was overwhelmed, every nerve ending firing, every sensation heightened to almost unbearable levels. You whimpered, your hips bucking in time with his thrusts, unable to do anything but take what he was giving you.

Remmick’s eyes were wild, his breath coming in ragged gasps as he drove into you. “Look at ya,” he panted, voice so thick with lust you could barely understand him. “So beautiful. So perfect. Ya take my cock like a dream.”

He leaned down, licking the tears that streamed down your face, his tongue hot and wet against your skin as he purred. “Ya taste so sweet when you cry.”

You tried to divert your attention, to escape the intensity of his near-crimson gaze and the raw, animalistic need that burned in his eyes. It was a need that terrified you to your very core. Your eyes darted around the room, seeking anything to anchor yourself to, anything to distract from the overwhelming sensations coursing through your body.

Your gaze landed on the necklace that swayed from his neck. That blood-soaked gold chain that glinted dully in the firelight. That gold chain that followed you from the life you once had to now, wrapped in Remmick’s embrace, his body moving against yours in a rhythm as old as time.

He noticed your distraction, a cruel, knowing smile playing on his lips as he reached up and took the necklace into his mouth. He bit down on the gold, his teeth sinking into the metal with a force that should have bent it, his eyes never leaving yours.

“That’s it, darlin’,” he groaned, the words muffled around the jewelry. “Focus on that. Focus on me. On how good this feels.”

And God help you, he was right. It did feel good. So good it hurt. So good it was almost too much to bear. The pleasure was a sharp, piercing thing, a knife’s edge of ecstasy that left you breathless and dizzy. With each thrust, each roll of his hips, each brutal, delicious stroke, the pressure inside you built, a coiled spring ready to snap, your body teetering on the brink of something monumental.

You could feel the guilt gnawing at you. A dark, insidious thing that clawed at the edges of your mind, trying to break through the haze of pleasure. How could you find enjoyment in this? How could your body respond so eagerly to his touch? To his invasion? You knew the depth of his depravity. The extent of his crimes. You were a willing participant. An accomplice.

You were ashamed of the moans that fell from your lips, ashamed of the way your body moved with his, ashamed of the desperate, keening cries that escaped you as he brought you higher, closer to the edge of oblivion.

Remmick's hips continued to roll in a relentless rhythm, his body glistening with sweat, his breath coming in ragged, desperate gasps. He leaned down, his voice a drunken, fervent whisper against your ear, his words a mix of promise and threat. “M’gonna put a baby in ya, sugar. Gonna fill you up. Watch ya get all fat ’n slow ’n pretty.”

His words sent a shock of panic through you. A cold, paralyzing fear that cut through the haze of pleasure and left you reeling. You tried to push him away, your hands pressing against his chest, your body tensing as you tried to escape the inevitable. “Remmick, no-” you gasped, your voice hoarse, your eyes wide with a mix of terror and pleading. “You can’t-”

But he was relentless, his body pinning you down, his strength overpowering yours in a way that left you feeling helpless. Trapped. He captured your wrists in one hand, holding them above your head as he continued to move inside you, his hips never ceasing their brutal, demanding rhythm. “Shh,” he cooed, his voice a low, soothing purr that contrasted sharply with the wild, untamed look in his eyes. “You’ve been askin' for this. You’ve been beggin' for it. I know you have. And I’m gonna give it to you.”

He leaned down, tongue invading your mouth, exploring, conquering, silencing your protests as he continued to move inside you.

You tried to turn your head, to break the kiss, to gasp for air, but he followed, his lips never leaving yours, his breath mingling with yours, his tongue continuing its relentless exploration. He kissed you deeply, thoroughly, his lips moving against yours with a suffocating desperation, as if he were trying to pour every ounce of his being into you. To consume you wholly.

“Remmick, please-” you managed to gasp as he finally broke the kiss, your chest heaving, your body trembling with a mix of fear, pleasure, and something else, something almost akin to desperation. “I can’t-”

But he only smiled, a slow, knowing smile that sent a shiver down your spine, a mix of anticipation and trepidation. “Ya can, sugar,” he insisted, the lack of choice you had in the matter laced on every word. “And ya will.”

With a final, shuddering thrust, he buried himself deep, his whole body seizing tight as he spilled inside you, breath caught somewhere between a grunt and a gasp. His mouth found your shoulder, and without pause, he bit down. Hard. Fangs sinking deep. The pressure broke through your skin, and the sound that left him was low and guttural. Like it came from the oldest part of him.

The pain hit first. Bright. Hot. A sudden wash of heat that bled through your dress and soaked down your arm. You cried out, not just from the hurt, but from the way it tangled with everything else. Your spine arched, your chest heaving, your head going light from the sheer force of it.

Remmick didn’t stop. Didn’t pull away. His hands gripped tight around your hips, and he moved through the aftershocks like he couldn’t bear to let the moment end. The bite held you still. Anchored. The only sound in the room was the ragged pull of his breathing and the faint sound of blood dripping onto the sofa.

When he finally stilled, he didn’t let go, or pull out.

He licked over the wound slow, careful, as if tasting something rare. As if trying to commit it to memory. A quiet sound rose in his throat, something between a hum and a sigh, and you felt it against your skin.

You were shaking.

Spent.

And he held you like you were something precious, something ruined, something he couldn’t stop himself from needing.

The sheets smelled like lavender. Fresh. Clean. As if nothing had ever happened at all. As if you hadn’t just laid beneath him in the room where the bodies had gone cold, their blood still tacky on the floorboards.

As if he hadn’t taken you with that same blood smeared down his chest, soaked into his sleeves, crusted along his jaw.

As if he hadn’t whispered love into your mouth while fucking you raw against the parlor sofa, his hands pinning yours down, his hips relentless, the broken cries that spilled from your throat sounding too much like pleading and too little like pleasure.

And then, when it was over, when your body was wrecked and shivering, your legs too weak to stand, he’d kissed your forehead like a lullaby, scooped you up in his arms like you weighed nothing at all, and carried you to the bath.

The tub was already full.

Of course it was.

Warm. Steaming. Waiting for you.

You’d wondered, hazily, if he’d drawn it before or after.

He didn’t speak as he undressed you. Just peeled the ruined nightgown from your skin with slow, reverent fingers. His claws retracted now, nails blunted and gentle. No urgency. No demand. Only care.

The water lapped up around your body as he eased you in, one hand holding your back, the other at your hough, lowering you as though you might break apart in his arms.

He didn’t get in with you. Not at first.

Just knelt beside the tub and cupped water over your shoulders, your breasts, your thighs. Ran a cloth down your spine. Washed you in long, slow strokes, like he was trying to scrub the memory of the bodies from your skin before it sank too deep.

But it already had.

Still, you let him work. Let him wash your hair, comb it through with his fingers. Let him tilt your head back and rinse it clean. Let him trace every curve of your body like it was scripture.

He scrubbed the blood from your shoulder with painstaking tenderness, kissing the half-healed wound in between passes, calling you his miracle, his mercy, his girl.

His voice never rose. Not once.

Not even when you flinched from his touch. Not even when you cried.

He kissed your eyes dry.

You thought about the quiet days. The good ones. When he made breakfast in the morning and left hibiscus tea on your nightstand. When he sang while he cooked. When he brushed your hair with such delicacy you almost forgot what his hands were capable of.

And you thought about the other days. The long silences. The backhanded questions. The hollow, hateful stares that brought you to tears.

Your body ached in places you didn’t have names for. Inside and out.

And he was so gentle now.

You wanted to scream.

Instead, you let him rinse the soap from your skin and lift you out of the tub. Let him wrap you in a towel, thick and warm, smelling faintly of clove and firewood.

Let him dry you off. Let him carry you to his bedroom, both of you silent now, except for his breath brushing against your temple.

The mattress dipped under your weight. The pillows caught your head like a secret. The blanket was heavy in the best way, and his arms found you again before you could move away.

Remmick curled around you like a second skin. One arm beneath your waist. One over your belly.

His fingers didn’t move. Just stayed there, still and steady, like they could already feel what had been made between you.

His mouth was at your neck again, breath soft, lips barely brushing.

And still, you didn’t sleep.

You just stared into the dark, remembering the warmth of his voice when he called you good. Remembering the snap of bone. The wet sound of flesh giving way. The feel of his body slamming into yours with no hesitation, no mercy, like love could be beaten into you if he just took enough of you for himself.

He shifted behind you. Pulled you closer.

There was no space left between your bodies.

None between the truth and the lie of it.

And you still didn’t move.

You kept your eyes open. Fixed on the wall.

And thought about everything.

About your daddy’s store. You thought about that first. The sound of the bell over the door, bright and sweet as wind chimes. The gentle sweep of the broom on the front steps every morning. You thought about how the sun used to come in through the big front windows, painting long streaks of gold across the shelves. You used to watch the dust swirl in the light and think it looked like magic.

You thought about the girls you’d grown up with. How you used to sit on porch rails with your legs swinging, eating too much candy and daring each other to run barefoot down the gravel road. You wondered where they were now. If they were married. If they had babies.

If they thought about you.

You wondered if any of them had come by the store. If they’d stood on the same wooden floorboards you once stood on and asked your daddy where you’d gone. If they were told you were gone for good.

Or maybe they didn’t ask at all.

Maybe they figured you’d run off with a man, like so many girls did when the world backed them into a corner and made them choose between being loved or being lonely.

You thought about your mama next.

About how she used to wrap your hair at night, hands gentle but firm, fingers slick with oil. She never let you skip it, not even once. Not even when you pouted and said you weren’t a baby anymore. “Still my baby,” she’d say, tying the scarf with a kiss to your forehead.

You thought about what she’d say now. Whether she’d still hold you close, or just hold your face and try not to cry. You didn’t know if she’d recognize you.

Not like this. Not with him.

Remmick shifted behind you in the bed, stirring as if he could feel your thoughts pulling you too far. He curled tighter. Pulled you in with him. One arm clutched low around your waist, the other curling beneath your ribs. Like he was trying to mold his shape to yours. Like if he could just hold you close enough, you’d stop trying to leave, mind or body.

And maybe he was right.

Maybe he could fold you into him, press you so deep into his chest you’d forget where you ended and he began.

You blinked slow.

Your throat ached.

The room was quiet. The air was warm. The shadows on the walls flickered and stretched like they didn’t know where to settle. The lamp on the dresser hummed soft and low, casting gold against the covers, turning everything honeyed and still.

There was no lock on the door.

No chain at your ankle.

No order in his voice.

But it was a cage all the same.

A soft, warm, gilded cage.

And you had stayed.

Because where else was there to go?

You’d imagined leaving. Dozens of times. Pictured it clear as glass. The road winding long and empty behind you. The night cool on your skin. Your heart in your mouth.

But every time you chased that dream far enough, it ended in the same place.

Here.

With him.

You’d made too many trades along the way. Traded silence for safety. Traded truth for comfort. Traded fear for something that looked too much like love to name it anything else.

And now you had nothing left to bargain with.

You’d redrawn the line a hundred times, and now the chalk had run out.

So you stopped thinking.

Let your muscles go slack.

Let the ache in your chest press itself into the mattress. Let the silk of his voice echo in your head.

You’re safe, darlin’.

My beautiful girl.

I love ya.

And finally, you let yourself go.

[cressidagrey]

Built to Last

Pairing: Oscar Piastri x Felicity Leong-Piastri (Original Character)

Part of the The mysterious Mrs. Piastri Series.

Summary:   Oscar and Felicity have their own Wedding Anniversary Traditions. 

Warnings and Notes: Big thanks to @llirawolf , who listens to me ramble 😂

Oscar didn’t mean to mention it.

They were halfway through a post-sim debrief, leaning against the wall outside the engineering bay, sipping coffee. The conversation was harmless, easy: weather, schedules…

And then, somewhere between a yawn and checking his calendar, Oscar said it.

“Anniversary’s next week.”

Lando blinked over the rim of his cup. “Wait. Anniversary anniversary?”

Oscar glanced sideways, frowning faintly. “Yeah. Wedding.”

There was a beat of stunned silence.

Then Lando made a sound like a cat being startled from a nap and nearly dropped his coffee. “Mate. What are you doing? Where are you taking her? What’s the plan? I’ll babysit. Have you booked something? Have you bought her a present? Is it diamonds? It should be diamonds.”

Oscar blinked. “It’s… not diamonds.”

Lando looked personally betrayed. Like Oscar had just declared that love was fake and Santa wasn’t real.

“You’re telling me you’ve been married for five years and you don’t do an anniversary anniversary?”

Oscar shifted his weight, eyebrows pinching together. “We usually just… make grilled cheese. Sit on the porch. If Bee’s asleep, we drink wine. If she’s not, we share juice boxes. Maybe pick out a piece of furniture. Something we actually need.”

Lando stared. “That’s it?”

Oscar shrugged. “We like it.”

“But—” Lando flailed, gesturing with his coffee like it was a wand summoning romance. “But this is the one day a yearwhen you go big. You know, romantic dinner, private jet, maybe one of those poems that makes people cry.”

“I’m not writing Fliss a poem.”

“Why not?!”

“Because I’d die of secondhand embarrassment before she even finished reading it. And she’d probably edit it for rhythm and meter and grammar.”

“She’d annotate your love poem,” Lando breathed, delighted. “God, I love her.”

Oscar smirked into his cup. “Same.”

Lando narrowed his eyes. “Okay, but still—you’re telling me you’ve never done a surprise trip? Champagne on a boat? A room full of candles? A necklace in a soufflé?”

“That’s a choking hazard.”

“You’re impossible.”

Oscar sipped his coffee and shrugged again, but this time, the movement wasn’t quite so casual.

Because the truth was… he hadn’t really thought about it.

Not in the way Lando meant.

He and Felicity didn’t do fireworks. Their entire relationship had been built on low murmurs and steady hands, not fanfare and spectacle. Their romance was forged in the back corners of university labs and packed lunches, in checking engine oil and falling asleep on the couch after Bee finally stopped crying at 3 am. It wasn’t showy. It wasn’t curated. It was real. Grounded.

But now, with Lando’s eyes boring into him like Oscar had committed a federal crime against romance, he felt a small, unsettling prickle of doubt crawl up the back of his neck.

Maybe he should’ve planned something. Maybe grilled cheese wasn’t enough. Maybe Felicity deserved diamonds and candlelit dinners and Instagram-worthy anniversaries with rose petals and skyline views.

He’d never once heard her complain. Never once seen disappointment flicker in her eyes when they swapped fancy reservations for couch blankets or museum dates for garden centre runs.

But still.

He took another sip of his coffee, slower this time.

“Maybe I’ll… think about it,” he muttered.

***

Later that evening, Oscar padded barefoot into the kitchen.

The house smelled like vanilla and sugar and the faint, familiar undertone of something gently burning in the oven. Warm light spilt across the tiled floor. Felicity was elbow-deep in flour at the counter, sleeves rolled to her elbows, curls falling loose from the bun on top of her head. Beside her, Bee stood on her wooden step stool, tongue poked out in concentration as she whacked cookie cutters into rolled dough with the determination of a tiny construction foreman.

There was flour on the floor. On the counter. In Bee’s eyebrows. One of the cats had paw prints across the hallway that suggested he had also tried to help. It looked like domestic chaos and safety, and home.

Oscar leaned against the doorframe and took a moment to watch them — Bee holding up a wonky star shape like she’d just forged the moon, Felicity smiling as she adjusted the dough thickness with an old wooden rolling pin they’d found at a flea market on holiday.

He cleared his throat.

“Hey,” he said, voice soft, a little scratchy with nerves. “Do you… wanna do something for the anniversary this year? Like. A thing.”

Felicity glanced up.

She didn’t answer right away. Just looked at him — really looked — eyes narrowing slightly in amusement.

And then she laughed.

Not unkindly. Never that. It was the sort of laugh that curled through the room like sunshine, golden and affectionate and just the tiniest bit smug. The kind that said she already knew where this was going. That maybe Lando had texted her before Oscar even made it home.

“You want to do a thing?” she asked, brushing a flour-smudged curl off her forehead with the back of her wrist.

Oscar rubbed the back of his neck, the way he always did when he felt a bit uncertain. “I mean… not like a jet to Paris kind of thing. Unless you want to. But just… I don’t know. Something special?”

She grinned — full teeth, eyes soft. Wiped her hands on a tea towel and stepped away from the counter.

“Oz, we got married at a registry office and ate Pret sandwiches on a bench outside. You think I’m holding out for a rooftop dinner now?”

Oscar shifted his weight. “I just thought… maybe you wanted something a bit more… grand?”

She snorted.

Actually snorted. Then, full-body laughed, leaning back against the counter, shoulders shaking.

Bee looked up, startled. “Mama snorted.”

“I did,” Felicity said, brushing her knuckles against her nose. “Because your papa is being very sweet.”

She turned back to Oscar, eyes still crinkled at the corners. “What brought this on?”

He sighed, defeated. “Lando.”

“Ah.” Her mouth twitched. “Lando said. Of course.”

“He asked if I’d bought you diamonds,” Oscar muttered, stepping fully into the kitchen now. “Or planned a surprise trip. Or hidden a necklace in a soufflé.”

Felicity’s eyebrows hit her hairline. “A soufflé?”

“I know.”

“He does realise you don’t like soufflés, right?”

Oscar chuckled. “I told him that was a choking hazard.”

Felicity laughed again, and then reached across the counter to take his hand. Her fingers were cool from the dough, her touch familiar and grounding. The weight of it settled something in Oscar’s chest.

“We went to Pret after our wedding,” she said.

Oscar nodded. “In our wedding clothes. On a bench outside.”

“I got egg mayo on my dress.”

Bee, still diligently cutting stars, looked up and said solemnly, “I like egg mayo.”

Oscar squeezed Felicity’s hand. “Your mama’s the only person I know who would pick a sandwich over a three-course meal.”

“And your Papa married me anyway,” Felicity said, proudly.

“I got the better end of the deal.”

She rolled her eyes affectionately. “Don’t get sentimental, Tin Man.”

He hesitated. “But still… five years is a big. And I don’t want you to think I don’t care. Just because we don’t do all that—” he gestured vaguely toward the ceiling “—sparkler-and-chandelier stuff.”

“I don’t need sparkles,” she said gently. “We already have our tradition.”

Oscar blinked.

“Every year,” she said, “we pick something for the house. Something that matches the traditional anniversary theme.”

“Right,” Oscar said, memory clicking into place. “Year one — paper — we got Bee’s sonogram framed.”

“Two was cotton — the new sheets,” Felicity added. “Three, leather — that vintage armchair from Brighton. Four was fruit — we planted the lemon tree. Which is still alive, by the way.”

Oscar grinned. “So this year…?”

“Wood,” Felicity said, brightly. “I was thinking maybe a hutch for the dining room? Something low enough for Bee to use, too. Or we could go to that reclaimed timber place you like. Get something together. As a family.”

She paused, then added slyly, “Unless you’d rather get me a life-sized mahogany sculpture of your face.”

Oscar made a face. “God, no.”

Felicity kissed him then. Quick, warm, and sweet — flour and sugar clinging to her cheek. The smell of dough in her hair.

“Let’s do what we always do,” she said. “Grilled cheese sandwiches. Something for the house. And maybe a dance in the kitchen when Bee’s asleep.”

Oscar leaned his forehead against hers.

“You’re not disappointed?”

Felicity looked up at him, so sure, so steady. “You are the best thing that ever happened to me. I don’t need a yacht. I need a hutch and a sandwich and you.”

Oscar swallowed.

“Good,” he whispered. “Because I really want that hutch.”

Bee looked up from the counter and asked innocently, “What’s a hutch?”

And Felicity grinned. “It’s where we put the cookies, baby.”

***

Five years.

Oscar still couldn’t quite believe it.

Not in the dramatic, we made it through storms and fire kind of way. Not even in the dazed, champagne-toast-and-fireworks sense people always talked about when anniversaries came up in interviews.

It was quieter than that. Softer. It was the realisation that love could be an accumulation instead of a crescendo.

It was the gentle clink of plates in the morning and Bee’s feet swinging rhythmically against the chair legs. It was the scent of coffee lingering in the air and the warmth of Felicity’s hand on his back as she passed behind him in the kitchen. It was the smear of strawberry jam Bee had left on the counter. The playlist Felicity always put on when she was in a good mood. The socks Oscar was wearing—his, but mismatched, because Bee had picked them out for him while giggling.

Five years married. Eight together. One life—stitched together out of early morning moments and late night compromises. Out of burnt toast and half-written text messages and late returns from races.

“Extra sharp cheddar and caramelised onion chutney,” Felicity announced, flipping one of the sandwiches in the pan with decisive grace. Her hair was still damp from the shower, curling slightly at the nape of her neck. “Don’t let it be said I don’t put in effort.”

Oscar, perched sideways on one of the stools by the kitchen island, raised his hands in mock surrender. “You know I’ve been looking forward to this all week.”

“Lando texted me to make sure I remembered,” she deadpanned. “Apparently, this is now a cultural event.”

Bee, seated at the dining table with her plush frog and a mini sandwich cut into stars, beamed up at both of them. “I love anniversary grilled cheese.”

“You love any grilled cheese,” Felicity said without looking up.

“I love love grilled cheese,” Bee insisted, her voice full of confidence and cheese-induced delight, legs swinging beneath the table like a metronome of joy.

Oscar laughed quietly. “That’s a bold statement.”

Bee pointed at her sandwich with all the solemnity of a toddler philosopher. “It’s warm and gooey and special. Like Mama and Papa.”

That stopped him for a second.

Felicity glanced over and raised an eyebrow, the corners of her mouth twitching. “Do not cry over grilled cheese, Oz.”

“I’m not crying,” Oscar said, already reaching for a napkin. “There’s just… steam in my eyes.”

They ate slowly, comfortably—Felicity curled up in her usual spot with her plate on her knees, Oscar dipping the corners of his sandwich into his tomato soup, Bee talking non-stop about a worm she found in the garden yesterday. The kitchen was golden with afternoon sun. No candles, no tablecloth, no grand declarations—just the three of them, a shared meal, and the faint crackle of an old playlist Felicity had made back when they still lived in Enstone, back when money was tight and futures uncertain and grilled cheese had been dinner out of necessity, not tradition.

But tradition it had become.

In the afternoon, they piled into the car and drove out to a secondhand furniture barn two towns over.

It wasn’t glamorous, but then again, neither were they. They liked it that way. Felicity had found the place during a parts run last year—one of those half-accidental discoveries she stored away in her head for a later date. She liked it because the floors creaked and the man who ran it gave out peppermints in mismatched jars. Bee liked it because there was a sleepy orange cat who rotated between different armchairs like royalty, completely unfazed by toddlers.

Oscar liked it because Felicity would wander through the aisles like she was in a gallery, fingertips brushing along the edges of furniture like she could read their stories. He’d catch her eyeing a carved drawer or a joint that needed sanding, and he could see the math running behind her eyes. Not just the dimensions, but the future. Where it would fit. What colour she'd repaint it. How many memories it could hold.

They spent nearly two hours there.

Bee trailed after them like a tiny contractor with a tape measure, periodically declaring, “This is too big for our dining room!” or “Mama, this one has a secret drawer!” or “That’s a no, Papa. That cabinet is too wobbly.”

Felicity laughed the whole time. Oscar kept a mental list of her maybes and a running total in his head of what they could fit in the car if they sacrificed the front seat.

Eventually, they found it.

Or rather, Felicity did.

It was tucked in the back corner of the barn, half-covered by a faded quilt and surrounded by old brass lamps and a sagging chaise lounge. An old oak hutch—solid, heavy, a little battered, its wood rich with age. The panels on the doors were intricately carved with vines and flowers, and the handles were brass, worn down by decades of use into something soft and warm to the touch.

Felicity ran her hand across the top of it slowly, reverently.

“It’s not perfect,” she murmured, inspecting a scuff at the corner and one drawer that stuck a little.

Oscar stood beside her and smiled. “Neither are we.”

She looked up, and her eyes were suddenly full—quiet and luminous, filled with all the years behind them and everything still ahead.

Bee tugged gently at her sleeve. “Can we put the fancy teapot in it?”

“I think we should,” Felicity said, brushing Bee’s curls back behind her ear. “Front and centre.”

Oscar crouched to test the hinges, and Bee knelt beside him like an assistant, watching his every move with deep concentration.

They left with the receipt, three complimentary peppermints, and the hutch wedged somewhat impossibly into the back of their car.

The ride home was full of Bee humming show tunes, Felicity tracing patterns on Oscar’s thigh with her fingertip, and the slight creak of the old hutch every time they hit a bump.

***

That night, after Bee had fallen asleep in a tangle of books and tired limbs — curled half off her bed with a plush frog tucked under one arm and a paper crown from that afternoon still slightly askew on her head — Oscar padded quietly into the kitchen, barefoot and already half-ready for bed.

The house had gone still in that soft, late-evening way he loved most. The kind of quiet that settled around the bones of a place when the day had been good, full. Like the whole house had exhaled.

And there she was.

Felicity was sitting at the dining table in one of his old sweatshirts, sleeves pushed up to her elbows, legs curled beneath her in that way that always made him wonder how she didn’t cramp up. A mug of tea steamed faintly in her hands, forgotten for the moment. Her gaze was fixed across the room.

On the hutch.

The old new hutch, as Bee had christened it. Sanded that afternoon by Felicity’s hand, already partially filled with mismatched mugs and the “fancy teapot” Bee had insisted deserved its own shelf. A tiny post-it note was stuck to one corner: oil the hinges – squeaky! in Felicity’s loopy handwriting.

Oscar stood in the doorway for a second, watching her. The light above the table was warm, casting gold across her cheekbones and glinting off the wedding band and engagement ring she wore on a chain around her neck…joined by a tiny bee pendant — not because she didn’t like wearing it on her hand, but because grease from her work tended to cake into the setting, and she hated scrubbing it clean.

“Happy five years,” she said softly, without turning. Just sensing him there, like she always did. She held the mug out in his direction without looking.

He crossed the room and took it from her hands, fingers brushing hers. “Best anniversary yet.”

“We say that every year.”

“And every year it’s true.”

Oscar didn’t sit. Instead, he stepped in closer, between her knees where she sat at the table, and leaned down until their foreheads touched. Her breath ghosted against his jaw, warm and familiar.

“Thank you,” he murmured, eyes closed. “For not wanting soufflé or champagne on rooftops.”

Felicity smiled. “Thank you for grilled cheese and dusty furniture.”

He laughed — low, fond. “Think we’ll last another five?”

She didn’t answer right away. Just shifted her hand and pressed it flat to his chest, right over his heart, like she could feel the rhythm of him and anchor herself to it. Her thumb brushed the soft cotton of his t-shirt once, twice.

“We’re built to last,” she said.

It wasn’t a declaration. It wasn’t said with smug certainty. It was just quiet, confident truth — the same tone she used when she taught Bee how to braid her hair or fix a loose kitchen drawer. Sure. Steady. Real.

Oscar let out a breath he hadn’t realized he was holding.

They didn’t need candlelit hotels. They didn’t need fireworks or diamond earrings or handwritten poetry folded into napkins.

They had grilled cheese sandwiches and secondhand oak hutches. They had playlists from Enstone and shared garden shears and a lemon tree in the yard that Bee watered with a plastic watering can shaped like a dinosaur. They had 3 a.m. wake-ups and tiny shoes by the door and two coffee mugs chipped on the same side.

They had this.

In the quiet house, with the scent of melted cheese still lingering in the corners, and the distant sound of Bee’s voice talking softly in her sleep about castles and worms and the cat from the furniture barn, Oscar rested his head against Felicity’s.

And he realized — maybe more fully than ever before — that this was what a life well-built looked like.

No grand blueprint. No parade. Just the slow layering of love and time.

One sandwich. One piece of furniture. One quiet, extraordinary year at a time.

***

Group Chat: Piastri Fam ❤️

Hattie: happy anniversary to my brother who got married in secret and then called mum like “soooooo I have a wife now” 😌👏

Edie: still iconic behavior. like, historical. will be studying it for generations.

Mae: it’s the fact that he called mumlike. not even a “hey fam, big news!” just. CALLED. MUM.

Nicole: Yes, well. I still remember exactly where I was. Laundry basket in one hand. Phone in the other. My eldest child says, “Hey Mum, just got married.” Like he was telling me the weather.

Like he was updating me on tyre pressures.

Chris: I just want it on record that I found out from your MOTHER.

She said, “Well, he’s gone and done it.”

I thought you’d joined a cult.

Nicole: Christopher.

Oscar: Okay, first of all, I texted first and THEN called. Let’s not rewrite history. I’m a responsible man.

Hattie: “responsible man” my ass you were 18 and married sandwich in one hand

Mae: THEY ATE PRET FOR THEIR WEDDING DINNER. I WILL NEVER BE OVER IT.

Nicole:I still sigh about it, just so you know. All that money I saved for a wedding dress… and you went with a Pret a Manger sandwich

Oscar:It was a really good sandwich.

Chris:Can’t believe my son’s wedding meal was a £3.75 meal deal

Edie: felicity said “I don’t want a fuss” and oscar said “I too hate fuss” and now they have been married for 5 years. 

Nicole: You could’ve called us.  One phone call, Oscar. One. You could have let me buy a dress or at least cry into a cupcake.

Chris: You say that like it wasn’t the most Oscar move possible.

Mae: Honestly. Five years later and he’s still the same: Emotionally repressed. Surprisingly sentimental. Mildly chaotic.

Edie:  And he somehow landed a tiny genius mechanic wife who could take all of us in a fight.

Oscar:  I am right here.

Hattie: Happy anniversary, Osc 💕 Give Felicity a kiss from us. And tell her we love her more than we love you.

Mae: Seconded.

Nicole:Happy Anniversary, darlings 💛 Still not over the phone call but we’re so proud of you both. And Bee, obviously. You made something wonderful.

[reignpage]

Things That Bind Us

Summary: in which student mage!choso encounters a spell that binds one’s body to an object of their choosing and he can't resist trying it out on an unsuspecting you… with a magically conjured sex doll?! Warnings: porn with little plot, 18+, mdni, fantasy au, fem!reader, a little hogwarts-esque, non-con/dub-con but it's really more cnc, sex toy usage, tit slapping, cunnilingus, quick pússy job, penetrative sex, unprotected sex, spitting, pússy slapping, creampie, brief ass play/rimming, díck piercing, squirting, overstimulation, portrayal of a possibly unhealthy fwb scenario, reader seems abusive but I swear she's not TT, she just needs to reign Choso in, not proofread Word Count: 3.3k

It’s stupid really.

Choso wasn’t even looking for a way to get back at you for leaving him high and dry after you rode his face to three orgasms. In fact, he was searching the archives for some textbooks he could use for the five thousand word essay he has due tomorrow, though it seems like it’ll have to wait now that he’s found something much more interesting and helpful. 

Throwing the last ingredient into his portable cauldron, he watches red fumes puff in the air, signalling that he’s ready to get the other half of his plan in motion. 

Hidden in his dorm room, door locked and walls reinforced with a shield spell, he climbs into bed and douses the potion all over a temporary conjurement. If anyone found out what he had done and is going to do, he’d both be the laughing stock of the academy and the one guys would turn to for help with their own deviant desires. But no one will know…except, of course, for you. 

What is the temporary conjurement?

Why, it’s a soft, almost life-like recreation of the female body. He’s sculpted it in his mind to look just like you, at least the you he remembered as well as he could given that he was a little preoccupied with gathering the ingredients necessary for his potion. Long limbed, smooth-skinned, bearing your complexion, and completely bare, it can do nothing as the wayward student douses the thing with the gloopy concoction, massaging it in thoroughly and leaving the body shiny and slick. 

Smelling of lavender and perversion, he doesn’t miss a single inch of skin with the potion, oiling the body up to the point where it glistens temptingly. Then, just as naked as his conjuring, Choso mutters a binding spell none had uttered in centuries and will not for longer. 

Nothing happens. 

He frowns, the black mark spanning cheek to cheek over his nose twitches with the movement. Did he say it wrong? Were the frog eyes he used expired? Or maybe he forgot to boil the snail mucus for a minute longer than usually recommended? 

What a shame. He was so looking forward to getting some payback — too often is it the case that he’s the one chasing after you, flushing an embarrassing red in the face when you’ve embarrassed him by pointing out that he’s drooling or that he already came by humping the bed from just your mere scent. Oh, what Choso wouldn’t give to render you just as flustered and dizzy as you leave him. 

You two have an agreement — nothing is too weird or sick. You love it when he touches you as you sleep and his cock drips like a leaky faucet when he pretends he doesn’t want you to suck his dick at the back of the pegasus stables. An odd pair in everyone’s eyes, his friends remain surprised that you two have stayed together as partners in lewd crime for so long. There are many times you two have broken things off, promising to do better, to be better, but those breaks never last very long before he’s bending you over backwards in the toilets. 

Sighing, he curses out the stupid spell book. No wonder it was dusty and hidden away in the library; who’d use a book full of faulty spells and empty vows?

Just about to wave the thing away, something catches his eye: a slight rise and fall of the chest. 

Wait…

No way…

It worked!

Your body is actually connected to the one he has in his bed. And, judging by the rhythmic breaths you’re taking, you must be asleep. That means you’re in your room too and won’t be caught in a compromising position because of him. Choso pretends he isn’t disappointed. 

Carefully, he planks over you and inhales at your neck. His eyes shut tight. Even with the distance, even when this isn’t your real body, he can still smell you and it sends blood rushing straight to his cock. He begins mouthing at the skin, sucking marks and smiling when your breathing quickens, just a little. 

Nipples flat, his fingers tweak at them, wanting to see them pebbled under his touch. You wear shirts to bed and he wonders if you can feel the flicking through the material or under — he hopes it’s the former since you like the friction. Either way, whatever he’s doing is having an effect on you: your heart is beating faster, breath irregular, skin warmer, back arching ever so slightly, and your nipples poke his palm. 

His memory was right. The breasts he cups weigh the same and feel practically the same. How often had he cradled your body like this for him to know the sizing of your tits perfectly? 

Choso’s mouth waters. Unable to help himself, he suckles a nipple into his mouth, tongue rolling the bud around. The potion is surprisingly tasteless though it is oily. That doesn’t put him off at all, however. Though you’re asleep, you still feel him, almost like a sixth sense. That’s sweet. He can tell you’re still asleep; you’re only ever this docile when in the land of slumber. Well, he won’t complain. Instead of shaking you awake, he trails a hand down your torso, tickling your belly button before it curves downwards to your pussy. 

You’re not very wet yet. 

Undeterred, he pets your cunt to waken that part of your body before your mind does. He loves the warmth and the plumpness of your pussy lips. Truly, he could spend eternity making out with it if only you’d let him. 

Your juices are leaking now and he spreads it around, smearing your skin with your wetness. The potion eases the tight circles he rubs against your clit, still hidden under its hood. Mouth full, Choso grunts. “Come on, baby. Come out for me. That’s it.”

Jostling, he watches your body come to life. You’re waking up. He wonders how you’ll react to the feeling of your tit being sucked and your clit being rubbed. Would you scream? Would you frantically search your textbooks for an explanation to the sensations you’re feeling? Or…would you indulge in the pleasure for a little longer than you should?

How long will it take you to figure out that he’s up to no good? What punishment will you give him?

He gasps. 

Without realising it, he had been grinding down onto your body double’s thigh. His cock is dribbling pre cum onto the skin. Can you feel that too? Can you feel the throbbing of his dick against your leg? Can you count the veins? Feel the length? Does it seem familiar?

Choso shoves two fingers into your pussy, burying them right up to the knuckles and getting his silver rings coated in your juices; he loves when the smell of you lingers and he can sniff the memory in class. Sometimes, he even absentmindedly takes a ring into his mouth and plays with the remaining taste of you whilst he studies.

It’s not really your body, he reminds himself. It’s not your pussy but, in the haze of pleasure and shame in knowing he’s doing something wrong, he can’t seem to care. The difference is marginal. You’re tighter but the heat is all the same, so are the pleats he’s rubbing. That gummy spot that has your toes curling is at the same place too. 

The body can only lie limp, the dusty spell book he found was clear on that — your arms won’t be wrapping around his back, won’t be clawing red lines down his spine that get his cock rising to full mast in the hallways when his shirt grazes them, and your legs won’t lock around his hips the way you usually do when you want him to cum inside and not on your stomach or back. 

Still, there’s something crazily hot about that. You can’t fight him off either. Can’t argue with him or boss him about. He gets to decide what position he wants you to be in, to control the pace and says when this ends. Surely he’ll pay for this later but he just can’t bring himself to think about the consequences, not when you’re tightening around his fingers and the tangy scent of your pussy is reaching him. 

“I bet you’re so confused right now,” he mumbles. “You might even be scared. Don’t be. I’ve got you. Always.”

SLAP!

SLAP!

He’s smacked each of your tits just to watch it bounce; you usually hate it when he does that. By now, he’d be sporting a bump on his head as you push him over to ride him until he’s overstimulated and begging for mercy. But you can’t do anything. And that fact is going to make him cum on your thigh. 

Shaking his head, he hurriedly grips the base of his cock. He can’t cum. Not yet. And not here. He didn’t go through the trouble of climbing up the whispering willow tree for the tallest branch in front of, what felt like, the entire student body, to not feel your pussy clench around his dick. 

First things first, though…

With haste, he scrambles down the bed to dive between your legs. Like a dog, he laps up your juices. You taste sweet, forever so sweet. It’s why he doesn’t complain when you teleport into his room at random times of the day and beckon him over without even speaking to him. It’s why he doesn’t mind when you leave his cock untouched; he can cum just fine with the taste of you lingering on his face, lips, and tongue. 

Using the tip of the long appendage, he plays with your clit, coaxing it out of the hood so he can suck hard at it. More cream drools onto his tongue. His eyes roll to the back of his head. Fingers digging deep into the fat of your thighs and threatening to bruise, he holds you in place and licks and sucks and licks again. 

“Hmm, you’re such a good girl when you’re getting what you want…come on then, you pretty little devil, take what you need. Bet you’re riding the air on your bed right now -hah- I wish I could see how pitiful you look.”

His fingers return inside, feeling the quivering of your pussy around the calloused digits. You’re close. He doesn’t need to hear you scream it out. He can simply tell from the way your clit is jutting into his mouth. A disappointment blooms in his chest — he so badly wishes he could hear you whine and whimper. The only consolation he has is that you’re not squirming out of his hold; you’re prey to his monstrous thirst.

SLUUUUUURPPP!

He’s shameless in the sounds he’s pulling out of your pussy. In fact, he’s fuelled by the squelching of your greedy cunt. It’s overwhelming him. You’re overwhelminghim. All of his senses are filled with you, dragging him down into the depths of pleasurable mania. 

“Tastes so -hah- good. I love your pussy so much. She’s so nice to me, not like you. No, you’re so -fuck, give me more, baby- so mean.”

Mischievously, his other hands treads further down. A thumb skims the rim of your asshole. You hate it when he does that too. Well, you can't do anything about it. Slowly, he pushes in the thick digit, laughing to himself when he feels the tight hole tense around it. Oh, you're definitely biting down on your fist right now. You're thinking Choso Kamo is a dead man walking, or rather, a dead man wanking. If he had longer, if you aren't such a clever student who can solve a puzzle within seconds, then he'd shove his tongue in there too.

Another day perhaps.

Hips rutting against the mattress, he feels like he can follow you to the edge just like this but this —the depravity, the power, the control— will likely never happen again and so he must make the most of it. When your orgasm erupts all over his face, soaking his cheeks and sheets, he desperately licks up as much as he can before he lays a kiss on your pulsing clit. 

“Feel good? I wish I could see your face. You always look so pretty when you cum. It’s okay though. You did such a good job. Well done.”

Choso positions himself between your legs. You’ve cum twice now but he hasn’t yet. Now, it’s his turn. Pushing the thighs back and feeling resistance, he slides his cock through your soaked slit, catching your pulsing clit. “I know you don’t like it when I -hah, you’re so -heh- wet- when I push your legs like this ‘cause you think it makes your tummy look silly but -ah fuck- b-but I love it. I love spreading you nice and wide for me like this. So, bear with me, ‘kay? Don’t get mad. I’ll do your homework for another week, I promise.”

You can’t hear him, he knows that. Yet, somehow, whispering comforting words to you brings him some peace of mind. He doesn’t want you to feel scared or panic. Ever. But you deserve to feel even just a little bit of what you make him feel on a regular basis. A balance must be struck somewhere and somehow. You’ll understand…or not. Either way, he doesn’t care anymore.

Slowly, he enters you. The stretch is as it always is: slow, maddeningly tight, and perfect. You’re wrapping around his length with expert skill. Maybe now you’ve caught on. Maybe now you know exactly what’s happening. There’s no way you don’t know it’s his cock that’s filling you up. Only he can push all this cream out of you. Only he can reach your deepest parts, can stimulate your g-spot and grind against your clit as he bottoms out. 

He’s sure you can feel the piercings on his frenulum. You once said it’s your favourite part of him. Something about the coldness at first and then the hardness whilst it rubs at your walls. 

If the feel of his cock stretching you to your limits doesn’t clue you on, then his piercings will. Now, you must be absolutely out of your mind with both bliss and anger. The very best combination when it comes to you.

“Oh, Merlin, you’re so tight. Fuck, I swear you do it on purpose.” Already his hips are stuttering, body and mind engulfed with the scent, feel and scalding burn of your doughy pussy. Everything about you is perfect, even the memory of you, which has manifested into a mindless sex doll and pales in comparison, is perfect. “You always m-make me want to cum so quickly. Not fair.”

Thrusting with a furious pace, Choso curses and flicks his wrist. A vibrator manifests in his hand. It’s your turn to be overstimulated, to cum again and again, and beg for mercy. He won’t hear you. Can’t. And a good thing, too; If he could, he’d give in. He always does. He’s pathetic. You make him pathetic. 

Cruelly, he presses the toy down onto your clit. 

“Fuck! T-too t-tight. Ah shit.” The immediate clenching of your pussy almost made him cum. Needing to ground himself, he holds onto a bouncing breast, still pummelling his cock inside you. It feels good for him too. The vibrations rattle your bones, sending it straight to him. Choso usually hates it when you use a vibe on him but he doesn’t right now. How could he when it’s making his abs flex and his vision blurry? 

At least now you’re not here to mock him for the drool trailing down his chin. He gathers it up and spits it down on your clit, landing with an obscene SPLAT! before he mixes it in with your frothing juices using the toy. 

The bed is banging against the wall. Thankfully he’s mastered that sound shielding spell; being a third year without having done that would make you a runt of the pack. No one will hear the salacious squelching of your pussy, his filthy moans and whimpers, or the foul slapping of skin against fake skin. 

You tighten impossibly around him as you cum again. He fucks you through it. No one can resist the devious power of a vibrator, not even you. “Bet you’re r-regretting all the times you’ve tortured me with this, h-huh? It’s not nice being on the receiving end, is it? Is it?”

When he doesn’t receive an answer, he pouts and smacks your clit. 

“It’s rude to ignore someone.” 

SMACK! SMACK! SMACK! 

Each ruthless slap has your pussy pulsing hard, hugging his cock like it could offer reprieve. It only angers him more. His thrusting goes deeper and harder, wanting to punish you to the point of tears. 

Then, he laughs. “Hah, I forgot. You can’t -ngh!- reply. Sorry, baby. I didn’t mean to be so -hah hah fuck- mean to your pretty pussy. Let me a-apologise.”

There is no apology. Not really. He’s ramming into your cunt at an unrelenting pace, balls smacking against your ass. At least now he’s let go of your legs, has stopped slapping your clit, and discarded the vibrator. That’s as kind as he can manage to be at this present moment. He’s sure he’ll pay for that too. 

Nearing his end, delirious and manic, he suckles at your tits once more. He could spend eternity worshipping them too. Something about how soft and warm they are, and when he lays between them, it’s like they’re welcoming him home. Choso licks up the sweat under your breasts. It’s something he can’t do with you even though he’s been wanting to for years. Now, he can live out his deepest fantasies, can fuck you how he’s how wanted to for a long time. 

You’re probably furious despite the euphoria channelling through your veins. Mentally, you must be cursing him out, planning all the hexes you’ll attach to him. Whatever you have planned for him, he’ll gladly take it. No matter how bad, how humiliating and stupid the punishments he receives are, he takes them with a smile — the fact that you spent time thinking about him at all makes him so happy. 

Oh, he can’t wait to see you. 

“H-hurry up and find me already! I miss you -sooooo fucking t-tight- miss you so so much.”

There’s no longer any rhyme or reason to his thrusting. He’s just chasing his high, fuelled by images of you. And when he cums, he swears he sees you appear in his room with a face one can only describe as livid. 

“Shit shit shit shit!” Choso’s orgasm makes him whine. It’s too much, too strong and too good. He slumps over your body, drooling all over himself and muttering confessions of adoration into your skin. Hot cum floods around his cock, pooling out. It’ll be a mess to clean up but all he can think about is how you’ll feel it. 

With a poof, the conjurement disappears. He’s left humping his bed, riding out the remnants of his orgasm. Totally worth it. 

“Had your fun, Kamo?”

He stills. 

You’re not a figment of his imagination. You really are in his room. Dressed in just a shirt — his shirt — you stand there, hands on your hips, hair a mess, tears on your cheeks, and wetness glistening down your thighs. Much prettier and better in every way than the doll, the sight of you in his room again urges his hips on. He winces at the raw and painful pleasure bolting through his body but he can’t stop.

Weakly, he waves at you, too tired to even feel panicked. All his survivor’s instincts have fled at the sight of your wrath, apparently. 

“Don’t act cute. You’re so dead, you pervy asshole.” Jumping on the bed, you rain down punches on his back, tickling him more than anything. He can feel the soaked warmth of your pussy on his back and it’s reawakening his softening cock. “I’m gonna rip off your stupid dick piercing, mark my words. I’ll tear you a new pair of balls, Choso.”

Pouting, he looks back and meets your eye. Your cunt pulses. “Is that before or after you ride me?”

Choso doesn’t leave the room until the next day. He doesn’t answer when his friends ask him about his limp, the frightening hickeys on his neck, and the self-satisfied grin on his face, which, of course, falls when he receives detention for not having a five thousand word essay to hand in.

He has no regrats.