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gtseven7 · 4 years

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My Seven Idols

this is the picture mentioned in the story

Summary:

Got7 as highschoolers as they deal with graduation and college at the same time starting up their own Youtube channel as idols.

A/N:

So this is chapter 1. Really, I wasnt supposed to write this thing but it has been bugging me for months and I just cant shake it off okay? I tried resisting thinking, dude you're on your way to the juicy parts of Seven Princes. But whelp I lost a battle within myself and wrote this anyway. I hope you guys like it!

masterlist

//prev

The click-clacking of the keyboard echoed in the room as Y/N furiously typed the remaining subtitle of the video she had been editing the last few nights. Hitting the export button, the brunette could finally exhale and relax. The beach aesthetic video she had been working on was now in the process of being complete. She just has to wait till it loads to a hundred and her hard work will pay off. Smiling to herself, she minimized the editing software and opened up her InstaBook. She scrolled leisurely, seeing the pictures of her peers and some from her photographer idols. Y/N was examining an aesthetic cityscape picture from one of her favorite photo blogs, Def, when her notification alerted her of a great news. Ding! And the words that popped up from the right corner of her screen made her screech. As it was almost midnight, she had to restrain herself and not wake her parents. But she can’t help the giggle that escaped her mouth. She quickly clicked the pop up. It said: pjy_01 updated his profile picture. When the picture loaded, Y/N's jaw almost unhinged. Park Jinyoung a.k.a. Mr. Student Council President rarely posts a picture of himself. His feed was usually just books, food and random sceneries. He did have few self-taken pictures and Y/N was happy with it (some of them are really just bad quality but she’ll take it) but this one? This one’s just beautiful, amazing, gift from the heavens. He was sitting on a comfy white couch, staring directly at the camera with puppy eyes. His white button up was slightly unbuttoned(!!) as he wore an innocent face and a cute peace sign as a cherry on top. Y/N was just about to scream and jump around. But before that, she made sure to save the picture in her Jinyoung Stash folder. “Woah. What is this Jinyoung? You should always post things like this. I’ll be a happy woman.” She sighed dreamily, staring at her screen but missed the notification of her software that finished exporting her video.

Y/N was rudely interrupted when her phone suddenly rang. Not even looking at the caller id, she answered the call with an annoyed tone. “What?” No one would be phoning her at this time other than her best friend. “Yo chill out Y/N.” Youngjae laughed at the other end, knowing he most likely disturbed her from her hobby. Which isn’t entirely false, he just didn’t know that the hobby at the moment was staring at their president and not videography. ”It’s midnight Youngjae, what do you need?” She elicited another hearty laugh from the guy. Any other circumstance, she’ll laugh along since his laugh is contagious but this time was not it. “Well?”

“Geez, aren’t you such a joy tonight. I’m just gonna ask if you already finished the essay homework due tomorrow.”

Blank silence. It was then that Y/N laughed at the ridiculing situation. Homework? Was there ever one? And she voiced it out, still half cheerful and half threatening. Youngjae might be pranking her once again. “The essay homework Mr. Kwon asked us to do. The one about Romeo and Juliet. Don’t tell me you don’t remember?” Youngjae chuckled a little too, thinking that his friend was making fun of him. When the only sound he heard was the bark of his cute dog Coco beside him, Youngjae started to sweat. “You haven’t done a single thing didn’t you?!”

“I think I’m gonna puke. Youngjae-ahh~ What do I do?!”

Y/N's eyes bugged out, realizing that yes, there is indeed an essay due tomorrow. And it is for Mr. Kwon’s subject, her most feared teacher. Oh how that teacher terrifies her whole being. How could she be so stupid?! “Youngjae!!! What do I do? What do I do?!” Panic was starting to rise from her gut, her heart beating too fast that even midnight coffee can’t do. Add the obvious panic in her bestfriend’s voice on the other end, it made things worse for her. “I don’t know! Uh… I can lend you mine? Just modify some parts. Paraphrase things…”

“Oh my God Youngjae I love you. You’re the best!!”

“You owe me one Y/N.”

“I do, I do. Thanks so much.”

They bid goodnight to each other, Youngjae promising to pick her up from her house so she won’t be late; she once again praised his goodness before hanging up. And as promised, he sent her his homework, Jinyoung’s picture on her screen forgotten. Y/N once again typed relentlessly through the night.

“I bet Jinyoung never had a problem like this. Y/N you must do better!”

That motivation fueled her to write the essay about Romeo and Juliet even if she didn’t understand what it was about aside from it being a romance story. Little did the sophomore videographer know, her high pedestaled president sat on his chair under the dim light of his study desk at the same time as her. He was hunched in concentration on the essay he stalled on doing days before it was to be submitted.

No words flowed, his pen stuck mid-air. “Argh. What the heck is this shit about anyway?” Jinyoung huffed as he crumpled his nth paper and tossed it in the bin beside him. His brain was not cooperating with him that night and it’s just frustrating. Why does he have to explain why the economy of their country is not thriving as it used to? It’s just plain bullshit to be honest. He had mountains of council work the past few days and he wasn’t able to attend few classes including the class he was supposed to write this essay for. This is why he hates skipping, when things like this essay arrive, he doesn’t know what to do. He didn’t have time to read up everything that’s why he just went straight to bluffing his way out of the conclusion of the paper. The distracting noise of the instrument app on Jaebeom’s phone didn’t help him much either. “You have your own room, your own bed. Why are you always here?” His housemate just shrugged and continued his melody making. It was sounding good to be honest, not that his friend ever made a bad song but the other’s process was just making the writing too difficult for him. “How can I even finish when you distract me like this?”

“One, Jinyoung, it was your fault for not doing it earlier. Two, you are not distracted by my music. You just don’t want to do that stupid paper.”

And it hit him too well. He’s right. Most times, Jaebeom’s music calms him but this time his brain just straight up refuses to do a thing. His long haired companion exited the app after saving his work. Jaebeom laid down on Jinyoung’s bed. He patted the space beside him, encouraging the other to lie down with him and sleep. “Don’t push yourself too hard. Get some sleep first, you’ve had a harsh week.”

“Get out of my bed.”

“Hmm…”

And with that, Jaebeom closed his eyes to sleep. He’s not a fast sleeper per se, he’s just waiting for Jinyoung to join him but he didn’t. He opened his eyes just a slit saw the student body president scribbling again with a determined face.

Few hours after, it was almost three in the morning. Jinyoung has to get up at six to prepare for their eight o’clock class. He doesn’t like not sleeping properly but for the sake of that damned paper, he had to sacrifice. He sighed once again and turned off the lamp. Looking to his right, he saw his friend sleeping peacefully, facing him from the farther half of the bed. Jinyoung shook his head in exasperation. He sat on the unoccupied side and stared at his friend of ten years. His face lax and serene. The nose ring glints under the soft glow of the stars from the window. Jinyoung’s hand inched towards the other’s face, stopping midway. He clenched his fist and brought it back to himself. ‘Ah, I really wanna remove that nose ring so badly.’

Morning came and the sunlight was harsh on Y/N’s face. She finished her essay in time, luckily. She trudged along the hallways of their small house, the only thing that woke her up completely was the smell of fresh bacon being cooked. She quickly ate her breakfast, showered and said goodbye to her parents with a tired smile. The sound of the bell announced the arrival of Youngjae by their door. She opened it and her friend almost screamed bloody murder. “I thought a zombie came out to eat me.”

“Shut up.”

Youngjae laughed and slung an arm on her shoulders. He ruffled her already messy hair further. “Did you finish the write up?” She gave a gloomy thumb’s up while yawning, earning a giggle from the boy. “Ah seriously, you should take care of your studies more Y/N.”

“Says you. You were up all night long playing. I can see it on the bags under your eyes.”

“At least I finished my work before doing so, unlike someone I know…”

Y/N clicked her tongue in disapproval but she knows he’s right though. “I got carried away with the good shots I had when me and Yeji went to the beach last week. Aah, I made such a good video last night.” Youngjae smiled at her friend as he watched her walk half asleep.

Y/N and Youngjae were friends since they were toddlers. With their mothers practically sisters because of their closeness, and their houses are just one backyard away from each other, the two developed a close friendship. Oftentimes they’d be hanging out in their places, playing video games or reading comics. Although when they started to grow up more, they drifted away slightly, having different circles of friends. That didn’t bother the two of them though. They thought that it’s better to have their friendship outside school so that they won’t get sick seeing each other’s faces all the time. With this, they rarely go to school together anymore. Their classmates are in the dark about their closeness as well.

Youngjae pulled out his phone and scrolled his pictures. He suddenly got excited about showing his bestfriend about his dog’s new outfit he bought recently. “Y/N, Y/N, look at Coco. I bought a new shirt. It’s so cute.” He practically shoved the phone on her eyes but it didn’t matter much to her as she was as excited as him. They practically raised that cute dog together. “Omo! Coco’s so adorable!” They were both bouncing on their steps as they look at the dog’s pictures posing differently with each new clothing. The two of them were cooing. “Ah, Coco is such a joy.”

"Y/N!”

They both stopped on their tracks when they heard a familiar voice. It was Yeji, Y/Ns other bestfriend outside Youngjae (he’s still the bestest but Yeji doesn’t know that). She happily waved at her two classmates, a teasing smile forming on her face already. ‘Youngjae and Y/N walking together eh? How interesting!’

Yeji’s appearance was their cue to head apart so Y/N smiled at Youngjae and said goodbye. “See ya later in class!” He just hummed in agreement, seeing as his peers are also in sight. He waved at Yeji and parted with Y/N He walked towards his other friends and greeted them.

"So Youngjae huh?”

“What about him?”

“Nothing…” Which wasn’t true because now she is sporting a silly smile on her face. Probably imagining things outside of this world and conjuring up different ways how her friend and Youngjae fall in love. Yeji is a fangirl at heart and she just ships everybody. She never imposes it to everyone though, she’s just happy to think about it and keep it to herself. Amazingly enough though, the people she secretly shipped usually ends up together at some point. But Y/N knows her too well and she knows the outlandish things going in her mind right now. “We just happened to meet along the way Yeji.”

“I didn’t say anything!”

The school entrance as it always is, was full of commotion. More so today than usual. Y/N saw a hoard of students lining up the gate with annoyed expressions. ‘Ah, it’s probably President Jinyoung.’ She giggled to herself, happy to see him early in the morning. She’s still a little bit over the moon with his latest picture. “Do I look okay?”, that question snapped Y/N out of her daydream (the picture still lingering at the back of her mind). Yeji took out a small mirror and checked herself out. She combed her hair with her fingers, checked her uniform, straightened everything that doesn’t look ironed out. “You know he just nags at those who violate badly. We’ll never get reprimanded.” Yeji breathed deeply as she puts her mirror back to her bag. “I’m just making sure you know. I don’t want those cold eyes stare at me. It’s scary.” Y/N wanted to protest, ‘Jinyoung’s not scary! It’s a part of his charm!’ but a whine stopped her from doing so. While they were talking, they have pushed inside the crowd to get in and not be late for class. They reached the front where Jinyoung was standing sternly, his mouth thinned in disapproval. “Bhuwakul. How many times do I have to confiscate that earrings of yours?!”

“Why are you so keen on getting these anyway? Would I do better in my tests if I don’t wear them?” The boy, with his id lace yellow (which means he’s a *freshie), was so close to stomping his feet. But Jinyoung was not fazed and just stared at the boy with a piercing stare. “If you wear them, would you do better? No right? So hand them to me. You violated the school dress code. Come get it at my office after school.”

The people around them were murmuring, Y/N even caught what the others are saying. They think that Jinyoung was being unreasonable and harsh for no reason. ‘Which isn’t true! He just cares about what the students of this school looks like.' The sophomore turned to glare at the onlookers that defamed their president. ‘Ungrateful fools.’ But she was startled when the tall boy (oh my he’s tall) beside the one named Bhuwakul spoke innocently. “Let him be, he probably just wants to wear your earrings.” Even Yuna, the student council secretary, was shocked at the carefree manner of his dialogue. The president just raised his right eyebrow, “Kim Yugyeom, button up your uniform and tie your necktie properly.” and reprimanded the other freshie without hesitation. Yugyeom grimaced a bit but did what he was told. ‘You should be the one buttoning your clothes last night President huhu’

Despite the commotion at the front gate (which happens almost everyday as Jinyoung loves to greet the student body with “Rule # 5 under the clause of the dress code law….), Y/N and the students of their campus managed to get to their class safely. When they entered their homeroom, Y/N and Yeji was greeted by Ga Young, another friend of theirs. It seemed that she had only arrived a few minutes before them. “Yo! Entrance was pretty hectic today.”

Yeji made a face and flipped her brow wavy hair away from her face as if she was hassled on their way over. “Ugh, don’t tell us. We had to push our way out earlier.” They both giggled and chattered mindlessly about the events that morning.

“Don’t you think the foreigner freshie earlier was kind of cute?” Ga Young said dreamily, looking at the ceiling as if he could see his face there. “Oh, that one with the earrings?”

“Yep. We’re blessed with another foreigner beauty.” That’s true, the videographer thought. He’d look good on camera.

“Yeon Seo isn’t a foreigner.” Y/N countered, debating that her friend’s crush wasn’t exactly from another country. He grew up in their city just like everyone else is.

“He’s a half-half though.”

“The tall freshie had a face too.”

Yeji and Ga Young started to talk about the new eye candy they found. Those two are fans of idols, especially the amateur ones they have in their school. Y/N absentmindedly listened to the two’s gossip. Sometimes she thinks she’s in a webtoon or something. These kinds of things exist on books and comics even dramas that she consumes. Y/N still can’t believe such things are in her reality. Aren’t groups of popular boys with a cheesy group name only in fiction? She wondered if it’s possible that this is not a real world.

“But you know, I heard rumors that Bhuwakul's gay.”

That piqued Y/N's interest. Not that there’s any problem with being gay, the rumor just caught her interest. Not many people are brave enough to admit their sexuality in their community so it was pretty interesting.

“Eh? Who told you?”

“My freshie cousin told me. He said that he’s close with girls and gives fashion advice. He’s on the softer side as well.”

Huh… Y/N thought it was a baseless rumor after all. “That doesn’t mean he’s gay though.”

“That’s true.”

When the talk about the foreign freshie Bhuwakul ended, the other two started to talk about their favorite topic once again. The Five Roses. Y/N was just done with that subject and had heard enough to last her a lifetime. She couldn’t even understand why the girls in their school seemed to be under their spell. In Y/N’s opinion, they aren’t that good looking. Heck, even Mr. Cold Eyes Jinyoung was much more handsome. ‘Especially if they saw last night’s picture. How come they don’t talk about it?!’

“Ji Woo looked handsome today too!”

‘Oh come on, even Youngjae looks better than that guy.’ At the thought of her bestfriend, she turned to glance at him. He seemed to have caught her and gave him those warm sunny smiles that made her heart beat a bit faster. Even if she doesn’t consider her childhood friend as a man, she’s sure that he’s a good looking guy.

//next

#got7 #got7 fanfic #got7 scenarios #got7 imagines #jackson wang #park jinyoung #kim yugyeom #mark tuan #bambam #choi youngjae #im jaeboem #got7 fic #my seven idols

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authorofdanger · 5 years

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Idol Pains

Yoongi x reader

Angst with slight fluff

I'm sorry if this is a sore topic for anyone!

Walking towards the dorms I was hoping the boys were home by now, or atleast Seokjin with a homemade meal. Today was my first time guest starring on Weekly Idol to help promote my new solo career. It is a big step and I'm excited to see where this path takes me.

"Boys I'm home," I called as I opened our front door to be greeted with an amazing smell in the kitchen and the sounds of video games in the living room. "That's now fair Kookie," Taehyung whined as Jungkook passed him in Mario kart. "Its perfectly fair! How is it not?" Making my way past them without blocking the screen for too long, I wandered into the kitchen where Jin was scolding Joon for how he was cutting the onions, Hoseok and Jimin were watching funny videos at the table, and Yoongi was in the fridge looking for more vegetables for Jin. "Hey you're home," Joon cheered before almost slicing his finger off with the kitchen knife. "Ya Joon this is why you need to pay attention!"

Placing the vegetables on the counter Yoongi made his way towards me and placed a soft kiss to my lips. "So how was it? Did the guys give you a hard time," he asked once he pulled away. "No not really. It was fine for the most part. Speed dances, try to do cover dances of you and TXT's songs, that type of thing. They did ask alot about why I moved from YG to Bighit and why my old group disbanded but I didnt really answer their questions."

"They do know you cant really talk about it yet right," Namjoon asked, "you legally cant." Shrugging my shoulders I simply laughed it off and sighed "it's fine. It wasn't of ill intent, just curiosity." I could tell the boys were seeing right past me but I wasn't going to give anything away. "When does your episode air," Hoseok asked. "Next week," I answered as happily as I could muster, "now tell me Mr.Chef what are we eating tonight."

****

"You know with you not telling us much about the show it worries us right," Yoongi sighed as I slipped into my sleep clothes. "I'm just trying to save alot of it as a surprise! Why cant you just be excited for me?" Pulling himself from the bed and wrapping himself around my back, I could feel his face burry into the back of my neck and I immediately relaxed in his touch. "I am Jagi. I'm just nervous as well. I know how nasty those men could get and I know how touchy the subject of YG is for you. Just dont be scared to talk to us okay? Hell I dont care if you talk to Jimin! Just someone?" Turning myself around and kissing the top of his nose I gave him a soft smile before pulling him into the bed. He laid his body ontop of mine and placed random kisses to my lips while rubbing my sides in a soothing manner. When it was just us two he was always the biggest cuddle bug, something the other members would never believe.

"I just want you comfortable and safe," he whispered on my lips. "With you how could I not be?"

***one week later***

The eight of us all sat down on the couch together while preparing the couch for my episode of Weekly Idol. "My best friend is going to be on TV," Jin squealed. "What about us hyung," Jimin fake whined. "Ah your my members! I am forced to like you people." Slapping him on his arm I let out a soft laugh right as the show was starting. My body tensed up in nerves as the show started. On the speed dancing I did fine until they played one of my old group's songs. You could see my body freeze and my face drop for a split second before I faked a smile and danced my parts to the song. It then continued into BTS's Fire and TXT's new song Run Away. "I dont see how you made it solo with your moves! You dance like a flailing fish," one of the hosts laughed. This made the boys turn and look at me in anger but we continued to watch as the dance segments came to an end. "Its a surprise that you were able to stay in the industry after your group disbanded, especially as a foreigner! What caused the split in your group?"

Questions like this continued along with comparisons and slight jabs here and there. All of this combined caused Namjoon to shut off the TV and turn his attention to me. Yoongi forced me to look at him, tears threatening to fall but I fought to keep them in. "Why didnt you tell us? This isnt okay," he whispered. "This is bullshit," Taehyung roared, "they always do this to foreign idols you know? They act like Y/N doesnt understand what they are doing! What they are saying!" "Taehyung be quiet before you bother the neighbors," Jungkook hushed while trying to calm his raging friend but nobody could be calmed. They were all angry.

"I'm sorry," I muttered while pulling myself off the couch and into the bathroom where I could lock myself in for just a few moments to regain my composure. Curling my body on the floor I tried to bury my sobs into my arm to hide the hurt I was feeling.

It wasn't my fault one of my member's got sick, it wasn't my fault none of us got along, it wasn't my fault how our manager treated us! All that is my fault is my choice to move companies after the disbandment! Why is it I have to be punished for it! I trained so hard and for so long but for what?

"Sweetheart open the door," Yoongi coaxed while knocking on the door softly. "Not right now. I need a minute," I whimpered. I listened as someone jiggled the lock, probably Jungkook, and curled in tighter when it finally opened. "Y/N," Yoongi hushed. His arms wrapped around my body and rocked me back and forth, something the members normally do when I am this upset. "I'm calling our manager," I heard Namjoon tell the others, "there has to be something we can do." "Hyungs look at social media! She is getting alot of comments and tags on Twitter and Instagram," Jungkook called.

"I need to see," I muttered. Crawling out of his grasp, I stumbled into the living room to watch as Jungkook showed me the posts and comments.

'I dont see how people still go on and watch this show. Idols go through enough these days and even TV hosts treat them like this? #idolsarehumantoo #thisishowbadshithappens'

'This girl goes through enough! She hasn't done anything wrong either! How can anyone treat our innocent Maknae like this?'

'I want to see these fools do what she does! Train for six years, learn a new language, scratch that FOUR because she had a foreigner based group, worked hard performing for nearly three years, and then has her group disbanded from things out of her control! But she still manages to keep going! Give the girl a break, she deserves what she works for!'

The comments warmed my heart a bit, even with the occasional hate comment here and there. Nuzzling into Jungkook's side I took comfort that there were people out there who still stand by me, who still want me. "I contacted our managed. He cant change what had happened but he did say we can start putting Y/N in BTS run videos. That way she can get a bit better publicity as a Bighit member," Namjoon announced.

Yoongi sat down next to me and pulled me into his chest. "Are you going to be okay," he whispered in my ear before leaving a soft kiss to my temple. "I dont know yet. Only time can tell."

#bts #bts taehyung #bts imagines #bts jhope #bts suga #bts namjoon #bts jk #bts jungguk #bts jin #bts jimin #bts v #bts rm #bts yoongi #bts hosoek #bts jungkook #bts angst #bangtan sonyeondan #bangtan #bangtan au

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sabraeal · 5 years

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Thy Body Under My Command

Obiyuki AU Bingo Fate/stay night AU

Some dialogue is directly from this Fate/stay night AU comic @septhi made for last year’s bingo

Dawn breaks over Wistal as it always has, pierced by the jagged teeth of the city’s skyscrapers, a dark maw awaiting the sun’s offering. Shirayuki’s hands don’t even shake as she buttons her blazer, not even when she realizes the red is the same color as the blood that had been on them only hours ago, running down the drain of the sink as she struggled to get them clean, to remove every last trace of the night that had dried on her skin.

Obi is waiting for her as always, looking entirely normal in the school’s uniform, nothing like he had last night, nearly bleeding out on the floor of the Seiran estate.

“Ojou-san,” he greets brightly, falling into step with her. “Good morning.”

Even when he’d arrived, breaking half the pots in her gardening shed, she’d never felt so shy around him so left-footed. “Good morning, Obi.”

He nods, pleased with the completion of their usual morning routine. Still, he’s quiet; ever since he -- well, since she summoned him, accidentally, afraid for her own life -- she’s known no peace, the air constantly full of his chatter.

Aren’t you Assassin? Kiki had asked, only days ago. Shouldn’t you work quietly?

Obi had only shrugged, mouth canted in that strange way of his, half mischief and half melancholy. I wonder...

But he’s been oddly silent, since last night. Almost dying does that to a person.

He keeps his normal pace, walking one step behind her -- she’s told him he shouldn’t, that despite what the rules say, he’s her partner, not her servant, but he never listens -- and when she glances at him from the corner of her eyes, sly, she sees that he’s holding himself stiffly, like he’s pulled a muscle.

“Are you sure you’re okay?” she asks, ducking her head, trying to catch his eyes. Obi jolts in surprise, blinking away the distance in his gaze, and smiles.

“Of course, ojou-san,” he tells her, as bright as always. “It’s only a little scratch.”

Shirayuki doesn’t think having his shoulder run through is just a little scratch, but Obi is covered in scars, a record of all his victories in life. Having another must just seem like business as usual. He breathes, he gets another scar.

She eyes where his uniform gaps -- he refuses to keep it zipped outside of school; Servants may magically have the right knowledge of their current time, but it doesn’t mean they have to like it, if Obi is any indication -- catching the ragged, silvered edge of another scar.

Ah, they are records of his victories, save one. But still, she understands Obi might have trouble telling what is actually a big deal, when he’s used to relocating all his own limbs after a fight.

She doesn’t have to like it, though. “You should let me look at it.”

His eyes round. “Now?”

Cars zoom past them on the street, the high school just visible at the bottom of the hill. They are the farthest away they can be from private.

And yet here he is, pulling at the zipper on his uniform with a sigh, as if she is the incorrigible one --

“No, not now!” she protests, waving her hands, trying to find an angle to shield his undress. She should have known better that to insinuate he needed to take his clothes off, not when he’s always looking for an opportunity to offer. “I meant tonight. At home.”

“Really, ojou-san,” he sighs, zipping his uniform jacket. “It’s not a big deal.”

Shirayuki tilts her chin up, trying to look down her nose on him; a plan that is ruined by the six extra inches he has on her.

“How about you let the mage decide what’s important, Assassin,” she tells him, feigning haughtiness. The both of them know she’s just barely scraping the requirements, and half of her clout is just the fact that he exists.

Obi laughs, shaking his head. “Of course, Master. I shall defer to your superior wisdom.”

“Good.” She levels him with the sort of rich girl glare only Kiki could pull off without looking entirely ridiculous. “I’m glad you understand how these things work.”

His mouth twitches, just at one corner and -- and it’s impossible to keep up the act, if he’s going to break like this! Her giggle bursts out of her, and his follows, making her duck her chin, cheeks flushed.

“Ah, ojou-san,” he sighs, rubbing at the back of his head. “A mage like you should have been matched with one of the noble classes.”

Shirayuki blinks. “What would make you say that?”

For a moment he stills, but then he shoves his hands in his pockets, giving her his most self-deprecating smile. “Ah, well, you like to leap before you look. Someone like Mitsuhide-danna would at least keep you safe during hair-raising things like that.”

She gives him a reproachful look. “You keep me safe just fine.”

A breath huffs out of him, doubt etched on every line of his face. “You’d do better in this game with someone more suited to your...style.”

“Well.” She puffs up her chest, trying to seem like an authority, to live up to the title Master, even if the top of her head is only level with his chin. “You’ve got me, and I’m not giving up on you. Or the Holy Grail.”

“Haah.” He looks like she’s punched him. “Right.”

“Come on.” She nudges him with her shoulder. “We don’t want to be late.”

He lags slightly behind her as they walk down the hill, and when she sneaks a look at him from the corner of her eyes, she sees his hand lift, sees it settle on his shoulder and squeeze.

There are only a handful of people she can go to for -- for Master things; it’s not like her father left her anything, and nearly any mage worth their salt has summoned up a Servant for this War, but --

There’s at least one in her corner.

“Have you seen Obi?”

Zen looks up from his bento; it’s pale pink, rice balls shaped into smiling kitty faces and fruits pressed into flowers and hearts. Not something the Wisteria’s fifty-year-old French chef would have made for him, no matter how good a mood he woke up in this morning. Shirayuki forbids herself from thinking too hard about which girl in their class did. He is the class prince; it would be more of a surprise to see him without a stack of lunches, carefully prepared by his bolder admirers.

That doesn’t make this, well, more comfortable.

“Wasn’t he just here?” He blinks, craning his neck to look at Obi’s empty seat. “Did you lose him already? You should really keep a tighter rein on him. If you’re caught without your Servant --“

“Yes.” She knows all too well what happens when she lets Obi wander away from her side. “I -- he’s just talking to Kiki.”

Zen leans back, and she knows the moment when he sees him; something subtle in his face relaxes, and his mouth spreads into a smile. It’s nice see, but --

But she knows that Zen must wonder if Obi was meant to be his, if she hadn’t bumbled along, summoning the last Servant out from under him. It’s better this way -- at least now it won’t be him facing off against his brother at the end of this war, deciding how much blood it would take for the Grail to appear, but...still. Whenever he allows himself that wistful expression, she just feels like an interloper that stumbled into this whole magic business, even if her father is some -- some famous mage.

After all, it’s not like he prepared her for any of this.

“I meant, have you looked at him today?” she clarifies, wishing she sounds less shrill, less unsure.

At least Zen doesn’t seem to notice; he just turns grim, assessing. “Is something wrong?”

“Yes. No. I don’t know.” She shrugs with her whole body, at a loss. “Obi says he’s fine, but -- something doesn’t feel right. And he seems...stiff, I guess. Not moving like how he usually does.”

They both peer out the door, watching him talking animatedly with Kiki. He’s all chaotic motion, limbs flying everywhere as he tells his story, Kiki’s mouth curling up into a reluctant smile. Part of her is glad to see it, happy he’s making friends, that he can charm even stoic Kiki Seiran into liking him, but --

But the other part does not miss his wince when he gestures a hair too far, does not miss how his hand flies to his shoulder, rubbing it as if it aches.

Zen settles back, mouth thin. “Hm.”

“Hm?” She drops into the seat next to him. “What does that mean?”

“It just...doesn’t look like it healed,” he remarks, and Shirayuki just bites back, oh, do you think? He’s trying to help her, she’s just -- impatient. If Obi’s in pain she wants to help him now, not after Zen is done leading her down the garden path.

“Why?” she says instead. “It’s never taken so long.”

“Rider’s hit must have damaged some of his magic circuitry.” Zen stares out the door, mouth twisting with concern. “He can’t passively get enough mana from you to both exist and heal. And since your summoning was well --” a complete and utter accident -- “untraditional...”

“He can’t go incorporeal and heal himself that way.” Shirayuki lets out a long breath and nods. “How do I fix it?”

“Well,” Zen drawls, suddenly too much like his brother. “If you were a trained mage, you could do it through active transfer, but --” he glances at her, guilty -- “I don’t think you have those sorts of skills.”

She could have, if only her father had stuck around to teach her properly. “There isn’t another way?”

“Um.” Zen’s face flushes, eyes darting to look anywhere else but at her. “N-no! I think you just might, ah, have to, you know, let it...heal itself?”

Her mouth pulls thin. “How long will that take?”

“Ah...” Zen grimaced. “I don’t know, exactly. But...a while.”

“Oh.” Her hands clench in her skirt. This is the Holy Grail War. As little as she likes it, she needs him in top condition now, if they’re both going to survive.

Zen shrugs, but it’s stiff, like he had an itch. “Don’t worry, Shirayuki,” he says, hardly sincere. “I’m sure it will work itself out.”

After running into Rider, Shirayuki can’t say she’s too confident in that. Especially not with two other servants unaccounted for.

His hand rests gently on her shoulder, and he smiles so kindly when she meets his eyes. “Kiki will protect you.”

Chain-link bites into the soft flesh of her fingers, but Shirayuki doesn’t let go, just rests her body on the fence. She’s so light it barely chimes at all. The baseball field is empty this evening with curfew still in place, and she can’t help but think that if she hadn’t been in the wrong place, that if she hadn’t gotten so lucky, she would be at home now too, worrying about all the strange deaths in Wistal.

Now she doesn’t have to. She knows exactly who is causing them, what is causing them.

Maybe she would have been happier not.

Obi laughs, dodging another of Mitsuhide’s heavy blows. He’s not in uniform anymore, instead in his battle gear, skin-tight and cape fluttering, mouth canted in a cocky grin, and --

And even so, she can’t make herself regret this. Any of it.

Obi falls for Mitsuhide’s feint, only just saving himself with a quick cut of his short sword. Metal hits metal with a shriek and --

And Obi flinches, his other hand coming up to grasp his shoulder until he stops himself, until he shakes it off.

Shirayuki grimaces. She doesn’t regret anything, save for that.

“That hasn’t healed well,” Kiki remarks, fence jingling as she comes to lean beside her.

“No,” she agrees, watching as Mitsuhide stops, leaning in to clap Obi on the shoulder. The other one, she can’t help but notice. “Zen says his magic circuitry must be damaged after last night.”

Kiki eyes her with a blend of wariness and incredulity that she is coming to realize is distinctly Kiki’s. Shirayuki bites her lip, pretending that her attention is fully on the fight, not -- not thinking about how she’s so tired of being treated like she’s, well, stupid.

Intellectually, she knows that despite their truce, Kiki is an enemy, one she shouldn’t be handing over her weaknesses to on a platter. But at the same time, she’s the only other person she can talk to, whose ideas on the bond of Servant and Master aren’t just all academic. Zen can help her only so far, but Kiki -- Kiki has practical knowledge, as much as someone can have, without having already survived a Grail War.

That’s the kind of information Shirayuki could only get from her father. Too bad he isn’t around to give it.

“Aren’t you going to fix it?”

Shirayuki blinks. “Zen said it would fix itself, with time.”

Time they don’t have.

“We don’t have that kind of time,” Kiki tells her, as if she weren’t already aware. “He needed to be fixed yesterday. You, of all people, can’t have your Servant be weak like this.”

Shirayuki ducks her chin, hoping Kiki can’t see the flush across her cheeks. She’s well aware that she has limitations the rest of them don’t have, that she doesn’t belong in this war of mages, that she barely belongs in magical society in general. Even if her dad did, it wasn’t as if he’d left any of that for her, not like how Kiki is branded with the Seiran crest, the culmination of every mage her family has ever produced.

And if she ever forgot, Obi was always around to remind her. She was lucky; as soon as she’d put the school uniform on him, Obi had transformed from deadly assassin to handsome school boy. If she’d summoned a Servant like Mitsuhide --

Well, it was good Kiki was a top-notch mage. Shirayuki wasn’t even sure the uniforms came that big.

“I’m not a real mage,” Shirayuki reminds her, every word like a knife. “I can’t do a transfer spell.”

“I know that.” Kiki waves her hand, as if she hadn’t even considered the option. “Why don’t you just do it the other way?”

Shirayuki’s head snaps toward her. “There’s another way?”

Kiki stares, at a loss for words. “Zen didn’t tell you?”

She shakes her head. “He said there wasn’t one.”

“Well,” Kiki drawls, voice thick with sarcasm, “isn’t that surprising.”

“Please,” Shirayuki pleads, fingers catching in Kiki’s sleeve, making her eyes as big and desperate as she can. “Do you know another one? I can’t leave Obi like this.”

For a long moment, Kiki stares at her, considering. It reminds her of the only time she’s met Izana, his icy eyes taking her in without comment and assessing her threat to him.

Kiki must come to the same conclusion as him and sighs.

“Mana is in you, Shirayuki.” She eyes her warily. “Are you sure no one has ever taught you this? Not at all?”

“No,” she says with an emphatic shake of her head. “I was raised by my mother’s parents. They didn’t know anything about magic.”

Kiki lets out a long breath, utterly still beside her.

“Mana is in every part of you,” she says after a moment, softer, as if she were trying to teach a child. “That’s why some mages sell their blood when the family fortune runs out. I hear it sells for a hefty bit of cash.”

“Why would people buy it?” Shirayuki asks, wide-eyed.

“To drink, of course.” Kiki says it as if it were the most obvious thing in the word, as if she were the silly one for thinking someone wouldn’t drink blood.

“People drink mage blood?” Somehow, out of all the supernatural reveals she’s been privy to over the last few days, it’s this one that is the most outlandish. “Why?”

“For power.” Kiki shakes her head. “There’s no limit to what a mage will do for power. You should know this, after last night.”

Her mouth thins. Yes, she’s learned that lesson all too well, now.

“So, I just need him to drink my blood?” She’s not sure how he’ll take that request; in terms of things she could ask him, Master to Servant, it’s mild, but still. “How much? Is it just a few drops, or should I be worrying about getting needles and syringes?I think the nurse might let me have a tourniquet if --”

“Shirayuki,” Kiki laughs, waving her hand. “There’s a much, much easier way.”

She considers the bodily fluids she has available to her and decides, “I really don’t think I could spit in his mouth.”

Kiki stares. “That was absolutely not about to be my next suggestion, but thank you for that delightful image that will almost certainly haunt me for years to come.”

“Does it have something to do with crying?” she asks, even more confused. There can’t be anything easier than that, though crying enough tears to drink seems like an insurmountable task.

“Shirayuki, no.” Kiki’s lips twitch. “That is not what I meant.”

“Well,” she sighs, frustrated. “I’m fresh out of bodily fluids!”

She does not like the way Kiki’s lip quirks. “Are you?”

“Oh,” Shirayuki murmurs, too short a time later. “Oh.”

Kiki’s teeth flash in a feral smile. “I thought that might be your reaction, yes.”

“I’m supposed to--” the words won’t come -- “and he’d supposed to...?”

“Yes.” Kiki stiffens beside her, tense. “After we fought Berserker, my mana was just barely keeping Mitsuhide together. His circuits were far too damaged, and unless I wanted to weaken myself trying to force the mana into him...”

“Oh.” She’s never heard Kiki talk like this, admit she was anything other than utterly prepared for any eventuality. It’s...nice to know she’s human too, even if she’s also a world-class mage, destined to be picked up by the Clock Tower after this is all over. “I hadn’t even realized.”

“No, you wouldn’t have.” Her mouth curls with satisfaction. “He recovered...quite nicely, afterward.”

“Are you going to work, ojou-san?” Obi asks as he walks out of the changing room, uniform jacket still half unzipped. Above the vee of his t-shirt, the raised ridge of his death scar peeks out. She’s seen his clothes ripped to ribbons, blood coating his skin, but she’s never seen the whole of that scar, never seen the thing that killed him.

But she would, if she listened to Kiki.

She jolts, shaking her head. She can’t think about this right now, not when he’s talking to her. “Yeah.”

“Okay.” His fingers tug at the zipper, and she -- she’s always noticed how long his fingers are, how slender, but now her skin feels hot looking at them, thinking of the way he could so easily hold her in those hands, how his grip is so strong she could bruise -- “Just give me a minute, and I can --”

“No!” This is -- she needs to think about this, and she just can’t if he’s around, making things -- things difficult. “You should go home and rest. I can take care of myself for a night.”

“Ojou-san,” he protests, mouth pulling into a hard, disapproving line, and --

And she should really, really not be thinking about how easy it would be to wipe that expression off his face. These are not very -- very Masterly thoughts.

“You’re already hurt,” she tells him. “And you need to keep up your strength. We don’t know who the other two mages are, or their Servants.”

“That’s the perfect reason for me to --”

“If they haven’t come for us already, they don’t know who we are.” She thinks of Rider, of how he and his mage are still out there, nursing their wounds. “Or they are waiting for the rest of us to kill each other. Either way, they aren’t going to be checking a drug store for a Master.”

“Everyone needs aspirin, ojou-san,” he protests, but he knows she’s right. Mages are used to power and money; her after school job is the best cover she never asked for. Even Kiki had been surprised.

“If anything happens, I can just call you to me.” She lifts her hand, showing him the jagged lines on the back of her hand. One of them is already smudged and dim, a legacy from their less than ideal first meeting. He scowls when he sees it.

“It would be better if you didn’t waste a Command Seal to get me,” he tells her. “You’ve already done that once.”

“I wouldn’t have had to, if you had been nice,” she reminds him.

“I was stubborn.”

“Telling me I’m your Master, and then saying I’m too stupid to command you isn’t stubborn,” she says with a quelling look. “It’s mean.”

His mouth curves, gaze tilting down, and she knows he’s laughing at himself. “No arguments here, ojou-san.” He slides his hands into his pockets with a resigned sigh. “All right, I’ll heal at home. But you’ll call me if anything happens.”

She puts her hand on his elbow, drawing his gaze down her. Maybe it’s just the light, but his eyes seem more amber today, like melted honey instead of cold coin.

Now is a really bad time to notice that.

“Always,” she tells him with a smile. His narrow brows arch upward and -- and he smiles too, warm and trusting.

That-- that’s not fair, him being so handsome. “I’ll be waiting, ojou-san.”

“I’m home,” Shirayuki calls out, toeing her shoes off into the waiting tray. Obi’s shoes are there as well, scuffed up Oxfords Kiki thought her father wouldn’t miss, but the house itself is dark, cold.

Dread claws at her, but she pushes it down, lets reason rule her instead of fear and habit. There’s still a draw on her mana, tiring but satisfying, an invigorating buzz just under her skin. He’s nearby, he’s safe.

She pads into the main house, socks muffling her footsteps as she makes her way across the wood floor, first looking into the kitchen, then into his room, then into hers. All of them lay empty, though his room does have his school bag on the floor, and his school uniform balled up in the hamper. There’s only one other place he could possibly be.

There’s a flagstone path to the dojo, and Shirayuki hops along it, wincing as she nearly misses a step, toe scraping into the gravel. She’s lost enough stockings already to this Grail War, she’s rather not have another casualty just walking across her own yard.

The door slides easily under her hands; only a week ago it had barely moved, swollen and crooked from disuse, but now it glides silently on its path, planed and reset by Obi’s own hands. It’s the same for the rest of the dojo; tatami replaced and floors shined, looking like it must have back when her father still used it. Obi’s only been here days, and already this place has been changed.

She doesn’t like to think what will happen when he leaves. After all, the Grail War can’t last forever.

The dojo is dark inside, just like the rest of the house, but her eyes adjust quicker this time, used to the dim. It takes her no time at all to make out his shape knelt over on the floor, oddly broad shoulders tapering down to a lean waist, the sort of body made for dexterity, not power.

That only reminds her of what Kiki said, of that -- that other way to heal him, and she had to grip the door to keep from bolting, from just pivoting on her heel and flying back to the house. She could just -- pretend she was asleep. That was a good excuse to give to Kiki tomorrow. She’d just fallen asleep --

“Ahh,” he hisses, palm slapping the floor. “Fuck.”

His fingers dig into the mat, rigid with pain. She blinks, chest clenching as she follows the tension up the stark lines of his arm to his shoulder, to where he sits, body contorted, one hand clenching at his wound. It’s hard to see his his face in the dark, but his teeth gleam, mouth pulled into a grimace.

She’s never seen him like this before, never seen him weak. “Obi?”

He jolts, hand dropping at lightning speed. He spins around, a bright smile painted on his face. There’s no hint of the agony she saw, no tell-tale wince or grimace. It is as if it were a dream, a nightmare borne of her own guilt.

It is too bad for him that she knows for certain that she is awake. In fact, she has never been less tired in her life.

“Ojou-san! You’re back.” His mouth widens into a playful grin. “Welcome home!”

She stares. There is nothing else she can do, now when she knows that all of this is -- is little more than kabuki, an act played out for solely her benefit. Obi is in pain, in agony, and here he sits on his knees, pretending that all is well, that he can keep her safe, while all the while the guilt must be gnawing at him, anxiety building as he wonders when the next Master will attack, what death he will have to defy with such a painful handicap.

He twists, turning to face her, and his t-shirt gapes, letting her see that ragged scar across his chest, the wound that set him in the record. The one where he was left bleeding and alone in a forest while he died. No one helped him then, and now --

Now that decides her.

Her bag hits the floor with a thunk, books spilling out from the top, scattering across the tatami, but she doesn’t care, doesn’t even think of it. She just takes a step forward, up into the dojo, and then another, and then another, until it’s just rhythm, until it’s just the pounding of her heart.

“Ojou-san?” His amber eyes watch her warily, concern and confusion mingling as his hands lifting to catch her hips, to stop her, but she drops to her knees before he can. His hands settle on her shoulders instead, loose and unsure, as if he hasn’t touched her before, as if he hasn’t just lifted her straight off the ground and leapt across the city with her in his arms.

Or maybe it’s because he hasn’t touched her like this, without danger and necessity dodging their steps. He hasn’t touched her because he wants to. But he does, he does, she can see it right in his eyes, in the way his hands hover as if she’s too precious to touch.

That won’t do at all.

“Ojou-san?” he tries again, a nervous quiver lifting his pitch. “What’s h--haah.”

His breath puffs into her mouth as she closes the distance between them, as she threads her hand behind his neck and drags him down. His dry lips meet hers, and there’s -- there’s something, a spark, and she leans in to chase it --

He jerks back, like he’s been shocked, hands leaping from her to clench on his lap. His bones shine stark white against the bronze of his skin, turned silver in the moonlight. She’s always been fascinated with the human body, with the composition of the skeleton and the way muscles and tendons cling to bone, but this is the first time she’s ever thought it was beautiful.

“Ojou-san!” His chest heaves, knocking against the arm that still holds him. Her thumb brushes over the arch of his cheekbone, and she can feel the heat against her skin, even if the light won’t let her see it. “What -- what are you--?”

Her fingers hook into the thick bristle of his hair, shivering as it tickles her palms, and she draws him down again.

He groans against her mouth, a pained, broken thing. Heat spikes unbearably in her, spearing the place between her legs, and her hand clenches with a whimper. If it pains him, he doesn’t let it slow him; instead he just cants his head, swallowing the sound down, tongue flicking through the space it’s left, licking teasingly against her teeth and she -- she wriggles, the dull ache of her sex too insistent to ignore.

It’s -- it’s a lot. More than she’s used to, with her experience limited to prime time TV and daydream.

Shirayuki sits back on her heels slowly, their lips parting with a gentle pop that makes her want to lean back in, that makes her want to try Obi’s trick with his tongue against his own lips --

But she doesn’t. She sits, she waits. Finally, he opens his eyes with a rasping breath, his gaze clouded with confusion.

And desire, she realizes with a hitch of her own breath. His eyes are on her lips, and she knows he’s thinking the same as her, that there’s both too little and too much space between them.

She reaches out, drawing his hand into her own, and taps his wrist. It’s the only thing that gets him to look away, that makes him focus where she needs him to -- though maybe not where she wants him --

“Oh,” he breathes, and this time, it’s easy to see the pink sitting high along his cheekbones, what with the way his circuit in glowing. “Oh.”

She looks down, watching it pulse faintly, like a heartbeat. The same one she can feel fluttering beneath her fingertips, as wild as her own. Ah, he may only be a hero’s spirit, but right here, right now, he’s human enough.

“Kiki told me there was another way to heal you.” Her thumb rubs gently over the skin of his wrist, wondering at how it is as thin and delicate as any other person’s. It’s so easy to forget that despite his power, despite his past, in this form he’s just like any other man.

“Haah.” He’s tense under her, as if he wants to pull away, but he doesn’t, just lets her pet at his pulse, motionless. “Kiki-jou, huh? That’s...unexpected.”

“I can’t do the ritual.” The shame burns at her even now. “I’m not enough of a mage --”

“Ojou-san!” Obi frowns, shaking his head. “You are as much of a mage as any--”

“Obi,” she says quietly, gently, and he calms. “It’s all right.”

“I know. I just...” His hand twists in hers, until their palms touch, until he can wrap his fingers around hers and squeeze. “You are enough, ojou-san. You have always been enough.”

Her chest is too tight, too small to contain both her breath and her heart together, and so it bursts out of her in a graceless pant.

“I can’t do the ritual,” she tries again, the words little more than a whisper. “But I can do something else. Something less complex.”

“Well,” he wheedles, “I wouldn’t say less complex --”

Kiki had said that it was a waste of a seal, that a true Master compelled obedience through the contract, through their power, but Shirayuki had none of that when Obi arrived, cocky and insubordinate. She knows now that such a vague command should have never worked, should have been useless with her inexperience --

But it hooked into Obi strongly that night, remained strong in him even now. She’s always been so careful since, using will you instead of do this, wording simple requests in a way that allows him the chance to say no.

But she doesn’t now.

“Tell me the truth.”

The command thrums through him, thrums through the both of them, but it’s different than before. It was not a whip crack but a whisper, not grasping hands but a come-hither look that leaves pleasure fizzling under her skin.

One look at Obi tells her that her own reaction is just backlash, just a ghost of what he feels; his head is thrown back, eyelashes fluttering at half-mast, breath laboring out of him in ragged pants.

“Yes,” he gasps. “Yes, it will heal me.”

“Good.”

It’s her that tugs on his hand, that draws him back to her, but it’s him that groans against her mouth, hands clutching at the back her head as if he’s adrift, as if he’s drowning, and only her kisses are keeping him afloat. Funny, since it’s her that is lost, her that is clutching to his jeans, to his shirt, trying to hold herself to the earth as his lips move against hers, as his tongue once more slides into her, licking at her teeth, coaxing her own to move against his.

Her neck aches as she tries to chase his kisses, tries to extended that delicious frisson of their lips meeting and parting. He shifts to get closer, knee brushing hers, and it occurs to her all at once that this is too far, that this polite distance between their bodies is not only unnecessary, but unwanted.

Her hands reach out blindly, feeling along the floor until she brushes his thighs, feels the worn denim underneath her palms. He gasps against her lips at the touch, and she puts her hands flush against him, kneading the muscles beneath with enough strength to make him moan, to make him pull away with a laugh.

“What do you think you’re doing, ojou-san?” he murmurs, kissing at the corner of her mouth. “Causing trouble?”

Her eyes narrow at that, at the way he laughs as if the thought of her trying to -- to incite something is ridiculous, and she crawls forward, laying one knee on either side of his lap.

“If I am?” she asks, staring down at him, relishing the way his mouth has slacked and his pupils have gone wide.

“Please,” he breathes, pulling her down to him, bringing her flush against his lap. “Don’t stop.”

His thighs feel like steel under her, and she cannot help but think about how close she is to him, how so few layers keep her from what Kiki had described in detail, and --

And she wants it. That.

Obi’s hands smooth up the backs of her legs, slender fingers dragging against her stockings. His smile curls against her lips as she whimpers into his mouth, until --

Until he hits the end of them, just higher than mid-thigh, and lets out a noise more fit for a wounded animal than a man. He grips her thighs hard, bruising, as if he’s trying to control himself, to keep from taking her right there.

Now it is her turn to smile, to gently pry each finger on one of his hands off her thigh and glide it up, past where here stockings end, and hook one tip under the elastic of her panties.

“Ojou-san?” he murmurs, confused, hopeful. In the darkness, his eyes still shine amber.

“Take them off.”

“Are--?”

“Take them off.”

The rip is deafening in the dojo.

“Did you--?” She gapes, looking at the ragged remains of her kitten panties in his hand, at the mischievous smile on his face. “Did you tear them?”

“You told me to take them off, ojou-san,” he says far too innocent, tossing the offending fabric far into the dojo, out of sight.

“Those cost 2000 yen,” she protests breathlessly, distracted by the drag of his fingers up her thighs, to the throbbing heat between them. He cups her ass in both of his hands and squeezes. “Obi!”

“You should have been more specific, ojou-san.” His thumbs tease her, right where her thighs meets her body, so close to where she wants them, but not there. “Your wish, after all, is my command.”

“I’m pretty sure my command is your command,” she tells him, grabbing at his hand. She drags it over the front of her thigh, placing his fingertips right over her slit. “Touch me, Obi.”

His jaw drops, breath rushing out of him all at once, and for a moment, he sits there, frozen. She presses her hand against his, dropping an encouraging kiss against his lips and finally, finally, he moves.

A finger parts her folds, and this -- this all seemed like a good idea just a moment ago, when the heat from just his kisses had left her throbbing and tight, but now two of his fingers trace her slit, teasing the tight bud of her clit, and --

And it’s so much worse; his touch leaves her gasping against his shoulder, pulling at the fabric of his shirt, trying anything to get him closer, faster. He hums, too pleased with himself, and when she lifts her head to -- to tell him something, if only he’ll stop teasing -- he slips a single finger in.

“Aah!” She yanks at his shirt, pulling up at its hem until he’s half tangled in it, collar over his head, sleeves stuck at the elbows.

“Ojou-san,” he laughs, dragging that finger her out of her so slow, making sure she feels every second of it. “So impatient.”

Her face is already flushed, but it burns now as she watches his stomach flex, as she sees the white cotton fall away to find the glow beneath it is blinding. The moment her shirt leaves his hands, sailing on the same trajectory as her destroyed panties, she grabs him, urging his fingers inside as she bears down, tongue licking into his slack mouth.

She can hardly think with him touching her like this; with one finger it had been a tease, but two makes her think of the thing pressing hard against her thigh, straining against the denim of his jeans, and she wants it, wants him in her so badly it’s a palpable need.

Her fingers trace down his chest, hesitating at the scar bisecting his chest. It’s an ugly thing, flesh knotted and poorly healed. The cut that killed him.

Shirayuki brushes it idly, her need cooling as she considers it, and the pulse of his fingers slow so that he can watch her.

“I wish,” she says, so soft, “that you hadn’t been alone.”

She bends down and presses her lips to it, gentle.

“Fuck,” he murmurs, and it’s all the warning she has before he grabs her, dragging her mouth to his, and devours.

The way he moves in her leaves her gasping, panting, mindless, her own hands desperately sliding down smooth skin and raised scars and burning circuits to the dark trail of hair on his belly. She hooks one finger around the waistband of his jeans, thumb rubbing thoughtfully at the button and --

And Obi jerks away from her, leaving her empty, hot.

“We don’t need to do more than this,” he tells her, panting beneath her hands. His own hover awkwardly at her sides, as if he’s afraid to touch her, as if he’s afraid he won’t be able to stop, if he does. “This is -- this will be enough.”

“Do you not want to?” She’s not sure how she’s still talking, with so little air in her lungs.

Obi lets out a weak laugh, gaze fixed to where her shirt gapes open and the soft cups of her bra are bared. Ah, so his other hand has been busy too. “Oh, ojou-san, doesn’t every man want to --?”

“Obi.” Her hand presses down against the bulge, watching as his eyes rolls back, his jaw going slack. “Tell me the truth.”

That frisson goes through them again, and he twitches hard against her thigh. “Yes. I want to.” His hands grip at her waist, kneading. “I want you.”

His admission bares him to her more than nakedness, and she -- she could not be more ready for him, wet slicking her thighs, her fingers fumbling at the button of his jeans. She’s not strong, not like Obi, but Shirayuki nearly puts a rent next to his zipper trying to work him free. He’s laughing into her mouth, hands busy with her own blouse, confounding matters when he drags it down her shoulder, tangling in her elbows, and she --

She doesn’t have time for this. Shirayuki lets go one him with a growl, shucking her shirt to the floor, but she’s back on him the moment she’s free of it, one hand flicking open the button, the other working the zipper.

He gasps, breath catching in his throat as she wraps her hand around his cock; she pumps him once and his hips nearly clear the floor.

Ah, he may act smug, but Shirayuki doubts there’s much of this happening in the heroic record. It’s nothing to sit over him, to guide him right to where she needs him and --

Oh! The pinch is sharp, though not unpleasant, but it does give her pause, makes her wonder if this is a -- a larger undertaking than she’s prepared for.

“Ah, ojou-san.” Just the tip of him is in her, but Obi is panting against her chest, kissing every inch of skin he can reach, moaning as if he could come from just this. “Ojou-san, don’t -- don’t --”

She widens the set of her knees, dropping down another inch, and his hands fly to her thighs, digging in with a grip hard enough to bruise. A wounded sound tears from his chest with each uncomfortable inch she takes, and she -- she should mind this strange sensation, this stretching, but instead those noises go straight to her head, straight to where her heat clenches around him, and --

And then stops. Her legs can’t part any more, not while she still expects them to hold her, but she’s not -- not full. She gives a tentative, shallow thrust, trying to see if she can work herself any further down and -- haah, that...that could feel good, if there was only more of it, if only she could take him further in.

Obi’s hands ease on her thighs, gently stroking her with each of her experimental thrusts. He buries his head in the cook of her neck, panting harshly against her collar. Still, she can feel it in him, that want to grab her, to take her --

This isn’t enough, she knows. He would never say so, but her hand is still clasped around the rest of him, and she -- she wants that, wants all of him, wants to know what noises she could wring from him if she did.

Her palm presses to his chest, and his head jerks up, eyes clouded with confusion and desire, but -- but he falls back at her gentle urging, down and down until his shoulders are on the floor and she could sink down on him until--

Ohh, yes, that -- that was better. The stretch is still uncomfortable, but also -- decadent, a pleasure that makes heat rush to her sex, that starts her on a slow, steady rhythm.

A laugh rumbles from Obi’s chest, a pleasant vibration beneath her hands, and then his own are on her, gripping her hips, guiding her into one that’s faster, that makes her drag along him rather than bounce and --

Ah-haah, that is -- is good. Pleasure sparks along her skin, building, building, until it all at once becomes enough, becomes too much --

And through the blinding force of her release, she can feel it, feel the way her energy runs into him, the way it’s filling him --

And the way he fills her in turn, leaving her gasping against his chest, cheek pressed to dewy skin. It takes her a minute to come back to herself, to feel the pressure at her scalp, her back. To realize that he is stroking her as he softens inside her, whispering things that are less words and more sounds, like the way a man might calm an animal, a child.

She might be offended, if she didn’t look, didn’t meet his eyes as see him look at her as if she is not only his master, but -- but his world. “Ojou-san?”

“I think,” she says, words feeling strange and tingly on her tongue. “you should really call me Shirayuki now.”

Obi returned to the baseball field with a spring in his step, waving to his opponent as he saunters across the diamond. “Mitsuhide-danna!”

“Obi.” The Saber nods, gaze sweeping over him. “That arm is moving much better today.”

“What can I say?” Obi shrugs, a grin so salacious pulling at his lips that Shirayuki is sure everyone can tell what they’ve done. “I let ojou-san take good care of me.”

Kiki lets a smirk curl her lips, giving Shirayuki an all-too knowing look. “I just bet you did.”

#obiyukibingo2019 #obiyuki #akagami no shirayukihime #snow white with the red hair #LEMON #fate/stay night AU #my fic #ans #listen if i was gonna write a fate AU #you better believe i was going to take it back to its h-game roots #although it took like 5K to get to the actual sex because I HAVE NO SELF CONTROL #also clearly i have thought about this whole AU far too much #but basically Shirayuki uses her first command seal the same way rin does #although her summoning happens more like Shirou's #but since mukaze's family were mages she actually has some gift for magic #though she's never been trained

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alt-ernativewonderland · 5 years

Text

Make You Smile

Harrison Osterfield x Reader One Shot

Warnings: Swearing + An abundance of Fluff and Banter + Secondhand embarrassment perhaps? Probably some very shitty writing?

It was a lazy fall Sunday afternoon, soon to be evening and because it had looked rather dreary outside this morning (not very unusual for London, of course) you and your housemate Tom had decided to stay in and play Mario Kart all morning in your Pj's feasting on Jaffa cakes and day old pizza.

However by the time noon had just about rolled around your partner in crime (or Mario Kart more accurately speaking) had received an urgent call from his agent requesting his presence immediately for a last minute rescheduled call back for a new film he had been in the process or auditioning for.

Tom felt a little bad leaving you during your Mario marathon so around 15 minutes after he had left, a knock at the door and a familiar hoodie clad face had popped in moments later, seating himself down next to you, taking up a controller for himself.

Tom's best friend. The gorgeous Harrison. Who you may or may not be a little helplessly in love with. Those damned eyes. Could you be blamed? Tom of course suspected something straight off and had been trying to get you to admit it ever since, giving you shit about it every. Single. Day.

"Alright? Tom called, told me you might need a friend he'd said, making himself comfortable and switching Tom's Mario Character for his choice Luigi instead.

This is how it had started out. Now? Now it was all out war.

"You better watch out princess look who's catching up" Harrison taunts.

"Good come a little closer so you can taste this banana i'm about to throw at your stupid green hat"

You fire back aiming the fruit behind you. It hits him dead on sending his cart spinning off the to side of the track, he yells out an obscenity in protest.

"You're in first now but don't get too comfortable you're about to get wrecked with blue shells just wait." He laughs managing to speed back into third place rather quickly.

"Meh me meung meh meh" You mimic back under your breath.

Suddenly the grin etched on your face is wiped clean when your screen goes black from the predicted blue shell.

"NoOoOo you fuck- stupid- fucking- shhhghaarrghh!!!!!!"

"Language, darling Peach that's not very royal of you" He chuckles.

"Shut it you, I can still win this, if you stop trying to distract me with your stupid retorts"

"If you can't bant and play at the same time what even is the point? Also careful what you say there peachy look who's in first" Harrison says grinning while poking a finger at your side.

"Well then who has to watch out for blue shells now huh!" You think up (a little weakly) tingling from the ticklish contact.

You didn't have any blue shells or any sort of random items actually so you decided to play a little dirty instead, palming his face and shoving him off to the side effectively tipping him over, off the lounge and onto the carpeted floor.

"Oi that's cheating you can't do that!"

"All's fair in Mario kart and war my friend" You say as you race toward the finish line, crossing it seconds later.

Immediately you leap from the couch jumping up and down like a little kid on Christmas morning.

"YEEESSS I am the queen of Mario Kart in your FACE Osterfield!" You cackle delightedly down at his hunched over form as he still sits upon the floor, dejected puppy dog expression and all.

Your cheeks are a little warm from all the excitement. And perhaps his adorably put out expression.

"You're princess Peach not queen Peach and whatever you cheated AND anyway we were playing on 150cc that's too fast it wasn't a fair game!"

"Oooooh that's right blame the speed and my genius tactics for your epic 5th loss in a row! Or is it 6th now? I've honestly lost count" You tease him, still giggling a little, sitting back down on the lounge for the next round.

"I'll show you a genius tactic!"

Suddenly he launches himself towards you from the floor, sprawling himself on your lap and tickling mercilessly at your sides.

"Stop! Stop! Please - oh my god Harrison, Harrison please stop I can't - stop - I cant breathe!" You scream at the top of your lungs gasping, laughing uncontrollably at his preferred method of payback.

"This - is what you get - when you play dirty and cheat - to - win!" He says a little out of breath from the effort of holding you down and dodging your pathetic attempts of attack and defence.

"Okay okay okay I'm sorry, I'm sorry please just please okay-"

"Have you had enough yet?"

"YES Harrison PLEASE stop it oh my god" You beg, giggling uncontrollably still.

"What was that? I couldn't quite hear you love"

You could just hear the smirk in his voice, your sight of him effectively lost from the tears of laughter streaming down your face"

"I'M SORRY for shoving you okay truce truce, I surrender! I'm going to die, seriously!"

He laughs a little through tears of his own as he replies "I don't think it's actually possible to die from being tickled but I think you've learned your lesson."

He let's up on the tickling as you clutch your sides protectively, trying to get your breath back.

Although after peaking your eyes open a little, any chance of this is immediately tossed out of the window as you take in his disheveled appearance.

He was wearing that classic angel faced smile that instantly turned into a devilish grin when his starry eyes met your tear filled ones. His sandy blonde curls were sticking up in all directions and his cheeks were flushed from all the exertion. He was absolutely stunning.

Suddenly you both became very aware of the position you were in. He was still sitting firmly in your lap, hands resting gently on the skin of your exposed stomach where your shirt had ridden up a little in all the commotion.

Harrison bit his lip a little as he took you in. You desperately wondered what he could be thinking as your breath hitched a little at the quick flash of his tongue darting over soft pink lips.

The sound of shoes shuffling at the doormat shattered the tense atmosphere, the squeak of the old front door swinging open had you both scrambling to opposite sides of the lounge seconds after. Tom came rushing in to the room.

"Y/n, Y/N! You would not believe - my agent Karen, and-" He stopped as he took in the scene in front of him

"What's...going on here? Harrison I thought you'd have left by now by now mate you do realise it's almost six, yeah?" Tom grinned at the two of you, shooting a knowing look your way.

"We were - we were just playing Mario Kart...still" He cleared his throat a little, reaching for a discarded controller and clutching it upside down in his haste.

"Right-o then if you say so." Tom scoffed, taking the spot on the lounge between Harrison and yourself and winking at your eye roll of a response.

"Are you sure H because you look a little winded there and your face is-" Tom started up again.

"What were you saying about your agent Karen? Thomas?" You piped up, noticing Harrison's embarrassment and glaring at the doe eyed boy beside you.

"Oh yeah! She managed to convince the casting agents to give me a second shot at callbacks because I missed mine from that nasty flu Harrison gave me and the director was so impressed with my 3rd audition that he invited us all out to lunch to get to know ME better because he really wants me to be chosen for the part! He thinks I was born to play Spider man can you believe?"

"No way man! That's incredible!" Harrison exclaimed high fiving his best friend and giving him a few congratulatory pats on the arm.

"I'm so proud of you Tom, honestly, you've worked so hard and you truly deserve this so much! You've been dreaming about this role since we were kids" Your face lights up and you offer a genuinely proud smile toward your best friend of 10 years reaching for a warm hug.

"Thanks guys, I really appreciate it. He mumbles back a little sheepishly into the crook of your neck.

"Well then, I guess this calls for a bit a celebration right? What's say I make some of my world class pasta for dinner tonight?" Harrison stands from the lounge, stretching languidly and heading towards the doorway to put his shoes on.

"Anybody need anything from the shops?"

"I'm good thanks" You reply back, rising from the lounge yourself to stretch.

You don't notice Harrison pausing in tying his shoelaces as you do so, fixated on your movements. Tom raising his eyebrows at him suggestively, then rolling them soon afterwards when his friend is brought out of his daze by his voice.

"Grab me a cornetto would you mate?" He grins, eyes twinkling at his friends dopey expression, reaching for his wallet.

"Nah mate don't even think about it, dinner and desserts on me; So parsley and basil for the pasta, cornetto for Tom aaaand Oreos for Y/n,"

He flips his hoodie up as he prepares to head out into the evening fall breeze.

"Hey I never said I wanted Oreos!" You call out to him, confused.

"Well yeah but I know you want them and even if you say you don't you'll change your mind, like always." He grins knowingly at your squinted eyes and crossed arms.

He heads out and its quiet for a moment, Mario Kart music still playing distantly on the TV.

"So" Tom's accusatory tone follows.

"What." You reply absently still facing the front door.

"What happened while I was out charming my future production team?" He picks up Harrison's discarded controller and flicks the character back over to Mario.

"Erm. Nothing. What? Nothing we were literally playing Mario Kart until you got back that's it." You respond hastily, plonking yourself back down on the lounge, grabbing the other controller and starting a new game.

"Are you sure about that? Because it kind of seemed like I walked in on something a little more than that." He smirked, instantly making it into first place with ease.

"I really have no clue what you could possibly mean." You bite your lip thinking back to just a few moments ago when Harrison had had you practically pinned beneath him, his face flushed and breathless.

"Oh come off it you've been completely infatuated with him for like 6 years now don't even TRY to deny it Y/n." He chuckles shoving playfully at your shoulder trying to distract you from the game but the conversation in itself was distracting enough.

"You know I can here sounds coming from that frog mouth of yours Holland, but all they're saying is 'I'm gonna lose spectacularly'" You shove back, deflecting the attention back to the game at hand, aiming a red shell his way.

He swerves just in time and dodges it

"Damn your expert reflexes" You mumble, not 100 percent paying attention to the game in the first place anyway.

Too preoccupied by memories wayward curls over starry blue eyes and soft smiles.

"I prefer Spidey senses"

"Calm down you dork you haven't got the part quite yet"

"Just you wait when I do and I start getting more and more followers on Instagram I'm going to post it all over my story for my 1 million followers to see; 'Y/N LOVES HARRSION OSTERF-'" Suddenly he has a face full of pillow as you prepare to throw another.

"Shut UP Thomas! Oh my god like you would even GET a million followers in the first place you fucking div" You don't even throw the next pillow at him this time, electing to just pummel him with it for a while until you hear a muffled "Okay okay I'll stop I'll stop I'm sorry don't kill me" As he continues laughing, running his fingers through his frazzled hair the game effectively forgotten.

You sigh as you give up your pillow attack, placing the pillow behind you and resting your head against it with a deep defeated sigh.

You sit in comfortable silence for a moment, both listening to the ever playing Mario Kart theme and taking note of the sudden rainfall that must have just started to during your miniature conflict.

"Okay but I'd just like to reminisce something to you for a moment here." Tom speaks up after the pause in commotion. "Remember when we were kids, and I brought H to your birthday party so you could meet him and I got you that new Sims 2 Pets game?"

"Yeah...?" Suspicious eyes peered over at the boy, wondering where on earth he was going with this.

"Not two weeks after that you'd already made sim versions of the two of you and were planning the wedding, which from the screenshots I vacantly remember browsing through looked to be a beautiful ceremony I might add." He snickered, already scooting away from you and grabbing a nearby pillow off the loveseat, bracing for another attack.

"I'm going to murder you in your sleep tonight, and might III add that I was like eleven when that happened! And I made you too!" You threw the pillow you'd been resting your head on in his direction regardless of his makeshift pillow shield, groaning at the memory and covering your now very warm cheeks.

"I WAS THE DOG YOU GUYS ADOPTED AFTER YOU'D MOVED IN TOGETHER!" His exasperated tone turning into gasps of laughter when he saw your grin peaking out from behind embarrassed hands.

"At least you were a golden retriever puppy! That's a super cute dog! I could have made you as a hairless cat with huge disfigured eyes or something equally strange and disturbing."

"Something equally strange and disturbing is the title of yours and Osterfield's Sims 2 honeymoon sex tape." He clapped back, already on his feet and sprinting off towards the kitchen.

"I hate you!" You called out to him getting to your feet and following the object of said hatred to make yourself some tea.

"You only hate the fact that I right." He taunted back sticking his tongue out at your less than impressed expression at his childish antics.

"Alright fine maybe I did have a sort of small crush or something when we were younger but it's in the past!" You give in finally, absently fiddling with the tab of the tea bag in your Pusheen cat mug. "Besides he never liked me back anyway." You mumbled the last sentence a little under your breath, concentrating on making the baggy bob up and down repeatedly in the steaming water.

"That's not true!" Tom blurted out, smacking a hand over his lips a moment later silently cursing his big mouth.

This was a secret Harrison swore him never to tell, he'd even pinkie promised.

Even if it was a secret from six years ago.

He couldn't help it though, after all this time you finally had said it clear as day, right in front of him!

"What do you mean it's not true? Thomas what aren't you telling me?"

You look up at his sudden admission, squinting your eyes to gauge his current demeanour as your heart rate inexplicably picked up. You watch as he shuffles nervously scratching at the back of his neck, not looking at you and busying himself with his own mug of tea.

"I mean, I'm just saying there was that one time you got really sick during the summer holidays before high school started and he brought Monty around to cheer you up."

"Oh I remember that! He said puppies could help cure anything so he stayed as long as he could to make sure I'd get the full effect even though I couldn't leave my bed." You smiled fondly at the memory, and how Harrison had also brought over your favourite chocolate chip cookies to double the efforts in making you feel better.

"Also when you lost your ring that day we played football in the park and he REFUSED to leave until it was found even after the sun had set and he only had his shitty phone screen light."

You shifted the heart shaped signet ring on your finger, remembering when Harrison's meticulous search had paid off almost 2 hours after you had initially lost the gold band and how Tom had made some cheesy remark when Harrison slipped it back onto your finger.

You were so delighted he'd found it that in your overwhelming excitement you'd thrown your arms around his neck in a tight hug and placed a kiss on his cheek, both of your faces tinted pink the whole walk home afterwards.

"Thanks by the way he would not shut up about that damned kiss for two months afterwards!" He chuckled, noticing your faint blush reappearing at the memory.

There was a pause as you collected your thoughts, sipping your tea silently while processing the memories and trying to connect any dots you may have missed from the past that may or may not be JUST In history, but perhaps also in the present.

"You know he only pretends to be bad at Mario Kart so he can watch you get all giddy and excited at beating him." Tom adds after a while, biting his lip after perhaps spilling a little too much information.

It was one thing to let slip that Harrison liked you years ago but it was another to hint at the fact that he possibly still did, and didn't want you to know about it.

"Okay that’s not true I'm great at Mario Kart!" You roll your eyes scoffing at his accusation.

"You suck at Mario Kart, why do you think I always beat you? And where do you think I learned all my skills from hm?" He raised his eyebrows at you, smirking at your slightly bewildered expression at all these new developments.

You didn't get a chance to rebut his claim because just as you opened your mouth footsteps came in quick succession up the front steps and the door swung open to reveal a very heavily rain soaked Harrison, shaking out his dripping wet curls in dog like fashion after slipping of his hood.

"Man it's raining cats and dogs out there!" He chimed in a faux American accent, slipping off his shoes and setting the groceries down on the kitchen counter.

"Just my luck, started up right as I stepped out of the shop." He continued when neither of you said anything at his return glancing between the two of you still standing a little ways from each other in the kitchen, your cheeks still tinged pink.

He pulled the uncomfortable hoodie from over his head, the t-shirt underneath sticking to it also and being pulled off with it letting out a sigh as he balled up the wet garments in his hand, still not entirely sure about the strange atmosphere he'd entered into.

"Have I missed something?" He questioned with a raised brow when STILL neither of you said anything and all you could do was fixate on the little droplets of water dripping periodically from Harrison's curls, making their way through the crevices of his glorious torso.

Tom snickered at your lingering gaze shaking his head as he finished off the last of his tea.

Harrison set his wet clothes down on the dining table and crossed his arms over his chest, eyes still shifting between the two of you curiously.

"Do you let me win at Mario kart?!" You blurted out when the silence started getting a little too thick.

"Really? That's the thing you choose to address first?" Tom laughed, rinsing his panda mug and shuffling past the two daft idiots standing in the kitchen staring at each other.

"What are you on about?" Harrison's perplexed tone answered back, glancing back at Tom's retreating form.

"Listen mate, this day has been a long time coming and you KNOW I suck at keeping secrets but might I just say I think I did a pretty good job considering I didn't breathe a word for six bloody years!"

Tom grabbed a towel from the linen cupboard and darted into the bathroom, head re-emerging a moment later from behind the door frame with a: "You'll thank me later for my big mouth!"

The water from the shower started up a moment after Tom closed the door and suddenly it was just you and a very shirtless Harrison left standing a little awkwardly together in the small kitchen area.

It felt even smaller when we was stood there looking like THAT.

Harrison's eyes met yours for a beat but you looked away, concentrating once more on the wayward water droplets traversing his skin, unable to look him in the eye.

"What's going on?" He murmured softly, trying to decide whether he should move towards you or keep his place in the door-frame.

"Tom, erm - Tom said, that you let me win at Mario Kart all the time and that you suck on purpose." You replied in a small voice, finally peering up at him through your lashes.

"I - I mean...maybe a little bit, sometimes?" He stuttered out, running a hand through the loose curls fallen on his forehead and biting his lip a little, bashful.

He was making it really difficult for you not to just kiss him right then and there.

"What else were you discussing before I interrupted? What did he mean by 'This has been a long time coming'?"

"Did you want some tea? You look awfully cold you should probably change into some dryer clothes." You grabbed Harrison's Avengers mug from the top cupboard and made your way back over to the kettle trying in vain to distract the confused object of your affections.

"No no no no no come on Y/n don't try to change the subject." He moved towards you, switching the kettle back off before it could make too much noise, taking a seat on the counter to face you, waiting patiently.

"Would you at least put a shirt on you're making ME cold just looking at you." You hug your arms around your middle, feeling self conscious and picking at stray pills of your jumper.

"Why am I distracting you?" He chuckled, throwing a cheeky wink your way and sitting up straight, tensing his muscles.

He was just joking but he couldn't help notice the slight tinge of colour gracing your cheek and the way your teeth gnawed unforgiving on your bottom lip.

This isn't fair. He should be the one feeling self conscious or a little nervous being half dressed and what not in front of you like this.

"Tom thinks - he told me that you used to like me." You let out, finally setting your eyes to his and not looking away. There. That should make him squirm a little, hopefully.

Harrison's face flushed as he was the one to avert his eyes this time, the back of his neck suddenly feeling very warm despite the cool raindrops still gracing his skin.

"You never said anything." You continued, carefully observing his now shifting form.

"Yeah well I - erm, I just always thought you might have seen me as a sort of brother you know, you - being friends with Tom first and all I didn't want to get in the way or make anything awkward."

"A brother?! God no Harrison I never ever thought of you that way Tom's always been like a big brother to me but y-you were the -"

"- The what?" He looked up hopefully, the crease in his brow still evident.

"The...’Cute best friend’?" You finished in a small voice, turning away to rinse your mug and making a beeline for the doorway, heading to the living room to tidy up all the stray pillows off the floor.

Harrison's face lit up into a huge shit eating grin heart beating wildly as he hopped off the counter, heading over to where you were very obviously pretending he wasn't an arms length away from you.

"Am I still?" He teased, taking a pillow from your hand and holding it up high out if your reach.

"Hm?" You offer in lieu of a response, playing dumb and reaching for the pillow but stumbling a little on your tip toes.

You swallow audibly after your hand pressed into his chest accidentally as he looks down at you catching your lower back to steady you.

"Am I still the ‘cute best friend’?" He whispers, grinning down at your shy form and tilting your chin up to look you in the eye.

"Cute...and....impossibly annoying." You finish, making a grab for the pillow after his hand had fallen a little in his distraction.

Suddenly you walloped him in the face with it laughing at his gobsmacked expression, trying to distract your thumping heart and nerves.

Harrison wasn't having it though so he grabbed the wet ball of clothes off the dining table from earlier and slowly crept towards you as you waited for the inevitable

"Don't you dare!" You pointed a finger at him menacingly with nowhere to escape to.

He captured you in a tight hug wrapping the wet hoodie around your frame and laughing gleefully at your yelps and small slaps of protest.

Resistance was futile though so you gave up with a sigh and rested your head against his chest listening to his heart rate pick up a little bit before he said his next words.

"You were the cute best friend for me too." He admitted, glancing down to your lips mere centimetres away.

"Am I still?" You mimicked his words from earlier unable to stop the corners of your mouth pulling into a wide smile.

He didn't answer, instead leaning down to press a swift kiss to you lips after you sucked in a quick breath.

"Does that answer your question?" He murmured, his eyes twinkling and a very pleased expression gracing his soft features.

"Hmm I'm not sure perhaps you should try-"

He cut off your witty remark, capturing your lips once more and this time you melted into the kiss all banter quickly vanishing from your thoughts as you reached up to play with his still wet curls, feeling the hoodie slip from his grip onto the floor so he could press you closer.

God you had waited far too long to do this you thought as he swiped his tongue along your lower lip, allowing the kiss to turn deeper.

You moaned a little as his tongue swiped over your own, the hand that wasn't toying with his damp locks tracing the definition of his toned stomach, fanning the fire that had started long go inside your chest.

"Still distracting you?" He murmured as he pulled away, his lips still brushing against your own as he spoke and a devilish smirk forming as his own hand found its way atop yours, pressing into his stomach.

"You're always distracting me." You continue pressing soft kisses to his lips unable to stop now that you knew what they felt like against your own.

"Is that so?" He chuckled, his hand on your back slipping underneath your jumper to feel the warmth of the skin beneath.

You sighed as you felt his fingers press firmly into you, his hand moving from the skin of your back to your hip as he continued to kiss you like his life depended on it.

A small gasp and a soft ‘ugh‘ fell from his lips as you raked your fingernails down his chest reveling in the feeling of being completely wrapped up in him.

The sound of a throat clearing somewhere in the distance brought you both out of your haze, bursting the bubble that had formed around you both.

You pulled away from each other at the noise and turned your heads toward the bathroom door, where Tom stood in clean pyjamas, toweling off his damp curls and giving you both the biggest self satisfied smirk you had ever seen on his boyish features.

"Oh man this is like the Sims 2 Pets all over again." Tom laughed, directing his shit eating grin to you as you buried your blushing face into Harrison's still gloriously bare chest.

Harrison sent a questioning look to Tom and then back down to you, confused as ever but laughing none the less at your sudden embarrassment, pressing his lips to your forehead then your warm cheek and finally back down to your lips, not a care in the world that Tom was now in the room.

"You're welcome!" Tom muttered under his breath, shaking his head at the admittedly adorable pair of divs in front of him.

Author’s Notes:

So there you go! Wow this is I think the first piece of writing i’ve actually started and compelted in literal years and I can’t believe it’s fanfiction between a real person and the reader but i’m gonna take it cause i’m a little proud of myself right now for accomplishing this one small thing. Anywho I hope you enjoyed this drabble turned very long One Shot and if i tagged you it’s ‘cause you liked or reblogged my original post/sneak preview of this fic! :)

@sleepwalkingdragon @hollandfieldluv @miraculousparker @would-you-tell-me-who-you-are @imwearingtomholland @soloriormora @kindbearqueen @claredolphinbear24 @ducky2542 @creativexdreamer @nachochitz @letstravelsunshine @the-divine-fxminine

#harrison osterfield #harrison osterfield twitter #harrison osterfield instagram #harrison osterfield imagine #harrison osterfield one shot #harrison osterfield fic #harrison osterfield drabble #harrison osterfild x reader #fanfic #fanfiction #harrison osterfield fanfic #harrison osterfield fanfiction #tom holland #spiderman #chaos walking #hollanders #quacksons #catch 22 #avengers infinity war

131 notes · View notes

blficarchive · 6 years

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Dirty secret by iilarryii (WORDS:122,946)

Additional Tags: #Alpha/Beta/Omega Dynamics, #Alpha Harry, #Omega Louis, #Alpha Liam, #Alpha Zayn, #Alpha Niall, #Mulan AU, #or at least inspired by it, #War, #Enemies to Friends to Lovers, #Knotting, #Sassy Louis, #lying, #Bottom Louis, #Top Harry, #Mpreg, #Discussion of Abortion, #(It doesn't happen therefore just a discussion), #Character Death

Summary: "Dad, you can't go!" Louis yells to his father as he watches him pull out his sword.

"Louis, you know that I have to. It's the pack leaders orders," Dan says calmly. "I need you to promise me that you'll take care of the family if I die."

"So what? You'll just give up?"

"Of course not. I am just willing to die for my family's safety."

"So am I."

The Zoely pack is attacked by rogue alphas and the pack leader orders all alphas over the age of eighteen to protect their pack. Dan Deakin is one of the strongest alphas in the pack, but there is one problem. He has a wife and six kids to feed and look after. Louis is the oldest child and the one who wants to protect their family.

Or a Mulan AU where Louis is an omega who takes his father's place in the war.

I Chose You by alex4968 (WORDS: 13,495)

Additional Tags: N/A

Summary: When he wakes up, the room is much brighter than when he’d fallen asleep. He has to blink the sleep from his eyes and eventually he just tosses an arm over his face to try and ignore the brightness, but then he realizes that the bed has a decent sized dent in it that forms perfectly to his body and he’s comfortable. It’s – weird. He can’t remember leaving the blinds open, and it wouldn’t have made much sense for Zayn to have opened them, either, but he doesn’t think about it. Maybe he just hadn’t realized that he’d had such a nice bed when he’d fallen asleep.

After a moment, he groans and takes his arm away from his eyes and – wait. This is – this is not his hotel room. This is a bedroom.

[Or: Louis wakes up in another life.]

Red by frosteddream (WORDS: 26,099)

Additional Tags: #Fluff, #Smut, #wolfman Harry, #Minor Character Death

Summary: Shockwaves were sent through the village after the McPherson family was savagely killed. There were people who feared the beast that did it, and then there was Louis, or, as most people liked to call him, Red. (Little Red Riding Hood AU.)

Of Course, Mr. Styles by countingcr0ws (WORDS: 12,714)

Additional Tags: #Spies & Secret Agents, #SHIELD Agent Harry Styles. #Kid Fic, #Babysitter Louis, #Fluff, #Romance, #Daddy Harry, #University Student Louis, #Very little agenting though, #Meet-Cute, #Age Difference, #Domestic Fluff, #Humor, #Baking

Summary: Harry's new babysitter is unlike the four before him.

Louis Tomlinson with the blue eyes takes Harry's shirts without asking, buys enough boxes of cereal to feed a battalion, calls him a beetle in arguments, forces Harry to watch Grease the Musical with him, and wants Oliver to drink more milk just to see him be the tallest in class

Harry feels guilty about asking for more. He doesn't know how to tell Louis to play blanket fort with him and Olly instead of staying out.

I really fucking hate you by seducedbycurls (WORDS: 83,347)

Additional Tags: #Gangs, #ziall, #Drug Use, #mafia, #Alternate Universe, #Comedy, #Violence, #Dom!Harry, #Sub!Louis, #Child, #Parents Harry Styles/Louis Tomlinson, #Smut, #Alcohol Abuse, #Humor, #Abusive Relationships, #Drug Abuse, #Mutual Abuse, #Love/Hate, #AU, #Enemies to Lovers, 3possible triggers, #detailed drug use, #Drug Addiction, #Alcohol, #Drug Withdrawal, #Domestic, #Kid Fic, #Suicide Attempt, #Rewrite

Summary: Harry really fucking hates Louis. Louis really fucking hates Harry, kinda. Two boys from two separate Mafia’s are forced to meet somewhere in the middle. Louis is burdened with a child and Harry is burdened with Louis. Liam is a sniper who cant stop looking at the curly haired beauty through his scope. Niall wants to live and Zayn is gunna help him.

My English Love Affair by isthatyoularry (WORDS: 19,198)

Additional Tags: #Famous Harry, #Normal Louis, #White Eskimo, #Smut, #Fluff, #Swearing, #tiny foot kink - I'm sorry, #Louis is the subject of a very explicit hit tune, #there's an English love affair going on

Summary: The thing about sleeping with a member of a famous indie band is that the inevitability of having a song written about you is most likely a hundred percent. The second thing is that in the end, nobody's supposed to find out it's about you.

The one where Harry writes a song about his English love affair and Louis sleeps with someone in White Eskimo and all he gets is a stupid song written about him.

This Wicked Game by cherrystreet (WORDS: 70,010)

Additional Tags: #Bachelor AU, #Alternate Universe, #Anal Sex, #Hand Jobs, #Blow Jobs, #Top Harry, #Bottom Louis, #Mentions Of Infidelity, #Fluff, #Smut

Summary: An AU in which The Bachelor is gay, Louis is a contestant, Harry is the bachelor, everyone drinks a lot of champagne, the entire world gets to watch them fall in love, and no one plays by the rules.

Emperor's New Clothes by sunsetmog (WORDS: 92,072)

Additional Tags: #Secret Relationship, #Pets, #Alternate Universe, #Famous Harry, #Non-Famous Louis, #Outing, #Money Troubles, #Mild Peril, #boys making some poor language choices, #Tabloid Journalism, #Harassment, #Relationship Negotiation

Summary: The fact that Louis’s most precious belonging was a cat with a face like thunder and an uncanny ability to cover every single inch of Louis’s clothing with cat hair was something that Louis chose not to think about too much.

or: Harry’s a pop star and Louis isn’t, and there’s a non-disclosure agreement where there used to be a relationship.

A Match Made in Aisle Three (Everybody Cut Footloose) by kikikryslee (WORDS: 16,529)

Additional Tags: #Alternate Universe - College/University, #Fluff, #Pining, #Mutual Pining, #I seem to write that a lot, #No Angst, #Drama Student Louis, #Frat Boy Harry, #Smut, #Blow Jobs, #Cashier Louis, #supermarket, #harry and louis are the same age, #Footloose - Freeform, #Shy Louis, #Nervous Harry, #Awkward Flirting

Summary: “Don’t feel bad,” Louis said. “You picked the machine that freaks out on customers more often than not. It’s not your fault it froze on you.”

“Oh, OK,” Harry replied. “Glad it’s not just me, then.” “Yeah. Um, I'll move your stuff to one that works." "Wait, don't!" Too late. Before Harry could finish his request, Louis saw what Harry's purchase was – a giant bottle of lube. Awkward. So Louis did what he does best: made it even more awkward. “Big night tonight?” Idiot. --- Or, the one where Louis is a drama student/cashier who assists Harry in buying a bottle of lube, and is also the only guy that frat boy Harry has trouble talking to. Also featuring Sophia as stubborn matchmaker and Liam as accidental wingman.

heart born out of fire by bloody_blade0 (WORDS: 31,212)

Additional Tags: #Alpha Harry, #Omega Louis, #Dark, #CEO Harry, #soft louis, #Death, #light drugs, #Louis is in a dark place, #Top Harry, #Bottom Louis, #Knotting, #Sex, #Artist Zayn, #Artist Louis, #Implied/Referenced Rape/Non-con, #Past Rape/Non-con, #just mentioned, #Depressed Louis, #Protective Harry, #Protective Zayn, #Possessive Harry, #Sad Louis, #Insomnia, #Hurt/Comfort, #Fluffy, #Smutty, #Panic Attacks, #Anxiety, #Low Self Esteem, #Fingering, #Dom/sub Undertones

Summary: au where louis is a sad, sad omega in hiding who hides from everyone and trusts no one. until he does.

#sorry this is coming so late #i'm gonna do monthly rrecs instead of weekly #larry fic rec #larrie fic rec #larry #larry stylinson #Harry/Louis #harry styles/louis tomlinson #bottom louis #top harry #fic rec #weekly fic rec #i'm still gonna tag it as weekly fic rec tho just to keep them all together

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sidpah · 5 years

Text

Unsigned

5:22 pm 11/29/2009

For the record, it’s currently, tonight, November 29th, 2009. Shall I continue to prolong the inevitable? I’ve already shuffled to my bedside, kicking off slippers for the last time. They’re torn open around the big toes, and the cushioning has been beaten into flat nonexistence by years of my feet on the cellar stairs, and pacing these narrow confines like a chimpanzee in research cell… They’ve served me well, the slippers have.

I sit on the edge of my mattress, bare feet flat against dirty hardwood floor. Black curls of shed hair, loose clouds of clotted dust cling to mattress and ring the base of the walls. In my left hand is a small brown bottle of laudanum – my five-flavored tea. I’ve not yet tasted it. Initially, I’d planned to use sleeping pills. The old standby. Two Ambien every four hours to help me coast steadily through. I’ve never taken either, the pills or the laudanum, but dissuaded by Zolpidem Tartrate’s more egregious reported side effects: lack of dreams, nightmares and sleepwalking, (along with the more distressing variants: sleep-eating, -driving and -phone calling) all of these wholly defeating my purpose, I felt laudanum to be the more reasonable option. Clearly, I’m not concerned about developing a tolerance or dependency. This leaves me free to increase the dosage should I, at some unearthly narcoleptic point, feel the need has arisen. Carefully though; someone of my size and meager narcotic history could overdose on as little as a few teaspoons, and that’s not what I’m looking for. I’m not aiming to poison myself. I just want a slow steady dream that will fade into oblivion.

One of laudanum’s many benefits to this end is that it should relieve the pain and soreness I’m virtually guaranteed to experience from remaining in bed so long. Another is that it promises to increase oneiric activity rather than squelch it. And I want to be there, I just don’t want to be here. To fill those vacant forms awaiting animation...

Originally, to swallow the Ambien I’d allotted myself two eight-ounce bottles of water. I’d rather not linger on for weeks. I wasn’t sure how much I would need to drink to get the pills down, but I was not about to rely on my own willpower when the thirst hits, as it will, inevitably. I envisioned myself sleep-drinking, guzzling down case after case, entirely oblivious to my error. Four bottles instead of two could have prolonged my survival by one more day. I’m not a fat man, but I’ve read that the body can last for four to six weeks without food. The thought of bedsores and cannibalized muscles doesn’t interest me in the least. Again, this is where laudanum becomes the obvious choice. Already a liquid preparation, there’s no need to consume additional water, which again shortens my life expectancy while downsizing the likelihood of needing a bathroom break, (aided further by the fortuitous disclaimer that laudanum may cause constipation). I know that in my final seconds I will soil the bed like an infant, and I’m okay with that. I simply want that nothing should impede my comfortable retreat. This is a vacation after all, not capital punishment.

I unscrew the dropper and place three drops on my tongue. This will only get easier. I set the bottle of laudanum next to four others, all with tops mostly unscrewed, droppers canted delicately in their necks so I won’t need to wake for more than a second or two to administer another dose. (I won’t mention how much this little gathering cost me, suffice it to say, my meager bank account has already accrued more in daily fines due to its failing to maintain the minimum balance than it actually contained to begin with; there clearly is no stepping back from this precipice. I will not disclose my source for the drug as, as I’m sure anyone reading this is aware, it’s a regulated Schedule II narcotic and obviously not easy to come by through legal means, especially in such quantity. I am not about to indicate complicity on the part of anyone kind enough to aid me on this journey.)

While the subject has been broached, I do have to laugh a little at myself for having opted so quickly for this obscure drug. Aside from its apposite elegance in all the ways already mentioned, my motivation here is terribly transparent. Perhaps it’s my emulation’s greatest work. It possesses a certain mythic sophistication, laudanum does. I can lie back on these stale sheets and easily imagine myself not blanketed under the watchful disapproving gaze of my pale childhood walls, breathing in the complete stygian darkness and faint phantom breath of old burned incense embedded in altar cloth and curtains, but rather in a hazy opium den, a hidden basement off a rubbish-strewn alleyway in late 1800s Europe. I’m lacking only an absinthe chaser. If not a renowned novelist or libertine, then at least a taste of a life I never could have lived in this flesh...

I am going to be as rigorous about this journey as I would a transcontinental road trip. Albeit, one on which I have made no prior reservations and plan to seek out the night’s shelter and morning’s sustenance on the off-chance that those needs should arise. Though I intend to limit my ingestion so as not to overdose, I can’t bear to leave my clock plugged in, red numbers at eye level, visible without sitting or fully waking as they have been for decades. I trust that I can be careful without documenting every dose. I gladly unplug the clock. Fuck you, Alarms, Schedules, and Planners, I’m sleeping in from here on out.

A second layer of curtains have been hung over the already thick blue polyester drapery. I must keep the room as dark and timeless as possible. As much as I love sleep, I’ve always had difficulty napping during the day. Even when, as a child, I was kept home from school (as I so frequently was) by tonsillitis and strep throat and ear infections and bronchitis, often two or more of these occurring at the same time, lying in bed, uncomforted, watching trashy daytime television game shows for the elderly and unemployed. A tonic of voyeuristic hope that was apparently lost in my youthful ennui… An unease about the stomach and shoulder blades, pressure in the upper rear quadrant of the skull, a tension through the back of my neck I’m sure the laudanum will alleviate should those feelings that come with the combination of warm sheets and daylight rear their heads one ultimate time.

The thermostat has been set at a cool 60 degrees. I’ve never been able to sleep when the air is hot. (I sound so fickle… so fragile, and yet sleep has been the paramount activity of the last eight years of my life…) I will wrap myself in five layers of blankets, throws, and handed-down afghans, and curl up, content and fetal. At that temperature I could still survive for up to ten days without any water. This strikes me as too long, but the laudanum is an unknown. There will be no food in my stomach to impede its effects and I haven’t read any studies on cases such as mine.

Driven by decades of unrequited longing… A pitiful creature filled with a hot broth of misery and sorrow that rises to overwhelm the dam of her self-control, and before she can fortify it with sandbags of antipsychotic medication, she’s swept away in her own emotions’ tidal flood… A middle aged man so repentant about one of his many past indiscretions that he deems himself beyond redemption, unrehabilitatable, and so concludes that the only object powerful enough to surmount his guilty memories of that lone infraction is a single .452 inch long hunk of lead sent careening through both hemispheres of his brain almost simultaneously… Ridiculous, asinine clichéd attributes of the suicidal mind as it’s all too often portrayed in popular media. This is where I separate from the pack. I am not miserable or despondent. I am not calling a hotline because I’m lonely or starved for attention. I am not shaking in a corner with a butter knife pressed against my wrist. I am rational and cool. I am tired, but I am content. This body has fulfilled its use, transcended its purpose and is now an empty canister ready to be discarded. A building in natural collapse. Let those old movies play on one last time before the theater closes its doors!

My mother died recently, but I’m not at all depressed. It would sound terrible to say I’m relieved, so I won’t. Not that that would be quite accurate either. It’s a relief from that tense ever-present Not Knowing. Eight years of that queasy, prickly hum, gone… Wondering when it was going to happen, if it would be today, tomorrow, in another twenty years… Not Knowing can break a man. That said, I’ve always had a knack for adjustment, for living with what I have. It feels as though most of my adult life has been one of servitude, caring for her as if, without prior consent of mother or child, our roles had been irrevocably reversed...

Not that I ever longed for more traditional action. Writers mustn’t live busy lives – Eventful, but not busy. If you think something of relative value (there isn’t, in truth, any value in these pages, but we’ll pretend like there’s a crumb or two so we can play our respective roles of writer and consumer for one last day…) it must be caught immediately, with that metaphysical butterfly net, and pinned squirming to the page while the energy is still vibrant and sharp. No one’s going to feel them or love them if they get stale – Words get stale too, just like saltine crackers and three-day worn underwear…

It seems the laudanum is already taking hold… That was quicker than I expected. But then, how much do I really expect?

I’ve just turned thirty, surpassing the natural life expectancy for most figures in human history. This is nothing more than my early retirement. Why submit to thirty more years, early-to-bed and early-to-rising only to loathe my job, my rut, my loneliness or, gods-help-me, my wife, and be forced into suffering the ravages of old age, illness, disease and paranoia of a hastily approaching death? I’d much rather greet death on my own terms. Here I am, ye olde red-handed bastard! Serving myself up on a silver platter for your grim dim black toothless maw!

I’ve never needed to support myself by employment and I have no interest in starting now. My mother received a decent pension from her years working at the plant. It was plenty for our meager means. But there wasn’t enough left in our savings to sustain me for more than a few years eating crunchy rice and beans in a cold house with no electricity to cook them. And now, thanks mostly to her prodigious medical bills and co-pays, even most of that’s gone. In truth, I feel rather guilty living off of that ill-gotten blood money any longer. Fed by those poor brainwashed souls… Of course I feel equally sick at the prospect of having to work a day job or, more likely, a night job, for the next thirty to forty years. I don’t feel that the world owes me a living; I just don’t feel I owe it to the world to live.

My name will die along with me, and I’m perfectly fine with that reality. I have no siblings and no young men in the family bear this surname. Perfect annihilation. Gate, Gate, Paragate, Parasamgate, Bodhi Svaha!

In a second I will pull the chain to switch off the lamp, the last light these eyes will ever register, set the pen next to this little pad and this large stack of collected papers, and then wait to discover with joy and the baited thrill of adventure to which strange lands my dreams will deliver me…

To whomever reads this note, know only that you’ve found the remnants of a profoundly satisfied man, a man untroubled by the tribulations of his world. And that he is even more so, untroubled, now, having been irreversibly freed of his bodily restraints, devious calculating mental formations, and purged of his seemingly endless memories.

With great love and optimism…[1]

[1] Unsigned

#fiction #depression #suicide note #sleep

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p-jiminaa · 6 years

Text

Noona, you okay? (part 6)

Jungkook and You

Summary : Jungkook fall in love with someone as same age as Jin, you.

Genre : Fluffy.

Next Part

Attn: Gif not mine. Credit to the owner.

I was reading on my novel in the living room before I heard a bell sound. I don’t think I order anything today. I put down my novel on the table and walked to the door and looked through the peephole before opening the door. Jungkook? How did he know I live here? I never tell him. Well I was going to tell him but I haven’t got a chance yet.

“Hello Babe..” He greet me once I opened the door for him.

“Hai...” I opened the door and gestured him to come in. He then put away his shoes and went straight to the living room.

“How did you know I live here?” I questioned him while he already laid down on the couch. Looks like he ‘made himself at home’ since he’s already lying on the couch.

“From Ji Sung Hyung.” He answered while observing me, from head down to toe. What is that stare suppose to mean?

“What?”

Smile appeared on his lips. He shook his head and said “Seeing your messy bun hair style and you in your simple attire, I can’t believe that I am yours.” I narrowed my eyes. Isn’t that suppose to be ‘he can’t believe that I am his’? This proud maknae!

“Okay seriously, why are you here? I thought you have practice today.” That what he told me earlier. I approached him and stood in front of him. He then pulled me down to lie on top of him.

“Actually, I’m bringing you out.”

“Where?”

“My members. They said that I need to introduce you to them.” What? As if they didn’t know me.

“Why would you introduce me, they know me already.”

“They know you as y/n, a lawyer who worked for the company not as y/n, who is going to be their sister in law.”

“Ouh I am going to be their sister in law. Who I am going to marry then?” I said it playfully, trying to annoy him.

“Jimin hyung. You can marry him.” He said it with his sarcastic tone. He still remember about that?

“Really? Wow! I thought I am going to marry you.”

“Of course its me.” He pouted.

“Yeah it’s you Jungkook. Unless you want me to marry Jimin then...”

“Don’t even dare to continue your words Noona.” I smirked. Aww... Jealous Jungkook is something I didn’t see everyday.

“Aww... is my baby jealous?” He narrowed his eyes. I wiggled my right eyebrow. He rolled his eyes.

“Okay, I am going to change.” I got up and walked straight towards my room.

“Babe... Five minutes. If not I am leaving you here.” I stopped walking and turned my body towards him. Seriously? That is such a short time to change plus I have to do my hair, my make up, putting on my lens.

“What? No! I need to ....”

“Babe you don’t have to wear make up. Its only them and I don’t want you to show them how beautiful you are. Only I can see your beautiful side.”

“But..”

“Babe move now. Or else seriously.. you are going to hail taxi to go there.” I rolled my eyes, annoyed.

“Fine.” I walked to my room and closed the door harshly, to shows my annoyance to him.

***

I was greets by the six members when I entered their dorm. They were standing in front of me while Jungkook close the door and then stand beside me.

“Two three, hello.. we’re Bangtan...” Err what?

“Hyung.. I introduce you, the love of my life, y/n.” I turned my head to Jungkook. So this is what he meant by introducing myself to them?

“Ah hello, I am y/n. His girl.” I pointed Jungkook while saying ‘his girl’ part.

“Hai! I am Jimin.” Jimin then approached me and extended his hand to shake my hand. Followed by others. Even Yoongi and Jin did the same though I can sensed Yoongi insincere face doing that. This must be either Tae or Jimin’s plan and all of them were forced to do the same.

“So are we done yet?” I questioned them.

“Actually we have more things to show you. Just wait and see.” Hoseok said that playfully. Now what is that supposed to mean?

“But first, come in Noona.” Namjoon invited me in. Finally! I though we are going to stay in this position forever.

***

“Jinnie where is Jungkook?” I was helping Jin in the kitchen and Jungkook never came to check on me. Well, I am not trying to be clingy or what but I think that what any man would do if they brought their Girlfriend home. They must be worry whether their girlfrined will be able to familiarize themselves or not but since I know them already, I guess Jungkook didn’t have to worry about it so he left me here, in the kitchen with Jin.

“Maybe he’s playing game with Tae. Go check up on him.” He smiled. I walked to the living room but didn’t see Jungkook with them. Namjoom and Hooseok were watching movie while Jimin and Tae were busy playing the games. Yoongi? Well he’s already napping on the couch. Hooseok who was watching TV realized that my eyes was searching for Jungkook and told me that Jungkook is probably in his room. I then walked to his room and found his door were left open ajar. I approached his room and before I was able to push open it I heard him talking on the phone and that stopped me from entering his room.

“Why are you calling me now?” My eyebrows furrowed listening to that. His voice sounded weak, not the normal voice.

“No of course she’s not here. She’s in the kitchen helping Jin Hyung. I am in my room.” He continued talking.

“Oh my God! why are you crying? What happened Hee Ra?” He sounds so worry. I am still curious who is he talking to. I never see him with any girl in the company except for the staff.

“Why are you making it difficult now Hee Ra. I am with someone now.” Someone? He did not even mentioned my name to her but Hee Ra? Whose that? I never heard of this name before.

“No I didn’t moved on too fast. I am with her so that I can forget about you.” My eyes widened listening to that.

“God Damn it! Don’t make it to difficult for me Hee Ra.” Seems like I know Hee Raa now without even asking him. So I am just a rebound then? And he’s going to left me after he can fully forget about Hee Ra? I felt tears filled up my eyes. I walked to the nearest bathroom and that when I cried my heart out. Stupid y/n. It only been a month. Why are you crying as if you’ve been with him for a years. But he promised me. He promised he would love me, he would cherish me and he would never.... Oh my God! Now I felt stupid! Why would he wanted to be with me when we barely know each other. He proposed me after two days we’ve known each other. Yes y/n. You are the stupid one here, not him. You should never make a decision based on feeling again.

I was arranging the food on the table and Jungkook suddenly appeared and stand beside me. I guess he just finished his phone call with Hee Ra.

“You cook all of this?” He was really excited seeing there is so much food on the table. I shook my head. I tried my best to bring back my mood since I came out from the toilet but I can’t. My heart hurt so much and I think I can cry at any moment right now. Why would I stay in the first place? I should have gone after I heard that but no. I don’t want to answer any question regarding my disappearance nor I am ready to face the reality about me being just a rebound.

“Jin cooked it. I only helped a little.” I then walked to the kitchen again and took the other food and placed it on the table.

“Yah.. lets eat..” Jin shouted to all of them and in the flash, all of them ran to the table and took a seat. I took a seat beside Jungkook and his phone suddenly rang. Must be Hee Ra. He turned his body from me and rejected the call. He didn’t want me to see whose the caller is so that why he turned his body from me. Right after he put his phone on the table, it rang again. I didn’t have to see whose the caller is. I know that her. Jungkook took the phone and turned his body from me again.

“Jungkook just answer it!” Yoongi who was sitting opposite him was already pissed off. Jungkook then looked at me. I shrugged. He rejected the call again and continue eating and that when his phone rang again. I see Yoongi was already glaring at him, for not answering the phone.

“You can go to your room to answer the call.” I said that while chewing on my food. Yea, I can maintain a poker face in front of him when actually inside I am broken!

“Yea. Who know it might be important.” Namjoon agreed with me. Jungkook then stood up and walked fast towards his room.

“Are you okay Noona?” Jimin asked me. I think he realized about the changes of my behavior. I nodded my head.

“Noona, I heard you love to watch Run.” Tae tried to change the topic. I smiled. No mood to talk. No mood to make any joke. No mood for everything.

“Noona you have to watch the latest episode it was so...” Hooseok nudged Tae’s arm when he see me having no reaction about it.

“Noona, are you really okay?” Namjoon asked me worriedly. I lifted my head and nodded my head again.

“I am just tired. That all.” Weak excuse. I was really hyper when I came earlier. I even played game with Tae before I decided to help Jin in the kitchen.

***

“Noona, you okay?” I was replying a text from my lil brother when Jungkook approached and sit next to me. Jungkook asked me to come to his room after I finished helping Jin washing the dishes and while waiting for him to take a shower, I sat on his bed.

“Yeah. Why?” My eyes still on the screen.

“Cause you looked so down. I mean you were so hyper earlier. But you looked so down during the dinner and now too.” I did not reply him. To be honest, I didn’t know how to answer that. He took my phone from me.

“Jungkook...” I frowned.

“Babe something bothering you?” Yeah, you.

“I am just tired.” He frowned listening to that.

“Just stay here tonight. Beside you’re not working tomorrow.”

“Jungkook I can’t. I already asked my brother to fetch me up. He’ll be here in fifteen.”

“I can send you back. Why do you have to...”

“Because we are going back to our parent’s house tomorrow but my brother finished his work earlier than he expected today so we’re going back tonight and he’s almost here.”I interrupted him. He sound disappointed that I have to ask my brother to fetch me up when he can send me home.

“But its late.”

“Jungkook its only an hour ride. Its midnight. There will be no traffic.” My phone screen then lit up. I took my phone from his grab. My brother’s name appeared on the screen and I answered it immediately.

“Are you here? Okay, five minutes.” I hung up his call.

“My brother is here.” I stood up, put on my jacket and took my sling bag from his computer table.

“Are you sure you have nothing to tell me?” He looked at me,straight into my eyes. He looks so worry. I am the one that supposed to ask you that. You should just tell me I am just a rebound!

“I am going.” He then walked with me and I stopped him in the door.

“Just stay here. My brother is just outside.” He frowned.

“Goodbye Jungkook.” I walked straight to my brother’s car without even looking back, without waiting for his reply.

Masterlist

#bangtan boys #bts jeon jeongguk #jungkook #bts jungguk #jeongguk x reader #jungkook x you #jungkook x y/n #jungkook scenario #jungkook imagine #jeongguk #jeongguk imagines #bts imagines #bts scenarios #bts army #golden maknae

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all-sortsa-stuff · 7 years

Text

A new start, part 5

Pairing: Chris Evans x Reader

Word Count: 2793

Warnings: Language and fluff

Part 1 part 2 part 3 part 4

“Oh.”

Chris stared at you in total shock. His answer felt like a punch to the stomach. Your mind whirling with what felt like rejection. Stomping off to the kitchen you pulled an open bottle of wine out of the fridge and poured a rather large glass for yourself. He stood in the same spot in the living room unsure of what to say.

“Just go home Chris. I’m sorry I said anything. It won’t affect work or the movie, okay? But please go.” It was difficult to look at him so you just concentrated on your glass as you stood at the kitchen island. He walked into the kitchen slowly, as though he were afraid to startle you.

“I don’t want to go, [Y/N]. I was just surprised to hear you say that. I mean, come on, why would you, this amazingly talented and wonderful woman, want a dork like me? I have had this huge crush on your since walking into that trailer. Holy shit, I think my heart stopped when I saw you.” You looked up quickly at him. Not sure if you could believe the words that were coming out of his mouth. “I knew I couldn’t act on them. You had been so hurt by that asshole and you needed a friend. So I wanted to try to be that friend. You know what?” You shook your head at him.

“What?” Chris had moved close but stopped before getting too close.

“We became good friends. It felt good. I knew I couldn’t have more than that with you but I was happy, am happy being your friend.” Letting go a breath you had been holding.

“So you mean you just want to stay friends?” He put up his hands quickly.

“No, no. Not what I mean. Shit, what the hell am I trying to say? [Y/N] I meant I don’t want you to think that I only became your friend because I wanted to take advantage of it. You have become a real friend.” You canted your head looking at him as you leaned against the island.

“So, you are my friend. And again it sounds like you just want to be my friend.” A look of confusion on your face. Chris raked his hand through his hair.

“Fuck. This is not coming out right. I am nervous as hell right now and my brain obviously can’t get my mouth to say anything right. Okay, let me try again.” Taking a long pull from the wine glass, you stared at him. The sweet taste and bubbles helping to settle your stomach that was doing flips as Chris paced back and forth in front of you. “[Y/N], I like you a lot. I have since day one. I was lucky enough that you let me become your friend. But I want more. I want to be more than your friend. I want you to see that there are guys out there that aren’t lying, cheating fuckers. Well maybe not other guys out there, but see that I am not like that.” You laughed as he fumbled through what he was trying to say. Finally getting to the point.

“So if I understand you now, you like me?” He laughed quietly taking a tentative step closer.

“Yes. I like you.”

“What do we do then?” Crossing your arms over your chest, you looked back at him. Chris shrugged his shoulders nonchalantly.

“Maybe we should go out. See how things go, being more than friends. Like normal people.” You bit your lip as though you were thinking very hard over the offer. When truly, you were trying not to throw up. Your heart furiously in your chest.

“I think that is a good idea. When?”

“Tomorrow? I know you are off the afternoon. I should be done by six. Maybe pick you up here by seven?”

“Seven is good. So tomorrow?” He nodded, as everything felt a bit awkward now. Why did it have to be awkward? This man had been your friend for the last several months. You had told him things you had not told anyone else. Now, it was awkward.

“Yes, tomorrow. Umm I should probably go. It’s late and umm yeah.”

“Yes it is… late.”

“Okay, see you tomorrow, [Y/N].” He walked towards the door. You followed behind, to see him out. As he opened the door, he turned back startling you and causing you to bump into him.

“Oh sorry. I wasn’t….” Chris laughed, relaxing his stance.

“Can I hug you at least? I have missed you this weekend. Not talking to you since last night sucked.” A flush of blood surged to your cheeks and you smiled shyly.

“Yeah you can hug me. I missed you too Chris. It was just… hard to concentrate on my thoughts about you when you were right there. I needed a step back for a moment.” He took the moment to step forward with his arms out, enclosing them around you in a tight hug.

“I understand that now. I’m sorry for acting like an ass. But I promise I will make it up to you tomorrow.” Returning the hug you squeezed tight. It felt good in his arms. You wanted to continue the feeling but he slowly pulled back. His face gave the impression it was reluctantly. “See you in the morning.” Chris walked towards his car throwing a grin over his shoulder. You waved like an idiot as you leaned against the doorframe. As he drove off the realization hit you that you were actually going on a date with Chris. Not just friends hanging out and having a pizza. A real date.

“Fuck, what did I get myself into?” Rubbing your face, you closed the door and went upstairs to get ready for bed. It was going to be a long day tomorrow.

After a fitful sleep, two large cups of coffee and an hour in the hair and makeup chair you were ready to get work started for the morning. The crew was setting up the shot as you sat in your chair waiting for the director to call you into the scene. Your phone started going off with a FaceTime message. Jake, for whatever reason, was calling. “Yes Jake? I’m kinda working here.”

“Well don’t you look all fancy ‘Miss I’mma super star actress.” Rolling your eyes at him through the screen you asked again.

“What do you need Jake? I don’t have much time.” He laughed as he moved the phone to show a beautiful black horse.

“Seems this girl right here needs a new home. She is great with other horses and…”

“Yes. I want her! She is gorgeous. How old is she? Where did she come from?” You excitedly sat up in the chair and squealed causing a few odd looks from those around you. Jake laughed petting the horse’s nose.

“She is five and has all her papers and looks pretty healthy. Going to have the vet check her out before I load her up in the trailer. I figured you would want her so he is already on his way.” Your brother knew you well.

“I hope Boots and Talladega like her. Jake you are the best.”

“I know, I know. Glad you appreciate that. Now did you tell that guy you like him yet? You look like you are in a better mood. Get a little something last night when you got back?” He wiggled his eyebrows with a smirk. You did not realize at that point in the conversation, Chris had walked up behind you, now he was trying not to laugh.

“Ugh, Jake you are worse than mom, you nosey ass. I have to go. Send me the info when you get her home please.” Turning the phone off, you did not wait for him to say goodbye. You leaned back in your chair with a groan.

“So you told your family about me?” Chris whispered in your ear, causing you to scream and jump out of the chair. He had a wide grin on his face.

“You scared the crap out of me!” He continued to grin at you. It was infectious and you could not help but start to smile. “And maybe.”

“Sounds like a yes. I think I like it. Don’t worry I told my mom, well she actually dragged it out of me, but she knows I have this giant crush on you.” Laughing you turned to sit back in your chair. Chris came around to sit next to you. He looked so handsome in old military costume. Just looking at him made your cheeks flush.

“Fine, yes I told my brother and my dad. Who probably told my mother. They noticed how we were texting all weekend. So they got nosey.” A look of pure happiness crossed his face. If you were telling your family there must be something there for you. He tried to give you that nonchalant look again as he turned to watch the set. It was not fooling you but you were not going to push the issue.

“So where are you taking me tonight?” You looked at him out of the corner of your eye, trying to play him at his own game.

“It’s a surprise. Don’t worry you’ll enjoy it.” That did not give you any information.

“Well how am I supposed to know what to wear?” That damn smirk of his appeared again.

“Wear that red and blue swirled dress. That looks gorgeous on you.” You raised a brow at him. If you remembered correctly, you had only worn that dress once during the whole time you had been in North Carolina.

“Okay, if you like it that much.” Before either of you could continue the director called you both to the scene. The morning was busy with trying to get as much done before the afternoon shots with Chris and change of location.

By the time the afternoon started to turn into evening, you were trying to calm the butterflies in your stomach. Chris would be at the house in little less than an hour. You had showered and pulled out the dress and sandals. The things that were most difficult were your hair and makeup. Makeup wise you did not want to look over done. Not that you could ever do what the makeup artists did to you on a daily basis. You wanted to look like you, just a prettier version. Once that was finished you worked on your mess of [Y/H/C] hair. Finally getting it up into a loose but pretty bun. The doorbell rang as you slipped into your sandals. Of course he was two minutes early. As you opened the door, looking at the man standing there it took a moment to remember to breathe. Chris looked amazing in a khaki colored pair of dress pants and a white long sleeved dress shirt with the top button undone. “Wow, [Y/N] you look… just wow.”

You beamed at him. It felt good that he thought you were beautiful. “Thank you. You look so handsome. Let me grab my purse and we can go.” He nodded sliding his hands into his pockets.

The car ride started off quiet, both of you nervous and afraid to say the wrong thing. “[Y/N] I’m sorry. I don’t want this to be weird. I want you to have a good time tonight.”

“I think you are worrying too much. I always have a good time with you. Remember we have been out so many times before. They just weren’t technically dates. So this should be easy. Like before, just with more feelings.” Chris looked over at you a moment as he tried to read your face.

“True. Okay easy then. Let’s try for that.” You moved your hand over to his and squeezed to show him it would be all right. But you did not expect him to squeeze back and hold tight to your hand. He did not want to let go. There went your heart; it was now somewhere lodged in your throat beating at ridiculous rate. You wanted your hand to stay in his, so there you left it. The smile he gave you as you did just that made your toes curl. Damn this man was going to kill you one way or another. You felt like a school girl on a date with the football star.

The restaurant was situated on a grassy area that looked over the beach. While there was dining inside Chris had reserved a table outside under the stars. There was a small band playing with several couples dancing in the middle of the tables that were scattered about. Twinkling lights ran the edges of the outside area. It was beautiful, quiet, and just perfect. With the wine ordered, he stretched his arm across the table and took your hand in his. Your mind started over thinking everything again. Like should you be feeling this way? He was your friend. Your friend who was now looking at you like more than a friend and was holding your hand. However, it felt good, it felt right.

“Stop trying to over analyze this, [Y/N]. It’s dinner. If you don’t like it then we will go back to being friends. I promise.” Fear flashed in his eyes the moment he said it. But he was a man of his word and would never force you to do something you did not want to.

“You know me too well. I’m sorry I know. I over think everything. But don’t think I don’t want to be here with you, I do. It is just a big step for me.” This time he was the one to squeeze your hand in reassurance.

“How about we not worry about it? Let’s have a good time. Tell me about your new horse. You were so excited today.” Chris knew what to say to distract you from yourself. The conversation after that flowed easily just as it always had with him. You told him all about the new horse as well as your other two back home. He went on to tell you stories of learning to ride for a movie years back then falling off and bruising his tailbone. You laughed so loud you had to cover your mouth. When the meal came each of you fed the other a bite of your meals just to try them out. After finishing and chatting for a little while longer Chris stood up holding his hand out to you. “Dance with me?”

You bit your lip nervously as you took his hand and stood with him. He drew you alongside of him and out onto the dance floor. Twirling you around first before he took you in his arms. The two of you danced just staring into the others eyes. It was then you realized this was how it was supposed to be. This was the person who made the world look beautiful and bright. You had spent the last four months getting to know him and becoming his friend. Now there was more. So much more. Closing your eyes, you laid your head on his shoulder drawing close into his arms. Chris leaned his head against yours. Neither of you wanted to move. However, after several songs, you knew it was time to go.

The ride home was similar to earlier in the quiet of it. The difference though was the air about it all. Both of your hands encircled his as he drove back to the beach house. He would look over at you for a moment and you would grin at him, causing him to return the smile. When you arrived home he got out, opened your door, and walked you up to the house. “Do you want to come inside for a bit? We can have a glass of wine.”

“I want to. But I think it’s best if I go home. I am not going to rush this. I want you to be able to see me as someone you want to be with and who will do anything for you. Especially wait for you. I’m not in a rush nor am I going anywhere. Remember that. I will call you in the morning if that’s all right.” You nodded with tears welling up in your eyes. This man did not know what he was doing to your heart. Chris took your hand and kissed it before walking back to his car. There you stood on the front porch watching until you could no longer see his taillights. It had been a wonderful night.

“Oh shit, I have it bad….”

Part 6

@feelmyroarrrr @bolontiku @aquabrie @malindacath @mysteriouslyme81

@thegirlwithnodragontattoo @magellan-88 @jensenxnina @thedoctorsnerdgirl @waywardswain @tacohead13 @beckyboo1188

#chris evans #chris evans imagine #chris evans fanfiction #chris evans fandom #chris evans fic #chris evans x reader #chris evans x you #christopher evans #christopher evans x reader #reader x chris evans #fanfic #fanfiction

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ildivine · 3 years

Text

between watching a lot of youtubers, losing a lot of sleep, and playing a lot of the off-peak games, i feel my creativity blossoming in the abstract way that i strive for.

i at least have come to understand how my creativity is dulled, and what i need to get it going again. its difficult, getting older, and becoming more jaded, and depression in the back of my mind is a noisy buzzing that can only be quelled with alcohol or weed. ive been learning how to deal without the prior, but, mm.

i dreamt about gavin and i think about a lot of people in ways that i don’t get to often talk about. its not like i talk to my therapist about this kind of thing. i havent mentioned the system to any since the last one i trusted treated it like DID, and thats fine for systems that need it, but we don’t work that way, and we never have.

alternatively i do think about myself ... and my past lives, often. i feel my limbs more often and it blends with the dysphoria; its strange to think i get so envious of just being spiritually Aware. ingesting mushrooms is the most helpful thing to me, and i know i mute my own sixth sense with doubt.

ive isolated myself from others quite a bit, as ive been mean again. im learning to appreciate the time i spend with dean and connor, even if it is every day. i miss connor every time i wake up without zem next to me, especially after weekends when i really get used to it.

our one year is coming up in july and ze thought aloud to me about marriage and we gently brushed over it. ze said something along the lines of “well, i wanted to wait for a better opportunity...” which, understandable.

one day ill be able to afford nice things like real rings and wedding ceremonies, but the last week of cleaning up my room, and throwing a lot of things out, made me realize what focusing on survival really means. i told myself that in 2021 i would focus on letting go, and its still hard. letting go of friends, and loved ones, and things, old stuff, its all the same, i have such an emotional attachment that it gets tangled in my head and my emotions. connors told me constantly to buy necessities and i brushed em off ... so im glad a friend helped us make up for it.

its embarrassing and its frustrating to rely on my money for things that others dont see as necessary. alcohol quells my twitching but i do have an addiction to it cuz i simply like to drink til i cant anymore, n im still learning that boundary. weed, i cant really explain what it does for me, cuz it is unusual. simple things like helping my appetite and sleep, two major things i struggle with a lot, as well as giving me inspiration to get up in the mornings, or do anything at all. right now it is medical in new mexico and i have a PTSD diagnosis, and when i smoke, it quiets the voices in my head screaming at me about wanting to die. i dont know how common this is, but its one of the things i struggle with financially. to survive. even with all of my antidepressants and anxiety medications, mental illness still lingers, and i think the more i delve into new media as well as reflect on past lives and old memories, my brain is in a very strange place. but ive come to appreciate that it is strange, i am strange, and i have mental illness, and i probably wont ever be able to silence it. i can take out my desire to cut my own skin open by watching dissection videos, and then im also learning and absorbing new information along the way.

when im not absolutely drunk on a tank of heavy alcohol, i can focus. i appreciate that i lost the years of 2018-2020 mostly due to how much i was drinking, on top of a medication that was already terrible for my memory. but the other day i went through my mood charts over those years, where i wrote down how i was, and although i drank daily and felt guilty about it, my mood was generally stable.

unfortunately its very expensive and unhealthy, and the inevitable withdrawals make me worse off than i started with. my therapist considers me drinking as playing with fire, but ive learned how to consume responsibly; dean and i can stop after a six pack and itll put us to sleep, but ill always want another beer, even in the back of my mind. That slight buzz from the mimosa that Connor drank and melted into was likely most of the reason ze could actually start dozing off, and we were half craving another for fun and relaxation, but i thought “i probably wont be able to sleep tonight without another drink”.

and i was right, and i acknowledge that its a problem. so ive tried to find that sensation from other things like hops tea and carbonated water (ew, its still not good, honestly dsjfsdj) or kombuchas, because it triggers the same response in my brain without.. melting my organs. did u kno ur liver is FUCKING HUGE n its also the only organ that can heal itself?? the cells reconstruct differently than scar tissue usually binds together n i just think thats Neat.meme

jokes aside, i think its also why my liver is Fine despite the fact ive drank since i was 13 years old, minus the year of rehab sobriety. That was also my Only year of sobriety. Digging into my alcoholism ive done a lot of questioning as to why i rely on it, and i think it is a lot to do with being addicted to being drunk, and i think its also a lot to do with ‘wow, i can finally turn my brain off! the thing thats yelling at me all the time, feeling scared and sad,” but drinking is also essentially a boost of stress hormones, so when the endorphins wear off, u get sad or anxious all over again. ive come to learn that i only withdrawal or get hangovers if i drink more than, i guess the recommended amount by doctors. 3 glasses of wine will now do me in, dean can power thru anything regardless of what hes drinking, but it does affect the health in ways i cant ignore.

i enjoy drugs, i think is the bottom line. i look up how to get a hold of psychedelic mushrooms cuz u can just get em in the mail if ur in a country where its decriminalized (hint: we’re not) n immediately the results are between getting help for addiction or how magic mushrooms help depression in low doses.

i really have a theme here. im still mad that my parents induced my reliance on all these substances and i know i would be a lot better off if i didnt drink til i was 21 or never smoked cigarettes, and i accept im always gonna crave these things regardless, but i only feel creative when i drink or smoke, and thats another problem with addicts because u fry ur neurons hard enough it all dies down. ive appreciated watching videos and playing games when i am in the comatose, apathetic stage of depression like i have been in recently, where i cant force myself to do anything and even fronting someone else to do it takes energy that quickly dies down.

my energy has died quickly since i went vegan, as my nails have chipped since, so im experimenting with my diet. my taste pallet cant handle dairy anymore, and connor was only here to try it, and i think we all discovered we just... dont wanna do that. but eating fish again helped my energy and brought a glow back to my skin. too much, however, still gives me the greasy meat sweats, so... a lil bit of everything seems to be whats right.

i still crash a lot, but i think thats just a side effect of being 28 in this generation and feeling 68 instead.

anyway, now that my room is FINALLY clean and looking nice, i want to try to do art again. i miss art. i miss thinking in images, i miss my imagination, i miss roleplaying and writing and drawing and arting. conny wanted to paint too but was absolutely too tired on sunday lol n i respect that so maybe tonight we can get something together.

but its been nice to feel something in my brain stirring again that isnt just the gross black buzz of mental illness constantly telling me to die. i get used to it, i guess. i forget its not supposed to happen because i have survived it for so long. im on the max dose of antidepressants and medicine i can take and i still feel really bad sometimes, but i didnt realize it until other people brought it up. stress definitely kicks me into my big bipolar mood swings, but i havent shaken off the depression in months. im not sure what to do so im trying to expand my horizons.

#>>.txt #drugs text #i GUESS #i dont rly consider them drugs but i understand they can b used recreationally...#and often are #but i think of it like taking advantage of benzos #theres no real need for neurotypicals i guess

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celestialallstars · 5 years

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Episode 11: “The odds are against me but I’m gonna make it....” - Loris

FUCK YOU MATT. FUCK YOU JACK. FUCK YOU STEPHEN. FUCK THIS CAST. YALL LYING ASS HOES SUCK MY FUCKING NIPPLES

Right now, I've got a mixture of feelings. On one end, I guess the tribal showed were some people's loyalties lie, but on the other I couldn't help but feel like it was a bit much. Like everybody in this game has literally lied and like I don't know, I understood Jack and Matt's frustration but it was a big yikes to see it get so tense and everyone get worked up. Like had my laptop not shut off, I would have likely snapped tonight and I think I'm seeing the good and the bad of things right now and it's just...a mess. Not to mention the 8 man alliance couldn't get it together until the 11th hour.

Fuck. Fucking fuck. Matt is finally gone, and this time we pulled it all off to keep him until Jared fucking pulled out an idol. How did he even know it was gonna be Chloe anyways? Man. I can't help but wonder if he wouldn't have played it had Matt and I shut our mouths but I think he would've anyways. I couldn't help myself, I couldn't let him lie again in public about that I had to expose him. Now he's got no idol, he's got few allies (I think), he's totally vulnerable and I pray to god we get him in the next 2 rounds.

It just occurred to me that I had a part in the chaos tonight. Stephen was already worried about the vote, but if I don't talk to Jack/Mitch then none of the last minute plan to vote Chloe happens I feel or gains as much momentum, then half the craziness that happened tonight at tribal does not happen at all....I saved Steph but at the cost of seemingly having Jared cost his game.

________________________________________________________________

I'm really drained at the moment between the school stuff and this game and now Jared claims my name was around for this round, or at least it was Bryce's plan. It did not phase me because I already wanted to go against Bryce/Zach but now it at least gives me another reason. AS of all of the craziness, my gut told me to try and stick it out with Michael/Chloe. I believe that between Rhys/Bryce/Zach's sketchiness, Jack just being himself, and Loris, I'd rather just try things out with the others. At this point, I'm kind of over a lot of the BS that people keep trying to sell. Having that said, I firmly believe that things need to get outted tomorrow unless we attempt a full on blindside.

I keep checking my messages as though someone wants to talk to me. Spoiler alert: they don’t.

Sooooo YESTERDAY WAS A DAY!

It started off so simple, Matt seemed to be the target for the majority alliance and Michael/Chloe didn't seem very interested in keeping him around. So I came up with a scheme that I think may have tied into someone else's scheme. But I didn't know it at the time. ANYWAYYYYY...

Matt's going home, but I don't want to vote him. Why? Because I wanna strengthen my relationship with Jack, so I approach both of them to talk about things and figure out who they're voting for. Matt was very antagonistic and I figured out this is because he heard I was saying his name, which was true! I get them to say a name they'd rather have taken out, and it's Chloe. Sure. Me and Chloe barely talk tbh. So I essentially go around getting pissy about wanting to vote Chloe instead of Matt to my alliance because I need to sell it anddddddd........

They... Want to vote her out? SKDJSKDKSKSKSKSKAKSK

Ummmm this wasn't the plan! Everyone except Loris and Jared want to do it. Okay. Whatever. I'm too deep in now to flip back, sorry Chloe!

THEN JARED PLAYS THE IDOL SKSKDKDMSKSKSKSKSSM

Ok but why didn't you use that idol to save Mitch hm?

Sketchy bitch.

Soooo I hear afterwards that Zach and Bryce had a chat with Jack and Matt and apparently they might have wanted to vote Chloe anyway????? But then why let the vote be Matt for the entire day? When we all would've voted Chloe if they just said her name originally? And now Jared also has a chat with Chloe and Michael? Worst allies ever.

Idk Zach and Bryce are sketchy and I've known that since the Mitch vote. Maybe they should watch their backs in the near future ......

First off I was SO happy for Loris! It would have been nice to immunity, but I know with all of the distracting things I had for the day that I did good with the few hours I had. This makes me wonder if it will continue a trend I see in a lot of orgs where I begin to place in the top 4 a lot in the late game. Only time shall tell. Going into this tribal, I for once feel great. Making a new alliance with Loris/Michael/Chloe/Jared all the while keeping Stephen in the loop. I'll still smile and wave in the 13th, three kings, literally any other chat but as far as I'm concerned, I'm ridding my hands of that. Hope its not too early to feel good (it is)

________________________________________________________________

So I did some thinking and for a bit I had a feeling me or Bryce would get 10th. This was just because Karth came in 20th and Kori in 15th, which had to mean one of us would come in 10th and the other in 5th. Time to see how accurate this prophecy is

Day 25......... gross. So disregarding the challenge because yikes the whole game seems to be flipped on and the best part is that I don’t put myself forward as a target and Jared and Chloe are seen as this tight duo so I expect them to be targeted over myself. However chris and loris both expressed disappointment in how the game has been progressing and Bryce and zach both came to me to strategise so hopefully I’m in some sort of power position in the game however chris has pulled this before where he’s so sad he didn’t get his way and so disappointed and nothing has changed so right now my focus is on how to get myself forward in the game with hopefully more to come and Bryce will hopefully be eliminated this round.

Soooooo I had to abstain from the challenge for work but that's okay. I don't think I'm the target anyway.

The biggest news is that Jared has added onto his old group of Chloe and Michael to create a new majority. One that is planning to overthrow the old one in the near future. Based on what Chris has told me, the additions are himself and Loris.

The issue is, based on what Jared has told me, that Loris wants to wait one more round before locking things down. I see why he'd want to do this. Jack could easily slip through the cracks of the impending majority vs. majority war and that puts him within reach of an easy win at FTC in my opinion.

Jack might actually go home unanimously if things keep up like this. It'd be sad, because I just really started putting work into my relationship with him recently, but it really doesn't seem worth it when, even if I save him, I'll likely be targeting him within 2 or 3 rounds anyway. Cyrena? More like, sayonara.

Of course, if last vote is any indication, this can all change in a couple of minutes! So who the fuck knows. There's still 3 hours until tribal and if I can convince the 5 in power to pull their move now I wouldn't mind it at all.

hi!! ok so like... I won immunity??? and it was a creative challenge???? I’m so shocked and proud of myself I rlly tried to snap and things went wrong but I still SNAPPED!!! and now I made single digits oh my god!!! like... 9th or above I’m so happy with but of course I’m gonna win anyways. so. I suggested an alliance with me chloe Chris michael Jared to Chris and Jared and now it’s a real thing and like.. we just need to get people to vote jack for themselves and then we can run the game perry add. That could be a serve. I genuinely feel like I’m in a rather good spot this game I don’t think anyone should want to vote me out except stephen maybe?? jack is hard to read because I’m not sure he talks To that many people ... idk... also oh my god so I just need to survive 3 more tribals and then I can play my legacy.... and like I’ll be so proud of myself if I get to do that. both seasons I find the legacy in round one(?) and I manage to hold onto it until the final six both times ?? like.. the odds are against me but Im gonna make it....

girl idk. i feel in danger because of lack of talk. everyone wants jack out. id prefer chloe. the only votes we can get are bryce, rhys, jack and myself. loris is dumb. HE WONT idk. jareds legit playin super well and good for him but ppl needa wake up and start knockin off his +1’s so hes easier to take out in the future. but who cares. these people are gonna end up lettin like jared or chris win .. and good. i suppose they deserve it.

im just super tired. partly due to this game but partly because of irl factors... so i just cant go chaotic. its so fun but soooo draining, and its hard when everyone leaks things and jared wants to be dumb and idol. it wasnt dumb. im petty. its real dumb.

im just trying to get ppl on my side but it seems so hard NNNN so . we’ll see

My names going round again 🤠

Ever since I played the idol on Chloe (which was indeed an in the moment decision), I feel a lot better about my spot in the game.

I revealed basically everything to Chris. There was very little that I left out. I told him about the F2 with Bryce, and my motivations behind every decision so far.

Sometimes overbearing trust comes out of overbearing promises. I still need someone to have my back no matter what, so being open with Chris was necessary. I still will try my best to keep Bryce in the game. I need them to war with each other because it will be a long term buffer for me. In terms of F3 plans, I'm not sure. I have options between Chris, Rhys, Chloe, Michael, Stephen, and Loris. I wouldn't mind staying true and taking Bryce as far as I can, but eventually his number will be up and I think that will be better for my chances to win anyways.

Today I finally pulled the trigger and Chris and I put together this 5some of him, Chloe, Michael, Loris, and myself called "starpower."

I will have to be cheeky with Chris to stay in a better spot than him, because he doesn't have strict promises with Bryce as far as I know.

Tonight Jack will go home which was Loris' call. I think it's fine because either way next round Stephen will want a big target out and he needs me to make it happen. I want that target to be on Zach, because I think Zach is the current frontrunner to win, and I think voting him will suit Stephen.

With that being said, it will take a smooth game from hear on out to not be a total goat. I'll try my best.

Feeling very strange about this vote. It's another sort of last minute vote, we've all kind of agreed to do a hard reset and vote Chloe again, but now that I've seen one idol play I can't help but feel like there's another coming, and this time it'd directed towards me potentially. I think I'm gonna propose possibly splitting votes just to cover our bases, because I do feel like Jared and Chloe are now gonna want to target me for no reason other than it's convenient.

If someone idols Jack tonight I’m gonna scream 🤡

So, I wanted Chloe gone this round, because I'm scared she will just float through this game and take a spot at the end. Which is exactly what is happening this vote. People want Jack instead so here we go. Haven't been too active so couldn't have gotten the numbers. Sad times.

Hi so the vote seems to be on jack which is a little bit anti climatic because everyone was like let’s make a move and then boom jack goes like I thot we were going after bryce zach or rhys but I guess not? Anyway I hope im not being played by bitches right now and people stick to their words. Or at least vote jared/Chloe out

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The thing that makes me most nervous going into tribal is that it makes strategic sense for Stephen not to vote with us and instead vote out Jared who’s a far bigger threat than Jack but hopefully the fear of a tie will mean that he makes it 6 and I hope he realises that I’m ok with going against Jared sksksksksk.

THIS game is so sad liek nothing i want happens ppl are just not wanting to do what i want and thats so unlike my first season KJFHDASKJ i just want total control and someone to run the game with but jared is so annoying and is trying to work with the ppl who will vote him out bc hes such a big threat like girl pls just let me have my way and i wont cut u at 4th! im still fuming over the idol play like who does he think he is playing it without letting me know thats all i ask i literally feel pathetic trying to work with him when he clearly has chris/loris/chloe interests ahead of me

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Jack is voted out 8-1-1. He becomes the third member of our jury.

Watch Jack’s exit interview take place below:

youtube

#shinebright #episode

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andya-j · 6 years

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There must be no compulsion to hide the bodies. Otherwise I’d have never found them. It was a Tuesday night. I was riding home after work, my leather roll of knives strapped across my back. I’d left my apron on the hook at the restaurant, but I still smelled like the kitchen. Before Doreen had moved out two months ago, she’d jokingly accused me of having a series of affairs at work, and that I was trying to mask the scent of all those other women with garlic and turmeric. It had been funny, a running joke, at least until the new sous-chef needed me to walk her through cleanup again after hours, and then leaned back into me while I was reaching around her to demonstrate where the fryer basket clicked in. I had been with Doreen four years, then. And the sous-chef—what the cheating man says in stories is that she didn’t mean anything. But that’s not right. That’s not fair. What she meant for me, it was a way out. So far, this is how my life’s gone, pretty much. I do all this work to build a thing—in this case trust, a relationship, someone to watch stupid television with, someone who lets me sleep late because chefs keep different hours—and then, once the Jenga tower gets tall enough to look a little bit scary, I start pulling out blocks, seeing how far I can skeletonize my life before it all comes crashing down again. Taking the bike paths home each night after work, though, it reminds me that I wasn’t always like this. There was a time. It was college. I was on the racing team. The university was buying us the latest bikes, sleek things, bullets with wheels—we weighed them in grams—and the sponsors were supplying us with the same shorts and helmets and gloves and glasses the pros wore, and every day my legs were pumping, pushing, pedaling. That was the only time I hadn’t started pulling out blocks, as it were. If college had lasted forever, I’d still be out riding, just zoning out at forty miles per hour, choosing the line I was going to take, just like Coach was always saying. You have to choose your line. Coming home at two in the morning, Velcroed into my old racing shoes that have the clips worn down to nubs—dull little nubs my pedals know like a ball knows its socket—I could pretend that life had never ended. That I was still me. That I hadn’t run Doreen off on purpose. That I wouldn’t run the next Doreen off just the same. All the other kitchen staff who biked in and out, their bikes were these bulky hybrids. Some were even labeled “comfort.” The comfort in riding—it’s not physical, it’s spiritual. My bike’s built for racing, still and always. Aggressive stance, the bars dialed low so you have to lie down on the top tube, pretty much. A butt-floss saddle canted forward like I’m a time trial racer. The only concession to middle age, I suppose, is the light clamped to the handlebars. It makes me feel old, but I’d feel older if I endo’d into the creek. The trail between the restaurant and my apartment is lit up intermittently, these pale yellow discs you kind of float through, but there are plenty of long, dark tree-tunnels over those two and a half miles. Those tunnels are fun to shoot in the dark, don’t get me wrong, but the dark isn’t the thing to worry about. The whole year, there’d been a battle going on in the opinion pages of the newspaper. Motorists were bullying bikers, bikers were kicking dents into fenders and doors. Nobody’d been hurt too bad yet, but it was coming. One of us was going to get nudged a bit too hard by a bumper, nudged hard enough to get pulled under the car, and the motorist was going to walk for it like they always do, and then cyclists were going to be riding side by side from one ditch to the other, stopping traffic for miles. It had happened before, and it was happening again. Even up in the mountains. Apparently—this just going from what I read, as I stick to asphalt and concrete—the hikers had been sabotaging the trail against mountain bikers. Deadfalls, rocks, the occasional spike. Helmets or no, riders were getting hurt. And now it had come to town. For five nights in a row, there’d been driftwood from the creek dragged up onto the trail. It was then I’d relented, finally started running a headlight. And the headlight was how I saw them. The bodies. Two guys, young, floating in the shallows where the creek turns west. On the shore was the large piece of driftwood they’d been trying to dislodge, to drag up across the trail. It was too much for two people. But they were the only ones there. One of them was floating facedown in the water. The other was on his back. His throat was gone. No blood was seeping from it. They were on the news by seven in the morning, the two dead kids. College students from one of the farming towns on the eastern plains. I had considered reporting them myself, but it was just a fluke of timing that I’d been the one to find them, I decided. Someone else would come along at about daybreak. Boulder’s full of concerned citizens, people for whom it would be a rush to get involved. Me, I was tired. We had two new bussers. You wouldn’t think a couple of non-lifers that low on the food chain would change the dynamic of a kitchen that much, but dishes, they’re our lifeblood. It had been chaos and emergency, from the first group reservation on. I deserved to just come home, watch some vapid cop drama until the sun came up. The last bit of the news I saw was the weather. The spring melt was coming down hard. Tonight the creek was going to be lapping at the concrete of the trail again. Awake again by three in the afternoon, I clamped my bike up onto the rack by the breakfast bar—by what would have been the breakfast bar—and administered to its various needs. The same way soldiers in movies are always taking their weapons apart and reassembling them, old cyclists, we like to perform our own maintenance. Old. I’m even starting to say it. When Doreen was leaving for good and ever, was on her last walk-through to be sure the last four years of her life were completely boxed up, we’d of course had to have it out a little. The main thrust of her accusation involved me just wanting to feel young again. That I’d never let that part of myself go completely, like other men did when it was time to grow up. I hadn’t had any accusations for her to feed on, to cultivate, to take with her and coat with saliva like a pearl. Just apologies, and very little eye contact, and one last offer of the apartment, which we both knew had just been a gesture, as it had been mine when we’d met. For dinner I ate sliced deli turkey straight from the container. Hang around a hospital for even ten minutes, you’ll see the nurses huddled up at the handicapped entrance, stabbing cigarettes into their mouths. Hang around chefs long enough, you’ll find us in the fast-food drive-throughs of the world. There we’ll be, walking out of the gas station with a bag of chips for dinner, so we can have enough energy to plate some salmon at sixty-per. The world doesn’t make sense. I tuned the news back on. The eyewitness—a senior citizen in a tracksuit with actual stripes on the sleeve and legs—was telling her story about finding the bodies. I watched the woods behind her, where the camera didn’t mean to be looking. At first I thought I was looking for myself—stupid, I know—but what I saw, what nobody else was seeing, it was a pair of cycling glasses, hanging by their elastic band from a small, bare sapling pushing up through the dank brush, way over in the ditch you never ford into, because you know it’s a literal dumping ground for the homeless population. What got me to hit the rewind button, then the pause button, it wasn’t as simple as castoff equipment. I’ve peeled out of I don’t know how many sunglasses and gloves and jerseys while riding, because I didn’t have time to dispose of them properly, but needed the ounce or two they’d free me of. What got me to hit the stop button was the color pattern on the elastic band. It was from a company that had been defunct since my junior year of college. And these glasses, they weren’t for the sun. They were clear. The kind you wear when riding at night, when what you need is a gnat-shield, goggles to keep you from tearing up, to keep the world from blurring away. And they were ten years old, at least. They had to be. I ate my turkey from the bag and I kept those clear glasses paused on the screen. Just watching them. My twenty-year-old self would have been disgusted, but when it started drizzling at five in the afternoon, and I was scheduled to meet the two new bussers twenty minutes before dinner prep—six—I accepted the ride downtown Glenda next door was offering. She asked after Doreen, said it had been too long since we’d been over for drinks. I agreed. Because she saw how I’d tried to shield my newly spotless bike from the water, loading it into her Honda’s hatchback, she backed up between the restaurant’s dumpsters for me. I grabbed my roll of knives and told her to drop in this week, tell the hostess she was my guest and, once again, she said she might just do that, thanks. Did she know Doreen was gone? Was this a game we were playing? I didn’t know, but it was too late to stop. I nosed my bike into the space past the line of coat hooks, chained it to the handrail like always. The components alone are probably two grand—all Campy, all high-end—and, while I’d like to think restaurant staff are good people, I also consider myself something of a realist. Only one of the bussers showed up for my hands-on training. I should have gone easy on him, repaid his loyalty or discipline or stupidity or whatever it was, but instead I just heaped all the attitude and scorn I had on him, and told myself that this is how it is for everyone, starting out in the kitchen. You’re tough or you’re gone. If I was chasing him off with this, then I was doing him a favor. He must have needed the work. The three times I came out to talk to tables—the first was someone I’d worked with years ago but wasn’t thrilled to see, and the other two were first dates showing off their food IQ, but masking it as simpering complaints—I made sure to linger long enough to see whether the groups huddled on the wrong side of the hostess podium were glittering with raindrops or not. I’d left my bike at the restaurant overnight a few times before, either hitched a ride home with a server or manager or just cabbed it, but I wanted to get out and stretch tonight, if possible. Judging by my second two trips out to the dining room—dry shoulders from the hostess podium crowd—it just might be possible. Granted, there would be puddles, a slick spot or two, and my bike would need another thorough rubdown once I got home. But the wind in my face would make it worth it. It always did. And, after a rain, the paths and bike lanes are usually devoid of traffic, completely lifeless. All mine. Coach used to always tell us to choose our line, to stay focused on that, to not look anywhere else but the direction you’re going. It was advice that worked in the kitchen as well. The line I could see ahead of me, it led past cleanup, out the back door, down the bike lane for half a mile before swooping and banking onto the path for nearly three glorious, empty miles. In the alley at two in the morning, my clothes steamed at first. It always made me feel like I was just touching down in this strange atmosphere, my alien fabric off-gassing, adjusting. It was just temperature differential, of course. It had been happening since I first started washing dishes, would clock out soaked from head to toe. I usually wasn’t this wet by the end of the night, had already paid those dues, but, because I was ready to be shut of the kitchen, and because the captain has to go down with the ship, I’d stepped in beside Manny, our dishwasher of nine months. You can’t help getting sprayed, especially when you’re dealing with a ladle. But we got it done in half the time, racked the wine glasses so they wouldn’t spot, and then I saluted him off into the night, hung my apron on its hook, and rolled up my knives. I should have been using them to cut up the day-old bread for croutons—a ten-minute job, with nobody tugging on my sleeve—but screw it. Sometimes you just have to walk away. Feed yourself first, right? The bike lane away from the restaurant was as empty as I’d imagined. I leaned back from the bars, planed my arms out to the side like I was twelve years old again. What do people who lose that part of themselves do, I wonder? When Doreen had accused me of not growing up, I’d felt parentheses kind of form around my eyes, the question right there in my mouth: And? It’s not some big social or emotional impediment to still be able to close your eyes, pretend to be an airplane. Some people hold on to that with video games, some with books about space, some with basketball or tennis, if their knees hold together. For me it was a bike. For me it was this. Soon enough the path opened up just across the creek, inviting me to slalom down it one more time, but I stopped mid-bridge, still clipped in, my arms crossed on the rail on the uphill side. The melt was coming fast, and hard. The surface of the water breathed like a great animal, the sides of the creek surging up just over the bank, washing the concrete of the path and then retreating. I was definitely going to be up until dawn, drying my bike out. Somebody old and sensible, they probably would have gone the long way, the dry way. My only concession was turning my headlight on, and hitching the strap of my knife-roll higher across my chest, like the bandolier it most definitely was. The first mile, the water never even crested up over my valve stem. And, down here by the creek, the sound was massive. It felt like the mountains were bleeding out. But I didn’t forget the promise I’d made earlier: A mile into it, right at the bend where the creek turned west, I stepped my right foot over the top bar, rode sidesaddle on my left foot, and looked behind me, at the rooster tail of mist I was leaving. It was stupid. It was wonderful. Before the bike rolled all the way to a stop, I stepped down into the grabby muck, hitched the bike up onto my arm like I was racing cyclo-cross. What I was really doing was playing detective. The mud in the tall grass and brush and tangle of vines and trash turned out to be sloppier than I’d hoped, but I trudged and clumped through it, picked those clear glasses off the naked sapling like the fruit they were. I’d been right, that afternoon. These were seriously antique, from another decade of cycling gear. Usually, something like this hung in a tree or set up on a rock with another rock there to keep it from blowing away, it was just what you did when you stumbled onto something somebody else had dropped. It was only kind. Surely they’d be back, looking for it, right? This was too far out for that, though. There were closer places to the path to hang a piece of equipment. I stood there by the sapling, raised the wet glasses to my face and looked through them. At the shiny path. At the silhouette of trees waving back and forth. At the creek where the two college kids had been floating. For maybe twenty seconds, I couldn’t look away from that bend. It was like I was seeing them again. Like a puzzle piece in my head was nudging itself into some bigger picture. Before it could resolve, I looked over, to the right. There was someone there. On a matte-black aluminum bike. You can tell aluminum from carbon by the turns in the frame. Aluminum bikes, they’re ten years ago as well. And the rider—where I was in kitchen rags, like usual for the ride home, he was in tights. Not shorts or a bib, but some kind of wet suit a surfer might wear: slick black like a second skin, ankle to neck to wrist. It would have been terrible in the sun, and at night it had to be terrible as well, since there was no way your skin could breathe. To match the black seal suit, this cyclist also had black shoes and black gloves, a flash of pale skin at wrist and ankle. No helmet. And—looking down to what I was holding—no glasses. I held them out across the muck, through the misting rain, and in response, this night cyclist, he snarled. I’d never seen anybody actually do that before. Like a dog you were happy was on a chain. “What?” I said, only loud enough for myself, really. He was already whipping his bike away, standing to granny gear it through the silt just under the water. When he looked back, his dank black hair was plastered to his white face. And his eyes—they were all pupil. Like smoke, like a whisper, he faded once he made the dry concrete. For maybe ten seconds, I considered what had just happened. And then I saw it for what it was: An invitation. A challenge. A dare. I smiled, splashed through the tall grass, ran past the deep water, and hit the concrete running alongside my bike, catapulted up into the saddle already shifting hard, my nostrils wide because my lungs were about to need air. It had been too long since I’d really gotten the opportunity—the need—to open up. Coach had diagnosed me early as a sprinter, and he’d kind of sneered when he said it, like there was no hope, really. He’d work with me, sure, but I was what I was. For four years it made me faster, better, harder. He was right, though: I’m a born sprinter. I’ll burn through my quads those first two miles, leave the whole pack in the dust. It was one mile until the trail nosed up into the canyon for twenty vertical miles. It was one mile, and this night cyclist, he only had about a half-minute head start. If only Doreen could see me now. Where I finally saw him again, it was at the pond the low part of the trail had become, downtown. He was standing there, one foot down in the water. There’s no way I was making any more noise than the flooded creek, but still, as soon as I rounded the corner, he whipped his head back settled his black eyes on me. I gave him a cocky two-fingered wave from my grips. He didn’t wave back. He was watching the water again. My big plan was to walk my bike up beside him, so as to keep from whipping water into his face. Not like we weren’t both already soaked, but manners are manners, even at two in the morning, in the dark and the rain. He never gave me the chance. I was fifty feet away when he hauled his bike around, rode the lapping edge of the water through the wet grass, all the way up to the road, stepped down for just long enough to lift his bike up onto the cracked sidewalk that runs up there. He didn’t lift his bike because he didn’t have momentum—the climb he’d just made would have even taxed my sprinter’s legs in their prime—he lifted it because road bike rims, especially old aluminum ones like he was running, they’ll crimp in from that kind of action. I bared my teeth just like he’d done, and I gave chase, having to run my bike up the last ten or fifteen yards, when my narrow road tires started to gouge into the mud. By the time I clipped in on the sidewalk, he was a receding black dot in the car lane. I ramped down off the curb at a handicapped place, and I gave my bike every last bit of myself I had. We took the turn—on the road, not the path—up into the canyon maybe ten seconds apart, him running the beginning of the red light, me catching the end of it, leaned over too far for wet asphalt but I didn’t care anymore. My left pedal snagged on the blacktop, hitching the ass-end of the bike over a hiccup, but the tire caught somehow, and I rode it out. Watching my line. I was watching my line. It led straight to him. He looked back just like Coach was forever telling us not to, but it didn’t slow him or tilt him even a little. A half mile after the turn, the road started its wicked uphill slope. Twice I’d gone up it, but that was fifteen years ago, and the road had been barricaded off for the event, and I’d still been pretty sure I was going to have to sag wagon it. Not because I was a sprinter. Because I was human. I’d promised myself never again. But this was now. This was tonight. I geared down, stood on the cranks. He was there in my headlight. Not riding away. Just crosswise in the road, like a barricade himself. I rear-braked, my rooster tail slinging past without me, like my intentions were going where I couldn’t. The night cyclist wasn’t smiling. He wasn’t anything. He was just looking at me. “I’ve got your—!” I said, pulling the clear glasses away from my neck, against the elastic. He turned in a huff, uphill, and, because I had the jump, I figured I’d be alongside him in two shakes. Wrong. He was faster on the climb than I was. It wasn’t even close. Even with me screaming for my lungs to be deeper, for my legs to be younger, for the grade to flatten out. It was like the mountain was sucking him uphill. And when he looked back on the first turn, his mouth wasn’t haggard and gasping like mine. He was calm, even. Not winded in the least. Two miles into it, blood in my throat, I had to stop. I threw up over the guardrail, then collapsed across it, not caring how it was chiseling into my midsection. No headlights came along to hitch me down the hill, into town. “What are you?” I said to the night cyclist, wherever he was. Miles away by now, I thought. Or—watching me from the trees? I tried to bore into the darkness, to catch his outline there, but then I was throwing up again, from deep, deep inside, like I was dry heaving all the years between who I was and who I had been, and then I climbed back into the saddle like the rag doll I was, rode my brakes home, taking the roads this time. I was bonked by the time I crawled into my living room. The adrenaline had burned through all the blood sugar I had, and left me in the hole for more. I couldn’t remember the last time this had happened. I didn’t miss it. It was like having sludge for blood, and having to look at the world through one narrow, long straw. I settled my bike against the back of the couch in exactly the way I never do—it was Doreen’s couch—unrolled my knives on the counter to be sure the oiled leather had kept them dry, and then I ate great heaping handfuls of corn chips and chocolate morsels from the pantry. Not because that’s any kind of magic formula, but because they were the first things I saw. It took ten or twelve minutes, but I finally woke up enough to rack my bike, dry it with a hand towel from the kitchen, even going so far as to twist off the valve stem caps, blow any lingering droplets in there back onto my face. Only after my bike was properly stabled did I change into dry clothes myself. Just some mountain bike shorts I’d only bought because they were on clearance and I had credit at that store. They were my house shorts, had a pocket right on the front of the thigh. My phone dropped into it perfectly. I turned on the television to see if our race had been documented, but all up and down the dial it was just cop shows sentenced to ten years, hard syndication. The first time I woke still watching, I rolled off the couch, checked to make sure the front door was secure—never trust yourself when your blood sugar’s flatlined—then climbed into bed on what I was still calling my side. The way I turned the lamp off in the living room was by shutting my eyes. The next time I woke, I wasn’t completely sure that’s what I’d just done. The way my legs were still both burning and noodled at the same time, I thought for a second that maybe I was at the end of a long ride, years ago. Something up in the peaks, in the thin, crisp air, permanent snow back in the shadows of the evergreen. Was that where he lived, I wondered? The night cyclist? Except—nobody could make that ride up the canyon. Any sane person would fork over the change for the bus. But this night cyclist, he hadn’t had a pack, hadn’t had a rack on his bike. If he did live up the hill, what was he even down here in the big wet for? Exercise? Recreation? That would be more like suicide, having to make that climb after bopping all around town in the dark. And, yeah, now that that was on the table: the dark. No light? Nothing reflective to him at all. Like he just wanted to whip past, be already gone by the time the smear he’d been even registered to anybody on the trail that late. “What are you?” I said out loud, but the comforter muffled my voice. Which was good. There was a shadow stretched out through the open doorway of my bedroom. My heart gorged up into my throat. And then, like my heart was that loud, the head of that shadow, it cocked around in a way I knew. A way I remembered. It was him. My first response was to curl deeper into the safety of my comforter. My next response, it was to ask him how he’d done that. How he’d sprinted uphill, away from me, a born sprinter. And on a relic of a bike at that. Keeping the blanket around my shoulders, I stood, shushed over into the doorway, for some reason superstitious about stepping directly into his shadow. Like it was a well I could fall into? Like that blackness was going to leech up through the print of my bare feet? I don’t know. It was instinctual; it was automatic. It was polite. In magical places, you make all obeisance you might think proper. He knew I was there, had probably clocked my approach from the exact instant I’d stopped breathing. What he was holding, and considering, it was his clear glasses. The reason he was considering them, it was that I’d put them on the plate Doreen had decreed the home for all glasses. The reason he was reconsidering them, it was that right there in the bowl were mine. My daytime ones, polarized, iridescent, and my night ones, clear and sleek, the elastic tight and young. My clear ones were enough of an update on his that they were practically a reinvention. He looked up to me, and his face, it was cut stone. Harsh, angular, pale. And those eyes. I’d been right, last time: The pupils or irises or whatever, they were blown out. There was hardly any white. Of course he didn’t need a headlight. Creatures of the night, they get along just fine in the darkness. There were no eyebrows, either. “What happened to you?” I almost said. And his thighs—if I hadn’t seen him ride, I’d never have clocked him for a serious cyclist. A rider who can rabbit up the canyon even just a mile or two without breaking a sweat, his quads should be jodhpured out past what any denim could ever contain, with thick, veined calves to match. Like gorilla forearms. His legs though, they were slender, smooth. Probably pale as his face, pale as those wristlets of white between his gloves and sleeve, between the cuff of his tights and the crescent of his shoe-tops. He must be corded like steel, and wound tight. At which point, finally, I cased the front door. It was shut, the deadbolt still twisted tight. Meaning—yep. Right on cue, the drapes over the sliding glass door billowed in, then sighed back out onto the balcony. The third-floor balcony. “I know what you did to those kids in the creek,” I said. “Before they were in the creek, I mean.” It was supposed to be what kept him from coming for me. Knowledge. Except, idiot that I am, I’d made sure he knew that the only place that knowledge lived, it was in my head. Dig that out, and he’d have nothing to worry about. “You didn’t have to,” I added. “They were never going to get that log moved.” He just stared at me. Evaluating me, it felt like. How long had it been since anyone attempted conversation with him, I wonder now? If he had spoken, if he could, what would he have even said, after so long? Would he have asked why a die-hard cyclist was defending those who would do violence to cyclists? Looking back, my guess is that he couldn’t speak at all. Not without showing me his teeth. “I didn’t invite you in here,” I said to him, my bulk—with the comforter—filling the doorway. To show how little threat I was, he turned away from me, studying his glasses again. Then raising them, to inhale their scent. “I didn’t wear them,” I said. “Not really.” What he was smelling, it was my sweat on the band, from when they’d been around my neck. From when I’d been chasing him. In a moment’s association, then, I knew that that was how he’d found me here on the third floor of an apartment building miles away from the last place I’d seen him. He’d picked my scent out of all the smells of the city. Out of all the thousands of other bodies out after dark. He’d known me through the rain. I swallowed, the sound of it crashing in my ears. He’d come here because I’d seen him. He’d come here because he couldn’t be seen. “You don’t ride in the sun, do you,” I said. It wasn’t really a question. I nodded down to the glasses he was still considering. “And the stores are only open in the daytime. So you can’t—you can’t update your gear.” I could tell by the new stillness about him that he heard me, but he didn’t look up. “Take them,” I said. Slowly, by labored degrees, he looked over to me. “Mine,” I said. “Take them. You need them.” Because it wasn’t in him to leave evidence behind, he hooked his down over his neck like I’d worn them, then settled mine around his head, the continuous lens cocked up on his forehead. When he lowered them, the dents left from the elastic’s pull didn’t fill with red color. But I’d known that wasn’t going to happen. “You’re fast,” I said to him. “I used to be fast.” He looked up to me for what I knew was the last time. I knew it was the last because there was a grin spreading across his face. No, not a grin. A sneer. What he was saying was that he was fast. The fastest. And he didn’t need lungs. And he slept—where he slept, it was probably burrowed into a hole somewhere up the canyon. Under a rock ledge, in a cave only him and the marmots and the chipmunks knew about, and whatever beetles and grubs can live in gaspy thin air, without the sun. The moment his grin flashed into a smile, I saw the dirty yellow sharpness past his lips and I took an involuntary step back. That was all it took to spook him. He moved like quicksilver over the couch, past the rattan stools, and onto the balcony. I rushed over after him, to see him silently touching down, or swimming through the night air, but he was already gone. I should have expected nothing less. Three nights later, the waters receded from the bike path. I hadn’t been riding to and from work. Doreen had called, actually. Just to talk. I told her to swing by the restaurant soon, that I’d make her favorite, like old times. Her breath hitched a bit over that. Four years, that’s a long time. For me too. “And you need to be careful,” she said, when we were both signing off awkwardly—awkward because we’d been saying the same thing at the end of every call for so long. What were we supposed to say now? “Careful?” I said. “Those two kids who died,” she said. “They weren’t riding,” I told her. “Just be careful.” I promised her I would and we somehow broke the connection. It was my night off. What she’d said, though. It was a challenge, wasn’t it? You only have to be careful when you think something can really happen to you. When you’re twenty, twenty-five, nothing in the world can touch you. To prove that still applied to me, I unclamped my bike from the rack, checked the tire pressure front and back, then nodded to myself about this, trucked us downstairs, to the sidewalk that led to the path that ran alongside the creek, up the canyon if I followed that far. It was one, two in the morning. Late enough that the hand-in-hand lovers would be bedded down someplace secret. Late enough that all the smokers who’d promised they’d quit weren’t out for one last drag. Just me and the creatures of the night. My headlight only stabbed fifteen, twenty feet into the darkness. To show I could, that I still had those legs, I pumped hard for the black space of the mountains. I knew better than to try to make the whole climb. But even a little would prove something. I made it the same two miles, not pushing hard, just steady climbing, before I wheeled around, rode gravity back to town. Two homeless men, tuned to nature better than the usual baby stroller crowd, stepped away from each other to let me slip between them at thirty miles per hour. I nodded thanks, but it’s always an empty gesture. You’re going too fast for it to register, and you can’t ever check back to see if they even saw your gratitude. Empty gestures are what make the world go round, though. I swooped under two, three bridges, pedaling though I didn’t really need to. There was still silt on the concrete. It crunched under my tires like sugar granules. “Careful,” I said again, to myself. Just retasting the word. Mining into it for what Doreen had really been trying to get across. I looked down, shut my eyes—I was on a straightaway, the one that tunneled through the next quarter mile or so of trees—watching my top tube coast back and forth instead of doing the first thing Coach always said: keeping my eyes on the line I was taking. My headlight was what saved me from myself. A piece of driftwood, obviously dragged up onto the path. Doing it without thinking—it was years too late to stop—I bunny hopped the wood. When you’re clipped in and your bike goes eleven pounds, you can do this. I came down with both tires at once, like’s proper if you want to keep control, and had to skid immediately, as clearing the next chunk of driftwood would only land me on a third piece. This wasn’t just a symbolic attempt to sabotage the trail. This was set up to hurt any rider who came at it with a head of speed. I didn’t wipe out, though. It was close, but I knew to cantilever out, ahead, and keep hold of the bike so it didn’t crash into me, send us both spinning into the darkness. It was a once-in-fifty tries dismount, but I landed it. Breathing hard from the close call, all the profanity I knew welling up in me, I looked back at what almost was, what should have been if I hadn’t just cashed in all my luck for the next ten years, and then I directed my headlight ahead, into the turn, to what other obstacles awaited. The night cyclists’s white face looked back to me. His white face and his red mouth and chin. His deep black eyes. I flinched, but then realized why he wasn’t already at my throat: He was impaled on the seat post of his own bike. He was impaled just like I would be, if I hadn’t reeled all my speed in. But my speed, it had probably only been half of his. I could see what had happened, too. Like me, he’d bunny hopped over the initial chunk of driftwood but, going faster, his hop had carried him farther, into the next strategically placed driftwood. It had been too much to recover from. He’d probably fallen over sideways, slapped the concrete of the trail hard, but he was going fast enough that instead of splatting into a skid, he bounced, he cartwheeled. And his bike was right there with him, coming apart at its welds, components spinning up into the night sky. Specifically, his seat. Only, the clamp hadn’t let go. The seatpost, it had snapped. A carbon-fiber seatpost, it would have splintered, would be showing thread. An old-style aluminum post like he was running, though, it’ll snap off up near the saddle, leave a ragged tube, a hollow spear. The night cyclist had hit the tree with his back, hard, and an instant later his bike’s seatpost, still extending from the bike itself, had jammed through his sternum. The blood around that wound, it was black, even at this distance. Not red like the blood at his mouth. I adjusted the strap across my chest, only just then realized I had my knives with me. They were clean, like always, but I could tell from the flare of his nostrils that he knew what I was wearing. That this was just one more insult the night had for him. One more stupid thing between him and wherever he was going. His lips thinned, his teeth baring, but before he could complete his display, he whipped his head over to the left. I looked too. Nothing. No sound. And then there was. Not voices, but brush and branches, parting. At first I thought it was the two dead boys from the creek, risen. But one of them had shaped sideburns this time, the other a shaved head. Different college kids. What they were carrying was a double-bit axe and a camp hatchet, one of those kinds with a textured hammer on the back side. And then I realized exactly where we were: at that bend in the creek. It’s why I’d thought they were the dead boys, risen. These were their friends, then. The other night, they’d tried to muscle that big log up onto the trail. This night, they’d come back with proper tools. To finish the job the night cyclist had interrupted. And to avenge their fallen comrades, as they probably saw it. When one of them dragged a flashlight up to the night cyclist, I saw that his chin and mouth, their redness wasn’t from himself. That Double-Bit and Hatchet were still standing, that meant that, a few minutes ago, they’d been three. I finally tracked down to the night cyclist’s feet, and there was the body that had to be there. The boy who had stepped too close, to taunt. At which point his two friends had decided to go for tools. For weapons. And they still hadn’t seen me. Because bicycles, when properly greased, they’re quiet. I laid my bike down into the grass, unlimbered my roll of knives, spread them out before me. I didn’t know for sure that Double-Bit and Hatchet could kill the night cyclist like they wanted—they’d still have to get close—but the sun would be coming up eventually, and if he was still pinned to the tree, then they might as well have killed him. The night cyclist saw me stepping forward but didn’t move a muscle on his face. And, because his eyes showed so little white, even if he was watching me, the two still coming at him wouldn’t have been able to tell. Double-Bit hit him once, swinging his great axe like a baseball bat into the night cyclist’s shoulder, and then Hatchet came not at the night cyclist, but the bike. He caught it on the bottom bracket with the hammer side, the full force of his impact traveling up the aluminum frame, driving the seat post deeper into flesh. The night cyclist didn’t even grunt. The black blood just slipped from his mouth, oiled his chin and chest. He did smile, though. “What do you have to smile about?” Hatchet screamed, bouncing like a boxer on his toes, wrapping up to swing again. Double-Bit smiled, seemingly pleased with how the night was falling out, but he caught me in his peripheral vision, too. At the last possible instant. He turned away just fast enough that my paring knife caught him across his open mouth, instead of his temple, like. The blade crossed between his upper and lower teeth, the dagger-point nicking the bunched-up jaw muscle at the back of his mouth on both sides, I was pretty sure. He reeled back, away from the pain. Into the mouth of the night cyclist, open just as wide as his now was, like a snake about to swallow an egg. When the night cyclist bit in, some of the blood spattered onto my face. I was wearing my backup clear glasses, but still I flinched, blinked. This all in a moment cut so thin it was nearly transparent. In the next moment, Hatchet was turning to me. I flipped the paring knife around and grabbed it by the tip, as if to throw—on the cycling team, we’d fake-lob a water bottle high to someone, then spray them hard with the water bottle we secretly had—and while Hatchet had his arms raise to protect his face, I drove my eight-inch knife up into his belly, digging for his diaphragm. Maybe I got it, I don’t know. He fell back into the night cyclist’s bike, fell back hard enough to crack it to the side, out of the night cyclist, and then the night changed. The night cyclist slumped down, free of the seatpost, his hair hanging over his face, and inside I was screaming at myself to run, to ride, to leave this place. But Hatchet was already coming for me, holding his guts in with one hand, his weapon high in the other. He would have got me, too, if the night cyclist hadn’t stabbed a hand forward, dug his sharp fingers into Hatchet’s calf. Instead of pulling Hatchet’s throat to him, instead of climbing hand over hand up to Hatchet’s throat, he simply pulled that calf to his mouth, and, with Hatchet facedown in the muck now, he drank, and drank deep, his Adam’s apple working up and down with each swallow. His eyes, they never left mine. When Hatchet was drained, just his foot spasming, the night cyclist pulled himself over to Double-Bit, drank some more there as well. And then he rolled over, convulsing in the mud, holding his shoulder. I could have run then, I know. But I didn’t. When he could, he stood weakly, looked up the path the way I’d come, then back the other way. We were alone. He lurched forward, for his ruined bike. “No,” I said. He stopped, studied me, his eyes showing real fatigue for the first time I’d seen. Shaking my head no, I pointed with my paring knife back to the bike in the grass, the one he could surely smell. He looked into that tall grass, then back to me. “Take it already,” I said, and nodded down to his bike. “Need to put this one out of its misery.” His front wheel was taco’d, one drop was lower than the other, and one of the cranks had bent in under the top chainring. I couldn’t imagine going that fast through the darkness, alone. It was a rush just thinking about it. “What the hell are you?” I said when he took that first step bike-ward, though I knew. In reply, he took my paring knife forearm in the cold grip of his good arm, pulled the meat of my hand right up to his mouth. He opened slow. His teeth were impossible. I had my big knife in my other hand, but it might as well have been someone else’s hand. He lowered his teeth to my skin, his eyes never leaving mine, and I understood what he was offering. Eternal youth. Night rides forever. Going faster than I’d ever dreamed. He was offering to share the night with me. What had my scent told him, revealed to him? Standing in the living room of my apartment, had he smelled the flavor of Doreen’s last accusations? I don’t put anything beyond him. Or his kind. When his teeth brushed my skin, I didn’t jerk back, but I did hear myself say it, my eyes welling up: “No.” He stopped, looked up into my face. “I’m going to call her back,” I said, trusting that he knew what I was talking about. Who. He held my eyes for a moment longer, long enough for me consider exactly what I was giving up here, then he nodded, pushed my arm back to me. He licked his lips, dabbing at a bit of dried blood, and then his eyes snapped up to the path. Company, soon. “Go,” I told him, and when he walked by I smelled it on him, from him. The decay. If he ever peeled out of his suit, it must smell like the grave for acres in every direction. Partway to my bike, he scooped up my leather roll, slung it back to me as if it was something any chef could possibly ever just leave lying there. Then he leaned my bike up from the grass, stepped across the top tube then back off, to adjust the seat. Not with a multi-tool, but by pinching the clamp’s bolt between his fingers. When he stood into the pedals, the bike was dialed perfect for him. He clipped in with both feet, just balancing there, getting the feel of this new machine—he liked it, could sense the speed locked in its geometry—and then, without looking back, he powered away, into the silhouette of the Flatirons, which, at night, are the maw of a great cave. Who he must have passed, who showed up two, three minutes later, it was a pregnant woman and a guy. They were bundled up, both crying over something—I’d never know what. He’d let them pass, though, the night cyclist. He surely needed even more blood to rebuild himself, but he needed worse to ride. I understood. With every part of myself, I understood. When the couple got to me, the pregnant woman yelped, stumbled back—I was standing in the gore of three more college kids, both my knives dripping, bug-eyed under the clear glasses, my face spattered with blood—and, and this is why I love the world, why I’m going to cook Doreen’s favorite meal tomorrow, just take it to her: The man, scrawny and useless as he was, he stepped in front of her, to stand between her and the monster I looked to be. “There’s no compulsion to hide the bodies,” I said to them like a joke, spreading my arms as if to showcase my night’s work—words and a gesture that would be on the national news by morning—and then I bowed once and stepped back into the darkness, and came out onto the path a half mile later, walked up onto the plank bridge, my knives cleaned and in their roll again. The waters were surging beneath me, inexorable, going for miles and miles, for centuries. I patted the rail’s cold steel and walked on across, home.

From Horror photos & videos July 14, 2018 at 08:00PM

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