#also i feel like i end up saying weird stuff out of nowhere or i say it in a really weird way

[butchcharliee]

☆

[satorusugurugurl]

The Headboard

Summary: when you find yourself in a compromising position, you’re lucky that you’re a hot neighbor who just so happens to be a firefighter, is just next door.

Pairing: firefighter!Toji Fushigurux AFAB!Reader

Word Count: 2,935

Warning: Language, smut, p-in-v, mentions of sex toys, degradation, name calling, unprotected smut.

A/N: A genuine fear I had often thought about when people tell me this is what they do. Plus, the DILF vibes were strong today.

Fushiguro Toji had no complaints about having you as a neighbor. You’re kind and quiet; you even watched Megumi for him if he needed a sitter. You would invite him and his son to your apartment for dinner, or he would do the same for you. The whole of being neighbors became friendship, and friendship turned into longing. Toji hated it when you would bring home someone who wasn’t good enough for you. He would spoil you rotten but didn’t want to ruin your friendship.

Nothing would be worse than an interaction after an awkward one-night stand that ended with you both not talking to each other because he would be the first to admit that he liked having you over for dinner. He enjoyed it when you came over with cookies or watched a movie with him and his son. If things were to become awkward or standoffish with you, that might be one of the worst things to happen to them in a very long time.

So, he would wait a bit to see how things would progress with you. Maybe once the lingering glances and the accidental brushes of your hands would turn into a little bit more. Perhaps once he better understood you and how you might feel, consider telling you he wanted to be more than friends.

Those thoughts ran through his mind as he sprawled out on his couch, not paying any attention to the movie on the television. Megumi was at a sleepover with his best friend Yuuji. He was all alone, not being stuck at the firehouse on call, filling his quiet evening with boredom.

Maybe he should call and ask if you want to come over; you could both watch a movie to make the most of a boring night. Just as he reached for his phone to call you, your name and profile picture popped up on his phone. Toji answered the phone with a slight grin, holding it against his ear.

“Hey, I was just about to call you. Do you wanna come—”

“Toji, you’re a firefighter, right?”

Your voice sounded breathless, almost with a hint of timidness. “Yeah, you know that. Why did you start a grease fire next door? Do not try to put it out with water; smother it with some flour.” You laughed only to be cut off with a whine.

“Uhm, uh—no, not that.” you sighed, “Y-you've seen some weird stuff, right? Like helped people?”

“Yeah, despite the title firefighter, I’m also medically trained and have helped many people in different scenarios. Why, what happened?”

The silence for a long moment told you to think that maybe, just maybe, the line disconnected before he heard him wince. “I-I need your help. But you have to promise you’ll never tell a soul about this.” A mixture of different emotions currently course through every nerve of his body. He’s concerned that you’re hurt, and his interest is peaked as to what you got yourself into this time.

“Of course, you have my word. I promise I won't say anything.”

“Good,” cloth rustles in the background, “you can come over right now. You still have my spare key. You still have my spare key.”

“Yeah, you gave it to me to water your plants that always die.”

“I don't have a green thumb sue me! Now please grab your medical bag and get your ass over here!”

The tone of your voice had him getting off the couch in a snap.” Alright, be there in a sec.” without you even having to ask, Toji grabbed his medical bag and your spare key.

You're nowhere to be found when he steps inside your apartment. “Hey?” He calls out, smirking slightly. “Fire department.” A squeak resonates from the bedroom.

“In here!” you call out, voice shaky, “b-but before you come in, I will emphasize that if you tell anyone! And I mean anyone about this, I will rip your balls off and shove them down your throat!”

Toji almost tells you not to threaten him with a good time, but he knows you from the whine that leaves the room. You were obviously in pain, and we’re taking this very seriously. Instead of making lighthearted jokes and conversation to push your buttons, he put on the best professional face before entering your room. The second he looks at your bed, his jaw drops to the floor in shock.

You’re naked from the waist down, your body bent forward, your ass pressed against the headboard. Your knee must’ve gotten stuck between the headboard and your mattress from how you're bent. Making it impossible for you to move in the predicament you found yourself in. Your cheeks are flushed as you averted your gaze, not daring to look at him. Toji was a smart guy; he was able to put two and two together.

Someone was having some alone time, and things had taken a terrible turn.

“What happened?” Toji clears his throat as he trots forward, opens his medical bag, and slips on some black latex-free gloves.

You want to crawl under your bed and cry out in embarrassment. How could you have put yourself in such an embarrassing situation? It was bad enough that you had gotten yourself stuck, and it was ten times worse now that the man you’ve had a crush on since you moved into the building was here helping you! But you would rather him find out what a size queen you were than call the fire department.

“I uhm, the uh—” you motion back to your headboard where your thrusting toy was stuck to your headboard. “It hit—my cervix hard, and I jumped, and my knee slipped between my mattress and my headboard.”

“Huh—okay, just try to relax a bit. I will look into getting that knee out first.” He gets on the bed behind you before gently grabbing your knee. As he does, the movement causes you to slide further down the toy, causing it to hit your cervix for a second time. The sharp, pleasurable pain can be felt from the tips of your toes to your head as you let out a pained moan. “Sorry.” Toji’s voice sounds more profound and more fierce. That you had never heard before; it was a voice that made every nerve in your body slowly awaken with lust.

“I-It’s okay—”

He gently moves your leg again, freeing it slightly. “So,” he goes with the questions when you were sure he was going to ask, “your boyfriend busy or something?” His question held no humor to it; instead, it was pure curiosity, and his voice made the nerves that reignited tingle with anticipation.

“What boyfriend? Who said I had a boyfriend?”

Toji glances at the curve of your ass, admiring the arch of your back, before he goes back to gently moving your leg. “Oh, I just assumed a pretty thing like you had one.” His hand gently grumps your ass as he maneuvers your leg a little bit more to the left, freeing it another inch.

“Do you honestly think if I had a boyfriend, I would’ve stuck a dildo to my headboard?”

“Hey, to each their own. So, no boyfriend?”

“Yep, single and ready to mingle. I let my friend convince me to try this position. She said it would liven up my solo sessions.” For as long as you can remember, the only way you masturbated was on your back. When you had mentioned this to your friends, they had been mortified, telling you there was more than one way to get yourself off. You so stupidly let them talk you into buying this stupid, expensive dildo and decided to give it a shot. That shot ended up with your knee stuck between your mattress and the wall and having to rely on your neighbor to help you.

“Hm,” Toji gave your ass a firm squeeze before gently pushing you forward off the toy a couple of inches, drawing out the sweetest sounds from your throat. “Would now be an inappropriate time to ask you out?”

A choked sound of shock cut off the moan that had begun to rise in your throat. There was no way he had just asked you out on a date—your hot neighbor. The sexy firefighter next door asked you on a date. Was this a prank? Oh god, why did he have to ask you out now, of all times? Despite the searing embarrassment, you can’t help but giggle, turning to look back at the massive man.

“Seriously?”

“Yeah, I think you’re hot and good with my kid; plus, I can make you feel so much better than this stupid toy.”

Heat began to pool in your abdomen as you continued to watch him carefully. “Oh, is that so?” he pulls his hand away from the fat of your ass, only to bring it back down, slapping it, making you help in pleasure and surprise.

“It's a fucking promise.” The tip of his pink tongue runs over the scar on his lip. “So, dinner?”

You laugh breathlessly, throwing your head back as he massages the sting out of your ass. “Would you be opposed to me counteroffering that?” Toji hand on your leg gently moves another inch, freeing you from the abyss you had been stuck in.

“Well, that depends on what your counteroffer is?”

The muscles in your leg burn with relief as you stretch it out, getting the blood flowing to it. Toji watches with dark eyes as you slowly in yourself off of the 9-inch toy that’s coated in your slick arousal. The sight of the coral-colored silicone covered in your wetness has his throat so dry it hurts.

“My counteroffer is that we skip the first date, and you help me with my current problem. You are a firefighter. It’s your job to help people.”

“Oooh, are you asking me to fuck you right now?”

“Maybe~ if I were to ask you to do just that, what would you say?” When you turn your head to look at him, your face is quickly snatched in his hands. His hand grips your chin tightly towards his mouth.

“I would say it’s about fucking time.”

His lips slam against yours in a symphony of desperation and need. He quickly shifts behind you, pushing you towards the center of the bed and away from the cavern you had found yourself trapped in moments before. The entire time he moves you, his lips never leave yours. It’s a messy open-mouth kiss, with tongue and groping hands as he releases his grip on your face, panting heavily as a string of saliva connects your lips.

“Do you know how hard it’s been trying to control myself? I try so hard to be a good, friendly neighbor. One that doesn’t come off as a creep.” he positions himself behind you down his gray sweatpants, spraying his thick fat cock. “Let me tell you, it’s been fucking hard; you are so goddamn fucking beautiful. Smart, funny, a great cook.”

You grip the sheets underneath you as he continues his confession. He told you how much he admired your strength and beauty. The pure admiration and raw need that’s in his voice makes your pussy clench, your arousal seeping out of your twitching hole. God, you knew you liked him, but knowing he was so damn bad for you, made you want him even more.

“I need you to fuck me.” There’s no doubt in your words that's precisely what you wanted. The word ‘want’ isn’t even included in your sentence! You didn't like this, and you needed it on a physical level.

“Yeah~? Need me to fuck that tight slutty hole?” His hands connect with your ass again, so smacking it hard, leaving a faint hand print in its wake. “Is that what you need, baby~?”

“Yes!” you shake your ass in front of him, dropping down low, revealing your wet hole to him as if trying to convince him to hurry the fuck up.

“Mhmm, that's a good little slut; tell me exactly what she wants; no, wait, I’m sorry, what she needs.” he grabs his thick cock in one hand. Toji held his cock, smacking it over your pussy. “And she claims that she needs my cock.”

You rock your hips back, fingers digging into the sheets as your chest heaves in anticipation of being filled to the brim by human flesh and not cold silicon. “Yes, please.” Toji tsks behind you giving your pussy, another sharp slap with his cock, the tip snagging at your entrance before he rubs it over your clit.

“Nah, I think you could do better than that. Try again to tell me what it is that you want.”

“I need you!” you cry out loud this time, shutting your eyes and anticipation of him thrusting inside of you, just feeling the head of his cock snag over your clit for the second time. “Please, Toji! Please, please, please.”

Grabbing the base of his thick, heavy cock, he gently presses it over your entrance over your slick hole. “Please, what baby girl~? Use your words, big like pretty little slut you are.” this was an absolute tort. Having your kit in your pussy, teased with nothing but finger-like touches, have you jerking and writhing against the bed.

“Please fuck me, Toji!” you screamed, not having to worry about your next-door neighbor complaining about the noise.

“That's a good girl.” Toji slapped your ass with a snarl, gripping the skin and spreading your cheeks. “I always knew you were a good girl. Always so sweet and friendly, the perfect innocent neighbor next door. but who would’ve thought that you would be fucking a toy against your headboard.” He spits his words before suddenly burying his cock fully into you.

You screamed out loud as his cocked stretched you like you'd never been stretched red d before, sending your eyes rolling back. "Nnngh~! Mmph~ Toji!"

“Fuck-Ngh.” Toji moaned, feeling your walls convulse around him. "You feel so good, baby. Fuck—baby, baby! Shit—being inside of you was so worth the wait!”

“Oooh fuck~!” Toji’s hands press into the middle of your back, pushing your shoulders down further into the mattress, allowing your back to be pushed down, beautifully showing the curves of your body for him. “Just like that, Toji, fuck, don’t stop, please don’t stop!”

“Oh, I’m not stopping until you’re crying. Your in need a good dicking down since you weren’t able to finish, I’m assuming.”

“Y-Yes!” You cry out, gripping the sheets tighter as you rock your hips back into his. “Yes, I want to cum so bad~!”

“Oh, I know you do, baby,” Toji smirked as he pushed you by your shoulders down into the bed, thrusting deep and hard.

His cock continues to hit your g-spot and your cervix, but his warm hot tip is nothing compared to the silicone. You had been using it earlier. So your eyes roll back. "Oh fuck! ~!" At this rate, you weren't going to last very long.

“Hoooly fuck.” Toji moaned, feeling your walls flutter around him as your legs started to tremble. "Fuck-Ngh. You’re about to cum. Fuck—baby, baby! Shit--I’m going to fucking fill you up. Is that okay?” he didn’t give you much time to answer as he angled his hips, thrusting precisely against that sponge spot inside of you. The one that had you seeing stars as your orgasm hit you like a freight train.

You whimpered loudly, turning to desperately kiss Toji as you squirted all over cock. "Ah~! Nnngh!!" your eyes rolled back as your body convulsed with the waves of your orgasm.

"Fuck! Fuckfuck—M’ cumming, I—Ahhh ahah—nngh!" Toji doubled over, his forehead pressing into your back as he kept cumming, releasing the months of pent-up desire into you.

He collapsed on top of you quickly, putting his arms out on either side of your smaller frame, bracing his weight upon them in an attempt not to crush you. You painted happily, grinning as you turned your head to stare up at the flushed, sweat-coated man who had fucked you thoroughly. He smirked, his scar stretching as his lips curled up.

His smirk, however, is short-lived as you push back against him, causing him to slip out of you as his back lands against your mattress. As he blankly waters, it allows you to straddle his hips, dribble, drop combined cum, and rub all over his dick as you so lewdly rub your pussy up and down on him. “I hope you have more where that came from because I’m far from being done with you, sir.”

“Hey,” he smirked, putting both his hands behind his head as he watched your position, his cock at your entrance. “Im a firefighter have pretty good fucking stamina. Let’s see what you got.” Little did he know you were a fire that could not so easily be put out. Not that he was complaining.

Forever Tag List:

@darkstarlight82 @pandoness @nealeart @simp-plague @sugurubabe @chilichopsticks @reap3erslov3

[opiopal]

I was thinking about more dumb McxMammon stuff because they’re both so stupid with each other and I will die on this hill.

Whenever there’s a situation that’s frustrating and one of them wants to storm out of the room, they stick out their hand expectingly and the other grabs a hold of that hand and immediately copies their anger and storms out with them. The first time this happened Mc got into a slight argument with Lucifer, held out their hand to mammon without looking at him, he copied their facia expression, and they both walked off.

Mammon is bad at hiding when he buys something for them. obviously like how we’ve seen in chats, if he’s asking Mc’s preference on something that means he’s going to buy them something. But Mc still acts surprised when he does anyways.

Whenever they have movie nights, they both end up ignoring whatever is playing in favor of cuddling after about two movies.

When Mc goes home to the human realm for the first time, the two of them are met with the crushing realization that it is insanely hard to sleep all of sudden without each other. So they fall asleep on FaceTime just to be able to hear each other while they’re falling asleep.

They absolutely get those tap bracelets, where you press it and the other person feels it on their own wrist. Mc’s is constantly buzzing.

They cannot be serious about anything. There’s a big test tomorrow? WE GOTTA LOCK IN- and quickly that stops after they start messing around, playing with their school supplies and making paper airplanes.

The first time mammon ever fell asleep in their room and in their bed with them, they had woken up before him, but then decided to pretend to still be asleep so then he wouldn’t be embarrassed and could “sneak out” before they woke up.

Sometimes they both still act like they just recently started dating, even though it’s been over a year,

“Hey Uhm… want to.. maybe hold hands, I just don’t want you to get lost in the crowd that’s all!!”

“Oh! Ok! Sure!! •//•”

Mc starts sending mammon random pictures that just say “us”, they could send him a picture of two clouds, two rocks, two flowers, two bugs, and simply just say “us.” and over time mammon also starts doing it to, and his is even more incoherent, but it’s cute anyways

One time Mammon probably had actually buttoned up his shirt all the way, only for Mc’s spider senses to tingle and them to come out of nowhere and pop them back open, “let the girls breath! Don’t be cruel!”

Because I recently got a sunburn, a thought entered my head of Mc also getting sunburnt and being a little miserable, and at the same time they are wearing take tops and shorts and all that crap, and having mammon help them put on aloe and rub their back. Mammon gets so angry about the sun burning his partner that he even gets a little paranoid about them getting burned, even in the eternal night of devildom.

Whenever Mc has a weird or crazy dream, Mammon always lets them ramble on about it, and is equally confused as they are.(for example, the Cinderella and Alice in wonderland events from the OG game,)

I don’t think this is as long as the other one, but still, I love my stupid

[autismprotocol]

TMAG Theory Board Update (EP 11-12)

Hi guys sorry about the late posting I've just started a new quarter of college and its been pretty hectic. also got into my school design BFA program so pretty stoked about that! Anyways lets get into the Episode Breakdowns because even though not a lot of lore related things happened I still have a lot to talk about

For the breakdown I'll separate each by episode in sequential order

What Happened in Episode 11: Marked

Celias Rude Awakening- we jump right into the weirdness straight away with Celia waking up on the side of the interstate. she indicates that this is not a weird occurrence and ends the scene by telling someone named Jack that she's "on her way." If you remember episode 8 after Celia and Sam talk to Gerry and Gertrude, she mentions stuff about wanting help with her own mystery. When Sam asks about it she says she's looking into Time travel, other dimentions and teleportation. Many people have theorized that maybe Celia is just a super heavy sleepwalker, but I think the she teleports random places out of nowhere. This could be a side effect of her reality hopping if this Celia is originally from The archives universe.

As for the identity of Jack I'm not quite sure about that yet. I cross referenced the name Jack with past episodes of TMA. The only thing that came up was Jack Barnabas from the statement about dating Agnes Montague (aka an avatar of the desolation and Jesus-like figure for the cult of the lightless flame) So Unless Celia is secretly Agnes of Agnes reincarnated , I can't find any way to link Barnabas to Celia. (if anyone has a theory feel free to send it my way.)

Sam Lore- this one is pretty minor story-wise but I thought it was interesting. Before the statement for the episode is presented we get some classic Sam and Alice Banter ™ most of it is pretty lighthearted but I noticed Sam mention something that could indicate he might be an amputee.

These could not mean anything and I find it weird that it hasn't been mentioned until now but thought it was kind of cool and I will probably be drawing sam with a prothetic leg in the future cause I really like this head-canon. It also begs to question if he is missing a leg. it might have anything to do with his past as a Magnus institute test subject but then again could just be a fun character detail added by Jonny and/or Alex .

The Statement- Getting into the statement we get another Ink5oul appearance. Also possible Ink5oul identifying as she/they. (and lets be honest being a fear avatar is pretty non binary core). I found this Episode gave me a feeling of a hybrid between the Vast, Buried and the Flesh some people are theorizing that is might be a new entity called the Deep but I think that the fear of the ocean could easily apply to the vast or buried. Not much to say about this story though pretty standard Magnus horror that also gave us a hint to what Ink5oul's goal could be/which entity they serve.

Post Bonzo- Gwen has a debrief with Lena after her first Externals Liason assignment and her meeting with Mr. Bonzo. Undoubtedly Gwen is still pretty shaken from her encounter, even arriving late to work due to sleeplessness. Gwen is able to ask Lena a few questions mainly she wanted to know who's name was written on the letter given to Bonzo

Lena is largely unhelpful but tells Gwen she should have worked it out by now and if not to pay close attention to the case load for the next couple of days. before the latest episode my guess was Klaus because that is the only person mentioned so far that the OIAR intends to kill. but more on that later

Marked- Now were getting to my favorite thing about this episode. This episode title can have two meanings. The first is the more literal interpretation. Tattoos are marking of the body and the case this episode was all about tattoos so easily a good name would be marked. But I believe this is a red herring meant to misguide listeners who have not consumed all 200 episodes of TMA because if you know the world of Magnus Archives the term Marked takes on a entirely different meaning.

In TMA the term marked is used to indicate that somebody has been influenced by one or more or the fears and are one their way to becoming an Avatar. I think this could be a coded way to tell the audience someone in the OIAR has been marked. I have two potential candidates

Alice Dyer- Alice has been having dreams about the Institute after her and Sam's adventure into the ruins. also she mentions feeling like someone's watching her (common to people influenced or fed upon by the Ceaseless Watcher/The Eye) My guess if she is marked it would be by the Eye.

Gwendolyn Bouchard: Probably the most likely culprit. The main way an entitly tends to mark people is through encounters with other avatars. Gwen has just had an encounter with Mr Bonzo last episode who I strongly believe must be an avatar of some sort.

What Happened in Episode 12: Getting Off

Aww Sam!!- Sam asked Celia out and it was adorably awkward. not much to say I just loved this interaction and I'm longing for a new Magnus brand office romance hopefully is wont be an agonizing slowburn that ends tragically like a certain pair of morons from Archives (I love you Jon and Martin but Jesus christ)

It's Bonzo time bitches!!- Probably one of the most gruesome Magnus statement I've ever listened to (good work Alex) Mr Bonzo completely annihilated some poor dude at his bachelor party. Based on the date of the Incident the I can confidently say that whoever Baz (the groom) was he was our mystery person the OIAR sent Mr Bonzo to get rid of. Along with some of the bloodiest imagery we learned a few things about Bonzo. The most interesting detail is that Bonzo has to be summoned by playing his theme song I think the CD of his theme song acts somewhat like the tapes did in TMA by materialising out of nowhere. Also fun fact you know that torn seam that is right down Bonzo's middle? that is actually is his mouth lined with rows sharp teeth so I guess I know that now (so fun) Moral of the story dont f*ck with Mr. Bonzo

Alice knows something: Theres been this recurring audio glitch throughout TMAGP thatnks to a few extremly observent fans we have started to relize that these glitches are not at all random and are actually letting the audience know when a character is lying (i actually reposted somones deepdive into all the istances of this glitch so far if you guys are intrested in knowing more) why i bring this up now is becuase since we know when any charater is lying we also know when they are being truthful if there is no glitch when they say somthing and at the end of this episode this interaction occurs

Alice goes ahead and makes a joke about this to annoy Gwen but the fact theres no audio glitch when she says "I know" means she does actually know who is behind the OIAR and is activly refusing to share it with Gwen or the others. What do you know Alice!?

and that's about it im already loving these next batch of episodes and am so excited to learn more (ERROR has to show up somtime )

thanks to everyone who resonded the poll on the last update I will continue to include drawings into the breakdown even if it takes me a little bit of time to post. anyways I wrote this all in one sitting and I'm about ready to pass out so thanks again and the ask box and comments are always open for discussion and theory crafting.

-Echo

[tomsvouge]

Bad Idea Right?

Pairings: Ex!Joe burrow x Ex!Reader Warnings:Alcohol use, situationship, mentions of sex Summary- What happens when y/n gets a text message from someone in her past that her friends are not fond of? Her friends tell her not to go but it can’t be a bad idea…. right?

Who would have thought I would end the night with him, In his bed cuddled with him like we are together. Should I regret it? Probably. Do I regret it? Hell no! Have you seen this man he is literally a walking hercules and who am I to block an opportunity that I was given. Anyways, you may be asking, "y/n what the heck are you even talking about?". Well let's go back to earlier in the day where everything started.

My friends and I were talking about throwing a party and I couldn't be more excited. I needed something to get my mind off of him. Me and Joe are kinda rocky when it comes to a relationship. We broke up about two months ago. Usually when two people break up they dont talk to each other, buttttt me and Joe have been sneaking around for the past two weeks. No one knows about this, not my friends, not his friends just sneaking around like two teenagers. 

As we all sit on my couch we start talking about party details, y’know the time, who to invite the food, all that good boring stuff when out of nowhere melody says this.

“Well since we're talking about personal invites I don't think you should invite Joe y/n”- Melody 

“Why would I invite Joe? We're done. Over” I said lying through my teeth knowing that we were still hooking up.

“I'm just saying you seem to be tense each time you see him. Like that one time we were watching tv and his Bose ad came on. You looked like you saw a ghost.” She says laughing.

“I was Just shocked at his dance moves, I thought I taught him better when we took that dance class.” and that was true we did take a dance class but let's just say, Joeys not dancing for a while.

“I wasn't the worst i've seen but also not the best”- Kaylee says while  writing something down.

OK! Can we stop talking about my ex, kinda getting weird. 

“Ok but just know Joe Burrow is not allowed through these doors.” Melody says in a serious tone.

“Got it Not allowed through the doors.” I say looking at her. 

“I'll just let him in the backyard” I say in my head.

Getting ready for the party I put on my outfit and did my makeup. As I'm putting on my mascara I get a facetime. I look at the screen and immediately knew it was joe as his contact name is “LOSER NOT WORTH MENTIONING🩷” showed up. Reluctantly I picked up the phone.

“What?” I say in a aggravated tone 

“Well hello to you too” Joe says, rolling his eyes on the other side of the phone.

 “What are you doing?” he says, trying to change the vibe of the call.

Getting ready-i say in a sassy tone.

“For?”- Joe

“My party”-y/n

“And i didnt get an invite?” joe says with that cocky smile on his face 

“Didn't think you needed one considering we were not really together”- I say side eyeing him so hard you could feel it.

“Just because we're not together doesn't mean we cant be friends”- joe 

“If this is what you call just friends I would love to see what you do with people you hate.” i say laughing

“You know what i mean” - Joe

“Friends dont have sex nearly every night and talk to each other the way we do.”- y/n

“Well friends also don't hide things from each other” Joe says, placing the phone down so I could see him.

“I didn't invite you because you are not allowed to come, you are not exactly on my friend's good side right now.”- y/n

 My friend did not like Joeto much after the shit they had heard about him from endless phone calls to late night gossip sessions at the house. He didn't hurt me like cheat or anything. He is actually a nice guy but anyone who plays mind games and gaslights is a no no in my friend's book.

“Nothing new, I wasn't on their good side when we were together.”- Joe

“But since I can't come to you, how about you come to me?”- Joe 

“And why would I do that?” I genuinely asked because who was he to think I would leave my own party for him.

Because we can't get enough of each other no matter how hard we try we both know that we will all go back.

And Joe was right, no matter how hard I tried to move on, no one seemed to understand me like Joe does. He knows everything about me. He accepts me for who I am and vice versa. Still sad we didn't work out due to commitment and trust issues. I think when the time's right Joe and I will be perfect for eachother.

“Well I'll think about it.”- I say 

“Good, let me know when you decide.” - Joe

I was having the time of my life. My friends made sure I didn't even think about joe. So much that I forgot to even remind him if I was coming or not. 

In the middle of taking group shots I feel a vibrate coming from my hip.

LOSER NOT WORTH MENTIONING🩷- u still coming??

“Don't do it.”-Kaylee says, looking over my shoulder.

“Who said I was?”

“You didn't say that but the look on your face said otherwise.”

“Okay but would you pass up a chance to just go back to your ex for one night.” 

“One night more like two weeks but she didn't need to know that right now.”

“No I wouldn't, he cheated and I'll be damned if I go back to him just to disrespect myself again.”

“Well I won't if i will make you happy.”

“Good”

Okay sooo im going to his house. You guys may say I have little respect for myself but all the respect leaves my body when I see that man. You get in a room alone with Joe Burrow and see how long you last without being all over him. Plus, can't be that bad of an idea right?

With my luck the rain decided to pour harder and completely drench me. Rushing to my car I hopped in and started it. I quickly texted Joe back telling him I was on my way. Thankfully The drive from my house to joes is not that far at all. Getting out of the car rushing to get to the front door as the rain came down on me. When I kid you not to say this man is a QB he is not quick on his feet off the field. I literally took him forever to open the door. 

Walking in the house I'm immediately tackled into hugs and kisses . After a while pushing wavy from him I decided I needed to put my clothes somewhere because wet clothes just don't feel comfortable. 

Eventually me and Joe decided to chill on the couch and talk for a while. And lets just say after the talk and cuddles the door was locked to that bedroom and that's how we got to this morning 

I woke up to like a million texts from my friends asking me why I disappeared in the middle of the party and I just told them all that I didn't feel well and went up early to sleep. Looking over left I see Joe sleeping with his arms wrapped around me. Part of me felt bad for lying to my friends about going to sleep early but technically i did lie i said I was sleep I just didn't say where.

hey guys! I'm gonna try to start putting out more fics . I chose to do this as a fun hobby and I just don't want it to feel and chore or job but if you want to request fics you are welcome to do so 🩷

[kikyoupdates]

Infatuated ⭑˚💌⭑ 𝑗𝑒𝑎𝑙𝑜𝑢𝑠𝑦

yandere!bnha x reader

yandere, reverse harem, bnha x fem!reader, slowburn, slowburn yandere

Your Quirk is rather unique. It plays out almost like a game, giving you missions and goals that help you become stronger. On top of that, you also have the ability to charm those around you. It sounds innocent enough on paper, and you can’t help but revel in the attention everyone keeps showering you with. But what happens when their feelings give way to something more sinister?

prologue | story masterlist | next

After what just happened, it feels like you have to tell your parents about it.  

“Mom, dad,” you say. “I think I just got my Quirk.”  

They react by smiling brightly. “Oh, that’s lovely, sweetie. What kind of Quirk is it?”  

Now comes the hard part. Since even you barely know how your powers work, explaining it to them will be a nearly impossible feat.  

You furrow your brows. “Um... it’s kind of weird. Out of nowhere, I started seeing this screen with different stuff written all over it. Nobody else can see it, though, so that’s why I think it might be my Quirk.”  

Out of fear of getting in trouble, you decide not to tell them about the fact that Katsuki passed out after you used your ability on him. You already feel pretty guilty about it. For the time being, you just want to figure out how your Quirk actually works.

“A screen that’s invisible to everyone but you?”  

Your parents exchange confused glances. It makes sense that they don't quite understand, because under normal circumstances, Quirks are mostly hereditary. Children most often develop powers that are similar to those of their parents, or some combination of the two. But neither of your parents has a power like yours, which is why you were so perplexed when it first popped up.  

“Interesting,” your mother hums. “And you’re sure it’s your Quirk? It’s not just some game you like to play with your friends? It’s important to know the difference between real life and pretend, honey.”  

You nod vigorously. “I’m not making it up. I promise.”  

“[Name]’s a good girl,” your father insists. “If she says she isn’t lying, then we should believe her. Quirks are mutations, at the end of the day. It might be unlikely, but it’s still possible for her to have powers different from ours. All that matters is that she finally has something to call her own. I remember being awfully excited when my Quirk first manifested. It’s a big milestone, after all.”  

“Well, I suppose that’s true. Okay, then. In that case, we should celebrate,” your mother beams. “Our little girl finally has a Quirk! What would you like to do to commemorate the occasion, hm? Do you want us to order you some yummy food or take you shopping to buy something you like?”  

Your parents love to spoil you, and since you are only a little kid, you certainly can't help but capitalize on the opportunity. 

The day your Quirk manifests, your family treats you to a delicious meal and even buys you a little gift. You end up having so much fun that you briefly forget all about your initial goal, which is to try and decipher the specifics of your Quirk. You even forget about poor Katsuki, who is bedridden after suddenly fainting.  

It isn't until later that same night that it all comes back to you, thanks to a sudden notification. 

[𝐍𝐄𝐖 𝐌𝐈𝐒𝐒𝐈𝐎𝐍: 𝐒𝐮𝐜𝐜𝐞𝐬𝐬𝐟𝐮𝐥𝐥𝐲 𝐂𝐡𝐚𝐫𝐦 𝐬𝐨𝐦𝐞𝐨𝐧𝐞.]

You’ve just gotten into bed and are staring up at your bedroom ceiling when you see the message pop up. It showed up completely unprompted, just like last time. This has to be your Quirk. Nothing else would make any sense. Well, unless you're somehow trapped in an incredibly long dream, but that seems like a stretch. 

“Charm someone,” you mumble. You have to admit that you're a little nervous. The last time you used your ability on a person, they passed out. Will the same thing happen again? Also, why is it calling this a mission? It almost seems to imply that there's some sort of reward to be had once you complete it.  

There's really no way of knowing—other than actually trying it out, of course.  

When morning rolls around, you head straight for Katsuki’s house and knock on his front door.  

Mitsuki is the one to greet you. “Oh, hi there,” she smiles. “You’re one of Katsuki’s little friends, aren’t you? Thank you for bringing him home the other day when he wasn’t feeling well.”  

“I’m [Name],” you say, trying not to look too guilty, since you're the whole reason Katsuki fainted in the first place. “Is Katsuki feeling better today?”  

“He’s perfectly fine. I’m sure he was just tired and needed some rest. He’s eating breakfast right now, but did you want to come inside and talk to him for a bit?”

After you respond with an affirmative nod, Mitsuki ushers you into the house. It's your first time actually being here. It still hasn't been very long since you’ve moved into the neighborhood, and even though you often play with Katsuki and the rest of his friends, you have yet to visit any of their homes. 

You find Katsuki sitting at the dining table, spooning some cereal into his mouth. You're pretty much always thrilled to see him. He is one of your role models, and you can only hope that you'll one day be as confident and fearless as he is.  

So, naturally, you break out into a grin the second you spot him. 

“Katsuki!” you cry out, practically rushing over to him. “Good morning!”  

As much as you wish you could say that Katsuki responds with the same enthusiasm, that isn't at all the case.  

Instead, he visibly recoils, cheeks darkening to a deep shade of red.  

“Why are you here?” he huffs, sounding a bit annoyed. “I already told you that I was fine yesterday. You didn’t need to make such a fuss over nothing. And you even took me back to my parents? I would’ve been back to normal if you gave me a few minutes. I was just taking a little nap, that’s all.”  

Your shoulders slump. “Oh. I’m sorry. I know you’re really strong, Katsuki, but you fainted so suddenly. I was so worried I almost started crying...”

He doesn't snap at you a second time. Instead, he spoons another helping of milk and cereal into his mouth, still blushing all the way up to his ears. He appears to be avoiding eye contact, and you suspect that it has something to do with the fact that you kissed him yesterday.  

He doesn't seem to blame you for the fact that he passed out, though. No one really thinks you're responsible for that incident. They still don't even know that your Quirk has manifested.  

A part of you wants to tell him, but that would be the same thing as admitting you made him fall ill the other day. So, for the time being, you decide to keep your mouth shut. You want answers first. 

Katsuki’s glances at you out of the corner of his eye. “What do you keep staring at me for? Weirdo. You’re being kind of annoying, so here. Have this candy bar. I was saving it for later, but you can have it instead.”

“Wow, really?” you gush. “Thank you so much! You’re the best, Katsuki.”  

He can't help but crack a grin. “Yeah, yeah. Tell me something I don’t know.”  

You hang out with Katsuki for a while longer after he finishes up his breakfast. He gives you the grand tour of his room—which is decked out in a bunch of All Might merch and looks super impressive—and then you eventually take your leave.  

Before you do, though, you want to make sure of one last thing.  

“Are you sure you're feeling alright?” you insist. “It was really scary seeing you collapse like that. I just don’t want you to be hurt. I’d be really sad if that was the case.”  

Katsuki rolls his eyes. “You’re nagging me the same way my mom does. I already told you I’m fine. I can handle that much, no sweat. Didn’t I already tell you I’m going to become the Number One hero one day?”  

“Well... alright. As long as you’re okay.”  

You have a mission to charm someone, but you have no intention of using it on Katsuki again. If you end up making him faint a second time, it would seriously weigh on your conscience.  

So, you decide to approach your other closest friend, Izuku.  

Izuku is different than Katsuki. He's a bit of a crybaby, but that's only because he's such a sweet, honest kid. He tends to be more emotional than most, which just goes to show how much he cares about things. He especially cares about other people and making sure that they always have smiles on their faces. He hates to watch someone get hurt, and when Katsuki fainted, he was easily the most frantic out of everyone. 

Given his considerate nature, you feel like it would be okay to entrust him with the truth.  

“So... your Quirk manifested yesterday?” he blinks. “And after you kissed Kacchan and used your powers on him, he fainted?”

You press your lips into a thin line, feeling quite guilty with the admission. “Yeah. Please don’t tell anyone else yet, Izuku. You’re the only one who knows, because I trust you to keep it a secret. My Quirk seems pretty confusing so far, so I don’t really know what I’m supposed to do with it.”  

“I-I promise to keep it a secret!” he reassures, nodding his head so fast that his curly green locks bob in place.  

“Thank you, Izuku.” You pause, not quite sure how to breach the next topic. “Um... there was actually something else I wanted to tell you about.”  

His brows arch. “Sure. What is it?”  

“My Quirk... it gave me a mission. It said I have to charm someone again. I’m not sure what’ll happen when I actually do it, but I want to give it a try and see how it goes. I’m hoping it might help me figure things out.”  

“Oh, okay.”  

Clearly, Izuku doesn't seem to understand where you're going with this, but once the realization finally sets in, a strangled little gasp catches in the back of his throat.  

“W-Wait!” he squeaks, flailing his hands in a panic. “D-Do you mean that you want to use your Quirk... on me?”  

You smile shyly. “I was hoping to, yes. I have to kiss someone before I can charm them, though. Would that be okay? A kiss on the cheek, like what I did to Katsuki yesterday?”  

At only four years of age, even just a cheek kiss is a big deal. Someone like Katsuki is normally unfazed by most things, but even he got incredibly flustered when you kissed him. You can only imagine how Izuku—the shyest kid in the neighborhood—might react.  

He’ll probably refuse. If he does, I should just leave it. I don’t want to make him uncomfortable.  

To no one’s surprise, Izuku is already burning red from embarrassment. He’s taken several steps back, most likely out of pure instinct, and is now clenching his fists so hard that his knuckles are white as paper.  

“You want to k-kiss me,” Izuku stammers nervously.  

“Only if you let me,” you promise. “I don’t want to make you upset. It’s just that it’s the only way to use my charm ability, so... yeah. But then again, I’m worried that you might end up fainting too. Ugh. I don’t really know what to do...”  

Embarrassment aside, you can understand why Izuku might be afraid to let you use your Quirk on him, especially after what he just witnessed yesterday. He has every right to refuse, purely from a self-preservation standpoint.  

But he doesn't.

“O-Okay,” Izuku swallows. “I’m happy you got your Quirk, [Name]. And... I want to help. Y-You can kiss me if you need to. Even if I pass out, it’s okay. As long as I can help you.”  

He proceeds to squeeze his eyes shut, no doubt too flustered to bear watching everything unfold. You officially have his go-ahead, and even though you don't want to end up making him feel unwell, you aren't sure how else you're supposed to get used to your Quirk.  

Please don’t make Izuku faint. Please let him be okay.  

Drawing in a sharp breath, you slowly approach him. Despite the fact that his eyes are closed, he can still hear you moving closer, and he starts shaking like a leaf in the wind. You figure it's best to just go for it as quickly as possible and spare him the nervous anticipation. 

Blushing quite a bit yourself, you peck Izuku on the cheek, then hastily pull away.  

“I-It’s done,” you say. “Izuku, you can open your eyes now.”  

He does just that, although it takes him a while to actually work up the nerve. Eyes the color of emeralds slowly drift open, and he even lets out a nervous little hiccup, clearly mortified beyond belief.

“A-A girl—hic—a girl actually k-kissed me,” Izuku stutters.  

[𝐔𝐬𝐞 𝑪𝒉𝒂𝒓𝒎 𝐨𝐧 𝐌𝐢𝐝𝐨𝐫𝐢𝐲𝐚 𝐈𝐳𝐮𝐤𝐮?]

There it is again. You now have the option of using your ability, just like before. You can't deny that you're a little worried. A power that makes people fall over unconscious is quite daunting, but you hope that things won't always turn out that way.

“Hold my hand,” you offer. “Just in case you fall over. I’ll catch you so that you don’t get hurt.”  

Nodding shyly, Izuku wraps his little hand around yours, then you finally make your selection. 

>>[𝐘𝐄𝐒]

It doesn't take very long for your Quirk to take effect. Much like Katsuki, he starts looking weak and unsteady. You hold his hand tightly, even loop your arm around his back to make sure he doesn't suddenly faceplant onto the ground. His breathing is getting shallower by the second, and if you thought the blush on his cheeks before was outrageous, it can't even compare to the one he has now.

“I feel... weird,” Izuku mumbles. Too weak to even remember his earlier embarrassment, he clings to your body as if he's holding on for dear life. “[Name], what’s... what’s happening? I feel... warm and fuzzy. So warm...”  

You fear that he's getting close to passing out. So far, it seems to be following the exact same pattern as before. Darn it. Is this really a mistake? Is coming to terms with your Quirk really worth doing this to the people you care about?  

Before you can ponder the moral implications of your actions, Izuku suddenly cups your cheek with his hand, then presses his lips against yours.  

Um?!  

It's a quick, chaste kiss, but a kiss nonetheless. A real kiss, not just one on the cheek. You feel like your entire face is on fire, and it's safe to say that you’ve been momentarily stunned from embarrassment.  

And by Izuku, no less. A kid who would’ve never had the guts to do that under normal circumstances.  

“Hehe,” he giggles, appearing somewhat delirious. “I kissed [Name]… on the lips. Wow. Was I your first kiss? I sure... hope so.”  

He goes limp in your arms right after that.  

[𝐂𝐨𝐧𝐠𝐫𝐚𝐭𝐮𝐥𝐚𝐭𝐢𝐨𝐧𝐬 𝐨𝐧 𝐜𝐨𝐦𝐩𝐥𝐞𝐭𝐢𝐧𝐠 𝐲𝐨𝐮𝐫 𝐦𝐢𝐬𝐬𝐢𝐨𝐧! 𝐀𝐬 𝐚 𝐫𝐞𝐰𝐚𝐫𝐝, 𝐲𝐨𝐮𝐫 𝐬𝐭𝐫𝐞𝐧𝐠𝐭𝐡 𝐡𝐚𝐬 𝐢𝐧𝐜𝐫𝐞𝐚𝐬𝐞𝐝 𝐬𝐥𝐢𝐠𝐡𝐭𝐥𝐲. 𝐍𝐞𝐰 𝐦𝐢𝐬𝐬𝐢𝐨𝐧𝐬 𝐰𝐢𝐥𝐥 𝐛𝐞 𝐚𝐝𝐝𝐞𝐝 𝐩𝐞𝐫𝐢𝐨𝐝𝐢𝐜𝐚𝐥𝐥𝐲. 𝐂𝐨𝐦𝐩𝐥𝐞𝐭𝐞 𝐭𝐡𝐞𝐦 𝐭𝐨 𝐨𝐛𝐭𝐚𝐢𝐧 𝐦𝐨𝐫𝐞 𝐫𝐞𝐰𝐚𝐫𝐝𝐬.]

Your body is briefly enveloped by a strange, pulsing light, and you swear that something inside you just changed. It's such a subtle change that it's probably almost negligible, but you know you aren't imagining it.  

Also, Izuku has definitely fainted. You are now responsible for having made two of your friends pass out.  

You shoulder the weight of his body as best you can, then let out a heavy sigh. “I need to get him back home as soon as possible."

Your Quirk is kind of like a game. Based on what you know about it so far, at least. If you keep on completing the missions the system gives you, then you will be rewarded by having your strength increase. It's like gaining experience points and leveling up. That's the best analogy you can think of. 

You don't like making people faint, though. After charming both Katsuki and Izuku, it's clear that the effects of your powers are perhaps too strong. You really hope there's a way to control it better. Maybe you're simply too inexperienced?  

“Hey, system,” you call out. “I’m still kind of confused about this whole thing. Can you please explain it better? I don’t want to make my friends keep fainting.”

You don't receive a response, so you figure it isn't an entity you can actually communicate with. It doesn't appear sentient, at the very least. It's most likely just there to give you missions and track your progress.  

Well, that sucks. 

You still want answers. Then again, nobody ever said that mastering a Quirk would be easy, and you’ve only just gotten yours. You suppose you'll just have to be patient.  

Out of the little friend group consisting of you, Katsuki, and Izuku, you are the first to have your Quirk manifest. 

After that, it's Katsuki.  

Since he has such a strong personality, it isn't at all a surprise that his Quirk would turn out to be strong too. He has the ability to create literal explosions from the palms of his hands. It's honestly incredible, and everyone in the neighborhood—as well as the other kids in the local preschool you attend—can't help but be in awe.  

Once Katsuki’s Quirk manifests, his personality starts to change, and not for the better.  

Eager to show off his strength, he starts getting in fights with all sorts of people. Most of them are other kids his age, but he even picks a few fights with those that are several years older than him. And he never, never loses.  

“Wow, Katsuki!” you gush. “You’re so amazing! I can’t believe you beat those guys up even though they were so much bigger than you!”  

Since you're young and stupid, you don't realize that in praising Katsuki for his acts of violence, you are actually part of the problem.

Katsuki sniffles, wiping away his tears before they fall. He got quite a beating during the fight, but in spite of that, he still held out until he won. “Obviously,” he huffs. “I’m not going to let anyone talk smack about me. It doesn’t matter how much bigger or older they are.”  

You haven't received any more missions since the day you charmed Izuku, but by now everyone knows that you at least have some sort of Quirk. Katsuki was skeptical at first, but even the doctor was able to confirm that your Quirk factor—which is what allows your powers to function—is located in your brain. So long as your brain keeps working, you have the means to interact with the system and use your abilities.  

The same can't be said about Izuku, though.  

He keeps waiting for his Quirk to appear. He waits and waits, and yet it still shows no sign of manifesting. All Quirks are supposed to manifest by the age of four, with no exceptions. You do everything you can to reassure Izuku that it's going to be okay, but no one seems to understand why he hasn't gotten his Quirk yet.  

Somewhere along the way, Izuku is labeled as Quirkless, and with his newfound cruelty, Katsuki makes sure to torment Izuku at nearly every turn. 

“From now on, we’re going to call Izuku Deku,” Katsuki chuckles. “Deku means someone who’s a good-for-nothing loser. It’s perfect for him, since he’s a Quirkless weakling.”  

You frown. “That’s not nice, Katsuki. Take that back. There’s still some time left. Izuku will get his Quirk soon, you’ll see.”  

“You need to stop defending him, [Name].” Katsuki sighs out in annoyance. “Can’t you see just how lame he is? It actually makes a lot of sense that he doesn’t have a Quirk. I always thought that he was weak. This is just how the world works. Right, guys? Don’t you also think Deku’s a loser?”  

The two other neighborhood kids that often follow Katsuki around, and who have since become his underlings, hastily nod in agreement.

“Deku’s a great name for him.”  

“It’s what he gets for being Quirkless.”  

Poor Izuku is already in tears, and you can't help but ball up your little fists in frustration.  

You like Katsuki. You really do. But lately he’s started acting like a real asshole, and you're honestly getting sick of it.  

“His name is Izuku,” you insist. “Don’t give him a rude nickname to try and make fun of him. Doing that is what’s actually lame.”

“[N-Name],” Izuku whimpers, wiping away at his misty eyes. “Thank you...”  

Even though you are friends with both Izuku and Katsuki, you know well enough to understand when something is just plain wrong. Katsuki is bullying Izuku, and it needs to stop.  

In picking sides, though, you actually end up making Katsuki even angrier.  

“You’re such a goody-two-shoes,” he spits, then uses an explosion to swat Izuku right across the face. His explosions aren't incredibly strong—not yet, at least, since he's still just a child. But they deal enough damage to hurt plenty, and Izuku’s little whimpers soon turn into full-blown sobs. 

Alright. You’ve officially had enough.  

“Come here,” you grit out. You grab Katsuki by the arm and pull him in, then roughly kiss him on the cheek. His immediate instinct is to freak out, of course, but he's mainly embarrassed, not angry.  

[𝐔𝐬𝐞 𝐂𝐡𝐚𝐫𝐦 𝐨𝐧 𝐁𝐚𝐤𝐮𝐠𝐨𝐮 𝐊𝐚𝐭𝐬𝐮𝐤𝐢?]

>>[𝐘𝐄𝐒]

It doesn't take him long to quiet down after that. While you don't like making people faint and overall feel unwell, desperate times call for desperate measures. It's better than letting him keep harassing and beating up Izuku, in any case. You are choosing to incapacitate one of your friends in order to protect the other one.  

“Not this shit again,” Katsuki mumbles in a daze. He seems to fend off the effects of your Quirk a lot better this time. Perhaps you're starting to get used to controlling its output? But regardless, he still ends up collapsing eventually. You’ve effectively put him to sleep. Hopefully a nap will help him clear his head a bit.  

“Aw, man!” one of the other guys whines. “[Name] just used her Quirk on him. That’s cheating! You can’t just go around doing that!"  

“Nuh-uh,” you deny. “Katsuki used his Quirk to hit Izuku first. He started it. Carry him back home, please. He needs to be put into bed.” 

They make sure to grumble the whole time, but still bring Katsuki back to his parents.  

Now, it's just you and Izuku.  

“Are you okay?” you ask, worry lacing your expression. “I’m sure it probably really hurts to get hit by one of his explosions. I promise it’ll be alright, Izuku. I’m here for you.”  

Izuku nods weakly. “I’m fine. Thank you for helping me. If only I wasn’t so weak... then I could help myself.”  

“You’re not weak at all. And your Quirk will show up soon! I have a good feeling about this.”  

It's pure unfounded confidence, but you're only an idealistic child, after all.  

Strangely enough, though, despite the fact that you’ve just saved him from getting beaten up, Izuku isn't all that happy. He knows you have to kiss someone first before being able to charm them, but he still can't stop replaying what he’s just seen. The way your lips pressed right against Katsuki’s cheek... it's impossible to get it out of his head.  

Izuku is too young to make sense of his emotions, but he is experiencing ugly jealousy for the very first time in his life.  

It’s okay, he thinks. I got to kiss [Name] on the lips before. Even Kacchan hasn’t done that. And she... stood up for me. Because I’m important to her.  

In that moment, even the pain of being Quirkless isn't quite as intense as the fear of losing your affection to someone else.

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[suzukiblu]

D8 , A10 , TimBerKon

“Please,” Tim says, and Kon . . . hesitates, and doesn’t leave the bedroom yet. He doesn’t know why Tim wants him to stay–why Tim or Bernard wants him to stay. Like, they did the fun sexy “guest-star-in-the-bedroom” game and he let them both boss him around and tell him what to do for it, but now it’s, like, after midnight and he feels all weird and spacey like he gets after this kind of thing sometimes and they should just wanna have their afterglow and cuddle up on each other, right? Like, he’s in the way of that, if he’s here. 

So they shouldn’t be asking him to stay, and especially shouldn’t be saying “please” about it. 

“Uh, I dunno. It’s kinda late,” he says, trying not to let the uncertainty or discomfort show. He doesn’t like–he doesn’t really like being around people when he feels like this. Like . . . it just feels . . . 

He just doesn’t like it. 

He’s safe, obviously. He’s fucking indestructible, and also it’s Tim, and–

He’s safe. Obviously. 

But being around anybody else when he’s like this sure doesn’t fucking feel like it. 

“So just sleep over,” Bernard says with a shrug. “No reason not to, right? Crash here, hog a couple of the blankets, maybe we can all have breakfast in bed and score our respective morning wood some morning sex. You know, whatever sounds good. Play it by ear.” 

“Uh–okay,” Kon says, a little less hesitant about the whole idea after hearing that. That, like–makes sense, then. For why they’d want him to stick around. If either of them especially likes morning sex or if they’re just in the mood for it right now, or whatever. And he can just . . . be normal, he tells himself. Not make it weird just ‘cuz he feels a little weird. Especially if they’re going to sleep soon anyway. 

Sometimes he wakes up feeling pretty hungover after feeling like this, admittedly, but . . . only sometimes, so . . . it’s fine, right? It’ll be–fine. Yeah. 

Tim–relaxes a little, weirdly. Like, Kon can only tell because his TTK’s a little bit all over the place right now and he felt it, but . . . but it’s weird, yeah. 

Nowhere near as weird as his brain’s being, though, so–yeah. Whatever. Just . . . 

“Um,” he says, and glances a little awkwardly at the bed, not quite sure where to get back into it, or if Bernard actually just meant he could crash on the couch, or– 

“Cool,” Bernard says easily, and holds out both hands towards him. 

Kon . . . blinks, and the part of him that feels all weird and spacey really, really wants to just . . . 

He’s not sure what it wants, actually, but it definitely, definitely wants it right now.

He slips back into the bed and Bernard tugs him in close and kisses–just his cheek, not anything, like, productive, for some reason–and Tim slides a hand up his back, and it feels sort of . . . it’s kind of . . . 

Kon ends up a little bit sandwiched under the covers between the two of them, Tim still petting his back and Bernard petting his hair, and then they both start talking about what they liked doing tonight and asking him what he liked doing tonight, what made him feel the best and stuff like that, and it’s a very weird and unprecedented experience in his life, but . . . 

Well. He’s already feeling kind of weird right now, like he said, so maybe it’s okay. 

And it feels . . . kinda nice, honestly, weird or not.

[ghostinthelibrarywrites]

I will love you (I really love you)

My second fic for @painlandweek has been posted. You can read it below or here on AO3!

Prompt: love confessions

Word Count: approx. 5K

Rating: T

Warnings: none

Summary: Five times Charles tries to tell Edwin that he's in love with him and one time he succeeds.

***

Before

It might be the shock of being tossed nearly ten meters that does it. It might be that the mysterious statue they’re investigating is located in about as scenic a place as you can find: deep in the forest in the middle of nowhere, right next to a little lagoon with a waterfall. Or it might be those lexicographic spectacles that Edwin takes every opportunity to wear.

“Are you quite alright, Charles?” Edwin calls. 

Charles lies flat on his back, staring up at the blue sky filtering in through the trees and taking account of all his various limbs. “Yeah, I’m aces. Never better.”

“Excellent. I think we can assume this final rune is a protection sigil of some sort. It seems to prevent anyone from touching the statue.”

“Yeah, think I gathered that, mate.” Charles pushes himself up on his elbows to find that Edwin is still kneeling at the base of the statue, examining it as closely as he can without touching it, his spectacles slipping down his nose. Charles always thinks that the lexicographic spectacles look like something a somewhat dorky James Bond would wear. They make Edwin’s green eyes look enormous.

Edwin looks up at him and smiles, looking as pleased as he always does when he’s cracked open the latest clue. “I think I know what’s been troubling our client.”

It might be the shock. It might be the lagoon. It might be the way Edwin’s eyes look framed by those spectacles or the satisfied smile he’s wearing.

Whatever it is, it feels like a hundred protection sigils slamming into him when Charles realizes that he’s head over tits in love with Edwin Payne.

***

“Niko,” Charles says the next day, sitting at Niko and Crystal’s kitchen table. Edwin is back at the office, working on their latest report for the Night Nurse. She made the mistake of calling their last report “half-assed” so Edwin is exacting his revenge by reporting every detail of their latest case, down to the interesting beetle they found crawling on the enchanted statue. He’ll be hours yet. “You’re good at this romance stuff, aren’t you?”

Niko puts down her mug of tea and smiles knowingly. “The only kind of anime I watch more than detective stories are romances.”

“Right,” Charles says. “Because I think I might be a bit rubbish at romance.”

Leaning against the counter, Crystal makes a sound that’s a bit too noncommittal. He could tell her that she’s also pretty rubbish at romance, which is why they decided months ago that they really should stick with being friends, but he’s on a mission that doesn’t involve arguing with Crystal today.

“I don’t think that’s true,” Niko says loyally. “Why do you think you’re rubbish?”

“Because it took me over three decades to figure out I’m in love with Edwin.”

He expects this to be a momentous announcement. His world seems like it’s been turned entirely upside down in the hours since he realized. Except, neither Niko nor Crystal look particularly shocked. Crystal lets out a long, exasperated breath while Niko beams at him.

“I’ve been waiting for this.” Niko claps her hands together.

“Waiting for this?” Bemused, Charles looks between Niko and Crystal.

“Nope.” Crystal shakes her head. “I am not getting involved in this.”

He bristles. “What? You don’t approve?”

That earns him an eye roll that he probably deserves. “No, but it feels super weird to talk about two of my best friends hooking up, especially when I used to make out with one of them on a regular basis.”

“We’re not just going to hook up. I love him.”

Niko makes a noise like he just made some kind of romantic speech at the end of a movie, complete with swelling music.

“Still not getting involved,” Crystal says.

Before Charles can protest, Niko reaches across the table and grabs his hand. “Tell us everything.”

So he tells them all about his realization at the statue. He thinks it makes for an anticlimactic story, but Niko seems delighted.

“And what did he say when you told him?” she asks.

“Er.” Charles scrubs a hand through his hair.

Crystal arches an eyebrow at him. “You haven’t told him yet.”

“Wasn’t the right time. We were on a case and you know how Edwin gets about distractions.”

She mutters something to herself. He can’t hear the words, but he guesses they aren’t complimentary.

“Oi, thought you weren’t getting involved.” He glares at her.

“I don’t need to be involved to judge you.”

Niko interrupts his retort. “You’re going to tell him, right?”

“Of course I am,” Charles says, like the thought doesn’t terrify him a little. “Just need to find the right time, yeah?”

Niko nods seriously. “He did tell you he loved you on the steps out of Hell. That’s pretty dramatic. I guess it will be hard to top that.”

“He told you that?” Charles is appalled. “Both of you?”

“Of course he told us,” Crystal deadpans. “He and Niko spent half the flight from Seattle to London dissecting the whole thing.”

Ah. Charles had spent most of that flight hanging out on the wing of the plane. There were some perks to being dead. “Well, I’m not going to go back to Hell just so I can tell Edwin I love him, so I’ll figure something else out.”

“Skywriting,” Niko says. “No, find him a really old book and write something romantic inside. Or maybe a series of love letters, each with a clue to find the next one. Edwin would love that. Oooh, or you could find a fairy ring and—”

Charles holds out a hand to stop her. “Mate, hate to break it to you, but I’d rather go back to Hell than deal with fairies.”

“Or you could just tell him,” Crystal says. “You’re practically an old married couple anyway. May as well make it official.”

“That’s why it needs to be super romantic.” Niko looks a bit starry-eyed. “You guys have been building up to this for, like, forever.”

“Right,” Charles says slowly. “Romantic. I can do romantic.”

***

1

The very spot where Charles first realized that he was madly in love with Edwin Payne seems the natural place to  confess his feelings. Luckily, they have reason to revisit the statue by the lagoon, so Edwin can break the enchantment that’s been plaguing their client. It’s not often their cases bring them somewhere with a waterfall; Charles knows he should take advantage of the romantic scenery while he can.

He stands by and watches Edwin work, admiring the way his graceful hands move as he carves a circle of runes around the statue. He’s always liked watching Edwin work, but it’s only now that he’s letting himself notice the fluid motion of his fingers and the way his mouth purses in concentration.

“Charles?”

Charles blinks. “Yeah, mate?”

He’s been so busy watching the hand holding the chalk that he totally missed that Edwin’s other hand is outstretched, clearly expecting Charles to deposit whatever he needs into his hand without any fuss, as Charles has been doing for years. Instead, Charles blinks at the outstretched hand, mind strangely blank. Edwin has a tiny freckle on the inside of his wrist, just peeking out from under the glove. Has it always been there?

“The Dictionary of Ancient Runes, Volume 18, if you please, Charles?” Edwin asks in the tone he uses when he’s trying very hard not to snap.

“Sure thing.” Charles fishes in his infinite backpack and produces the thick, navy blue volume, handing it over. 

Edwin examines one of the pages for a moment, then carefully draws the last few runes before snapping the book shut and straightening up. “There. Now we wait a quarter of an hour or so and if this doesn’t work, onto Plan B.”

“Right.” This is the part Charles has been waiting for. He throws a casual arm around Edwin’s shoulders, steering him to face the lagoon. “Pretty view, isn’t it?”

“The kind of view that makes me glad I don’t have corporeal flesh, or I’d be getting eaten alive by mosquitoes,” Edwin says dryly.

That’s what Charles adores about Edwin, his romantic spirit. He realizes he’s bouncing nervously on his toes and forces himself to still. “Remember Hell?” he blurts out, then winces. That wasn’t how he planned on starting this, by reminding Edwin of terror and pain. Fuck, he had a whole speech planned. He even rehearsed it with Niko.

Edwin turns to face him. One of his eyebrows has crept so high up on his forehead that Charles half-expects it to take flight. “I think I recall something of the sort.”

There’s nothing to do but plow on, hoping to salvage this. “What we talked about…”

“We talked about many things in Hell.” Abruptly, Edwin turns back to the lagoon.

Charles is starting to panic a little. He seems to be messing this up and he's not completely sure how. “Listen, Edwin—” He registers movement out of the corner of his eye and has already shoved Edwin out of the way when a stone arm swings right through the place where his friend was just standing. When he turns, he finds the statue standing next to its pedestal, its serene smile suddenly seeming much more menacing.

“Time for Plan B, Charles!” Edwin shouts, but Charles is already drawing his cricket bat.

By the time they’re done, the lagoon is filled with chunks of broken statue and the view doesn’t seem quite so romantic anymore.

***

2

It’s only natural that after the Case of the Statue with the Shit Bloody Timing, they have a series of tough cases, one of which involves ritual sacrifice, which always makes Edwin extra twitchy. Crystal also has a crisis with her parents, leaving her unavailable. After over three decades without a psychic, Edwin and Charles have gotten so used to having her around in the past months that her absence throws them off their game. Plus, something has put the Night Nurse in a foul mood—Niko is convinced that she’s pining for Jenny, but Charles has his doubts—so she’s riding their asses harder than usual.

All in all, it’s not a great time for Charles to be distracted, but he can’t help it. When he looks at Edwin, he can feel all the things he’s not saying like a physical weight on his tongue. He half-expects them to all come bursting out like the girl in The Exorcist and the split pea soup. It’s hard to focus on murder and magical mayhem, when Edwin Payne is existing in the same space as him, with his kissable mouth and his perfect hair that Charles desperately wants to see mussed up. And his high-waisted pants, which Charles has become more than a little obsessed with. Did Edwin always have a great ass? He feels like he should have noticed that earlier.

Still, Charles has time to work on his next plan. Since none of their cases take them to anywhere remotely scenic—unless you count the posh house where they end up fighting a vampire—he has to come up with something new. His chance finally presents itself on a quiet, rainy night where Crystal and Niko are off having a girl’s night with some friends from school and the Night Nurse is probably somewhere making kittens cry.

“Got you something, mate,” Charles says in as casual a tone as he can manage.

“Oh?” Edwin looks up from the thick, leather-bound tome about flesh-eating fungi he’s reading. “My birthday isn’t for months, Charles.”

“This is just because.” Feeling a little shy, Charles hands over the wrapped parcel. “Hope you like it.”

Still looking puzzled, Edwin unwraps the gift. When the paper falls away, revealing the book inside, he lets out a little gasp and looks up at Charles with wide eyes. “Where did you find this?”

“Had to do some digging, but I found it at some weird little bookshop across town.” Getting the bookseller to agree to sell it to him had been a challenge—the man had acted like Charles was about to carve out his firstborn’s still-beating heart—but Charles knows how to use his smile to his advantage.

“This has been out of print for nearly a century.”

“Yeah, I remember.” Years ago, Edwin lamented to Charles that he’d been greatly enjoying a detective serial in the last months of his life, only to return from Hell to find that not a single copy of the story seemed to remain and no one even seemed to remember its existence. Edwin never learned how it ended and it’s been bothering him for decades.

“Thank you, Charles.” Edwin’s voice is choked. “This is… very thoughtful.”

“Hope it has a happy ending, mate.”

Edwin smiles at him, eyes a little too bright. “Truly, I just want to know if my guess about who the killer is was right.”

“Sure it was. You’re a pretty crack detective.”

Edwin laughs and ducks his head. Squaring his shoulders, Charles takes a step closer. “Edwin, I…”

There’s a pop and the Night Nurse appears in the center of the office, holding a thick stack of papers and scowling at them. “Would anyone like to explain to me why the report on the Molly Mickelson case contains seven thousand words about the origins of the word ‘ectoplasm?’”

***

3

Their caseload continues to be jam packed and every time Charles tries to find a chance to tell Edwin he loves him, someone always seems to interrupt, whether it’s a client, the Night Nurse, Crystal, Niko, Jenny, the ghost postman, or even the bloody Cat King swinging by London to “just say hi.” Charles is about to put wards up on the office so no one can barge in for an hour or two, but he knows Edwin will decry that as bad for business.

Instead, he remembers Niko’s suggestion of a series of love letters. He doesn’t know if he has multiple love letters in him—he’s good with words, but not necessarily with putting them in writing—but he thinks he can manage at least one decent one. So while Edwin is spending an evening with Niko, Charles takes advantage of the empty office to try and put everything he feels into writing.

He spends hours pouring his heart out onto a sheet of paper, discarding countless drafts as not being good enough. He tells Edwin that he’s everything to him, that he feels so bloody lucky to get to spend the rest of eternity with him, that he’s pretty sure the tranquil eternity the Night Nurse is always nattering on about is right here, solving cases with his best mate for the rest of his existence. He tells him he loves him in every way he knows how until he’s filled up two whole sheets of paper with everything he’s feeling.

Just as he’s slipped the letter into an envelope and left it on the desk for Edwin to find, the door comes flying open and Niko comes racing in, Edwin at her heels. Charles knows the minute he sees their wide-eyed, terrified expressions that something is terribly wrong.

“Hellhound!” Edwin gasps out.

“What?” Charles grabs his cricket bat from where it’s leaning against the wall. “I thought you went to the movies. How the hell did you run into a—”

But there’s no time to find out the details, because then a flaming hound with burning red eyes and razor sharp teeth bursts into the office, its attention focused on Edwin, and there’s too much screaming and fire to have a proper conversation. When they finally send the beastie back to Hell where it belongs, half the office is burnt to a crisp and the other half is in disarray, but all three of them are unharmed.

Charles stares at the desk, which sports a giant scorch mark right down the middle. Most of the papers on it were burnt to ash. All that’s left of his letter to Edwin is a single corner. He picks it up and pockets it before Edwin can see, even though there’s nothing obviously romantic about the bit that’s left.

“It’s alright,” Edwin says, following Charles’s gaze. “Nothing I was working on was of great value. And I’ve been thinking we need a larger desk anyway, now that we have more members of the agency.”

Charles nods jerkily, feeling like the scrap of paper in his pocket is an iron weight. “Aces. No harm done, then.”

***

4

Of course, the hellhound isn’t the end. It turns out that the last demon that owned Edwin’s soul—whatever being controlled that hideous doll-headed spider—has sold his soul to another demon and this new bloke wants to collect. The Night Nurse is doing everything she can on the bureaucratic side to sort things out, but in the meantime, Charles and Edwin have to dodge a line of bounty hunters and other beasts sent to drag Edwin back to Hell.

But Charles keeps Edwin safe, like he’s been keeping him safe for over three decades, until something is able to get past his defenses.

“Just a little farther.” Charles holds Edwin tighter against him, like he can physically block him from the pain of the iron shackles that are still locked around his wrists. There wasn’t time to pick the locks; they just had to run. “Sorry, mate.”

“It’s quite alright, Charles. I’ve had worse.” But Edwin is shivering, back in the nightclothes he died in, a sure sign that he’s deeply shaken. They’re lucky that the bounty hunter who caught him didn’t bring him straight back to Hell, that he wanted to play with his food first. Charles doesn’t feel very lucky right now.

He turns them down a narrow street, trying to keep their movements erratic. He doesn’t know if the bounty hunter knows where their office is and he doesn’t want to lead him to it.

“Talk to me, please,” Edwin says weakly.

“About what?” Charles checks behind them, but doesn’t see any figures following them.

“About anything. Distract me.”

Charles glances down at the iron cuffs around Edwin’s wrists, which are smoking slightly. His hands are shaking. Charles knows that Edwin has had worse injuries than an iron burn, but knowing that he’s suffering because Charles wasn’t quick enough to protect him lodges something sour in his throat.

“Do you remember that case with the poltergeist in the hotel a few years back?” Charles asks.

“Of course.” Edwin’s grimace starts to look more like a smile. “You do love a chance to go undercover.”

“Hey, it was the poshest hotel I’d ever been in. Had to take advantage, didn’t I?” Donning their disguises and going undercover as a married couple had been Edwin’s idea, but Charles had thrown himself into it with gusto. In retrospect, he wonders if he was already in love with Edwin, with the way he took every opportunity to hold his friend’s hand and call him “love.”

“Yes, well.” Edwin ducks his head. “The poltergeist has moved on to her afterlife, so it was a job well done.”

“We should go back sometime,” Charles says. “As us, I mean. No disguises this time.”

Edwin gives him a strange look. “And why would we do that?”

“Because it was a nice hotel, mate. Good to get out of the city once in a while, yeah?”

“I suppose so.” There’s a faint flush on Edwin’s cheeks and Charles wonders if he’s remembering pretending to canoodle in the lobby or holding hands as they walked through the gardens. He wonders if Edwin was in love with him back then, or if he didn’t realize until Port Townsend. Charles hasn’t asked.

“Here.” Charles stops behind a dumpster. “Let me get these things off you, then we can find a mirror, yeah?”

Edwin nods and Charles retrieves his lockpicking kit before he starts to work on the iron cuffs. As the cuffs fall to the ground, he looks up and finds Edwin watching him, cheeks still flushed. An overflowing dumpster in a seedy alleyway is hardly the kind of romantic place Charles has been imagining to have this conversation, but he could have lost Edwin tonight. If Edwin had gone back to Hell never knowing how loved he is, Charles never would have forgiven himself.

He rubs his thumbs over the iron burns on Edwin’s wrists. “That was one of my favorite cases we’ve ever worked.”

“Yes, Charles, it was a lovely hotel, even if we could not enjoy the complimentary chocolates.”

“No, mate.” Charles entwines his fingers with Edwin’s, squeezing gently. “Because I got to spend that weekend with you.”

Edwin’s brow furrows adorably. “We’ve spent thirty-five years in one another’s company, Charles.”

“Not like that. Edwin, I—”

With a screech of metal, the dumpster goes sliding across the alleyway, slamming into the wall, and Charles spins around to greet the demonic bounty hunter with his cricket bat.

***

5

It turns out that Charles doesn’t much like being the damsel in distress.

Being taken captive by the bounty hunter is one thing. Being held hostage so Edwin will turn himself over is another. The worst part isn’t even the iron shackles or listening to the demon blather on about earning some respect in Hell. The worst part is knowing that Edwin is going to turn himself over, because Charles would do the same without hesitation if their positions were reversed.

What Charles does enjoy more than he ever thought he would is Edwin striding towards him with a sword in hand, splattered in blood that isn’t his, while the bounty hunter’s headless corpse lies on the ground behind them. Edwin’s fighting form is still shit and there’s no way he would have stood a chance if he hadn’t had the element of surprise—the bounty hunter was clearly expecting the trembling virgin sacrifice and not the competent detective with decades of experience—but  Charles isn’t about to tell him that. Not yet, at least.

“That was brills, mate.” Charles can tell that he’s wearing a dopey grin, but he can’t stop himself. Edwin looks like a fairytale knight, if fairytale knights wore slightly crooked bow ties and tweed jackets.

With a disgusted noise, Edwin picks at the front of his jacket. “Thank you, Charles, but I will be leaving that to you in the future. Being the brains involves significantly less… viscera.”

“Oh, no, you’re not getting out of this. Now that I know you know how to use a sword—” Charles breaks off, frowning. “Wait, where did you get that? I thought it was in my bag.”

“It was.” Edwin bends to clumsily pick the locks on Edwin’s shackles. “I had a bit of a chat with your bag of tricks. It seems to be somewhat sentient, because when I told it that if it ripped off my arm, you might be lost forever, it gave me the sword without fuss.”

Charles’s grin widens. “See, mate? Told you that you could figure it out with a little practice.”

Edwin rolls his eyes up at the ceiling. “I got lucky. I’ll leave the magical voids to you in the future.”

“Don’t do that.” Hands freed, Charles reaches up to cup Edwin’s face in his hands. “You’re bloody brilliant, Edwin. You just saved my neck. I was going to go out of my mind if I had to keep listening to that twat blathering on.”

“Truly, I have saved you from a dreadful fate.” For an instant, Charles thinks that Edwin’s gaze drifts down to his lips before snapping back up to meet his eyes. He wonders if he should lean up to kiss Edwin, or if he should wait until Edwin isn’t covered in blood.

“Edwin,” Charles breathes. “I just need you to know, I—”

“Edwin? Charles?” The door bursts open and Crystal and Niko come racing in. Charles sees them register the bounty hunter’s body on the ground, then Charles and Edwin standing together, unharmed. Niko smiles with relief, but Crystal just looks pissed.

“How did you get in here?” Edwin demands. “I locked the door behind me.”

“Yeah, you did, and you are so lucky you’re already dead, or I would kill you.” Crystal’s words are belied by the fact that she crosses the room to pull Edwin into a hug. “What the fuck were you thinking?”

“I was thinking that it was far too dangerous for the two of you to be involved in a confrontation with a demon. As I explained at length.”

“And as I explained at length—”

While they bicker, Niko pulls Charles to his feet. “Are you okay?”

“Of course I am.” Charles pulls her into a hug with one arm, then scoops both Edwin and Crystal up with the other arm. Both make noises like angry cats, but come willingly, allowing themselves to be manhandled into a group hug. Charles rests his head against Edwin’s shoulder, Niko and Crystal tucked between them, and closes his eyes. Right now, he can’t even be upset about the interruption.

***

+1

“So that’s that, then,” Charles says later, safely back in their office, their iron burns healed, Niko and Crystal seen back to their flat, and the Night Nurse off doing whatever she does in her spare time.

“It appears to be.” Edwin is busy organizing their new desk. “If the Night Nurse has gotten things with Hell sorted out, I can’t imagine we’ll have to deal with any more bounty hunters. Why take a bounty with no reward?”

Charles makes a skeptical noise. The Night Nurse and Edwin both seem satisfied with the demon’s word that he won’t make any more plays for Edwin, but Charles will be keeping an eye out for the foreseeable future. He’ll be damned if he lets another denizen of Hell lay hands on his best mate. Bad enough that it’s happened twice in a year under his watch.

Edwin must know what he’s thinking, because he looks up with a small smile. “I’m fine, Charles.”

“Nearly weren’t.”

“But you saved me.”

“And then you saved me.”

“Someone had to do it,” Edwin says softly and Charles can’t speak for a moment, overwhelmed by a swell of warmth.

Edwin turns away, face flushing. “Anyway, job officially jobbed, as you say. I think we should give it a day before taking on any more clients. I don’t know about you, but I could use some rest.”

“You want to take a break?” Charles raises an eyebrow. “Didn’t take any iron to the head, did you?”

He can’t see Edwin’s face, but can feel his eye roll from across the room. “I simply have some reading to catch up on.” He picks up the book Charles gave him last week up off the desk.

The warm feeling in Charles’s chest grows. “Still need to find out if you were right about the killer?”

“I can say with almost total certainty that I’m entirely right about the killer.” Edwin settles down on the couch with the book, thumbing it open.

Charles plops down on the other end of the couch. “Read to me out loud?”

Edwin looks up, surprised. “From the beginning?”

“Only if you want to.” Charles doesn’t give a damn about the story; he just likes listening to Edwin reading out loud, goofy voices and all.

“I’d be happy to.” Edwin flips back to the beginning and begins to read.

Letting Edwin’s familiar voice wash over him, Charles closes his eyes and leans back into the couch, letting his knee bump comfortably into Edwin’s thigh. He hardly listens to the words, just enjoys the moment. Their office is quiet and peaceful around them, the only sound besides Edwin’s voice the light tap of raindrops against the windowsill. Edwin is safe and they’re home.

Opening his eyes, he watches Edwin, who sits in his shirtsleeves, lips curled into a little smile as he reads out a particularly silly line of dialogue. He glances over to see Charles’s reaction and Charles grins at him, feeling so in love with him that he thinks he might burst with it.

There’s no scenic view or trail of love letters. There’s no great, dramatic moment. There’s just Charles, Edwin, and the home they’ve built together over the past thirty-plus years.

Something in his expression causes Edwin’s voice to falter, a tiny furrow forming between his eyes. “Not enjoying it?”

“No, it’s aces,” Charles says softly. “I just love you.”

Edwin huffs out a tiny breath and turns back to the book. “I love you too.”

“No, I really love you.” And in case he doesn’t get it, Charles adds, “I’m in love with you, mate.”

Edwin blinks once, then twice, getting the look on his face that he does when he's working on a particularly difficult puzzle. For a moment, Charles wonders if maybe he missed his chance. Maybe Edwin fell out of love with him months ago and all this waiting for the perfect time has been for nothing. Maybe the perfect time was months ago on the staircase out of Hell. Maybe the perfect time was over thirty years ago and he just didn't see it until it was too late.

And then Edwin turns to him, putting the book aside, a slow, almost shy smile spreading across his face. "I love you too," he says again, his voice wavering a little with emotion, and Charles knows with complete certainty that in his many, many years of existence, no moment has been as perfect as this.

***

Thank you for reading! If you enjoyed, please consider leaving kudos or comments on AO3.

[chenlesfavorite]

BURNING DESIRE [PT2], huang renjun.

— summary : after being bonded to renjun for a week, you've been experiencing insane emotions out of nowhere. non-stop. you want them to stop, but you don't know how to stop these emotions, so what better way to find out how to stop them than asking the vampire that you're bonded with?

— pairing : vampire!renjun x humanfem!reader

— genre : romance, fantasy, vampires

— extra : profanity, suggestive, implied that they fuck at the end, kissing

— author's note : woop woop, pt2 of burning desire bc it was requested by my lovely ❤️‍🔥 anon!! hopefully this isn't too bad and it's somewhat enjoyable :') also pretty short, so my bad!!!

— word count : 1.3k

— read part 1 here !

reminder that this is pure fiction and not an actual depiction of how they act.

It’s been about a week since you bonded with Renjun; you haven’t seen him since the day you first summoned him.

The day after you summoned him, everything was fine. You didn’t feel weird, and you didn’t have any side effects from being bonded to a vampire, as you expected to be feeling thousands of different things at once because he’s a vampire and you’re a human; you expected the bond to affect you in some sort of way.

And well that was the case the next day.

You woke up with the strangest feeling ever concocting in your stomach, you had no idea what it was. It was like an insatiable hunger for something... but something you have never craved before.

Your mouth felt dry, and that sensation in your stomach was gnawing at your insides. The feeling was intense, and your mind kept drifting to blood, desiring blood; its taste, its essence that gives life to vampires.

And it continued like this day after day, moment after moment.

You could be happy one minute and then totally sad the next. Out of nowhere! You can be talking to your friends, all cheerful that you’re speaking to them but then you’ll just get in a weird mood.

The feelings aren’t weak though, they hit you like a truck because of how strongly you feel them.

You didn’t know why you were feeling all of this. You tried to search for it on search engines, typing stuff like “Why do I feel so strange 2 days after bonding with a vampire?” but nothing. Nothing came up.

And that’s when you remember, you can summon Renjun and ask him about it. Sure, he told you that you shouldn’t summon him again but... you really need to ask him about this because these feelings were getting out of hand and you were feeling that wretched thirst for blood again.

You follow the summoning ritual you did before and just as you thought, Renjun appears before you again.

It takes him a moment to realize where he is and to adjust to his surroundings— a surprised look appears on his face when he notices you’re the one who summoned him. “You know, you don’t have to do the ritual all over again just to summon me. Just call out my name and I’ll be here.”

You blink at him, unsure of how to respond to his casual words as you expected him to be all angry at you for summoning him again. “I... I didn’t know.” You say, your voice wavering. “I wasn’t planning on summoning you again but, this is important and I need your help.”

Renjun’s expression softens, but there’s a curiosity in his eyes. “What’s wrong?” He walks towards you, taking your hand to heal the cut again. “What do you need help with?” Renjun asks, keeping his voice calm and his touch gentle.

You take a deep breath as Renjun heals your palm. You rummage through your thoughts, trying to find the correct words to explain this strange feeling. “Ever since we bonded, I’ve felt... weird, really weird. A sudden surge of emotions just explodes in me, and I feel this odd hunger for blood.”

His gaze sharpens as he listens to your explanation, nodding to your words. “It seems like when we bonded, a part of my essence was shared with you but yours wasn’t. These strong emotions that you feel are my emotions. Whatever I feel, you feel it too, but stronger.”

Renjun reveals as he lets go of your now-healed palm. “What?” Your jaw drops, in disbelief of what you just heard. “So... I just have to deal with these emotions? Renjun, I might actually lash out at someone and start trying to suck their blood because of your bloodthirsty ass.”

To think that these strong emotions that you’re feeling are not even your own emotions, but his that overpower yours. You feel a bit helpless because of it. “What am I supposed to do, Renjun? Just hope that your emotion doesn’t make me hurt someone by accident? I can’t live like this for the rest of my life.”

“Calm down, you won’t be hurting anybody and I’ll make sure of that. You can separate my emotions from yours easily. You just need to learn how to do it and I’ll teach you that right now.”

Renjun says, and it just now hits you what you’ve gotten yourself into because of this bond with a vampire. Screw you for being so interested in vampires in the first place, maybe you should’ve listened to the people saying they’re just fantasy creatures and not actually real.

“Please, teach me how. I can’t handle this any longer.” You beg, sounding desperate. You just wanted these overpowering emotions to be gone once and for all. Dealing with your feelings was enough but Renjun’s feelings on top of yours are just too much for a human.

Renjun reaches out, gently placing his cool hands on the sides of your head. His touch is soothing. “Close your eyes,” He instructs softly. “Focus on my voice. We’re going to start by building a wall, something to keep your emotions separate from mine.”

You do as he says, shutting your eyes tightly. His voice becomes your anchor, something to cling to in the swirling chaos within you.

“Imagine a barrier,” Renjun continues. “Something strong and impenetrable. It can be anything—a wall of stone, a shield, a fortress. Picture it in your mind.”

You try to imagine the image, but it’s hard to focus with everything crashing around inside you. “Breathe,” He whispers. “In and out. Slowly.” Renjun’s voice is so calming as he guides you through this.

You take a deep breath, then another, and slowly, the insatiable hunger you’re feeling begins to recede. The barrier you’re imagining starts to take shape—a massive wall of thick, dark stone, encircling your mind.

“That’s it,” Renjun encourages. “Now, I’m going to guide you through separating our emotions. I’ll help you push mine to the other side of that wall.”

You nod faintly, trusting him entirely. His voice soothes you as he walks you through the process. Slowly, you start to feel a difference— as if some of the weight you’ve been carrying is being lifted.

“It’s working.” You whisper, relief flowing through you. The intensity of Renjun’s emotions begins to dull, becoming distant instead of an overwhelming torment.

Renjun’s hands slip away from your head, but you keep your eyes closed, holding onto the calm he’s helped you find. “You’re doing great,” He says softly. You slowly open your eyes, meeting his gaze.

“Thank you, Renjun.” You say. A small smile appearing on Renjun’s face. “You don’t have to thank me. It’s my job now to help you through any struggles as we are bonded.”

It’s as if a sudden flame lights up inside you as you look at Renjun and the moment feels right. Without thinking, you reach up, your fingers brushing against his cheek. “Y/N...” Renjun’s voice is quiet.

But before he can say anything more, you close the distance between you two. Placing your lips onto his, sending a spark throughout your bodies.

He responds immediately with his actions. In one, swift motion, he pushes you gently against the wall. The cool surface of your bedroom wall pressing against your back. Renjun’s hands urgently finding their way to your waist, gripping onto it.

The kiss is intense once he takes over it, deepening it. His lips move against yours with a hunger, one that wants to devour you fully. Your fingers tangle in his hair, wanting... no, needing him badly.

You pull away, the both of you breathless from that heated kiss. The look that both of you have in your eyes is one filled with desire and a need for each other. You both know what you want. “There’s no going back now.” Renjun murmurs as he starts leaving trails of kisses on your jawline, then leaving kisses on your neck.

You bite down on your bottom lip as you feel his hot breath on your neck, making you feel even more heated. “Good,” You breathe out, your fingers trailing down his chest. “Because I don’t want to. I need you, Renjun.”

“I’ll show you how much I need you too, tonight.”

[inkyvendingmachine]

Avedone With All of This Season 4, Episode 4

💀 Call of Cthulhu: Haunted Hijinx Masterpost 💀 Call of Cthulhu Season Four Masterpost (Coming Soon)

Warning: This campaign is an edited version of  a Call of Cthulhu scenario from the Tales of the Crescent City book. While a lot has been changed, there IS spoilers for it throughout these posts.

GUESS WHO FINALLY SHOWED UP!!! and also a lot of other stuff happened. I'm sorry, this one is very long because I didn't take notes, and struggle to leave out details when I'm writing from the records instead of the notes.

Art Credit: @inkdemonapologist : sketching + inking @inkyvendingmachine : concept + colouring

Somehow Jack’s car, with all its original passengers and no extras, manage to make it back to the studio. Joey immediately rushes into the studio, to go rant at Bendy about everything that happened… and possibly to go fuse with Bendy because he feels utterly helpless now after completely draining himself with panicked magic. 

But it’s probably just the first one.

Sammy and Henry arrive as well to find Jack and Peter quietly picking glass out of his broken car in something like shock. Upon getting no responses from Jack about what happened, Sammy storms off to find Joey.

Joey is all too happy to start his entire rant over again for Sammy as he works on fusing with Bendy. They were just following Peter’s leads and driving from location to location and then all of the sudden this ASSHOLE shows up out of nowhere and just stands in front of the car. Busts the car, terrifies poor Jack, and then on top of that tries to break INTO the car and abduct Peter?? It’s a good thing Joey managed to blast him out, but they weren’t even DOING ANYTHING that would have possibly summoned him NOTHING AT ALL... And on top of all that, being an absolute PRICK as he’s doing it! 

… Anyways, how was the moooob?

Sammy updates Joey on everything that happened with Johnny Nero, which is pretty much just that he had seen the Yellow sign, that Henry removed it, and that Nero was pretty intent on getting his hands on whatever the Phantom wants first. Which like… yeah, if you wanna solve all our problems and fix this mess, go ahead! But Joey’s pretty sure that’s not going to happen, so he goes back to working on his ritual.

Sammy leaves to go back to Jack, and right as Joey feels ready to start the ritual his phone rings. The special one. And it’s… Avedon??

Avedon immediately starts info dumping on Joey about everything that’s been going on already… like, all the information Joey already knows. A lot of flat “yeah?”s in reply as Avedon rambles on, until he mentions that it’s already gotten to Norman. Wait, what?? But Avedon doesn’t stop, telling Joey to meet him at his hotel room in NYC so they can go over more information. Before Joey manages to get any clarification, he hangs up. 

That’s Joey’s thing!!!

Joey is the one who hangs up on others!!!!!!!

Frustrated, Joey does try to call Norman, and… Yeah, Norman is talking in weird riddles and speech that doesn’t fit with the Normal Norman Vibes. That call is also ended with little information gained… but at least it DOES seem like Avedon knows what he’s talking about this time, so Joey’s willing to meet with him, even though he’s also feeling done with him already.

Joey finishes the ritual and merges with Bendy.

On his way downstairs, Sammy is still turning over the car event he just heard about… and the increasing evidence that Peter might actually be the Phantom’s target?? Why else would he be trying to drag him out of the car?

Sammy approaches Peter, who has since started exchanging information with Henry as they all get the last of the glass shards out of the car, and says that he wants to see if Prophet can tell anything about what happened. Sammy looks distracted for a moment, and [lack of surprise because it was actually somewhat communicated beforehand,] Prophet is here!

Prophet concentrates, and with no hesitation, mushes his hands all over Peter's face. 

The good news is that, while Prophet can tell that Peter’s been grabbed by the Phantom recently, that’s actually all that he can detect. No additional eldritch stuff, he’s not possessed, he’s not weirdly marked or damaged in a way that can’t normally be seen. Great!

But Prophet can’t tell if Peter is the target or not. For his part, Peter has been muttering that it seemed like the phantom was trying to pull information from Peter on someone else he was looking for, someone who “followed us out”, but there’s nothing Prophet can sense to confirm that… but he realizes he can sense the distortions to reality increasing throughout NYC. They’re in the air, moving about… getting stronger.

Henry can feel it too.

But that’s all the energy Prophet has, and he unfortunately misses Joey showing up and dumping his new plan of action on everyone. He, Henry and Peter are going to go find Avedon’s dumb hotel room and figure out what’s going on with him, while Sammy and Jack are going to go check up on Susie and Norman because Norman is definitely acting weird now and he’s not quite sure if Susie is in over her head or not…

Nobody objects to the plan. And with NYC losing more and more of its reality to the yellow mist rolling in, it seems important that they do something.

Henry, Joey and Peter do make a detour to Henry’s house though to make sure all is well there. The car is gone, the lights are out, things seem as they should if Linda managed to follow through and get the kids out of the city. Peter is concerned when he notices some of Henry’s wards, but don’t worry, those are supposed to be there. Henry checks them over, and they all seem good. Bendy finds a bucket of clay he and Henry's kids had played with before, and brings it along to entertain himself on any following sleepovers, since that is a thing that will probably keep happening. For once, it seems like everything is actually left alone? 

Until they look out back and find the treehouse Henry built for his kids is gone. Actually, it’s almost like all the landscaping and such in the area was just… cleared away? Or never happened. Joey meanwhile is tabbing through Henry's photo albums and makes sure everyone is still there, which they are. But the treehouse isn’t. And, perhaps even worse, there’s also an extra guy in the JDS staff photo now? Joey pockets it, since this guy seems to be in the music department according to the photo, but Joey is sure he’s never seen him before. And it’s not Alan. So. Hopefully the music boys can shed some light on this.

Henry grabs some supplies and his gun, and Joey turns him around to fix his outfit and make sure the gun is properly hidden. Avedon is 2 trigger happy, we don’t want to say our hellos by instantly showing off the weapons we brought.

Meanwhile Jack and Sammy’s drive to Norman’s is more fraught than the previous ones. Not only has he moved house again, (though at least this time they have evidence of his new address from the junk mail they took last time) but… many other roads are starting to move too. Also Sammy is driving, so, speed has been cut in the engine department too… don’t need to hit two things in a single day with all this mist building up, and any sort of navigation trouble puts even more delays in.

At least they do manage to find the place and head on in, with hope that also maybe now that Avedon has arrived Norman will stop being so “sticking it out in a house that keeps wandering off apparently.” Things seem kinda fine at first at least, like they’re not immediately shooed out or attacked or have any weird monsters hanging over the house waiting for them to try the door… But upon Sammy questioning Susie while Jack goes to find Norman in the back, the music boys find out that things are very much not fine.

Susie is… very confident with a knife all of a sudden, and very confident that she will be able to just stab the Phantom when given the word to go out and hunt him down. Y’know just… stab the guy who couldn’t be damaged by a 2 ton vehicle slamming square on into him. And when Sammy tries to argue this logic, it just becomes more and more obvious that Susie and Norman are both… in character. Susie’s speech cadence is even reminiscent of when she’s performing rather than talking normally. But they don't seem aware that their actions seem more scripted than decided.

Jack finds Norman in the back, with a hatchet and a very similar plan to Susie’s. But whatever is happening isn’t strong enough to make them completely forget themselves, and with some facts being pointed out and reminders of who they are, the boys manage to get these two actors back to themselves... kind of. There's still some weirdness going on, and this also doesn't answer the question of what could be done to prevent this happening again?

Neither Susie nor Norman really realized when it started to happen, and it took some serious outside convincing to snap them out of it at all… Do they need Henry to expel something to truly get back to themselves again??

ALSO, IF THE PHANTOM CAN’T BE HARMED WITH A CAR, WHAT ARE THEY GONNA DO ABOUT THAT TOO?? THAT SEEMS CONCERNING!!!!

Meanwhile, Henry parks near the hotel they were directed to by Avedon, and the trio look upon it in… concern. First of all, it doesn’t even look like a hotel, or look like it belongs in NYC. And the entire place is surrounded by a yellow mist… and while they could wait it out or try to somehow call Avedon and tell him to come out, it just feels like the longer they wait the worse it will get. 

Really, it’s starting to feel that way for a lot of things.

But even though everything about this feels bad, they press on and enter the “hotel”. What should be the hotel lobby is abnormally empty, and when they start up the stairs… well, that’s not normal either, the stairs just keep going. Joey is flipping any rugs he finds though to make sure they don’t have stupid destabilization spells underneath them.

After a few rounds of strange rooms, weird hallways, some alien screeching outside the windows, and Henry noticing that NYC is not the city outside said windows, he stops everyone out of worry that they’re walking into a trap… and Joey agrees. But not that this hotel is specifically a trap.

All of New York is a trap.

It doesn’t matter where they go next, the longer they don’t solve this issue, the more of a trap everything will be.

They just gotta press on.

…

Aaaaand start yelling for Avedon because clearly they aren’t gonna be just walking up to his hotel room at this point.

Good news! Avedon replies! Bad news!! Only Henry can hear it for some reason!! And… Avedon can hear Joey but not Henry?? 

It’s all very confusing. They find Henry’s reading glasses on a table. Those were in his pocket how did they get there excuse me. All of this isn't fine actually.

But after a few rounds of Avedon Polo, they finally stumble across each other in a… garden. In the middle of a hotel. And of course, the first thing Avedon says is that they need to leave immediately. He didn’t know it was going to be like THIS, he just stepped out to get a coffee and suddenly the whole place is weird??? Well, now that they’re here, time to immediately leave because YEAH THAT WAS THE PLAN FROM THE START. 

Going through another door leads out into a familiar courtyard, at least familiar to Joey. He had been here a few nights ago, while invading Y’s dream, and indeed, right where he’d expect, he finds the Y twins chatting amongst themselves. Marching up to them, Joey demands to know what they’re doing and what’s going on.

They respond by addressing him as royalty.

✧･ﾟ: *Joey Drew, as Your Highness･ﾟ: *✧

Normally, this would probably inflate Joey’s ego! Currently, it sinks like a stone into his stomach!! He does not want to be part of the play!!!

Unless…

Joey suddenly wonders, because it’s the same courtyard, if they are in a dreamscape of some sort… Does he appear different than himself… and that's why they're addressing him this way?

But no, he looks like Joey, and Henry looks like Henry, and Peter looks like Peter, and Avedon is still here… except Joey also notices some of their hands are starting to turn transparent…………. That's probably fine.

He still doesn’t want to be part of their play.

The Y twins try to get Joey to go somewhere with them, and he makes up a story why they need to not do that rn, so that the group of normal fading humans can attempt once again to leave this place. 

Since it's all weird here, Joey tries his little will-what-he-wants-into-reality trick and… well it doesn't work. Instead, he finds a throne room?? and realizes that they aren’t just in Carcosa, they’re in the castle where the Yellow King’s play takes place. And Joey manages to follow his intuition from here to find some kind of portrait hallway, covered with familiar faces… all labeled as characters from the play. Not recognizing all of them, Henry starts drawing them so we have a record of it later.

But there's a few he doesn't have to draw.

One is Alan Leroy, the guy that they're becoming sure is the target of the Pallid Mask. Part of the royal family, apparently. He's a slender man, black hair slicked back, young looking, quite pretty … kinda looks like Joey…

Which makes more sense perhaps when the portrait of the eldest son in the royal family is none other than Joey himself. Guess this is why he was being addressed as royalty… but that means the Y twins are not quite in their right minds, and anything he finds them doing here is probably just play nonsense.

Also Denis is the youngest prince but who cares about that guy.

What they DO care about is the fact they’re getting more and more transparent, so the boys go to find Avedon, who is oh so helpfully knocking shit over and muttering in french, and Joey manages to get his door trick to actually work this time; he opens the door and there’s…

STAIRS!!

Everyone starts running down them, managing not to get turned around when they start making twisty turns, and get to the front door of this stupid castle in a hotel lobby.

They peek outside.

Sure enough, on the side of the building, there’s a shadow shaped suspiciously like nothing they can really identify, so it must be some sort of angel monster or something.

At this point, there’s really only one option they have: try sneaking to the car and hope it’s looking the other way, and if not, run!

Everyone agrees that this is a great plan.

And then they do that.

There’s a bit of fumbling in the middle, but the car was parked outside of the yellow mist for once, so the creature just fades out as soon as it leaves the mist to chase them. 

Well! Okay then!! That problem is solved!! Let’s go deliver Avedon to Norman so that he can take responsibility for his mad man and then maybe stop hiding at home or something!

Henry drives off, and things seem fine for now…

Until Joey swivels around in the front seat to question Avedon, and out the back window, sees something flying after them, only visible whenever it passes through the mists…

Problem… not solved.

[txttletale]

(Other than the really weird bit about "Male presenting Doctor") what were your thoughts about the specials?

pretty mixed bag, pretty messy, but good overall. i think they were very obviously a nostalgia trip for people around my age lol and it worked! i loved seeing tennant and tate back onscreen together, their chemistry hasn't aged a bit, and honestly just watching doctor who that wasn't written by chris chibnall was a breath of fresh air. they weren't boring, like seasons 11 and 12 were, and they didn't go too far off the other end into nonsense like flux did. characters want things again! the show can let itself just be silly! i was literally cheering out loud when donna and the doctor were just saying random scifi gobbledegook at each other for like a solid several minutes during the star beast.

the structure of the specials kind of baffles me. i love wild blue yonder--i think it's definitively the best of the specials as a standalone, it's absolutely fantastic, creepy and atmospheric and bringing things around to RTD's strength, which is well-written characters interacting with each other and letting good actors just act. but at the same time i dont understand why it exists? it feels like...idk. imagine if you watched the star wars original trilogy but instead of the empire strikes back the middle film was just a feature length film about luke and han surviving on an ice planet with no reference to anything that happens in the last film except the two characters' relationship. and then the next film was still return of the jedi, unchanged. it felt like that

i liked all the weird campy silliness of the star beast and the giggle, and they were both very fun! neil patrick harris gave a fantastic performance, there are a lot of very memorable sequences from the giggle, but it's very very all over the place. so many threads get kind of picked up and go nowhere. the toymaker's haunted house dimension goes nowhere. RTD's eyerolling social media commetnary goes nowhere (thank god tbh but yknow im illustrating something here). even the toymaker kind of goes nowhere, after ncuti gatwa shows up he's bascially an afterthought who loses by dropping a ball. obvious parallels to david tennant's first episode with that ball scene could be made, but just... aren't. it feels like load-bearing sectikons of the plot and themes were cut out to make room for a backdoor pilot for the stupid fucking UNIT spinoff

oh and it goes without saying i fucking hate all the UNIT wank in the star beast and the giggle. i hope space nine eleven 2 happens to their stupid fucking avengers tower i cannot stand kate stewart who is constantly a murderous bonehead (in the giggle alone she gets two pepole killed by not listening to the doctor and assuming that this teleporting godlike entity could be restrainted by Two Guys) who is both in and out of universe just a boring nepo baby with no merit of her own

um. i still dont know what happened with the regeneration. i think the implication is that when david tennant dies hell time travel back to become ncuti gatwa inside himself--at least the rehab dialogue seems to make that implication. but it's not really explained or explored? baffling. i do think that fourteen getting to settle down and live a peaceful life with his friends is cute.

oh yeah and the ask said other than that but goddd there was some good stuff in the star beast and honestly with the state of the UK media i will take any perspective on trans people that includes baseline human erespect but some of those lines made me cringe so bad. anyway overall i am cautiously optimistic for the future of the show--oh ncuti was fucking great did i mention that i instantly bnought him as the doctor he owned the scene, the moment he was there it was clear he was the protagonist, and i liked the church on ruby road well enough too--i am cautiously optimistic but i worry that a big UNIT-shaped tumor will devour huge chunks of it and it'll be annoying. also russel t davies is like 60 and i just dont want to hear what he has to say about twitter so im not looking forward to dot and bubble

[gamerwoo]

Hyunjin: Age-Restricted (Part Eighteen)

Characters: Hyunjin x female reader (ft other skz members)

Genre/warnings: nanny!reader, ex-porn star/neighbor!hyunjin, generally inexperienced and painfully shy virgin!reader, fluff, humor, mentions of porn and sex work, hyunjin is stupid in love and also has a thing for tall girls (it doesn't necessarily say reader is taller than him but he does beg her to wear heels so interpret that how you want), hyunjin is very much not straight, lots and lots of flirting and teasing, mentions of kinks and stuff but no smut happens sorry <;3 (minors dni!!!)

Word count: 6,074

Summary: You think it’s luck when the new family you nanny for is so stupid rich that they rent you a fancy new apartment just so you can live closer to them. You think it’s luck when the guy across the hall is the most beautiful person you’ve ever seen in your entire life and makes an effort to talk to you. But that’s just about where your luck runs out, because Hyunjin is more out of your league than you could ever imagine, and you’re just some hopeless virgin who never had good luck in the first place.

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He knew you’d have questions. Hyunjin expected nothing less, but you made sure to tell him you were curious but would only ask questions if he was comfortable with it. Considering you found out everything about him when he’d ended things, you never really got a chance to ask him anything. But he was 100% okay with answering any question you had, and he planned on being fully open and honest.

That first night that Hyunjin apologized, he was fully prepared to go home alone, but you told him he could stay. Even if you were mad still, you missed him. And that was where your questioning started.

“So then how did you get into porn?” was your first question, and it was the one he expected to be first.

He had gone to his apartment to change into clothes to sleep in, and the two of you were laying in your bed, inhumanly close. You missed each other and he didn’t know how to tell you that he still didn’t feel close enough even with your entire body on top of his without sounding weird.

“Changbin,” he stated simply.

“So you both got into porn when he said he was gonna do it?” you assumed.

He nodded, “I also really needed money, aaaaand I was basically going nowhere. I really liked art and I wanted to be an artist, but getting into that industry is fucking hard, so I just…went for porn. It was pretty easy for anyone to get into, anyway – at least in that area of Vegas. There were so many sleazeballs looking for amateurs.”

“So how’d it go in the beginning?”

“Honestly, shockingly well,” he scoffed. “I don’t mean to, like, sound like I’m bragging, but I kind of took off almost instantly. Directors and producers and shit were saying I just had the perfect face and a good body, and everyone wanted to have me in their videos. It was actually really overwhelming, but I needed all the money I could get so I just ran with it.”

“That actually sounds kind of terrifying,” you nodded.

“Oh, I think you would’ve gone into shock and died,” he nodded along with you.

You narrowed your eyes at him and he just grinned.

“Anyway,” you stated.

“Anyway,” he laughed.

“What about Changbin?”

“He was only a little salty that I was getting more jobs than him, but he worked his way up there. Plus, I paid most of our rent so he couldn’t complain that much.”

You suddenly realized something, letting out a gasp, “Wait, were you the mutual friend that got him and Kit together?”

“Yup.”

“What happened?!” you squealed.

“‘Kay, so as I said, I got popular fast. I caught the attention of bigger producers and directors who worked with bigger names. Big names like…”

“Kat Valentyne,” you finished, saying her name with pizazz and doing spirit fingers to really sell her porn name.

He laughed and rolled his eyes, his laugh making you shake as you laid face-down on top of him, “She’s been a big name almost since she started. Word got out to the people she went to school with that she got hot and was in porn, so it got spread around along with old photos of her, so it kinda made headlines online.

“But anyway, I got cast in a scene opposite her, and I knew–”

“Hang on a minute,” you interrupted him, and that was when he realized what he’d just given away. “So you mean to tell me that you fucked Kit?”

He was quick to point a finger at you and look you dead in the eyes, “I never had feelings for her and I still don’t. Never will.”

“No, Hyunjin–” you sighed and shook your head. “You’re telling me that you were mad that she only flirted with me and looked at me a certain way, but you already had sex with her?! That’s not even fair!”

All he did in response was roll his eyes before continuing, “Anyway, so I knew Changbin had a fat fucking crush on her since forever, so I figured I’d throw his name out there. I showed her a couple photos of him and she thought he was cute aaaaand yeah. Rest is history.”

“I still can’t believe you got mad when you had sex with Kit…” you mumbled.

“Are you even upset that I had sex with her or just that I got jealous over her?”

“I know it was your job,” you scoffed, waving away his concern. “I trust you. I mean, she’s also dating your best friend.”

“I also just don’t want to date her,” he added.

“But how come you get to fuck her, but god forbid she look at me the wrong way?” you huffed.

“I think it’s suddenly bedtime,” he told you before he pulled the covers up over your head, and then rolled over on top of you.

“Hwang Hyunjin!” you squealed between laughs.

“Can’t hear you, goodnight!”

-

Hyunjin wanted to do the proper thing: take you on a fancy date. And what better way to do that than using your ex-boss’ certificate to go to that fancy restaurant? It seemed like a very fitting way to celebrate the two of you making up.

Unfortunately, the only fancy thing you owned was your old prom dresses, so that meant shopping.

As far as you could tell, Hyunjin would be an expert at fancy. While you mostly ever saw him in t-shirts and sweatshirts – you had still seen him in other clothes like jeans, button-ups, and such – they were always expensive. So he must’ve owned fancy clothing, right? He must’ve known what rich people considered acceptable since clearly the dude was loaded.

You were pretty sure you’d never seen someone look so goddamn good in just some black jeans and a baggy button-up shirt with one half tucked in, but Hyunjin was just another level. You were wondering if he was even human, actually. Maybe he was actually an android or something.

“You’re staring,” he noted as you watched him brush through his dark hair before leaving the apartment.

“Yeah,” you nodded.

He just laughed, eyes turning into crescent moons.

You missed his smile.

While you were browsing through clothes at a store you felt far too out of place in, Hyunjin mentioned, “Pick out whatever you like. I’ll cover it.”

“Um, no?” you turned around to tell him. “You’re already paying for my apartment – which, by the way, still stop.”

“I can afford it, don’t worry about it,” he promised, waving the worry away.

Which then sparked more questions about him.

“Did you just make a ton of money back then?” you wondered.

He shrugged, “More than most. I did save most of it, but– …Actually, we’ll talk more in the car. I gotta take you somewhere for you to get it.”

“Get what?”

“It.”

You made a face at him and rolled your eyes before going back to looking at dresses, “So, uh…what’s considered…fancy?”

“Do you want form fitting or more flowy?” he asked as he started perusing the racks as well.

“Do you also want to pay for my shapewear?” you asked sarcastically.

He shrugged, “If you think you need it, I’ll buy whatever you want.”

You frowned, obviously not happy with his answer. But again, he grinned back at you.

-

Dress and shoes acquired, you were back in Hyunjin’s car, driving to an unknown location. All he’d said was, “I’m gonna show you something.”

You didn’t plan on getting shoes, but Hyunjin was quick to ask after picking out a dress if you had any shoes for the occasion. You’d said something about wanting to find just a cute pair of flats, but Hyunjin turned to face you with wide eyes.

“Please wear heels,” he begged, clinging onto your arms for dear life.

“I never wear heels,” you told him. “I’ll be too tall.”

“No you won’t,” he stated very seriously. “Wear. Heels.”

You did end up getting a pair of heels that you were totally not persuaded to get due to the fact you were very positive that Hyunjin found it hot when you were taller. As if he wouldn’t have bought them for you anyway because he liked how you looked in them. If the way he eyed you up and down and almost drooled on the marbled floor was any indication.

“Soooo,” Hyunjin began, one hand on the wheel and the other resting on your thigh, “have you ever noticed anything in my apartment?”

“Are we talking about the mirrors?” you asked.

“You need to get past the mirrors, baby.”

“So that’s a no. What was I supposed to notice?”

He chuckled, “Maybe something on the walls…?”

“Art!” you gasped, recalling the times you’d been over and noticed that large canvases were always evenly spaced across the walls of the hallway, and a few were put in his living room and his kitchen.

He nodded, “Very good. What about the art?”

“It’s…there!” you pointed out, much less enthusiastically. “It’s on the walls!”

Thank god he was stopped at a stop sign because he looked at you with an unamused look for a painfully long time.

“Hyunjin, when have I ever had time to sit in your apartment and look at the art?” you asked him, trying to prove a point. “We were usually in your bedroom, and even when we were on the couch, we were cuddling and watching something or laying down and watching something, or we weren’t even watching anything because we were doing other things!”

He scoffed with a wide smile and asked, “You can’t even say making out? You have to say ‘other things’?”

“What about the art, Hyunjin?” you asked sharply, wanting him to move on from the route he was about to take.

After a bit of laughing, Hyunjin replied, “Most of the art has the same signature.”

“That’s so interesting,” you deadpanned, still not getting it.

You also weren’t paying attention to where he was driving, but he finally pulled into a lot outside of what looked like another apartment building. He put the car in park and pulled out the key before he looked at you again. Again, he was unamused.

He eyed you up and down before noting, “You’ve gotten more sassy, huh?”

“I’m not trying to be, I just don’t understand!”

“Come on, babydoll,” he patted your thigh before he got out of the car. “I’ll show you.”

He took you into the building and into an elevator. You noted that he stuck a silver key from his keyring into a keyhole in the elevator, turned it, and pressed the button for the top floor. You and Hyunjin waited side-by-side at the back of the elevator. He was on his phone while you were watching the numbers on the LED screen above the doors.

“Have you talked to Kit or Changbin?” you asked him.

“They know everything,” he nodded, still not looking up from his phone. He assumed you were asking because you wanted to know if they were caught up. “I told them after you fell asleep last night.”

“After I was suffocated,” you corrected.

“Don’t be dramatic,” he scoffed, finally looking at you to smirk.

“Oh, says you of all people.”

“Touché.”

Finally, the elevator dinged, and the doors opened. The top floor seemed to be a penthouse, but it was all open space with large windows all on the back wall. The rest of the walls were exposed brick and covered in half-finished and fully-finished paintings. Scattered around the space were easels that either held canvases, white stained drapes, or nothing at all. There were a handful of stools around the area, and lots of art supplies. There were two large desks on either side of the room, with more art supplies and sketchbooks and canvases.

“Since we’re being completely open and honest now,” Hyunjin smiled at you, gesturing with an arm to the space while he guided you in with the other around your waist, “welcome to my studio. This is how I’ve made so much money.”

You looked at him, eyes bugging out of your head, “What, you’re some huge artist?”

He pointed at a painting that seemed to be finished, leaning up against the wall as it stood on the floor.

“There’s the signature. On most of the ones at home.”

You walked over and bent down to get a closer look. It looked mostly like a bunch of scribbles, but you could make out a large S and a large H.

“No offense, but what does it say?” you ask. “There’s no S in your name.”

“Sam Hyun,” he replied. “When I lived in Vegas, I went by Sam Hwang, and my name is Hyunjin. I combined the two.”

You turned around to face him again, head tilting slightly to one side as you studied him, “You actually do look like a Sam…”

He shrugged, “Thanks, I think.”

“It’s a good thing. Sam’s not an ugly name, y’know? You could’ve been something ugly like…Frank. Or you could’ve been a Kyle.”

He gave you a strangle look as he chuckled, “What’s wrong with Kyle? It’s a common name, no?”

“Kyle itself is a red flag,” you stated knowingly.

“Would you still love me if my name was Bartholomew?” he asked suddenly with a giggle.

“Fuck no,” you replied immediately.

“Just take a fucking guess what Changbin almost made his stage name.”

You gasped, “You’re kidding.”

“He’s so fucking lucky we went back to Vegas for our first auditions because he met one of my old buddies names Xavior and thought his name sounded cool, so he used that as his stage name instead. But he was dead set on Batholomew.”

“Why?” you asked with a disgusted face.

“His mind works in mysterious ways,” he shrugged.

“So…Kat Valentyne and Xavior…something?” you asked.

“Xavior Chang,” he scoffed. “He couldn’t come up with a second name but he didn’t want to copy me and use just one – even though I told him I didn’t think he was copying me, but whatever. But honestly, after the movie with him and Kit, she kept slipping up and calling him Binnie so now that’s basically all he’s known as now.”

You nodded slowly as you started to look around the large space. Hyunjin just stood and watched you, hands in his pockets.

“So…how did you come up with Sam Hyun?” you wondered. “Why not just use your name?”

“Because I was in porn and I was afraid of ever being connected back to it,” he explained. “Anyone could google my stage name and find out my real one. With being an artist, I wanted absolutely everything to be separated from what I was doing during the day. Nobody had a face to the art, either. Sam Hyun is untraceable. As far as anyone knows, Sam Hyun is my real name. Separate from Hwang Hyunjin, and therefore, separate from Jin.”

“So…you’re like Banksy.”

“Yeah, like Banksy.”

“So how’d it happen, then? The switch between porn and art?”

“I was doing art at the same time, but more as a hobby. I kind of gave up when it never took off. But one day, out of nowhere, I got really lucky. Something I made got noticed at a show by some big name and they offered a lot more than it should’ve been worth, honestly,” he laughed like he still couldn’t believe it. “That just kinda…put my name on the map, I guess. And once I had that break, I left the industry and focused full-time on this.”

A small smile broke on your face as you looked at him, “That’s kinda sweet. You get to do the thing you actually love.”

He nodded, “I got very lucky. Still am very lucky.” he added the last part with a warm, happy half-smile at you, just looking at you with the most lovesick expression anyone had ever seen.

You started looking around again, wandering between easels and canvases, looking around at everything Hyunjin had made. You never knew he could draw, but fuck, was he talented. It was mostly people and a handful of scenery pieces thrown in there, but everything you saw was so insanely good. 

You hadn’t noticed Hyunjin had wandered over behind you as you studied a seemingly random couple he’d drawn, their bodies filled in with a watercolor sunset, until he softly asked, “Do you wanna see something?”

You looked at him to silently say you were paying attention to whatever he wanted to show you, and he guided you over to an easel that was covered by a white drape. It was obvious that there was a large canvas underneath, but you weren’t going to uncover anything that was covered. That would be rude.

Hyunjin reached up to gently pull the sheet off so as to not knock over the painting. Your mouth fell open as your eyes widened in awe, seeing the portrait of you and Hyunjin. It was done in the same exact style as the piece you were just looking at – just the messy-on-purpose black outline from the shoulders up, and being filled in with warm tones that blended together – but this was very clearly supposed to be you and Hyunjin staring deeply at each other. Your lips were only inches apart as one of his hands cupped your cheek, looking at you with his signature smirk, but even in a picture, he was able to capture the way he looked at you like you were the entire universe. And you looked back at him in a way that very much mimicked how you looked at the piece: in pure awe. Your eyes were wide and your lips were parted, your hand holding lightly onto his arm just a couple inches down from his wrist. The colors used to fill in your bodies were similar to the first painting but the reds, yellows, and oranges were put in different spots. It was somehow more pleasing, but maybe you were being biased.

“The one you were just looking at was based off of this,” Hyunjin explained to you softly. “I made this one a while ago, but when things got…really shitty between us, I tried to replicate it to sell it. As you could probably tell, I gave up. Wasn’t as good as the original.”

“Holy shit, Hyunjin,” you breathed, unable to take your eyes off of it.

“If you think this is insane, you should see my most recent sketchbook,” he chuckled. “You’d probably think I’m a psycho.”

Your eyebrows furrowed as you realized what he’d said before, looking back at him, “Were you going to sell this?”

He scoffed, “Absolutely not. I was gonna keep it, but I like the style of it and thought it would sell well. But this is priceless – even if it’s half a self portrait.”

You frowned at him and lightly whacked him in the stomach, making him laugh, “You’re literally a God, you freak.”

“Yeah, well,” he sighed as he draped an arm casually around your shoulder, “you really are your own biggest critic. Drawing myself took the longest fucking time.”

“You definitely look at me like that,” you promised, pointing at him on the portrait. “And I definitely look lost all the time like that.”

“You’re not lost,” he scoffed again, rolling his eyes. “I’m literally right there.”

You started laughing, “That was stupid cheesy.”

“The cheese gets worse, don’t worry,” he promised with a smirk as he started to lead you over to one of the tables. He brought you to a closed sketchbook that looked much less beat-up than the other ones. “This is my newer sketchbook. I got it a little bit before I met you, actually.”

He gently pushed you forward to stand at the table and open it. You flipped it open and started going through it slowly, seeing him use different mediums to make different things. It was mostly people – people you’d never seen before, but a couple that you’d seen at The Brooke. But after about 5 pages, you flipped the next page to see you, holding a moving box. It was a charcoal sketch from your thighs up, and it was only somewhat shaded. But it was very clearly you, laughing as you carried the cardboard box.

The next page was you again, but from the side, and only from your shoulders up. Your expression was neutral and you seemed to be looking at something. The next page was, again, you, smiling with your eyes closed. The next page was you, and the next, and the next, and the next.

“I like to draw people that I see,” he explained. “Clearly, I saw you once and couldn’t get you out of my head. I’ve drawn you a lot since I’ve met you.”

You kept flipping, and every single page was you. But then you got to the last few sketches in the book, and you only looked sad. You looked disheveled or upset. There was even one of you with tears on your cheeks with your eyes casted down.

“I kinda never stopped drawing you,” he admitted quietly. “Even when I was mad at you, I still thought about you all the time.”

There were a couple drawings of you scattered in the sad ones where you looked happy again, and it tugged at your heart. Even when you were both upset, Hyunjin seemed to still think of you when you were happy, like he wanted to see it again.

The last 10 pages or so were still blank, so you closed the sketchbook again and turned to face Hyunjin, cheeks feeling hot from seeing how often he drew you. He could tell you were flustered and grinned widely at you.

“I’m pretty cute, huh?” he asked with a modest shrug.

“How come I never knew you could draw?” you asked him, poking his chest with your finger.

“Changbin and Kit have seen me doodle on stuff here and there, but they don’t know about all this,” he explained. “This is top secret. Nobody knows about it because I don’t want there being any possible ties between Sam Hyun and Jin, y’know? They’re both me, but nobody else knows they are. I want to make sure it stays that way. But since we’re working on honesty, I figured you’d be a good first person to tell.”

You nodded, “I won’t say a word.”

“I’ll make sure you don’t,” he promised with a mischievous grin before he leaned in and pressed his lips to yours.

-

You’d never seen Hyunjin dress up before, but boy did he dress up. There was a lot of black, but a lot of chains and silver and mesh. Everything just looked expensive and extravagant, and despite having Hyunjin help you pick out what to wear earlier that day, you somehow felt severely underdressed beside him.

Despite that, the way Hyunjin looked at you made you feel like the best looking person at the restaurant. When you first got dressed and you were doing your makeup in his bathroom, he was sitting on the counter by where your makeup was spread out, going between looking at his phone and glancing up at you with a soft smile.

But when you put on the heels, he was gone. His eyes only left you so he could drive, but he kept stealing glances. He looked at you probably the way you looked at him. Like you were God and had descended down in front of him. You weren’t even sure if you’d make it to the restaurant because you were almost positive there were a couple times he almost passed out.

“You’re oddly quiet now,” Hyunjin mused as he looked over the menu with you – he had to help you with some things because you’d never had a lot of the food they offered. It was all fancy stuff with big words.

You glanced away from the words that didn’t even seem like real words to look at him, “What do you mean?”

“You’ve rambled off so many questions today and now you’re dead silent,” he chuckled. “Feeling okay?”

You felt your cheeks warm a bit as you mumbled, “I’m not gonna ask those questions out in public, Hyunjin.”

He chuckled and rolled his eyes, “Oh, as if anyone is listening to us. They’re all talking about business and nannies and vacations and shit that’s important to rich people. Dates are meant for talking to get to know each other. You should feel comfortable asking me anything.”

You knew he was right about dates being made for getting to know each other, but you still felt nervous to ask questions about sex and porn where people might hear it. What if some rich person overheard and thought you were weird and got you kicked out?

It took a couple minutes of silent internal encouragement, but you finally asked in almost a whisper, “What…kind did you do…?”

His laugh was louder than your words but nobody seemed to notice, “Both. Gay and straight. Does that bother you?”

You shrugged like he told you it was a little cloudy outside, “Not really. I mean, unless you prefer guys, in which case, that would make me kinda insecure probably.”

“My preference is you, dummy,” he told you with a playful smile.

“I meant…sex-wise,” your voice got quieter on the last word, which made Hyunjin laugh again.

“No preference there.”

“Okay, maybe this is a dumb question–”

“No dumb questions.”

“Sure. How did you, like…not fall in love with every single person? I get it’s mostly acting and stuff but that’s some serious acting. I would be convinced everyone actually loved me and cared about me and would catch feelings everyday.”

“I learned how to separate my feelings from my work,” he explained. “To me, sex was just sex, and my feelings were basically shut off when I was doing it. But that was only when I was working. It’s different with you.”

“We’ve never…done that,” you reminded him.

“I mean with everything else. We’ve done other stuff. Unless you forgot about that when we were mad at each other,” he smirked.

“Trust me, Hyun, I remember,” you promised.

“Are you sure?” he asked, his smirk growing and making you feel things you did not want to feel in the middle of a restaurant full of a bunch of important and rich people. “Because I don’t mind jogging your memory.”

-

Despite the first conversation at the restaurant, the rest of the date was the most romantic experience you’d ever had. You were starting to learn that despite Hyunjin’s line of work and claiming he could turn off his feelings, he was a true hopeless romantic – not that you didn’t know before, but now it was painfully obvious. He ordered for you, held open doors for you, and asked a lot of questions about you. The two of you had already caught up on new happenings since you last spoke, but now Hyunjin was asking you questions about your future. What field were you going to look for a job in? Have you considered going to school for something? How did you get into nannying in the first place? Did that mean you wanted kids?

You learned more about him, other than just his previous job. You learned more about his friendship with Changbin, his life in Las Vegas, and everything outside and in between. How he got out of the industry and how he found himself living at The Brooke and befriending the two bellhops who worked the night shift. More about his early life pre-porn and even some stories from his life while he was in that industry, but about stuff that was separate from it.

You felt like the whole time, his eyes never left yours. You weren’t even sure if he ever looked down while eating his food to see what he was picking up with his utensils, but his plate was cleared by the end of the date. 

To be fair, you weren’t sure of many things because Hyunjin kept refilling your wine glass whenever it was empty. He got some fancy bottle brought to the table in an ice bucket and while it was meant to share, you weren’t sure if he had any of it or if you’d drank the whole thing. You saw him with a glass but then you were too lost in his eyes to notice much else. When his stare got too much and you felt nervous like you had to look away, you looked down at your own food instead of focusing on whatever he was doing.

Back in the car, Hyunjin drove with a hand on your thigh and the other on the wheel. Despite your tipsy state and him teasing you about forgetting the things you’d done together, he was being a complete gentleman. The most he’d done was just then as his warm palm rested on the exposed skin of your leg. 

“I have a follow-up question,” you announced suddenly between Hyunjin humming along with the music.

“Yes, angel?”

“Can you elaborate on the ‘sex without feelings’ thing?” you asked.

He chuckled and glanced at you, “How long have you been thinking about this?”

“Just now. Just going over stuff in my head, y’know?”

“How much wine have you had, my love?” he continued to laugh.

“Whatever you didn’t drink, I did,” you stated surely.

After his laughter had died down, though, he replied, “The people I worked with, I never had romantic feelings for. When I was starting out, it happened a couple times until I learned. I had a couple…situationships, I suppose during my time in the industry, and I didn’t try to disassociate from my feelings because obviously they were supposed to be relationships. But with them, it always felt like they were trying so hard to make it like a scene that I just auto-blocked it all out anyway. It kinda sucked.”

Your eyes widened slightly as you looked over at Hyunjin, “That doesn’t happen now, right?”

“Absolutely not, angel,” he looked back at you with a soft smile before looking back at the road. “With you, everything is so much better than any sex I’ve ever had. Feelings really do make it. I actually get turned on and everything feels more intense. It just feels… I don’t know how to explain it other than everything is better because there’s feelings. I can’t not feel things for you, _____.”

“Awww,” you giggled as your cheeks began to warm. “Shut the fuck up, you’re too cute.”

“Not to say,” he quickly added, “if you did want to do anything a little…raunchier in the future, that I would hate it. I think in that case, it would be okay because the feelings are still there. It was just with those people, they made it seem like they only saw me as Jin and not Hyunjin, if that makes sense.”

You nodded, “No, I get that. That does make me feel better, though."

 The two of you fell into a comfortable silence for another moment until you thought of another question, shyly asking, "So, um…what’re you…into…?”

You could see the smirk growing on his face as the streetlamps flooded through the windshield as he drove, “I’ll do just about anything if that’s what you’re asking.”

“But what are you personally into?” you pressed curiously, though you were sure Hyunjin would be able to tell how flustered you were. “Like, if you didn’t have to worry about your partner.”

“Hair pulling,” was his immediate response. “I love having my hair pulled.”

You eyed his hair as it currently was. He kept it on the long-ish side and it was almost always half-up. Even in the one video of his you saw, his hair was at his shoulders.

“Yeah, that math adds up,” you nodded. “I think you like dirty talking, too.”

He let out a laugh as he glanced between you and the road, “What’s that supposed to mean?”

You were smiling, too, because of his laugh as you replied, “You would always talk a lot to me. You’re just really vocal.”

“You react well when I do talk to you,” he pointed out before he leaned over toward you, his lips almost brushing your ear. “You like the dirty talk, _____.”

A shiver went down your spine as he pulled away, and you were pretty sure Hyunjin noticed from the way his smirk widened and his chest quickly rose and fell like he scoffed. But he didn’t say anything about it, and you were too shy to confirm or deny. So he went back to quietly humming along to his music.

-

Both Felix and Jeongin were behind the counter when you and Hyunjin returned back to The Brooke. When you left that evening, it was only Jeongin who was punching in for work and making a comment about how dolled up the two of you were. When you came strolling into the empty lobby with your hands intertwined, Felix’s jaw was just about on the floor as Jeongin started smirking.

“Nice to see the two of you still look presentable,” the younger boy noted. “I thought for sure Hyunjin was gonna pounce at some point.”

“I don’t blame him,” Felix choked out a laugh as he started to regain his composure. “Either of you. You both look incredible.”

Your face had already been warm from the wine and Hyunjin’s compliments, but Felix made it feel hotter, “Thanks.”

“What’s the occasion?” he wondered.

“Make up date,” Hyunjin stated, stopping at the front desk to chat with them. “We went somewhere nice for free, thanks to _____’s asshole ex-bosses.”

Jeongin nodded, “You love to see it.”

“Now,” Hyunjin released your hand to place his hands on your shoulders, “I need to get this one to bed since she drank almost an entire bottle of wine by herself.”

“You kept pouring!” you insisted.

“But you kept drinking,” he countered with a playful grin.

“You can’t start gaslighting her when you just got back together,” Jeongin told him with a sigh and a shake of his head.

“But it’s official now,” Hyunjin pointed out with a wide grin that made his eyes crinkle.

Felix nodded in understanding, “Oh, then it’s totally okay now.”

“See ya later, guys!” he chirped as he turned you and started leading you toward the elevators.

“Don’t be too loud, please!” Jeongin laughed after the two of you. “I don’t feel like getting a ton of noise complaints tonight!”

That’s where your mind was, actually. Hyunjin had done this big gesture for you. He made an entire day out of it, too. He brought you to his gallery and showed you all of the art he made, and half of it was of you. He brought you shopping and got you expensive clothes and accessories for the fancy date he brought you on. This all must’ve been leading up to him taking your virginity now, right? Hyunjin definitely seemed like the type of person who wanted to make that something big and romantic and special. You half expected to go into his apartment and see rose petals leading to his bed.

Even if it wasn’t that far, he’d probably want to do something, right?

But instead, he stopped with you outside your apartment. You looked up at him in confusion, “Are we staying at my place?”

“You are,” he chuckled.

“What?”

“_____, it’s our first date,” he explained, still laughing softly at your confusion. “I’m doing things traditionally. It seems right. So you sleep here, I sleep over there, and I’ll see you in the morning, okay?”

You pouted but mumbled an, “Okay…”

Did you feel disappointed? Kind of. But did you also feel relieved? A little bit. You were pretty sure you were wearing some ugly cotton thong you’d gotten at the department store, anyway.

Hyunjin kissed your pouting lips, which brought a small smile to your face as he beamed back at you, “Goodnight, _____.”

“Goodnight, Hyunjin,” you replied before turning to unlock your door.

And once you were inside, you had to call your friends to tell them everything.

————✧♡✧————-

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[georgiapeach30513]

I'll be honest, while Deuxmoi always and still does post a ton of BS, thanks to the development of this never-ending saga...I'm starting to really feel like she's been used intentionally to push this narrative along all the way from the very beginning. Aka 2021.

A very out there theory but hear me out: Early on, the fandom had the general consensus DM was BS. Especially in regards to CE. Because DM was the one that first started spreading his super secret GF nonsense back in 2021, right before the introduction of Soba Saga. Her almost nonsensical rants about her having legit sources on this secret GF - while doing weekly podcasts where she insisted she never got any intel on him because his circle was so tight knit (interesting how that suddenly changed out of nowhere when someone showed up) - just made her seem like crazy cat lady gossip conspiracy Marjorie Taylor Greene on steroids.

She was the first to post that "dating Soba for over a year and everyone in PT/her circle knows about it" in early 2022.

They go public in late 2022. 2023 There's some Sunday Spotted (I could be wrong) vDAY post about CE and "fiancé" being seen in town at dinner (sounds very similar to the most recent vDay sighting). That was about 10 months before the super secret wedding and there had been no announcement of being engaged, minus the Tumblr blogs and random third rate tabloids and troll twitter accounts passing on the rumors. DM starts spreading around the same time some Tumblr blogs get the intel about secret engagement, wedding, rift in the family, people on his side not liking Soba, etc. Eventually it is revealed DM was right all along???? In a complete turn of events her credibility goes from zero to 1 (grudgingly of course, while she continues to spill BS daily)

Meanwhile, DM gets the first RPatz sighting with Scarlett and crew at dinner. Nobody believed it - as Nancy mentioned, it just seemed too farfetched with the way that restaurant was set up.

Then in early 2024 we get an actual RPatz sighting with with Soba/CE, and separately, sightings with Scarlett and Colin. Now there's more "credibility" to that random other sighting even if it still can't be proven.

Now...possible project with RPatz and CE's name circulating. Maybe just gossip fodder, maybe some truth to it. Time will tell. Coincidences once again.

DM gets the sighting of CE in LA with Russos. He actually confirms that one himself a month later.

Simultaneously, DM gets random sightings of CE doing other stuff where soba is not mentioned. Nobody knows really what to believe anymore.

But for every 15 BS things she posts, she actually gets 1-2 right. It starts to completely make her a hit or miss source but enough to get people riled up and worried if/when she gets something related to CE/Soba.

In a way, this strategy, if it were to have any salt to it, is kinda interesting. It also sort of enforces the idea of possible foul play. Because if CE is truly in such a happy, private, loveful relationship, why use somebody as uncouth as DM to throw out breadcrumbs? Especially since, in the past, his fanbase and most Tumblr blogs believed it was only legit if it came from someone like People Mag (his team's go-to). Ironically, Page 6 has been getting most of the exclusive scoops this time around, in addition to weird low rate tabloids that eventually make its way to the top.

I know I sound like crazy qanon conspiracy theorist, but I guess people see what they wanna see. But for the people who believe this relationship isn't as genuine as some want to believe, it kind of tracks that somebody's PR team pushing this out in ways to sort of make you wonder, question, and push back on the validity. Just enough to make you think, maybe, maybe there's something going on BTS that they're not saying but they're kinda telling. But you'll never know what the truth is. At least not for now.

I do find DM’s role since 2023 to be very interesting indeed. You missed nothing. Not one thing. She’s made herself be credible enough during this, but also, she’s questionable. So of course, take everything she says with a grain of salt.

I made this comment a bit ago to someone else, he still uses People. Who got the Jinx articles first. Think about that for a moment. He. Just him.

As far as the last paragraph, what I will say is celebrities need to be talked about. Good or bad, they need the press. They need to be in the front of people’s minds. What better way to have them in people’s minds, and to have fans talk about something long past their expiration date than by playing a game. PR has become such a hot topic word, and I think very few people even understand it. But to me, if you’re having to play so many games, what really is real? Live your life. Isn’t that what we continue to be told they’re doing?

[dr-spectre]

Talking about Side Order and... Marina. (SPOILERS AHEAD!!!!)

You know, i really enjoyed Side Order, like it wasn't perfect or anything but i had such a blast with it and if they continue to expand on it we could have something REALLY amazing. My reaction to the GOD DAMN TUTORIAL BOSS GOT ME HYPERVENTILATING! IM NOT JOKING! IT WAS SO EXCITING AND SHOCKING!!! THE FINAL BOSS WAS INCREDIBLE TOO! I was singing along to Spectrum Obligato and WHEN THEY BROUGHT IN THE STUFF FROM THE LIVE CONCERT VERSION OF EBB AND FLOW MY JAW DROPPED!!!

However i gotta admit, the story could have been better, what was the deal with the Octoling engineers Marina was talking about? That goes completely nowhere and i thought it was gonna build to something with the repeat playthroughs of the final boss.

And of course, the biggest missed opportunity in my opinion, Marina Agitando.

Now look, i wanna say right off the bat, the design is excellent, it was so smart to bring back her Order outfit and make her into a giant abomination that moves in such a weird way that makes you feel uncomfortable. When i saw her for the very first time when you enter the room, i stood there for at least a solid minute in complete disbelief and shock seeing a giant Marina in some octopus tentacle heart thingy that beats and pumps with the music. The song that plays too "Unconscience" is such a BANGER and honestly it rivals Octo Callie's Bomb Rush Blush remix in my opinion.

The build up for this was pretty good too, seeing Marina say "help me" before she was knocked unconscious and then possessed by Overlorder BROKE ME! I was like "OH NO! ITS HAPPENING AGAIN! NOT MARINA!!" The build up to the 10th floor was so anxiety inducing because you know in the back of your mind that Marina is gonna fight you but you don't know what it's gonna look like, if you were there since Splatoon 2 and have watched Pearl and Marina since the beginning then this build up is even more anxiety inducing and its pretty damn good. And once you free Marina she feels so sorry about what happened and helps you out to put things right, heck she goes through a small character arc of embracing chaos.... but... i have to say...

It is unfortunately not executed that well or with any depth in my opinion because they repeated the whole thing of "oh no a character we know is evil because of (quote on quote) mind control!!!! oh noooo!!" Which is a tired trope in this series that needs to stop or else I'm gonna get REALLYYYYYY pissed off.

I've done enough ranting about Callie's villain arc and how that has been misinterpreted and stuff, but for Marina, i really wish they didn't do the whole "oh no a character is evil because of an evil character oh nooo!! we gotta save them!!" thing again and i wish Marina was more of a villain with a sad motivation for her actions. As much as its cute to see Pearl and Marina act all flirty with each other in Side Order, it kinda ruins the mysterious and dark tone of the story that was teased from the trailers and the tutorial in my opinion. Everything is also explained so quickly early on which really sucks. I really wish Marina was actually conscious throughout her time as Marina Agitando and most of it should have been her fault. She does blame herself for creating Overlorder but it's kinda brushed aside quickly and Marina ends up being totally fine and free of guilt. There isn't enough depth to it which is so lame and a missed opportunity.

Marina is flawed, she makes mistakes and acts emotional and angry sometimes. We have seen a side of Marina where she snaps at Pearl when she loses Splatfests and has shown signs that she still hasn't recovered from her time before she met Pearl.

She picked team Order because she was genuinely scared that her new life would fall apart and she doesn't wanna lose the people (especially Pearl) that she's met and grown to love. Marina is also heavily theorized to be on the autism spectrum and as someone who is autistic, i can see myself in Marina, they could have really explored Marina's psyche and mental health in Side Order but they just... didn't. Instead she's put to sleep and controlled by her ai child and all of the focus is put on stopping it like a traditional "oh no we gotta stop an evil ai!! oh noo!!" story... ugh... I mean Smollusk is cute i guess but there's not a ton to them and they come off as yet another "evil ai that wants order and control!! roarrr!!!"

From reading the most recent interview on Side Order and seeing the concept art, they said that they wanted to tell a story about Marina losing herself to a machine that she created. Could you imagine how tragic it would have been to learn more about Marina and how she's so wrapped up in anxiety that she decides to make this replica of Inkopolis Square and make the Memverse? Maybe at first she makes it to help Sanitized Octolings just like in the dlc, but then maybe due to overwork and burnout (which Pearl mentions in the tutorial by the way), her emotions and anxiety become so strong that she becomes consumed by it, this obsession of order and trying to achieve happiness takes over her and then she gets the idea to spread this order to the real world, where her friends can be "happy" and "safe." Maybe Overlorder is still there but they just whisper to Marina, manipulate and point her in the right direction to continue to her mission of order instead of just fucking knocking her out and using her as a meat puppet for 5 minutes.

Could you imagine how much better the build up would have been to not see Marina until you get to the 30th floor for the first time and you got to unlock her diary entries beforehand? Seeing her thought process and her slow descent into becoming an antagonist. I'm not sure how they would have changed the permanent upgrades but they could have thought of something man. I get that they wanted to subvert expectations but, i think they should have gone WAY further with Marina Agitando.

I was waiting for Pearl and Marina to have their "Tidal Rush" moment where it's this emotional battle between the two, could you imagine how DEVISTATING a remix of Ebb and Flow would have been if it had gotten that "Tidal Rush" type of remix? Pearl singing her parts in this chaotic and emotional way, on the brink of tears trying to get Marina back and calm her down, and Marina trying to fight back against her words, not wanting to believe her because she's so wrapped up trying to make them both happy in her way. She's so caught up in order that she has forgotten what Pearl wants, that Pearl wants to be with her and go against any obstacle that stands in their way together. God i would have cried seeing that I'm not gonna lie. Maybe once Marina starts to think rationally, she breaks free from the machine and then leaps into Pearl's arms, and then we have to go back up the 30 floors to fight Overlorder and we slowly see Marina learn to embrace chaos throughout the floors instead of it just being at the final boss.

I really do feel like Splatoon has this issue of trying to appeal way too hard to kids and being really scared to dive into the flaws of these characters. They are so avoidant of being more serious and they hide it away in optional collectables and obscure posts on social media that creates misinformation and stories that feel way too undeveloped. They just say "oh this character has been brainwashed!!" which is such a lazy and bullshit trope they slap on these characters to avoid getting into their flaws for some stupid reason. (Hell that word has lost all meaning to me now to be honest. Like no, Callie wasn't "brainwashed" per say, hypnosis is not brainwashing or mind control I've said that a trillion times in other blog posts but whatever. Agent 3 was knocked out and had no clue on what was happening. They weren't "brainwashed" they were used as a puppet from a fucking goopy telephone for five minutes while they were asleep. Maybe its poor translation i don't know.)

I know that Splatoon is made for all ages and primarily for children but, i find that to be a stupid excuse for bad storytelling, a good story with depth that's explored and set up properly can be applied to all kinds of age groups not just adults. And the adults that say that shit too, why do you think like that? Why do you wish to dismiss that sort of thing in media? So what if it's made for kids? Adults write these stories and plant themes and arcs into them. Why do you think people cried over the Rosalina storybook in Mario Galaxy and think its the best part of that game? You don't want that kind of stuff in games because "they are made for kids"? Why do you think there are so many adults in the Splatoon community hmm?

I am so worried for Deep Cut in the next game because i really don't want this to happen again, i want an actual proper villain arc for either Frye or Shiver. No hypnosis, no brainwashing, no mind control. Just a pure fucking villain arc caused by the flaws of the characters and without the involvement of a third party. Please, i wanna see growth in these characters that is explored way more clearly and better. Or maybe don't do a villain arc again and just have Deep Cut be fully happy with each other and develop their relationship more with lore and backstory. PLEASE!

Anyways ramble over, thank you for reading!

[creature-wizard]

I see this (alien abduction communities) having a lot in common with ROMCOA stuff. The Controversial History of Alien Abductions by Kaz Rowe on Youtube (https://youtu.be/of8igM9WFWc?si=LrE_pCrDUMbujQah) What people may get out of ROMCOA (Validation of trauma in a way that is more obviously bad and may be not be as emotionally difficult due to a less personal abuse or mistreatment having clearer motivations.) is different, but the conspiracism of it feels similar.

I say this as a system who has skirted the edge of ROMCOA stuff for reasons like those stated above, but I wondered if you'd have any thoughts on it. (If it's of any interest, I'll send a separate ask with thoughts on the why/how we've dodged the ROMCOA bullet despite being drawn to it, but that's a significant tangent. Also sorry to be anon, I'm shy.)

(To anyone reading this: If you've heard the term "RAMCOA" but haven't heard how it originated among conspiracy theorists and was always meant to push conspiracy theories within legitimate psychiatry, further information is provided at the end.)

Oh yeah, you are absolutely right. I've been comparing these two things for awhile now, and it's basically two presentations of the same exact social phenomena.

You usually have somebody with psychological or physical problems that seem to defy explanation, but are very likely related to something like anxiety, depression, chronic stress, PTSD, C-PTSD, BPD, schizophrenia, bipolar, autism, ADHD, allergies, mast cell activation syndrome, or fibromyalgia. Y'know, a lot of the kinds of things that doctors will dismiss as "all in your head," or that just aren't that well-understood by the public, or might not seem possible because they underestimate just how traumatizing their life actually was.

The way they fall into it is nearly always the same; they never really "remember" any of it until they start coming across literature and people who introduce them to the idea of RAMCOA or alien abduction. And of course by this point a lot of them are absolutely desperate for some kind of explanation or validation, so they look deeper into it. They start learning and absorbing the tropes and narratives that go along with whatever mythology, so to speak, that they've fallen into. Then when they undergo hypnosis, they start "remembering" events that just so happen to line up with whichever narrative they've been exposing themselves to.

There are other groups doing this same thing with their own narratives, of course. In New Age and neopagan contexts, people often seek explanation and validation by trying to uncover past lives. In fact, the whole entire practice of undergoing hypnosis to recover lost memories actually began with people trying to find their past lives.

A common thread is that people remember something that pretty much everybody would agree would be absolutely terrible to endure. Whether you're "remembering" being burned at the stake for witchcraft, eating the heart of a ritually murdered child, fleeing the destruction of Atlantis, or aliens performing invasive procedures on your body, there's no ambiguity or uncertainty that what supposedly happened is horrible. In a society that constantly tells people that they haven't had it bad enough to be traumatized, because real trauma can only come from something way more severe than what they're experiencing, it's just no surprise that this keeps happening. Their subconscious minds seek the images and narratives that seem to align with the distress they're feeling.

It's been observed that what people experience while under hypnosis is basically the same as what they experience while dreaming. What they experience isn't necessarily logical; in fact, it's often far from it. Weird, surreal stuff just happens out of nowhere. People just do things with no genuinely reasonable motive.

In the context of RAMCOA, this is often handwaved away with "well, they're cultists, this is obviously part of their weird cult practices." This is not only an incredibly weak explanation for most of this stuff, but when you look at other supposedly recovered memories, you just can't help but notice that this is a pattern in every belief system people try to recover memories in, so trying to do this for supposed cases of SRA and the like is just special pleading.

And yeah, if you wanna share your story, I'd love to hear it!

For anyone reading this who isn't aware: The term "Ritual Abuse, Mind Control & Organized Abuse", or RAMCOA, is not an innocent catch-all term for religious abuse, institutional abuse, sex trafficking, etc. It was coined by conspiracy theorists in order to repackage Satanic Ritual Abuse/Satanic Panic/Project Monarch alter programming conspiracy theories into something they could pass off as legitimate science/research. Essentially, it's a Trojan horse for far right bullshit. For more information, see Cathy O'Brien - The First Project Monarch "Survivor" and Fritz Springmeier and Cisco Wheeler: Two Of The Most Dangerous Conspiracy Theorists Most People Have Never Heard Of.

[mswyrr]

finally saw Lisa Frankenstein

SPOILERS BELOW

i love that this movie is about true love and the writing has no compunction about needing to pretend like true love has to be between moral people - soulmates can be kind of selfish assholes who are nonetheless absolutely perfect for each other and tender and good to each other

and i love, after choking on so many heroines who are so pure it's inhuman in recent YA (which I largely only read for canon f/f) for Lisa to just be... so id-tastic and her story to be driven by the intense feelings of teenage girl coming-of-age stuff that gets prettied up and erased

she was internalizing her pain the way a good girl is "supposed to" -she was hurting so much that she wished she was dead with him. instead, he comes to her and they BOTH come more and more alive as he kills the people who hurt her. in increasingly "unfair" ways because it's not about right & wrong

he's kind of her dark side, speaking to and expressing the things she's shoved down inside along with her will to live - as he acts those things out, as she is complicit and eggs it on, covering for him and feeding him the attempted rapist as a victim, her will to live comes back

but they don't do the "maleficent" (and the whole "bad girl but in a safe way" kind of story) thing of making Lisa's dark side "safe" and her only fairly getting revenge - the darkness the Creature speaks to and acts out is not fair, it is not safe or contained.

instead of internalizing her pain, Lisa shares in externalizing it and making other people hurt and she blossoms into herself. and who she is is a bit cringe in the best possible way? she's embracing her own life energy, or own crazy selfish lustful weird set of desires.

it's about Lisa's feelings and what she WANTS, morals enter nowhere into it. except when it comes to Taffy - the one person who really tried to love her at her most broken. everyone else abandoned Lisa emotionally--including her father--but Taffy tried to be there, as awkward as that could be at times

speaking of which: Taffy and Lisa make an interesting contrast to Needy and Jennifer from Jennifer's Body (also a film by Diablo Cody and she says they both take place in the same storyverse). both Jennifer and Lisa decide that what makes them feel most alive is embracing their inner monster, but Taffy doesn't go all "i have to kill the beast" the way Needy does. i like this much better. Taffy is wearing Lisa's mom's rosary at the end and, by doing so, accepting Lisa's "I love you" despite everything Lisa did. whereas Needy ends up ripping off the BFF necklace and rejecting Jennifer's love. In my mind the two films are a tale of two necklaces now lol - one where the "good" girl rejects the monster girl and the other where she accepts that love and carries it with her.