#and i wrote it in an hour XD

[effervescentdragon]

Any pairing+ Soulmate AU where you feel your soulmate’s heart beating alongside your own?

"It's not a congenital anomaly," the doctor days, and Charles sees maman stumble and fall into papa's embrace. "There is nothing wrong with his heart, I assure you of that." The doctor chances a look at him, and Charles is pretty sure the smile she gives him isn't completely sincere. "I would like to speak with you in private, though, just so you know what you can expect."

Maman kisses his forehead and papa hugs him, and then they're following the doctor out. Lolo stays with him, sitting on Charles' hospital bed and tugging on his hair when Charles keeps looking at his palms.

"It will be okay, bebè," Lolo says, and his hand in Charles' is warm. "You'll be back to karting in no time."

"You promise?" Charles raises his head, meeting his brother's eyes. "I - I was winning, and then my heart started doing that weird thing, and then I saw that Pear crashed, and I couldn't - I didn't know -"

"Hey, it's okay," Lolo says and pulls Charles closer into an embrace. Charles wouldn't let Lolo hug him if someone could see them, but nobody is here, and his brother is calm and steady when he says "It will all be okay. I promise."

--

"It's a myth," Pierre says, and Charles wants to punch him for maybe the third time in their lives. "That's like - that would be like believing in magic. And there is no magic." He snorts. "Or Ferrari would have won a championship already." He nudges Charles with his elbow. "Right, calamar?"

Fuck you, Charles thinks. Fuck you, Pear, my soulmate's heart is beating as hard as mine is now, like they are lying to someone about something, like they are scared, I know what they feel like when they are scared, I feel them almost all the time except when we're in sync, except just before we fall asleep, fuck you, Ferrari will win, I will win for Ferrari, fuck you, they are my soulmate, they are the other half of my soul and you're my best friend and you don't even believe in this, and fuck you.

"We should go back, boys," Lolo says like nothing is wrong. "Your parents will have my head if I don't bring you back from the beach in time for lunch."

"Food!" Arthur yells and barrels into Charles, effectively cutting off his stare-off with Pierre. "Come on, Charlo, maybe we get madeleines!"

Arthur grabs his hand and pulls him towards where theor parents are, and Charles goes without another word. He doesn't think about the confusion in Pierre's eyes, or how Pierre reached to rub his chest as Charles stayed silent, masking the movement by grabbing his cross. He especially doesn't think about how, even when his own heart calms down, his soulmate's beat stays irregular, and fast, and fluttery.

--

Charles is excited, more excited than he thinks he will be when he himself finally makes it to F1 next year, if all goes well. Or maybe not, not really, but Pierre is in Malaysia, and he's in his Toro Rosso, and he's about to race in Formula One for the first time, and Charles - Charles is watching, and waiting, and praying for it all to go well.

Lolo is sitting on his right and Arthur is on his left, and they will both come with him to Spain next week, but right now they are both pressing into Charles' sides as he watches the screen. The formation lap is done, and Charles takes a deep breath.

In. Out. In. Lights out.

The constant heartbeat next to his is steady right up until it isn't; right up until the lights on the circuit go out.

Away we go.

He doesn't know when it is that he grabs Lolo's hand, but Lolo lets him. One look at his brother confirms to Charles what he didn't ever dare think of, much less admit.

"It's okay," Lolo whispers to him when Arthur starts yelling at the screen and maman laughs at him. "It will be okay."

My soulmate doesn't believe in our bond, he said so himself, Charles wants to say, how can it be okay? How can you even say that?

"Charles, it will be okay. I promise."

Charles wants to believe his brother. He holds his hand and watches Pierre on the screen instead.

--

"I knew you could do it," Pierre whispers in the darkness. Both their eyes are filled with tears, and they shouldn't be together, but Charles begged and pleaded and threatened until he got what he wanted and what Pierre needed. Two of them in bed in Belgium, as rain is falling down like God's punishment from a story Charles only vaguely remembers from church and as both their hearts are breaking over and over again.

"I did it for him," Charles whispers back, and Pierre's hand in his tightens.

"He'd be proud," is all Pierre has strength left to say, and then he cries, and Charles cries with him, and the nights stretches in front of them like a neverending track.

Charles does not fall asleep until he is certain that the other heartbeat in his chest is finally as calm as his. Only then does he close his eyes, and begs for dawn to come.

--

"I knew it wasn't you," Pierre whispers wildly into Charles' ear. "I knew it couldn't have been you, I knew it, they wouldn't tell me but I knew, Charles, Charles," he keeps repeating, and Charles holds him tighter, grateful that - just grateful.

"I'm okay," he replies, and holds on, and listens to the frantic beat of the other heartbeat in his chest. "I'm okay, I promise, I'm okay, it's okay, we're all okay."

"I don't care - you - you're okay, it wasn't you," Pierre keeps saying, and Charles' own panic subsides alongside Pierre's. "You're okay."

"You can't get rid of me that easily, Pierrot," he tries to joke, but it's awkward, and stupid, and innapropriate. Pierre snorts nonetheless.

"I don't want to be rid of you," he says softly, and Charles' heart speeds up. Pierre chuckles into Charles' neck, and his beard tickles Charles. "Calm down, calamar," he says, "Grosjean is okay, we're all okay, and you have one final chance to outdrive Seb. Breathe, Charles," Pierre says, and Charles, somehow, magically, does.

--

"That's how I found him," Este's girlfriend says. "My heart would do weird things at weird times, but it was usually on Saturdays and Sundays. It just so happened I stumbled upon him on a racetrack my friends dragged me to, and when he crashed, well..." she trails off, and Este pulls her closer and kisses her hair. "I knew it had to be him. They made me look at all the drivers on the grid and asked me who the most handsome one was, and I picked him even after I saw Lewis!"

Everybody laughs at that, and Charles laughs along with them. His whole heart aches, and he can barely take it, but he won't make a scene. All the PR training he received from Ferrari is good for one thing, it seems, and that's pretending he is alright while his soul tears itself apart.

"And you feel hers, too?" Pierre asks Este. There is no animosity in his voice, no snideness, just genuine curiosity. Este's eyes meet Charles', but Charles doesn't know why. He's never told Este about his - thing.

"Sometimes," Esteban says slowly. "Usually when she is upset, or very happy. When there's extreme emotion involved."

"That's weird," Charles says before he can stop himself. When he looks over at Pierre, he blushes, he knows he does, but he decides to prwtend nothing is amiss. "I just meant, isn't it supposed to feel the same - equal for both of you?"

Esteban looks down at his girlfr - soulmate, who is giving Charles a look that borders on pity. Charles decides to pretend he doesn't see it.

"I think - and this is just my theory, so I'm not sure if it's right, but," she hesitates, and Charles doesn't miss how Esteban's hand on her hip tightens. "I have lost - my parents are gone, have been for a while, and the accident that took them took my brother too. I don't - I have lost many people I've loved," she says, and there is a smile on her face despite her obviously teary eyes. "I think that the universe - or God, or whatever, I think it gave me - reassurance. Because I need it more than Este," she says, and Charles almost stops breathing. "I need to know he is here, and this way, I can."

Esteban lowers his head and kisses her hair again, and Charles sees it in her eyes, how she must know, how she must understand, at least some things if not all, and he murmurs something and thanks her and pretends he has to leave before Pierre can say anything, before Charles starts to scream, before he is forced to admit how weak he is in front of his oldest friends, how pathetic, in front of Esteban who was there for most of it, and the wonderful girl who was the other half of his soul, and in front of his oldest, best friend, his soulmate, who doesn't even believe in the concept. So before Pierre even manages to get the first syllable of his name out, Charles is already gone.

--

"Take a picture of us," Pierre says to Joris, and puts his arm around Charles. He smells so good, and Singapore is warm and wet, and Pierre is close and radiating contentment and heat, and Charles knows his heart skips a beat, and another. Before he knows, the picture is taken, and Pierre is looking at him strangely. Charles forces himself not to blush, and ducks his head, and wills his stupid heart to calm down.

"Good food and good friends, as a caption, what do you think, calamar?" Pierre asks suddenly, and Charles startles feom his thoughts. He searches for the second heartbeat in his chest, but it's - it's calm, and steady, ony a flutter here and there, and he swallows around the lump in his throat and makes himself smile and look straight into Pierre's eyes as he nods.

"Whatever you want, Pear, just make sure I look good."

"You always look beautiful," Pierre says matter-of-factly, and his mouth widens into a grin just as Charles finally loses the battle with his blush and just as his own heart starts an irregular, abberant rhythm.

--

"We can't," Charles moans and pulls Pierre closer.

"We can, and we will," Pierre replies and his mouth is on Charles', and his cross is pressed against Charles' skin where his shirt is torn and unbottoned, and his hips press into Charles', and one of his palms is raising Charles' leg to his hip and the other is locked on Charles' cheekbone, caressing it gently as he plunders Charles' mouth, and it's heaven and it's hell and Charles has wanted him for so long, but it's -

"You - you don't - I have to tell you, ah," Charles' protests get cut off when Pierre lowers his face to Charles' neck and bites down, and Charles whimpers and throws his head back and holds on, and it's so good, of course it is, but Pierre doesn't know -

"Pear, you, listen, fuck, ah, yes, more, no - no, listen," Charles tries again, and something in his voice must come through to Piwrre because he kisses Charles' collarbone and then stops.

"Charles," Pierre says, and his eyes are dark, and his lips are swollen, and he is beautiful, and Charles doesn't know how to tell him, doesn't want to ruin it, doesn't - "Close your eyes."

Charles blinks in confusion. Pierre smiles, and kisses Charles quickly, and chuckles when Charles tries to follow his lips. "Close your eyes, Charlo, and trust me, yes?"

Charles closes his eyes without hesitation this time. Pierre takes Charles' right hand in his and moves it to his chest, right above where his heart is. "Listen, Charles," he whispers. "Listen."

Charles can hear Pierre's breathing, shallow and fast, and the way Pierre tries to control it. He can hear the voices from the street below, but they fade away very quickly.

Thump-thump. Thump-thump-thump. Thump. Thump. Thump-thump.

Charles listens, and listens, and listens, until his hands starts shaking and his lips part in a quiet gasp, because the heart he feels underneath his fingers and the heartbeat he has felt in his chest for his whole life are both beating in the same rhythm.

Thump-thump-thump. Thump. Thump. Thump-thump. Thump-thump-thump.

"You know," Charles whispers. He keeps his eyes closed, because he doesn't want to open them. Doesn't want to see. Doesn't want this to end.

"I know." He can feel Pierre's breath on his lips. "Do you know?"

Charles knows many things. He knows he will be Ferrari driver until the end. He knows he will be a world champion one day. He knows he has been in love with his best friend since he knew what love was. He knows he only ever felt this way when he was racing. Most of all, he knows he is not a coward, no matter how fast his heart is racing, no matter how scared he is that the second heartbeat in his chest and the one under his palm are the same one. Charles is not a coward. He is a racing driver, and he always, always, goes for the gap.

"Oh, I know."

Charles opens his eyes, and smiles.

[niyana-the-ambiguous-mobian]

Psst hey, Wsatw Headcanon time >:) One that Tails and Sonic were separated for several years for reasons they couldn't help. They finally find each other and have a very heartfelt reunion.

*sharp inhale*

I'm not even gonna be all loud about it this time, but I will give you kudos for putting that image in my brain there Non.

==

The two of them end up being away from each other longer than anticipated, they both decided to go on separate adventures to where they ended up on different continents and had a limited amount of time to call one another without something getting in the way and distracting them.

Once they do reunite, they're still the same yet so different at the same time.

.....

Ok, screw it. You gave me an idea and I went with it fully.

==

Sonic, of course, was the first one to see his little brother once they make plans to meet up and arrived at the planned rendezvous, the kid who had always literally looked up to him, was almost at the same height as him now, he could tell immediately even from the small amount of distance that separated the two currently.

A part of him wanted to run over and tackle him into a year's long worth of hugging and never let him go, the other part of him however took over and just watched to see how much the kid had changed from when he last saw him.

His fur had become a bit darker in color and was a bit more ruffled up around his tails and head, which proved that he still didn’t keep up with brushing his fur each day like he was supposed to. The back of his ears seemed to be gaining dark, brown patches and black tips right at the top of his ears.

He had all kinds of new attire on than what he usually carried on him, a toolbelt with many pouches carrying who knows what, a blue, oil-spotted scarf around his neck, and a pair of goggles sitting upon his head.

He even had a giant burlap sack slung over his shoulder that he impressively carried with one hand, Sonic could only guess that whatever was in there was going to be quite the dinner conversation to have later on.

One thing that didn't seem to change was whenever the fox was in a deep enough thought, he tended to sit completely still and stare off into space with a disinterested look on his face. Sonic audibly dubbed this as his "Mr. Rock face", much to Tails' disapproval and his amusement. That face was currently intact and internally betted that it's been more than 10 minutes since he even blinked.

"Tails!"

He saw Tails blink (ha, called it) out of his internal state and frown in confusion, his head turning in the other direction away from where Sonic was.

He shook his head and cupped a hand over his mouth. "Tails!"

The fox’s ears flick toward his direction and a sharp head turn follows afterward, a look of confusion quickly transforms into recognition and excitement. His tails started wagging back and forth and a wide smile masked his muzzle. Immediately, he dropped the huge bag off his shoulder and lifted himself into the air, flying straight towards him.

Sonic smiled just as heartily as a laugh spilled out from his chest, raising both his arms. "Hey!-"

His call was cut off as Tails flew directly into him, causing Sonic to lose his balance and bringing both of them down onto the grass. Sonic let out a pained grunt as his back hit the ground harder than he anticipated, the kid had definitely gotten stronger that's for sure.

"Ow. I was not ready for that one." He groaned, pulling his body up and rubbing a hand along Tails' back while the other gave a small scratch behind his ear.

"Are you trying to get back at me for missing your calls so much?" He joked lightly, feeling Tails curl up against him more. Sonic froze slightly, adjusted himself to a crisscross, and lifted him onto his lap, which in turn was an awkward position since he could barely fit on his lap anymore due to this growth spurt but he tried regardless.

"Hey, you okay?" He asked gently, all he got was Tails' voice being muffled as he had his face still hidden against his chest.

"Hmm? What was that?"

Tails moved his head away from his chest, glancing up at him with fresh tears forming in his eyes.

"-missed you", He finally said with a tearful smile. "I really missed you."

Sonic felt his heart fill up with a familiar feeling, a feeling he hadn't been able to hold onto as much as he wanted to over the years. Was it pride? Was it fondness? Was it joy? He couldn't tell, all that he knew was that it only happened a few times in his life ever since he took Tails in.

When he first shared a hug with Tails after the kit finally started to be more comfortable around him,

When he heard Tails say, "that's my bro'ter!" to random strangers walking past them,

When he witnessed him take down his first badnik all by himself without his help,

When the kid managed to stop Eggman from blowing up Station Square, among many other things that happened over the years.

But this? He wanted to hold onto this for as long as he could.

He gave Tails a tender smile, wrapping both his arms around him with his cheek resting on the side of his head and feeling his brother's arms tighten in response. "Missed you too little man. So much."

==

Psst, @starrjoy. It's still Wednesday where I am so I hope this counts :)

[syenago]

Camp Camp | Cryptid!David AU

Okay so I’ve been thinking a lot about this AU lately. The Cryptid!David AU.

This would be a canon divergence. Basically, everything is the same (mostly). Except that David is a weird creature shape shifting thing that protects the camp.

More about this AU under the cut :)

The idea would be that David was a normal human young person. But after being on a hike during his time as a camper to Sleepy Peak Peak, he is chosen as the guardian of the Camp and or Sleepy Peak forest area. He is given some sort of amulet/bracelet by QM that allows him to control his shapeshifting. As the guardian of the Camp, he fights other creatures like wendigos, skinwalkers, big feet, you name it! But because he is not 100% human, even if he wants to leave the camp, he is somehow tied to it and needs to shift between his human and monster form every so often. Or his two selves start leaking into each other.

He is mostly able to act as the guardian and also as a counselor, but when Max comes to camp things start getting pretty difficult for him. Max is convinced that David is hiding something and is trying to expose whatever it is. For David, this means that he is not able to shift as often as usual which causes some bleeding of his cryptid side into his human. And who knows, maybe this causes even more problems.

Anyway, I am still working on this idea and I am currently writing a short story based on this AU :)

[astersatdawn]

FFXIV Write Day 6: Halcyon

“What are you doing?”

Azem looks up at him, their eyes dancing with that bottomless sense of mirth. “Is it not obvious? I’m making flower crowns.”

They present the flowers to them then, pretty little things Emet-Selch could not name even if he tries. He knows he’s seen some of them before, their depictions classic in literature, with their gentle white petals or bright sunshine hues, but there are many others that he doesn’t. Unusual multi-colored leaves attached to the stems of gentle cool-toned flowers, some with petals more geometric than round. 

“Do you even know what flowers you’re working with? They could be poisonous.”

They laugh, though Emet-Selch would not know if it was they had caught his ignorance or if it was that Azem, as always, charged ahead despite the dangers without a care. “Only one way to find out.”

And before he can protest, they reach for a disorganized pile, pull something out of it, and plop it on his head.

He sputters, reaching for the apparently finished crown Azem had been hiding, because of course they were, but doesn’t remove it from his head. “I wasn’t aware I was summoned to be a test subject.”

“A test subject, and company,” Azem’s grin, somehow, broadens, as they resume weaving the stems together with practiced movements. “It’s been a while since we’ve been able to see each other.”

The tone shift is jarring, the wistfulness in their tone almost unexpected. The words are a gentle punch that has him slumping beside them. 

It’s true that it has been some time since they had seen each other. Things have been busier as of late. Azem was out on adventures, as always, and some of the others among the convocation had been sent away from Amarout for miscellaneous tasks. 

Some might call it fortuitous that his responsibilities had sent him Azem’s way, for once, though Emet-Selch would vehemently protest and insist the universe was playing some sick joke on him instead. Truly, the others underestimated Azem’s penchant for trouble, somehow doubling whenever he was in the vicinity. 

“Do you think the three of us will see each other again?” Azem whispers, enough that Emet-Selch has to strain to hear it. 

“It wouldn’t take much to get Hythlodaeus here,” Emet-Selch murmurs. 

Azem laughs, but there’s something about it that’s off. Like a cry, squashed away and hidden away. The stem between their hands snaps, and Azem stares down at their hands forlornly. “Maybe it wouldn’t have, once.”

“We’ll be together again,” he insists, setting his hand on their shoulder. The touch is enough invitation for Azem to lean over, into him, bonelessly collapsing in a way that he was all too familiar with. In seconds, their head is in his lap, and his fingers are now in their hair, playing with it with practiced ease. The flowers Azem had been weaving fall away, some rolling back onto the ground while others cling to their robes and tuck themselves within the folds of the fabric. 

There’s something soft and torn in Azem’s gaze as they look up at them. Their hand, now free of flowers, rises to trace his jaw and settle on his cheek. All the joy Emet-Selch is used to seeing on Azem’s face is gone, as if it had never been there at all. 

“Not for many more lifetimes,” they say, mourning, and Emet-Selch’s own heart sinks deeper and deeper with the weight of it. “I won’t regret it, but I am sorry, my dearest Hades.”

“Thalia? What are you—”

“You can’t hold onto me forever. It’s time to wake up now.”

As if a spell is cast, his gray robes shift to imperial black, white gloves distance him from the softness of Azem’s hair, and he can feel their solid weight against him fading away. 

“Thalia, wait.” He grasps her wrist, he blinks, and they—she flinches when his hand tightens its grip. Those damn eyes of hers are wide, the exact same shade of violet, made brighter by the light of the Rak’tika Greatwood. “What were you doing?” 

“I…” the Warrior of Light clears her throat. “I was just getting this out of your hair.”

As if proving her point, she rubs the stem of a leaf between the fingers of her captive wrist.

“Why bother with such a paltry detail?” He snaps. 

Ellida is silent for a long moment, her expression shifting only into a deeper frown. 

“I was surprised to see you asleep,” she says instead of any meaningful answer. 

He scoffs, drops her wrist. Truthfully, he doesn’t know if he wants the answer himself, at this point. She had ripped him away from that moment of peace so long ago, tainted the memory with her very existence. No answer would satisfy him—there was simply no excuse that made her action so forgivable. 

“Am I not allowed a moment of rest? I certainly thought you and yours would have preferred I kept my distance.” 

She puts more space between them, now that the choice is hers. “We do.”

“Well then, go make some distance, for however long you can.” He waves her off. “Do you not have better things to do, hero?” 

She’s staring at him. It’s uncanny, how long her gaze lingers, as if she sees something he doesn’t. Her lips are pressed together, something thoughtful in the lines of her face. Whatever had her attention drops away with a quiet sigh.

“Yes, I do.” Even so, she hesitates. “Will you be alright?”

“Excuse me?”

“I—” she shakes her head. “Nevermind.” 

Without another word, she’s marching off, leaving behind a moment that, Emet-Selch knows, is best forgotten. 

[emmebearpaw]

“What do I do when I’m angry?” You ask without even asking. You are small, these emotions are new, the people around you teach you about each. Being happy is yellow and you show you are happy with a smile. Being sad is blue and you show you are sad by crying. Being mad is red. “How do I be angry?” They don’t really answer it.

You learn later that being angry is being loud and scary. Being angry is when your parents yell at you for doing something you shouldn’t have. Of course your parents yelling is scary. Being angry is being scary.

But being scary isn’t exactly an action to do. You can yell. Yelling is a good way to be angry. People already tell you are loud a lot though, like when you are excited! What’s another way to be angry.

The animal inside of you responds. Being angry is to be violent. The best way to get rid of the pain of holding the boiling pot of rage is throw it on someone else.

You scratch the girl you were mad at in first grade. You really should have gone to the principals when she told on you. You realize in that moment and dozens before you can’t hurt someone when you are angry. You lie to the teacher and say it was an accident, your nails were long and you didn’t mean it. But you didn’t have to hold that pot. You don’t do that again, being a good girl means you can’t be hurting anyone.

You are holding the boiling pot yet again and it hurts and it hurts and you have to do something. The pressure is mounting with deadlines for projects and extracurricular activities and now you need to do all of that work all over again and you kick a fucking hole in the wall at your middle school.

You know you shouldn’t have done that but nothing chills the pot like guilt sliding down your throat. You already knew by then that the boiling anger can’t go onto objects either. Only special objects can be hit. “You can punch your pillow if you are mad.” Your parents say. You can’t punch your fucking pillow when you are at SCHOOL. You can’t punch your pillow on the bus you cant you can’t.

So you learn to hold the boiling metal. You scream about it next time it begins to boil. Everyone looks at you and goes silent. Your friends tell you they were scared you’d hurt them.

you can’t do that. You can’t do that.

You go silent as the anger seeps through you. That’s weird. Why aren’t you talking. You talk. You sound angry, why are you angry. You leave the room. You can’t do that, we are busy right now, you can’t leave without permission.

You are trapped there. You have enough brain power left as the rage seeps into your skin to realize you are the only one who is angry in the situation you are in. Because you are angry at things you did and didn’t do. Because you have to be a good girl. That’s who you are. You set expectations for yourself and for others and you can’t even get yourself to meet all of them, how could you ever get someone else to. The kettle whistles louder and louder as the kids around you in class get off topic as the teacher runs to grab something. This is a discussion you want to scream. We have a topic to talk about you want to beg. You are sitting criss cross applesauce on the fucking floor with a hot iron pressed to your chest and you can not leave. You can not fix it.

So what did you learn to do? The anger has to go somewhere. It doesn’t sit in you well. You know you should be able to handle the searing metal but you can’t. It has to go somewhere. It can’t go on others, they’ll hurt. It can’t go on objects. They’ll break. It can’t go in the air it can’t be pushed into the ground it can’t leave the room all the time.

You pour the boiling hot anger onto yourself. It’s the only place for it to go? Isn’t it. It doesn’t solve the fact the water is still boiling. Now more is burned, but your hands don’t have to hold it. The sound of your fist hitting your own head provides some relief. The rattle in your brain after you slam it against something can distract you from the rage. You can punish yourself for the fact that no one else seems to have this problem that you do.

You know you picked the wrong way to pour out the water. it’s too loud. Too noticeable. You get in trouble for doing it. People get angry at you. Concerned for you. Scared of you. You look one of your best friends in the eyes and you want to punch them for something they said. You don’t remember what it was at this point you just remember you thought you should punch her.

But that was the first thing you learned wasn’t it? You can’t hit someone. You look her dead in the eyes and punch yourself with the force you wanted to hit her with. You get in trouble with your parents for doing it, grabbed by the arm to stop you from giving yourself a concussion in a parking lot as you sobbed over not knowing what item you wanted at the craft store.

they still haven’t answered what you should do instead.

You still don’t have a better answer. You become an adult, far past the point of learning that anger is red and you still don’t know what to do about it.

you learn to be quieter about it though. You try counting how many times you wanted to do it in a day. The people around you ask you to stop the ominous counting at the things you used to get mad about. You stop doing it on the second day. You try not to think about how you didn’t hit yourself at all yesterday, despite the rage. You start doing it again.

You learn that biting isn’t quite as good as hitting but it’s quiet and clean and easily hideable as you twist your hands to hide the teeth marks.

You stop being as angry when you leave high school. It turns out not being locked into rooms with the things that make you angry, helps a lot.

and yet.

One day you realize your sibling got to go to therapy for their anger issues. They went to therapy for it because they didn’t learn. They kept hitting and breaking and yelling. They got cards to give their teachers to take a walk when their pot started boiling. The reason you didn’t is because you learned. The reason you didn’t is because you hit yourself instead of others.

At that realization, the pot starts to simmer once more.

this time you cry.

[bigcats-birds-and-books]

great news!! i DID finally get my executives to function, and i sat down and journaled about writing things for AN HOUR AND A HALF, and i feel SO MUCH BETTER with all that word vomit OUT, and WHY DOES THIS ALWAYS WORK

[metalandmagi]

The gay butlers from Queen Charlotte: A Bridgerton Story made me feel some kinda way, so last night I wrote a Captive Prince fanfic where Damen and Laurent have their own gay butlers who judge everything they do.

[scottpilgrim4everr]

I rewatched the Scott Pilgrim movie last night after work and it definitely is a movie that exists.

[always-a-joyful-note]

Thinking some fandom thoughts and then about ORV's portrayal of an author-character-reader relationship with the story and realising how....lacking at times the whole death of the author perspective on media can be.

(Turned out to be long and rambly so I put it under a cut. If you like death of the author, probably not for your worldview? Also, beware major ORV spoilers if you care about that)

Like, perhaps I'm misinterpreting something here, but in ORV, we had these three characters plus an entire system that gave us a look into the relationship between author/reader/character. And focusing on the Han Sooyoung, Kim Dokja, and Yoo Joonghyuk dynamic, I realise that none of them really died. Pushing asides Joonghyuk and Dokja for the moment (as I am talking about death of the author), we have Han Sooyoung whose consciousness faded after finishing Ways of Survival.

However, I don't know if we can really call that death of the author, really. Because Sooyoung's whole purpose in writing ORV, her authorial intention, was to save Kim Dokja's life...which she DID. And even after the story left her hands, her intentions were imprinted into the story itself. Yes, Dokja realised that the system was lenient to him because of (spoiler alert) his status as the OD. But at the same time, I think that Han Sooyoung's authorial intent to keep Dokja alive with WoS can also be taken as a factor in the system's leniency towards our reader.

And just jumping from that back to my original point, while death of the author IS fun and can be awesome for reinterpreting stories that the author may have intended as problematic (to our modern standards, at least), to separate the actual story itself from its creator seems just....a tad disrespectful to the author.

Or maybe disrespectful isn't the right word. Like, say, even if said author is objectively the worst of humans, there remains the fact that the story in essence has part of them embedded into it. It doesn't make sense, at least to me, to only give "morally okay" writers the allowance of people who put a part of themselves in their works. Any writer, even those who are writing for money imo, can't help but put part of their own selves into their story...and to separate the story from the author just because we hate the author or hate their beliefs seems a bit counter-productive. You can't just say, after all, that this author's vulnerability in their writing is okay because it's Correct but this other guy's vulnerability should be ignored because it's chalk full of Problematic Content.

But again, that's not to justify authors you dislike or the deeply wrong messages implied in their works. Especially those that could easily be shooed away by employing death of the author. But I think I'd consider fanfic or analyses that ignore authorial intent and their message to be something...new entirely? (Best way I can say it is something something death of an author employed to help the reader create their own narrative inspired by someone else's story rather than it being used to ignore author intent and claim our interpretation is what canon actually meant).

I think there's a saying in music as well as writing that you could play the same exact score or write the same story, it's just that things will come out different depending on the player or writer. (That's not a perfect comparison because the player/musician who WROTE the score could be considered a reader/author relationship...the point is more that the same thing will look different in the hands of different people. And that just as the reader will interpret something in their own way when reading/re-reading (another ORV reference), the author also has placed in their own interpretation and intent in that own work...which should at worst be respected because they DID make that content (and then we proceed to brutally revise it to make something we like better xD) or at best be taken as "word of god" for lack of a better term)

Not sure if any of this makes sense, and I definitely don't have any factual evidence to back up this opinion, but it was just something I was thinking of.

TL:dR? Death of the author is FUN and actually pretty cool but I think the things coming out of it are new(ish) things/works entirely, and og author's beliefs/intentions are important to consider for that text they wrote in of itself.

[nevergonnasimpyoumikey]

previous

Useful Fun

"Yeah," you repeat. "I guess I am. Aren't you?"

"Curious? About you?" There's a hint of amusement in his voice but also something more. Almost like a challenge.

So you challenge him back because you have a feeling he doesn't back down from things like this. "Yeah. About me."

"Sure," he admits, but then, "It's more than a bit curious how you can be so cocky even though I just saved your ass."

You laugh. You ask him again how he got into this life. He tells you he was kicked out of the air force because he doesn't follow bullshit rules. You tell him about being kicked out of high school, which he never finished either, about not having a place to go so crime was the only option, which was the case for him too. You talk about how much life sucks when you're broke; his operation isn't big enough to really make him money, and you... well. You're robbing gas stations for change.

Canada seems just as shitty as North Yankton, and he says it is. You drop off the guns, get the money, share it and leave, and on the way back you talk about nicer things, movies and music and sports flying, and he makes you laugh as well as provokes you with his sharp tongue, and you haven't felt as alive in a good long while.

When he lands the plane and you get out, you have a suggestion.

[celadoncerulean]

as much as i truly do try not to do this “sad acoustic” vibe too often bc i think it’s so easy to get boxed into that sound, it does tend to be the genre i tend to fall back to when i just need to get something out. this just kind of came out yesterday night and yeah lmao here we are

[elizabethrobertajones]

FFXIV Write: Day 27, Hail

I....... have joked before about this. It's never said in game if Thancred only popped out of the lifestream the same time Y'shtola did, or if she successfully teleported him but got stuck herself so he was out there the whole length of HW base game. I prefer the latter, because it is very, very, very funny and they're deliberately so vague on times since it takes as long as it takes to complete any story. And boy do I level slowly while looking at everything and doing all the side content. This prompt definitely just let me write out this headcanon and how accidentally mean to Thancred it is XD

“Full glad am I to see you again.”

“As am I.” Frog paused, looking around the beautiful plains of the Dravanian Forelands, eyes turned to the distant settlement visible by only a few spires beyond the protective rocky outcroppings. “So you were with the Vath the whole time?”

Thancred froze, a cold sweat assailing him at once. “Aye, they took me in, for a while…”

“Mmhm.”

Unbidden, the memory came to him of a day not so long ago. He had not been in the lifestream long, so far as he could tell, for when he had fallen out of it, naked and lost in a part of the world he had never had cause to visit nor even learn much about, he had lost track of days and nights and where they fell on the calendar in those early days scratching a survival out of the Chocobo Forest.

Frog hadn’t winced with the overwhelming shock of a memory blessed by the Echo, unless she had become far more adept at concealing the visions of late. But her eyes were still looking through him as if she now, in his memory, turned and faced him.

Standing concealed in a nook of the wall around the Vath settlement, having arrived with fresh Bandersnatch pelts from the forest where he had been out hunting for days, he had heard unfamiliar voices – harsh, Ishgardian accents at that – and hung back to gauge the situation.

His surprise had been immeasurable to see not only a strange Dragoon and some sort of icy sorceress, but the most heartening sight of Alphinaud hale and talking authoritatively as ever. And returning with new Vath friends in tow, his heart sung to see Bounding Frog, dressed now in Ishgardian mail and armed with a fierce lance of her own. He had almost stepped out of the shadows to greet them, but hung back, not just because he was dressed mostly in scraps and stunk worse than the Vath, and who knew how haggard and miserable he looked right then, but he had not trusted the situation at all. For what reason would such a group travel out here? The last he had known the Scions had crumbled under Alphinaud’s self-wrought calamity, and given the lack of other familiar faces he felt compelled to make sure they were in no trouble – that they were here of their free will and that Alphinaud and Frog weren’t caught in some strange scheme.

The words he caught were talking urgently of war and dragons, not even the looming situation of a local primal who he had hoped they had come to hunt. Surely an investigation and summoning the strength to fight the warlike god would take weeks, and he could - Just as he resolved to track their next moves and follow them longer to better understand their purpose, Frog nodded, and began casting a teleportation spell. A moment later the whole group had vanished.

He stepped out of the shadows, and hurried to the Storyteller.

“Who were they?” he asked, ever cautious.

They were, it turned out, heroes and friends of the Vath who had shown up just that afternoon trading delicious treats for information, and had, just within the hour, both set out to slay, and slain, the Gnath’s god. And were now continuing on their way.

He looked up at the spires of Anyx Trine. It would take all day to either scale the rocks or trek the long slow way around following the river. They were travelling with such purpose he did not doubt that already they had begun whatever journey they had talked of, were always moving further from his slow reach.

For a moment, he had been within hailing distance, could have called out, and in moments joined them on their purpose, for what good he could do without any aetherial manipulation left to him, one-eyed and half-starved, probably fully mad by this point.

Caution may have won that day, but it was the sheer embarrassment that stopped him in his tracks when a mere two days later Frog was back; he snoozing in one of the tiny rooms of the Vath’s construction, cramped with his knees folded up and his neck bent in a way that took days to stretch out after a stay here in the safety of their home. And out of the little round window he saw her laughing cheerfully with some of the Vath, delighted to discover that they had taken up Triple Triad. They told her that a travelling hunter had taught them, kindly concealing their weary guest by his request – but he had never meant for it to be to hide him from her.

But here she was the next day, helping them build the front to what they later told Thancred would be an adventurer’s guild of their own, and offered him membership in exchange for the trading he was already doing with them.

“I’ll do anything you ask for clothes more befitting a gentleman,” he grumbled, and, since Frog was going to return on the morrow, took himself off deep into the woods to tackle their most dangerous chores far from where she could see him.

Except, this was Bounding Frog. A week later, as he stopped by a river to drink, the sound of a chase sent him climbing a nearby tree in a hurry, and lo and behold, in the darkest corner of the Forest, Frog came haring after a huge Bandersnatch of her own, practicing her archery, and running in circles around the beast until it caught her with a great paw. Seeing her go down like another tree, he jumped down to help her, but her unconscious form lifted up and was whisked away on the aetherial currents, because, of course, she was one of the lucky few even among those who could use aetherytes, that could attune well enough that she never had to fear being left abandoned and hurt in the woods.

And then, of course, the enormous Bandersnatch turned and sniffed in Thancred’s direction, and that was the rest of his day.

So it had been for weeks. As apparently Ishgard resonated with the end of wars and social revolution – each time he saw her and reached out for her, thought this time he would call some unaffected phrase and step out from the shadows, shame gripped his heart and held him back until a new, better plan formed that may make this exile seem as if it had been more for a purpose; panic among the Vath that Ravana had returned and the Gnath were planning something. Strange adventurers seen moving almost like ghosts around the open plains. This, surely, was a worthy purpose to stay concealed for.

He looked up at Frog, finally reunited with her, and nodded with absolute certainty that there was nothing more for her to question about the timeline of events he had presented them, the shameful details of his survival and his dramatic entrance to the fight enough to sand down the sense he was hiding anything else about that time.

“It is good to see you again at last,” Frog said, and reached out and pulled Thancred’s braided hair playfully, before turning to Krile and Y’shtola to talk about their next plan of action.

Thancred never did know for certain what that comment meant, but it definitely haunted him.

[archaeren]

How I learned to write smarter, not harder

(aka, how to write when you're hella ADHD lol)

A reader commented on my current long fic asking how I write so well. I replied with an essay of my honestly pretty non-standard writing advice (that they probably didn't actually want lol) Now I'm gonna share it with you guys and hopefully there's a few of you out there who will benefit from my past mistakes and find some useful advice in here. XD Since I started doing this stuff, which are all pretty easy changes to absorb into your process if you want to try them, I now almost never get writer's block.

The text of the original reply is indented, and I've added some additional commentary to expand upon and clarify some of the concepts.

As for writing well, I usually attribute it to the fact that I spent roughly four years in my late teens/early 20s writing text roleplay with a friend for hours every single day. Aside from the constant practice that provided, having a live audience immediately reacting to everything I wrote made me think a lot about how to make as many sentences as possible have maximum impact so that I could get that kind of fun reaction. (Which is another reason why comments like yours are so valuable to fanfic writers! <3) The other factors that have improved my writing are thus: 1. Writing nonlinearly. I used to write a whole story in order, from the first sentence onward. If there was a part I was excited to write, I slogged through everything to get there, thinking that it would be my reward once I finished everything that led up to that. It never worked. XD It was miserable. By the time I got to the part I wanted to write, I had beaten the scene to death in my head imagining all the ways I could write it, and it a) no longer interested me and b) could not live up to my expectations because I couldn't remember all my ideas I'd had for writing it. The scene came out mediocre and so did everything leading up to it. Since then, I learned through working on VN writing (I co-own a game studio and we have some visual novels that I write for) that I don't have to write linearly. If I'm inspired to write a scene, I just write it immediately. It usually comes out pretty good even in a first draft! But then I also have it for if I get more ideas for that scene later, and I can just edit them in. The scenes come out MUCH stronger because of this. And you know what else I discovered? Those scenes I slogged through before weren't scenes I had no inspiration for, I just didn't have any inspiration for them in that moment! I can't tell you how many times there was a scene I had no interest in writing, and then a week later I'd get struck by the perfect inspiration for it! Those are scenes I would have done a very mediocre job on, and now they can be some of the most powerful scenes because I gave them time to marinate. Inspiration isn't always linear, so writing doesn't have to be either!

Some people are the type that joyfully write linearly. I have a friend like this--she picks up the characters and just continues playing out the next scene. Her story progresses through the entire day-by-day lives of the characters; it never timeskips more than a few hours. She started writing and posting just eight months ago, she's about an eighth of the way through her planned fic timeline, and the content she has so far posted to AO3 for it is already 450,000 words long. But most of us are normal humans. We're not, for the most part, wired to create linearly. We consume linearly, we experience linearly, so we assume we must also create linearly. But actually, a lot of us really suffer from trying to force ourselves to create this way, and we might not even realize it. If you're the kind of person who thinks you need to carrot-on-a-stick yourself into writing by saving the fun part for when you finally write everything that happens before it: Stop. You're probably not a linear writer. You're making yourself suffer for no reason and your writing is probably suffering for it. At least give nonlinear writing a try before you assume you can't write if you're not baiting or forcing yourself into it!! Remember: Writing is fun. You do this because it's fun, because it's your hobby. If you're miserable 80% of the time you're doing it, you're probably doing it wrong!

2. Rereading my own work. I used to hate reading my own work. I wouldn't even edit it usually. I would write it and slap it online and try not to look at it again. XD Writing nonlinearly forced me to start rereading because I needed to make sure scenes connected together naturally and it also made it easier to get into the headspace of the story to keep writing and fill in the blanks and get new inspiration. Doing this built the editing process into my writing process--I would read a scene to get back in the headspace, dislike what I had written, and just clean it up on the fly. I still never ever sit down to 'edit' my work. I just reread it to prep for writing and it ends up editing itself. Many many scenes in this fic I have read probably a dozen times or more! (And now, I can actually reread my own work for enjoyment!) Another thing I found from doing this that it became easy to see patterns and themes in my work and strengthen them. Foreshadowing became easy. Setting up for jokes or plot points became easy. I didn't have to plan out my story in advance or write an outline, because the scenes themselves because a sort of living outline on their own. (Yes, despite all the foreshadowing and recurring thematic elements and secret hidden meanings sprinkled throughout this story, it actually never had an outline or a plan for any of that. It's all a natural byproduct of writing nonlinearly and rereading.)

Unpopular writing opinion time: You don't need to make a detailed outline.

Some people thrive on having an outline and planning out every detail before they sit down to write. But I know for a lot of us, we don't know how to write an outline or how to use it once we've written it. The idea of making one is daunting, and the advice that it's the only way to write or beat writer's block is demoralizing. So let me explain how I approach "outlining" which isn't really outlining at all.

I write in a Notion table, where every scene is a separate table entry and the scene is written in the page inside that entry. I do this because it makes writing nonlinearly VASTLY more intuitive and straightforward than writing in a single document. (If you're familiar with Notion, this probably makes perfect sense to you. If you're not, imagine something a little like a more contained Google Sheets, but every row has a title cell that opens into a unique Google Doc when you click on it. And it's not as slow and clunky as the Google suite lol) (Edit from the future: I answered an ask with more explanation on how I use Notion for non-linear writing here.) When I sit down to begin a new fic idea, I make a quick entry in the table for every scene I already know I'll want or need, with the entries titled with a couple words or a sentence that describes what will be in that scene so I'll remember it later. Basically, it's the most absolute bare-bones skeleton of what I vaguely know will probably happen in the story.

Then I start writing, wherever I want in the list. As I write, ideas for new scenes and new connections and themes will emerge over time, and I'll just slot them in between the original entries wherever they naturally fit, rearranging as necessary, so that I won't forget about them later when I'm ready to write them. As an example, my current long fic started with a list of roughly 35 scenes that I knew I wanted or needed, for a fic that will probably be around 100k words (which I didn't know at the time haha). As of this writing, it has expanded to 129 scenes. And since I write them directly in the page entries for the table, the fic is actually its own outline, without any additional effort on my part. As I said in the comment reply--a living outline!

This also made it easier to let go of the notion that I had to write something exactly right the first time. (People always say you should do this, but how many of us do? It's harder than it sounds! I didn't want to commit to editing later! I didn't want to reread my work! XD) I know I'm going to edit it naturally anyway, so I can feel okay giving myself permission to just write it approximately right and I can fix it later. And what I found from that was that sometimes what I believed was kind of meh when I wrote it was actually totally fine when I read it later! Sometimes the internal critic is actually wrong. 3. Marinating in the headspace of the story. For the first two months I worked on [fic], I did not consume any media other than [fandom the fic is in]. I didn't watch, read, or play anything else. Not even mobile games. (And there wasn't really much fan content for [fandom] to consume either. Still isn't, really. XD) This basically forced me to treat writing my story as my only source of entertainment, and kept me from getting distracted or inspired to write other ideas and abandon this one.

As an aside, I don't think this is a necessary step for writing, but if you really want to be productive in a short burst, I do highly recommend going on a media consumption hiatus. Not forever, obviously! Consuming media is a valuable tool for new inspiration, and reading other's work (both good and bad, as long as you think critically to identify the differences!) is an invaluable resource for improving your writing.

When I write, I usually lay down, close my eyes, and play the scene I'm interested in writing in my head. I even take a ten-minute nap now and then during this process. (I find being in a state of partial drowsiness, but not outright sleepiness, makes writing easier and better. Sleep helps the brain process and make connections!) Then I roll over to the laptop next to me and type up whatever I felt like worked for the scene. This may mean I write half a sentence at a time between intervals of closed-eye-time XD

People always say if you're stuck, you need to outline.

What they actually mean by that (whether they realize it or not) is that if you're stuck, you need to brainstorm. You need to marinate. You don't need to plan what you're doing, you just need to give yourself time to think about it!

What's another framing for brainstorming for your fic? Fantasizing about it! Planning is work, but fantasizing isn't.

You're already fantasizing about it, right? That's why you're writing it. Just direct that effort toward the scenes you're trying to write next! Close your eyes, lay back, and fantasize what the characters do and how they react.

And then quickly note down your inspirations so you don't forget, haha.

And if a scene is so boring to you that even fantasizing about it sucks--it's probably a bad scene.

If it's boring to write, it's going to be boring to read. Ask yourself why you wanted that scene. Is it even necessary? Can you cut it? Can you replace it with a different scene that serves the same purpose but approaches the problem from a different angle? If you can't remove the troublesome scene, what can you change about it that would make it interesting or exciting for you to write?

And I can't write sitting up to save my damn life. It's like my brain just stops working if I have to sit in a chair and stare at a computer screen. I need to be able to lie down, even if I don't use it! Talking walks and swinging in a hammock are also fantastic places to get scene ideas worked out, because the rhythmic motion also helps our brain process. It's just a little harder to work on a laptop in those scenarios. XD

In conclusion: Writing nonlinearly is an amazing tool for kicking writer's block to the curb. There's almost always some scene you'll want to write. If there isn't, you need to re-read or marinate.

Or you need to use the bathroom, eat something, or sleep. XD Seriously, if you're that stuck, assess your current physical condition. You might just be unable to focus because you're uncomfortable and you haven't realized it yet.

Anyway! I hope that was helpful, or at least interesting! XD Sorry again for the text wall. (I think this is the longest comment reply I've ever written!)

And same to you guys on tumblr--I hope this was helpful or at least interesting. XD Reblogs appreciated if so! (Maybe it'll help someone else!)

[basketonthedoorstepofthefbi]

Spencer Reid x Read fic. Reid and Reader are friends, like best friends. Reader is always offering Reid donuts and listening to his fun facts and info dumps. It's one of those, they both like each other, but also are convinced the other doesn't like them.

Spencer is taking care of a slightly drunk reader whose grandmother called and asked why they're not engaged when they're younger sibling is married and expecting a child. At some point Spencer makes his ever classic comment about how it's safer to kiss and drunk reader, before being able to think, kisses Spencer. I hope that made sense.

OOPS I DID EXACTLY THAT

Safer to Kiss (Spencer Reid x Fem!BAU!Reader)

Pairing: Spencer Reid x Fem!BAU!Reader

Word Count: 2899

Warnings: Mentions of food, drinking alcohol, mild cursing, outdated expectations of women, and lots of pining

A/N: Hi I wrote this in 2 hours and was extremely entertained, please enjoy and if you send me a fic request I'll probably do it bc this is my hyperfixation hobby right now and very much keeping the demons at bay xD @bxm-1012 thank you for dropping by my inbox! I am VERY tempted to make a part 2 of this, I hope you enjoy! c:

-----

The whole expiration date thing that women faced was, in your humble opinion, complete and utter bullshit. Here you were, slowly approaching thirty (definitely still told people you were twenty-five, when, in fact, you were actually twenty-eight), and the biological clock was ticking. No, you didn’t want kids. Not right now, anyway. Not when you were only two years into your career as a profiler for the FBI’s prestigious Behavioral Analysis Unit. Not when you still had tons of things to check off your bucket list - go to Europe, visit an independent bookstore in every state, pilot a helicopter. 

And you didn’t buy into that whole ‘once a woman hits thirty, her stock plummets’ crap. Not usually, anyway. 

But Nan’s phone calls always left you questioning your existence. 

Back home in Ohio, your little sister, Kendra, had just announced her pregnancy. Three years younger than you (ironically, the age you told everyone you were), and married to a power plant manager, Kendra was living the dream of a woman from the 1950s. You tried your best not to look down on it, to wish for more for her - but Kendra was happy. She’d always wanted to be a mother, and you couldn’t imagine anyone better suited for the role. There was nothing wrong with wanting to be a wife and a mother, to devoting one’s life to it. You reminded yourself of that every time you spoke to Kendra. You especially reminded yourself of it every time you spoke to Nan. 

That sympathetic tone your grandmother used when she said, “Oh, Button, you’ll find someone eventually, and you’ll be just as happy as Kenny” was like nails on a chalkboard. You resisted the urge to gag into your speakerphone and simultaneously rip your grandmother a new one. You wanted so badly to explain to her that you were perfectly fulfilled with your life. 

You helped lock up bad guys on a weekly basis, you wanted to remind Nan. Your brain was one of few that had been chosen for a task force that caught criminals based on their behavior. It was amazing, working for the BAU, bouncing ideas off of your colleagues, finding a family within this small group of people that spent more than forty hours a week together. 

Nan didn’t see it that way. She wanted you to be just like Kendra. She wanted you to have that white picket fence in the suburbs, with a broad-shouldered husband and two little tykes running at your feet. Domestic bliss just wasn’t in the cards for you, you’d decided. And that was okay.

You were still reeling from your conversation with Nan the night before when you walked in to work on Monday morning. It was Derek who caught the raging RBF first. “Woah, pretty girl. Pump. Your. Brakes.” He said, halting you just as you entered the BAU’s bullpen, holding a hand up to stop you. 

“Good morning to you, too, Derek,” You flashed him a phony grin, and he rolled his eyes. 

“And you’re grumpy this morning… why, exactly?” Derek asked, turning to walk beside you, essentially escorting you to your desk. 

“Because I’m allowed to be?” You proffered, shrugging your shoulders, not really wanting to talk about it with him. You loved Derek - hell, you loved all your coworkers - but he was not the person you wanted to go to with these thoughts. You didn’t really want to talk to anyone about it, actually. You just wanted to ride the cranky train until it came to a complete stop. 

Emily was returning from the kitchenette with a fresh mug of coffee and decided that the conversation concerned her as well. “What’s going on?” she asked. 

“Y/L/N’s wearing her cranky pants this morning,” Derek filled her in. 

“Oh, those so don’t match your blouse, Y/N,” Emily teased, winking at you with a smirk before looking at Derek. “Cut her some slack. No one likes Mondays.” Derek held up his palms defensively. “Alright, alright. Forgive me for being a concerned citizen.” 

“It’s appreciated,” You told Derek genuinely before setting your bag down at your desk. “But unnecessary.” 

It wasn’t until later in the morning, around ten, that anyone bothered you about your obvious bad mood again. This time it was Spencer, the one person you couldn’t possibly be annoyed with. He rolled on his desk chair around the partition that separated your workspaces, holding his hand out expectantly, like he usually did this time of day. 

Without speaking, you opened the bottom drawer of your desk and pulled out the white bag of mini powdered donuts that you always kept in stock. They were your guilty pleasure snack, and one of the first things you and Spencer bonded over when you started at the BAU two years ago. That, and the fact that you were the closest agents in age, was how you got along so well so quickly. Over several cases, varying in degrees of intensity, you and Spencer became really great friends. Best friends, actually. 

There wasn’t anyone else in your life that you trusted more than Spencer Reid. 

You opened the bag of powdered donuts and shook one haphazardly into Spencer’s palm, then grabbed one for yourself. Silently, you cheers-ed your donuts together, and ate them simultaneously, making weird-but-comfortable eye contact as you did. 

“Derek says you’re in a bad mood today,” Spencer pointed out with a teasing smirk on his face. A smirk, and white sugar blanketing his upper lip.

“Derek’s full of shit,” you grinned after swallowing your snack, the smile on your face totally facetious. “I’m extremely happy.” 

“I can tell,” Spencer snickered as you set the powdered donuts back in your snack drawer, closing it with a clank. You watched as he brought both of his legs up into his desk chair, crossing them like a kindergartner. 

The action made your stomach flutter. You’d felt strongly about Spencer for a really long time, probably a year and half, if you had to try and pinpoint it. But there was no use in going down that road with him. For one thing, he was your best friend, and you didn’t want to risk flushing the best relationship in your life down the toilet. For another thing, you knew it was one hundred percent impossible that he could feel the same way. 

“What’d you do this weekend?” Spencer asked, and you could tell by the question that he was trying to discover the source of your poor attitude. 

“Stayed home, caught up on chores,” You said, crossing your knees and leaning back in your seat, your expression telling him that you knew exactly what he was doing. As much fun as playing mind games with Spencer was, you decided to throw him a bone. “Spoke to my grandmother on the phone last night.” 

Spencer nodded understandingly. “Say no more,” he said with a chuckle. “She gave you the whole ‘when are you going to get married’ spiel again?” 

You nodded. “Unfortunately. I usually don’t let it bother me, but for some reason it’s just, like, lurking in the back of my mind today.” You shrugged your shoulders and exhaled through your nose. “What about you?” You asked. 

“What about me?” Spencer arched a brow, and you rolled your eyes playfully. 

“What’d you do this weekend?” 

“Oh,” Spencer began, pursing his lips for a moment, like he was hesitant to tell you. “I actually went on a date.” 

Your stomach flipped. “Oh yeah?” You choked out, forcing a smile. “Who with?” 

“That girl, Lisa, from the coffee shop, the one you told me wouldn’t stop ‘ogling my boy band hair’,” Spencer held up air quotes when he repeated your words from memory.

You recalled the cute barista from the coffee shop just down the highway from Quantico, a popular morning stop for agents on their way to work. You tried to stop the jealousy from turning your blood into fire. “How was it?” You asked, trying to resist the urge to sit on the edge of your seat, trying not to hang on his every word. 

Spencer shrugged his shoulders. “It was okay. She was very nice, but there just wasn’t…” he trailed off, gesticulating as the words failed to come to that supercomputer brain of his. 

“It was like a donut without powdered sugar on it?” You suggested with a small chuckle.

“Yeah,” Spencer agreed, nodding, meeting your eyes and smiling, mildly amused. “Exactly.” 

Spencer went back to his desk a few minutes later, and the rest of the day went on. It was quiet, especially for a day at the BAU. There were, weirdly enough, no open cases right now, so you spent the day catching up on paperwork, which there was always plenty of. 

You caught the elevator about ten minutes after five with Spencer in tow, and you held the door open for him. It was just the two of you as you made the descent from the sixth floor, and Spencer leaned against the back wall. “Plans tonight?” He asked. 

“Not really, no,” You said, shaking your head. “Why, you want to do something?” You asked. 

Spencer nodded. “There’s this landscape and nature photography exhibit at one of the galleries downtown,” he said. “Might be fun. There’s this artist, Milton Harvell, who takes photos of renowned locations around the world but zooms in on an obscure detail and gives the framed photograph to the person who correctly guesses the location.” 

You smiled slowly at that. You loved it when Spencer went off on one of his tangents. You found it completely adorable. “It’s actually quite fascinating,” Spencer went on, an amused tone lining his voice, making it sound lighter. “Kind of like a Where’s Waldo, but in reverse. There was this one photograph he took of the Louvre in Paris, but he zoomed in really tightly on a young boy enjoying an ice cream cone. He even went so far as to edit the photograph to make it look like it was a different time of day. The four thousand and eighth person to view the photograph was the person who guessed the correct location.” Spencer’s head bobbed and he was smiling like an idiot. 

God, you were down bad. 

“Was the four thousand and eighth person… you?” You asked, narrowing your eyes at him scrupulously and allowing a teasing grin to cross your face. 

“The photo’s hanging in my living room,” he confirmed. 

You laughed softly. “Will there be alcohol at this function?” You asked him, and he nodded. 

That was all you needed to hear. 

— — —

You and Spencer went straight to the art gallery from work, sharing a cab rather than bothering with your cars. You immediately bought a glass of red wine, and began to follow him around the gallery. You weren’t an art aficionado, not by any means, but you enjoyed looking at beautiful things, and you especially enjoyed spending time with Spencer that wasn’t hunched over a dead body or trying to map out a killer’s comfort zone. It was a rare occurrence, so you tried to soak it all up as much as possible. 

Plus, your Nan’s words were still lingering in the back of your head. It’ll happen for you someday, Button. Men just don’t find you strong, career types attractive. Maybe you should soften up your look a little. 

You downed your first glass of wine within ten minutes, and caught one of the catering staff passing out champagne almost instantaneously after. The champagne fizzled down your throat as you strolled with Spencer through the art gallery, listening intently as he went on about each piece, rattling off whatever contextual knowledge he had. But you were a little bit biased; you could listen to him list different types of soil and find it interesting. 

After the glass of champagne came another glass of champagne, and by the time you made it to the main exhibit Spencer wanted to see, your cheeks were flushed. It wasn’t that you couldn’t hold your alcohol; rather, it just made you a little bit silly. Your inhibitions were lowered, just like it would affect anyone. But with your arm looped through Spencer’s and your Nan’s nagging message still in the back of your mind, you were perhaps a little more loose than usual. 

As Spencer examined the exhibit, you tapped your foot, unable to keep still, and scanned the open space. Your eyes landed on another patron of the gallery, a conventionally handsome man about your age, and you found yourself unlooping your arm from Spencer’s, subconsciously not wanting to appear taken. 

“Are you gonna go talk to that guy?” Spencer asked, and you snapped your eyes back to his. “Because you can, if you want to. Don’t let me stop you.” 

It was almost like he was daring you to. Spencer’s jaw seemed tense as you examined his expression, the way his gorgeous brown eyes darted from the man and back to you. “You don’t mind?” You asked, arching a brow, almost like a challenge.

Spencer shook his head, his lips pursed. “Not at all. I’ll wait here for you?” 

You nodded, and turned towards the man. There wasn’t any harm in getting a guy’s number, right? Your feelings for Spencer were a lost cause, anyway. Plus, as Nan liked to point out, you weren’t getting any younger. 

The man’s eyes locked on yours and he seemed to understand that you were about to speak with him. He met you halfway, and you shook his hand. “Malcolm Greene,” he introduced himself, and you spouted off your own name in return. “You’re not here with that guy?” He asked, jerking his chin over to Spencer. Your eyes followed Malcolm’s, and you saw Spencer with his body turned towards the photography exhibit, but his head turned to the side, as if he were keeping an eye on you with his peripheral vision. 

“Yeah, I am,” you said, and Malcolm’s head inclined to the side. “I am. I’m here with that guy,” you panicked, suddenly realizing in that moment that you weren’t interested in speaking with Malcolm. No, you had absolutely no interest in spending your time with any other man but Spencer Reid. “I just, uh…” Your cheeks flushed, and you stifled an awkward laugh, anxiously trying to come up with some excuse. “I came over here to tell you that your shoe was united.” 

Your eyes followed Malcolm’s down to his shoes, which were loafers. Laceless loafers. Malcolm’s mouth opened as if to point this out to you, but you managed to stammer words out first. “Ok, well, have a great night, goodbye!” You turned on your heel and marched back over to Spencer, your cheeks red as you reached out for his arm. 

Spencer furrowed his brows down at you as your arm gripped his. “I need another glass of wine,” you confessed. 

Twenty minutes later, after two more glasses of wine and a very watchful eye out for Malcolm, you and Spencer left the art gallery. You were awfully giggly on the cab ride back to your place, cracking puns and humming along to the radio intermittently. Spencer seemed to be amused, but more so concerned with getting you home in one piece. 

As he walked you up the stairs to the door of your apartment building, he was teasing you about your conversation with Malcolm, which you still hadn’t told him completely about. “I still can’t believe you didn’t get his number. You were talking with him for exactly two minutes and twelve seconds. What, in that short of an amount of time, could have turned you off to him so quickly?” He pondered aloud, a playfully mocking tone lining his voice. 

“Listen, I shook his hand! I had my fun!” You exclaimed, bursting into laughter as you leaned against the handrail of the stairs that led up to the door. “Good, clean fun!” 

“You know, the number of pathogens that are passed during a handshake is staggering. It’s actually safer to kiss someone,” Spencer rattled off, and your eyes snapped to meet his. 

You don’t know what took you over. Maybe it was the wine. Maybe it was the way the street lamps reflected in the irises of his eyes, or how you stood just a few inches away from him. Maybe it was his stupid tweed blazer, how he looked like a tenured art history professor despite barely being thirty years old. Maybe it was the way he smelled like pine and printer ink, a combination you wouldn’t have ever thought was attractive. 

But when Spencer said that, you stood up on your toes and kissed him. It was slow and innocent at first, until it passed the border into lingering, and Spencer’s hands found your hips, pulling your body closer to his. There was a cool night breeze that filtered through the space between your bodies, and by the time you pulled your lips away from Spencer’s, and slowly opened your eyes, you were completely red in the face and breathless. 

No, that certainly wasn’t the safest choice you could have made.

——

read part 2 here

[cuubism]

work is driving me fucking insane this week, so here's this silly self-indulgent thing i wrote to distract myself.

the spirit of this post is here as well XD

coffee shop au, meet cute, literally falling for your crush

--

In retrospect, forgetting to eat for three meals in a row wasn't Dream's best move. Not that he'd done it on purpose. Hence the forgetting. But taking time to cook always felt so wasteful when he was finally making progress on his novel. He could eat later, whenever the hyperfocus burned itself out.

The only thing that eventually got him out of the house was caffeine. He'd run out of both coffee and tea in the dysfunction of this week, and thus was forced to venture out to the cafe a few blocks away from his flat in search of enough energy to keep him awake for a few more hours.

Technically, there was a place that was closer. There was also a grocery store, where he could have bought coffee grounds. But Dream took the excuse to go a bit further, and not for the quality of the coffee.

He and Johanna, on the occasion she could convince Dream to leave the house and attempt to be part of society, had first started coming to this particular coffee shop because Johanna's girlfriend Rachel worked there. But Dream had to admit that what really kept him coming back, including at times when he wasn't being dragged along by Johanna, was another employee entirely.

Hob.

Hob was, in Rachel's words, "a perfectly nice guy but I don't know why you're so obsessed with him." In Johanna's words, Hob was, "quite fit, I can't lie, but I really thought you'd have gone for someone who's a bit more of an arts gremlin like you."

In Dream's words, Hob was perfect. He always had a smile for Dream, and a kind word or compliment, and he had kind eyes, and nice hands, and was terribly handsome. Dream had never been particularly attracted to masculinity before but Hob was proving him wrong over and over. He looked like he was strong enough to pick Dream up, and that did all sorts of exciting things to Dream's insides. Dream may or may not have had an actual dream about Hob holding his hand.

Hob also made terrible coffee. But Dream didn't care. He took whatever coffee Hob made him, whether the grounds were burnt, or it had way too much cream, or was vastly overbrewed, and drank it quite happily, sneaking looks at Hob all the while. Because Hob's coffee might be awful, but he always smiled at Dream as he gave it to him, and sometimes their hands brushed and it sent a thrilling little shock up Dream's arms. And anything Hob made for him felt made with love, he could tell, it was like a homemade birthday cake with uneven frosting and an undercooked part in the middle.

It was possible Dream should care more about the quality of the coffee and less about the symbolism of it.

In any case, he went to the coffee shop, underfed and undercaffeinated, hoping that Hob would be there, even if it meant he would have to down another cup of extremely bad coffee. Hob should be there, he did usually work Tuesday afternoons, not that Dream had memorized his schedule like a stalker or anything.

He stepped inside, the little bell over the door jingling, and found that he was right, Hob was there. A thrill of delight ran through him. Dream did not often feel anything as carefree or joyous as delight, but he was very sleep-deprived, and Hob was there, so there it was. Rachel was also working, and waved to him as he stepped up to the counter. As she and Johanna were both very aware of his embarrassing crush on Hob--much to Dream's chagrin--she didn't come over to take his order, instead leaving him to Hob.

"Hey, it's Dream, right?" said Hob, wiping off his hands on a towel and leaning on the counter, looking at Dream with a smile. He knows my name, Dream thought with a heady rush, then remembered that Hob was obligated to write it on his coffee cup, and that Dream came here often, and it didn't have to mean anything. "Dark roast with almond milk and caramel?"

How Hob could be so diligent about remembering his order and so terrible at making it, Dream didn't know. "That's correct," he said.

Behind Hob, Rachel mouthed keep going, which Dream took to mean that if he wanted to get anywhere he had to attempt to engage Hob in slightly more conversation than his usual coffee-ordering script. This was unfortunately true, particularly since Hob had already nullified half the sentences Dream would usually say by predicting his order.

"You remembered my order," he said, which felt like a reasonably normal response, definitely better than do you want to see if you can pick me up? which would probably be creepy. Rachel gave him a thumbs up.

"Of course. You're quite memorable," said Hob, and winked at him. Was he flirting? Dream would like to think so, but he wasn't usually very good at picking up on that sort of thing. Why would Hob be interested in him anyway? Perhaps he meant that Dream was memorable in a bad way, that he was annoying or weird, or--

Dream still hadn't responded.

"I am not trying to be," he said, and behind Hob, Rachel sighed. It was true, though. In most areas of life Dream preferred to go unnoticed. It was only Hob's attention that made him feel all bubbly inside.

"Task failed successfully," said Hob, "because I can't stop noticing you."

Was Dream... still succeeding at the conversation? That was truly unexpected, that he hadn't already turned Hob off by being utterly unsuitable for human society.

"Is that a good thing?" Dream asked.

"Is it?" asked Hob.

Undoubtedly it was. Dream liked the thought of Hob noticing him. He liked the thought of Hob remembering his name, and his coffee order, and when he came into the cafe, with as much detail as Dream had memorized his schedule. He did not normally like having people's eyes on him but he liked the thought of Hob looking. Of Hob caring about what he saw. It made him feel interesting and worthy, and sort of giddy and lightheaded--

Oh. No. That wasn't Hob's attention. That was the fact that the last meal he'd eaten had been a sleeve of biscuits for breakfast two days ago, and that he'd been on his feet for a long time, or what constituted a long time when one had only had a sleeve of biscuits two days ago to eat. And he hadn't slept, and he'd had quite an exciting few minutes just now, and apparently this all meant that his body had decided it needed to check out for a moment, thanks, goodbye.

Inconvenient timing, Dream thought, as everything went sort of spinny and blurry. He was making such progress! He really thought Hob might even like him, and falling on the ground was not going to help his case.

Inevitable now, though. The last thing he saw before he passed out was Hob's face, expression shifting from amusement to concern, and really, there were worse ways to go out.

He woke up not much later, or at least it felt like little time had passed, to find himself lying down on a couch in what seemed to be the cafe's back office, as best as his overtaxed mind could gather. And Hob was crouched beside him, looking at him worriedly, Rachel leaning over his shoulder, face likewise creased in concern.

Dream wondered how he had gotten to the couch. Had Hob carried him there? It was a pleasant thought, though he wished he could have experienced it in person.

"You know," said Hob, "there are easier ways to get out of talking to me than blacking out." The words were light, but he sounded genuinely stressed out about it.

Dream immediately felt bad. "I'm sorry."

Hob chucked him on the cheek, a light touch that felt fond. "Not what I meant. Are you okay?"

Dream carefully pushed himself up to sitting, Hob watching all the while, hands hovering over him but not touching. Dream sat up. His head didn't spin. "I am okay," he said.

"Probably didn't eat anything today, huh?" said Rachel. She didn't look quite as concerned as Hob did, she was used to Dream's habits. Meanwhile, for all Hob knew, Dream had a brain tumor and would imminently die.

"No," Dream admitted. "I was... occupied."

"Will you be okay here for a sec?" Hob asked, brow scrunching as if he truly thought Dream might just collapse again onto the floor without him. "I'll get you some water. Something to eat, too."

It was worth fainting in a public place, Dream thought, just to have Hob look at him with such care.

When Dream nodded, Hob hurried away to do just that.

Only now his crush was going to be one million times worse, and certainly not reciprocated, not after the scene he'd caused.

Beside him, Rachel was laughing, hiding it behind her hand.

"Is my suffering humorous to you?" Dream asked, but there was no heat in it, he was too busy looking after where Hob had disappeared.

"You should have seen it," she said. "He launched himself over the counter to catch you. Oh my god, I wish you could have witnessed it."

"Surely Hob would aid any customer in distress," Dream sniffed. But something turned over in his stomach, a little flutter of hope.

"Yeah but not literally vault the counter. It was terrific. I was worried he'd break a hip."

"I'm not that old," said Hob, coming back around the corner and crouching beside Dream again, water bottle and what looked like a chocolate muffin clasped in his hands.

Rachel was unrepentant. "You're lucky you didn't wind up on the floor, too."

"You caught me," said Dream, staring into Hob's eyes. He had such pretty eyes. Rich brown, like coffee with a dash of cream.

Dream might still be a bit lightheaded.

"Of course," said Hob, and uncapped the water, handing it to him. Dream took slow sips, realizing as he did that he hadn't drank any water all day. "I'm fond of you, you know. Can't let you hit your head on the floor."

Fond. Dream might faint again.

"Should I take you to hospital or something?" Hob asked, still so concerned it was making that floaty feeling bubble up again in Dream's chest.

"I will be fine here," he said.

"He just fell for you, that's all," said Rachel, and Dream glared at her. She just smiled back. "Swooned and everything."

"I did not swoon," Dream protested.

"You kind of did, actually," said Hob. "I've never seen someone just crumple so dramatically."

"Oh, have you seen many people faint, then?"

"No, but--"

"I'm going to man the till," said Rachel, patting Dream on the arm. "I don't think I want to be in the middle of this. Let me know if you want me to take you home, Dream." She winked at him. "Unless you'd rather Hob do it."

Johanna was never this meddlesome, Dream thought bitterly. She just made fun of him and left it at that.

Then he was alone with Hob, which was both an exciting and anxiety-inducing state of affairs. He clutched his water bottle for balance.

"Um. I got you this," said Hob, and handed him the muffin. "Made them this morning."

Dream was really quite hungry, so despite Hob's poor coffee record, he took a bite of the muffin.

And this was how he learned that Hob was utterly lacking in coffee-making skills because all his talent was in baking.

The chocolate was so rich, it tasted more like cake than a muffin. the chocolate chips melted on his tongue, and he had to force himself not to just immediately take another huge bite. He really was so hungry. Perhaps, now that he knew he could get such things here, he would have a reason to visit the cafe other than just Hob -- and a reason to eat breakfast, too.

"Good?" said Hob, and Dream nodded, licking the melted chocolate from his lips, and he didn't fail to notice Hob watching the movement of his tongue. Perhaps Johanna and Rachel were right, and it wasn't hopeless, even if Dream's best attempt at flirting back was collapsing onto the floor.

He did not know what possessed him then. Perhaps it was the chocolate. Perhaps it was the worry still lingering in Hob's warm eyes, or maybe he had just hit his head and forgotten about it. Either way, he leaned forward in his seat, and kissed Hob on the lips.

His lips were so soft. Just as Dream had dreamt they would be. Hob made a sound of surprise against Dream's mouth, and caught him by the arms so he wouldn't fall out of his chair. Which was a definite possibility, though now the lightheadedness was not caused by a calorie deficit but rather because he was kissing Hob.

Hob who was kissing him back, too. Softening against his mouth, licking the remaining chocolate from Dream's lips. Would Hob hug him, too? If he had already caught him? Dream had fantasized so much about being hugged by Hob.

Only one way to find out. He leaned into Hob's arms, and Hob caught him again, wrapping his arms around Dream's back. He was so warm, and strong. He was wonderful.

"It is a good thing," he said into Hob's shoulder.

"What is?"

"You noticing me."

Hob chuckled. The sound rumbled through Dream's chest. "It's not hard to do. I've been eyeing you for a while, you know. I always hoped you'd talk to me more."

"I am not very good at talking more," said Dream.

"I think I've got that now." Hob pulled back to look at him, the corners of his eyes crinkling as he smiled. "Falling over is more your style."

"I only faint on occasion," Dream protested, which only seemed to amuse Hob more.

"Well. If talking is a bit tough, maybe we can go for a walk sometime?" He tucked a strand of Dream's hair behind his ear, and Dream shivered. Hob clocked it, too, and let his hand rest on the back of Dream's head, fingers curled in his hair as his gaze flicked to Dream's lips and back up. "Or. Something else?"

Dream thought something else might make him spontaneously combust. That might have to wait a bit, at least until he could cope with Hob looking at him like that without feeling like he was about to explode in a flurry of butterflies.

"A walk, if you will hold my hand," he said, and Hob smiled, and took his hand, and Dream learned that all dreams really could come true at once.

[littlerat2]

"Is now a good time to tell you we're dating?"

Ship: Romantic Prinxiety

Warnings: Kissing. I think that's it but as always, please feel free to let me know if there's any I should add!

Word Count: 822

AO3: https://archiveofourown.org/works/56439292

Summary: Just some fluffy Prinxiety I wrote very late at night. Probably a little OOC, but it was like, 4 AM, so shhh. Originally wasn't gonna post it, but my friends really liked it, and one threatened to eat my social security card if I didn't XD

Authors Note: Thank you so so so much to @logan-the-artist and @cats-soups for beta reading this fic!! And thank you guys for your kind words, and also for just like, being fuckin' awesome people!

Virgil awoke missing the warmth Roman provided. They’d spent the night cuddling and watching Disney movies, and Virgil had actually gotten some good sleep. But now his prince was gone. He wasn’t there to kiss the pinch out of Virgil’s browline, and play with his hair.

He wasn’t having it.

He got up to look for his prince, shivering as his feet touched the cold floor. He checked the time. It was ten AM, about two hours before he usually got up. He briefly considered going back to bed, but goddamnit, he missed Roman, and he wanted a kiss.

So he walked out of his room and down the stairs sleepily. He was met with Patton, who was tidying up in the kitchen, humming a happy little tune.

“Oh, hey there, kiddo! You’re up early!”

“Morning, Pat,” Virgil mumbled with a yawn. “Have you seen Roman?”

“He’s in the living room with Janus and Remus,” Patton smiled. “Logan might be in there, too. I’m not sure.”

“Thanks,” Virgil said, offering a sleepy smile as he walked towards the living room.

That was a problem. Roman and Virgil hadn’t told the others they were dating yet. Not for Roman’s lack of trying. He’d been ready to tell the others for a few weeks now, but Virgil insisted they wait just a little longer. He wasn’t sure why. He knew the others wouldn’t care, but that didn’t calm his nerves. Thankfully, Roman was being very patient. He said they’d tell the others when Virgil was ready.

Virgil wasn’t ready to tell the others, per say. He didn’t want to have that awkward conversation just yet. But he was ready to stop hiding. And he really wanted to kiss Roman’s stupid face.

Then it was settled. He’d decided. He was going to kiss Roman’s stupid face in front of everyone. And then, he wouldn’t have to hide the fact that he wanted to kiss his stupid face ever again.

He stepped into the living room. Janus and Remus were listening to Roman talk about a podcast about gay vampires Virgil had gotten him into. He waved his hands wildly with each passionate word.

Virgil loved how passionate he could get. He loved listening to him talk about his interests. And he loved that he got to share this interest with him. He loved how excited he was to share with Janus and Remus, just like Virgil had been with him.

He made eye contact with Roman. The way his expression softened, just enough for Virgil to notice, and no one else. Oh, it had him smitten.

He all but sprinted towards Roman. He stood on his tiptoes, pulling Roman down by the collar of his shirt. He pressed his lips to Roman’s, his heart pounding in the way it always did when they kissed.

He could feel Roman’s initial surprise fade into contentment, if the way he smiled against his lips was anything to go by. Virgil smiled too, as Roman wrapped his arms around his back, warm and gentle.

He could feel Janus’ and Remus’ eyes on him and Roman, but oddly enough, he didn’t quite care. All he really cared about right now was the lips under his, and the man they belonged to. They were addictive.

He wanted to remain ensnared by Roman’s mouth, but figured he should probably let the taller man return to his conversation. So he leaned against Roman’s chest with a content hum, enjoying his warmth for half a second before looking up at him. A smirk grew on the prince’s face, his eyes alight with mischief, trained on something behind Virgil.

He turned around, seeing Janus’ and Remus’ mouths agape, shock plastered on their faces, as well as Patton’s, who had emerged from where Virgil did just a moment ago.

Roman burst into bright laughter that made Virgil’s chest warm. “Is now a good time to tell you we’re dating?”

The other three just gaped at them for a moment longer, not saying anything even as Logan walked in, his brows furrowed in confusion at the scene.

“Would anyone like to explain why we’re staring at Roman and Virgil?” He asked.

Janus just sputtered for a moment, before giving up. Remus took this as an opportunity.

“I- you- Virgil is dating my brother?”

“You didn’t know?” Logan asked, and Virgil shot him a look.

“You knew?”

“I may be trash at social cues, Virgil, but even I have picked up on the smirks you two share during dinner and movie nights,” Logan deadpanned. “And, my room is right next to yours. You two keep me up all night talking. You aren't exactly quiet.”

Virgil winced lightly. “Sorry about that.”

“That's quite alright. It’s well worth it.” Logan smiled, the corners of his eyes crinkling softly. “You two have seemed far happier than I've ever seen you. I'm glad.”

“Aw, thanks, Lo.” Virgil elbowed Logan softly.

“Of course.”