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honnelander · 1 year

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go fish! part 3

here we are everyone! we made it guys! the much anticipated part 3 of the go fish! mutual pining series!! i cannot express enough how much this series means to me and that i am constantly blown away with how much you all love it too. it amazes me every day. i hope this lives up to the hype and that you all love it. and don't worry, there will be a part 4! disclaimer: i tried tagging everyone that had asked but a few users don't come up when i try tagging them, so i'm sorry :(

WARNINGS: none

word count: 4k

pairing: opla!sanji x jealous!reader

summary: reader sees Sanji get cozy at the bar with someone else and you get jealous as hell. Zoro sees the whole thing.

prequel part 1 part 2 part 4 masterlist

taglist: @mischiefmanaged71 @smolracoon25 @smol-book-nerd @shuujin @amanda08319 @nimtano @your-platonic-gay-lover @lovelymrvl @whiskeypowder @jovialcat123 @xtigerlily @shadowwolf1864 @quixscentsposts @guidingstarsstuff @ateliefloresdaprimavera @chexmixtrys @princettecharlie @amitydoodlez @the-maladaptive-daydreamers @abracarabbit @commanderfreethatdust @lordbugs @sweet-little-nothings @geisterfvhrer @kenkenmaaa @dazaisfavgf @fan-goddess @shadydeanmuffin @cherrypie5 @sauceonmyshorts @hhighkey @gimmebackmyskeeball @he4vens-ang3l @selcouthaesthetics @sapphireonline @dory-98 @redskull199987 @teenyforestfairy @acupnoodle

It really shouldn’t bother you...but it did. You couldn’t help yourself. Sanji wasn’t even yours, he never would be, and yet...you couldn’t help the wave of jealousy and annoyance that crashed over you every time he would be a little too friendly with other women. (At least, too friendly by your standards and, of course, you thought your standards were pretty reasonable.)

But Sanji wasn’t even yours (he never would be). You weren’t his wife or his girlfriend, hell, you were only just crewmates to each other, so there really should be no reason why you felt as angry and jealous as you did.

That still didn’t stop you, however. In fact, it just enraged you even more and you didn’t know why.

It was just a stupid crush you had on him, right? So why did it bother you so much when he would cast that perfect smile of his towards someone else? When he would wink at another woman and say some suave innuendo that he would never say to you? Or even touch their shoulders or give a hug to someone else when he’s never even touched or grazed your arm or shoulder by accident before?

“If you stare any harder at that glass, it’s going to shatter from all the daggers you’re giving it.”

You blinked, looking up from the drink in your hand and to the left, only to see an ever calm and nonchalant Zoro take a swing of his beer, keeping his gaze towards the bustling nightclub/bar you all were currently visiting.

It’d been a couple of weeks of straight sailing on the open ocean and everyone on board was going a little stir crazy, even the ever-happy-go-lucky Luffy. So, when the Going Merry’s captain had smelled a whiff of food in the air midafternoon up on the masthead that wasn’t Sanji’s doing, everyone had collectively decided to follow Luffy’s nose and see what lied ahead.

After a half hour of sailing, you all had stumbled across another ship-like restaurant that, admittedly, even looked better than the Baratie. So, it was an easy decision for the crew to decide to dock there for a couple of hours and give Sanji the night off from making dinner, much to the chef’s annoyance.

But it had all turned out to be the right decision in the end, apparently, since Sanji had made a point to visit the kitchen and give his compliments to the chef.

Now, all of the straw hats had made it to the outdoor bar area to ‘drink the night away’, as Usopp had so jovially put it, and you’ve been here ever since.

“Ha ha,” you deadpanned, looking back at the nearly full drink you had in your hand. “Very funny Zoro. You know, you should quit piracy and be a standup comedian.”

Your green-haired crewmate turned his face to you with an unamused expression. “You’ve been nursing that drink all night.” He arched an eyebrow. “You ok?”

At that question, your eyes immediately went to Sanji, who had been at the bar for a majority of the evening, chatting with the bartender but, of course, as if on cue, another gorgeous girl slinked right up to him, batting her eyelashes and ever so casually rested her hand on his bicep, sliding it all the way down to his forearm as she giggled at something the chef said.

Sanji, on the other hand, flashed the new woman, the tenth this evening at least, you thought sourly, one of his dazzling white smiles, leaning forward slightly as if he was telling her some sort of inside joke, causing her to laugh louder and place her other hand on top of his. Sanji’s smile only grew wider.

You couldn’t help the stab of pain your heart felt at the sight.

“Never better,” you replied to Zoro bitterly as you quickly downed your drink.

His gaze didn’t budge. “You don’t look fine.”

“Yeah, thanks for pointing that out Captain Obvious,” you quipped sarcastically under your breath, stealing another glance at the object of your affections. He was still chatting with that other woman, and you couldn’t help letting out a small breath as you felt the familiar sting of jealously deep within your chest.

God, it hurt. It hurt so goddamn badly, and you didn’t know why.

Zoro followed your line of sight and when he saw the Going Merry’s cook at the end of it, he hummed to himself, hiding his sly smirk behind his beer as he looked back at you. “Sounds like you need another drink then.”

“I guess so,” you sighed, sitting up and leaning over to grab the bottle of liquor that sat in the middle of your small table to refill your glass when Zoro stopped you.

“Nuh-uh,” the green-haired swordsman said as he put the heel of his boot on the table to block off your reaching hand. “If you want a refill, then you have to go to the bar,” he explained, nodding his head towards the bar, and, coincidently, Sanji. “This bottle is mine.”

“What?? Aw come on Zoro,” you whined. “I don’t want to go over there.”

“Oh? Any particular reason why not?”

It must’ve been the liquor, because you could’ve sworn you heard a knowing tone laced in his voice but when you looked at your friend, he looked as nonchalant as ever. Maybe you were imagining things.

“No,” you lied, your cheeks heating up slightly.

“Good,” Zoro said, taking a long swing of his beer, finishing it up and slamming the empty bottle on the glass tabletop lightly. “Then when you’re up there, get me another beer.” You opened your mouth to protest again but Zoro spoke before you could. “Since, you said there’s no problem.”

Shit. You were backed into a corner. And the only way out was to go up to the bar and be face-to-face with Sanji.

You looked back towards the crowded bar and felt another wave of emotion come over you. But these feelings were hard to discern. The pair was still talking at the bar, the woman still being a little too touchy towards him for your taste. You sighed slightly. Maybe when you got over there, he would just ignore you, since he was so engrossed in conversation it seemed. Part of you didn’t know if you wanted that wish to come true or not.

“Alright- fuck it, whatever,” you grumbled as you snatched your empty glass and made your way to the bar, leaving a smug Zoro alone.

As you made your way across the small dance floor and towards the bar, you felt your heart fill with dread with every step you took. You prayed to whatever God was out there that Sanji didn’t notice you but, of course, when you neared the bar, you noticed that the only open spot was behind him.

How fucking perfect.

“One beer and a refill please,” you quickly ordered, handing over your empty glass to the bartender.

“Y/n?”

Your heart clenched at hearing Sanji’s voice. Why did you think, for even a moment, that Sanji would ever ignore you? The man seemed to always notice you no matter what, even when no one else did, so why would he ignore you now?

But you couldn’t look at him. “Oh, hey,” you quickly greeted.

Sanji, however, didn’t miss a beat. “I didn’t think you were a big drinker,” he commented curiously, turning his body fully to face you, leaning against the bar, and unintentionally removing the woman’s grip on his arm.

“I’m not,” you answered, casting a quick glance up at him.

The blonde chef blinked in confusion, his brows pulled together slightly, but before he could question you further, his ‘date’ for the evening quickly made her presence known.

“Sanji?” the woman called out sweetly, stepping to the cook’s right, placing her hand on his right bicep and the other on his shoulder as she looked up at him with a coy smile. When she looked down at you, however, you could see the look in her eye that was anything but sweet. “Who is this? I didn’t know you had a girlfriend,” she commented, tilting her head in fake misunderstanding.

Immediately, both you and Sanji straightened up, shaking your heads quickly.

“No, no, she’s not my girlfriend-”

“He’s not my boyfriend,” you both denied simultaneously.

You quickly looked away from them, hoping to hide the rush of embarrassment that crashed over you and, to be honest, the sting of his quick rejection. It was just another reminder, you thought bitterly, that even though Sanji always acted like a complete gentleman towards you, you weren’t his girlfriend. He was just being nice, like always, and he would never like you how you liked him.

You looked down at your hands, quiet for a moment as you knocked a knuckle against the bar top. “No,” you said after a beat. “We’re not dating.”

The woman blinked, clearly unfazed by your admission, like she expected nothing less. She still had a fake look of curiosity on her pretty face. “Oh, right! Of course not,” she laughed slightly, in a way that made you feel small. “You must be one of the straw-caps then, right?”

“It’s straw-hats, actually,” you bit back, straightening up and turning to face this jerk of a woman, chin up high, sending her what you hoped was one of your meanest stares. This girl could be mean to you all day if she wanted to, you didn’t care, but you’d rather drop dead than to ever let her bad mouth Luffy and the wonderful pirate crew he put together. “And yes, I am one of them. I’m a pirate,” you stated proudly.

Sanji must’ve been drunk or stupid, because he didn’t seem to pick up on this girl’s bad energy. “Don’t you remember, darling,” he started, sending the girl a small smile, “I was telling you about my crewmates?”

“OH right!” She hit her head in an exaggerated manner. “I remember now, pookie. You said there were two girls on your crew, an orange-haired map girl and another one...” she trailed off, tapping her pointer finger on her chin like she was deep in thought. “Oh!” she exclaimed brightly and looked down at you, her smile sweet as candy but her words as sharp as a razor. “You must be the potato girl!”

Whatever air of pseudo-confidence you had was immediately snuffed, her words quickly cutting you down to size. “The- the what?”

“Yeah, don’t you like potatoes or something?” she laughed, acting like it was the stupidest thing she’d ever heard.

And to her credit? It definitely sounded stupid if you didn’t know the context behind the story. You swallowed the lump in your throat, trying to fight the urge to either cry or deck this girl in the jaw over her making fun of such a special moment between you and Sanji.

You opened your mouth, ready to shut her shit down when she beat you to it. The next words out of her mouth immediately sucked the air out of your lungs.

“Or is just because you look like a potato?” she asked, laughing her about ass off as she lightly hit Sanji in the chest, keeping her hand there, expecting him to laugh along with her but Sanji just stiffened at her side.

You, however, were too busy keeping your breathing under control and trying your hardest not to cry to notice Sanji’s reaction, or lack of. You could feel red hot shame bloom across your chest, the heat crawling up your neck and flushing your face as you looked down at the floor.

Normally, another girl calling you ugly would sting, sure, but not cause you to literally break down in tears on the spot. So why now? Deep down, though, you knew exactly why. It was because of Sanji. She had literally called you ugly in front of Sanji, the person you had a major forbidden crush on, and what if Sanji just laughed along and agreed with her? You didn’t know if you’d be able to handle it. If he did, you would have to quit the straw hats because there was no way you could ever look at him again.

Not wanting to wait and see what his reaction would be, you started shaking your head, ready to mutter up some lame excuse to get the hell out of there when you felt an arm snake around your waist and a warm body press against your side, pulling you against them.

“Now, Madam, I don’t think those are the right words to describe the most beautiful woman in all of the four seas now, is it?” a deep, familiar accented voice asked from above you.

Your breath hitched in your throat as you whipped your head up towards the voice with wide eyes, only to see the ever-beautiful Sanji look down at you with a small, soft smile, his eyes full of wonder and another emotion you couldn’t decipher, as you felt his thumb rub small, comforting circles on your right hip.

His look and touch sent shivers down your spine, and you couldn’t tell if he was acting or not. Your heart hammered in your ribcage as you searched his eyes for a lie, but all you could find was the truth, strong and unwavering, staring right back at you.

“I said: is it?” Sanji repeated himself, tearing his eyes away from you, looking straight on at this awful woman with his eyebrows raised slightly, like he was daring her to say something else.

Clearly not expecting Sanji to rebuke her as blatantly as he did, the woman started sputtering. “Well, I- I didn’t mean it like that, Sanji-bear, really-”

The blonde man raised his left hand in the air, immediately silencing her. “Yeah, I gotta be honest- I highly doubt that, sweetheart.”

At his condescending tone, you saw the woman bristle and nearly foam at the mouth, her eyes nearly popping out of their sockets. She huffed, looking back and forth between you both for a moment before scoffing and shaking her head in disbelief, saying, “I knew it. I fucking knew it.” She looked Sanji dead in the eyes, glancing at you, her eyes filled with hatred, before taking a step closer to Sanji, filling in the gap between them, as she whispered something into his left ear before stalking off and leaving the bar without another glance.

You quickly looked up at Sanji as she was whispering into his ear, confusion apparent in all of your features. Whatever she said to him, you couldn’t hear since they were both taller than you and the woman wore the highest heels you’ve ever seen, but whatever words she had spoken had left the chef completely stunned because you felt his body become rigid, the comforting circles his thumb was rubbing on your hip stopped, and you saw the muscles on his face freeze as he kept his stare straight ahead.

“Sanji?” you call hesitantly, instantly forgetting your own muddled emotions as you looked up to your heart’s desire. “Are you ok?”

At the sound of your voice, you felt him relax. He let out a little laugh (it sounded fake to you), as he looked down at you with a smile that didn’t reach his eyes. “Of, of course. I am.” But as quickly as he looked at you, his attention was stolen by the bartender placing your order on the bar in front of you. “Thanks, man,” he called out, removing his arm from around you and stepping away to grab your drink order.

Instantly, you missed the warmth he provided. You felt cold all of a sudden.

You shook your head once, clearing your head of those thoughts. Now wasn’t the time to analyze things like that. “Sanji-”

“How are you feeling?” he asked with his back facing you, beating you to the punch. When he turned to face you, drinks in hand, any trace of inner turmoil was gone. His eyes, instead, showed concern for you. “You know you’re beautiful, right?” he asked softly, his eyes scanning your face before looking back into your eyes.

The look in his eyes nearly took your breath away. For a moment, you had completely forgotten what he was referring to. “Uh, w-what?”

He must’ve mistaken your confusion for disbelief because his next action nearly stopped your heart. “Oh, my love,” he started softly, a small smile tugging on the corner of his lips. He placed the drinks on the bar, freeing up his hands, and placed them on either side of your head, along your jawline, as his thumb rubbed your cheek soothingly, his fingers gently entangled in your hair. Sanji gently tilted your head upwards, so your eyes connected with his, and the look on his face was filled with such tenderness and radiated a warmth that touched your soul. His gorgeous, tanned face filled your entire field of view, and you could feel his minty breath fan your face.

When the hell did he get so close?

You felt your cheeks heating up at the proximity, your eyes tried to look at anything but his crystal-clear blue ones. Your brain was sure to short circuit if you didn’t get ahold of yourself. You were going to do something incredibly stupid if you didn’t get space immediately. “San-”

“Y/n,” he said, his tone soft yet commanding. “Look at me, love.”

Your heart rate skyrocketed and you felt your breathing quicken. God, you could feel yourself getting a panic attack and you didn’t even understand why. There was nothing more you’d rather do more than look at Sanji but you didn’t know if you had the strength to do it.

You placed your hands on top of his wrists, fully intending to peel him off and push him away, mumbling, “Sanji, I can’t-”

“Please.”

In an instant, you looked into his eyes and what you saw nearly made your heart stop. His gaze was so intense, so piercing, his blue eyes seemed like they were staring directly into your heart and soul. Could he feel your rapid pulse through his fingertips?

When you locked eyes with him, you saw his soft smile grow. “You, y/n, are the most gorgeous woman to ever sail the four seas. You are the most beautiful woman in the world, I promise you that.”

With each word out of Sanji’s mouth, you could feel your heart breaking and it was dawning on you as to why.

But Sanji continued, his eyes sparkling. “And I'll be damned if I’d ever let that horrible woman make you feel otherwise. Alright, Missus?”

At the nickname, you let out a shaky breath and quickly blinked back tears. It was right then you knew, you knew it from the depth of your soul, just like you knew for certain that the sky was blue and the earth was round: you loved Sanji. You didn’t just have a crush on him anymore, but you were completely head over heels in love with him.

You swallowed the lump in your throat, which might’ve been your heart, because you realized that even though you loved him, you could never have him. He was your crewmate, your friend, another one of the straw hats. He was someone that you promised yourself you would never cross “the line” for. Who you vowed to yourself that you wouldn’t risk anything for feelings-wise because you didn’t want the rest of the crew to suffer if you both didn’t work out.

But despite all of that, it didn’t make the truth any easier to swallow because now you were stuck. You were stuck with your stupid feelings and all it did was want to make you cry. You should’ve been happy right now at this sudden realization but no, instead all you wanted to do was go hole up in your room and sob.

And besides, Sanji would never return your feelings anyway.

“Y/n?” Sanji repeated, a hint of worry laced in his tone the longer you kept staring at him unblinking.

You quickly blinked, unable to stop a few tears from escaping your eyes, but managed to hold back the rest. You tried your best to fake a smile for him, but you could feel your lips quivering. “Sanji,” you breathed but quickly cleared your throat. “That, that was beautiful.” You looked at him in the eyes. “Thank you.”

At your thanks, Sanji’s whole face lit up and he winked. “Ah, anything for the Missus.”

The blonde cook didn’t make an effort to move, however. He kept his hands on your face and with each stroke of his thumb you felt tingles shoot down into your stomach (and to other inappropriate places), and felt goosebumps erupt across your skin.

You had to get out of here.

Carefully, you squeezed his wrists and slid your hands over his, gently prying them away from you, pulling them down and giving them one last quick squeeze in appreciation before dropping them. “Thank you, Sanji,” you repeated softly. You looked towards the bar, at the two forgotten drinks placed there, because you just couldn’t look at Sanji right now. “I, uh, should go bring these over to Zoro.”

“Of- of course. Right. Mosshead is probably quite pissed off at us but, ah, who cares what he thinks.” Ever the gentleman, Sanji went to reach for them. “Here, let me help you-”

“No!” you quickly intervened, grabbing them like it was a pot of gold. “No, no. I got it. Don’t worry about it. You should, uh, stay here and keep talking to the bartender. I think he was looking for you,” you lied and without waiting for his response, took the drinks off the bar, leaving a crestfallen Sanji standing there, watching you walk to Zoro and then, promptly, out of the nightclub altogether.

As you walked over to your green-haired friend, your legs felt like rubber and that you would collapse at a moment’s notice from the sheer weight of your thoughts. You, however, were so far gone that you completely missed Zoro’s Chesire cat grin.

“You and the waiter seemed pretty cozy over there, huh?” Zoro jabbed, his arms resting on top of the seat cushions and knees spread out like he had no care in the world. “I thought you guys were going to kiss or something for a minute there, but instead-”

“Shut the fuck up, Zoro,” you practically growled at him as you put his beer and your glass on the glass tabletop with much more force than necessary.

The swordsman lifted his hands slightly along with his eyebrows. “Whoa, hey now no need to-”

Instead of taking your seat back and sitting back down, you started walking past him and towards the exit without waiting for his response. “I’m heading back to the ship.”

As Zoro watched you leave, a clearly drunk Usopp slid in right next to him, gnawing on a toothpick, watching you as well. “Daaamn, Zoro,” the slingshot shooter drawled loudly, leaning against his crewmate and completely disregarding the other man’s personal space. “Did you see Sanji and y/n? I thought they were going to- pft, start making out or something!” Usopp exclaimed as he waved his hands in the air, mimicking an explosion and two people kissing. “Do you think they know they like each other?”

Zoro hummed, watching your retreating form and then looking towards the dejected waiter, who looked like a kicked puppy. “I don’t know Usopp,” he replied, leaning forward to grab his beer and take a swing. “But if they don’t tell each other soon I’m going to lose my goddamn mind.”

“Yeahhh,” Usopp agreed, sliding his sunglasses down the bridge of his nose to look at the swordsman better. “You said it- oh! Is this drink taken?” he asked, not waiting for Zoro’s response before taking the beverage and sipping on its straw.

Zoro shook his head with a small smile. Sometimes his friends were too predictable for their own good. He just hoped that you and Sanji would start being predictable soon so you two could finally be together and put everyone out of their misery.

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reasonsforhope · 8 months

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"Chicago’s 82-story Aqua Tower appears to flutter with the wind. Its unusual, undulating facade has made it one of the most unique features of Chicago’s skyline, distinct from the many right-angled glass towers that surround it.

In designing it, the architect Jeanne Gang thought not only about how humans would see it, dancing against the sky, but also how it would look to the birds who fly past. The irregularity of the building’s face allows birds to see it more clearly and avoid fatal collisions. “It’s kind of designed to work for both humans and birds,” she said.

As many as 1 billion birds in the US die in building collisions each year. And Chicago, which sits along the Mississippi Flyway, one of the four major north-south migration routes, is among the riskiest places for birds. This year, at least 1,000 birds died in one day from colliding with a single glass-covered building. In New York, which lies along the Atlantic Flyway, hundreds of species traverse the skyline and tens of thousands die each year.

As awareness grows of the dangers posed by glistening towers and bright lights, architects are starting to reimagine city skylines to design buildings that are both aesthetically daring and bird-safe.

Pictured: Chicago's Aqua Tower was designed with birds in mind.

Some are experimenting with new types of patterned or coated glass that birds can see. Others are rethinking glass towers entirely, experimenting with exteriors that use wood, concrete or steel rods. Blurring lines between the indoors and outdoors, some architects are creating green roofs and facades, inviting birds to nest within the building.

“Many people think about bird-friendly design as yet another limitation on buildings, yet another requirement,” said Dan Piselli, director of sustainability at the New York-based architecture firm FXCollaborative. “But there are so many design-forward buildings that perfectly exemplify that this doesn’t have to limit your design, your freedom.”

How modern buildings put birds in danger

For Deborah Laurel, principal in the firm Prendergast Laurel Architects, the realization came a couple of decades ago. She was up for an award for her firm’s renovation of the Staten Island Children’s Museum when the museum’s director mentioned to her that a number of birds had been crashing into the new addition. “I was horrified,” she said.

She embarked on a frenzy of research to learn more about bird collisions. After several years of investigation, she found there was little in the way of practical tips for architects, and she teamed up with the conservation group NYC Audubon, to develop a bird-safe building guide.

The issue, she discovered, was that technological and architectural advancements over the last half-century had in some ways transformed New York City – and most other US skylines and suburbs – into death traps for birds...

At certain times of day, tall glass towers almost blend into the sky. At other times, windows appear so pristinely clear that they are imperceptible to birds, who might try to fly though them. During the day, trees and greenery reflected on shiny building facades can trick birds, whereas at night, brightly lit buildings can confuse and bewilder them...

Pictured: A green roof on the Javits Convention Center serves as a sanctuary for birds.

The changes that could save avian lives

About a decade ago, Piselli’s firm worked on a half-billion-dollar renovation of New York’s Jacob K Javits Convention Center, a gleaming glass-clad space frame structure that was killing 4,000-5,000 birds a year. “The building was this black Death Star in the urban landscape,” Piselli said.

To make it more bird friendly, FXCollaborative (which was then called FXFowle) reduced the amount of glass and replaced the rest of it with fritted glass, which has a ceramic pattern baked into it. Tiny, textured dots on the glass are barely perceptible to people – but birds can see them. The fritted glass can also help reduce heat from the sun, keeping the building cooler and lowering air conditioning costs. “This became kind of the poster child for bird-friendly design in the last decade,” Piselli said.

The renovation also included a green roof, monitored by the NYC Audubon. The roof now serves as a sanctuary for several species of birds, including a colony of herring gulls. Living roofs have since become popular in New York and other major cities, in an inversion of the decades-long practice of fortifying buildings with anti-bird spikes. In the Netherlands, the facade of the World Wildlife Fund headquarters, a futuristic structure that looks like an undulating blob of mercury, contains nest boxes and spaces for birds and bats to live.

The use of fritted glass has also become more common as a way to save the birds and energy.

Earlier this year, Azadeh Omidfar Sawyer, an assistant professor in building technology in the Carnegie Mellon School of Architecture, working with student researchers, used open-source software to help designers create bespoke, bird-friendly glass patterns. A book of 50 patterns that Sawyer published recently includes intricate geometric lattices and abstract arrays of lines and blobs. “Any architect can pick up this book and choose a pattern they like, or they can customize it,” she said.

Pictured: The fritted glass used in Studio Gang’s expansion of Kresge College at the University of California, Santa Cruz, depicts the animals in the local ecosystem.

Builders have also been experimenting with UV-printed patterns, which are invisible to humans but perceptible to most birds. At night, conservationists and architects are encouraging buildings turn off lights, especially during migration season, when the bright glow of a city skyline can disorient birds.

And architects are increasingly integrating screens or grates that provide shade as well as visibility for birds. The 52-floor New York Times building, for example, uses fritted glass clad with ceramic rods. The spacing between the rods increases toward the top of the building, to give the impression that the building is dissolving into the sky.

Gang’s work has incorporated structures that can also serve as blinds for birders, or perches from which to observe nature. A theater she designed in Glencoe, Illinois, for example, is surrounded by a walking path made of a wood lattice, where visitors can feel like they’re up in the canopy of trees.

Pictured: The Writers Theatre, designed by Studio Gang, includes a walking path encased in wood lattice.

Rejecting the idea of the iridescent, entirely mirrored-glass building, “where you can’t tell the difference between the habitat and the sky”, Gang aims for the opposite. “I always tried to make the buildings more visible with light and shadow and geometry, to have more of a solid presence,” she said.

Gang has been experimenting with adding bird feeders around her own home in an effort to reduce collisions with windows, and she encourages other homeowners to do the same.

“I’ve found that birds slow down and stop at feeders instead of trying to fly through the glass,” she said.

While high-rise buildings and massive urban projects receive the most attention, homes and low-rise buildings account for most bird collision deaths. “The huge challenge is that glass is everywhere.” said Christine Sheppard, who directs the glass collisions program at the American Bird Conservancy (ABC). “It’s hard to know what I know and not cringe when I look at it.”

Tips for improving your own home include using stained glass or patterned decals that can help birds see a window, she said. ABC has compiled a list of window treatments and materials, ranked by how bird-safe they are.

Whether they’re large or small, the challenge of designing buildings that are safe for birds can be “liberating”, said Gang, who has become an avid birdwatcher and now carries a pair of binoculars on her morning jogs. “It gives you another dimension to try to imagine.”"

-via The Guardian, December 27, 2023

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sandwhitches · 2 months

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✦ 𝐬𝐲𝐧𝐨𝐩𝐬𝐢𝐬: a love story told through peaches

✦ 𝐠𝐞𝐧𝐫𝐞: fluff, childhood best friends to lovers

✦ 𝐜𝐰: language, tiny bit of angst in places if you squint, kissing/making out, mutual pining, fem. reader (one mention of “girlfriend”), reader has a mother

✦ 𝐚/𝐧: inspired by the poem “From Blossoms” by Li-Young Lee (which is just a beautiful piece, do read it if you find the time!) randomly decided i wasn’t allowed to sleep until i finished this fuck ass thing so enjoy i guess. if it’s really bad i wouldn’t know i read over it once and hit post, so i humbly apologize if this is word vomit.

✦ 𝐰𝐜: 3.1k

It first happened in 2000, the fresh spoils of summer weighed down on skinny branches of the tree they had grown on, perfect for little hands to pluck. At the base of its trunk, you sat cross-legged, crunching into a perfectly ripe peach for the very first time that summer.

That day, as you remember it, was intended to be spent with a pout; after all, your mother had dropped you off for the day with your new neighbors to run errands, leaving you with two identical makeshift playmates you couldn’t say you were too fond of.

Atsumu is the oldest twin, but he’s an inch shorter than his brother Osamu, which confuses you. Aren’t you supposed to be taller when you’re older? They’re both more interested in roughhousing than skipping rope or coloring, they bicker over small things, and they smell too much like the outdoors. From the first five minutes at the Miya household, you decided you were not going to enjoy it.

Osamu found you crouched in the living room, dejectedly pushing one of their toy cars back and forth with a finger, counting as high as you could under your breath (about five-hundred until you ran out of steam.)

“Whatcha doin’?” That’s another thing that initially unsettled you about them, the way they spoke. Their words came out lazier, much more different than any other kid or adult you’d met before moving to the Kansai region. If I spoke like that, you thought, I would probably be corrected.

“Nothing.” You’d mumbled, too shy to look up at him. That didn’t seem to deter Osamu one bit, because that’s how you found yourself beneath the peach tree in their backyard, licking the sticky juice that had bled down your arm upon the first bite.

You’re a bit intimidated by Osamu, who had somehow managed to eat two peaches in the duration it took you to eat one, but you still keenly listened as he told you about how his grandmother planted that tree a long time ago.

Atsumu was on the other side of the yard scowling, Osamu said it was because he didn’t like the way peach fuzz felt on his tongue.

By 2006, you’ve realized there’s more than one way to eat a peach, your favorite method as of that summer was the peach pie that the Miyas’ mom would make if you asked her really nicely.

Atsumu had since gotten over his personal grudge against peaches and Osamu probably liked them more than he did before. Neither of them would even think about eating a slice if it did not come with a generous dollop of vanilla ice cream on the side. You’re stuffed full after two helpings of dessert, hunched over in discomfort at their kitchen counter.

It’s no surprise that Osamu was shuffling his fourth slice of the night onto his plate, fueled by an appetite unfathomable to most people but him. “There’s not gonna be any left if ya keep piggin’ out,” Atsumu hissed, slapping a palm flat on the counter; he was also hardly able to move after a full meal and then some, but he always found enough energy within himself to insult his brother.

Osamu, who turned out to be the quieter of the twins, didn’t have a verbal rebuttal, but took a resolute bite that perfectly asserted a good enough response to piss his brother off.

Your mother usually called an hour or so after sunset if you were still with the Miya twins, and during the summer, you were always with them. It was Osamu who walked you next door most nights, your pathway lit by flickery street lamps that swarms of bugs buzzed around, save for the cicadas that chirruped their nightly song in the bushes.

He was still a bit disgruntled after Atsumu had reached over and pushed him, leading them headfirst into an angry brawl on the linoleum floor of the kitchen.

“Such an idiot,” Osamu muttered angrily under his breath to fill the silence, hands twitching in the pockets of his pants. You don’t tell him this, and you don’t really know why this is, but you think that might be the first time you realized you had a slight preference towards him.

After all, out of the two of them, Osamu was the only one who didn’t complain when you changed the channel to the weekly showing of your favorite cartoon (a “girl cartoon” as Atsumu had put it with irritation laced in his voice), he was the one that knocked on your door in the mornings and asked your mom if you were up yet, and no matter how many new friends he made, he’d sit with you at lunch.

In the winter of 2008, you coped with the seasonally baron peach tree with the light pink package you tore open on the floor of Osamu’s room.

You were long done with your homework for the day, Atsumu was avoiding his, and Osamu was scrabbling away at his desk with a look of dull boredom. You popped a peach gummy into your mouth. Sometimes you’d forget that if you walked from school with them in your backpack, the winter air would toughen up the candy, and make it harder to chew; surprisingly, you found it tasted better that way.

Atsumu’s back was pressed against the floor, hands outstretched as he tossed a slightly deflated volleyball a few inches, caught it in the basket of his ten fingers, then pushed it back into the air. You watched him as he got testier with his limits, letting the ball drop closer and closer to his face until his fingers couldn’t stretch fast enough, and the ball bounces off of his forehead.

In order to deflect his embarrassment, he turned to you, raising a brow, “Those don’t even taste like peaches.” Atsumu commented superfluously, knowing himself that it was a pointless thing to say.

He’s not very popular with the boys on his volleyball team because he does things like that, and Osamu told you with a look of concern that he doesn’t even care. You think you agree with Osamu, Atsumu is certainly annoying, but he isn’t necessarily unlikeable.

Atsumu is blessed to have a brother like Osamu, who is most likely incapable of ever growing to dislike him. Not many people have such a degree of patience for him, and you suppose that’s why they’re brothers.

Without a retort from you, he returned his attention to tossing the ball once more.

Your eyes were drawn to a hand that reached over the seat. Splotches of ink stained the side of Osamu’s palm because he always wrote with a heavy hand. You grinned wordlessly and placed three candies into the center of his cupped palm, knowing he was going to ask for more once those are gone.

That’s okay, you think, because Osamu is the only person you know who does not ask for you to share because he’s greedy, he asks because he simply likes to share. There’s no ulterior motive or impatience in the way he holds his hand out once more, only an eagerness to enjoy something with you. That, for a reason you’d been avoiding to confront over the past year, made your heart flutter like a caged bird.

In 2011, you find yourself back where you started, criss-crossed under the peach tree beside Osamu as you enjoy the first bloom of the summer. You bite into the peach’s dusty skin, uncaring that the sweet juice dripped down your chin and collected at the corners of your mouth. Osamu rolled a pit around his hand after meticulously sucking the flavor left from it, he pressed his fingers into it until it made indents on the skin.

You paused, wiping your face with the back of your forearm, “Somethin’ on your mind?” It had been a very long time since their accent had bled into your own tongue, and you never noticed it anymore. Osamu glanced up, eyes clouded over with thought, “Do ya think I’m boring?”

The question surprised you. You couldn’t remember a time Osamu voiced an insecurity, in fact, you were beginning to enviously think that he didn’t have any. Boring? You wondered what could have brought that about. How long had he felt that way?

Since starting high school, you’d noticed an influx of opportunities for the twins to be compared. As far as popularity went, Atsumu had surprisingly climbed up the ranks the first month. In volleyball, no matter how great Osamu’s spikes were, Atsumu’s sets were always better. At home, they’d taken to rapid firing every grade they’d received in the past week until it was clear who was performing best, and Atsumu frequently took the cake.

On top of this, Atsumu was now one inch taller than Osamu.

It’s almost funny, you thought to yourself, they’re not that much different than when they were younger. They still roughhouse and bicker and they still can’t be angry at each other for longer than five hours.

Both of them still consistently pulled off stupid stunts, the most recent one being the cheap boxed dye they purchased with the hope of having a shot at being two different people for once.

Finally, you replied, “I don’t think that at all.” And you wished you had said more.

Osamu, you thought that night as you replayed the memory, I think you’re anything but that. You’re funny, and you always think about other people…and I think you’re one of the nicest people I know. You buried your face into the pillow, groaning. If you’d managed to at least say half of that, maybe he would have smiled instead of looking away, nodding in disappointment.

Your mom was frowning to herself in 2014 as she folded up your high school uniform and packed it into a cardboard box to be forgotten with the other relics from your childhood. You swallowed a lump in your throat as you handed her your school shoes, “You might wanna throw ‘em out, the soles are about to lift anyways.” You know she won’t. She’s sentimental.

Later on that evening, you told Osamu all about it on the lawn chairs in their backyard, swatting off a mosquito that buzzed in your ear. The two of you had just returned from a midnight run to the convenience store, indulging in salty chips that made your mouth go dry, but were impossible to stop eating. Such an issue was easy to remedy with the juice of a peach, even though the nectar wasn’t as sweet.

A few months before, during January, Hyōgo was hit with the iciest winter storm in a while, leading to the unfortunate demise of the peach tree in their backyard. Atsumu was more than positive that the old friend would make a comeback, but come springtime, it did not blossom and remained a thin skeleton of rigid sticks.

Now you had to buy a peach if you wanted one.

The convenience store peach was slightly overripe, but you supposed that beggars can’t be choosers.

Osamu listened intently, his face hardly discernible in the dark. You two hadn’t meant to be up so late, but you often lost track of time these days, you noticed that it goes by so fast now that you’re older.

“I’m scared,” your voice was shaky, tears threatening to spill for the umpteenth time that day. You didn’t want to go to sleep, because you knew in the morning you’d have to leave. It would end for the very first time. You tried very hard not to think about the bags all packed up in your room, and with such empty walls it was beginning to feel like it wasn’t even yours anymore.

“What if I don’t like it?”

Osamu sighed quietly, setting the peach he held down to place a comforting hand on your knee, “Yer gonna do just fine, ya know that?” He mumbled quietly, and if he wasn’t touching you, you might have been able to consider what he was saying to a deeper extent. It’s easier said than done when you’ve already come to terms with the fact that you’re madly in love with someone you’re sure you shouldn’t be.

“I know, but…I don’t want it to change…I don’t like not seein’ you.”

Though you couldn’t witness it in the inky cast of twilight, something changed in his face, and you wouldn’t have had a clue had his next words not come out as strained as they did, “We’ll see each other durin’ breaks.” Osamu whispered, almost as if it was a reassurance for nobody but him.

That’s not enough. You’d been with Osamu every day for nearly the entire duration of your life, how could it only be rendered down to a few precious weeks a year? You couldn’t take it. The tears finally flowed freely down your cheeks, muffled noises of anguish pushed against your bitten lip.

“Hey,” Osamu muttered hurriedly, calloused hand moving to cup the side of your face, he thumbed at a stray tear. “Nothing’s gonna change while yer gone…okay? We’ll all-…I’ll still be the same. I promise.”

“How can I know that?” You sniffled between sobs, unabashedly leaning into his touch.

With everything to lose, but nothing else he wanted, Osamu leaned forward and pressed his face against yours, his lips tenderly grazed against your own in a rushed kiss. Upon remembering himself, Osamu pulled away swiftly, exhaling in disappointment.

“Shit, I’m really sorry, I don’t-”

You cut him off in a desperate search of his lips once more in the dark, kissing him like you’ve been starved your whole life, finally allowed a meal just this once.

Up close, he smelled like the linens his mother used to hang in the backyard, the ones you weaved in between during clumsy games of tag that always ended in skinned knees and grass stains. Osamu’s lips felt like the succulent meat of a peach, soft and warm; they tasted of its nectar, not of the convenience store peach, but of the sweeter ones that used to grow in that very backyard. Osamu’s kiss was everything you’ve grown to love and everything you’ve yearned for.

You pulled apart after awkwardly knocking foreheads one too many times, giggling mindlessly at the state the two of you were in. The hand on your knee squeezed tighter, and Osamu rested his head in the crook of your neck, breathing you in. You wondered if you also smelled like the linens, like peach juice, if he could hear that your heartbeat sounded like the cicadas that sung to the two of you during your shared childhood summers.

“When ya come back,” Osamu started quietly, “I promise I’ll still feel the same.”

It’s 2019 and you’re knackered, bored of watching the wooden posts that held up a barrier along the road go by, tired of the same playlist that’s been on loop all day, and yet you’re not even close to being sick of the man in the driver's seat.

Osamu blinked at the road groggily, appearing to also be over the long haul through the mountains.

“Remind me again why I moved?” He droned, readjusting his loose grip on the wheel as he took another turn that does not particularly help your developing carsickness. “Because you missed me?” You mused playfully, lolling your head to the side to watch his expression lighten up significantly.

“I did, didn’t I?”

It’d almost been a whole year since Osamu had gotten fed up with how little he got to see you, his girlfriend, and decided without hesitation that the perfect place for him to open up his restaurant would be in Osaka, only a few minutes away from your campus.

You’d since graduated, gotten an entry-level job with shitty hours and shittier pay, and found yourself a nice little apartment for the two of you to share.

It would be your first summer returning to Hyōgo together.

Maybe it’s always been this way, though. You couldn’t remember a time in which you didn’t love Osamu, and similarly, you couldn’t remember a time where it didn’t feel like he loved you. It was always meant to happen this way. Things like kisses and passionate touch bloomed in time as the seasons turned, but the roots of his love had always been there since the beginning, digging deeper into you until it was your favorite way to live.

You hummed in realization, bending over in your seat to grab something from the floor of the car, “Almost forgot about these.”

Osamu peered back over at the sound of light rustling, eyes glinting with affection as you reached your hand into a brown paper bag, pulling out a peach. It was impossible for the two of you not to stop as you drove through one of the quaint small towns, a little boy sold the fruit from his family’s orchard beneath a hand painted wooden sign.

You bought five peaches, each one large and solid in the palm of your hand, and you think you might have forgotten how much grocery store peaches pale in comparison to ones that were plucked from a tree that very morning.

“When we get our own house-...” you started. A wry grin twisted on Osamu’s lips in response.

The two of you liked to play this game, fantasizing about the distant future in which you’re able to settle down in the suburbs, far away from grumpy landlords and noisy upstairs neighbors.

You both had already lost track of half of the dreams you wished to fulfill, only able to barely recall the simple things like two dogs, a nicer oven, and dark green walls in the bedroom.

Even though it’s a game, you hoped you didn’t forget this time. “Let’s plant a peach tree in the backyard.”

Osamu laughed under his breath, but you can see a hint of nostalgic fondness bring warmth to his expression, “I dunno, yer gonna have to be in charge…I don’ really have a green thumb.”

You’ve since taken a large bite of the peach, then passed it to him. Much to your amusement, Osamu only turned his face ever so slightly to eat it from your hand, eyes still carefully fixed on the road.

“I think I can do that,” you nodded, bringing the sweet fruit back to your lips again. If there’s one thing you end up doing in your make believe house, you hope it’s that.

And there, in the comfortable silence of the car, you bask in an all too familiar feeling whilst enjoying your favorite thing to share: the fresh spoils of summer.

#osamu miya #miya osamu #osamu x reader #osamu drabble #osamu miya x reader #osamu imagine #haikyuu osamu #osamu fluff #osamu miya fluff #haikyuu #haikyuu x reader #haikyuu drabble #haikyuu imagines #hq x reader #hq osamu #🍓.osamu

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stonecreationslongisland · 8 days

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Stone Creations of Long Island by Paul Saladino Via Flickr: Deer Park, N.Y 11729 Stone Creations of Long Island Pavers and Masonry specializes in masonry design and outdoor living, serving communities all across Long Island in all aspects of home improvement and repair. From custom brickwork and pavers to asphalt and concrete, Stone Creations of Long Island provides free estimates at your home or business seven days a week. With experienced employees, and a knowledgeable staff, Stone Creations of Long Island knows your home is your greatest investment and choosing the right masonry team to protect and enhance that investment is important. For any inquiries, we look forward to your questions and helping on your next home improvement or commercial project of any scale. Paul Saladino Office (631) 678-6896 Mobile (631) 678-2710 Visit Our Website www.stonecreationsoflongisland.net See our work on You Tube www.youtube.com/user/stonecreationsLI/videos Follow us on Twitter www.twitter.com/stone_creations Check us out on Pinterest www.pinterest.com/stonecreations See Our Work On Houzz www.houzz.com/pro/stonecreationsoflongisland Follow our Updates on www.stonecreationslongisland.tumblr.com Follow us on Wordpress www.stonecreationsoflongislandinc.wordpress.com Like us on Facebook www.facebook.com/stonecreationsoflongisland

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gtgbabie0 · 4 months

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-Cowboy!Remus Lupin x Reader

{You’re the preachers daughter but God be damned he just can’t keep away even if it’s to see you for just a small moment.}

Cowboy Remus, you have saved lives. Enjoy lovelies 💕

⋆⁺₊⋆ ☾⋆⁺₊⋆ ⋆⁺₊⋆ ☾⋆⁺₊⋆ ⋆⁺₊⋆ ☾⋆⁺₊⋆ ⋆⁺₊⋆ ☾⋆⁺₊⋆ ⋆⁺₊⋆ ☾⋆⁺

The sunset casts over the horizon, painting the clouds in the prettiest colours, a pinky-orangey mixture swirling throughout the sky. It makes for a beautiful sight as Remus makes his way through the plains on his brown Spanish Mustang, a loyal horse that’s been with him through thick and thin.

He knows where he’ll end up, back at your father’s small ranch house despite the tiny part of his mind that screams at him to turn around. Your father would shoot him, he reckons, he might be a man of faith but you’re his little girl.

With a soft groan, he runs his hand through his horse's mane as he trots across the trodden grass. He continues on the path to your ranch, excitement bubbling up inside him as your house comes into his line of sight.

Remus knows that you’ll be alone, this isn’t the first time he’s been here, sneaking around like some damn outlaw. He knows your father is off in town doing his daily sermons that last for hours. He can’t help but smirk at the idea of getting a moment alone with you… his sweetheart. Even if it’s fleeting.

He’s tying his horse to the hitching post just by the white fencing of your house when you come rushing over to him with a joyous expression. That sweet smile of yours is enough to make anyone fall to their knees. Remus nods to you, taking off his hat as he holds it to his chest.

“Thought you’d forgotten about me.” You say, giggling softly. You lean over the fencing as he walks over to you, hooking his hat on the white wood.

He shakes his head, and his calloused palm grazes your cheek as he brushes your hair behind your ear. “How could I forget ‘bout you?” He asks with a grin, admiring the soft cotton dress you’re wearing and the way the fabric ripples through the wind.

It was true, there wasn’t a world where Remus could ever forget about you, your soft skin and pretty eyes are practically engraved into his mind and heart. That’s why he’s here, standing in front of you despite his better judgment and the fact he knows that your father, deep down, would never approve of him dating you.

The smell of the outdoors and firewood lingers on his sun-kissed skin. You’re hit with it as he leans down slightly to press a soft kiss against your cheek.

“Have you eaten yet?… and I mean a good meal.” Your question makes his heart swell with love and he can’t help but chuckle.

“Yeah, I’ve eaten sweetheart.” He promises, pressing his thumb against your chin, he tilts your head upwards to look at him as he steps closer to you with his other hand resting against your hip.

You nod, wrapping your arms around his waist before slipping your hands into his back pockets. A habit you’ve picked up on from him. He smirks down at you.

“Are you coming in?” God, the way his mind spins with that question and how badly he wants to say ‘yes’ and stay with you.

“Can’t stay for long, baby. James and Sirius are expecting me down at the Saloon.” He tells you, soothing his thumb along your jaw as you pout up at him with a look of disappointment in your eyes.

“Oh, come on now.” He chuckles, pressing a sweet kiss to your pouty lips. “Don’t give me that face, pretty thing. you know why I can’t stay.”

Remus presses another kiss to your lips as your expression softens. “He’s gonna find out one day.” You’ve got a point, one day Remus will have to bite the bullet and fish out a neat suit to meet your strict father.

“Hmm… not if I steal ya away first.” He teases, enjoying the way you roll your eyes slightly with a huff. He tugs you closer to him by your hips. “Promise, one day I’ll let ya introduce me to him.” He says, pressing his face into the crook of your neck as he takes in the scent of your flowery perfume.

You decide to trust him, after all, he’s never once lied to you before. Remus just isn’t the type, he’s a man that values trust and he’d never take yours for granted.

“Why’d you come all the way out here then?” Your question makes him lift his head up from your shoulder, his eyebrow-raising with a playful look.

“Just wanted to see your pretty face.” He states simply as if it was the most obvious thing in the whole world. “I don’t need an excuse to come and see ya do I?”

You shake your head, looking up at him. “No… I’m glad you came, I’ve missed you.” There it goes again, your words make his chest bloom with a warmth that leaves a sickly sweet taste in his mouth.

“Missed you too baby.” He whispers, his fingers fiddling with the dainty golden cross that sits against your collarbones. He knows your father will be back soon, he should get going but at the same time, he can’t seem to pull himself away.

Remus takes your hands in his own, glancing over to his horse before looking back down to you. “You wanna go riding with me tomorrow?” He asks, hope gleaming in his honeyed eyes.

The excitement in your expression is truly a sight he’ll never get bored of. “Of course, I’ll wait for you after breakfast.” You tell him and he hums in agreement, picking his hat up and fixing it on his head.

“Better get some sleep then, I’ll be here early.” He smiles, caressing your warm cheek with his thumb. He tilts his hat up slightly so he can lean down and press a loving kiss to your lips that tapers off into small pecks.

“I will love you, cowpoke.” You whisper against his lips, shying away from him ever so slightly as he trails his lips along your jaw to your cheek, he grins against your soft skin.

“Love you too.” He whispers, fixing his hat once more.

He kisses your forehead before walking over to his horse, unhitching him from the post before saddling up. With a wave he clicks his tongue and his horse is off, carrying him away from the ranch, leaving only a promise of returning tomorrow.

⋆⁺₊⋆ ☾⋆⁺₊⋆ ⋆⁺₊⋆ ☾⋆⁺₊⋆ ⋆⁺₊⋆ ☾⋆⁺₊⋆ ⋆⁺₊⋆ ☾⋆⁺₊⋆ ⋆⁺₊⋆ ☾⋆⁺

-Art by @/sophithil on twt

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izzabela · 2 months

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Broke - Bi Han x fem!reader

in which you can't pay for dinner and Bi Han makes you pay (one way or another)

a/n: a private request i got during my vacation. thank you, anon, once again for another req!

ship[s]: bi han x fem!reader

warning(s): MDNI - smut, hate-fucking, spanking, semi-public sex, outdoor sex, against a wall, f!reader = f!genitalia, rough sex, degradation, unprotected sex, breed kink(?), hella aftercare

You and Bi Han are sat together in a booth inside a fine dining restaurant, somewhere beyond Arctika.

And inside said fine dining restaurant, you both dressed to the nines. You, in a risqué black dress, sheer tights, and little red pumps. Fashionable makeup, glittery eyeshadow, and a bold red lip.

Bi Han was in a dark navy three-piece suit. His dress shirt was black, and it went well with the dark navy pants.

The sight of him in this attire made your heart flutter a bit- his clothes were tight enough that his muscles were practically pressed against the fabric, but loose enough for movement.

Unfortunately, you couldn't get him to change his shoes. No matter though, as you both wined and dined, chatting amongst yourselves about, well, everything.

You both got a rare break from the Lin Kuei, and you suggested to Bi Han to go somewhere far, far away. Away from the palace, duty, or anything related to the hunt for his brothers.

The Lin Kuei lived modestly, funds used only for items related to the betterment of the clan.

However, Bi Han took some out for this. After all, you were his girlfriend, but it was also in case you were short.

And he was damned right.

You rummaged through your purse to find the paper notes you "supposedly" brought with you. However, Bi Han watches with a scowl and down-turned eyebrows, seeing through your lies.

The way you bat your lashes to the waiter. The way you dramatically had your hand above your chest, exclaiming how you didn't have the money to pay.

Bi Han saw through your little play, show, whatever you call this stunt of feigning embarrassment and shame.

The waiter, blind to your seduction, hands the bill to Bi Han robotically- as if he were under your spell. Without breaking eye contact, he sighs the paper and slaps the bills on the tray that holds the receipt.

Fuck, he almost broke the table.

At this, you glare at him with a look a mother would give her child.

Behave, you communicate through your eyes. Bi Han just ignores your attempt at telepathy, grabbing your wrist as he drags you out of the restaurant.

"Ah!" you yelp, and you apologize on his behalf as he drags you away and out the doors of the establishment.

It's a warm evening, and the restaurant was dwindling down the guests they had hour by hour. As you both get out, Bi Han turns the corner and pins you against the wall.

He only needs one hand, as your wrists were small enough for his rough hand to capture yours.

His pants are against your leg, and you realize he's spreading your legs apart with his knee. You gasp, but his free hand catches your worried cries.

"It is one thing to suggest a night out," he growls lowly into your ear, and your eyes are wide.

"It is another to suggest such games," now he's looking at you, into your eyes as he puts you under his command.

As much as you're putting up a fight, your lower region forsakes you. You internally scold your own mental fortitude.

Your thong is practically soaked, the fabric only covering the front portion of your sopping wet cunt. You whimper, bucking your hips lightly to try and get off on... anything.

Unfortunately, Bi Han corners you again. His knee holds your leg open, and he removes the hand that covered your mouth.

He tweaks your nipples a bit, teasing them to get them puffy and agitated. The fabric that covers your tits becomes uncomfortable, and you lament him onward, to engage some sort of sympathy from him.

He chuckles darkly, "If can't pay for what you got, why bother?"

Fuck this guy, he's making you pay one way or another.

His hand makes it to the bottom hem of your dress, and it slithers up to rub your clothed, damp pussy. You moan, eyes half-lidded as the entire situation brings you erotic delight.

Behind a building, albeit still rather public, not in the confines of the bedroom, while your lover mercilessly plays with your pussy.

Bi Han can feel the rapid changed of your cunt, more slick covering his hand as he pieces together what you're thinking.

"Dirty woman," he spits with venom. "You're getting off to this, huh?"

You shamefully nod your head, and he immediately shoves two of his fat, rugged fingers in your greedy hole.

"Is this how you pay for all your dinners?" he ridicules. "Spreading yourself wide open. What if it weren't me, hm?"

You imagine yourself getting slammed into a wall by a stranger's cock, relentlessly hitting your cervix as it pumps in and out.

Again, your privates betray you, and you squeeze on his fingers at the debauched thought.

"Harlot," he roughly takes his fingers out, also taking the hand that bounded your wrists above you.

He spins you around, face uncomfortably resting on the concrete as you can hear him remove his trousers and underwear.

Despite no hands on you, you don't dare turn around. You don't disobey, you don't move or try to escape. A plaintive whimper leaves you, and you feel a burning sensation on your bum.

Ah, he spanked you.

You turn your head around slightly and see Bi Han gripping your little love handles, plush body fat that rolled over your hips. He chuckles and spanks the other cheek, and your cry is caught in your throat.

"Disgusting woman," he sneers, spanking you again in the same spot. It burns, but you enjoy every little sensation this man was giving you.

You smile happily, borderline sadistic, as you push yourself against his throbbing cock.

Unfortunately (well, maybe fortunately for you), he pulls your hair and pulls you close to him.

"Do you take any form of payment?" you tease, your hand finding its way to his leaking length.

He groans at your stroking pace, but he doesn't stop you. As you stroke him, he flips the bottom half of your dress over and holds your thong to the side with his thumb.

"I need my money's worth," he takes his dick from you and lines himself up in front of your drooling cunt.

"How I get it is my concern."

At that, he pushes deep inside of you. You almost scream, but his other hand covers your mouth to make sure you don't give your current position away.

Your hot breath is in Bi Han's hand, and your body adjusts to his dick.

He's decently sized, but what he lacks there makes up in girth and technique. He's wide, and it stretches you good on the inside.

In fact, he's molding your cunt to perfectly fit him, and only him.

"Comfortable?" he asks, but you can't answer as he immediately begins his quick pace.

The sound of damp skin slapping against one another is ironic to the question. Your face is on top of your hand to protect yourself from the roughness of the brick, but your makeup smears against the back of your hand.

Your moans are muffled as he keeps driving into you, a pace that could rival that of a wild animal.

It's quick, needy, and greedy- he wants to remind you who you belong to.

Who owns everything about you, including the money you spend.

Bi Han shifts his hand over your mouth, shoving two of his calloused fingers in your mouth to suck and choke on.

The feeling is too much: cock buried in your wet cunt, fingers slobbered by your needy mouth, a mixture of spanking and gripping your hips.

Bi Han chuckles, feeling the smile that grows on your face from his fingers.

"Take it all then," he snarls.

Your mouth is freed from its fleshy prison. Each of his hands takes your wrists, your shoulders stretched as he plows himself into you with an inhuman speed.

Your moans are obnoxious, echoing into the night as Bi Han doesn't relent his pace. He's punishing you with every thrust, every spank, every hair pull.

While you aren't supposed to enjoy any part of this at all, your heart is practically leaping out of your chest.

There's a sudden change of pace with Bi Han's rhythm (he's practically not human at this point). They've become more erratic, desperate, and you squeeze your cunt with the knowing fact he's about to roll over the edge.

His moans are a little more breathy, grunting still present, but more airy. His forehead is touching your back, and both of his hands grab your still-clothed breasts.

Your arm weakly reaches around to him, and you give a gentle squeeze to indicate the fact you feel him.

"May I?" he asks politely, a complete three-sixty degree change from his harsh demeanor from earlier. You hum, letting your hand drop and return to you as he lets himself go completely.

A couple more deep thrusts and his vision is white, heavily panting as you can feel his seed fill you whole. You had also lost your grip with yourself, cumming as well and bits of your own juices roll down your thigh.

You're sticky, but satiated, and you can hear Bi Han's clothes rustle and move. Seems to be he's fixing himself up.

You try and wait for him, but your knees collapse due to the stress and strain of staying arched against the wall.

Right before you hit the ground, though, Bi Han catches you. On time, he put his clothes back on, and buttoned up his pants.

However, his blazer is not on, and you realize he had wrapped it around your waist to cover up the... mess you two had made.

"Wha..." but you couldn't talk anymore as Bi Han swept you off your feet, carrying you bridal style and away from the back of the building.

"Fixing the mess you made?" you tease him, yawning after such.

He simply tuts, "I am covering you up. Wandering eyes and whispers are unnecessary, especially since you are mine."

You blush at this. Despite all the roughness, he treats you like the most precious thing in the world. A fine piece of china, a marble statue- the most beautiful thing he had ever seen.

You smile happily, arms wrapped around his neck as you snuggle into his chest. His body may be a bit cooler than most, but it's warm enough for you.

A portal opens in front of you, and suddenly you're staring at the grand entrance of the palace. The wooden doors swing wide, and both ninja and attendants are at Bi Han's side.

"Prepare a bath, her favorite tea warmed, and fresh clothes for both of us," Bi Han commands. After they bow, they're quickly doing their tasks.

You're slightly delirious as Bi Han carries you. You see flashes of the halls, and then one blink later you're in your shared bedroom. He sets you down gently at the edge of the bed, gently lifting your arms as he takes off your clothes.

No words are spoken, but the attention to care and delicacy he's taking when it comes to you is enough evidence of his undying love for you.

He plants the gentlest kiss on your head, and he picks you up again to take you to the bathroom.

It seems the attendants did their jobs, the bath is warm with steam rising. A detachable table sits over the water with yours and Bi Han's favorite tea, and the water smells like magnolia flowers.

Bi Han sets you in first, slowly of course, and then gets in behind you. The water slushes and splashes, and finally settles with both of your bodies in.

You moan in delight of the warmth, and the heat of the bath sends you to an immediate sleep.

Despite your slumber, you could feel Bi Han's scarred and harsh hands glide over your body softly. Like picking a flower, he carefully scrubs and washes you of any filth and muck from tonight's raunchy activities.

He's even cleaning your insides out, and although a normally lewd thing, he does it with such gentility and care. And with presence of mind that you're already exhausted.

Afterwards, Bi Han leaves the bath, tenderly setting your back against the tub as he quickly dries and dresses himself. He picks you up from the bath, quietly drying your body and hair of any water that could get you sick as you slept.

He dresses you, albeit with some challenges since you were knocked out, but he succeeds as your light blue night set is on.

Coincidentally (and oddly charming), it matches Bi Han's sleeping attire.

Bi Han smoothly tucks you in, your little head hitting the feathery pillow. The comforter is thick and warm, but you instinctively find and curl up next to Bi Han.

His arm wraps around you as he pulls you in close, and your brain can finally shut down, sending you into dream-filled sleep.

===================

oh good grief guys, my req. box went up to four LOLOL

the prompts, though, are amazing, and i'm so happy that you guys chose me to see your ideas come to life

stay tuned for more, and i'll see yall in the next fic!

#mortal kombat #mk1 #mk1 2023 #bi han x reader #bi han sub zero #bi han #x reader #sub zero #bi han mk #smut #mk smut #mk1 smut

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missannwinchester · 6 months

Text

Good girl (Joel/Reader, nsfw)

Joel Miller/Reader

Rating: E

Summary: Joel’s friend invited him to his peaceful resort by the lake. His stay there turns out not as peaceful as Joel had hoped when it turns out he set his eyes on the only woman in the resort that should be off limits.

Warnings: super cheesy, all over the place, dad’s best friend, age difference, slightly rough sex, outdoor sex, nsfw, dirty talk

Joel drove through the forest, the asphalt road leading him straight to the resort. He took a sip of cold, gas station coffee, slowing down as the road became full of potholes. He could smell the fresh scent of pine trees as the wind flew into the car through open windows. Despite wearing sunglasses, Joel squinted each time the sun appeared between the trees. He was driving to his friend’s resort to spend one week in a place with small wooden cabins, a huge lake, boats for rent and no reception and he couldn’t be happier. He desperately needed vacation, and talking to another human being, who happened to be his old buddy, seemed like a dream.

He parked his car, drank the rest of the coffee and got out of the car, taking his black duffel bag from the backseat. He looked around and smiled at the trees swaying in the gentle wind and turned, facing the nearby lake, trying to adjust his eyes to the brightness of the sun dancing in its reflection. He stood like that for a while, inhaling the scent of the forest, before he decided to go check in. He headed for a cabin with a huge ‘reception desk’ banner and took his glasses off as soon as he went inside, standing face to face with the prettiest woman he saw in a while. Not that a hermit like him saw women often, but still.

“Hello,” she greeted him quite cheerfully, but she was clearly surprised to see him.

Joel smiled at her, almost automatically forgetting about his usually gruff demeanor towards new people.

“Hi,” he said, rather sheepishly.

If he had to speak from experience, clerks in places like that were usually awkward middle-aged men, scrawny college frat boys or older women who always flirted with him.

“Did you have a reservation?” She asked, suspecting he hadn’t.

“Uh, no,” he responded. “I was hoping you’d have free cabins by chance, I’d like to stay for a week,” he blurted out and looked into her bright, beautiful eyes. He didn’t mention that he had just talked to the owner of this place or that he was promised ‘the best cabin there was in the whole resort’.

“Lucky for you, there are two cabins available for one week, one right in front of us, by the parking lot and my personal favorite, hidden a little further behind the trees, right by the lake, but it’s got a con and it costs twice as much as the parking lot one,” she explained, not breaking eye contact, staring into his dark eyes with fascination.

This man was extremely handsome, well-built, very broad, and his eyes? His eyes were truly something else.

“I’ll take that personal favorite of yours,” he smiled and took out his wallet out of the back pocket of his jeans, forced to stop staring at her for a while.

She took a piece of paper and bit her lips when she reached for a pencil.

“Is anyone joining you?”

“No,” he said, leaning against the counter as she wrote something down.

“Breakfast included? Costs just extra 4 dollars per day.”

“I think so,” he retorted and she wrote something down again.

“So, when do you want to check out? Wednesday next week?”

“That’s right,” he nodded and she took a calculator and told him the price.

“I need to take a look at your ID,” she said and he complied, giving her the document.

“Okay, welcome to the resort, Joel. That’s the key, and here’s a map you can use to find your cabin or,” she said, sliding the map and key across the counter, “or I could just walk you there,” she suggested trying to sound breezy.

See, she had always been a good girl. Sunday school, do as she was told, good girl. She went to a good school, met a good man, got a good job, rented a good apartment, lived a good life. A good school she didn’t choose, with a good man she didn’t love and a good job that made her want to die in a good apartment that didn’t feel like home.

“It’s a little far, that’s all and… all the trees look kinda the same, but… well, you have a map,” she babbled, trying not to sound stupid.

“I’ve never been good with maps,” he smiled at her before he took the map and purposefully looked at it upside down, making her chuckle.

“I better walk you then,” she told him.

They walked for about five minutes through the forest, avoiding the small, crowded beach by the lake. The path was very narrow so Joel walked a few steps behind her. She could almost feel his eyes on her tight jeans shorts and she took a mental note to check out his bottom as well.

“How far is the cabin exactly?” Joel asked curiously.

“A little further,” she said. “You know, if you could read that map you’d know it shows an estimated time that you need to get from your cabin to all the important places? Like the breakfast lounge, boat rental or the reception desk,” she told him and slowed down a little, as the path became wider and now he could walk beside her.

“Interesting,” he admitted and eyed the map, quickly reading details about breakfast and how long it takes to go to the restaurant. “So, are you needed at the reception desk or can you show me around?”

“I can, no one's scheduled to arrive today. You were lucky I was even there when you showed up,” she told him and smiled at him playfully.

“Lucky indeed,” he smiled. “When you’re not there, what do you do all day?” He wondered.

“Well… that’s your cabin,” she announced and gestured to the pretty little house. “And as for what I do, I guess I mostly sit on a pier,” she laughed and Joel looked at the map.

“16 minutes that way,” he said, pointing his finger at the forest.

“Wow, you got better at it so fast,” she joked, but then she bit her lip hesitantly. “Actually, this one is not on the map,” she confessed quietly, as if she was telling a secret.

“Oh,” Joel sounded intrigued and waited for her to elaborate.

“We could go there if…” she sighed.

“If?” He prompted.

“If you promise me you’ll never go there without me. It’s mine and mine only,” she said quite sternly, looking at him with confidence.

“I promise, scout’s honor,” he responded without hesitation.

“Alright. Go, leave your bag, I’ll wait,” she promised and Joel went to the cabin and tossed his duffel bag inside carelessly and almost ran back to her.

His heart had been fluttering ever since he saw her, he figured it would stop after a while, but it was probably gonna be a longer while.

Fifteen minutes later they were standing on a pier. It was surrounded by water and reeds.

“Isn’t it awesome? We can see the lake, but the lake can’t see us,” she said with a grin. “I love this place,” she told him.

“I can see why,” he muttered, taking a deep breath, looking at the beautiful landscape surrounding him.

“Tourists never come by here, they stick to the other side of the lake, so it’s very peaceful,” she told him.

“And the view’s nice,” he said, looking straight at her and she smiled, suddenly a little shy.

“Yeah, especially when you actually look at the view,” she blurted out, pointing at the lake.

“Well I don’t know, I like looking over here,” he confessed, his body turned towards her. “You’d make any view better,” he whispered, but gave her space in case he read the signals wrong.

She turned, facing him with a smile dancing on her lips. She took a tiny step forward, getting closer to him, but not closing the gap between them, leaving him some room to decide what to do next. He also stepped forward, now standing in her personal space, their bodies almost touching.

“Does this line always work?” She wondered out loud, looking up at his face.

“Well, it seems to be working this time,” he responded and reached out to grab her hand, intertwining his fingers with hers, his other hand touched her hair, which was as soft as he expected, tucking them behind her ear as she leaned into his touch making his boxers even tighter now than a second ago. “What about your line?”

“What do you mean?” She asked unsurely.

“About the secret pier?” He clarified. “About how no one can see us.”

Her free hand traveled up his chest to rest on his shoulder and she knew it would be a horrible time to mention that she had never done anything like this before, not on this pier, nor anywhere else. The only sex she had was with her lousy ex fiance and for that she should have got an award for the best actress in a live action short film because she always had to fake it. So here she was, having her very first summer fling with an older guy and she had never been so aroused in her whole life.

“Seems to be working this time,” she smiled.

Joel leaned down and kissed her, slowly but surely and she responded, parting her lips, letting his tongue slide in. He tasted like something sweet and vaguely familiar and she gasped softly as his tongue explored her mouth. His hands were on her back, pulling her close and hers were wrapped around his neck, fingers playing with hair at the back of his head. His lips left hers and she was disappointed for a second before she felt them on her neck.

“Are you gonna tell me your name?” He asked, focusing his actions on her jawline.

He frowned when she tensed, grabbing his T-shirt, lightly pushing him away, but not letting him go. She told him her name.

Her grip on his T-shirt was quite strong considering her size and Joel could see how aroused she was. She pulled him towards her and kissed him deeply, dominating the kiss. He pushed his leg between hers, his hand on her ass, pulling her closer to him. She grinded against him and he hummed when he pressed his erection at her hip. She gasped into his mouth and pulled at the waistband of his jeans. She had never felt like this before, like she could come right there, dry humping him.

Joel unbuckled his belt and took off his jeans as she did the same. Her shorts fell on the pier and she felt a little self conscious. She tugged at the waistband of his boxers, pulling him into a kiss, his hand immediately found their way to her ass, squeezing it and slapping it very, very lightly, just enough to make it bounce. She sucked on his neck for a while before she pushed his boxers down and felt his fingers sliding under the soft material of her panties, pushing them down her smooth legs. He brushed his finger against her wet folds, sliding it in slowly, his thumb on her clit. He finger fucked her slowly, adding another digit while kissing her shoulder. She moaned at the sensation and slid her hands under his T-shirt, exploring his back. She was on the edge, waiting for him to just lightly, lightly push her.

“Hop up?” He suggested, reading from her uncertain expression that she might have some doubts.

“Um… up… you mean…”

“Don’t worry, I’ll help you ride me, sweetheart,” he promised and she nodded, wrapping her hands around his neck, waiting for him to pick her up.

When he did, she squeezed him with her legs, kissing him and sucking on his lip. She noticed that he was insanely strong, it seemed like she didn’t weigh anything to him. One of his arms snuck under her leg and pushed her a little higher and the other positioned his cock right at her entrance. He supported her butt lightly, as she slowly lowered herself on his thick shaft. Her walls stretched around him and she let out a quiet moan when she heard him groan. She felt his eyes on her face and she looked at him, rolling her hips, making him gasp into her face. Encouraged by him, she started riding his cock, squeezing him tightly with her thighs. He dug his fingers into her hips, almost painfully as he grunted when she lowered herself again, but his touch quickly softened again. He was helping her up and down, but he had to stop himself from straight up ramming her down on him.

“You can hold me like before,” she whispered. “I like how strong you are,” she told him and she felt his fingers digging into her flesh greedily and she heard a low growl as he closed his eyes to prevent them from rolling back.

“You like it rough?” He guessed and she realized she does actually like it rough. “Fuck, you’re so damn sexy, he growled.”

His confession gave her a boost of confidence that she needed, their pace was now relentless, the soft moans she made were driving him crazy, he felt like he could explode any second. He knew she was close, because her whimpers were becoming louder with each roll of his hips. She was gripping his T-shirt tightly, holding onto him with shaky arms and she wondered how he could do it, standing so straight up. He broke the sloppy kiss and licked the side of her neck, then nibbled on it softly. She moaned, a little ashamed of herself as she had never actually moaned during sex before. Without thinking, Joel brushed his teeth against her skin, scratching it.

“Fuck, sorry,” he apologized quickly when her legs jerked around him, knowing it must have hurt and he leaned to to kiss that spot better, but she whimpered loudly and dug her fingernails into the back of his neck, making him think that he misread her reaction.

“Did you like it?” He asked, already sure what the answer would be when he felt her teeth brush against his skin shyly, not enough to even leave a mark.

He guessed it might have been her first time and he hummed, trying to encourage her to use her teeth.

“Yeah,” she moaned quietly in response and Joel felt her timidity.

He noticed that her confidence decreased the moment she took her pants off, but he didn’t mind, knowing that if this went well he would have more time to rock her world again during his stay.

“It’s okay sweetie, I like it too,” he assured her and did it again, letting his teeth leave a mark on her shoulder. “Do you like it when I talk?”

“I do,” she admitted, not slowing down.

“Fuck yes,” he groaned and found her lips and his tongue slid in to start a sloppy kiss.

She started panting and Joel leaned down again to bite and suck on her neck and the second his teeth pinched her neck she came with him buried deep inside her. Her walls pulsed around him and he came too, rolling his hips into her one last time. He held her through her orgasm as he focused on not letting his knees give out as he panted loudly. She stopped squeezing him and let go of his T-shirt as she hummed contently, kissing him on the neck, on the hickey she had left on his soft skin. He helped her off his cock and he carefully put her back on the pier. He kissed her softly, his tongue gently brushed her lip. She smiled and pulled her shirt down to make it a little longer. She looked around in the search for her underwear. Joel got the hint and found his boxers while she was busy putting on her shorts. He winked at her with a smile while putting on jeans and she smiled back, comforted by his face expression.

“It was… very nice to meet you, Joel,” she said.

“My pleasure,” he muttered under his breath.

He came to face her again and his eyes traveled down her neck where she had a red mark left by his teeth.

“Well, it seems like a good start of a mindblowing week,” he whispered hopefully and she looked at him finally, nodding her head. “We could do this again tomorrow.”

“You know where to find me,” she reminded him with a smile.

“Will you walk me to my cabin?” He asked.

“Totally,” she said and started walking awkwardly towards the forest.

It all happened so fast, she wasn’t even sure if it was real.

“Actually, I was… I was hoping to meet the guy who owns the place, would you tell him I checked in when he comes back?” Joel asked.

“Yeah,” she nodded, just then thinking of her father. “Can you maybe not mention to him the…”

“The warm welcome?” He chuckled. “I don’t kiss and tell.”

“I’m actually kind of supposed to sit at the reception desk all the time,” she confessed. “If anyone asks, you got to your cabin all by yourself.”

“Sure thing,” he promised, not thinking much about it.

He leaned down and grabbed her butt. He gave it a firm squeeze and pushed her forward a little, and taking advantage of her initial shock, he kissed her passionately.

“I’ll find you tomorrow,” he promised and let her go, walking slowly towards the cabin.

“You better,” she muttered and bit her lip as she tilted her head, looking at his ass as he walked through the long grass.

A couple of hours later, she was sitting behind the reception desk, reading one of the old books she had found in one of the drawers. She turned the page, bored out of her mind and she glanced at her phone to see what time it was. She sighed loudly and threw the book at the counter. She got up from her seat and walked up to the window. She sighed one more time and pressed her forehead against the cold glass. Her dad was supposed to be at the resort in the evening and even though he hadn’t precised when, she was getting impatient. The reception was horrible so there was no use in even trying to call him. She locked up and headed towards the lake. The sun was setting, painting beautiful colors in the sky. She took her shoes off and walked into the lake, trying to ignore the screaming children who were running next to her. The water was quite cold, so she stopped after just a few steps, wiggling her toes in the sand. She could no longer see the sun as it hid behind the trees, but she enjoyed the colors dancing in the water. Despite the commotion, she heard a car engine and she turned her head to see her father’s truck on the rickety road. She walked out of the water slowly and picked up her shoes, walking lazily towards the parking lot. She saw her dad's silhouette from afar, she guessed he was holding something in his hand, probably his phone. He waved at someone and she heard his laugh. She smiled, glad that after all those years her dad was still excited to run the resort. The staff loved him and it was nice to watch as he joked around with them. Trying not to step on anything sharp barefoot, she walked slowly and carefully, avoiding the pine cones, but she was already right next to the parking lot. Involuntarily, her gaze followed her dad and that’s when she saw something strange. Her dad was hugging… Joel. Her dad was hugging Joel. She stopped and blinked a few times. Sure, she saw that guy one time, but she was certain that was him.

“You finally showed up man,” she heard her dad’s cheerful voice. “That calls for a celebration!”

“Definitely!” He responded and the men finally let go of each other. “I brought booze!” He said, handing his friend a paper bag.

“Let’s get you drunk like that time in Wichita!” Her dad cheered.

“I don’t remember ever being in Wichita,” Joel protested with a frown.

He turned around, motioning Joel to come with him and that’s when he saw his daughter and he greeted her with a smile.

“Hey,” he started, walking up to her, “that’s my old friend Joel, I met him way before I met you,” he laughed and she hoped she managed to hide how horrified she was.

She quickly glanced at Joel and for a second, his eyes met hers and he gulped, then, as if nothing happened he put a perfect poker face on.

“Joel, you must have met my daughter,” he said proudly. “Did she show you around?”

“She gave me a map,” Joel said quickly, faking a smile.

“That’s my girl!” His friend laughed. “Let’s go grab a bite, tomorrow I’m gonna take you fishing, Joel! See, we have this secret pier, it’s not on the map…”

The end

Thank you for reading :)

~Ann

#joel miller #joel miller fanfiction #joel miller fanfic #joel miller fic #joel miller x you #joel miller smut #joel miller x reader #joel miller x female reader

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50cal-fullauto-astarion · 1 year

Text

to leave the blood stay in the veins

monster!könig x f!rcursed!reader (no use of 'y/n') 6.6k words NSFW!

DEAD DOVE DO NOT EAT‼️CW: extremely NSFW, descriptions of gore, implied consumption of human flesh by a non-human monster, mention of necrotic curse, monsterfucking, vaginal sex, unprotected sex, knotting (no omegaverse), outdoor sex, ambiguous ending, pre-established relationship, 0% proofread, könig and reader are both fucking unhinged.

Day 01 of the Haunted Hoedown Challenge by @/inklore

taboo au (monsterfucking) + "i'll be your dirty little secret, if that's what you're into." + oh no i'm dating the town serial killer

There is a beast in the woods, and it leaves so little meat on the bone that not even carrion birds find value in the corpses it leaves behind.

It’s a strange town in the foothills of the Austrian Alps, full of little sicknesses hiding in the corners, and you learned them well when you moved here. No one goes past the treeline at night. Hardly anyone is outside of home if they can help it. Tourists are the beast’s fodder.

Your boyfriend thinks it’s funny.

König, under his ever-present hood–a not altogether uncommon sight in your town, people come here when they have something to hide, something they are uncomfortable with or find hideous in themselves, and he has given an unimaginable amount for you out of love–laughs, sharp in the tooth.

“Anyone dumb enough to head into the trees is dumb enough to die,” he teases, but there is an arrogance and a contempt swimming deep in his bloodshot blue eyes.

“That’s coldblooded, but not wrong,” you tell him, from behind your own mask. Plain thing, blank in expression, modeled from the one from Eyes Without A Face. It covers the ravages of a curse, numb necrosis slowly spreading up your face through the years. “I still want you to get me a gun.”

“What’s a gun going to do against a thing like that?” he asks, tilting his head, the hood bagging off the curled horns that start at his temples and sweep back over his ears. “Something like that, you need silver. I’ll get you a knife. Big one. Nice and fucking sharp, Schatzi.”

The knife isn’t a comfort when the beast begins to hunt in town. It stalks from house to house, preying on people in their beds, their living rooms, their bathtubs–there is no rhyme or reason, not a whit of discernable pattern.

Only teeth-gouged bones and viscera ground into wall, tile, and carpet alike. Your neighbor falls victim, and you watch the police from your window, flinching when a veteran officer stumbles out into the fall-frosted grass to vomit, sobbing and pulling his hair.

“It got Emil,” you say, still watching through your sheer curtains.

König nearly cackles from your bed, lounging as he visits. “Good. Emil was a piece of shit. Depperte Fut.”

You glance at him from the corner of your eye, over your shoulder, before returning back to the circus in the yard next door. “‘Stupid cunt’ is a pretty strong insult. He was an asshole, but I don’t think he deserved to die like that,” you mumble.

“You don’t know all that much about your neighbors, Schatzi.”

You begin to rock side-to-side on your hips, the enormous silver blade König gifted you turning over and over in your hands, the point digging lightly into your palm.

It’s insane, the way you begin to tell yourself that you’ve seen König’s face nearly everyday for the last two years—you can see it right now. He lies on your bed, pointed teeth gleaming under his split philtrum in the soft yellow light of the bedside lamp and the red-blue flash of the cruisers. You know there is a man under the hood, however odd and satyr-seeming.

And yet. And yet.

The blade digs a little too deep, drawing a curse-blackened bead of blood. König’s eyes burn into the back of your neck, and you can only guess his horizontal pupils dilate into black holes.

Just quit your job. I’ll take care of you.

It’s a simple enough promise, and one you know König will keep, but not one you’re willing to make. You have few shreds of independence, hard-bought through years of fighting back against misfortunes and setbacks, and, no matter the depths with which you love him, you’re not willing to trade your shit wage on faith for love of a man. It doesn’t matter how helplessly besotted he is.

It’s this molar-cracking grit that delivers you right to the beast. Because you were forced to pick up an extra half shift at the hotel to fold towels behind the front desk, because you needed the money, because you wanted to pay back your beautiful, bloodthirsty boyfriend for the ridiculous blade he begat you.

The god forsaken thing lumbers down a deserted street, blocks from your little rental, and something fucking horrendous seizes you. It’s enormous, walking on cloven hooves and back-bent legs. Its arms are too fucking long, clawed, jagged. And worst is the skull, bleached white and glowing like a beacon in the dark, an enormous rack of brutally sharp horns dripping trinkets of bone and gold that glints in the street lamp it approaches.

A horrible fact hits you. It’s not lumbering, it’s wandering. Putting a massive, craggy hand on fences and peering into houses, taking its time, evaluating. You swear you can almost hear it humming.

You don’t know when your hand found the handle of the silver blade strapped to your belt under your coat, but the leather on the grip bites your palm with the force of your grip, a nauseous, cold sweat terror tearing apart your ability to think.

It’s a primal fear, one that makes you want to protect your soft, vulnerable neck, even if the blood that warms it runs venomous.

It’s a bad choice, but there are no good ones. When the beast lifts its head and scents the air, skull snapping your direction and shaking its grisly trophies, you run. You snap the huge blade off your hip and drop into a dead sprint, cutting between yards, trying to escape the horrendous bellow that reverberates through the bony chambers of the monster’s skull.

Choosing to run instead of freezing maybe bought you a few extra minutes before death decided it was time to seize your pulse in reclamation, and it hurts. The physical exertion it takes to bomb through the last stretches of suburbia before the forest closes in feels like you are breaking every bit of your body by forced choice, listening to that awful fucking thing chase after you.

Your blade makes a slicing sound cutting through the air at your side, the monster’s hooves pound the dirt as it digs in and chases after you, but, good god, it doesn’t sound like it’s even trying.

You don’t dare look back, pushing your body past agony, your lungs shredding in your chest. You’ve never moved this fast, you’ve never run this hard for this long. Your body is TV static—hissing, popping, distant—and, insanely, the urge to cry drills into your eye sockets.

You’re going to die. You’re going to die. You’re going to fucking die, stupidly and dumbly and pointlessly, because you wanted to pay your boyfriend a stupid sum of fucking money, for a stupid fucking knife that he bought you on a stupid fucking joke.

Two meters from the second worst decision of your life, the monster snaps out, rough hand between your shoulder blades, crashing you into the goddamned dirt. Your eyebrow splits on a tree root, your eyes roll in the back of your head, your hand stays manically tight on the blade, slicing your other arm.

“Schaaaatzi,” the miserable fucking thing hisses, pressing that same hand between your shoulder blades, pinning you into the freezing dirt.

Oh, god, no, it has König’s voice. It’s—it’s not him, but it has his voice, thin and washed out as low-hung fog, but you would know that voice. In hell, in high water, in the dirt with a massive, bark-rough hand grinding your skin raw through your coat—you - know - his - voice.

Furiously, you slash the blade over your head, behind your back, screaming and digging your feet in the dirt. For a brief second, as you hack at the wood of the monster’s hand and wrist, you’re even able to push yourself off the ground by mere inches. The beast growls and shoves you back down twice as hard, knocking the wind out of you, spasming your hand open. The knife drops, and you begin to blindly try digging and dragging yourself away.

“Stop…hurting…me,” the beast lows, still in your boyfriend’s voice, and you imagine a bathtub full of gnawed bones, a living room with scattered body parts, your kitchen smeared with blood like cave wall art, and you start to scream as loud as your lungs will allow, your mask filling with dirt in your horrendous and futile bid to escape. Bloody murder bellows, filled with rage, wanting to kill and consume and conflagrate.

If König is dead, you will take your pound of flesh. You will either die fighting, or win, and you will hack apart this freak-fuck’s corpse to burn in your woodstove to warm your home. You’ll mount its fucking skull on your front door, so anything else in these woods will know you won’t hesitate to make trophies of them either.

Bone, warm to the touch, presses against the back of your head. When it breathes, the air is as hot as exhaust, almost scalding your back. “Schatzi,” it bids you slowly once again.

“I’LL KILL YOU!” it rips your throat raw to shriek it, reaching back and almost dislocating your arms to rip at anything you can. Your hands fall on the dressings attached to its horns, you tear off a vertebra, and a gold wedding band, and a bracelet of rave kandi in plastic beads. “IF YOU HURT HIM, I’LL YOU FUCKING KILL YOU!”

The head presses harder, driving your face into the dirt. There is something desperate in the pressure. It spits all at once, grating and wide in a voice you know better than your own, “You pissed off a fucking witch, because you ran out of riddles to tell her, when she was ransoming you to your arshloch grandmother. She never paid. That’s why you were cursed—no one gave a fuck. But I gave her my face for you, to stop it halfway, better than fucking nothing.”

Your rage freezes immediately, your chest heaving under the weight it presses down on you.

No one knows that. Only König. He’s the only person who would know about his lonely and quiet climb up to the Scottish highlands. Besides you, and the witch, König is the only one who would know why his human face was distorted, malformed, made animalistic.

“Lee?” you pant, unleashing part of his first name, the only one he ever tolerates. And, fuck, instantly the pressure pulls away, the skull rubbing against your back to soothe it.

“It’s me, Schatzi,” the slow voice promises, nuzzling you. There’s rustling above you that you don’t dare turn to see. “I’m not going to hurt you.”

A tinkling piece of jewelry lowers in front of your eyes, and you can see that it dangles from an enormous, ligneous finger. You’re being shown a sterling silver charm bracelet. You’re being shown your bracelet, the one you thought you had lost months ago.

Your hand shoots out, wrapping around the finger, the peeling bark shearing off under your grip. You find instantly that you can pull yourself up on your hip, sitting, caged and protected under the beast’s massive body—under König’s massive body.

He shifts back onto his digitagrade haunches, holding himself over you, still offering your bracelet. He shudders at your touch on his hand, and you imagine that he may’ve never been handled with kindness in this shape. Which makes a certain amount of sense. Because he fucking kills and eats people.

“What the fuck is wrong with you?” you snap, staring dead into the hollow sockets of his eyes. He shifts uncomfortably, turning his head. “Why—you have me so fucked up—what have you been thinking—?”

“Oh, for fuck’s sake, do you have to—”

“Yes, I have to, fucker.” It’s impossible to wrap your head around the magnitude of what a simple secret and a silver bracelet has done to your understanding of the world. A complete unraveling—upheaval, utterly.

You take the bracelet from his finger, on which it fits like a ring, and push it into your wrist, sitting up on your knees and grabbing him by the underside of his jaw. Though it puts you in his blind spot, staring dead center at the sinus dimples between his eyes, it feels like you have a mote of power over him.

(If he were asked, he would say the power you hold over him could corrupt, absolutely. He would badly like you to ask someday.)

“Why are you—what are you? Have you always been like this? Or was this new, with the fucking witch? Are—Jesus Christ—why are—the monster isn’t supposed to come into town, why are you in TOWN?” you run off at the mouth, words stalling and crashing and fusing together as your thoughts overwhelm just how quickly you can speak.

And up from that impossibly deep throat–simultaneously from the center of your brain, and from all around you all at once–crawls König’s pitchy hyena-laugh, edged, always, with cruelty. He butts the jagged end of his nasal cavities into your stomach, catching on the threads of your sweater.

“Leshy, Schatzi, say it for me.”

Your hands pull his jaw closer, digging the bone into your stomach, wondering if he can feel the pressure of your deep breathing. Oh, fuck, you could crack. This is your König. You start to wonder how many of his perverse buttons you can hit, the part of you that felt shame for your attraction to what the world discarded as ‘ugly’ long ago removed from your emotional bank.

“Leshy,” you say, really leaning into the word, saying it deep in your chest. One of your hands travels the long length to the hinge of his jaw, gripping tight, directing his head to turn so you can meet one of his empty eyes. “Answer my fucking questions.”

The laugh doesn’t come this time. In its place is a near-violent whole-body shudder that wracks through you.

“Old! Alwaaays been this way,” and even in the strange disconnect of his voice from his physical form, you can tell his arousal is eating away at him in big bites–clipping his speech, broiling his brain with body heat, “can’t remember ever being young, haa-haa. And why do you think I’m hunting in town?”

Another trap, a stupid pop quiz, wanting to test your knowledge of him, or a gotcha! to check your observations and what you had missed.

Your hands get tighter, and you pull his jaw open, marveling at the sharp grooves ground into his teeth, like nightmarish, ivory rook pieces, tall and straight in the dry sockets. His chest begins to heave, his breath fogging into steaming clouds over your hands, and, remarkably, it smells like nothing at all apart from pin needles and snow.

You’d thought you’d smell decaying flesh or rotten blood. The only blood you can smell comes from your own busted brow and sliced arm, crusting black on your skin and in the fabric of your sweater as it coagulates.

“If I was working on a hunter’s instincts, I would say that Schladming has become too good at keeping people out of the forests. Even during daylight hours. It cuts down on prey,” you say, ice cold and clean as a slit throat. Your eyes flick back up to the socket, surrounded by the feeling that those glass-blue eyes of his humanoid form are drilling into you. He’s waiting for you to hit the hook. “But I’m working on your logic.”

“Oh, yeeaah,” he drawls, his hips shifting, and you feel as if he would bite his lips in anticipation now, if he could.

“Oh, yeeaah,” you echo him, “the logic of a fucking crazy asshole.” He feels like a huge grin, hands on his muscular, bunched, and flexing thighs. That detail is not lost on you. “You’re hunting in town because you’re pissed off. You reached a limit, and you got tired of sitting on your fucking reaction.”

You swear to god he moans a little. Just softly. It could be a breath, but you know him too well to dismiss it out of hand.

“That’s good, Schatzi. I like that. I like that you figured that out,” he says, definitely panting in rhythm now, his fogging breath giving away the rhythm secondary. “People are looking at you too much. I don’t fucking like it when they look at you too much.”

That’s a sudden thought that had not occurred to you, and you lash yourself silently because it hadn’t. König has always been possessive of you. Jealous. Protective. And he held grudges in ways that could spark blood feuds and successive generations of death.

Like a curse.

It’s a testament to how fucking cracked and perfectly matched the two of you are that you start laughing, stroking his orbital bones in big, pleased pats, kissing the bridge of his nose.

“Schatzi, please,” he groans, pressing into you insistently. “Promise you won’t tell. Promise me.”

“Why the fuck would I tell?” you laugh, losing track of your faculties, your very sense. What does it matter? What does it all even mean? You’ve found a man that loves you so deeply and truly and twistedly that he slaughters those who desire or deign you. You’ve found, and fallen in love with a man that would sell his face to save as much of yours as he could. “Who the fuck would I tell?”

The slope of his shoulders relaxes, and he moves closer to you, once again shielding you with the massive bulk of his body, warming you in the cold air. Tucked under his chin, you can study the soft suede-like material of his body, how the bark covering his arms gives way to a ruff of dense, double-layered fur around his shoulders and his long, muscular neck.

The rest of the muscle on him is horrendously hard, flexed like steel cabling under a layer of fat. There is something about this body that reminds you of the shape of the human one so well–long legs, a nipped waist, and flat hips built to strut and rock, all of it buttressing a broad set of shoulders.

You press your face into the ruff, pushing your fingers into it. Dear god, your hand goes deeper and deeper, and it just never seems to stop. His scent is–it’s almost familiar. He’s in there, somewhere–his musk, the metallic tang of blood seemingly sunken into his skin–but there’s so much more to it. Green, and earthy, almost like soil and moss.

A sound comes from his body, like a house settling. A deep, broad creak. The trophies on his horns rattle together, clinking like dull wind chimes. “More,” he says simply, leaving you to figure it out. Simple enough.

Your hand drops from the ruff, tracing over his convex chest, down to his stomach. Another shudder, and he pulls those big arms around your entire body, a fuller, more protective hug than you’ve ever felt.

“Schatzi–would you let me…” he breathes, a heaving sigh.

Another laugh cracks out of you, hysterical, constricted by your mask. Why not? Why shouldn’t you? You’ve always been a woman that loves monsters. You, yourself, are one. You can’t find a reason to halt your hands, nor your body, nor his desire.

In an odd show of tip-to-tail, you push the mask off your face, and kick off your boots, going for your zipper. “Yeah. Yeah, honey, come on. Show me,” you urge him, pawing at his massive waist as you struggle out of your jeans.

He groans and this obscene trill escapes his body–a low, rattling moan that travels miles through every cell of your body, his legs spreading wider. You laugh in delight and mania, watching rapt as his cock slides out of a sheath you hadn’t even caught sight of, his monstrous body a foreign land you hadn’t traveled yet, but, fuck, do you want to learn the lands well enough to call them home.

It’s heavy in your hands, a little slick, and, childishly, you almost giggle (holy shit, that is a sound that has never left your mouth in your living memory, and yet, here you are). It’s hot, hotter than you expected, and a vulnerable shade of pale, like a plant slip. Oh, and it’s elegant, almost spiraling. He huffs as you stroke the length of it, pushing your fingertips into his sheath at the base.

“I don’t think this is gonna fit,” you warn him, and it somehow feels as if you’re challenging yourself with the statement.

He takes it as a challenge for himself, though, and an aspiration to hold for you, “You are going to take all of it. I’m going to make sure.”

His massive hand comes to the back of your waist, finding your fulcrum without needing to search, pulling you off your knees to hold to beneath him. “You naked yet, or still fucking around?” he asks, breathing heavily, and you shove your jeans off the rest of the way.

“You’re being a little bitch,” you snipe, a dumb swipe at reclaiming dignity after you realize you’re so wet that it slicks your thighs, having darkened the crotch of your freshly abandoned jeans pathetically.

He throws another coarse laugh, haa-haa, shifting his massive body long, pulling you into place.

It’s on you, then, to figure out the logistics. Somehow, it just works, even through layers of physical translation. Under your hands, he reads König, loud and clear.

There’s a brief, flighty moment of terror as you rub the head of his cock between the lips of your cunt, rolling your hips to stimulate your clit against it. It is just fucking enormous, almost half again the size of his human cock. But then you grit your teeth, tipping your weight back so your shoulders rest against the dirt, bleak and unyielding ruthlessness seizing your mind.

You do not back down, you have never done it once in your life, and tonight is no different.

His head lifts, bottom jaw dropping, and he bays as you push yourself down on his length. The sound crashes into you, rocking your entire body, and the stretch burns, but you buckle down. What are the people in the houses just at the edge of suburbia thinking? Has the fucking abberation that has been slowly killing its way through their number taken to a different form of punishment? Has someone unlucky fallen to its new tastes?

It cuts your mouth into a horrid grin. If they only knew that you were no victim at all, if only they had an inkling of the fact that you are a victor. That you are the hand holding this nightmare’s collar, and he attacks for the sake of you.

Inch by inch, a slow journey, he fills you, pressing completely against your walls, body shaking with the effort it takes not to thrust fully into you. Oh, what destruction that would result in, what a wreckage that would make of your body, what lengths he would go to not ruin you in such a fashion.

“Fuck–fuck–Liebes,” he mutters, just for you, the moment he is as deep in you as he can go, most of his length still outside of what your body can handle, pleading, “I can’t–I. I have to move. Please, meine Liebes.”

“Go. Go-go-go,” you answer back, almost frantic, too full and occupied, needing motion or you might split apart into atoms. The way he answers is instant, undeniable, desperate, rocking into you as if testing waters, going faster as if he finds them warm and welcoming.

You lose yourselves to it, and your eyes threaten to roll back into your head, gripping onto the elbow of the arm suspending you, blood rushing to your head in an ache from the way you hang off him, forcing you lightheaded. Sap-like blood from where you’d hacked at him in rage drips down your arm, your waist, clinging to your skin in a way that feels permanent.

He tenses all around you, panting, clouds of steam fogging the air over your head from his pants. Words escape him, leaving nothing but animalistic grunts, the grinding of his dry, exposed teeth as your desperate pussy sucks him deeper and tighter.

You’d taught him as a human to find your g-spot, to destroy your brain with a steady climb, and he doesn’t even need to search now, every movement pressing every inch of his cock into it, and unrelenting onslaught that makes you shake and nearly drool, being fucked like a sacrifice.

König raps his other fist above your head and pulls out without warning, shaking his head and breathing roughly.

You imagine brutally grabbing him by the scruff and biting his ear–what kind of punishment would that even be, no worse than a bug bite to him, more likely than anything else–for the loss of his cock. Mostly just an impulsive fantasy, too barbaric and stupid to actually act upon, but you were thoroughly enjoying yourself, and it feels like hell to be split open against him with nothing inside you.

Breathless–and naked, sweating, and trembling in the woods–you start to sit up on your elbows, cunt throbbing. "What is it? Are you okay?" you ask, your love for him–your fear for him–overwhelming even your damnation-worthy starvation.

König, massive and so dark he's almost indistinguishable from the night apart from his skull, shakes his head again and puts up a clawed hand. Fine, the gesture says, and you’re realizing he’s beyond words now, but trying his best to communicate. Then he curls it into a loose fist and pantomimes masturbating and finishing.

"Christ!" But you’re laughing, tugging at a tuft of fur on his chest, spun out in your giddiness. It’s still him, you’ve already known, but to see it. To find him through this–this utterly new reality. "They teach you that signal in the forces?"

In his hollow sockets, twisting his body to watch you closely, he looks pleased with himself, ducking forward, bracing on his free hand to one side of your head as he nuzzles into your neck and breathes deeply.

He huffs, rough fingers running over your back, claws trailing the parts of your spine he can reach as he holds you, before he taps the side of your thigh with his other hand. At your eye level, he turns his finger in a slow loop. Roll over, maybe? It's worth a shot.

"Okay. Alright," you sigh, relieved. When you try to roll in his palm, he shakes his head and sets you down, pressing down against your body, pushing his arm under your ribs. With his other hand, he gestures a flat line on the ground. You ask, "On my stomach?"

Two knocks against the ground next to your head. Yes.

You stretch out flat over the frost-crisp grass, too hot to even register the chill against your bare skin, and König lowers with you, sliding the arm under you down to your diaphragm. With his knuckles, he taps your outer-thighs until they're drawn back together, and your breathing hitches when you understand what he intends.

With his legs on the outside of yours, he uses his free hand to run his cock up the length of your seam to tease your pussy, but he takes his sweet time with it. Impatient, you slide onto your knees with near-perfect timing, driving your entrance against his head, snarling with indignation when he bows away. "Fucker!"

He rumbles something almost humanoid, between a laugh and a gruff, trilling ‘rrrr’ you recognize as cousin to a sharp, challenging hum he makes when faced with an idiot comment in his human shape.

"Stop teasing me. I can't stand it," you try instead, turning to give him big eyes over your shoulder because you know that it works well on him.

He bends down and barely-barely nips the top of your ear, a startling move that leaves you perfectly inflamed all over again again. Greedy brat, it says to you, so pleased in the fact he is so desperately wanted.

The feeling of him inside you is extraordinary. He lubricates in this state, but you hardly need it with the nearly absurd way you’re wet, slick down your thighs. You wonder if your cunt is glimmering under the dim moon and streetlamps, because he'd said that to you once. Heilige sheiße, you have the prettiest pussy I’ve ever fucking seen, could just stare at how wet you get for me forever, he'd laughed during one delirious, marathon session of staying sunken between your legs.

He begins to rock his hips, growling quietly and pleased at the wet sounds of your of cunt squelching around him–another sound he enjoys, a marker of pride, how wet can I make my girl get–settling onto his forearm and pressing a little weight against your back.

He rests his head across your shoulders, burying his snout in your hair, breathing in hard-bought bursts of restraint.

"Yes, honey," you almost seethe, loosening your body, giving up a little of your own iron will to become just a little lost in the feeling of him. You relax your walls in a bid to take more of him, breathing tight, voice pitching up into a plea, "Yes, baby, that's perfect. That's so perfect, keep going. Just like that."

He rocks a little faster, thrusts a little deeper, breathes a little harder. The hand around your waist shifts up to your breast, but isn't dexterous enough to do more than give it an encompassing squeeze.

With your thighs pressed together, you feel as if your body can't stretch properly to take as much of him as you want (and you want all of him, every burning hot inch, fucking him so well that he cannot disappear into one of his miseries where he will not let you follow, because they all live in his head).

He ratchets back his speed, tries a new motion with his hips. He rolls instead of thrusting, a more fluid movement, brushing your insides in new ways that leave your swollen clit screaming for attention and your eyes watering. You breathe in ragged pants, fingers digging into the turf over your head, trying not to rip it with the force of your grip by the fistful.

You might cum. You might cum. You want to cum, and you might, and he's so much deeper now, panting hot as fire against your shoulders. You can feel the muscles in his abdomen clench and dance, his horns cutting the air in swipes of agitation above you, and he is so much this way. König: bigger, sometimes bloodier, but always so, so amplified.

"Honey, honey, honey," you whine in a chant under your breath, trying to ground yourself, trying to encourage him. You squeeze your thighs together for the extra stimulation, but you know you’re going to orgasm from him alone, no extra assistance needed. You’re just greedy, you just want it all, but you want him the worst.

When he pulls out this time, you snarl loud and gnash your teeth, digging your dirt-packed nails into his unyielding skin. You were full to the brim and on the wire-edge of climax, and he is so suddenly fucking gone it's almost as abrupt as violence.

"KÖNIG!" you shout, his callsign cutting from between your teeth like the desire to slit a throat, shattering the quiet around you both, reeling to find him with your burning eyes.

He collapses onto his side, cock jumping and leaking, and he whines deep in his throat, pulling at you with the flat of his hand. Your thigh, then his hip, your chest, then his–more hand signals, a story-told like a man with a sucking chest wound needing saving. He snakes his arm under you again, whining growing deeper, and you understand.

You roll, throwing your thigh over his hip, tucking tight against his chest. You give yourself one second of feeling cool air against your overheated pussy before you take him in hand and direct him home, and his deep, slick slide into you knocks the air out of your lungs like a punch to the solar plexus.

You’re only seconds away, and he can't be much farther, driving his head under yours to give you something to rest on that isn't the ground.

You don't utilize his offering, craning your neck as if you'll somehow get a glimpse of your connection from this angle–flat against him from belly to breast, resting your cheek and forehead against his heaving chest. His whine turns into a series of small, strangled howls and gasps as your voice crawls from whimpering to keening.

You’ve known you were going to cum, but you’re still somehow surprised with yourself at how quickly it's raced up, and how overwhelming it feels like it's going to be. You feel like you’re going insane.

His other arm wraps your ribs, too, squeezing you to him like you’re the only thing in the world worth keeping close, and damn him for it. You don't know why, but damn him.

"Cum, baby, cum," you instruct, gasping when you aren't clenching your teeth. You curl close to him, as close as your body will allow, spreading your legs as wide as you can. You drive back down into his thrusts, giving as much of yourself as you can, taking as much of him as you’re able.

You want it all–everything–every little bit of blood and bone that's built him into a home he offers only to you. "Cum in me. I'm ready, I want you to cum," you demand, finding it truer than true, finding yourself right on the razor-edge.

The command is all it takes. Three hard thrusts, and he's buried in you to the base, punching the wind out of your lungs, and filling you to the point of what feels like impossibility with his spend. It forces you to finish as well, lighting you up like a lightning storm, swallowing him deeper as you cum and cum like you'll never be able to stop, soaking the both of you.

You gasp a raw-throated howl, tears pricking the corners of your eyes, and you praise him as his cock kicks and kicks, emptying everything he's got to give into you.

A pressure builds inside you, beginning nearly unpleasant, until something just gives and his knot anchoring him to you feels right.

It feels special and dazzlingly intimate, and you’re boggled, again, with the knowledge you’re the only person in the world that he's ever shown himself to this way. It’s just a thing you know in your marrow, an immutable truth, like the sun setting in the west, or the cruelty of witches without their wants.

You wind down, sweating and panting and filthy in each other's arms, and you rock against him, holding him inside, clenching around him what little you can. You feel so wonderfully safe, so immaculately powerful, so stupidly, crazily, fantastically in love.

When your combined breathing evens, and the knot between you retreats, you groan when König shifts back into his human form, but only for the resituating you both have to endure.

The body against yours is familiar again, and you’re dreadfully sleepy, though you want to clean yourself and eat. You crave something raw, something bloody. You hunger the way an animal hungers after a hard fuck. His spend drips out of you now that his cock's returned to normal, and it forms a trail of cooling wet down the crease where your thigh meets your ass.

You feel lovely.

König laughs, rough and spent, tucking hair out of your face and kissing your closed eyelids. "Holy fucking shit, Schatzi," he marvels, looking at you like you are the only god that has ever mattered.

Your smile cuts sharp, and your fingers find his pulse point, tracing it thoughtfully. “You hungry? I bet you're fucking starved,” is all you say in return, eyes trailing the way his hand finds the charm bracelet newly returned to your wrist, touching it like a token.

It’s late and dark when you both manage to stumble your way back to your rental. He stays close, needy and soft, his hand on your hip, tugging you into his body when he can, careful of not knocking into the big, silver knife you’d placed back in the scabbard on your belt.

The hood is back on his head, rolled up to his nose, and his split mouth kisses against your neck and behind your ear, his eyes closed like he endures a waking dream. You, in your own filthied mask again, allow it, craning your neck to give him more room, anchoring him with an arm around his waist in return.

It is late now, and the neighborhood is silent. Again, you wonder what the quiet lives inside must be thinking–whether they think the crimes have increased into a new field of brutality, if they are fearing and wondering what body parts they will find at the treeline come dawn.

You know they will not leave the safety of their homes to investigate. They would be stupid to do something like that.

“That shower is going to feel so goddamned good,” you mutter, unlocking your door, and he nods against your skin.

“Oh, yeeaah,” he says, and the familiarity of the phrase makes you hum a laugh, shutting your eyes as you push through the threshold. "Get that blood off your skin before it stains. Your poor face, your poor arm. Poor Schatzi."

He splits off from you with a facsimile of a kiss–your masks pressing together at the mouth–and he pinches your ass before he takes off to the kitchen, his stomach growling, not even bothering to take off his boots.

You, however, kick off your shoes, and pull together clean clothes, heading toward the bathroom in the hall, the one with the big shower, in case he decides to join you.

Sleepy and content, you listen to his boots move heavily over the kitchen tile, the sound of the fridge door hissing snickt as he pulls it open, and shoves things around in his search for food. You nearly sway up to the closed door–why is it closed, you barely manage to wonder–your eyelids lead-weighted.

It takes only one thing to make them snap open wide, your back going ramrod straight. A dark smear, curling around the knob, around the edge of the door where it seams to the jamb.

Cold grips your lungs, sending your heart galloping painfully in the cage of your ribs, wondering if it really is copper you smell, or if it is a trick of your mind. The hall is too dark to tell if the swipe on the white door is red or black–if it is blood, if it is König’s or yours.

There is a presence at your back, and enormous hands on the door on either side of your head, so fast you cannot tell if you were even able to blink before you saw his wide, scarred, and knuckle-broken limbs spreading wide across the wood.

Your hand finds the grip of the knife, looking at the brutal gouges you had hacked into his forearm earlier in the night, and you are thinking faster and harder than you ever have in your life, realizing in a terrible microsecond that you will have to make a decision–that you will have to choose what reality you are willing to live with, or that you are simply mistaken.

Either way, you are moments from learning.

“Something wrong, Schatzi?” your boyfriend’s familiar voice asks, low and raspy, hot against the nape of your neck.

The laugh in his tone is cruel, and you can’t tell whether it belongs to König, or something pretending to be him.

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rel124c41 · 6 months

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SCHISM. jade leech

You could not grab a full-bodied mushroom, that had already lived a life outdoors, and stick it into a terrarium. "I know the pieces fit because I watch them tumble down" - TOOL, Track 5 on Lateralus

tags: established relationship, relationship issues, soul bond, ghost camera, angst w a happy? ending, character study, parental crewel, mental breakdown(s), crowley finds a way to send the prefect home, grimms fairytales, tattoos

word count: 16,920

“No! NoNONO! Wait, Jade! Cut it out Jade! Jade!”

The words you let out are overflowing with terror. Fear makes itself familiar and known in your vocal cords.

Out of you comes one last fruitless, ignored shriek of his name before you cry like a child on a rollercoaster. With you in his arms, Jade falls back first off the cliffside.

Catlike, you cling onto your boyfriend. Pointed nails dig deeply into his neck, causing little injuries and indents. The fall is short and, before you know it, you are both underwater, weightless.

It is freezing and awful and warm and great all at the same time. You want to resurface immediately. Which you do, kicking yourself out of the constricting arms around your waist. Lake water ripples and billows. Once you surface, you expect to hear that mocking laughter. Rivulets of water cascade down your neck and face as you bring two soaking wet hands up to your temple to wipe away water – rather fruitless. But you clear the skin over your eyes and open them, searching for what you thought you would find in sound.

“My clothes are drenched, Jade,” you whine, knowing he can hear you no matter if he is underwater.

The lake remains a calm surface, no body popping up. Kicking your legs and waiting, you glance up at the cliffside Jade had thrown both of you off of. Sun burns the palm you face up to its golden rays, protecting your eyes. There is, sitting all pretty. The mushroom you had been going to collect lies unplucked. Next to it, your pair of sunglasses that had fallen off your nose when you were lifted as easily as a mischievous cat.

Though, you are not the mischievous one in this. That description belongs to another: the one sly predator swimming underwater and avoiding surfacing for mischievous reasons most likely. Who were kidding, you think watching still waters, definitely for those types of reasons.

And you only get one warning – a hand pinched on your nose and a hand cupping your mouth – before you are dragged right back underwater.

You thrash wildly. A lean body folds and tilts itself over you. You punch at where you think his shoulder or rib-cage is. He spins you once then twice underwater, disorienting you. You clutch at his shirt and pull. He kicks at your right leg and bends your body as if it is a bow. Wrestling against one another, your objective to resurface and his objective to dance clash until finally Jade pulls you up for air.

This time mocking laughter accompanies the cool sting of air. “Ugh, you jerk! You absolute – ugh!! My clothes!” Your punching fist is caught. Jade twists it and wraps it around his neck in an amorous hold like you two were going to start tango-ing. He laughs, subdued chortling at your furious expression.

“Fufufu, you should’ve seen your face.”

“This is Floyd level behavior! I cannot believe you!”

“Come now, (Name). You were just complaining about the heat.”

You gasp, offended. “The heat?! You did this because –”

“Because I wanted to assist my love however I could? Yes, of course. I do need to take care of you after all.”

“Oh, you ass,” you growl and dig your nails in the back of his neck.

Jade is unaffected by your humane strength. Instead, Jade smiles at your attempt to inflict any harm on him. His lips pull up and you are struck breathless by the visage of him. Sunlight falls on his glass-clear skin in an evangelical way. Teal hair is pressed down by water, slick with a rare shine. Even with black eyeliner smudged raccoon-esque, his eyes are piercing and vibrant. A lemon and an olive, rich like plucked from a painting. You punch his latissimus for being so effortlessly handsome at times.

With clipped and vexed words, you say, “I’m cool now. Thank you.”

“It’s my pleasure.” His white smile is aggravatingly handsome too. “Don’t I get a reward for my consideration,” Jade asks, not missing a beat, simply floating with you in his arms.

“Take me back to the shore?”

“Of course I will.”

“Okay, here’s your reward,” you say, pecking him on the lips. “Now then.” Your gaze sharpens. “Shore. Now.”

When you two finally reach the lake’s sandy border, you start to wring out your button-up. You will not walk around in wet clothes. The dripping fabric of your tank top suctions itself to your skin in an unrelenting, octopus-like grip. You glare when Jade openly stares. Half-lidded eyes trace up and down the curvatures of you. Taking the shoulder ends of your button-up, you whip the material down hard once then twice then thrice, watching as water droplets splash your boyfriend.

Take that, you think triumphantly as you remove another article of clothing.

Jade gets back at you by taking his own wet button-up and wringing it out over your head rather than over the dirt like you had done. Dropping the shoe you were shaking water out of, you attack him and his self-satisfied, coy smirk.

It takes about five minutes of horseplaying until you two get back on task.

You sit on shore, squeezing water out of socks and mourning when Jade was more cowardly about touching. All two sets of teeth yet no bite. Endearing courting methods involved gifts, and even then, he was earnestly timid about it. Hand like a shield on his heart all the time as if to translate, be gentle with me.

Rolling a still damp sock back on your foot, you think that message was truly worth ignoring. Jade Leech and gentle were antonymous.

Still, there was a certain charm about his slyness. The fake humanitarianism he wore in his finely pressed uniform and neat bow was attractive. The glowing, angular silhouette of those sharp, up-turned eyes could still make you swoon. Something about him being out of reach was magnetizing.

But … you watch as Jade walks up to you, your mushroom and sunglasses in his hand, there is something equally magnetizing in unlocking this part of him.

And you have to admit the dip into the lake did wonders dropping down your temperature. Now you were not losing by such a large margin in the battle against heat stroke.

You let him have this win. And you let him come to you. Accepting your sunglasses, you lay them to perch on the crown of your head. Before he offers a hand out to you, Jade carefully places your mushroom in the bucket you two have been wandering around with. He drapes his wet button-up over the button, electing to stay in his own tank top.

“Not going to dry out your socks?”

“No, I happen to enjoy the feeling of walking around in wet socks. Reminds me of home”

“You’re incorrigible.”

A smile splits across Jade’s face at your harsh words. Stalactites and stalagmites of razor enamel shine in his mouth, menacingly. And yet he offers out a hand to you, nails trimmed down to the plate, safe and warm even if it is calloused a bit.

Your eyes trail over him. Past shoes and compression tights and white cargo shorts. Gliding over the palm of his pallid hand and over the black eel skeleton made of tattoo ink which wraps itself from elbow to shoulder. Up to his collarbone, to his face, and to his eyes.

A fond thought arrives in the mailbox of your mind. It is a letter perfumed in heart, base, and top notes of aquatic and woody scents. The smell of stepping on the beach and breathing it all in so deeply that your ribs ache. As the letter’s wax seal melts off, you read and transcribe the letter into the passionate smile on your lips and the way you trust yourself with holding Jade’s hand. The letter reads: I think I want to spend the rest of my life with him.

That was only yesterday.

That was only yesterday. Now, that mental letter means nothing to you.

How quickly our opinions can change, you reflect, standing in Crowley’s office with a pearl of torment clutched in the bowels of a stomach ready to puke.

When you were summoned to Dire Crowley’s office, you were vexed more than anxious. In your head bounced around the theories on what under-the-table job the Headmaster was kindly electing for you to take care of. Another thirty plus stack of papers he did not want to write his signature on or another school activity that you would be generously put in charge of. You weighed the options of work as Grim (perched on your shoulder) weighed the options of what you would ask for as a reward.

“Tuna croquettes, Henchman, imagine the taste of those! When Crowley gives us our job, ask for those! Ask for tuna –”

“What even is a croquette? When did you learn a French word?” You can already guess the answer to the second question: if it involves food, not even a language barrier can stop Grim from learning about it.

“They’re these breaded balls of tuna that are deep-fried.” You stick your tongue out in disgust. “They look delicious. You can dip them in honey or put them on crackers. Oh, Henchman, you have to ask for them. And we should pick up more honey for home.”

“I’ll remember to pick up honey. I can’t promise any tuna coqu –”

“Croquettes.”

“Croquettes. You know, you need to stop watching food blogs or going on websites like Food & Wine. I found my phone opened up to twelves tabs of just food blog recipes last week.”

“I’m not the one browsing them. Jade is.”

“Well, I’m cutting both you and Jade off. You’re grounded from looking at food blogs together. I can only handle so many different ways to organize a bento box before I go crazy.”

“Henchman,” Grim whines, nuzzling his fur against your cheek. “But they all look so yummy.”

“Grounded,” you had declared just before pushing open the door to Dire Crowley’s office, knowing he was already expecting you. How you wish you could re-spark that easy conversation between you and Grim. How you yearn to have the foresight to ignore his summoning.Now, you stand in front of Crowley, frozen.

“He-Henchman,” Grim whines, trying to get you to speak or at the very least blink.

Blind-sighted is the only accurate description for you. Your eyes sit in your skull like wispy white spider eggs, paralyzed. If breathing were not a necessity, you would dare not even breathe. Vision blurring, you focus on the thin lips of Crowley underneath his raven masquerade mask, replaying all he had said. Salted water twitches on your bottom eyelashes.

After seven volatile overblots, the too close for comfort spell of comatose casted over the entire world, and two years of rapidly draining hope, you had a way to go home through the assistance of the Dark Mirror and Dire Crowley.

You think you really are going to puke.

The only thing that halts your throat from cleaning itself of previous dishes is the bite of Grim’s fangs on your cheek. Like four tiny needles, his fangs sink in with a vengeance. You startle back with a yelp, stepping back, fruitlessly because your attacker is still laying on your shoulder. “Grim, ouch!” Blood holds itself unsteady in the puncture mark before one droplet slides down your cheek. You bat him off your shoulder. “That hurt.”

Grim lands gracefully in the space between you and the Headmaster. He turns around on two legs, neck craning to look up at you. His eyes are wishing wells of cerulean blue. You know what that sorrowful color means without his frowning eyebrows telling you his thoughts indirectly. “You’re not planning on going are you, (Name)?”

You are not a fantastic multitasker but you might just find yourself puking and crying. The wobble in his voice as if his emotions were an earthquake. How were you to explain what it was to yearn for family when Grim’s only family was … his only family was you.

“Gr-Gri,” your bottom lip trembles.

You find yourself unable to do anything but react to physical pain. Speaking meant acknowledging it. Ignoring Grim’s question, you look up at Crowley, past his lips to those glowing eyes. “Headmaster, I –” Your words pitifully stop there. No section of your mind can construct a sentence and you cannot even say Grim’s name fully.

You look at him with child-like vulnerability. Vulnerability seen in the eyes of kindergartens who are squeamish that the world has become big — the world offering more than just their four walled home — and thus look up at their teachers for guidance. Nervous without their parents around. Sevens, you are only nineteen.

You cannot lie; I want to see them again.

Perhaps the desperation in your eyes is prominent because Dire Crowley quickly amends, “Now, this is not without some wiggle-room. I am not an unreasonable person! According to the Magic Mirror, you have exactly a month before the carriage arrives. Plenty of time!

“Now, I have done my part in delivering the news,” Crowley says jovially. Jovially as if he has not turned your entire world on its head.

“Wai –”

You stutter. A hand is already pressed firmly on the small of your back. Your body shudders with a riptide of thoughts. Thinking about the conditions of how you will get home, thinking about asking for an extension, thinking about how unfair it all is. After Tsunotaro’s overblot, you managed to accept your place in Twisted Wonderland and one raindrop day causes all that to shift into a storm.

All the conditions of Crowley’s instruction fight in your head. Five talons on your back fight to move your catatonic body. You feel as elastic as rubber and as stone as granite. Somewhere far away, you think you hear Grim hiss. What are you going to tell Jade? And with that horrible thought, you allow yourself to be pushed out of the office.

You think you feel Grim crawl back up to your shoulder but you feel as if some supernatural force has kicked you into the back of the line, kicked you out of your mind.

“Now (Name), please remember the Dark Mirror says this event only lasts for four hours. Think of it like a solar eclipse; it is a change of elements allowing this method to work. The carriage will ride past the –'' The rest of Crowley’s words waterfall out his mouth like white static. There is a strange ringing in your ears. You think you might pass out.

“I’ll keep that in mind,” you wag your tongue, speaking words you will not remember tomorrow.

Crowley says something more but it is a breeze, wordless and untranslatable, before closing his door. You stare at the gradient of wood. There is an urge to knock on it again, worrying your memory is wrong and now is the first time you were called into Crowley’s office. But you know … how you know what reality this is. It feels like you left parts of your brain lobotomized and body amputated, lying beyond that gradient wood; missing parts of yourself.

You rub your cheek, a little blood gathering on your knuckle. Grim’s bite, you remember, bleeding as if you had dug into a pimple. “Huh? I.” Without fully gathering all the parts of yourself back up, you walk off after a breath of hesitation.

Grim hops off your shoulder as you two glide away. The physical burden of this situation is already a heavy weight on your shoulder, you do not need him adding to it. Observing that, Grim stays quiet on his two legs, keeping stride.

He feels his skin bubbling with questions. Your eyes are full of water refusing to fall. Will you two be returning to class or Ramshackle? You were called into Crowley’s office in the middle of Magic Analysis class. Would you really still have the fortitude to write up answers?

Your mind was swimming with something much more tantalizing than the differences of divination magic in users like the Fates to users like Jafar.

Grim watches you stop in the corridor. About two hallways away from Magic Analysis class. You stare ahead, blank and dollike; then, as if a horrid thought has passed into your mind, you move as fast as a scorpion.

For the briefest moment, horror is in your eyes. A tight, clenching hand flies up to your face, slapping itself over your mouth as if you are going to vomit or scream. You squeeze your eyes tightly together, doubling over at the hip. Nails dig (four on the left and one thumb on the right side) into your cheek, forceful enough to leave marks.

The pain is grounding.

Hyperventilating for no more than ten seconds, you suddenly straighten up, taking a deep breath. You put the thought away like a child pushing their shoes into a cubby. When you look down at Grim, your eyes are dry as his big blue eyes implore you to speak. Your body shakes slightly like you have goosebumps running up and down your skin.

“Henchman?”

“Tuna croquettes. What would you say if I made some tonight,” you give Grim an unsteady smile but your voice is magically even. “You’ll have to pull your weight and help me. It’s been a while since we cooked together, right?”

Heartslabyul is the first to know. Thus is the natural law of order.

There is probably an unconventional rule written down: lies can only be told on a Tuesday if the liar has prematurely prepared mealworms for the hedgehogs during noon … or … something eccentrically long like that. A rule only plausible for Heartslabyul standards. But you predicted, walking into Magic Analysis class yesterday, that Ace and Deuce were going to find out the truth first. Even if you were not prepared to tell them it.

The reveal was a far leap from graceful. Unplanned, your woes spilled out of Grim’s mouth, something about you not being there for finals. Sudden cobblestone hits your back. Wincing at the bite of the school wall, you wilt at the rapid fire of Ace and Deuce, not even getting space to speak, Ace starting:

“You only get a month! How long have you known!”

“Grim just told us you aren’t going to be here for finals, and he well – he!”

“He’s gotta be joking, right?”

“After Draconia’s overblot, I thought it was impossible to –”

“Prefect, I can not go through that again. I know I joke about sleeping forever. But those are jokes!”

“Ace! … But really how did Crowley and the Dark Mirror figure it out?”

“They haven’t contacted Briar Valley have they? Not even Crowley can be that suicidal.”

“I mean, I can totally understand if you want to go; we all have families but –”

“But you don’t want to go right, Prefect?”

“Ace, don’t just ask them that!”

“Oh shut it! Why shouldn’t I ask, you coward? No one else is gonna but us!”

“Wait, does anyone else know, (Name), besides Grim.”

“So no one else knows.” You nod. “Wait, when will you tell Jade?”

Never, a part of you thinks. Wanting to save yourself from the hurt, you judge wrongly that you can continue through this month without having to face Jade and tell him. You just want to avoid the pain. Cobblestone-made bruises hum on your shoulders, deep in reminder.

You did not even get to break the news in Ramshackle, away from prying eyes. When you finally got a word in edgewise, you were still pressed against the outdoor wall of Night Raven College. The walking crowd was gratefully small … yet you stayed anxious over the idea anyone else would find out. The college was a hunting ground for weakness and each dorm was not above spreading a rumor.

Your anger at Grim for revealing your predicament lasts only ten minutes. What good was fruitless anger when these might be your last days in Twisted Wonderland?

Eventually, the group of five in Heartslabyul come to know. If Ace and Deuce knew something, the information eventually falls like dominoes to Cater, Trey, and Riddle.

Even with two of the three away on their internship, the information was passed over. Your favorite cake appears glittering with magic residue on the porch of Ramshackle with a letter signed by Trey that leaves you shaking. Quotes on eternalism – specifically time’s finiteness – from books and poetry start to bloom on Cater’s Magicam stories, not enough to change his feed but enough to stir up suspicion, and you feel that pit in your stomach deepen.

Other than the five in Heartslabyul, you keep the predicament from everyone else. Tears welling up in Kalim’s eyes; disbelief writing itself on Ruggie’s face; the volume of Sebek’s concern mounting in your ears. You do not want to deal with any of it.

Jade … you do not want to even think of how that will blow over. Would you get tears? Most likely not. Would you be shouted at? No, you have not heard Jade really shout. Would his expression reveal his inner turmoil and disbelief? No, he is a master at schooling his expressions. So predictable yet not, you mourn, walking down the hallways to your next class.

When we are at the height of our most paranoid, we think that every conversation that we cannot hear is about us.

You reflect upon this philosophy as you walk. Whenever glancing or idle eyes fall upon you, you get this stabbing pain running itself through your spinal cord. Your heart spikes when you see Riddle interact with Silver in class, jumping to the obvious: they are talking about me. Lips move yet sounds are unheard; in response, your heart drums a solo of fortissimo fear.

About three-fourth through the day, you leave Grim who has been gluing himself to your side with Deuce. Citing that you are feeling unwell and need to go to the nurse. No one argues with your firm insistence that you do not need a guide.

Your feet carrying you to the Mostro Lounge is simply muscle memory. If you want to calm down, you go to Jade. Knowing his schedule too is all ingrained in you.

The host sits you in a booth pressed snuggly against the aquarium’s glass. Upon your request, he neglects to give you a menu or coaster. This one time you will not be dining. You know it will vex Azul, taking up space where a paying customer could be, but you will make him forgive you.

Underneath electric, pulsing blue lights, you sit like an egg in an incubator. Facing the stretching walls of a sixteen foot tall aquarium. Shielded and blanketed by cerulean and black shadows. Entirely still.

What are you going to do? More people will come to know – people you care for and would not like to be torn from. And they will try to gauge or guide your decision, perhaps do both at once. You abhor that idea. All you really want right now is someone to be your rock to latch to when there is a riptide around you, someone who will be calm in the stare of a calamity.

Questioning, your eyes trace the motions of a codfish. It is odd for one of them to be swimming off from the school. He swims on the very belly of the conjoined body the school has made, pressing the limits of harmony.

The yellow-olive codfish starts to break the formation completely. Curious thing. You wonder if it has a disease. Determined, the codfish swims to the bottom of the aquarium, tail dilating back and forth as it heads down. But if a fish has an illness, usually they float? Ah, you are no marine biologist so you can never tell.

Then, you finally spot what it wants. A mollusk resting against a rock formation, just shy of a fake shipwreck punched full of holes. The codfish descends down to it. Cold fingers go up to your lips, concealing a smile, effortlessly. Adopting his mannerisms, you think with a laugh. Ah … you really have been spending far too much time with Jade to the point where you mimic him.

You anticipate it this time. Sediment explodes in a puffing cloud. The codfish retreats almost comically. And, slowly like savoring his success, the moray eel slinks his head back through the cavern of the starboard, mollusk caught in his mouth.

“Chamomile tea. It is known to soothe even the most anxious of souls.”

To be honest, you would have expected that voice to be much closer. His chin hovering over your shoulder and teeth too close to your ear is typical. Turning to drink in the sight of him still in his waiter attire, you concede that you will have to get closer to him later.

You glance down at the ceramic, steam still rising from its watery mouth. “And you just happened to have it on hand?” It looks to be the perfect temperature too. The stream is not excessive or lacking.

“On hand, why of course. I anticipated you coming here today.”

You raise a brow.

“It actually belongs to Table 5.”

Smiling, you pick up the teacup. Warm ceramic nuzzles into your palms and you take a generous sip. Near you like a guiding presence, Jade watches with one hand over his heart and the other holding the tray behind his back. “Well, I say my soul is subsequently soothed now. Thank you.”

He bows, bent at the hip, like a chivalrous knight. “Now,” he says as he tucks the tray under his arm, pulling out his notepad, “I sure hope the scenery alone hasn’t brought you to us today. Would you like to order now or later?”

“Aw, why do I get on the clock Jade and not boyfriend Jade.”

“Because I am paid by the customer.”

“But aren’t I just priceless?”

“The special of the day is also priceless. Monkfish. Though I’m assuming lobster rolls sound more appetizing to you than monkfish piccata.”

You hear your stomach growl at the notion. You gasp when Jade’s pen starts to move across the paper. Leaning off the booth, you push at the side of his stomach, glaring playfully. “Hey, no writing! I’m here to freeload; don’t ruin that for me.”

Chuckling, Jade starts to lean down to you, teeth all on his display. He looks ready to bite at your lips, all mischievous and elevated that you will definitely bite back. Staring each other down, you startle suddenly at Jade’s next move. Quite quickly, Jade shoots back up, wincing with his gloved knuckle pressed under his nose.

“Jade?” You blink up at him as he furiously rubs the bridge of his nose. “Do you need a tissue?”

“No, I'm fine, my love.” He gives one last rub to his nose. “Felt a sneeze coming on.”

Looking at him unconvinced, you hum when Jade pushes your teacup of chamomile closer to you. Then, he grabs your right hand sweetly, squeezing it. Your eyes meet again. Sevens, you could fall into those eyes as easily as a suicidal man falls into a noose.

“Why don’t you drink some more and I’ll be back shortly with food for us?”

“Us? Aren’t you on the clock?”

“You’re stressed,” he states like he is noting that you are wearing a certain article of clothes. As if it is obvious. His thumb runs itself up and down the ladder of your tense knuckles. “It’s a little evident, dear.”

Panic writes itself on your face. “Is it really?”

“Hm, now it is.” Referring to the way your eyebrows clench and your voice whispers in fearful tones. A manipulative, proud smile crawls onto his face. “But I know your soul after all, so it is evident to me.”

Jade lets your hand go, making sure you rest it on the teacup. Urging you one last time to drink, he stalks off to get you both some food for an impromptu lunch together. You watch his back as he disappears into the kitchen, blue light raining down on him.

Sweet and mild dyed water runs down your throat, on a mission to relieve you of stress. When you have about half a cup left, you set it down, contemplating.

You were so grateful for Jade. If you were only friends with him, you would have told him about this first. Advice from a Leech with benevolent intentions is often the best advice. Even Floyd, who is very go with the flow, is so emotionally intelligent. And Jade … Jade would not pressure you to give his details about your misfortune but he would also not allow misfortune to ruin you. Refusing to intervene too early or too late. He is like that sacred rock in the riptide.

However, you and him are dating. That makes certain topics difficult to breach.

Chamomile tea still the ideal temperature, you stare back at your reflection in the liquid. They pull down their lips. Worry has gathered fast and voluminous in their eyes like ants crawling all across a dead mouse on the ground, coating the brown fur to a patchy, thick black. Sizing up a reflection, you reflect on previous conversation.

Chamomile tea. It is known to soothe even the most anxious of souls.

But I know your soul after all.

Souls. Soul.

Perhaps you can tell Jade what is going on, just without directly telling him.

The Ghost Camera is a bulky thing. All heavy brass, that precious metal silver, and nickel. It almost tumbled out of your hands and into water during Camp Vargas; you could only imagine the speed it would have sunk at if Floyd had shorter arms. Eventually, you stop carrying it daily after your first year. Yet, you refuse to part from it entirely, still taking photos when you have it on you.

Perhaps it is an effect of being born in the very early 2000s but you adore having photo albums. Your parents had ten of you alone, separate from your siblings, and half of your childhood on camcorder films. It is in your DNA to keep memories.

Or Memories as the fragments are called.

Though, you sympathize with Grim that a whole room of photo albums might be extensive. But you have a whole house to yourself! And Sam sold you photo album books at a very cheap price because no one at a college wants to have physical reminders of being at college.

And how they could become physical reminders.

There is no system for the room crammed with albums. You do not have not enough time to delegate a day to organize each album by person, dorm, or month. So, letting fate guide you, you pick up three books, cradle them in your arms, and announce to an unimpressed cover, “Okay, let’s do this.”

The Ghost Camera is unique. Takes ordinary, unsuspecting photos then does a full 180 by being enchanted with magic.

When the user photographs a subject, it photographs a part of their soul along with the physical form. Memories are those soul fragments. If a soulbond between user and subject comes to be, it allows Memories to move across the surface like twenty second animated clips. If a soulbond between user and subject deepens, Memories can slip out of the photograph and take on corporal forms.

One night you dreamt of chasing a rabbit and woke to Ace, who had slipped out of the photo, standing over your bed. How you screamed. Until he floated silently back into the photo you had on your nightstand.

Once, a fake Floyd had tried to juggle three glasses of spice in your kitchen before one had fallen through his flickering, tangible then not-tangible hand. Then, the Memory had the nerve to melt away, leaving you with three broken spice jars.

Malleus had once strolled down the hallways of Ramshackle, mumbling over the decorations you hang onto walls of a once abandoned building, before sliding down a hallway, never to be seen from again that day.

The only way you can feel a Memory from the real person is the lack of warmth. It is like stepping out of a toasty car at the peak of winter. Memories carry along with them an icy breeze, unable to be fully human.

Grim is in bed asleep, warm, and you really only have time to do this now. Walking down to the lobby, you slide your hand over the spine of the albums. If you can ask whoever is in here for their advice, you never have to reveal the situation until you are at the ready.

A dodge on your part but who readily jumps into despair?

You collapse on the couch. With the weight of the albums in hand, a horrid thought passes in your mind. Cinderella’s stepsisters and the glass slippers.

Cinderella’s stepsisters, you will always be like them. You will have to slice off your heel and toes — as if you are carving into an apple or slicing down into a row of carrots — to fit into the glass slipper of Twisted Wonderland. Of Sage’s Island. Of the Coral Sea and Queendom of Roses, if you ever visit. You walk magicless in a world of magic, limping while blood soaks the inside of your crystal heels.

The thing about mushrooms is that you cannot just plant one into a terrarium.

Originally, you were under the assumption that it was like moving flowers from bed to bed. Jade cleared up the misinformation for you. You could not grab a full-bodied mushroom, that had already lived a life outdoors, and stick it into a terrarium. Full-bodied mushrooms would come to reject the ecosystem. The key to get them to stay? The key was to get the mycelium into the ecosystem; without the support system underneath the soil, the mushroom would wither and leave in a few days.

As you rummage around in the bucket from your recent Sunday date with Jade, you know there is little you can do. Some would take and others would not. Shifting, latex-covered fingers stir through the rather common mushrooms, passing over maybe only two or three rare ones.

Apparently, the one you tried to pluck off the cliffside six days ago was poisonous to the touch. Not enough to be fatal but you would have gotten a nasty itch coating itself over your hand. Even with the latex on, you avoid touching it. Jade’s hand is still a pinkish-red after all.

Stupid Jade, you think fondly on the protective eel and take a mushroom out of the bucket.

Terrariums are beautiful but mushrooms are rather fleeting. As you start to crumple up the gold-hued chanterelle mushroom in hand, you reflect upon the matter. Take for example the terrarium tank you are working on currently in Jade’s dorm. He has three on his bed-side shelf: one cylinder, one spherical, and one square. The one you laid on his desk is the spherical one.

This one terrarium has housed pholiota adiposa, then albino pleurotus ostreatus, and now gomphus clavatus mushrooms (known as pig ears), and has probably housed more before you even knew Jade.

Mushrooms are decaying plants. It is nearly impossible to curate an enclosure that can house a certain fungi all year round. After a while, Jade simply scraped all that death up in his hand, threw it into the compost bin of the botanical gardens, and departed from it.

A part of you would never understand how Jade could deal with it. All that hard work only for it to naturally wither and go. You suppose he dealt with it because he adored change. Who would have thought? The always-in-control Jade Leech actually enjoys seeing things shift and change. You understood his love of a challenge though. His unfinished magnum opus was a terrarium breaking the laws of nature, trying to get nine species of mushrooms that mimicked a coral reef in one single environment.

“Each species of fungi have different growing conditions that they favor, so it is impossible for me to recreate all of these in the same ecosystem,” he once said.

“So why even try?”

“I think it is most enjoyable and eye-opening to covet after the impossible.”

He then looked at you like you were a meal, speaking double meanings with a honeyed tongue. Scandalous yet not, so you could never accuse him of being scandalous at any moment. Ah … even the memories of Jade could make your face feel warm.

Distracting yourself, you start to add little bites of the gold-hued fungi in hand, tucking them under the moss and placing them on the tree bark.

Jade’s unfinished magnum opus involved this glasshouse– the pig ears, gomphus mushrooms. Gomphus mushrooms could not be successfully cultivated as they are mycorrhizal, meaning they form a special relationship with their host plant. Two of the nine species he was working with for his coral reef terrarium were mycorrhizal, pig ears and indigo milky. And Jade finally got a mycorrhizal species of mushroom to sustain itself in an ecosystem made of glass. Proving the impossible was possible. A smile reaches your features, feeding more of the common mushroom in the terrarium so the pig ears could feast.

Though that one project was going to have a long way to go, you had faith Jade would be able to complete it, despite the ecosystem and biology of fungi fighting against him. Would you be there to share in that victory? You dip your hand back into the bucket, ignoring the squirming of your stomach.

The door clicks open.

You look up to be greeted with the sight of teal hair and spindly limbs reaching up to six feet and one inch. Tongue already forming around the ‘J’, you stop suddenly. One then two Dunhill shoes – costing more than you will ever keep in a month’s pay – are kicked across the pale lilac floor. You watch cap-toe shoes sumersault and tumble.

As he falls into bed with a groan, you greet, “Hi Floyd.”

“Shrimpy!” You blink in surprise as the exhaustion seemingly disappears out of Floyd. He props himself on his elbow, legs shuffling a bit further up the bed, and a predator’s smile pulls on his lips. Energetic at the sight of his twin’s significant other.

“Was wonderin’ why my bed was so neat,'' Floyd hums … and oh, he must still be exhausted, you observe. Lying back down in the bed you cleared of candy wrappers and sheets you straightened, Floyd slightly props his head up with his crossed elbows and a pillow so he can keep talking to you. “What ya doin’ here?”

“Just helping Jade with his terrariums. I wanted to repay him for the chamomile tea.”

“Shrimpy’s so sappy.”

“Hey, I just adopted the Octavinelle values. Can’t be walking around with a debt. Got to keep us on an even playing field.”

“Mmm … which ones?”

“The pig ears. They’re so volatile. I’m worried if they’re going to stay or not.”

“Is that what has Shrimpy so stressed?”

“Hm? I wouldn’t say stressed. Just trying to figure out how I should handle them.”

You pick another mushroom out of the bucket. Gomphus mushrooms were so sensitive. Cousin to chanterelles mushrooms, you could safely add the gold mushroom in – as you had just done. Looking down at the mushroom you now hold, you consider if it would be safe fertilizer for the pig ears. You do not want to jeopardize the delicate balance.

Under Floyd’s watchful eyes, you put the mushroom you picked up back into the bucket. You start to rummage again before the eel’s words interrupt your work. “So what’s got ya so stressed?”

Not catching his drift, you say, “Nothing? I’m not too stressed right now.” It is a true statement. Your body feels entirely at ease, just measuring how you can help here and there with the terrariums. You cap the glass enclosure with the glass cover. If Floyd wants to sleep, you should not impose.

“Ya smell stressed.”

“You’re a real gentleman, you know that, Floyd?”

Ah, that old reliable nose of an eel. Hiding a playful smirk, you sing, “Well, I’ll get out your hair so my musk doesn’t ruin your sleep. I was just about done with everything anyways. I think Jade’s going to use the rest of the mushrooms from our hunt to cook something.”

“I’m serious. Ya stunk ever since Tuesday and ya stunk real bad on Friday,” Floyd says in a low tone, eyes glued to your back. “Kinda still smells now too. Not as bad but still.”

You are glad you get the terrarium down safely on Jade’s bed-side shelf because your hands shake at Floyd’s words. Ah, that vexingly reliable nose of an eel. Trust their olfactory system to even pick up the stench of tension like a dog picking up frequencies unheard. You sit back down on Jade’s bed, spine facing Floyd.

“Just school stuff. Crewel’s been on my ass about a test. I need to get mine and Grim’s shared grade back up in Animal Languages. Things like that.”

You can lie successfully with your body, keeping it from tensing in betrayal. You can lie successfully with your vocal cords, keeping them even and precise. However, you found you can never lie eye-to-eye with Floyd. It did not matter whether the golden eye was on the left or right. Somehow that flaming, glittering sun burns you to the core and figures out the undeniable, obsidian truth.

Already, you are mapping the escape route. Just a quick spin off Jade’s bed, grab your phone from his desk, and exit out the door. Avoid his eyes at all cost as if is a predator, and that he is. Moving off the bed, you say, “Like I said, I’ll leave so my musk doesn’t –”

“(Name).”

Your eyes snap up; a gasp is pinched tight in your mouth. Floyd challenges you back with his luminesce eyes. Bristling a hissy cat, the back of your thighs hit Jade’s mattress and you whine, “I hate when you two do that!”

Floyd laughs. He laughs in his normal, nasally drawl instead of the deep, sinister tone that Jade has. As Floyd takes pleasure in your surprise at his perfect impersonation of his twin, you refuse to look at him. The gloating jerk. In a rush, you grab your phone just as Floyd starts to speak, “Ya always fall for it, Shrimpy. It’s cute.”

“Yeah, whatever.”

“Ya stressed around Jade?”

“No.”

“Really? Ya reek right now. All stressed out after hearin’ ‘Jade’ speak. Smells like wet dog and cigarette smoke.”

“I’m not stressed,” you argue, flipping on your phone to check the time. Above Jade’s head, white numbers stare back at you, 4:43, and you watch it change to the next minute with a scowl. The screen goes black; angelic numbers and the photo of Jade leaning over Ramshackle’s oven, cooking a meal for your one year anniversary, disappear. “Look, I’ll –”

The words die in your throat when you and Floyd lock eyes. He knows I’m scared but just not of what. You cannot blame Floyd with the way his mismatched eyes narrow, little squinting fireballs of suspicion. He is only looking after his twin.

“I just need a little time before I can tell him, okay?”

“Kay, Shrimpy.”

Glance around the bedroom; check that you got everything in hand. You lock eyes with yourself, heart agonizing in your chest like a clawed talon has made it its footstool. Your happier, lighter face smiles back at your crinkled expression. Frozen in mirth. Stuck in a moment of easy breathing and thoughts. The photograph on the desk of you and Jade taken from the Ghost Camera. Only one of you looks at the lenses and the other stares down at the person pulling them into the surprise photo.

Uneasy thoughts fill your head. This is the photograph Jade wakes up to every morning. He had even cut Azul and Floyd off the edges of the polaroid, chuckling evilly when Floyd gapped and Azul sneered, instead of just folding them off the edges. Always wanting to get a reaction.

Would the facsimile of your soul one day be all that was left for Jade to keep? A photo that might fleetingly speak the words of your heart to him. You imagine it with a wince: Jade talking to a facsimile of you, empty of your warmth, but still there. Staying when you would not.

I don’t want that for him. I don’t want that for me!

I want to see them again.

Gomphus mushrooms. School assignments. The dinner you have to cook. Whatever lingers in your brain, you try to focus on it to distract yourself from the conflicting yearnings of your soul. Eventually, you will come to tell Jade. It might be procrastinated upon already, but better late than never. When you left the Leech twins shared bedroom, you did not realize how right you were. Eventually, you did come to tell Jade. You told him that very night, at 2:13 A.M., on the porch of Ramshackle.

You have not been sleeping well since Crowley broke the news to you. Everyone knows this. The concern is clearly written in Ace and Deuce’s faces when you two have classes and lunch together. Epel gives you the caffeine and Vitamin C eye-roller that he never used his first year. Sebek and Jack take to allowing their large hands to be the barrier between your cheek and a cold desk that might startle you awake.

Crawling out of bed, swollen eyebags aching like a bruise, careful to let Grim sleep, this is normal now.

Stumbling feet successfully walk themselves down spiraling stairs. One foot by one foot. Out of the corner of your lidded eyes, ghosts move like the undulating waves of a storm, pellucid bodies pulsing without a heartbeat. Sweat rolls down your neck, soaking into the nook of your collarbone. You miss the last step, bump hard into the wall, and that is all it takes. You start crying.

Uncertain of why you are down on the first floor instead of the second, you cry and cry, confused. When did you get out of bed? Your only answer is the raspy noise your mouth exhales. The loose t-shirt that is three sizes bigger than yourself is constricting and choking you.

The waterfall on your face continues steady even when the warm breeze of spring-turning-summer fights against it. You would take in a deep breath of fresh air if each breath you did take did not feel like drowning. Engine lungs refuse to start smoothly, instead churning with gasps and coughs of water.

I want my Momma. I want my Jade. I want my Dad.

Your butt falls heavy on the steps of Ramshackle, knowing there is no one coming for you. There will no longer be any hortative, glowing green fireflies coming to save you tonight. You sit there, presuming you will fall asleep from the exhaustion of weeping.

You feel like you are on a boat. A boat in the middle of a snow-globe. Turning and turning is fruitless because the sight is never changing eternalness: blue waves and a lighter blue sky. Color that cuts into sadness. Color that swallows. You can pirouette, jump, do handstands, but the sight remains. Blue on blue. On a boat that you do not even attempt to steer because there is no direction you want to go in.

Your mother once said she was so in love with your father that she knew he was the one because she would put him above her parents. Never getting enough of each other. Time spent with him was just better than time spent without. Better than being with her own parents.

That is love; when you find your person, you put them above everything else.

The iron gate to Ramshackle creaks.

You would like to say you watch Jade Leech climb up the cobblestone path to Ramshackle, thinking about the definition of love, but you cannot see past your tears. All you see is an emulsified blur of black, teal, and dark green water. Furious hands whip at your face. Eyes red and face warm, you look up. He is still a haze of skin, hair, and clothes sliced into little horizontal lines of color.

“Ja-Jade?”

“Pardon me if it sounds odd … but I heard you crying in my dorm. Of course, you weren’t there. But it still made me anxious so I decided to check.”

You sniff, scrubbing your eyes harshly to clear them.

“And here, I do find you crying in the exact same volume and manner.”

“Sorry. I —”

“Nonsense. You need not apologize for your tender disposition.”

“Sorry,” you say again. You drop your head at Jade’s exaggerated look. The exaggerated look on his face is only a squinting of his eyes. However, you can decipher and tell the differences between the twenty eye-squints Jade Leech can make.

You keep wiping away tears as Jade sits down by you on the porch. Vision clear, you smile at the rare sight of Jade in his pajamas. Oh, those are the fleece pants you bought him with a blue flannel pattern. A bit comforted by that, you lean into him as he rests an arm upon your shoulder.

“If my own disposition is not seen as rude, what is troubling you? You are not known for being so out of sorts. Crying is one thing, crying outside Ramshackle at 2 o’clock is another.”

“Do you think I smell?”

The smile grows a bit on your face as Jade quickly tries to submerge a laugh with his hand.

“Sorry, that was ah, a bit unexpected.”

“Heh, I know.”

“But?”

“Floyd made a comment early. I smell like stress.”

“Well, I would be lying if I said I hadn’t noticed too.”

“I think I could tell when you pull back from that kiss all the sudden. The sneeze excuse wasn’t very convincing.”

“Come now, I am an excellent actor.”

“Not around me.” You warm up when Jade trails his hand up and down your arm. Not around me. I can always read what is on your mind, Jade.

“Ah and there goes my dreams of being the first eel-mer movie star. Why are you so cruel, my love? Crushing a poor eel’s dreams?”

“Ah, my apologies,” you say remorselessly. Playful, your hand falls into Jade’s hand. You take to drawing swirls and seashells into the rough, warm center of his palm. Above, a few droplets of water start to sprinkle out of the sky. A slight change in the weather as you start to draw more seriously.

“Thank you.” He plants a kiss on the crown of your head. It settles on you like a flower petal, soft. “Now, would you like to tell me what has made you so incredibly stressed? I can be very patient, forewarning.”

“When you graduate, where do you want to live, land or sea?” You watch three droplets hit Jade’s hand, feeling a few pepper themselves on your shoulders and back. You take one droplet and smooth it out into the image of a starfish. That is not what you wanted to come out of your mouth. However, the chronic worry you have had about graduation slides out of your mind easily.

In the dust of rain, you listen to Jade’s answer. “If I were to choose … between land or sea … why that certain is a weighty question. And to think you have been all alone in your musing about it. How sobering, I cannot even imagine such a barnacle of a thought.”

“You’re stalling.”

“Hah, I can never keep things hidden from you, can I? Let me think.” He cannot draw up an arm to his chin but he definitely has that same contemplative look on his face. As rain kisses his crown, he slowly says, “Both land and sea come with advantages. Though I have only known land for three years, it has gifted me with wonderful consequences that I have never thought I of all merfolk would know.”

“I’m a consequence?”

“Quite. My favorite consequence,” Jade replies tenderly. “The sea can be seen as inhospitable to visitors. I happen to enjoy the cold and dark where others do not. I suppose I would have to measure the decision through memories. Am I fonder of the memories of my childhood or am I fonder of the memories of my education?

“I still have the chance to cultivate and reap the benefits of my education, unlike my childhood which is long gone. But, in the end, I would want both land and sea. And somehow, I would find a way to make that possible, no matter ecosystemic limits.”

You wilt as the rain starts to grow more constant. A few twenty or so dots of water are not gathered on Jade’s palm. Taking the abundance of paint, you draw the face of an eel with the water. “But it would matter: the consequences and the people you could possibly leave behind.”

“Your worry is about whether I would stay with you or my family?” You cannot nod because that is selfish of you, pushing your dilemma onto your boyfriend. Jade can tell what exactly the root of your stress is even as you draw. Leaning to be heard better over the rain, he says, “I would never leave you, (Name).”

“Crowley found a way to send me home.”

Jade tenses up. You wilt when the canvas of his hand suddenly changes , hand gripping your hand in a tight, binding hold.

“Pardon?”

“Crowley, he found a way to send me back to my home. I–” The clouds of your eyes grow heavy. “I don’t know what to do, Jade.”

Holding hands, you look up, hoping the answer can be found on Jade’s face. He is the decision maker in the relationship, picking the food you eat, offering advice on homework; Jade always has this way of knowing how to solve anything. His expression; you need to see so it can guide you.

Oh.

Oh. That is not good.

Profile stone and staring off into the dark beyond Ramshackle, Jade is unreadable to you. You wilt a third time.

“Cater’s been talking about getting Kalim to throw one huge going away party. I told him you would really enjoy it if the Pop Music Club played Supertramp’s Goodbye Stranger during it.”

That sentence gets you to stop cutting the strawberries. Jaw dropping, you turn towards Trey’s villainous smirk as he pretends to innocently pipe frosting on the second cake. Only his profile faces you, acting arrogant to your mortification. “You … absolutely did not.” The response you get is the crinkle of Trey’s cheek as he tries to push down his smile.

You whack him, taking vindictive joy in the icing that runs down the side of the mousse cake, and shout, “You jerk!”

“Hey, I just think the Ramshackle Prefect should go out with something memorable.”

“Isn’t being magicless enough?”

Trey takes to fixing the frosting as he replies, “You know Cater won’t do something so big without permission. He might just livestream all of it.” He picks back up the icing bag to resume and cover up the slight imperfection. “Would a party really be so bad?”

“Goodbye parties defeat the whole purpose of the word party,” you grumble. One by one, you plant the scales of cut strawberries on top of the strawberry tart. They extend out in the space of a lotus. “I’d be covered in tears and snot by the end of it. Ugh.”

“Hm, I suppose I see what you mean.”

Trey and Cater, after being alerted of the news with your permission, manage to return to Night Raven College from their internships for the weekend. The use of magic makes it easy for them to travel in quickly, popping by for an unbirthday party.

Currently, you and Trey prepare the strawberry tarts (as is customary for unbirthday parties) and a chocolate mousse cake (as is customary for you to enjoy). Riddle has meticulously plotted out each faucet of this unbirthday party. Nostalgically, he reminds you a lot like his old tryantical self, barking orders as his stress rockets, meticulous to give you the perfect unbirthday party. When asking where you were wanted, Trey happily scoops you up before anyone else can.

Playing catchup, you and Trey talk about a wide variety: how his internship is going, new recipes or meals you two have been introduced to or learned, the shenanigans of Ace and Deuce that Trey missed, and how your shared friend Jade Leech is doing.

To be frank, you enjoy Trey’s company a lot. Despite being a graduate of NRC, he makes you feel the closest to home. Normalcy. He expels this aura of normalcy that is absent from the rest of the student body. Pearly white, non-serrated teeth smile at you. Regular brown eyes shimmer behind his glasses. Within his presence, it is easy to masquerade around with the facade that NRC is a quotidian college. Protected by the walls of the kitchen, you can forget about the flamingos being used as croquet mallets and the magic pens waving through the air.

You are kicked from this fantasy comfort when Trey asks you for a favor. As Grim happily slurps up the leftover frosting from the plastic bag, a question is posed. “Can you do me a favor and grab the chocolate sprinkles?”

“Ah, of course.” Back on the paper plate goes your knife and quarter sliced strawberry.

You turn to where the shaker of chocolate sprinkles lies. Ah, unfortunately it is on a pretty high up shelf. No matter, you stretch out your body and reach. Fingers only scrap the glass surface. You move to your tiptoes, stomach pinched by the countertop.

“Don’t worry, Henchman! I got it!” On stubby legs, Grim stands up from his spot on the counter. He squints at the cabinet overhead and stands on his tiptoes too. He makes it about halfway less than your reach. Ribs pressing into Grim’s fur, you stretch out like an uncoiling snake.

You watch your finger slide down the glass. So close. You stretch when the sprinkles container suddenly starts to move. Putting your hands in front of your face in the shape of a triangle, you instantly coil back into a tight position and squeeze your eyes close. The impact never comes.

A wary eye opens and watches as the red glow of Trey’s pen and the sprinkled shaker that floats over the mousse cake. No matter how much you pretend, no matter how many times you stumble into your boring Wonderland, hoping all the magic is gone, it always comes back to catch you by surprise. Normalcy … you cannot get that back unless you go home.

Trey notices how eerily silent you are as you go about cutting up strawberries and hanging some of the banged up fruit to Grim. There is only one mousse cake but plenty of tarts waiting to be served in the kitchen. Well, it can’t hurt. “Here. For you.” You blink as two empty plates are put in front of you. “The piece of cake, or tart, typically goes to the Housewarden. However, I doubt Riddle will be too mad at this development.”

“Only been gone from Heartslabyul one semester and you’re already breaking rules,” you gasp with fake terror.

He simply puts a finger to his lips, eyes shining under his glasses. Trained, he empties a slice from each sweet with deadly, applause-worthy accuracy. Two confectioneries are put on the plates in front of you. As calm as an executioner, you stare at the two slices: a tart with scales of strawberries running across it and a cake with layers of mousse and bread laddering across it.

And you suddenly know this is something deeper than just picking which treat you want to eat. Ah, Trey Clover is a Night Raven graduate after all.

Under watchful amber eyes, you pick up your fork.

“Ha greedy, aren’t you?”

You admonish Trey for his teasing comment. Balancing the two sweets on a fumbling fork, you take the biggest bite of the overlap. Chocolate stains your lips. Despite that, it is the strawberry tart that you taste first.

“Aren’t I the unbirthday girl/boy? I get to be greedy!” You grin like Grim does and stab back into the confectioneries. Your fork picks off a bit of the mousse then moves to scoop off a bit of the tart before returning to your mouth. So what if you are greedy for wanting both? You can make a Wonderland for yourself.

Right?

A week and a half left. A week and a half passed. Time falls on a perfectly split down the middle day. Wednesday, the day Mountain Lovers club meetings fall on.

As time marches on, voices become more vocal about wanting you to stay. The Unbirthday party had gone swimmingly with a few rough waves. You sympathize with it. Yet you feel you have to be so careful when conversing about it, any wrong word might cause anyone to jump to a conclusion. So, with the loss of sleep, you are also talking less.

You wonder if everyone takes your silence as a sign you have made the definite answer.

Not everyone though. Jade Leech. Jade is the only one not acting erratically. When no filter Ace had asked him to agree with them he wanted you to stay, the eel-mer had only put a hand on your shoulder, picking you up after the Unbirthday party, and said, “Why that is not in my expertise to answer. I’m afraid that I would have to vote for a no comment statement.”

Calm, level-headed Jade. Calculating Jade. How you adore that detached yet sly nature of his. He is the sight of land after days of aimless traveling blue waters. He is chamomile tea on a sleepless night. He is a neat white pill of xanax.

And today, you are blessed to bask in that tranquil presence after school. Waiting to be received after knocking on his dorm door, you think upon it. No interrogation. No stress. Just you and him, hunting and sketching mushrooms. You even picked up a new set of charcoal pencils at Sam’s Shop for today. You light up when the dorm door opens.

“Ja – oh, hi Floyd.”

Something has set off Floyd. It is evident in the deep scowl cutting itself on his face. His discord eyes are dull. His posture is slouching like a deflating house made of bad wood. When you spoke, you even saw his hand twitch into a fist. Instead of attacking, Floyd blinks down at you and sighs out, “Sorry Shrimpy.”

Your grip on your bag tightens. “Um, why are you apolog –”

“Hello (Name).”

A little of that happy fire comes back to your soul. Smiling, you look behind Floyd to see Jade dressed in his pair of cargo pants and lightweight thermal henley. Foraging bag slung over his shoulder, he is like a breath of fresh air, the normalcy that sweats from him. “Hi honey,” your smile is innocent.

You only notice it for a brief flicker of time: a nasty glare directed from olive and gold eyes to mirroring gold and olive eyes, so hateful that your heart pats in worry that you might witness a fight between them. Then the loathing bleeds out of Floyd. He nudges you out the way, stomping down into Octavinelle’s halls.

“I’ma go. Can’t stomach watchin’ this.” Words that depart with Floyd.

“Jade?”

“What are you doing here, (Name)?”

Your stomach drops. “I - uh,” your neck is growing foolishly warm, you have not heard Jade speak so monotone in a while “, well, today is Wednesday and so I came to – uh.”

“Did my lack of response not clearly indicate that I would not be needing you for this hike?”

Further and further, your stomach sinks. You know what he is referencing, the single text you sent about thirty minutes ago: Did you want me to bring anything for tonight? It was just a quick check-up on your part. It is unlike Jade to take more than ten minutes to respond to you.

“I just thought you were busy.”

“No. I was trying to indicate that I would not need you on this particular night.”

“But … but this is our thing.”

Much like Floyd, Jade nudges you on the way. You stumble, staring at the expanse of his shoulders and back. He refuses to turn around, “Yes, but if I am to be alone in the Mountain Lovers club for the rest of my third year, then I should slowly wane off your company. A rational decision, yes?”

A hairline fracture snakes itself up your heart. Splatting, your stomach lands on the ground. Jade will not turn around to look at you. You look down your own foraging bag where those new, suddenly silly charcoal pencils lie.

“Um, yeah, that does actually make a lot of sense.”

“I will see you tomorrow though. So don’t fret so much.”

“I’m not fretting.”

“I know you won’t. That’s what I admire about you.”

And then, he leaves, back still a wall facing you. Perhaps you do not adore that detached yet sly nature of Jade’s in its entirety.

It is only natural that things decay. Jade knows that. Observed it happen with mushrooms a hundred plus times. Brown rot, soft rot, white rot. The fear of rot gives way to the fear of death. Death: that final departure. He wonders if when you inevitably step through into the carriage, ebon stallions with steely gray eyes as cold as the Grim Reaper’s scythe carting you away forever, if it will be like death or decay.

Jade knows you will not stay. Who would? So he is going to do better by you right now, be kinder and more unaffected, after tonight. He just needs this solitude for a few hours.

Memories of his twin’s face are dancing in Jade’s mind when he really wants to be focusing on you. It cannot be helped. They fought physically before, but never departed from one another still needing to fight. They would have fought. They should have fought. It was only the knowledge that you were arriving in fifteen minutes that kept them shouting at each other.

Floyd thought Jade was doing wrong by you.

Jade told Floyd to stay the fuck out of his relationship.

“Dad always said you were the fuckin’ coward of the family.”

Jade should have thrown a punch there. Walking down the hiking trail, he feels the knot of nails into palms. Easily falling back into the therapy of forming fists, Jade relocates his hands to the strap of his bag. Not yet. He cannot get destructive yet.

“You’re not gonna even fight for them!”

No. Jade was not because he knew your soul. It would only be natural for you to return home. It would only be natural for him to return to the sea. It is only natural for things to decay, Jade reminds himself as he finally makes it deep enough into the thicket of Sage Island’s forest.

Not this though. I wanted this to stay.

“Nothing to be done except support them.”

Jade says this to a peculiar looking tree as he removes the forage bag off his shoulder. He deposits it down by a peculiar looking rock. He is a master of nature but it is better to have landmarks for his belongings. Rolling up the sleeve of his thermal henley, the skeletal eel tail and filigrane ends of the waves tattooed on his left side peek shy from the rolled cotton.

“Nothing to be done.” He finalizes the word with a nod. Then, he breaks off the path into a brisk jog.

Jade has gotten much better with the usage of legs since freshman year. Experience conducts improvement. None of them had quite taken to it fluidly. Jade can still remember when he tried stairs for the first time, shaking like a lamb, yet still finding the ability to laugh smoothly when Floyd fell down them. Though Floyd had laughed even harder at Jade when he experienced his first calf cramp, thinking he had been shot. Thank the Sevens most of their blunders had been in training camp, away from ill-intent eyes.

I hate fighting with my brother, Jade thinks as he moves slightly to the right to avoid a rock too big to jump over. He keeps pumping his arms and jogging.

Fighting is natural for moray eels. You have to fight in the Coral Sea to keep what you covet. It is not like Jade is lacking that urge to change the situation and make you stay. But this situation? It is too close to resembling a scenario where a person quits a job for the sake of their wife’s promotion; or someone changes their dream college to settle with the one their boyfriend is choosing to attend.

This is something I cannot put up a fuss about. Jade passes a blackberry bush and tries to stomp out the memories that come with it.

Your excited face — hand-feeding him some berries — laughing as you gather them up — pouring them into a muffin tin — a sweet and tart memory

You have to do what is right for you, not him, not Grim, not anybody else. He should not infer or try to influence you this upcoming week and half. Jade takes a meaningless right turn, trying to get lost deeper in the woods.

Yet as he falls deeper into the thicket of trees, spores, rocks, and leaves, he finds memories returning to him:

The smell of you, distinctive like red to a bull, swimming in the college hallways or in Mostro Lounge.

The look of pride on your face when you find yourself able to read his true intentions better than all but two of the student body.

The feel of the first time Grim chose his lap over yours, a reluctant purr vibrating against the cotton of his gloves.

The sound of you shuffling morning sheets and the sensation of the kisses you press to his face to arouse him from sleep.

Your smiling voice left like a voicemail —

— That happy world tumbles down upon Jade like a Jenga tower, suddenly unreachable, as he too tumbles. A loose tree root snags his foot; ground flies towards him. Barely expecting it, Jade gasps as cold and wet hits his face.

Mud. Mud from the previous days’ rain presses itself to his face, soaking into his cuts and unraveled hair. Throat undulating, Jade starts to spit back the wet dirt he had taken from the earth. The crust of sediment coats his lips like a cosmetic. He watches brown saliva bubble under him.

Jade’s hands embrace the ground as he positions himself up on all fours. He watches his hand. Cold blue of his veins like the tassels of a jellyfish. Red-pink heat of his knuckles and palm bed. Contrast to the pale calcite-like bloodlessness of his skin. All of his skin ill-fitting. Pale dough splitting apart in gaping ovulate mouths. Himself. Splitting apart down to the last atom.

I – I – I –

He can barely feel his frozen body move as he lifts up one fist. Mud-stained teeth grit. His fist flies in a frenzy. Two, five, seven, eleven, twelve, fifteen. Moving like an electric chisel, Jade punches and punches and punches into the ground until a tiny crater is left into the earth where he fell.

It is not enough and Jade knows it. He pulls his hand back, chocolate-dipped with mud and leaking from the new wounds a rock had given him, as he sits on his haunches.

Both of his hands go up to his face, covering off where open mouth breathes flicker out of him. It is not enough.

As if he was kicked into the back of line; as if he has lost his mind; Jade jumps up with a spark, turns towards the nearest tree, and punches it. Pain splits down his arm like lightning and it feels calming. Now, red is flowing in equal measure with the brown. He wants to do it again. He wants to fight until his fiery soul is extinguished.

People think him so different from his twin. Floyd and Jade are the same; both yearn for a good fight now and then. Jade simply hides just a small percentage better than his brother, under a sheep’s skin like an ill-fitting and tearing apart in oval holes.

There is no need to wear that soft suit when he is alone, in a far off corner of Sage’s Island that no one is going to be at this hour.

Jade goes through the motions of his emotions, all of them rocking him as violently as Charybdis’s whirlpool. His fist falls like a meteor into tree bark. Hair is pulled and yanked, just to give him the satisfaction of pain. The ground stirs at the violence of his long legs. Finds a rock, kicks it. Finds a bigger rock, kicks it harder. Trying to break one of his toes.

His hand flows through wet leaves and mud, grabbing a stray branch. Jade turns towards a different tree. “FUCKING SHIT!” Slices his branch down like a claymore, a hum of satisfaction blooms up as the thick twig breaks into an explosion of wooden chunks with a deafening crack.

“FUUUCKAAAARRRGGG!” He shouts back at the answering wilderness, two inhuman sets of teeth on display. A vein in his neck strains with the pressure of his harrowing, soul-tearing screams.

When Jade returns to his dorm, covered in mud and blood, he finds Floyd asleep. It seems his twin found his own way to relieve himself from the cliffhanger urge to fight. Jade mourns that because he has not. His own energy and need to fight seems as vast as the ocean in his anxiety of losing you.

He wants you to stay.

“He wants me to leave. I can see it in his face. He wants me out of his life, and this is the ideal situation to do it without directly saying it. Agh, he is such a coward at times. And what’s worse! Is that he keeps acting like nothing is wrong. He took the hike alone and came back like nothing was wrong. Same old Jade. Not a word of the situation. Oh God, what if he does want me to leave,” you lament, shaking.

A tissue box is nudged closer to you. You stir, looking up from the hands you had shelled up your crying face into. With a sniff, you grab a tissue, “Thank you.” You blow your nose and settle back into the loveseat.

Kleenex clutched tightly in hand, you continue speaking a voice clogged with tears, “You know, I’ve been wondering why Jade won’t let me in. He obviously has an opinion on the situation yet he isn’t saying it. So then, I start thinking he is being petty because I didn’t come to him about the situation first. Like maybe he thinks I don’t trust him with that information. But it was so hard to talk to him about because he’s my boyfriend. And I just want to talk now but I’m so scared about what he will say.

“I could always read him before. I just somehow knew what he was thinking at times. Now, I feel like he’s a jigsaw puzzle missing a piece yet I don’t even know what the picture is of anymore.”

You hesitate and pass the moment by blowing your nose again. “Honestly, I feel like that too.” With teary eyes, you look towards your confidant. He gives a tiny huff of his snout, chin resting on the loveseat’s armrest between you. His big brown eyes simply stare wistfully at you.

“Are you going to communicate that to him or just to Pongo?”

Eyes drawn away from Pongo, Crewel’s dalmatian, you glance towards the opening of the kitchen connecting to the living room. Your professor is deep enough inside the adjacent room where you cannot see, only hear him. You reply, “I’m trying to keep us on amicable terms. I don’t want him to think that I’ve made the decision to leave.”

“Then, tell him that very sentence, pup: I have not made the decision to leave yet. If you start off with that then you can continue on with explaining the rest. Do you think he has already thought you have made the decision yet,” Crewel says as he walks out of the kitchen.

He carries a platter out in his lavious living room. Crewel is much more of a casual manner of dressing; a devil-red button-up with a silk evening tie, ebon with engravement of flora. He puts the platter down on the table in front of the two chairs, scolding Pongo off his chair.

“That’s just the thing: I can’t tell what he is thinking anymore. I never really understood what Ace, Deuce, and Grim meant when they said they couldn’t really read Jade’s true intentions. Now, I feel the exact same way. Just second-guessing everything that comes out of his mouth,” you vent as Crewel accesses your bad posture.

He must feel generous because he makes no note of it. “Well, mind-reading is a magical skill that not many mages master. So, though it is unfavorable, we have to learn to trust words at face value.”

“You say that if he is not Octavinelle’s vice-housewarden. Words are Jade’s sword. And he knows better than anyone that words can be manipulative, exploitative, and false. Since I didn’t come to him first, he is going to think –”

“Octavinelle students at their best are deeply intune with the world around them. That young pup is Octavinelle’s vice-housewarden because he is deeply observant and intuitive … and deeply sympathetic. I agree that words are his sword. A sword can be used to defend and help too. Do not restrict it.”

You wait until you have finished chewing around the carrot chip in your mouth before you speak, “I know that. To me, those are some of his best qualities … But! Octavinelle students work to solve problems. Jade hasn’t even given me his thoughts on my problem.”

“Perhaps he feels that if he says a certain thing, you will resent him. Or you will suddenly pick your decision because of what he says. I’m certain he wants you to make the decision for yourself.”

“But he’s one of the main reasons this is so hard to decide upon. Him and Grim.” Crewel’s face scrunches at the mention of your troublesome cat. “I love Jade dearly and I think of Grim as family. I know Grim’s thoughts. I cannot read a single thought on Jade’s face.”

Your eyes fall down to the floor, suddenly too damp to maintain proper eye-contact. “It is like he is shutting me out while staying robotically in the same relationship we had.”

In your ribcage, the valves and arteries of your heart give a painful jerk of agony. As if noticing, Pongo empathically rests his head upon your knee. You greet him with a soft whisper, stroking down the crown of his head to his neck. You are still shaking.

“Nothing happens when you do nothing, pup. If you keep shuffling your feet upon the matter, eventually, when it comes for you to decide, you will be making a decision purely from your soul and nothing else. But that won’t give you closure. It won’t be good for you.”

“I don’t want Jade to resent me. I don’t,” you bit back a cry. Harshly, you pick up a tissue and press it over your eyes. After a few deep breaths, you manage to gain yourself before you slip down a watery, steep incline of the mountain of your emotions.

“If neither of you talks to each other, nothing grows. Nothing changes unless one of you manages to talk to the other.”

“It’ll be such a painful conversation.”

“The ones that reap the most rewards are often the most painful of them all.”

You look up, eyes still incredibly wet. Crewel’s eyes resemble something like dark storm clouds. That color would suggest a bit of hardships but his advice flows off him naturally. You cannot look at Crewel like he is a surrogate father if you chose this world over your own. But, you will hold onto this relationship fondly, if this world is the one you stay in.

“I want him to know my soul again. I want to be able to read his soul again.”

Sometimes, Jade seems like a mountain. A bit too poetic comparing a hiker to the very structure they climb but it is suiting. Height aside, he is out of reach frequently. Scaling him – boots slipping on sediment walls, fingers bleeding with each desperate grab of sharp rocks – had been a trail as harsh as Everest. The view from above is breathtakingly beautiful and a sweet reward trumping all others.

Your first kiss felt like being on top of a mountain.

Mountains are rewarding but they are still mountains. A simple slip on slick rock and you bust open the crown of your head like a senile king or an old ram. Incredibly foolish of you to trust a jagged summit to keep you safe.

Right now, he seems quite like a mountain. You worry over each of your premedicated steps in approaching this. Sizing up which indent of rocks you are going to trust putting your weight on. One breaking underneath you will not end it. Two breaks though … Jade might pull away from you.

Studying the eminence of his back, you pick yourself up from Ramshackle’s couch and start the hike.

Jade does not even jump when you wrap yourself around his torso. You trap him in with an embrace, X-ing arms over his chest, underneath his arms. Steadfast, Jade continues with slicing long strips of fat into precise, 12 millimeter squares. Over the side of his arm, you look at the air-tight bag of hog casing and chop onions sizzling on the stove.

“Smells delicious. You look really good when you cook.”

“You say that no matter what I do.”

“Well, I can’t help that my boyfriend’s good-looking and I have to tell him so. It is just natural that I let you know.”

“Ah, then I thank you for the wonderful insight,” Jade says, all coy allurement in his voice. His knife falls and repositions itself to the start of the sausage, again and again like a guillotine at the height of revolution. “Can I ask you to add these in the skillet? I think you happen to look delectable when cooking too.”

“Good enough to eat?”

All you get is a quick flash of teeth, playfully biting air, as you reach over Jade’s body to grab the bowl he gestured to. You smile warmly. In the bowl lies chopped shallots, parsley, scallions, and a dozen more minor ingredients that you can identify. You take them, dumping them into the skillet. A tantalizing smell rises up to you along with a cloud of steam.

Taking a spatula, you start to stir the mixture. What is on the pan bubbles and cooks. As you maneuver the ingredients to burn evenly, you cannot help but think this is exactly what you wanted to avoid.

The environment of normalcy.

The ease of talking to Jade.

What a foolish thing to want to ruin, you sneer as you push at ginger and grounded cloves. But those two things have a masquerade mask slipped over them. Neither of you have brought up the issue once since the time you spent past midnight on Ramshackle’s porch.

“Jade?” Jade hums, letting you know he is listening. Your hundred questions feel like acid in your throat. “What are we making?”

“It is Boudin Noir de Lyon. A French blood sausage. I’ve only attempted it twice before.” With his knife, Jade points at the long glass of goose blood that you have on your counter, next to the bag of hog casing.

“Ah, I see.”

To be honest, you were unaware you had the components in stock to make Boudin Noir de Lyon. Sometimes, Grim and Jade just showed up with bags upon bags of food or food ingredients. You could understand why Azul wanted Ramshackle as a second Mostro Lounge. Shelves are bottomless and the kitchen is so spacious after your remodel.

It is a house wasted on you. You can easily look around and imagine all those industrious chefs roaming around, cooking and serving. Would Jade be content with the tradeoff?

“Jade?” This time you are going to try to go in and not dodge the subject again.

“Yes, my love?”

“You once said eels mate for life. Was that just sweet talking or is that a fact?”

“I thought the biology of merman species didn’t interest you much.”

You remember that, saying that you did not need biology to let you know that Jade liked you very much and you liked him very much. So what if there were hints and nuances to learn about his biology. You just liked him; you felt at ease around him. “Just please … Please answer the question, Jade.”

“Eels and eel-mers usually pick only one to spend their life with.”

“Usually?”

“In the occurrence of a death or loss of a mate before one reaches adulthood fully at twenty, some eel-mers find someone else.” Jade elects to hold your hand instead of his knife, halting your worry-energized stirring and letting the spatula rest. The only thing you notice about his touch is that he is as cold as a December death. “We were only seventeen and eighteen when we met.”

“So you could find someone else if I left,” you say with a mix of relief and sadness. Then, your hand slips through Jade’s hand. You look at it with a gut-wrenching guilt, the collision of flickering skin and your tangible skin.

“No,” he says firmly, just barely managing to keep a growl out of his voice. “No, I couldn’t find anyone else but you.” And as if saying those words restore some of the bond you had, your hand floats back up as fake bones, muscle, and skin reappears. He squeezes your hand tightly.

You take Crewel’s advice. “Jade, I haven't made my decision whether I’m going to stay or not. I want you to know that: I haven’t decided yet.”

“I know.” He says those words. But he looks at you like you are something fleeting, like you are a mushroom collapsing in on itself, mildewed and smoldering, premature decay. His ice cold hand around yours is painful tight.

“If I leave,” you choke on your words. With a gasp, you quickly pull away from him to wipe away the tears you were unprepared to feel fall. Ice rises up to press its thumb to wipe away the water. “I-If I leave, I want to know you’ll be okay. I want to know that you aren’t hiding away all your anguish from me.”

Clipped and short: “I can’t burden you with that. The weight on your shoulders is enough.”

“You ignoring this situation is a burden. I want us to talk. I want to know what’s on your mind, what’s in your soul.”

Jade holds his tongue. You try to pull your cheek away from him but that just worsens the misery in his eyes. You fall still, waiting.

“Jade?”

“I’d never be able to recover.”

“Huh,” you gasp breathless.

Even after such powerful words, Jade still holds his tongue in the cage of his mouth. The influence of words is not lost on a man such as him. If anything it is evident as emotions are on his twin’s face, unhidden. So very unlike Jade who keeps everything hidden to a certain degree.

Lifting a rock off his chest, unburdening himself, Jade confesses, “If you were to leave, I’d never be able to recover. There would be a hole in my heart always ready to receive you again.”

Disconnected, you feel one tear race down the right side of your face and another tear catch on the curve of your left cheek, hanging and warm.

You were not ready to hear that. You thought you could handle hearing Jade’s true emotions but you had expected him to be losing interest. In his first year, he was fascinated with manholes; in his second year, he was fascinated with mushrooms; you expected this romantic interest to be fleeting. He learned to play bass in middle school then never picked it up again. Jade grows bored, he tosses things away, thus is nature.

He still has an interest in mushrooms, you think, he is settling down with his interests.

Were you two fleeting? An insecure part of you expected to be fleeting to him. I’d never recover. That is a far cry from a passing fancy that washes and recedes like the tide.

“I’m sorry for saying my true feelings.”

“There’s nothing to apologize for,” you say, blinded by tears.

“But I’m making you cry. I’m cruel.”

You take his face in your hands, fingers clumsy due to impaired sight. “I’m glad to know it though. I’m glad you can say that.” Then, shaking, you go in for a kiss. And the fake Jade vanishes back into the photograph, leaving you puckering up for cold air.

With the sweet smell of a French meal you do not know how to cook lingering in the air, you cry and cry.

You only have three days left to make a decision.

I’d never be able to recover.

You have been rotating those words around in your head for thirty-eight hours. Moving the sentence around like it is a puzzle piece in a game. Dissecting it like it is the evidence that a serial killer left in the heat of crime. Even considering the weight of the punctuation mark.

The true feelings of the soul of Jade Leech.

Grief comes without any sort of recovery. Instead, hurt erodes from the turret of time that passes through and splashes about but ultimately without cure.

I’d never be able to recover? Who’s to say that’s true?

But, the same sentiment rings true in your soul. Whichever you choose, the recovery path for the only choice will be fierce and full of regret. You will slice a part of your soul up and crush it no matter whether you go home or you stay in Twisted Wonderland. You pluck yourself out of the memory as you pluck a bottle of nightshade off Professor Crewel’s supply rack in potionology.

Despite everything, you attend classes and unbirthday parties and … well, you would have attended club meetings, to procrastinate on the decision. If you leave, you leave with nothing but the skin on your back. You pour the deadly nightshade in the cauldron as Riddle, your lab partner, keeps stirring. You only have a day left. The phone in your pocket has been buzzing all day with concern but among the ladder of contracts you slide through you never see Jade 💕 among them.

Pulling away to save us both the hurt, you think with a smile. That is so Jade, I should have been able to predict that. You watch the whirlpool of the gray mixture. Yeah, I’d never recover either. Then your lab goggles slowly but surely start to fill with tears.

Riddle stops stirring, tool falling from his hand, when he sees you remove your goggles out of the corner of his eyes. You push them up and reveal bright red eyes brimming with tears. Tears so glutinous and heavy that it almost looks like melted wax.

You cry because you know what you are going to pick. Your soul may fiercely want both options, impossibly greedy. Yet, now in the blimp of time, this pocket of your life, you have chosen the one you will go with. Removing the gloves from your hands, you start to furiously scrub away the ocean draining from you. It is so difficult to see.

“Prefect, do you need to use the eyewash station? (Name)?”

“Ri-Rid,” you wheeze out. The waterfall is cascading down your face, clogging your voice. Gradually, the sound of you crying is starting to pick up a bit in volume.

“Prefect, what’s wrong? Here, I can use a spell to get it out of your eyes if you need. Did something splash up from the mixture?” You feel his smaller hand timidly rest on your quivering bicep. Sevens, your entire body is shaking like a power-drill.

Students are starting to look in your direction. Morbid curiosity draws their eyes to you, listening to the gut-wrenching sobs you expel. Riddle’s face hardens in a glare. Frustration lies pink on his cheeks. With the force of your sobs, your knees start to tremble, tipping over the fence edge of buckling. You are a wreck.

“Professor Crewel –.”

“Every single pup is excused from class. Right now.”

The door is already magic-ed open. It takes a minute for others to pile out, some lingering in curiosity and some leaving steadfast in their recoil to no longer hear your cries. The click of the door breaks you and you finally collapse. Riddle goes down with you, gentle hand glued to your arm.

“I need to make a call,” you manage to get out from your wet throat, crying as if you are grieving. You suppose it is appropriate. You are grieving someone who you will lose tomorrow and never see again. “I need to –”

“Who do you need to call, (Name)? I can call them for you.”

“Pup.” Crewel does not finish his thought.

You are back to being incomprehensible, crying like you have never cried before. Water coats your face and no matter which direction or what material you use, you cannot dry your face against the assault. Jade. You want Jade so badly.

Riddle – top of his class yet failing the grade of life – stares, not knowing who you want or how to solve this. He grew up isolated; comforting others is not his specialty. “I could call Ace and Deuce. I can –” Riddle quickly locates his phone, fingers frantic. The phone slips out of his grip when a hand starts pounding against the classroom door.

Beyond the tears, you hear:

“Class is dismissed –”

“Striped beakfish, move it.”

“Pup, I’ll have you –”

“Professor Crewel, I need to –”

“Shrimpy’s in there move it.”

“I don’t have time for this – move.”

The arm in Riddle’s hand is suddenly wrenched away. You puppet your head up forcefully despite your tears. You should have known. Jade knows your soul after all.

If it was under any other circumstances, it would be either terrifying or oddly hilarious, the open concern on Jade’s face. He collapses right down on the ground in front of you after pushing Professor Crewel out of his way. His face is taut with the emotions on it, a far cry from the always composed look he has. Only you could get such a reaction. His knee bumps your knee but you do not mind, throwing yourself on him and crying yourself dry of grief.

“It’s okay. I got you. I’m not going to let you go, my love. I got you in my arms, okay?”

Jade’s single yellow eye manages to catch the bewildered look on Riddle’s face. There is a question in the housewarden’s expression: what’s wrong? It is obvious to Jade. You picked whether you want to stay or go.

A soul bond is engrained in the two holders. It allows them to read each other easily when they are at their strongest in a relationship. Thus, Jade knows exactly what you cry for. Riddle misjudges it as stress or a laboratory accident. Jade knows exactly why those tears fall down your face. You are staying in Twisted Wonderland. He knows in the beautiful, snotty, and wrinkled mess on your face: you are staying with him.

It is odd; all you wanted before was to talk, discuss, have a heart to heart vocally. You wanted so badly to restore your crippled communication. Now, you do not need a single word to let him know the entire situation, all the nuances are laid bare on your soul.

“I got you. I’ll always be here, my love.”

He wipes flushed, wet cheeks and pulls you back in for a tight hug. You know when you feel tears fall onto your collarbone that they are his own soul thanking you for trusting him.

The hand on Jade’s bicep is like ice.

Jade twitches, nose scrunching up. His bed tries to lure him back and make him ignore the comatose-cold hand on his arm. It is not a hard task; he is exhausted beyond belief and wants to sleep. His head tousles in the lilac pillow, falling back off the cliff into dreams, when the frozen hand starts to shake his arm.

“Mmm.”

“J … Ja … Jade.”

“Mmmmmm.”

Leave him alone. He is tired. Binding his pallid arms around the pillow in an amorous hold, he tries to dream. The room swelters with summer heat and the silk is like a balm to him. His bare stomach lies the inner sheets and the muscular expanse of rhomboids block out whoever is calling his name. Leave him alone.

“Jade, wake up please. Please Jade.”

“Leave me alone,” Jade groans into the pillow, words distorted with fatigue.

Above him, a sniffle and pathetic hissing cry breaks the heat. The sound is familiar. Out of mouth that is stringy with prison bars of salvia, tears, and snot, his name is called again. Around his eel sleeve tattoo, the hand remains shackled to him, gently shaking with each hiccup of tears.

“Jade. Wake up.”

“Love?”

He blinks and there you are. Blue tears fall down your face and ice fingers pinch into ink. Jade is suddenly awake, releasing the pillow he was embracing and turning on his back, motions hazy with sleep. “Love?” His warm fingers reach up to thumb away the steady waterfall on your cheeks. Sevens, you are freezing.

“What’s wrong,” he asks as he sits up in bed. For some odd reason, you are dressed up in your white button-up and slacks like you have somewhere to be going. His other hand reaches up and then he cups your face in his embrace. “What’s wrong, (Name)?”

“I wanna go home. Oh, Jade, I really want to go home,” you blubber breathlessly between your bawling. “I just – oh God – I want to go home.” Then, you fall into his shoulder, squeezing him tightly and sobbing anew. Sobbing inconsolable for your mother.

Jade knows that there are fresh tears wetting his bare collarbone but he feels distinctly out of his mind. Like his skin is not really his own, floating in a stranger’s body. Grasped in the throes of selfish panic, he pushes you tighter into his shirtless torso. Sleepy strands of hair are in his mouth; haunted eyes are unfocused in the dark of his room. Despite his large height, he truly does feel like he cannot come to terms with your words and is kicked out of his body because of it.

Subconsciously, his dominant hand runs over your back in circles. Trying to use it as a rope to come back to his senses more than to comfort you.

Home? But he had thought — had he mistakenly pushed his own soul’s objective onto you — you cannot go home!

“(N-Name). (Name), love,” Jade says into your ear. You do not respond, hysterically loud enough to drown out his voice.

He is surprised that Floyd has not woken up. The pitch and volume that you cry at is like someone screaming in a cave, knowing they are in solitude and can let it all go. Even when your teeth bite into his shoulder, your cries are far from quieting.

It does not matter if Floyd was a deep sleeper — which he isn’t, Jade is the deeper sleeper of the two — no one should be able to sleep through this.

Yet, grateful Floyd is asleep, Jade hugs you tightly to his warmer skin. Shushing, he runs a hand down the crown of your head to your shoulder, hoping his touch will ground both of you from the cloud of agony. His grip is piercing, dug tight into your skin, but you do not bleed. Holding you so you do not escape him and leave for your home world. Selfish Selfish Selfish.

Eventually you fall asleep; no one can cry like that without exhausting themselves.

Eventually he falls asleep, blinking watery at his desk, thinking something is wrong with the image and doubly petrified for the morning.

When he wakes up, there is no one in his bed.

#jade leech #twisted wonderland x reader #jade leech x reader #twisted wonderland

156 notes · View notes

skzhua · 1 year

Text

Episode eight.

MASTERLIST

pairing: XO, Kitty's Min Ho x Female Reader

genre: Fluff, angst, enemies-to-lovers, slow burn, coming-of-age.

word count: 3.8k

warnings: Swearing, that's it. This one is cute as hell, y'all.

summary: Transferring to KISS was the last thing you had asked for and, yet, a certain tall boy made it seem both worse and better than you expected.

note: Bold - Korean, Italic - Over the phone

a/n: So I got productive and wrote this in under a few hours only... I hope you'll enjoy this!

(let me know by filling the form in my bio if you want to be added to the taglist!)

You looked at your two friends in surprise. While Kitty was smiling widely as she held Dae's arm, the latter gave you looks of pleading. From that, it wasn't hard to get that he didn't want you to speak about the fact him and Yuri were fake. A shame, you were thinking that this would give you the chance to be free of lies.

"I'm happy for you two." you grinned and raised your coffee cup. "Long live Kitty and Dae."

"And not us?" Min Ho huffed as he sat next to you.

Us. A term with which you were still quite unfamiliar. It had only been a day since you and Min Ho started whatever that was happening. You weren't sure what you were or where it was going but you preferred it that way. Putting tags on it honestly frightened you.

"Us?" Kitty frowned. "Did I miss something?"

Min Ho put his hand on your thigh, squeezing it gently. "More or less."

Dae coughed. "Well, while you two do your thing, we'll go do ours. Kitty, let's go?"

He brought her along behind him, grabbing her purse for her in the way, and left the dorm. Q having gone to the Outdoors Club already, you and Min Ho finally had some time alone. Approaching you, he laid a quick kiss on your lips before stealing your mug.

"Dude, come on! I didn't finish it."

"You had one sip left." he said and then drank the rest of your beverage. "And now it's empty."

You shook your head in disapproval. "You're kind enough to make me coffee but evil enough to steal it away from me."

He walked to you and got you off your stool before wrapping his arms around your waist. "You'll have to admit, it kind of turns you on."

You held onto him by the neck and frowned. "Being both a gentleman and an asshole?" you asked and he nodded. "You're way too confident in yourself."

"You said I was a gentleman, I'll take it and ignore the rest." he laughed.

You exchanged a long-lasting kiss, and he positioned himself to help you up so he could hold you by the thighs. He was still kissing you as he walked to his room but the door just had to open at this exact moment. Min Ho dropped you as horror plastered on your face.

Widening his eyes, Q nearly screamed. "What is this? When?" he asked but stopped himself. "You know what? I don't want to know. I'll just grab my water bottle and let you finish your business."

He hurried to do so and slammed the door behind him. Looking back at each other, Min Ho let out an awkward chuckle.

"We can continue..."

You rolled your eyes. "Get ready, we have class in a few."

But class didn't seem so important as the days went by. Making out in the library, cute dates in Gangnam district, more kissing in his room with a disgusted Dae on the side (as if he wasn't any better with Kitty)... This thing you two had was going strong. You were hoping that he might not see it as a simple casual thing. Because you were falling, and deep. There wasn't going to have any turning back at that point.

Q packed some last minute items in his bag. At the same time, you were debating whether it was a good idea to bring cute outfits despite the fact you were going in the middle of nowhere for two days.

"Oh, that dress is dead gorgeous." Q commented as he checked up on you.

"Not this one, too revealing." you said and pushed it aside.

He took it and put it in your bag. "And that's exactly what we are aiming for."

"What? No, Q." you complained while letting him zip it all close.

"Min Ho is going to lose his mind over this."

You suddenly got shy. "Min Ho? Why would I dress for him? I don't need to do that, it's stupid."

He laughed. "You'll thank me later." He went to the kitchen and you followed him behind. "Okay, time to go. Bus leaves in twenty." he told the other couple.

Just then, Min Ho got out of his room and was bringing with him a huge ass luggage. Plus one of those luxury bags of his.

"Gosh." he mumbled to himself, struggling a little.

"Dude, the class trip is camping. In tents. In nature. For two days." Kitty told him, unimpressed.

"I know." he rolled his eyes. "That's why I packed light."

You laughed and walked up to him. "Right, you did. Let's go."

The five of you headed outside to where the bus was waiting for you. You stayed with Min Ho and he exchanged a few things about Kitty with Dae. And that made you rather uncomfortable.

"She wants to go over everything that happened with Yuri." Dae explained.

"Don't, it's a trap." Min Ho advised right away.

You shrugged. "I don't know. Honesty is always the key, don't you think so?"

Dae sent you a glare, visibly not wanting you to reveal you knew all about his fake relationship. Meanwhile, Min Ho shook his head in disapproval.

"You're right about honesty. But in this case, they say they want to know all the details to move on, but then they obsessed about them."

You let out a huff. "You really know women..."

"Is that how it is with her?" Dae asked Min Ho, nodding his head to your direction.

"Y/N?" he said before he slung his arm around your shoulders. "No, she's totally uncomplicated and chill."

You looked at him. "Really?"

He sent a smirk your way. "Really. You're quite great, actually."

Growing more embarrassed, you broke away from his grip as soon as you came closer to Yuri. She was already with her other friends but didn't seem to mind your presence. In fact, she seemed reassured.

"You've kept yourself busy this week." she said, referring to your few make-out sessions she had accidentally stumbled upon.

"And you have been moving on quite well from Dae."

Her face became serious. "Not a word, please."

The girls suddenly started to scream and Madison came closer to show you a video on her phone. There stood the famous actor Ocean Park. He was explaining how his grandmother's village had been ravaged by a flood and was thanking Madison and your school to come help them out. She squealed at the mention of her name, jumping up and down.

"He said your name!" Eunice exclaimed.

"I know! And we owe it all to Min Ho and his famous mom." she replied before running to him and giving him a hug, almost making him fall.

"Whoa..." he let out before breaking away from her.

Leaning on him, she went on to explain about how his mother had worked with Ocean Park before. Apparently, Principal Lim agreed to cancel a ski trip to go to the village instead. But you weren't listening, you could only focus on her arm that was on top of Min Ho's shoulder.

"Your mom is really good with pulling strings." Madison finished off with telling Yuri that.

"For evil, usually."

You choked out a laugh and Yuri followed. You, then, proceeded to get seated in the bus. Analyzing the places, Madison and the other girls had already took the back seats. Kitty surprisingly sat with Finnerty, leaving Dae stuck with another student. Florian and Q together, the others with their friends... That left you a two-seat spot that you could share with Min Ho. However, the image of Madison being glued to him from earlier still fresh in your memory, you hesitated.

"Hey." Yuri said. "Sit with me?"

You ended up agreeing and got yourself comfortable with your friend. So when Min Ho got on the bus, he was more than confused to see you seated with Yuri instead of keeping a spot for him next to you. He stopped where you were with a perplexed look on his face.

"What is this?"

You shot your head up as you heard his voice. "Hey. I'm sitting with Yuri if you don't mind. We'll see each other when we get there."

He seemed disappointed but acquiesced nonetheless. "It's okay."

You watched him getting to a solo seat and started to feel bad. At this point, though, who could blame you for being mad? First off, you had never brought up the subject of Madison in the last week and, second off, you were now wondering why the hell she went to hug him after telling everyone he helped her with organizing this trip.

After a while in the bus, you were growing tired more than you'd liked to be. Yuri had shared a ballad playlist with you and that only made you more sleepy. After some time, she shook you out of your daze and told you she was going to speak with Dae and that she'd switched places with the guy next to him. As she left her seat, Min Ho took the opportunity to go beside you, sending the other guy at the singular seat he was previously at. You let out a scoff at him.

"Excuse me but I believed we agreed last night that we would sit together." he justified himself.

You shrugged. "That was before I learnt you were still hooked on Miller."

He sighed. "Is it about this morning?"

"I don't know, Min Ho. You tell me." you answered, growing frustrated.

"Jealousy kind of looks good on you." he joked but you slapped him across the chest.

"I'm not jealous. I don't want to be in your collection of women, that's all."

"I have spent every second of my free time with you this last week. You would have known way sooner if I was seeing another girl at the same time."

"You hid your trip arrangements with her very well, though."

"Exactly. It was trip arrangements."

You plugged in your earphones again, not wanting to hear any more of his unclear answers. He did look at you for a bit afterwards but he ended up getting the message. That didn't stop him from taking your hand in his, and neither did it restrain you from liking it.

You arrived at the camping site soon after and joined Eunice outside. She and the others were still scrolling through social media as they wanted to see more pictures of Ocean Park. You weren't necessarily a fan, but you had to admit that the man was fine as hell.

After Professor Finnerty gathered everyone together, he asked you all about the rooming arrangements. You were taken aback when Yuri told him she'd be with Kitty. That wasn't even the best... What followed shook you even more.

"Y/N and I, sir!" Madison shouted.

Barely having any time to process what she had just said, Finnerty noted it down and she took your hand to head towards your tent. She started to talk about how excited she was and all about the whole trip, ignoring completely the elephant in the room.

"I'll take the left side and you can take the right. Does that work for you?"

"Yeah." you confirmed. "Why did you pick me?"

She hummed. "What?"

"For the room. We barely know each other."

"Ah." she smiled and invited you to sit with her. "I have noticed that I might be creating some tension between you and Min Ho. No hard feelings about him choosing you, by the way. I would've picked you too."

"Thanks..?"

She continued. "I want you to know I was only looking for a casual fling that night at his party. And he only kissed me back because he told me you went all out on him so he got sad."

You smiled in guilt. "I did, yeah."

"And the day after, I thought he was still on with the casual dating but he obviously told me off and went to you instead."

You were still in doubt. "That does not change the fact he's Min Ho. He'll go after someone else in a week at most if I'm lucky."

She exhaled. "Well, you are more than lucky, then. He wants you, I can see it. And, by the way, the trip thing was because I begged him to do so. And the hug was just friendly, I swear."

"It's fine." you let out a laugh. "I appreciate you for telling me all this. I was barely getting anything out of him when I asked."

"Men are like this." she shrugged.

You could do it for an extra hour before curfew but nothing was going to make you like cleaning up. You did enjoy having a clean personal space and cleaning a village for a good cause was good too. Still, you were not having the most fun. You and Yuri being similar on that aspect, you helped each other as one raked the branches together and one put them away in a bag.

Min Ho watched you from afar. Considering you were still not acknowledging him, he took it as in Madison told you something that put you off. That was the last thing he wanted. The night before, he called his mom to tell her about you. He wanted to know her opinion on the situation and it made him realize a lot of things. One of them being that he wanted something more with you, something real. Not a close friend he'd kiss whenever he'd want to. No. He wanted to try and date you.

"You're looking at her again." Madison snapped him out of his thoughts.

"I know."

"She's not mad at you, I told you I cleared things off with her."

He scoffed. "Explain why she is still avoiding me, then."

"From what I got, she feels like a fling to you... which she is so-"

"Not." he corrected. "She's not."

"Then, show her."

"How?"

Madison had shifted her attention elsewhere by then. A car pulled over in front of the camping site and everyone – meaning every fangirl – rushed to see what was happening, Madison being the first. Min Ho followed lazily as Ocean Park stepped out of the car, greeting his fans.

You joined out of curiosity. It wasn't like he was a nobody; you were getting to meet a celebrity. You stood next to Min Ho. Not on purpose, it was only because he was close to the front. After Madison introduced herself, Min Ho did the same but with much less enthusiasm.

"Hi. My mother, Dami, says 'hello, Mr. Park.' "

Ocean looked up dreamily. "Ah, Dami... Your mother is an incredible woman. Did she ever tell you about the time I ran into her at Sundance?" Min Ho gave him a very clueless look. "She kept me warm on a very cold night."

Min Ho was baffled. "Excuse me?"

"And who are you?" Ocean smiled at you.

"Park Y/N." you bowed.

He held his hand up. "No need to be so formal. Are you with him?" he asked, pointing at the man next to you.

"Oh, we're not-"

"She is." Min Ho cut you off while bringing you closer to his body by your waist.

Ocean nodded his head at him in acknowledgement. "You got yourself someone as beautiful as your mother." Clasping his hands together, he then addressed the crowd. "Let's take a selfie."

You pushed yourself away from Min Ho while Ocean Park and his groupies went to a spot to take photos. "What is it with you?"

You walked off to continue your task. You didn't get why he acted all possessive when, clearly, Ocean was only being polite. Nor did you get why he felt the need to keep you so close to him. It made you feel things and you hated feeling things.

An hour was added to your time before curfew as a reward to the hard work you had done all day. Yuri had briefly told you what happened so far. You felt much better now that Kitty finally knew the truth and that Yuri didn't forget to tell her that she asked you to keep it shut for her. Kitty texted you later on to tell you she forgave you and understood that it was not your place to tell. Overall, a weight had come off your shoulders.

Exhausted from the day, you didn't plan on doing much other than watch some shows you downloaded before leaving and staying in bed in your pyjamas. You were going to have the tent to yourself since Madison was going to Ocean Park's grandmother's house for dinner. You were more than okay with finally getting some time for yourself. Well, for a few minutes at least.

Min Ho: Come to my tent.

Min Ho: I've got a bit of a surprise for you.

Y/N: No. :)

Min Ho: Do you want me to beg or something?

Y/N: Maybe...

Min Ho: Please, come to my tent, my sweet puppy?

Min Ho: Get all ready too, it's a formal occasion.

Y/N: I'm in my comfy fit, so it's still a no. I'm not coming out.

Min Ho: I have strawberries dipped in chocolate.

Y/N: Coming in ten.

Most people would tell you that this was a bad idea. And usually, you'd say that it was, indeed. But, hey. Strawberries and chocolate couldn't be a better bait for you. You loved food, he knew that and he got you just how he wanted. You honestly didn't care, as long as you had something to eat in the end.

You thanked Q mentally for forcing you to bring the tight off-the-shoulders dress. You picked it to go with some golden jewellery and did some waves for your hair. Once you determined you were all good – which was more than ten minutes after you told Min Ho that you were coming – you finally left your tent.

You weren't sure how to react when you saw him in a suit, standing in the middle of the room he had decorated with candles, petals and all. On the table were the strawberries with a bottle of non-alcoholic champagne. You stepped closer, growing more confused.

"What is happening here?"

"Surprise." he said. "I was hoping this could help me for you to not be mad at me anymore."

You acquiesced slowly, still scanning the room. "I can't say that I am not impressed."

"Want some?" he offered you the treat and you happilly took them.

"I never thought I'd see you do something like this for anyone. Even less make a heart out of petals." you teased.

"Can you appreciate my effort instead of mocking me?"

You laughed. "Alright, I'm sorry. This is a very nice surprise, thank you."

"You're welcome, beautiful."

He came closer to you and wiped off the chocolate that smudged on your lips. With a single look down your lips, it was just enough to make you melt all over again and press your lips against his. He let out a gasp, startled by your move.

"I'll take it as we are good now?"

You nodded. "Yeah, we are. I'm sorry, by the way. I was overthinking things and you have the right to see anybody else because it's not like I'm your girlfriend or anything." you laughed nervously.

He bit his lip. "Actually, that's what I wanted to talk about with you."

And, of course, your little insecure self had to start thinking about all sorts of negative thoughts. Was he about to tell you this thing was over? Would he still want to be friends? Was he only playing with your heart?

"I can't believe I'm about to say this, but..."

And it was coming, you knew you were going to get your heart broken.

"... I think I want more."

And just like that, everything stopped. Your brain short-circuited as you attempted you comprehend properly what he had just said.

"You, what?" you said in a whisper.

"I think I'm ready for a real relationship and, honestly, I don't see it happen with anyone else other than you."

You said nothing, you just couldn't physically speak. So you kissed him, slowly and passionately. In all the times you kissed, this felt like the most intimate you had ever been. It wasn't physical intimacy, it was emotional. Without even noticing, teardrops came out of your eyes. Just a couple as Min Ho brushed them off with his thumb.

"Are you okay?" he asked once he pulled away from your face, but still kept his forehead to yours.

"What... Why the change of heart?"

He sighed. "You really want me to tell you how special you are, don't you?"

"I actually do, yeah." you admitted without any shame.

But the evening went on like this. There was some friendly teasing, kissing here and there, talking for what felt like hours. You wanted to stay forever there with him.

"I could kiss you forever." he said softly after lifting your chin up to make you look at him.

You held onto him even closer. "Me too." And you kissed him again. "I should really go."

He shook his head and placed a couple of pecks all over your face. "Or you could stay."

"No." you laughed. "Curfew starts in five minutes."

He pouted but still help you up on your feet from the bed. "I'll see you tomorrow?"

"Yes, you will."

"On the bus, this time."

You sighed heavily. "Yes."

"Good. Then sleep well." he kissed you one last time for the night.

"Good night."

As soon as you got to your tent, Madison was already sleeping. You lost no time in dialing Kitty's number but she didn't answer. The next person in mind was Yuri but she did not respond either. Last person was Q who, thankfully, picked up.

"So? How was it?" he asked.

"It couldn't have been any better."

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